MOONSPELL's New Drummer Is Already Contributing To Songwriting Process

Vocalist Fernando Ribeiro of Portuguese metallers MOONSPELL spoke to Finland's Kaaos TV about how he and his bandmates are dealing with the coronavirus pandemic. He said (see video below): "There was a time that we had to be distant from each other for at least a couple of months and work from home. And then, [about] two months ago, we resumed work with MOONSPELL. We did demos for the new album that we're going to record in October, and also we played together with the new drummer. And also, we did two TV shows — one for the national TV, because it was a way of the national TV to help the musicians; they paid us a little fee, and we went there to play like a showcase — five songs — that is going to be ready in September… We did another show to create a kind of live thing already so we can present it to people on our network and also on our site. And on the 20th of August, we are going to play our first live show to a very limited audience that will be sitting down and wearing masks. We're probably going to France as well, if we can travel.

"It's very weird times, but we're doing, here and there, some plans," he explained. "We also have a plan to do a live streaming, [like] a lot of bands are doing, so we don't disappear completely off the radar of our fans, because they miss seeing us live, obviously, or most of them do. But also we didn't want to rush things. We toured a lot these past few years. Especially between October and December, we did a very comprehensive tour of Europe, which our main crowd is in Europe. We've been in the States last year as well with DARK TRANQUILLITY and AMORPHIS and OMNIUM GATHERUM. So it's not like I thought that everybody was expecting us to do something. But I think nowadays with the development of the virus and the travel restrictions being lifted, et cetera, we're going to do more stuff."

MOONSPELL will record its new LP with producer Jaime Gomez Arellano (PARADISE LOST, ULVER, GHOST). An early 2021 release via Napalm Records is expected. The upcoming LP will be the band's first with Hugo Ribeiro (no relation to Fernando) who replaced original drummer Miguel "Mike" Gaspar earlier in the year.

Asked if Hugo is involved in the songwriting process for the new MOONSPELL album, Fernando said: "Yeah, he's involved. Of course, we had a lot of the ideas already in our minds. Once we split up with Mike, we wanted to give it a renewal of the ideas, especially when it came to the part of the drums, so we kind of threw a lot of stuff out and put new ideas together — not just for the drums, but for all the other instruments."

MOONSPELL's latest release was the "Lisboa Under The Spell" live DVD/CD, which came out in August 2018 via Napalm Records. The live DVD/Blu-ray/3CD package captured MOONSPELL's performance before 4,000 fans at the sold-out Campo Pequeno arena in their hometown of Lisbon, Portugal on February 4, 2017.

MOONSPELL's fourth album, 1999's "The Butterfly Effect", was re-released on August 7 via Napalm Records. The reissue includes two new remixes, a completely re-designed cover and layout artwork, as well as an exclusive excerpt from the Butterfly FX chapter of the band's official biography, "Wolves Who Were Men".

MOONSPELL's most recent studio album, "1755", came out in November 2017. The Portuguese-language disc was written about the 1755 Lisbon earthquake, also known as the Great Lisbon earthquake, which occurred in the Kingdom of Portugal. In combination with subsequent fires and a tsunami, the earthquake almost totally destroyed Lisbon and adjoining areas.

Photo credit: Rui Vasco