Welcome to Napalm Flesh! This week we have an interview with vocalist Fernando Ribeiro of Portuguese metal heroes Moonspell, who will be releasing their new double album Alpha Noir / Omega White next week. We also have a rundown of this week’s metal happenings in and around Salt Lake.
Event Listings
On Friday, May 4, get your Led Zeppelin on with cover group No Quarter (from Seattle) playing at the Depot (21+). Tickets are $10 advance and $15 day of the show, music at 9 p.m.
Also Friday in the tribute realm, Roll the Bones (A Rush Tribute) play at Ginos (21+) with Supersofar. Tickets are $7 at the door, music at 9 p.m.
Lastly Friday, Metal Night at Club Expose (21+) will see your favorite metal tunes cranked via DJ and requests. There is no cost to attend and the night gets underway around 9 p.m.
Saturday, May 5, celebrate Cinco De Mayo with some metal from Salt Lake City's Yaotl Mictlan headlining at Burt's (21+) with Eyes of Damnation Leyenda Oculta, Valle De Feugo, Notre 45 and Nezia. A whopping $5 at the door gets you in, tunes underway around 9 p.m.
Also Saturday, “Cinco de Meato,” goes down at 5 Monkey's (21+) with Salt Lake's Meat playing with Below Me and Hooga, $5 at the door music at 9 p.m.
Monday, May 7, German thrash metal titans Destruction, celebrating their 30th anniversary in tour style ,play Burt's (21+) with American Death metal troop Vital Remains. Tickets are $14, music gets underway at 9 p.m. Check out our interview with Destruction that ran in the January 2009 issue of SLUG.
Interview with Moonspell vocalist Fernando Ribeiro
Four years in the making Portugal's Moonspell is set to unleash their double album Alpha Noir / Omega White on May 8 in the US. Napalm Flesh had the chance to talk to the founding member and vocalist Fernando Ribeiro about the band’s past, present and future with one key point always in mind: expect the unexpected from this long standing dark metal crew. Enjoy!
SLUG: With over 20 years and 10 albums now, how would you describe the legacy of Moonspell at this point in time?
Fernando Ribeiro: I think the best reward in the end is that we've kept our heads above water and we have this new album for our 20th anniversary. I think a lot has changed but the basic creative principles and what we believed when we were young and we formed the band are still there nowadays, enjoyed and thought about in a different form than when we were 16 or 18 when started the band. We are always a bit afraid of talking about a legacy because there are so many bands that came before us and also influenced us. We can still write out little page in history, especially when we started with Wolfheart and Irreligious we got into a scene that we loved, which was the dark metal avant-garde European metal scene. Out best legacy is that we could get our Portuguese boots at the door and still allow ourselves in the scene when the train was already almost leaving. One of the best things with Moonspell was that we were able to pair with the bands we really loved at the time like Tiamat, Samael, Sentenced—the bands that were being signed at the time and getting a lot of recognition in Europe.
SLUG: The new record comes out in the US May 10. What made the band decide to take on the task of creating a double album Alpha Noir / Omega White?
Ribeiro: We knew immediately two things that we wanted to have: more time for the songwriting and more songs. We started writing and playing and we came up with three songs—two ended up to be Alpha Noir songs and the other one was placed on the Omega White disc. The songs were “Lycantrope,” “Love is Blasphemy” and “White Omega” which is the opener of Omega White. We knew that we liked both directions and it was really hard to choose between both. We didn't want to repeat ourselves and make an album that is not so together because it has more deep Gothic atmospheric songs going to more metal songs. So this time around, as far as the creative principle, we split the band in two and just followed that path. It got so interesting for us that we decided this will be the record. It’s not just to put things in their right places, but also this will be shared and released as a entire record. It makes sense for us to take old natures of Moonspell take a step back and take a picture where all elements are there. I think it's an album that really represents Moonspell because it's so long and it has so many songs so much stuff we could try out and experiment. It's also an album that has two different feelings. I think Alpha Noir is something more of a scream-in-your-face album, something more of a getting into an arena and fighting for yourself in a way with secret, a wish of revolution or fulfillment. Omega White is the healing room where the gladiators came after they fought when they survived. After the string of Memorial, Night Eternal and Alpha Noir we were kind of missing the more Gothic rock dark music and atmospheric style of Moonspell. In the end we ended up with a very large album in a time when everyone tells us that nobody listens to albums anymore, let alone double albums, and everybody is just going to buy a song from iTunes. To be honest I refuse to live in this reality, even though it’s probably true. I'm actually optimistic that some people still want to go through an experience, and to make such an extensive album with so many different feelings is also an invitation to that experience to listen to the album is something we decided to do. We cannot control the reaction. At least we made sure that everything was from out part of things designed to create a reaction.
