Anthony Morgan at Metal Forces Magazine recently caught up with MOONSPELL frontman Fernando Ribeiro to discuss the band's new album Alpha Noir/Omega White. An excerpt from the story is available below:

A thrash influence flavours Alpha Noir. “We wanted Alpha Noir to be an album that was more alive really, and it all started when we played the 70000 Tons Of Metal,” the frontman discloses. “There were a lot of thrash bands there. Our guitar player Ricardo (Amorim) was hanging out with Testament’s guys and watching all the shows, so one thing led to another, and he started to write stuff more focused on this thrash and speed metal influence. I then got really excited and I really liked thrash metal, probably more obscure bands like ONSLAUGHT or ARTILLERY, and ANNIHILATOR’s first album – it’s a masterpiece. We got really excited because thrash metal was a big pleasure when we were teenagers, and now that we’re not teenagers anymore – we are heading fast into our 40s – it was great to to experiment in a way, and to see how it also fitted with our way of making music.

“It fitted really well because I think the guitars are very alive, the riffs are more memorable, and everything is very groovy in a way. It mixed with our darker sound. You’ve heard all these riffs before, but it’s delivered in a more original way. Of course, many people are already thinking or are afraid that we’re jumping into the thrash revival bandwagon. We’ve toured with some of those bands and it’s interesting, but not so much that we wanna score a tour with Legion Of The Damned or Municipal Waste. It’s just a musical influence, but for us it made all the sense to bring it to the table. Now I think when we’re practising for the shows, it really sounds alive. We wanted an album that passes on enthusiasm ahead of doing something different and probably more complex.”

Thrash metal isn’t Alpha Noir’s sole ingredient, however. “I think the thrash influence is really obvious and it’s a more guitar-oriented album, but I think there are certain characteristics we started to explore more,” Fernando notes. “We played faster music on Memorial, Night Eternal, and our last Century Media album The Antidote. I think there was this great album in 1996 made by Carl McCoy from FIELDS OF THE NEPHILIM; he made this project called NEFILIM, and did this album called Zoon. For me that’s really the blueprint of gothic metal over anything else; if you know this album you’ll recognise it’s very dark sometimes – dark and gothic – but also it sounds like SLAYER sometimes. It has really heavy, heavy guitars and double-bass drums. It’s a great example of how you can mix the metal world and the gothic world without necessarily having to use the same resources like female vocals or orchestration. Sometimes there’s a very fine line between what’s sublime and ridiculous, so the gothic metal style is a little bit always hanging on a wire. It’s very easy when you express these kinds of emotions to be a little bit over the top, let’s say.”

“I think that album with loud and deep guitars and deep vocals was really influential for us, and besides the thrash influence that’s something we always like to do. When people call us dark metal or gothic metal, we don’t want to take away the metal part. I still think it has to have these epic moments and atmospheric moments as well though. I think that Nefilim album was really influential, and was something that Moonspell really, really loved at the time.”

Go to this location for the complete story.

As previously reported, Moonspell recently their new video for the Omega White track 'White Skies'. Check it out below:

Alpha Noir/Omega White has achieved more chart positions in Europe. The list is now as follows:

Germany: #37

Finland: #37

Austria: #44

Switzerland: #48

The Netherlands: #83

Norway: #87

Belgium: #87

Portugal: FNAC Top Seller #2

Alpha Noir is available in a digibook with slipcase, limited double vinyl and strictly limited edition deluxe box set, containing the limited-edition double album mediabook, including two album covers, and Alpha Noir's counterpart, Omega White, and an exclusive Moonspell logo pendant.

Check out BraveWords.com scribe Carl Begai's new Moonspell feature at this location.