February 26, 2021 will see Portuguese dark metal titans MOONSPELL release their hotly anticipated 13th studio album, entitled Hermitage, via Napalm Records.
MOONSPELL is not only approaching their 30th band anniversary more ambitiously and stronger than ever, but with their forthcoming record, they’ve created a wonderfully intuitive, yet epic masterpiece and a testament to what they’ve always loved the most: Honest, emotional metal that binds us even in these dark times.
Following up on their just recently unleashed album opening track, “The Greater Good“ (watch the lyric video HERE), today, MOONSPELL is sharing their second single and a brand new video for “Common Prayers“! With “Common Prayers”, MOONSPELL successfully builds upon their previous dark works.
Directed by Guilherme Henriques and featuring actress, singer and performer Aurora Pinho, this clip was shot 90 meters below the surface at the amazing caves of Grutas de Mira d’Aire, one of Portugal’s seven natural wonders. With a classy gothic and catchy feel, MOONSPELL flexes their best songwriting skills. The lyrical content is “perverse, almost religious” and deals with the 18th century pregnancy surge amidst Portuguese nuns. Twentieth century demolitions and excavations unearthed the bones of hundreds of children, revealing the sad fate of Jesus’ sons and daughters.
Vocalist Fernando Ribeiro states:
“Political? Religious? Who the fuck cares, really? Music is, for MOONSPELL, about self-expression, and we are old enough to pick our battles. ‘Common Prayers’ is the kind of song we love to write, sensual, different, with a to-die-for chorus. Hermitage is coming your way, you can run, but you cannot hide. Staying safe is staying smart. Say a prayer!”
Hermitage was recorded, mixed and mastered this past summer by Jaime Gomez Arellano (Paradise Lost, Primordial, Ghost, Sólstafir & many more) at the Orgone Studios in the UK. Building upon the sensitive facets of the album, one can expect an entertaining and revolutionary journey through the darkest days of human existence. Beautifully crafted songs such as “The Greater Good“ show us the modernity of the wolves in 2021, while tracks alike “Common Prayers“ embrace the MOONSPELL tradition of writing a gothic metal song like no other band can. The ethereal and melodic sounds of MOONSPELL, while never straying away from their metal roots, make Hermitage likely one of the deepest, surprising and most epic albums MOONSPELL has ever written.