Moonspell
Irreligious

THE REVIEW

“And they crown her Queen of the Dead…”

Nocturne.
“Irreligious” can be described with this single word.
One of the most important albums of the European gothic scene was born in 1996, representing the confirmation of the Portuguese after “Wolfheart,” a masterpiece of the Moonspell discography.
Ribeiro’s deep inspiration makes the album’s atmosphere unique: evil sounds, church instruments, dark voices, unisons, indescribable creative impulses, profound cadences, gothic settings!
The mastery of the Portuguese is fully expressed in this stunning record.
Different musical strands are combined and conceptually, it comes out as a mix of spiritual and religious aspects, all tied together by that famous gothic-metal that Moonspell introduced from the Lusitanian land.
A slow, atmospheric sound, darker than most. The electronic, synthesized effects are the cherry on top of this “irreligious cake.”

The various musical aspects of the “Moonspell genre” are dragged into a dark oblivion, from which the ashes of the Phoenix emerge, which will transform in its aspect and tendency towards electronics and acidity of sounds a few years later.
The union between the strength of metal and gothic elegance, musical, literary, and visual, is the synthesis of what Moonspell manages to create, balancing spirituality and power until reaching the dimension of the sublime being!
“A Poisoned Gift” is the only disappointment of the track, in my opinion. The rest… is history!
“Opium,” a true masterpiece capable of redeeming that energy that has been dormant within us for a long time; “Raven Claws,” which with the addition of a female voice to Fernando’s frightening one, becomes even more epic; “Mephisto,” the male alter ego of the great “Alma mater”; the concluding “Fullmoon madness,” melancholically funereal and dedicated to the last wail of the Wolfheart wolf.

A masterpiece made possible not only by the band’s skill but also by their great personality and the fantastic charisma of the “Count” Fernando Ribeiro, the quintessential pagan religious.