Night Eternal (Special Ed.)

Moonspell

Product Details

• Audio CD (June 10, 2008)
• Original Release Date: June 10, 2008
• Number of Discs: 2
• Label: Steamhammer / Spv
• ASIN: B001672L3K
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #60,316 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

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Editorial Reviews

Product Description
Like no other bands on this planet, the Portuguese translate the sadness and despair as well as the enterprising spirit and the raving passion of their countrymen into the language of heavy metal. Moonspell were among the founders and foremost protagonists of that style during the nineties. Like the Portuguese metropolis, "Night Eternal" is riddled by a multitude of alleys and places. Moonspell s city of Lisbon and their new album share a wise and experienced beauty as well as the opposing principles of heat and cold, life and death, severity and gentleness, male strength and female magic. Moonspell have re-discovered themselves once more and still found a way back to their origins. They continue to couple the fire within their souls with poetic emotionality, a gentle touch of the erotic, as well as a distinct melancholic mood.

The Special Edition of Night Eternal comes packaged in high quality digipak format with slipcase, contains two bonus tracks and an exclusive DVD featuring live material from their 2007 Wacken Open Air appearance, video clips and a making of short.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "Life is meaningless...", June 10, 2008

By	Murat Batmaz (Istanbul, Turkey) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Night Eternal firmly follows Moonspell's previous release Memorial, but also involves the dark atmospherics from the band's re-recorded CD Under Satanae. Those who enjoyed Memorial will definitely find Night Eternal of interest because it further expands on that style, with plenty of heavy vocal parts, dark keyboard textures, symphonic elements, and deeply melodic guitar lines.

The black metal aesthetic of their earlier material has partly been applied to some of these tunes, such as the album opener "At Tragic Heights", easily the most standout track on this disc. Starting with the creepy intro where dark, lingering keys engulf Fernando Ribeiro's trademark whispers and spoken lyrics, Moonspell venture into a fiercely heavy scorcher that also boasts a great interplay between guitars, keys, and bass (courtesy of Niclas Etelavuori from Amorphis) and concludes with Ribeiro's evil death growls. Speaking of which, there is plenty of growling and screeching on the album, but we also get to hear him switching to his calm gothic voice on some tunes. His hoarse, abrasive delivery on songs like "Night Eternal", complete with insanely fast drumming and tremelo picking; "Moon Is Mercury", highlighted by a gripping melodic guitar theme; and "Spring of Rage", a blend of jackhammer riffery and gothic keyboard exercise, is perfectly contrasted by his seamless switch to clean singing on the otherwise punishing "Shadow Sun", where he continues to repeat the lyrics "Life is meaningless!" until he is sure the listener has absorbed them.

Of all tracks, only two of them are sung with clean vocals: the clean-toned "First Light", noteworthy for its wonderful guitar layering and Ribeiro's assured vocal melody; and "Scorpion Flower", in which Ribeiro duets with Anneke van Giersbergen formerly of The Gathering. First, Ribeiro enters the piece singing over a simple yet effective guitar-keyboard synthesis and a steady, 4/4 drum beat. Then, van Giersbergen offers her instantly recognisable vibrato, doubling his vocal lines and eventually singing solo. In a way, this tune evokes her brilliant duet with Ulver's Garm on the Souvenirs album, but this one is less minimalistic and more guitar-friendly. On this album, Ricardo Amorim is given bigger space for guitar solos, one of which totally complements this piece.

The result is a blend of Moonspell's recent material injected with some of the more blackish atmospherics pre-Sin/Pecado, and while I've never been a big fan of the band's post-The Butterfly Effect material, I feel this one may be their best from that period yet.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Killer single... the rest is adequate, September 27, 2008

By	M. Vicente Manzanares "Lone Wolf" (Charlottesville, VA, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Moonspell are a Portuguese Doom/Gothic Metal band. I've been following them for some time, waiting for them to "make" it. This CD brings them a bit closer, but they are not there yet.

For Night Eternal, they have polished their approach a bit compared to other recent efforts, like Memorial. The production is cleaner, which takes some of the edge off of them for fans of hard Doom sounds, with a lot of distortion and growling. This CD leans more towards a Gothic sound, which is a turn off for some people, but others (like me) will find it more palatable. However, this CD has a problem common to all Moonspell releases, that is, songs are kind of similar to each other, making for a somewhat monotone listening that is not all that engaging. It's not bad, just feels adequate, and you probably expect more when investing your hard-earned bucks/euros in a CD.

Having said that, there is a glorious exception, which is the song Scorpion Flower. This song features The Gathering siren Anneke van Giersbergen, and her contribution to the song lifts it from the monotony of the rest of the CD, making it one of the most powerful Gothic "singles" out there. The videoclip is also phenomenal, please youtube it.

In summary, if you're a Moonspell fan, this release may feel a bit "light". If you like Gothic, it may sound a bit monotonous and purposeless. But by all means, get Scorpion Flower. You can download it from amazon or iTunes, that song alone is worth it.

2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Living music!, July 23, 2008

By	anonymous - See all my reviews

I've been following Moonspell since 1995. Each of their albums has it's own feel to it, but they all have one thing in common: They're "organic." The music feels like it's alive. This one's no different in that respect! I'd have to say that Night Eternal has captivated me more than their others. The richness and complexity is amazing! It's a great blend of raw black metal, to a very surreal, very ambient music that I can't even classify. Get it!