MOONSPELL / ROTTING CHRIST at Parkteatret (Oslo, Norway)
Special Guests: SILVER DUST
Wednesday, December 4, 2019
by Jorge Patacas
The Portuguese dark titans Moonspell visited Oslo as part of “The Fall of Darkness” European tour which also includes the Greek masters Rotting Christ and the four-piece Silver Dust as special guests. Due to personal reasons, I couldn’t arrived on time to see the performance of the steampunk goth outfit from Switzerland, but I’ve heard only good comments from the attendees at the sold out venue.
It’s always a pleasure to see Rotting Christ live. The Athens-based band has always delivered great albums and they always give 100% on their live show and this was no exception. Earlier this year, they released their latest album, “The Heretics”, which also got positive reviews from fans and media worldwide. Unfortunately, they could play just two songs from this album (“Fire, God and Fear” and “Dies Irae”) since they only had a one-hour set, but nobody would complain about this when they open their performance with “666” and its hypnotic beats. That wasn’t the only song we got to hear from “Kata Ton Daimona Eaytoy”, the album they released in 2013. They also played the title track as well as “In Yumen-Xibalba” and “Grandis Spiritus Diavolos” which was one of the highlights having the audience singing those three words out loud.
They concluded their intense performance with the classic “Non Serviam”, which is also the name of the book they published last year, in which they tell the official story of the band.
Under the same publishing company (Cult Never Dies), Moonspell just released a book as well. It’s called “Wolves Who Were Men”, they tell in detail every period of the band from the very beginning with their previous name Morbid God to this day. Two large crosses were lying on the stage, one on each side, when the vocalist Fernando Ribeiro appeared carrying a big lantern in his hand while they started to play the first song of the evening, the dramatic sounding “Em Nome Do Medo”, from their latest conceptual album “1755” (2017). This album is based on the Lisbon earthquake of that year and it’s written entirely in portuguese, their native language. The theatrics were there too, he even wore a plague mask for the title track and there were going to be more surprises on that sense. After playing “In Tremor Dei”, it was time for “Opium”, a Gothic Metal classic track taken from their “Irreligious” album from 1996.
Closer to the end of the show, the lights turned red and Fernando came out wearing a cape and that meant they were about to play “Vampiria” from their amazing debut album “Wolfheart” (1995). This one was followed by one of their best songs ever, “Alma Mater”, which was hailed by the crowd. It’s also one of the band’s favorites to play live, so this was surely the climax of the evening. But there was more.
The encore consisted of two songs. First we got “Todos Os Santos” from their latest record and for this one, Ribeiro carried a large cross with red laser beams which he sent out over the crowd. Before proceeding with “Full Moon Madness”, the vocalist mentioned the intention of coming back on the tour for their new album, even though they still don’t know when that’s going to happen exactly, since they like to do things in a calm way because “after all, we are portuguese”, he joked. The wolf’s howl at the end of the aforementioned track from “Wolfheart” marked the conclusion of a brilliant performance. The sound was great, each musician felt clearly comfortable in their own place and Fernando’s vocals are outstanding, no matter if he’s screaming or singing clean with his deep voice.
Not so many bands have been that stable and consistent throughout their career when it comes to the lineup and the way they work as Moonspell, and that was proved once again with a very solid performance that left everyone, as they would say, under their spell.
Congratulations to everyone involved in the concert, from the sound to the light technicians working for the bands to the promoters who did a great job as usual. A night to remember!
