In a new interview with Denis Denisdriver, vocalist Fernando Ribeiro of Portuguese goth overlords MOONSPELL spoke about a possible follow-up to the band’s 2021 album “Hermitage”. He said: “Well, we’re kind of closing the cycle now that initiated a little bit before the pandemic, and then the pandemic stopped everything. We did an album called ‘Hermitage’ back then, which suffered a lot from the fact that we couldn’t go on tour, et cetera. And so all these things that we’ve done since then, especially the orchestra show and all the touring with DARK TRANQUILLITY and (celebrating the 30th anniversary of MOONSPELL‘s debut album) ‘Wolfheart’ was also a way to go step by step into our ultimate goal, ultimate question, which was, can MOONSPELL make interesting new music? And what kind of music will it be? And we took our time. Our last album, full-length, it’s from 2021, so it’s gonna be five years since we released new music. But we had to prepare ourselves, too, and we had to prepare our audience. So we already wrote all the album. We’re gonna record it in December. It’s coming out in the summer of 2026. I think in March you can already see the first single and the first video clip that we are gonna film, I think, in January.”

Regarding the musical direction of the new MOONSPELL material, Fernando said: “We’d done so much and we had so much musical experience and extensions, et cetera, that we felt in our heart that we had to do a very classic album. So it’s a gothic metal album. I don’t know if it’s ‘Irreligious Part Two’ or whatever — it’s not the terms we are thinking — but it’s beautiful songs, romantic songs, melancholic songs with great riffs, great solos, great atmosphere, lyrics about fiction and fantasy. So we are very, very happy with the result of the songwriting. Now we’re going to record it, and we can’t wait for our fans to discover new songs about MOONSPELL, because I think it’s high time they do that. I’m curious about their reaction, as always, but I think we’re gonna have a great time together when the new album is out and when we take it on the road and on the festivals.”

Fernando went on to say that he and his MOONSPELL bandmates are “very lucky” to “still have the drive to do new music and to have such a beautiful past and such an unpredictable past because I never thought that the MOONSPELL could be a professional band and tour and have fans all around the world. It was too good to be true when we were starting off in Portugal — especially coming out of Portugal that nobody had ever done it before us.”