"Beloved Antichrist" is a rock opera in 3 acts. Originally we wrote almost 4 hours of music, but at an early stage I realised it would get too heavy for audience with such a lenght, so in the end we recorded around 3,5 hours of music. After reviewing the final results I cut it down even further and we ended up with 3 hours 4 min (this means we have around 25 min of unreleased material saved from these recordings). It was a tough work to cut it down, because not every scene can be removed due to the storyline. And the weakest musical compositions are not necessaily linked to the removable scenes.
I would estimate around 75% of the material has been written by me, the rest was written by Thomas, Vidal and Linnea. Nalle also wrote a scene with me, but it was one of the scenes that was cut out.
Musically I would say around a third of the material sounds like "classic Therion". Another third sounds very different from what you would expect to hear from us. And the last third is something in between.
Which means those who are open minded and wants to explore something new will have plenty of dig in to. And those who ”don't give a shit about rock operas and just wants a new Therion album" can burn a CD or make a play list with the songs they like (and use the other CD's to even out a rickety table or something).
Important to take notice of is that this is NOT a regular album release where the lyrics is a storyline. It is NOT like Ayreon or Avantasia.
This is music composed for a theatrical stage work. Like a Therion version of Jesus Christ Superstar (the working title while writing it was even "Antichrist Superstar"). And just like you can buy Jesus Christ Superstar also as an audio release, you can also buy "Beloved Antichrist" as an album. The concept is totally the same. This is vital for the understanding of this release.
However, I would also like to stress the fact that the tour we do in the first half of 2018 is NOT a theatrical performance of the opera. On this tour we will treat "Beloved Antichrist" just like any other CD release and perform the songs like normal. We will try to stage the theatric version on the second half of the year.
Tracklisting:
CD 1/Act 1:
1. Turn from Heaven
2. Where will you go?
3. Through dust through rain
4. Signs are here
5. Never again
6. Bring her home
7. The solid black beyond
8. The crowning of splendour
9. Morning has broken
10. Garden of peace
11. Our destiny
12. Anthem
13. The palace ball
14. Jewels from afar
15. Hail Caesar
16. What is wrong?
17. Nothing but my name
CD 2/Act 2:
1. The arrival of Apollonius
2. Pledging loyalty
3. Night reborn
4. Dagger of God
5. Temple of new Jerusalem
6. The lions roar
7. Bringing the gospel
8. Laudate dominum
9. Remaining silent
10. Behold Antichrist
11. Cursed by the fallen
12. Resurrection
13. To where I weep
14. Astral Sophia
15. Thy will be done
CD 3/Act 3:
1. Shoot them down
2. Beneath the starry skies
3. Forgive me
4. The wasteland of my heart
5. Burning the palace
6. Prelude to war
7. Day of wrath
8. Rise to war
9. Time has come / Final battle
10. My voyage carries on
11. Striking darkness
12. Seeds of time
13. To shine forever
14. Theme of Antichrist