Hello, oh earthlings.
Today I want to talk about a band that I’ve been really loving as of lately. This is a more or less metal band called Ghost also known as Ghost B.C. I first discovered this band a couple of years ago on Spotify and really loved what I heard, so in a moment of inpulsivity while in Vintage Stock I saw their first release, an EP titled Popestar and bought it without knowing what was on it. When I got home I played it, once again loving what I heard, but never played the record again for a year because at that time I had an awful record player that I had just discovered can, and will damage your records. With that being said Ghost was momentarily put on the back burner as I’m also always discovering new music, they were semi forgotten about for a time.
Fast forward to this year it was a cold winter day with a chill in the air, nothing to keep my time occupied I had a brilliant among many ideas, I decided to go through my Release Radar on Spotify. I was going down the list listening to those songs till my eyes landed on a song by none other than Ghost, recognizing them I quickly clicked on the song realizing it was a live track feeling compelled I clicked on the album to find that they had released a live album. Those that know me well know I’m a sucker for live music.I love concerts, I love live albums, I just adore live music. I can literally sit in my room and watch videos of live performances all day. It’s one of things that makes me the happiest, so after listening to that entire live album I started watching their music videos, live performances, listening to each of their albums and doing some research on the band.
One of the best things about ghost (other than their music of course.) is their anonymity, aesthetic, and ecentric on-stage precsence. each member of this band is masked, never revealing their true identities. The front man and vocalist goes by the name of Papa Emeritus, The rest of the members are dubbed as nameless ghouls. I don’t know why, but I love this about them. It just adds a little extra something special, and unique really getting the wheels of my imagination turning and speculating. Though the true identity of Papa and five former Nameless Ghouls were dispelled when four of those five filed a lawsuit against Papa who is now known to be Tobias Forge. I don’t know who Tobias really is, or looks like, and I don’t want to. I’d rather be left in the dark when it comes to this. With new Nameless Ghouls among the clergy shredding behind their masks, and Papa revealing that over fifteen musicians have taken part of the ceremony (including, but not limited to Dave Grohl.) The anonymity lives on. Meaning you never really know just quite who you could be listening to or watching perform.
Something that’s equally as fascinating to me about this band as someone who’s a bit of a horror buff is their use of, and play on old-school horror imagery in not just their music videos which are so beautifully crafted, but also in their absolutely gorgeous album artwork. They play off of this very tounge-in-cheek Satanic lyricism and have managed to combine their love of horror films and traditions of Scandanavian Metal. For example their debut album Opus Eponymous has artwork on the cover that pulls inspiration from, and plays off of the cover of Salems Lot by Stephen King.
One of the main complaints that die hard Metal heads tend to have is Papa Emeritus doesn’t have typical Metal vocals in the majority of their songs. I however feel that’s a very close minded reason to dislike this bands music. If you see their music as purely Metal you’d be very mistaken. Though Metal is their most prominent and forefront of their genre and sound, they have a plethora of influences that play a part in their music as a whole to create something unique. I personally am very fond of the fact that they’ve taken typical Metal vocals here and there and mixed it with melodic vocals that are the beautiful yin to the instrumentations wicked yang. There’s something in Ghosts dicography for everyone from Metal Heads to Rock N Rollers to Hair Metalists to Thrashers and so on. They even have lost of 70’s influence and some 80s atmosphere. They’ve covered a Beatles song on that same album mentioned earlier, and The tracks “Con Clavi Con Dio” and “Genesis” are sped up Waltzes. With that being said if you’re in the mood for some kick-ass Metal that’s much more than Metal then go listen to these Ghouls.
