“Belial! Behemoth! Beelzebub! Asmodeus! Satanus! Lucifer!” If you are at show and hearing this verse sung by a choir, you are most certainly in the church of Ghost! The dark one goes by many names and Ghost knows them all, preaching their Satan loving philosophy in an occult rock candy coating shell of musical goodness. They are catchy enough to be popular in the modern sense of any metal band being “popular”, but make no mistake; this is one of the most subversive groups to infiltrate the mainstream in a long time. On this night the current leg of the US “Black To The Future” tour stopped off once again in Arizona, with the faithful masses gathered at the ready. Commanded by the ministrations of Papa Emeritus III and his Nameless Ghouls, crowds at a Ghost headline show are often found in a froth from the jump off. The set list was a heavy mix of 2015’s Meliora (Spinefarm/Loma Vista) and the bands’ earlier work too. The aura and imagery are certainly entrancing, but it is the music that makes fans commit so deeply to the band. They were captured for Ghost Cult tonight by Melina Dellamarggio of Melina D Photography.
As we dash towards the holidays and the end of the year Ghost Cult is feeling good about this season of giving. So we are giving our fans a chance to get to know our partners, peers, and friends from bands in the world of music. They will chime in with some guest blogs, end of year lists, and whatever else is on their minds as we pull the plug on 2015. Today we have Bidi van Drongelen, Dutch booker and manager who has worked with the likes of The Devil’s Blood, Saint Vitus, Ghost, In Solitude and many more. Every year a multitude of his bands get booked at the excellent Roadburn festival, and we have asked him what he feels were the best releases of 2015.
1. Klone – Here Comes The Sun
Great songwriting, amazing vocals, and a crystal clear though heavy production blending prog and post metal.
2. Ghost – Meliora
Ghost has it all to become one of the leading melodic heavy rock bands in the world
3. Bliksem – Gruesome Masterpiece
If you like Metallica’sMaster of Puppets of Death Angel’sACT III….with the a raw female voice like Doro.
4. Royal Thunder – Crooked Doors
Great atmospheric rock album with the amazing voice of Mlny Parsonsz
5. Tribulation – Children of the Night
Melodies of occult rock like The Devil’s Blood drenched with a satanic black voice which reminds of Satyricon.
6. Chelsea Wolfe – Abyss
Refreshing approach of doom & drone. ART with capital A!
7. Paradise Lost – The Plague Within
8. Steak Number Eight – Kosmokoma
9. Melechesh – Enki
10. Enslaved – In Times
11. Clutch – Psychic Warfare
12. Thy Catafalque – Sgurr
13. Amorphis– Under The Red Cloud
14. RAM – Svbversvm
15. BRING ME THE HORIZON– That’s The Spirit
16. Mgła – Excercises In Futility
17. Baroness – Purple
18. Leprous – The Congregation
19. Graveyard – Innocence & Decadence
20. Hangman’s Chair – This Is Not Supposed To Be Positive
Ghost are the sort of band that attract a huge diversity of fans, all with an intensity of support and admiration for the Swedish occult rockers and their penchant for matters Satanic and enormous, 70’s influenced tunes. Now deep into a tour that has seen them traverse the USA as well as mainland Europe in support of their critically acclaimed and warmly received third album, Meliora (Spinefarm) – Ghost Cult’s Album Of The Year for 2015 – this final show of 2015 had a real sense of occasion about it.
Ghost – 2015. Photo Credit: Susan Wall
The sold out venue is heaving; literally and (in terms of audience anticipation) figuratively. Fellow Swedes Dead Soul provide a, ahem, lively opening. Their atmospheric blend of Nine Inch Nails industrial rock meeting Nick Cave and Johnny Cash in a darkened alley and agreeing to go for another round of drinks somewhere less than salubrious is a dark and delicious delight and the audience’s annoyance that their 30 or so minutes seems to be over in a flash, is palpable. Come back soon, gentlemen.
Ghost – 2015. Photo Credit: Gary Alcock
Ghost arrive as long lost heroes. The roar of approval for the purple robed Papa Emeritus III is as loud as it is warm. Ghost have, quietly but assiduously, built themselves an enviable canon of songs that are greeted with raucous and genuine affection. Much of the set is inevitably around the latest record which is all fine and dandy given that it’s one of the best of the past 12 months. ‘Mummy Dust’ has an added venom and sense of danger than is perhaps initially obvious on the album and is all the better for it. ‘Majesty’ reveals itself as one of the album’s tent-poles, layered and intoxicating. ‘He Is’ has become something of an instant classic, 1000 voices joining in unison around a song that seems destined to be this generation’s power ballad of choice. Never has the phrase Satanic Abba seemed more apposite. ‘From the Pinnacle to the Pit’ has one of the filthiest basslines that you’re likely to hear this or any other year and is greeted like some twenty year old classic rather than a new cut from a new album.
Ghost – 2015. Photo Credit: Gary Alcock
Ghost’s ability with melody has been well documented; live they have become a beguiling and compelling proposition. Anyone who harboured any doubts about whether they could cut it as a headliner or move out of the constrictions of simple novelty act should dispense them immediately. Ghost are intelligent, self-aware and self-deprecating in equal measure. They have evolved; they have a better sense of showmanship and audience interplay. Where early shows revolved around Papa shuffling around the stage simply dousing the audience with incense has now morphed into a full on rock show with The Nameless Ghouls losing the monks hoods and sporting very fetching demon masks and dominating the front, sides and back of the stage. ‘Year Zero’ has drama and danger in equal measure, ‘Guleh’ feels cathartic and invigorating. The old – and misplaced – adage that cover versions are never as good as originals has now been ground to (mummy) dust as the band’s cover of the Rory Erikkson song ‘If You have Ghosts’ amply demonstrates- this is now, unequivocally, their song. Closing track ‘Monstrance Clock’, arriving as assuredly as the morning sun, is valedictory.
I doubt whether Ghost actually intended this, but this show at the start of Christmas week was the capital’s alternative Christmas Evensong, such was the intensity of performance, the proliferation of ecclesiastical ritual and an overall ambience of rich, invigorating passion.
As we dash towards the holidays and the end of the year Ghost Cult is feeling good about this season of giving. So we are giving our fans a chance to get to know our partners, peers, and friends from bands in the world of music. They will chime in with some guest blogs, end of year lists, and whatever else is on their minds as we pull the plug on 2015. Today we have Joseph Spiller of progressive metal band Caricature. Caricature put out the acclaimed Shadows: Maxi Single this summer have a full-length in the works for 2016. Here is Joseph’s “Most Topesty Cool Favorite Releases of 2015”.
1. Tigran Hamsayan – Mockroot
How often can an album tote a definite influence of Meshuggah, Dave Brubeck, Keith Jarret, and Porcupine Tree? Add on top that this is still a pure jazz record? Pfffft. This is the sound of someone furthering and redefining a genre.
2. Fetty Wap – Fetty Wap
Yeah, before anyone says it sucks because it’s not metal, listen to this record. Fetty is all hits, all the time. Zoogang knows how to make pop hooks as if it’s in their DNA.
3. Steven Wilson – Hand.Cannot.Erase
Steven Wilson, by Melina D Photography
Backing band of the century along with the golden god of Prog. Though it gets overly self-indulgent from time to time, Hand.Cannot.Erase is absolutely stunning.
4. Psycroptic –Psycroptic
Do you even riff, Bro? Joe Haley most definitely does.
5. Ghost – Meliora
Ghost, by Meg Loyal Photography
I never got the hype on this band. I actually disliked almost everything prior to Meliora, but goddamn, did Papa bring that A-game with this heavily Dave Grohl “inspired” record.
6. Abigail Williams – The Accuser
Who doesn’t love a good comeback? Possibly the best thing Ken Sorceron has ever done. Crushing and beautiful with rich song structures. BUY THIS RECORD NOW!
7. Lamb of God – VII: Sturm Und Drang
Lamb of God, by Evil Robb Photography
After all that went on with Randy, the band came back and tell that tale along with snapshot a troubled time in the world perfectly. The riffs and drumming on this record are some of their best to date, and Josh Wilbur killed it on the production side.
8. Baroness – Purple Record
Another “Comeback Record” of sorts. Stronger, more refined, defined. The mesh of only the finest points of Yellow & Green mixed lush instrumentation and what sounds like an intense infatuation with The Cure. This one has it all.
9. Ellie Goulding – Delirium
Though not an immensely technical singer, Goulding has a golden voice. The slight raspiness and harmonically rich tambre makes me envious. This album is LONG for the pop genre, but its all top quality with fantastic hooks meshed with smooth beats and tranquil melodies.
10. Solution .45 – Nightmares In The Waking State
If you don’t know who this band is, we probably cannot be friends. GROOVES
EXTREMELY HONORABLE MENTION: I’ll be Me – Soundtrack
The delayed release of the soundtrack to the documentary about the legendary guitar player, singer, songwriter, and former member of The Wrecking Crew,Glen Campbell, who has been battling Alzheimer’s Disease for the past few years. This has two live songs from his final tour that will blow your mind considering his state, along with songs from his daughter that will make you cry while your heart flutters. The title track, penned by Mr. Campbell himself as a final letter to his wife and family will give you goosebumps (unless you don’t have a heart.
Released on 21st August, Ghost Cult’s Album of the Month for September and now our official Album of the Year, managed, even in a year in which Slayer released a divisive selection and Iron Maiden unveiled a 90 minute double album after a five year hiatus, to dominate conversations, causing arguments and endless discussions about it’s place in their canon and Ghost‘s status in the world of rock and metal.
For a “new” act to take on the established acts for column inches and internet debate is testament to how successful the Satanic vision of the original Nameless Ghoul has been.
The band formed in 2008 with a simple mission to spread the word of Satan through the medium of retrospective rock with the devil’s harmonies carrying and subverting the masses.
“This is the album where Ghost have consolidated the tricks and tropes that drew us into their strange vaudevillian universe to begin with and the album that will hold us there for some time more. Meloria sees Ghost honing all their tricks into one accessible and often infectious package.”
Much as dream follows day, Infestissumam saw a definite evolution and movement on from Opus Eponymous, and so Meliora is a further celebration of the Ghost sound, of their continued exploration of a musical niche, adding rock opera tendencies, even, at times, grinding War Of The Worlds into the feted gristle flowing through their distinctive Satanic mills as 70’s synths flutter, guitar solo sing, and holding it all together into memorable hook-filled hymns is Papa Emeritus III.
You can throw superlatives, or analyse things to the nth degree, or you can enjoy that most special of things – an album filled from top to bottom with great songs.
And more than anything, THAT is why Meliora is the Album of 2015.
Ghost have released a lyric video for ‘He Is’ from their acclaimed album Meliora (Spinefarm/Loma Vista). You can see the video at this link and below:
Ghost is currently on their “Black To The Future” world tour of US in support of Meliora. After wrapping a run of US dates with an appearance at Monster Mash Music Festival the band has remaining dated in Europe for the end of the year:
The Deezermusic service is streaming their exclusive Ghost live performance video. Three songs were performed: ‘From The Pinnacle To The Pit’, ‘Cirice’ and ‘Absolution’ from their recent acclaimed album Meliora (Spinefarm/Loma Vista). You can watch the video at this link or below:
Ghost is currently on their North American dates for their “Black To The Future Tour”, performing in Boston tonight at The House of Blues. UK dates are booked for later this year:
Ghostreleased their new video from the song ‘From The Pinnacle To The Pit’, from their album Meliora (Spinefarm/Loma Vista). You can watch the video at this link or below:
On the heels of a successful mini unplugged tour to promote the album, Ghost will launch a full US Tour later this month:
Ghost – “Black To The Future Tour” US tour dates
Sept 22: The Fillmore – Washington, DC
Sept 23: Newport Music Hall- Columbus, OH
Sept 25: Stage AE- Pittsburgh, PA
Sept 26: Union Transfer- Philadelphia, PA
Sept 27: Terminal 5- New York, NY
Sept 28: House of Blues- Boston, MA
Sept 30: Metropolis: Montreal, QC
Oct. 01: Sound Academy- Toronto, ON
Oct. 02: The Majestic Theater- Detroit, MI
Oct. 03: The Riviera- Chicago, IL
Oct. 05: Liberty Hall- Lawrence, KS
Oct. 06: The Pageant- St. Louis, MO
Oct. 08: The Civic Auditorium- New Orleans, LA
Oct. 09: The Tabernacle- Atlanta, GA
Oct. 10: Beacham Theatre- Orlando, FL
Oct. 11: The Ritz- Tampa, FL
Oct. 13: House of Blues- Dallas, TX
Oct. 14: Aztec Theater- San Antonio, TX
Oct. 16: Sunshine Theater- Albuquerque, NM
Oct. 17: Sumitt Music Hall- Denver, CO
Oct. 19: Knitting Factory- Boise, ID
Oct. 20: El Corazon- Seattle, WA
Oct. 21: Roseland Theatre- Portland, OR
Oct. 23: Warfield- San Francisco, CA
Oct. 26: The Mayan Theater- Los Angeles, CA
Oct. 27: Knitting Factory- Reno, NV
Oct. 28: The Depot- Salt Lake City, UT
Oct. 30: Northside Park Theater- San Diego, CA
Oct. 31: House of Blues- Las Vegas, NV
Nov. 01: Monster Mash Festival- Phoenix, AZ
Ghost, photo credit- Spinefarm Records
Additional dates for the UK have been book. Tickets are on sale now:
Ghost has streamed their new album Meliora in full, ahead of its release this Friday from Spinefarm/Loma Vista. You can hear the stream of Melioraat this link or below:
Ghost has announced “The Summoning II:Unholy/Unplugged” tour to support the their upcoming new album Meliora from Spinefarm/Loma Vista on August 21st. Performing unplugged in five cities, the group led by Papa Emeritus III will then host a record signing session.
Ghost The Summoning II: Unholy/Unplugged tour dates:
Aug 18: Silver Platters (SoDo Location) – Seattle, WA (7:00 PM)
Aug 20: Amoeba – Los Angeles, CA (6:00 PM)
Aug 21: ZIA (Camelback Location) – Phoenix, AZ (7:00 PM)
Aug 22: Sound Garden – Baltimore, MD (5:00 PM)
Aug 23: Rough Trade – Brooklyn, NY (2:00 PM)
Meliora Tracklist: 01. Spirit 02. From The Pinnacle To The Pit 03. Cirice 04. Spöksonat 05. He Is 06. Mummy Dust 07. Majesty 08. Devil Church 09. Absolution 10. Deus In Absentia
