Ghost – Skeletá | soundsfromthedarkside

Dear readers: prepare to be Ghosted. Skeletá is now out.

A new release by Sweden’s Ghost is always somewhat of a happening. There will be teasers, the band will release little vignettes on YouTube to further expand on the lore behind the band and its fictional papal vocalist and then we’ll be treated to one or two singles leading up to the final release. You can say about Ghost or Tobias Forge, the long since unmasked mastermind behind the project, but they’ve got their marketing skills down to a T. Add to that the promise of a spectacular new live production with the only caveat that you’d have to have your phone encased in a Yondr pouch so you’d have to watch the show like back in your grandfather’s day instead of watching it through your neighbour’s phone’s screen and you know you are going to have people talking about you.

I love me some Ghost and have done so ever since their debut album Opus Eponymous. The mysterious, masked band was quickly hailed as the next best thing since sliced bread by the fanatical metal scene, only to be widely ridiculed and loathed as soon as their sound became ever more commercial from Infestissumam onwards. Well, I’ve got a surprise for you sonny: Ghost has always been a weird amalgamation between metal, hard rock, Abba and Blue Öyster Cult from the beginning. The catchiness was there, the harmonies and the pop sensibilities, only the guitars were slightly louder back then. You only have to look at their two EP’s full of cover songs of Abba, Genesis, The Beatles, Tina Turner and Army of Lovers to realise that Forge is wearing his pop influences on the sleeves of his papal cassock.

Skeletá is the sixth album on the band’s roster since their immaculate conception all the way back in 2010. Musically, little has changed. The band has found its sound by now, its audience and its way of making it all work together with the storytelling and the visuals. Ghost may not be metal per se but rather a big arena band these days, but the music is instantly recognisable. And even if I still think Prequelle is their high water mark, Skeletá is a step up from 2022’s Impera to say the least. Very little they threw at me on that one really stuck, and I still have a hard time sitting through it in one go.

How different Skeletá is then, in that time seems to fly by. It’s lean as hell at just over forty-six minutes, and there’s nary a dull moment on it. Okay, I could really have done without the downright cringe-y Missila Amori, which robs the album of its momentum and waxes poetic with kindergarten level lyrics, spouting nuggets like Love rockets / Shot right in between her eyes. I have opinions, and they’re not the good kind. Luckily it’s the only dud on an otherwise splendid album. Skeletá boasts a bountiful collection of great songs, starting with the haunting Peacefield. It sort of nicks the melody and cadence of Journey’s Separate Ways, but other than that it’s a really strong Ghost track. Lachryma might be the heaviest track on this album, with some really chuggy riffing, but it won’t be enough to get back the old fans from the first hour.

Satanized, Marks of the Evil One and De Profundis Borealis are the “hit” songs Ghost really excel at these days. Instantly catchy and insanely hummable, they will do well live and they really show what a masterful songwriter Forge (and his team) really is. The songs are short and sweet, dole out hooks that will keep you coming back and deliver vocal and musical harmonies that will stick with you for days after the first listen. Highlights of Skeletá are undoubtedly the haunting ballad Guiding Lights and the adventurous rocker Umbra, but as always, everyone will have their own favourites, or perhaps none at all as some will keep yearning back to the old days where Ghost still wasn’t as metal as people like to think.

Skeletá is another triumph for Ghost, and another feather in Forge’s mitre when it comes to downright creativity and songwriting prowess. It will not change the minds of the jaded gatekeepers who inhabit our heavy metal universe, but if nothing else, the band will continue to draw in new fans and only expand on their success and stage production. Judging Skeletá on its own merits and assessing it as an insular thing for those unaware of or only superficially acquainted with the band, I would describe this as the perfect marriage between big, eighties arena rock with a hint of AOR and a healthy dollop of occultism. As it has always been the case with Ghost, of course.

Label: Loma Vista Recordings

Buy it here: https://intlbodega.lomavistarecordings.com/collections/ghost

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