Tobias Forge Says Ghost Has ‘Always Been About Mankind and Living’
Tobias Forge thinks one of the misinterpretations about Ghost is that the band is all about evil and summoning the devil. To the contrary, the frontman tells Heavy Hour on Germany's Star FM, "It's always been about mankind and living."
"At the end of the day, one of the biggest misconceptions of Ghost is that it's just about the devil," Forge says in an interview transcribed by Blabbermouth. "It's always been about mankind and living. Even though [the band's latest album] Prequelle is a record about death, essentially, it's a record about survival, and I think that that is something that's gone through all the records. Even back to [the 2010 Ghost debut] Opus Eponymous, there was a double meaning to things that doesn't necessarily have to do with evil sermons out of some old grimoire somewhere how to summon the devil. That is a symbolism in order to paint a slightly more interesting picture. It's the salt that makes the dish a little tastier."
Forge continues by saying that what is happening within the confines of Ghost are things he has been planning for awhile and that the idea has always been to present the band on a grander scale.
"A lot of the things that we're doing now are things that I've had on my agenda for years and years and years. More than often, what you see, or what we've been able to recreate, has usually been a tampered-with version of what I have in my head, because the original idea has always been bigger. Every time I am in the mode of creating a show, there's always some level of gravity that comes in play, either of a monetary sort or there's a space issue. If it's not the amount of buses that we can cater to having people/personnel, it's the amount of truck space we have or the stage size, or maybe there's another band playing that day that also has a production. There's always something fucking with it, and I spend a lot of time trying to get this show that we're going to bring on the road now to be as close to my intended show as possible. I think it's looking really good, but it's also a start." You can hear the interview in two parts here and here.
Ghost's Prequelle hit No. 3 on the Billboard 200, which was five spots higher than their previous record, Meliora. The album moved 66,000 units (including streaming); 61,000 of those were physical sales. The Swedish outfits is headlining North American tour beginning in late October. The full list of dates can be found at this location.
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