Ghost – ‘Skeletá’ [Album Review]

It’s a chilly spring evening in Amsterdam, and the sense of anticipation is electric. A motley gathering of black-clad, grucifix-bearing misfits have all come together at the Concerto Record Store on the Utrechtsestraat for the pre-release ‘Midnight’ listening session of Ghost’s sixth full-length, Skeletá.

‘Midnight,’ of course, is in inverted commas: in a hugely atypical display of disregard for timeliness, scheduling and diarisation, the affiliated Dutch record stores collectively decided to begin their listening parties at five PM so as not to infringe on the weekend festivities beginning on Friday with Koningsnacht – one of the most important excuses to get blackout drunk on the national social calendar, ranking right up there with Carnival and the sun coming out from behind the clouds.

But enough cultural critique – the star of the show is Ghost.

Following the cliffhanger ending of last year’s cinematic spectacle, Rite Here Rite Now, that saw Papa Emeritus IV being elevated to the head of the clergy, or Frater Imperator, fans have been waiting on tenterhooks for the newest incarnation of the band’s masked frontman. A live feed of a billboard stating ‘V is Coming’ had fans scratching their heads and trying to invent deepview easter eggs for three days before the reveal of Papa Perpetua in the closing moments of the first single off the record, “Satanized.”

The nameless ghouls finally make their unmasked debut.

The song itself is Ghost at its “Mary on a cross” peak: a pop-metal balancing act between irreverence and darkness, made manifest in a sing-along number (‘Heresy! Blasphemy!’) purpose-built for crowd participation, pyrotechnics and pleasure. An associated faceswap social media stunt (blithely dubbed ‘the satanizer’), where fans could have their own faces inserted into the darkly comic black-and-white video, speaks to the song’s success with audiences.

However, “Satanized” is the third cut on the record: before it, we also have the second single, “Lachryma” to contend with – Skeletá’s answer to the chainsaw riffing mood-setting of Prequelle’s “Rats.” A grand guignol theatrical video accompanied this release, which better revealed the ‘new’ frontman’s masked visage – the first mask to allow the audience to see Tobias Forge’s actual mouth, incidentally.

The campy music video is the perfect visual cue for the sound, reinforcing the stadium rock sensibilities of the composition.

But the album opener, “Peacefield,” is what really cements the central theme of the record – and that theme is, quite simply, that the 80s called, and they want their record back. The inevitable – and deserved – comparisons being drawn across social media between this track and Journey’s “Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)” are entirely appropriate, with the chorus sections being near-perfect matches in tone, rhythm and delivery.

Journey’s lawyers had better not hear this one.

This track sets the tone for the whole of Skeletá – for better or for worse. Tracks like “Cenotaph” and “De Profundis Borealis” are indicative of the massive role the 1980s played in Tobias Forge’s musical upbringing – a fact already evidenced in cover versions like “Bible” (off of the Popestar EP), or any of those on 2023’s Phantomime.

Following “Lachryma,” the record becomes a little contentious: it is quite likely that many fans may agree with Frater Imperatour’s denigration of the new stuff, as shown in the image below culled from the most recent ‘Message from the Clergy’ mini-movie. That said, Ghost is one hundred percent Tobias Froge’s passion project, and it is unlikely that his affinities will always mesh exactly with those of his listeners: by injecting other influences and themes into his work he is, after all, deepening the gene pool of a genre where everything has been done before. As one example, “Missilia Amori” (yes, that’s Latin for ‘love rockets’) is the cheesiest offering yet from the phantasmagoria that is Tobias Forge’s mind palace, recalling all the sleaze and glamour of Kiss or the Sunset Strip era, but inviting some raised eyebrow at its place on the record. Previous paeans to sexuality, like “Jigolo Har Megido” or “Monstrance Clock,” were nowhere as blatant as this, even though the song deserves to be celebrated as pure hair metal gloriousness.

Ghost in 2025

“I’m gonna watch… this hyped up shit”

Luckily, the thematic content hasn’t really changed too much: the irreligious stance and quest for personal gnosis are still front and center, and the lyrics on “Marks of the Evil One” are some of the best-written metal poetry in Forge’s career. Undeniable growth is also shown in the vocal performance: the album ends with the stripped-down “Excelsis,” which is not only a great display of Forge/Perpetua’s pipes, but a great spiritual successor to audience favourite ballads like “Faith” and “Life Eternal.” The expansion of the live band has also paved the way for more intricacy, more technicality and more orchestration: all coming together in a far richer, fuller sound, more in keeping with a band well on their way becoming the next stadium success story in the vein of Guns ‘n Roses, Abba or Queen.

All in all, the mood of the Amsterdam ghouls leaving the listening party isn’t quite as energetic as it was to begin with: this could be a cathartic exhalation, or it could be a need to listen to the record a few more times to really make their minds up. One thing is for certain: it will not dampen their enthusiasm for the upcoming show on the 8th of May as part of the current Skeletour – itself a sore point for some, given its provocative no-phones policy. But more to come on that later. Personally, following the benchmark set by Papa Nihil’s last offering, “The Future is a Foreign Land,” I did expect more from Skeletá, but time will tell.

Skeletá Track Listing:

1. Peacefield
2. Lachryma
3. Satanized
4. Guiding Lights
5. De Profundis Borealis
6. Cenotaph
7. Missilia Amori
8. Marks of the Evil One
9. Umbra
10. Excelsis

Runtime: 46:43
Release Date: 25 April 2025
Record Label: Loma Vista