Ghost

Queens of the Stone Age

Must-see sets at Lollapalooza 2013

Need to plan your itinerary for three days of tunes at Chicago’s Grant Park? We’ve done it for you, and Friday’s alignment is near perfect – complete with a dinner break. Also, graciously, we’ve directed you away from the glow-stick-raving teenagers.

Ghost BC

Public-access blasphemy: Ghost BC’s video for “Secular Haze”

Ghost BC: InfestissumamGhost BC: Infestissumam (Loma Vista, 4/9/13)*

[*not final cover art]

Swedish occult-metal band Ghost BC (formerly just Ghost) is back this April with its “sophomore psalm,” Infestissumam, and it promises more rollicking tunes set to lyrical themes about everyone’s favorite dark overlord.

The video for “Secular Haze,” the album’s first single, finds the band in its usual high-priest and heavy-cloak garb, jamming its just-barely sinister melodies on a public-access-style set. Catch the band live across America this spring.

Ghost (Sweden)

The Metal Examiner: Ghost’s Opus Eponymous

Every Friday, The Metal Examiner delves metal’s endless depths to present the genre’s most important and exciting albums.

Ghost - Opus EponymousGhost: Opus Eponymous (Metal Blade, 1/18/11)

Ghost: “Con Clavi Con Dio”
[audio:https://alarm-magazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/Ghost_Con_Clavi_Con_Dio.mp3|titles=Ghost: “Con Clavi Con Dio”]

Sweden’s Ghost is a purposefully mysterious sextet propagating an overtly Satanic message. With a tongue-in-cheek press release making bold claims about subverting the minds of adolescents who have a “void in their life,” it’s tempting to dismiss Opus Eponymous as ironic kitsch. However, the songs themselves are wildly catchy and full of melodic twists in the school of King Diamond‘s 1980s compositions.