Ghost is back : time for resurrection

After almost a year's silence and a tour finale immortalized in the cinema, Ghost are back with a bang with Skeletà, a new album scheduled for release on April 25. With a new leader, a new single and an aesthetic as polished as ever, the Swedes open a new chapter with mystery and symbolism.

Time seemed to stand still for Ghost fans. Since the discovery in cinemas of Rite Here Rite Now, released worldwide on June 23, 2024, and released on DVD last December, they've been feverishly eager to discover who might be hiding behind that closed door.

The half-live, half-fiction feature was recorded during the last two sold-out concerts of the Re-Imperatour at the Kia Forum in Los Angeles. And the final scene was the talk of the town. While everyone was hoping to discover the worthy successor to Papa IV, the band once again played the mystery card, leaving everyone wanting more.

On the other hand, this finale was the occasion to unveil The Future Is A Foreign Land, a previously unreleased studio track that completes the trilogy begun with Kiss the Go-Goat and Mary on a Cross. Heralded as a “lost” track from the Papa Nihil era, it brings the film to a close with a sixties vibe and a prophetic touch that's right up there with the times.

We’re Satanized

We had to wait many months for the world to finally discover the first single from this new album, Skeletà, after an intriguing staging in the middle of the Las Vegas Strip. Carried along by a hypnotic rhythm and harmonies as meticulous as ever, Satanized continues Ghost's theatrical, melodic vein, flirting with the codes of 80s heavy metal.

The black-and-white video follows the descent into hell of a man in the grip of demonic possession, between visions, troubled confession and gritty religious symbolism. Directed by Amir Chamdin, it ends with the long-awaited revelation of Papa V Perpetua and his ghouls, ushering in a new era for the band.

Fun fact for the keenest eyes: the musician monks seen in the clip are none other than the real unmasked ghouls, hidden beneath black robes with a kitschy false tonsure in medieval Benedictine style.

Scheduled for release on April 25, Skeletà promises to be a new act in the Ghostian mass. While the band remains faithful to its taste for secrecy, a few hints hint at an album with a darker, perhaps more organic universe, where the themes of death, transformation and spiritual heritage could well be at the heart of the narrative. The name of the album itself, halfway between Latin and Italian, evokes bones, vanished flesh, what remains once everything else has been erased.

We'll have to wait a few more weeks to discover what this new album has in store for us - which leaves French fans little time to soak it up before the Skeleton Tour hits France. The band will play the LDLC Arena in Lyon on April 26 and the Zénith in Toulouse on the 27th, before settling down at the Accor Arena in Paris on May 13. Three dates that form a perfect trinity to celebrate the start of a new papal reign.