Ghost achieved great success with their latest album, Prequelle, but frontman Tobias Forge says that he wants the band’s next LP to “feel different”.
The Swedish progressive metal act achieved new heights in 2018, headlining arenas in the United States for the first time. Currently, they’re opening for Metallica on an extensive European tour that just kicked off earlier this month.
In a new interview with Revolver, Forge (aka Cardinal Copia) admitted that the band’s 2018 album was “a little ballad heavy,” and added, “I want to make a different record from Prequelle. I want it to feel different. If I dare to say heavier, people think that it’s going to be Mercyful Fate all the way … but I definitely have a darker, heavier record in mind.”
(Read: Buy Tickets to Ghost’s Upcoming Tour Dates)
He continued by talking about his evolution as a lyricist, explaining, “I grew up with metal. It’s in my DNA, so I can formulate death-metal lyrics easily. But I try not to repeat myself on that. I like to make the Metallica comparison — where Kill ‘Em All is a little bit more crude, on Ride the Lightning they started writing about more real things. It had more depth. I’m not going change everything and just talk about politics, but I believe that if you have people’s attention, you have responsibility to weigh with your words a little.”
Forge previously stated that Ghost would likely hit the studio in early 2020 and release a new album later that year.
(Read: Ghost Turn Brooklyn’s Barclays Center Into a House of Worship)
Elsewhere in the interview, Forge revealed that Ghost are working on a feature-length film, but that it wouldn’t be a biopic. “Most films about bands are biographical, and I see no reason to tell our story yet,” he remarked, adding that it would likely be a fictional story set around concert.
In between legs on their European tour with Metallica, Ghost will fly to the States later this month to play the Sonic Temple and Chicago Open Air festivals on May 17th and 18th, respectively. After the European trek wraps in August, they’ll embark on another North American tour leg on September 13th in Bakersfield, California. Get tickets here.