For a band that (supposedly) no one knows anything about, GHOST are the talk of the town. Formed back in 2008 they slowly but surely built a cult following in the rarefied environs of the underground. Since the release of their debut album, “Opus Eponymous”(2010), however, their rise has been nothing but meteoric and the swiftness of their success would give most bands a nosebleed. 

 

With this third album called “Meliora” (Latin for better) GHOST don’t exactly push their sound into pastures new, but they do take it to the gym, trim away some of the fat (meaning keyboard flooded anthems) of their last one, “Infestissumam”(2013), and make it altogether much more muscular. In fact, the major strength of this outing is the return of the riff (“From The Pinnacle To The Pit”, Majesty”) and the power of the message, crafted to capture, channel and reflect the tumultuous times you can clearly see depicted on the cover. “Meliora” is not a concept album with a story line, but a futuristic, dystopian tale about the end of days, placed back in the end of 20’s when Fritz Lang created his famous black and white silent movie “Metropolis”. Now imagine that solemn motion picture, combined with some tongue-in-cheek borrowings from movies like “Silence Of The Lambs” and “Carrie” (“Cirice”) and you will start getting the bigger picture. 

 

It’d be unfair to focus solely on the sensational elements of GHOST. Yes, they do exist in the twilight zone between music and theatre, but the buzz surrounding them has little to do with the music. The quality of their dark, occult, doomy and atmospheric songs suggest that whoever they are, they have been doing this for some time. Listen to “He Is”. It may sound like ABBA outtake, but is intimidating and evil beneath the surface. In fact it was written back in 2007 and it wasn’t written for GHOST, but some friends from IN SOLITUDE and the late Selim Lemouchi of DEVIL’S BLOOD suggested it should be recorded as GHOST song. Another song, “Spoksonat” seems to be an introduction to a song on the next album. 

 

Ultimately, though, GHOST’s biggest achievement in “Meliora” is that in a world full of bands imitating other bands they sound like no one else. Whether or not that’s a good thing is a matter of opinion. If you never liked them, this album probably won’t change your mind, but don’t blame them as sell-outs, pointing out thousands lesser known bands as more consistent, just because they are lesser known. Even if there were Black Widows, Covens and Lucifers before Black Sabbath, we still love Black Sabbath, because they do have something all those bands did not. For all the ghoul fans out there this is quite possible their best record to date.