In their largest local show to date, Swedish metal band Ghost turned in a positively slaytanic performance Saturday night at St. Paul’s Xcel Energy Center.
Led by 44-year-old singer/songwriter/majordomo Tobias Forge — who currently uses Papa V Perpetua as his stage name — Ghost kept the crowd of about 11,500 deeply under their spell, thanks in part to a mobile phone ban that kept all eyes on the stage. (Concertgoers had to keep their phones in a secure sleeve that was unlocked at the end of the show.)
And Ghost gave the audience plenty to see. They perform in full costume and masks, dressed as demonic, rocking skeletons. Forge and his eight-piece band, who are known collectively as the Nameless Ghouls, go deep into Satanic imagery on stage as well as in their lyrics. The backing vocalists wear bat wings and one of their most warmly received songs Saturday night was called “Satanized.”
It’s all tongue in cheek, of course, and comes off as campy, not spooky, much like KISS and Ozzy Osbourne. And Forge has a delightfully twisted sense of humor and a certain rakish charm. Early on, he asked the cheering crowd: “Are you going to show us what love means? Are you going to knock us up?”
Ghost is also much more than your average metal band. Yes, there are enough loud guitars and headbanging to qualify for the genre, but Ghost aren’t afraid to expand beyond their boundaries to include everything from ’70s arena rock to show tunes. Their songs are often reminiscent of the late Jim Steinman, the theatrical songwriter best known for his work with Meat Loaf and Bonnie Tyler.
“Call Me Little Sunshine,” “The Future Is a Foreign Land” and “Cirice” all flirted with doomy alt-rock with a side of Pink Floyd. The aforementioned “Satanized” and “He Is” sounded like Queen at their grandest and poppiest. Oh, and the audience cheered for the cowbell that fueled “Umbra,” one of the numbers from the group’s sixth and most recent album, “Skeletá.”
While often ridiculous, the two-hour concert was also a heck of a lot of fun. It helped that Forge and company aren’t afraid to lean into sheer goofiness in a way most acts at the arena level rarely do. All that, plus it wrapped just after 10 p.m., giving the fans the chance to get up early Sunday morning and not go to church.
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