Ghost - IMPERIA Album Review

(The beautiful album art for Ghost's new album IMPERIA 2022)

Okay holy fucking shit let’s talk about Ghost, because I've gone so far down the rabbit hole I've personally shaken hands with the white rabbit. Their new album IMPERIA is a genre bending experience, featuring sounds of classic rock, Iron Maiden-esque doubled guitars and such strong meaty bass and drum beats with some amazing sonic additions that make their music beautifully unique. The new album seems like a total critic knockout with brilliant reviews coming in across the board, and honestly I'm about to give it a similar shining review.

To me this album is a conceptual record of two sides, rise and fall, both of which are fucking brilliant, with themes of totalitarian power and worship, and the abuse of power and cultish devotion. They're playing with some brilliant concepts and smashed it out of the park in my opinion, so lets go track by track and see what's going down!

The opening track Imperium sets a really cinematic opening tone, opening the operatic doors to the first side of the record, leading perfectly into the opening track.

Kaisarion was a brilliant opener, beautiful really driving beats that created an amazing motif that smashes on and on throughout, the constant chanting of the tracks name feeling more like pagan worship than anything else and upped the ante for Spillways, which was also a really strong track, with some really nice riffs and good punchy tone. The vocals from lead singer Papa Emeritus are really strong and quite unique for a rock band, with tinges of American and Swedish influences which I really enjoy.

Call me little Sunshine and Hunters Moon are both stunning songs that I love. Sonically Sunshine is almost perfect, made with beautiful musical force and precision, with some great lyricism and more brilliant delivery that drags you in and throws you around, an experience I'm all but too familiar with. Hunters Moon takes all that’s good in Sunshine and makes it better, the lyrics are alluring and threatening, one of the most perfectly sonic tracks I’ve heard with some amazing technical work within it. I'm sure its one I’ll have on repeat for a while, and ill never forget the genuine goose bumps I had as soon at the chorus hit, it was pure musical bliss.

Watcher in the Sky seems to be a nod to some old rock ballads, and being a fan of good old classic rock it sounds brilliant to me. The drum panning is beautifully perfected between ears to create a cinematic effect that never fails to slam home just before your punched by the main riff again, Ghost know what their doing. Although it gets a little tiresome at the end its still a pleasure to hear, with the fade out at the end signing the ending of the first act of this rock opera.

Dominion is a great operatic track, bridging between the two sides of the album, creating a darker overtone as we slowly ease into the next track and the more dark side of the record, the fall needed after the rise.

Twenties starts with similar horns used in Dominion, before slamming into an amazing breakdown beat, amazing use of the double bass pedal to create some brilliant smashing blast beats and pretty interesting lyrics that seem to be an attack on materialism that was once suggested in the side before, further pushing that awesome motif of the sudden death of a society. I like the ‘Rats!’ like delivery that's very reminiscent of their previous album. I love how these songs are continually growing somehow, morphing into different beasts as they move along and growing in their own wild ways.

A real stand out track to me is Darkness at the Heart of My Love, which starts and sounds brand new and fresh, with a really interesting mix of classic rock and new wave electric. I like the acoustic sound to it with the driving beat, I like the more stripped down feeling to this track before it’s swing into this really lovely drawling ballad-esque chorus before going into another verse, I love a lot about this track. Ooh and I love a ride cymbal based drum beat so this was a real feast for the ears, paired with those solos wailing the vocal melody it really made a perfect feeling of rise and fall. The main motif is really slamming through, the rise and fall of this song is devastating and I'm really loving every second of it.

Griftwood is based around a nice little repetitive plucked riff that sounds really good that builds into a strong beat. I'm a big guitar geek, and guitar wise this record does no wrong, again being very reminiscent of an old rock and roll ballad and has a really nice clean feeling to it. I feel like a nice strong chorus would really add to the track, but I respect the fact that that sort of move was already used earlier on in. The final guitar solo is a good touch and feels decently built up to and I like the mild octave shift at the end as a final pretty flourish.

Bite of Passage starts off foreboding, I like the more sinister opening like the opening shots to a saw film. Then, suddenly I realised it acts as a genuine passage to the final track Respite on the Spitalfeilds. I really love that effect of flow between tracks, that rise and fall is really emphasised throughout this album and its just delightful.

The final song has a nice build to it, and seems to be reeling me in slowly as the verse continues, I’m begging for a massive ender and oh yeah, I got what I wanted. A really awesome head bopping and choppy bridge before another strong chorus. As far as lyrics are concerned we will go softly into the night is a great one that really encapsulates the emotion of this final chapter. After this civilisation failed, they seep quietly into the cracks never to be seen again. THAT SILENCE INTO THE GUITAR SOLO WAS INSANE, this feels like heavier Pink Floyd track and i really dig how this track is ending. The second verse also feels like it’s reeling me back in which I’m loving, choppy bridge really helps the build in the second half before once again seeping into the chorus beautifully. I’m sure this will absolutely destroy live, killer!

(Ghost performing live in 2022 - Image courtesy of Ultimateclassicrock.com)

TL;DR - This is an album that tells a story over an amazing 45 minute runtime, the operatic flow makes for a really stunning experience of rise and fall, dominion and collapse, and has completely sold me on Ghost and their unique style and delivery. This album is one that I’m going to be enjoying for a very long time, and I'm sure get me to fork out for some tickets the next time they're in the UK

Rating - 9.5/10