The Swedish group, whose last album was number 5 in sales in France and which will be one of the headliners of the next Hellfest, filled the Accor Arena in Paris on April 18. On the program, a total show that dazzled.
On November 28, 2011, a young Swedish group named Ghost performed their first Parisian concert at the Olympia as the opening act for a big name at the time, In Flames. Since then, the band has visited many venues in the capital, and when it was headlining, increasing the gauge each time: the Cigale in 2015, the Olympia, but this time in the spotlight, in 2017, the Zénith in 2019.
Monday, April 18, another big leap forward, it was downright the Accor Arena (ex-Bercy), 20,000 seats, which hosted the Scandinavians, with a new successful album, « Impera », ranked number 5 in sales in France, 2 in the United States, 1st in Germany, Sweden and Finland.
Suffice to say that Ghost had no interest, on this Easter Monday, in playing the phantom menace. But if we can accuse Tobias Forge, the singer, founder and boss of the group, of many evils, that of not knowing how to develop a show calibrated to the millimeter is not one of them. From 9 p.m. to 10:45 p.m., the spectators therefore attended a grandiose entertainment, not only musical but also visual. The master of ceremonies himself, during one of his many interventions, said: “Welcome to the show tonight. Then all you have to do is let yourself be guided…
Explosions and throwing confetti
For example, in this polychrome setting, with raised drums, a chorister and keyboardist also up high, the musicians, nicknamed the Nameless Ghouls, dressed all in black and sporting a sinister crypto-steampunk helmet evolving in front of gigantic hangings representing cathedral stained glass windows. Or these many effects, explosions, flames, jets of confetti, which dot the ritual, sorry, the concert. And then there’s Tobias Forge, whose stage name is now father. Emeritus IV, alternately dressed in a tail coat, a sovereign pontiff outfit, or a sequined jacket, his face heavily made up. Wherever the gaze gate, the photon flux is intense.
And then, of course, there’s the music, always extremely melodic metal. Starting with the excellent “Kaisarion”, from the last album, to open the ball, followed by the no less good “Rats”, from the previous opus, on which 20,000 people chant the « wo oh oh oh » of the chorus.