#copia with glasses doing old man shit my beloved | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

playwiththesire · 10 months

Text

still thinking about ryuzato’s gerardsonaverse. rat king my beloved. rat king x mary butch girlfriends im crying. dirty butch girlfriends fucking copia while rat king has their period dONT LOOK AT ME

anyway. explicit, 2527 words. ao3 link

Copia was exhausted from giving sermons and hearing confessions, sitting in meetings, running errands for Sister Imperator, and artfully dodging Papa Nihil to avoid being scolded for whatever he was doing wrong in the old man's ghostly white eyes. Closing his doors, he was more than relieved to unbutton his cassock and wrap himself up in a simple robe, because it was moreso laziness that kept him from bending over to put on pajama pants than the tiredness. Ruffling his hair free from the gelled combed-back style, he sat down at his mirror to wipe the black off his upper lip first.

Surprisingly, when he saw movement in the window behind him, he didn't flinch. When he first moved into his new suite, it would often take him by surprise, only to learn that there were Ghouls walking around the courtyard at night. He knew better than to stick his little nose into their business. So once his lips were clean, he dampened his rag again. Before it even touched the dark circle under his eye, it dropped from his hand.

Copia finally screamed when a loud bang tapped against the glass hard. He stumbled to his feet and knocked the stool over, and. of course, he had to trip over it. His cheekbone collided with his floor, and though his vision blurred, his hands pushed him up as much as he could. "What-" He tried to blink his vision back to normal, but relying on his hearing came more in clutch when the lock on the window jiggled.

The culprit jimmying the lock open with a coat hanger was none other than Mary fucking Goore. Again. Only this time, they weren't alone. And it seemed like they didn't have a care in Earth or Hell whether or not Copia saw them.

Scrambling back to his feet, Copia stumbled to the window and pressed his hands against it. "You may not enter!"

Mary pouted. "But I missed you!" he whined through the glass, and gave his best puppy-mutt eyes. A mutt that had rolled through a butcher's shop, no doubt. Their friend hung back with their greasy arms crossed. "C'mon, Cardi. I'll tuck you in."

Copia should say no. He couldn't count the number of times Mary had committed B&E, and he knew that they were just gonna find some crack in the wall to squeeze through somehow. It would have been amusing to watch them get caught, but...that friend. The grime that drenched their body made the surprisingly soft features of their face stand out more. The eyes. The sweet little pout, the grumpy pose as they nudged the tip of their shoe into the grass. Shit, the Cardinal was entranced. When their gazes finally met, the friend wiggled their fingers on one hand in greeting, and cracked a half-assed smile.

Mary didn't need a verbal confirmation when they read his face, and finally pushed the window up. "I knew you'd say yes!" Eagerly, Mary hopped up with their legs swinging and held Copia's face to smack a kiss on his lips. "Hey, dollface."

"You smell like low tide." Copia stared them up and down with disdain, even if the bats in his belly fluttered at the sight of them. But he pushed Mary aside to offer a hand to the friend, helping them through. "Scusi, bella. Is this creature bothering you?" Their hand was slippery and difficult to pull, and admittedly, the slimy feeling made him wince. But their touch was still warm, and by the time they were in the room and on their feet, they were practically pressed up against his chest. Their face was at the same level as his, and his whole face flushed red.

"I like your eye," they murmured, and pressed the pad of their index finger against his left cheek.

Mary lightly tugged Copia's earlobe to snap him out of his trance. "Copes-" He shuddered at the bad pet name. "This is Ratty. I thought they'd like you."

"R-Ratty?" Copia blinked. "Oh. Yes, well- eh, yes. I have been known to...well, it's a whole thing. I'm working on this-s story, no, a song. About plague and a metaphor of-"

Ratty just nodded along, humming every few moments to remind him that they were listening.

"Ah, widespread religion is infectious, see, and some followers are like the rats that carried diseases...but I'm not saying you're diseased!" He eyed their oily arms and dirty shirt; he could see why Mary was drawn to them.

Ratty shook their head. "I'm not," they confirmed. "I'm just feelin' a little unwell."

"What?" Copia glanced back at Mary.

Mary took Ratty's hand and glided them over to sit on the edge of Copia's bed. "Calm down, your unholy eminence, it's just cramps. I wanted them to have a safe place to sleep tonight."

Copia brushed the wrinkles out of his robe, but ended up smearing some grease stains over the cotton. His lips pressed together tightly, and tucked it away in his mind as a later problem. "As man of faith, I do have a duty to aid those in need."

"Widespread faith?" Ratty's shoulders shimmied a little, teasing him.

It was a contradiction, he knew, with his luxurious rooms in a luxurious palace of a church. "I...I suppose so."

Mary guided Copia to sit down as well, and Copia's instinct was always to tilt his head up to await a little kiss from Mary. Mary obliged, and Copia rested a gentle hand on Ratty's back. He rubbed in slow circles, pleased to see that their face relaxed. But he felt a little wrong when something in his pelvis sparked listening to them hum in relief.

"That's nice," Ratty assured him, and shamelessly took his hand to press against the front of their hip. "Right there, please."

Mary shuffled in behind them and rested their chin on their shoulder. "Copia's gonna take good care of you," they whispered, smiling. "He's so attentive."

Yes. Yes, he was. He hadn't planned on taking any lovers to bed tonight, but he couldn't turn them away. He couldn't stop touching them, he didn't mind them leaving traces all over his sheets. The deep, earthy, salty tang of them drew him in closer. He didn't mind Mary's blood-crusty fingers suddenly combing through his hair, and he leaned in as Ratty turned their head and let him kiss them gently. "I'll ease your pain," he whispered, half in his professionally dulcet tone. "Unburden your troubles with me."

"Should I call you Cardinal?" they whispered against his lips.

"If you'd like." A sharp hiss quickly filled his lungs when Ratty guided his hand lower, between their legs. He quickly got the message and attempted to lay them down, only to find that Mary wouldn't budge.

Mary brushed a thumb over his cheek affectionately. "Just let 'em lean on me." They smiled when Ratty's neck craned back, and their head rested on their shoulder. "They're aching real bad, Cardinal."

Copia picked up what the trouble was quickly enough. And by the looks of Mary's mouth, they already tried to ease the cramps before they got here. Figures that he'd get sloppy seconds, but he didn't mind. He was more than happy to treat this fallen angel.

"Wanna feel how good you are." Once Mary got Ratty's pants down past their knees, their legs spread open and revealed a surprisingly clean-shaven pussy, still dripping blood. "Please, help me, Cardinal?"

Now, usually Copia avoided letting church-goers use his title as a kink, but he had exceptions. One bat of their lashes and he was two fingers deep inside them. Moving slow at first, he pumped them in and out of her until they were red-slick, and he buried them as deep as they could go, scissoring them wider.

Ratty keened and bucked their hips up, nodding. They kept a steady hand on his wrist and parted their lips, inviting Mary to slip their tongue in their mouth. Their whines pitched high in the top of their throat, wordlessly begging for more.

Copia couldn't get a good enough angle sitting. He stood up again to hover over the both of them and get three fingers in, now, to curl them better inside their cavern. He was humming softly from his chest, and very aware of the flame burning in his thighs. It almost felt wrong to get so hard from this, but Mary's impure smirk assured him that it was so right.

"Cardinal, could you help a little more?" Ratty bit their lip and arched their chest forward. Copia got a good look at the muscle tank now: All Hail The Rat King. How apt. The knotted tails would have skeeved him out more if all of his blood wasn't in his dick.

With his fingers still moving, though, his thumb pressed against their clit in quick motions. His eyes turned downward to watch himself fingerfuck them, and his l'appele du vide was making sense of why Mary ate them out before they both got here. His mouth watered, and shame itched in his stomach. No, he couldn't. Besides, his room was filled with their shaky panting and whining, so he must have been doing well enough of a job. That didn't mean that it was easy to ignore the cock eagerly pulsing between his legs, however. "My dearest-" His voice cracked. He tried to ignore it. "May I fuck you?"

Ratty didn't hesitate on nodding. "Pull me back." They slid down to the center of the bed, and Copia crawled with them. He peeled their shirt off their body, and nodded at Mary in silent demand that they undress as well. He shed his robe and finally took the plunge to press Ratty's and his chest together, getting himself deliciously dirty. He kissed them like his sanity was slipping away and their arms slipped all over their waist.

"Turn over." Mary leaned back and helped Ratty on their knees, legs spread and hips bucked like an animal. Mary pet their head and neck, grinning down at them. It seemed like Ratty knew just what to do when they took Mary's cock in their mouth. Mary winked at Copia. "You can have some next."

Copia huffed at them and leaned over Ratty, kissing their shoulder before he mounted them and plunged his cock in deep. Their walls were so soft and hot, he shuddered in pleasure and couldn't help but thrust into them again.

Ratty's voice vibrated hard around Mary's head, making them grunt in return. Ratty only freed their mouth to look over their shoulder and nod eagerly, and let Copia's thrusts help set the pace as they took as much of Mary into their mouth as they could. Mary's hips just worked a gentler rhythm, not wanting to choke them.

Copia reached around to keep rubbing soothing motions between their hips as he fucked them carnally, but as they cried out in desperation, he returned to circling their clit until they were practically screaming, tightening around his cock and absolutely shaking. For a moment, Copia felt panic rise as he feared that he pushed them too far, but they let Mary's dick go again and wiggled their hips again eagerly, touching themself in satisfaction. "He is good, Mare."

"I know. Get him on his back." Mary laughed softly and tipped Ratty's chin up to kiss them just as sloppily as before.

Ratty didn't even need to move for Copia to obey and slide forward, laying down next to them. His cock was a deep, glistening red, with only a rivulet of precum cutting through the blood. He could only stare for a few seconds before Mary was sitting on it, grinning down at him.

"You missed this, didn't you?" Mary moaned, arching their back with their legs spread wide open for Copia to get a good look. Apparently, Copia was slick enough for him, since there was no resistance going into his ass. "You missed me riding you, unholy eminence. You missed the way I look when you stuff me fucking silly."

"M-Mary..." Copia's eyes rolled back, but his hand scrambled to grip at Ratty's arm. "Bellisima, how do you feel? Are...are you alright?" He felt a little stupid with the way the mattress bounced from their weight, with Mary's rough motions.

Ratty's fingers brushed over the forming bruise on Copia's face from falling on the floor earlier. "I think you're the pretty one," they purred, and their fingertips dragged along their lips. Bloody fingertips from overstimulating themself.

When in Rome, right? Copia closed his eyes, like that would make succumbing to his any better, and let their fingers press against his tongue. It was filthy, it was sort of humiliating, and Copia wanted more. A squeak escaped him, and he grabbed for their thigh instead. "I need you, Rat. I need...por favore. Use my mouth."

"I knew it." Mary threw his head back with a smug moan, and gripped Copia's ribs. "Drink up, Cardi. Trust me, it's delicious."

Copia didn't have much time to respond with Ratty throwing a leg without a care over on the other side of Copia's face. Their thighs stretched out more in a lazy spread-eagle, and they leaned forward to kiss Mary again. Their cunt pressed hard against his lips, his nose brushing their taint as he sucked on their folds. His own cum was dripping back onto his face, making their taste more sour, but he couldn't stop anymore. It was too good, he never knew he loved being used like this so much. Without a second thought, he spanked their ass hard, just once, and reveled in the yelp they let out.

Ratty bit down on Mary's lip and jerked them off; it didn't take much longer until they were cumming all over Copia's happy trail with that guttural growl that he so famously used instead of singing. But it was a pleasing noise, a feral signal of a well-fucked out gutter rat.

Ratty arched their back as they shared Mary's cum together, and though Copia couldn't see, his other senses were so amplified between taste and smell and Mary still clenching tight around him that he couldn't stop himself from cumming deep inside them. He spanked Ratty one more time before begging for air, and as Ratty pulled up, the blood left his chin and cheeks cooler. Licking his lips, his cheeks burned in glorious shame.

"Lay with me," Copia begged. "Stay."

Mary patted his stomach and wiggled off his dick to flop down on top of him, earning an annoyed oof from the cardinal. "As you wish."

"You bum," he grumbled, but was easily pacified when Ratty cuddled up against his shoulder. They kissed all over the side of his face, from his jaw up to his temple sweetly. It was apparent that nobody was going to clean up, so he sighed and let his muscles ease. His hand wandered again to take Ratty's, and he found himself smiling again. "Can I keep your friend.

At once, Mary grunted "No", while Ratty giggled with a "Yes."

#rat king #mary goore #cardinal copia #ghost #repugnant #thats all im tagging nothing else to see here mcr fans

3 notes · View notes

slavghoul · 5 years

Text

Interview with Tobias from this week’s Kerrang UK

Well, my PressReader subscription finally came in handy. The article is pretty long, so it’s under the cut. Enjoy!

Their Kerrang! Award-winning fourth album PREQUELLE took GHOST from cult concern to global superstars. But the arena-filling congregation of fans is growing restless for clues as to what’s next for Cardinal Copia, Papa Nihil and the ministry. Let TOBIAS FORGE, then, take you behind the mask and into the making of – and future plans for – a band like no other…

The Wamu Theater, Thursday 19 September. Last night this venue – attached to the side of Centurylink Field, the home of the Seattle Seahawks NFL team – played host to the ‘Groover from Vancouver’ himself, Bryan Adams. Tomorrow it’s the turn of the Pacific Northwest city’s beloved sons, grunge legends Alice In Chains, for their last show in support of their sixth album, Rainier Fog. Tonight, though, Seattle gets the latest ritual on Ghost’s extensive Ultimate Tour Named Death.

Despite this morbid moniker, the scene inside the building is one of lively activity, with techs rushing around to finish the show’s elaborate staging. The house lights illuminate the stained glass window backdrop, while the seating, flat on the floor and sweeping upwards towards the back, furthers the illusion we’re in a vast church. Just then, Tobias Forge, the man whose job it is to address tonight’s 5,000-strong congregation appears. K! doesn’t notice him at first given the ninjalike silence of his approach, but there’s an intensity to his presence in these make-or-break moments of preparation.

“I’m interested in tour production, so I get to know a lot of these things,” he offers matter-of-factly. “I’m sure I only get to know about 40 per cent of it, but I notice if things aren’t in place.”

As a nine-year-old child, Tobias used to watch the documentary 25x5: The Continuing Adventures Of The Rolling Stones on repeat. The film charts the rock legends’ genesis in 1962 and their steep, heady ascent to becoming the biggest band in the world, circa their 1989 album Steel Wheels. Tobias considers their subsequent Bridges To Babylon Tour (1997-1998), which made more than $274 million and became the second-highest grosser of all time, to be the greatest ever piece of rock staging, and he was evidently taking notes even then. As a result of the level of professionalism he aspires to, you get the distinct impression he’s not a man who suffers fools gladly in this setting – an idea he doesn’t go to great pains to dispel.

“I want to know who’s in the shit today,” he explains. “Who has been put in the situation where his or her job is compromised, because I don’t want to start yelling if it’s a case of, ‘Oh my truck didn’t arrive in time today,’ because then I’ll know what the problem is. If you want to be a good boss, it’s very important you keep things on your radar.

“I’ve definitely got into trouble over the years by being too nice to people and giving them too much slack,” he continues, surveying the operation. “When you do that it’s like with dogs: if you don’t tell them what the rules are, they start making up their own. That sounds horrible, but there are 40 people on this tour, so there has to be a line and a curriculum. I’m adamant about getting my vision through, especially now we’re in this transitional phase between theatres and arenas.”

This increase in scale reflects the continued upswing in Ghost’s popularity, which has seen them go from misunderstood cult band to metal superstar status in the space of less than a decade. Despite this success, Tobias clearly isn’t taking anything for granted. Ghost haven’t played Seattle for three years, but this time around they’re doing two shows in Washington State, the other being the one they played at the Toyota Center in Kennewick two days ago, which has a capacity of 6,000 – almost eight per cent of the city’s 80,000 population.

Tobias may or may not be referring to that show when he discusses his unbridled joy at recently playing in an unnamed city that doesn’t get a lot of large-scale entertainment coming through town, save for appearances from KISS, singer-songwriter Pat Benatar and a touring production of the musical Wicked in recent years.

“None of us had ever heard of this place, and I’m pretty good at geography,” he explains. “But I loved being the singular moment somewhere, instead of the seventh show they’d had there on that particular week.”

And while Tobias describes the resulting night as “phenomenal”, earlier in the day there was an “unforeseen curveball” when the company who were meant to be selling merch at the show pulled out at the last minute, citing Ghost’s satanic image for their decision. This was, of course, a throwback to earlier shows, such as one in the Texan city of Odessa in 2018, when a minister attempted to dissuade people from attending because of the band’s threat to the morals of good God-fearing people. Unsurprisingly, this outburst resulted in an increase in ticket sales.

Despite this more recent – and, these days, more unusual – blip, Tobias’ desire to cover as much ground as possible on tour this time around is inspired by his heroes in Iron Maiden and Metallica, who have long provided him with the blueprints for achieving and navigating monumental success. In this case, the lesson he’s putting into practice is that every location Ghost visit, without exception, should be treated the same.

“The most important thing to me on this tour is that we bring the same production to everyone,” he says. “They all get the full-fucking monty, whether they’re in Sioux Falls [South Dakota] or New York.”

The walls backstage at the Wamu Theater are lined with Seahawks jerseys, personalised with the names of acts that have performed here, including The 1975, Bastille and Nas, and the rockier contingent featuring twenty one pilots, Halestorm and Dropkick Murphys. Various rooms lead off from these labyrinthine corridors, providing sizeable production offices for the band’s tour management and crew, all of who wear dapper black shirts, trousers and braces affixed with silver broaches of Ghost’s upside down cross insignia. They affectionately address Cardinal Copia as ‘Cardi C’ when he appears later for a fan meet-and-greet. Here, too, are the dressing rooms for the headliners and the opening act for this tour, San Antonio rockers Nothing More.

On all of the doors is a distinct A4 page, the day sheet for this show, which not only details what’s happening, where and when, but also includes a different tongue-in-cheek quote for the occasion. Today, for example, in recognition of the touring party travelling overnight to Vancouver for tomorrow’s show at the city’s Pacific Coliseum, we get this gem courtesy of Britney Spears: ‘The cool thing about being famous is travelling. I have always wanted to travel across seas, like to Canada and stuff.’

Tobias, of course, has actually travelled over oceans to be here. Nowadays he lives in Stockholm, the capital of his native Sweden, with his wife and their 11-year-old twins, but he was born in Linköping, the country’s seventh largest city, where the steeple of its 13th century cathedral dominated the skyline. That’s not what the young Tobias was fixating on, though. Instead, aged five, when he already knew he wanted to transform into another person, he’d stand outside his childhood home and gaze down the street. The sun always seemed to be hovering between the buildings at the end, like a fixed but intangible hand beckoning him to get on a plane and go somewhere else and be someone else.

“The days and options seemed limitless,” he recalls today. “For some reason I always thought of the world as being there for the taking, even though I didn’t have any access to that world.”

In spite of this, he felt a deep affinity with his heroes, like the Rolling Stones and Queen, who also came from places you didn’t automatically associate with being breeding grounds for rock gods.

“I felt similar to them, even if they grew up in Dartford [Rolling Stones] or an island off the coast of Africa [Zanzibar, the birthplace of Freddie Mercury]. I, too, felt out of touch with my surroundings, and knew I had a higher calling.”

Twenty-three years later, in 2009, Tobias realised he hadn’t made much headway in heeding this call. He’d been in bands from a young age, from death metallers Repugnant to alt-rockers Magna Carta Cartel. The latter featured Martin Persner and Simon Söderberg, who’d later appear as Nameless Ghouls in the first incarnation of Ghost. Söderberg, along with some other ex-ghouls, is now embroiled in an ongoing lawsuit with Tobias over what they suggest are the rightful shares of profits they’re owed from their time in the band. Tobias doesn’t volunteer any information on this topic today, which is perhaps understandable given the considerable column inches already dedicated to it.

Regardless, none of those early bands provided Tobias with the success he needed to, say, quit the day job. He had then been working in a call centre, aiding people having trouble with their mobile phones. Despite spending his childhood endlessly sketching elaborate stage designs and lighting rigs, he still has little interest in technology, particularly mobile phones. Back in 2009 his personal life was happy and satisfying, having welcomed children with his then-girlfriend – now wife – though this potent reminder of the finite time we have drew his attention to the area of his life he recognised as falling short.

“I had an epiphany,” he explains, raising his hands as if sizing up an imaginary canvas. “I found myself very far from the path, so decided in the limited time I have to invest everything in the one thing out of all my [professional] options I believed most in, which was Ghost. I understood wholeheartedly what it was, the music and the image, and felt I could do it without my vanity coming in, because I didn’t like how I looked in pictures or the sound of my own voice. But this would be fiction, so that was fucking cool. So I took all of my eggs and put them in one basket and was back on track. For the first time in my fucking life I was really focused.”

For evidence of the dividends this paid, you need only look at the fact that just a year later, with the release of their 2010 debut album Opus Eponymous, Ghost exploded on to the scene, taking the first step to becoming metal’s hottest new hope.

Further proof of this focus comes today from interviewing Tobias somewhere there’s a screen showing news channel CNN. We’re in the band’s pre-show warm-up space, which is decked out with guitars, keyboards and an electric drum kit he removes the stool from to sit in the centre of the room. He admits if he were in a hotel room now, he could easily watch CNN for 24 hours straight. He doesn’t so much as turn his head to look at it now, though, giving his full attention to the interview at hand. Even at 38, an age he says his kids consider “as old as shit”, he remains remarkably boyish looking. His dark and piercing eyes, however, belong to an older soul – and it may be K!’s imagination – but they appear to moisten at several points during this hour-long chat, particularly when connecting the dots between his past ambition and what he’s achieved today.

“I’m trying to recreate a lot of things that aren’t necessarily real,” he says mysteriously. “In my head they’re real, and I’ve been given this fantastic carte blanche where I don’t have to sit in a fucking call centre anymore and am applauded for getting to be someone else. It’s perfect for someone like me who has a fundamental problem with functioning normally in society. If it wasn’t for the fact I was doing this, I would be completely useless.”

When Ghost signed with their American record label, their mythology wasn’t the deep well of fascination it is today. In fact, there was nothing to it at all. They had a unique aesthetic and a sound that didn’t necessarily go with that look, something that would wrong-foot new listeners in the early days, but Tobias didn’t have an answer to why Ghost were the way they were.

“They said the music was great but asked, ‘What’s the story? What’s the biography?’” recalls Tobias. “I said there was no biography because there was no story to tell. I wanted people to throw themselves into the vision and make up their own. But in the end I had to come up with one, which is second nature to me now. Even [Norwegian black metallers] Mayhem had a story. In the early ‘90s, before the internet, there was something that compelled us to want to find out more and listen to their music.”

This mythology Tobias has developed over the years was furthered with the release of Ghost’s fourth album, last year’s Grammynominated Prequelle, which introduced Tobias’ latest incarnation, Cardinal Copia, a character fans have come to love if the number of $40 plush toys sold at the merch desk tonight is any indication. More recently, a web series on Youtube has added to the intrigue, with the latest episode harking back to 1969, when a young Cardinal Nihil was fronting Ghost at the launch of their EP, Seven Inches Of Satanic Panic. That just so happens to be the band’s latest release in 2019, which will also be available as part of Prequelle Exalted, a limited collector’s edition of the album. Meanwhile, The Ultimate Tour Named Death has introduced the EP’S two new songs, Mary On A Cross and Kiss The Gogoat, to its set list.

While Ghost’s music has always tipped its papal tiara to the ‘60s, particularly its psychedelic leanings, the latter song in particular sees them take this interest a step further. How much can we glean from them, then, with regards to where Ghost goes next? Not too much, as it turns out, according to Tobias, who suggests, as with the Youtube series, it’s a way to deepen the story of Ghost spanning from the ‘40s to the present day, without necessarily providing clues to the sound of album number five.

“It’s just there for shits and giggles,” he laughs, before revealing that Kiss The Go-goat, a song that’s been knocking around for some time, actually had the working title ‘The Throwback Single’. “I grew up listening to ‘60s music like the Rolling Stones and The Doors, as well as metal. People shouldn’t read too much into this direction, though. The next album is going to be something completely different from that.”

Can Tobias perhaps give two words to describe where, musically or thematically, album number five is heading?

“I’d choose the words ‘fifth’ and ‘album’,” he replies with a wry smile, before justifying what seems like a diversionary tactic. “I look at many fifth albums as a guide as to the urgency for what that record will need to be, with [Iron Maiden’s] Powerslave being a great example. By the fifth album you’re at a point in your career where you have this momentum built up, and you have the expectancy of people depending on you, so you have to put something special in those many spotlights. You need to step up and make a record that’s worth it and justifies all of these things.”

Who, then, can we expect to see fronting these rituals in future?

“I just know that person will have the name Papa Emeritus IV. It will be the fourth Papa Emeritus. But who that is, we don’t know yet.”

We’re not sure we believe him, so push for more. Might we see Cardinal Copia graduating to Papa status? The latest episode of the web series seems to indicate the ‘Sister Imperator’ character and Papa Nihil conceived a child. Wouldn’t that make him part of the papal bloodline?

“I think that what you will get over the next year are a lot of answers to a lot of questions,” offers Tobias, keeping things vague.

Like the question of whether Sister is pregnant? (In the latest ‘chapter’ of the web series, Sister attacks a woman at a Ghost show for smoking next to her).

“We don’t know that yet. It would blow my mind if she was now,” he says, clearly referring to the elderly Sister in the present day. This suggests she could well be with child back in 1969, though.

Has Tobias sketched what this new Papa will look like?

“Have you ever seen The Big Lebowski?” he asks by way of an answer, referencing the scene in the Coen brothers’ classic where Jeff Bridges’ character, The Dude, spots someone drawing on a notepad. When the man leaves the room with the piece of paper, The Dude rushes to scribble on to the page below to reveal the outline of what’s been drawn, only to discover it’s a doodle of a cock and balls. “It’s something along those lines.”

Sensing Tobias is in full evasion mode by this point, we change tack. Perhaps understanding his ambitions, and whether there’s a summit to them, can shed some light on the future – especially as he seems more focused on what Ghost’s next album will do rather than what it will sound like.

“I wouldn’t necessarily compare [my ambitions] to what the Rolling Stones have done, because that was a completely different time under completely different circumstances. For the last 40 years they have sold tickets because of nostalgic reasons, and maybe 40 years in the future there would be a nostalgia element for Ghost, but I can’t count on that.”

“I regard Metallica as colleagues and friends now, but they’re still Metallica,” he says of the thrash legends Ghost supported on their European stadium tour this summer. “I am an ambassador and they are presidents. But when I look to Metallica for influence, I’m looking at what they did in 1988. We’re on our fourth album, as they were on the Damaged Justice Tour, so the next stop is the Black Album.”

Spotting K!’s obvious joy at this admission, Tobias is quick to clarify exactly what he means by this.

“You have to make a responsible record,” he adds emphatically. “That doesn’t mean to expect riffs. It’s two different things – what the record sounds like and knowing to put yourself in the right spot at the right time. When I had nothing, and lived in a small apartment that cost very little because the ceiling leaked, the dream was to be able to live off making music. When I had kids that became even more important. Now it’s about something else. I’m responsible for showing my wife and my kids that all these years of waiting for me have been worth it. And that goes beyond money, because at the end of the day that’s just seasoning. One day my kids will be grown-up and I have to be able to show them that all this time playing rock shows had a real purpose.”

Of course, it doesn’t hurt that Tobias loves touring.

“I’m like a sailor,” he says. “I just love being on the ocean. I’ve not always been on tour, but I’ve always been a transient person. And the road to achieving all this is endless, just like the road I looked down when I was five seemed to me at the time.”

#Tobias Forge #the band ghost #interview #prequelle era

238 notes · View notes

tisthenightofthewitch · 4 years

Text

THE NEXT CHAPTER: TOBIAS FORGE AND THE FUTURE OF GHOST

Their Kerrang! Award-winning fourth album Prequelle took Ghost from cult concern to global superstars. But the arena-filling congregation of fans is growing restless for clues as to what’s next for Cardinal Copia, Papa Nihil and the ministry. Let Tobias Forge, then, take you behind the mask and into the making of – and future plans for – a band like no other…

The WaMu Theater, Thursday 19 September. Last night this venue – attached to the side of CenturyLink Field, the home of the Seattle Seahawks NFL team – played host to the ‘Groover from Vancouver’ himself, Bryan Adams. Tomorrow it’s the turn of the Pacific Northwest city’s beloved sons, grunge legends Alice In Chains, for their last show in support of their sixth album, Rainier Fog. Tonight, though, Seattle gets the latest ritual on Ghost’s extensive Ultimate Tour Named Death.

Despite this morbid moniker, the scene inside the building is one of lively activity, with techs rushing around to finish the show’s elaborate staging. The house lights illuminate the stained glass window backdrop, while the seating, flat on the floor and sweeping upwards towards the back, furthers the illusion we’re in a vast church. Just then, Tobias Forge, the man whose job it is to address tonight’s 5,000-strong congregation appears. Kerrang! doesn’t notice him at first given the ninja-like silence of his approach, but there’s an intensity to his presence in these make-or-break moments of preparation.

“The most important thing to me on this tour is that we bring the same production to everyone,” he says. “They all get the full-fucking-monty, whether they’re in Sioux Falls [South Dakota] or New York.”

The walls backstage at the WaMu Theater are lined with Seahawks jerseys, personalised with the names of acts that have performed here, including The 1975, Bastille and Nas, and the rockier contingent featuring twenty one pilots, Halestorm and Dropkick Murphys. Various rooms lead off from these labyrinthine corridors, providing sizeable production offices for the band’s tour management and crew, all of who wear dapper black shirts, trousers and braces affixed with silver broaches of Ghost’s upside down cross insignia. They affectionately address Cardinal Copia as ‘Cardi C’ when he appears later for a fan meet-and-greet. Here, too, are the dressing rooms for the headliners and the opening act for this tour, San Antonio rockers Nothing More.

“The days and options seemed limitless,” he recalls today. “For some reason I always thought of the world as being there for the taking, even though I didn’t have any access to that world.”

In spite of this, he felt a deep affinity with his heroes, like the Rolling Stones and Queen, who also came from places you didn’t automatically associate with being breeding grounds for rock gods.

Twenty-three years later, in 2009, Tobias realised he hadn’t made much headway in heeding this call. He’d been in bands from a young age, from death metallers Repugnant to alt-rockers Magna Carta Cartel. The latter featured Martin Persner and Simon Söderberg, who’d later appear as Nameless Ghouls in the first incarnation of Ghost. Söderberg, along with some other ex-ghouls, is now embroiled in an on-going lawsuit with Tobias over what they suggest are the rightful shares of profits they’re owed from their time in the band. Tobias doesn’t volunteer any information on this topic today, which is perhaps understandable given the considerable column inches already dedicated to it.

Even at 38, an age he says his kids consider “as old as shit”, he remains remarkably boyish looking. His dark and piercing eyes, however, belong to an older soul – and it may be Kerrang!’s imagination – but they appear to moisten at several points during this hour-long chat, particularly when connecting the dots between his past ambition and what he’s achieved today.

This mythology Tobias has developed over the years was furthered with the release of Ghost’s fourth album, last year’s GRAMMY-nominated Prequelle, which introduced Tobias’ latest incarnation, Cardinal Copia, a character fans have come to love if the number of $40 plush toys sold at the merch desk tonight is any indication. More recently, a web series on YouTube has added to the intrigue, with the latest episode harking back to 1969, when a young Cardinal Nihil was fronting Ghost at the launch of their EP, Seven Inches Of Satanic Panic. That just so happens to be the band’s latest release in 2019, which will also be available as part of Prequelle Exalted, a limited collector’s edition of the album. Meanwhile, The Ultimate Tour Named Death has introduced the EP’s two new songs, Mary On A Cross and Kiss The Go-Goat, to its set list.

While Ghost’s music has always tipped its papal tiara to the ‘60s, particularly its psychedelic leanings, the latter song in particular sees them take this interest a step further. How much can we glean from them, then, with regards to where Ghost goes next? Not too much, as it turns out, according to Tobias, who suggests, as with the YouTube series, it’s a way to deepen the story of Ghost spanning from the ’40s to the present day, without necessarily providing clues to the sound of album number five.

“It’s just there for shits and giggles,” he laughs, before revealing that Kiss The Go-Goat, a song that’s been knocking around for some time, actually had the working title ‘The Throwback Single’. “I grew up listening to ‘60s music like the Rolling Stones and The Doors, as well as metal. People shouldn’t read too much into this direction, though. The next album is going to be something completely different from that.”

Can Tobias perhaps give two words to describe where, musically or thematically, album number five is heading?

Who, then, can we expect to see fronting these rituals in future?

“I just know that person will have the name Papa Emeritus IV. It will be the fourth Papa Emeritus. But who that is, we don’t know yet.”

“I think that what you will get over the next year are a lot of answers to a lot of questions,” offers Tobias, keeping things vague.

Like the question of whether Sister is pregnant? (In the latest ‘chapter’ of the web series, Sister attacks a woman at a Ghost show for smoking next to her).

Has Tobias sketched what this new Papa will look like?

Spotting Kerrang!’s obvious joy at this admission, Tobias is quick to clarify exactly what he means by this.

Of course, it doesn’t hurt that Tobias loves touring.

Kerrang

#Tobias Forge #Tobias Interview #The Band Ghost #Ghost Band #Cardinal Copia

35 notes · View notes