#Virus IV band

[lightineventide]

Happy birthday to Magali "Maggy" Luyten! Her work is a big inspiration for me (I know that metal music as a whole is, but I'm not immune to having favourites). Especially since I recently found out about her newest band - The Prize. I couldn't finish the whole of this experimental drawing in time like I had wanted, so I'm putting here the first half, hehe. I hope that I've managed to catch a glimpse of that stage presence which has captivated me for years! (Note: I hold a great appreciation for singers that make me wanna sing along Every Time I hear their voice, so that's why I'm currently fangirling more than usual.) I don't own the rights to the reference photo.

Some recommendatons:

With Ayreon - that's the most popular of her works. In the studio album she's featured on only two songs: Liquid Eternity and Ride The Comet, but I strongly recommend checking out her performance in the Ayreon Universe live album (2017) - of the songs Intergalactic Space Crusaders, Star of Sirrah, Everybody Dies and again, Ride The Comet.

Beautiful Sin - I'm not that much of a fan of their album, but that was Magali's first more popular work, I think, and it's definitely not bad at all. Songs recs: Give Up Once For All and Closer To My Heart.

Nightmare - this French band was founded in the 80s and has had different vocalists. Luyten was on the position in 2016's Dead Sun. I don't know if it's the band's best album, but I definitely love it - a classic heavy metal songwriting style, plus, Maggy's voice really shines here, and the production is nice - worth checking out if you like such stuff, in my opinion. Specific song recs: Ikarus, Red Marble & Gold and Starry Skies Gone Black.

The Prize - again, a very classic hard rock/metal approach, with a touch of modernity. I'd say their album (first and only for now, self titled, from 2022) is a collection of the musicians' influences and loved music, overall a not-too-unique but fun and exciting work. I strongly recommend it to anyone who has that specific nostalgic connection to this type of music (I am a person who was raised on rock and metal and I get very excited by only the sound of electric guitars and drums and rockstar-type vocals, so maybe that's why I like it so much). Song mentions: Cirkus (my favourite), Funhouse Mirror, Garden of Bones and Blood Red Ink.

[xviruserrorx]

Should know better than to listen to the amazing devil before bed

[w1tchybusiness]

warframe reveals theory time

1999: the new enemy faction we saw are proto grineer. i have no proof of this its just a gut feeling.

INFESTED LICHES: heres my crackpot theory that actually treads water. on-lyne the boy band are actually entirely digital ala hatsune miku but because its warframe they are actually a sentient computer virus. they were going to play a concert before whatever terrible disaster occurred on y2k happened, but the stadium was somehow blasted into space along with the technocyte strain of the infestation (which can merge with technology and computers.) it then festered there merging with on-lyne until eventually when your warframe discovers it it births the unholy on-lyne infested (the liches).

this post is a lot less in depth than my jade shadows one but my brain and vocal chords are fried from screeching with excitement during tennocon this is the best ive got

[pupsmailbox]

MEDICAL︰GORE ID PACK

NAMES ⌇　aceso. addison. aden. aero. airmed. aliza. alora. althea. ambrose. ambulette. ame. amelie. amor. amore. angel. angelique. angelo. anna. anthony. apollo. arabella. arzt. asa. avian. babe. baby. bambi. bandage. bandagette. blanche. blanchette. blood. bloodette. bright. brigid. cal. carla. carmelita. catherine. cathie. cathy. cecil. chamomile. charge. charles. charlotte. clara. clemence. clement. connie. cora. corina. corry. cosmas. cross. crosse. crossette. daisy. daniel. david. delilah. desdemona. dorothea. dropsy. edema. edith. eira. elias. eliza. elizabeth. ellison. emil. emily. emma. evangeline. feronia. fleur. florence. fragilette. frailette. galen. ginger. gram. grimm. hansen. harmonie. harmony. hazel. healer. hira. hospette. ida. incisionette. incisionne. ivie. ivy. jace. jackie. james. jason. jayla. jayr. jen. jennifer. joasias. john. josiah. joy. jules. kaison. lace. lain. laryn. leah. lee. leigh. leuk. lucie. luciel. lucile. lucy. lue. lues. lyra. lyrica. mae. maebell. maggie. maiya. malachi. mark. mary. marybelle. may. maya. meddette. medette. medicel. medicette. medicinalle. medilita. mercia. michael. michelle. milo. milu. mitzi. moraxella. morgan. natasha. needlette. nile. norrie. norry. nursesse. nursette. nursie. nwurse. nyura. palsy. penny. phoebe. phoebus. pille. pillette. pott. potter. quinn. raphael. ray. red. redde. reseda. reye. richard. robert. rose. salmon. savior. scalpelle. scarlet. scrivener. scrubbe. scrubette. scrubs. serra. shiga. solitude. steven. stitch. stitches. stitchette. susan. sylvie. syrinelle. syringe. syringette. thomas. triage. vasc. viper. vitas. vitus. wiel. winnie. yves. zika. zoster.

PRONOUNS ⌇　ache/ache. ai/aid. aid/aid. aid/aide. amb/ambulance. ambulance/ambulance. bacteria/bacteria. band/age. band/aid. band/bandaid. bandage/bandage. bandaid/bandaid. bile/bile. bl0/bl00d. blood/blood. bu/bubonic. bump/bump. ca/care. care/care. chick/chicken. chronic/chronic. chu/chu. clean/clean. cold/cold. cough/cough. crab/crab. cross/cross. cross/crosse. cure/cure. cyu/cyu. die/dying. doc/doc. doc/doctor. doctor/doctor. dra/draw. drug/drug. fe/fever. fever/fever. flu/flu. fluff/fluffie. fragi/fragile. fragile/fragile. fragile/fragility. frail/frail. frail/frailty. gauze/gauze. germ/germ. gown/gown. gross/gross. he/heal. he/heart. he/help. he/hem. heal/heal. heal/healer. healer/healer. heart/heart. help/help. herb/herb. herb/herbal. hos/hospital. hospital/hospital. ill/ill. in/inject. incision/incision. infect/infection. injure/injury. IV/IV. iv/iv. ivy/ivie. ivy/ivy. lace/lace. li/live. love/love. lung/lung. luv/luv. mas/mask. mask/mask. med/med. med/medic. med/medical. med/medicine. medi/medic. medi/medicine. medic/medic. medical/medical. medicine/medicine. nee/needle. need/needle. needle/needle. nu/nurse. nur/nurse. nur/se. nurse/nurse. out/outbreak. pain/pain. pat/patient. patient/patient. pi/pill. pil/pill. pill/pill. pla/plague. plus/plushe. poke/poke. red/red. sa/save. savior/savior. sca/scan. scissor/scissor. scissor/scissors‎. scrub/scrub. shi/hir. si/sick. sic/sick. sick/sick. sick/sickly. skin/skin. sle/sleep. sneeze/sneeze. so/soft. soap/soap. sore/sore. stab/stab. stem/cell. stitch/stitch. stu/study. su/surgeon. sun/sun. sweet/sweet. symptom/symptom. syn/syndrome. syr/syr. syr/syringe. syri/syri. syrin/syringe. syringe/syringe. tape/tape. te/test. virus/viruse. ward/ward. we/well. wrap/wrap. ☎ . ☣️ . ⚰ . ❤️‍🩹 . 🌀 . 🌡️ . 🎀 . 🏥 . 🏨 . 👨🏻‍⚕️ . 👩🏻‍⚕️ . 💉 . 💊 . 💐 . 💤 . 📞 . 🔬 . 😷 . 🚑 . 🤒 . 🤢 . 🤧 . 🥀 . 🥼 . 🦠 . 🧊 . 🧑‍⚕️ . 🧠 . 🧪 . 🧫 . 🧬 . 🩸 . 🩹 . 🩺 .

[glass--beach]

do you or any of the other glass beach members have sonas we could draw in fan art?

i do have a sona but i’ve got so little art of it and no ref sheet or anything. our top scientists are working on that however. the rest of the band are decidedly not furries but cool with furries afaik. last time we were on tour everyone figured out what species they WOULD be but i don’t think any of them are that invested and i don’t remember what everyone decided sorry

anyway ive got this fox. still pinning down a lot of the details but daxe has done some art here and there that i think is lovely (this is a discord icon he did for me and he’s got a matching one). there’s one i can’t find that’s in a ‘garfield style’ that i think is the cutest shit ever

also heres my annoyware-sona i made for my neocities site that will definitely not give you a virus

[thefuryinyourfist]

hi i’m devin, 19 yrs old he/it, i’m fairly new to gatsby tumblr (gatsblr) but ive been listening since v late 2019. im friends w nic and we’ve been friends since like 2020. gatsby really carried me through the virus that shall not be named

gatsby fans interact im scared of u guys but i want to be friends !! really!

@chariactic is my main

gatsbys is my autistic special interest so kindly refrain from stating you know more about them than me around me . you probably do, all i do is sit around and talk to nic all day, but just . don’t. i dont like sharing my interests sorry <_< its not on purpose

yes im a friend of the band in general, ask me about it

[amphiptere-art]

Hi I'm Amphithere_Art and I love drawing. I'm using this website as motivation to improve my skills.

Asks are open

A link to the discord

Current hyperfiction. The sun and moon show. Below is either things I'll be updating constantly or stuff I look at constantly.

Warning, I am not afraid to swear.

Important refs- RBB, CC, EC, ITTBAG, offshoot references, DH, SMOA, Crimble, SSC, LL, BM, sundown, CE, Ralph, arcade, etc

Everybody's height chart

Everybody's pronouns

Big list of characters/worlds

Here is a link to all my stories, events, and info posts

Crossover Canon

Nicknames

Size chart

Sticks and stones

Magic system

The locked door lore

Dragon culture and history

Demons and fae

Just for convenience more convenience

Doodle ideas

My dumping ground here @amphiptereartdump

↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ All my AUs below ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓

—————————————————

Lore/story au's

Most of these are heavy in story. Asks concerning the story will be more received. And will be drawn with story in mind. (Might receive written stories)

mechanical medic AU-Ralph the repair dragon works as a moving parts and service. But is haunted by 3 fragmented souls of mechanics that died in the Plex. Sun n Moon struggle to get the medical mechanic animatronic to leave them alone.

Rusty wheels-a apocalypse au were a nanite Afton virus infects the world. It's cyberpunk with a rustic feel. Y/N has a big truck sized motorcycle thing and finds sun n moon. And drags them in their attempts of adventure and survival.

Warehouse AU-after the fire story were the dca, Freddy, DJ, foxy and Bonnie are moved to a big werehouse (owned by a y/n) is modified into a mini Plex (honestly more like a side road arcade that's bigger). And the dca has to relearn how to function with the band.

purrfect thief-you are a shape-shifting cat. You work with The gang Lord Eclipse but live as a house cat with the detectives Sun and Moon. You are an informant with the spiders web. A info company owned by DJ. Life has been simple and happy. But on the horizon a pack of dogs is ready to ruin that simple life.

saving waves-a sun n moon mer story. Were sun n moon were once in our lab/mer fighting facility. They are saved by a rehab facility and have to learn how to be normal Mer again. Also following the other side of the family. Who are trying to get pesky humans to stay out of their wild waters.

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Ask based au's

These aus are very open to ask. Most of them have no more than a basic story. They will be drawn more frequently with asks.

red, blue, and black-a SAMS AU where suns kill code merge with him and Moon is attempts to control his kill code makes two AI but fails. computer takes over and creates eclipse with those two AI. Eclipse then has to figure out how to keep his family together.

Cryptid eater-a Sun and Moon are Hunters story but you are a creature that eats vampires and werewolves and things like such. And the story takes place with you trying to convince them that you're on their side.

warehouse daycare-a version of the warehouse AU where it's only sun n moon. The werehouse is smaller and they grow a closer relationship with y/n and a emotional support cat.

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Art doodle au's

These a use are mostly created out of the will to draw something fun.

Stop you silly siren-suns a tired Pirate. moons a silly siren. Eclipse is an angry sea captain. Popped in my head. want to see were it leads.

Star foolery-basic place for me to draw the dca in different situations. no major story but has lore. does occur during after and before in dca history

Creature dca-a random look for sun n moon. Has flip floped between being and basic non animatronic form to fey creatures that deal with changelings and guardian God entities.

-------------------------------------------------------

Story's ive had since childhood.

Most of these stories occur in the same or adjacent universe and are more likely to get to to get drawn due to my familiarity with it.

Shadow wars-Major wars that occurred in the history of dragons. Particularly wars of Shadow dragons versus light dragons. split up into four.

Outsting of the dark(Shadow dragons being misjudged and cast out),

shadons terror(an evil emperor of Shadow dragons taking revenge only to be beaten by family),

falling twins(a family split by different ideals),

the hybrid(a hybrid child that finally solves the war).

chains-The comic series I started as a kid about a wolf and his companions as they travel. Split into three.

The fallen stars(how chains fell out with his best friend),

fleeing revenge(chains fleeing his old friend now enemy),

God war(chains son and others get in a great war over religion and power).

dreamers musing-various stories that take place on "the a locked door". Occurring from dragons, Kings, knights, dinosaurs, animals. anything that comes to mind that uses the same gods.

moss and car-car -a old spinosaurus and a baby Carcharodontosaurus meet up together and decide to live alongside each other. The Old spinosaurus trying to care for a youngster that is not his kind. And the Young therapod running around trying to figure out how to dinosaur correctly. Shenanigans issue.

[mapsofnonexistentplaces]

ranking albums of bands i like this is a post for nerds

tmv tough but i think im landing on octahedron > bedlam > frances = deloused > ramrod tapes > amputech > landscape tantrums > nocto > tmv = qdtmmc

+ orl solo shit out of what ive heard. sdbnb > bwps = cryptomnesia > solar gambling = aels > iitc?

ee augh. gth > man alive > re-anim > rdf > arc > afd = mountainhead based on current singles…

haken i think ive definitively decided on the order of aquarius = virus > fauna > affinity > the mountain > vector > visions

tyscientist it goes monep > stranger heads > plague accomms > time travel > terraformer

king gizz fucking get ready. fmb = ice death > nonagon > gumboot soup = rats nest = omnium > polygondwanaland > paper mache = mind fuzz > 12bb > fishies > pda > tsc > fafyl > sketches = kg > lw > b3k

dream theater heres my fucking contention. awake = metropolis > iaw > falling into infinity > train of thought > sys chaos = six degrees

nin we go the fragile = year 0 > phm > broken > tds > with teeth > bad witch > hesitation marks

closes my eyes

[l-1-z-a]

Will's Seminar on Failure + Learning + Games [17 February 2010]

Will Wright's "Why Games are (Good) for Learning", [2010]

Original description @ the NYU's website...

"Video game pioneer, Will Wright, the creator of "SimCity" and "Spore" will lead a discussion on how digital games encourage learning.

Wright has been called one of the most important people in gaming, technology, and entertainment. In 2009, he left Electronic Arts to form his own think tank, the Stupid Fun Club.

Sponsored by Games for Learning Institute and the NYU Game Center

About the Games for Learning Institute

The G4LI is a joint research endeavor of Microsoft Research and a consortium of universities. The partners include: Columbia University, the City University of New York (CUNY), Dartmouth College, Parsons, Polytechnic Institute of NYU, the Rochester Institute of Technology, Teachers College, and Pontifical Catholic University of Chile as well as NYU. The Institute’s aim is to identify which qualities of computer games engage students and develop relevant, personalized teaching strategies that can be applied to the learning process.

Price: This event is free, but a ticket is required. To obtain tickets, e-mail tickets@g4li.org"

The media published here are exclusively dedicated to educational purposes. If one, for any reason, deems that they violate the copyright, please inform us, and it will be our care to remove immediately the posts accordingly.

Notes from Will Wright’s “What Makes Games (Good) for Learning?”

Earlier this week, legendary game designer Will Wright delivered his keynote speech at the Engage! Expo in New York City. In addition to talking about the potential of games as “toys,” he apparently blew up a Barbie doll and kept the lid (mostly) sealed on his Stupid Fun Club. While this event made a few headlines, he also made a less-publicized visit to NYU last night. Wright’s speech, sponsored by the Games for Learning Institute, undoubtedly covered similar material, but here are a few tidbits that I found interesting…

There were a few technical hiccups prior to the speech, so Wright offered to answer a few audience questions. When asked about why educational and serious games are typically lame, he replied that this is primarily tied to craftsmanship. Serious game developers are going for the most obvious depictions of real-world crises, but those are rarely the most fun. For example, he suggested that rather than controlling a Peace Corps member trying to prevent the spread of a deadly disease, it might be more fun to put the player in the “shoes” of the virus.

Wright talked a bit about allowing more opportunities for failure. While classrooms emphasize testing and theoretical understanding, games allow for more practical applications. He suggested that this requires trusting the minds of young people, but that games haven’t been around long enough for this to take hold in classrooms.

Another interesting comparison: Robert Louis Stevenson plotted out “Treasure Island” by looking at a map and playing everything out in his mind before ever setting a pen to paper. Wright followed this up by talking about his crazier experiences in Grand Theft Auto IV. Even looking at box art, the player creates rough adventures in his mind before making a purchase.

As for where Stupid Fun Club is heading, he was again tight-lipped, but he does believe that emphasis on immersion will be superseded, at least for now, by games like Wii Sports and Rock Band. Here, it’s as much fun to watch someone play as it is to play yourself. Also, more of the usual talk of turning players into creators. (Spore)

Unfortunately, Wright was then rushed off stage because he had exceeded his time limit. The guy speaks pretty damn quickly, but a lot of slides still had to be cut off. Oh well. If you’ve read any interviews with the guy, much of this is stuff he’s said before, but it was still exciting to hear this nerd hero.

Source of notes:

[mapsofnonexistentplacesremade]

OK activating music autism pick one band to associate to each character + bonus unrelated question do they have a fav color and if they do what is it

colors image first i was gonna do everyone but i got bored

AND MUSIC AUTISM YIPPEE

dalisays always been like industrial metal kind of guy to me with delves into jazz and ambient music... but ive also always had the association between hir and liquid tension experiment just for songs like paradigm shift and universal mind and i think thats also befitting. intense instrumental prog metal but also occasional sillyness. sometimes theres random ragtime and circus music. just for fun. fuck it

somsak i just associate with generic ska bands because. he is in one canonically. saying less than jake because thats the funniest one i can think of off the top of my head

freya olzhas and isel i will group together into two associations. first is haken which is just because i think like. the presentation in albums like affinity and virus match the threes attitude and motivations in the story and their songs usually have this big grandiose but also bitter tone. and also there are many songs about just like divorce in their discography which reminds me of Those Two Old Men. second association is just dream theater plainly because it also has that grandiose melodrama aspect to it and because it inspired a lot of cassiopeia band stuff in terms of how theyd sound.... overall these threes connection to prog metal has like a lot of meta backbone ive been trying to explain it to myself for a while but its very abstract lol.

tangentially olzhas has garnered a lot of ninch influence. ninfluence. over these past few months and i genuinely have reasons for it but also saying "this happened just because its really funny to me" works. faris also has this kind of

uhhhh ulises and peixin kind of share a band association in my mind but for like wildly different reasons lol. that being mars volta. in ulises' case its much more of a 'oh this is music she'd listen to' and on a canonical meta level that connection comes in the form of like. very mild backstory stuff being inspired by either the actual guys in the band or by the frances the mute album. but their music doesnt really influence her active arc in the story so to speak. with peixin its the precise opposite as their entire character campaign was based on deloused in the comatorium (and also the haken album visions but thats another thing!!!!!!!) and they mostly retain things from the in-album character cerpin taxt, mainly a lot of the surrealistic horror and paranoia springing from him...

demeter is weird.... i honestly think the most apt artist i can throw up is kate bush just because a lot of her songs have like this distilled dreamy air thats very classical prog esque and i think thats just like a good encapsulation of their presence. similarly a lot of beatrix's arc is about reminiscing on the past and all kinds of skeuomorphism and also just social observation. which cements king crimson as my association for her....

i think i woke up one day and decided valerie was gonna be a fan of tool and thats just stayed consistent over the months for no good reason. but i do think it matches her attitude as like. simultaneously being very complex philosophical and esoteric whilst also being very tired and contemptful a lot of the time.

marjolaine haaaas a tenuous connection with everything everything in my mind but i dont think i can really explain it. mazin has connections to both btbam and coheed just because those bands made a few songs that HEAVILY inspired his creation. i cant think of anything for sabri off the top of my head

[lightineventide]

Virus IV - Children of the Storm (Live Acoustic)

Love how tender Maggy's voice sounds here!

[andromerot]

@svankmajerbaby oh yeah true ok something about me is i really like most music from most genres but the artists/bands ive listened to most these past months are probably ezra furman, virus, daniel kahn, aliceband, sufjan stevens. but like. anything goes for real

Top 5 musicians/bands from before 1980?

this made me realize i dont really have enough i LOVE to fill the list so im open to recs

[july-19th-club]

big news on the music front i know what the notes are now

[spinef0ryou]

not 2 be really fuckin nu metal on main but dope are a really good band

[tisthenightofthewitch]

How Ghost — ‘an occult, pop, satanic sort of rock ’n’ roll band’ — conquered metal and the charts

Onstage at Anaheim’s Honda Center arena, Tobias Forge is not himself.

Instead, he is Papa Emeritus IV, leader of the theatrical Swedish metal band Ghost, singing from behind a latex mask and corpse paint, dressed in religious attire or bat wings.

His persona is of Ghost’s demonic pope, preaching of war and plague like a doom prophet amid heavy guitar riffs and vivid pop melodies. Some lyrics are more prescient than fantasy, from warning of “beliefs contagious, spreading disease” on the 2018 song “Rats” to the band’s new “Impera” album, which decries empire-building in time for Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine.

Forge says he’s merely an observer of history and “the circularity of things,” as destructive human impulses repeat themselves catastrophically across the centuries. “Flags, pandemics, flus and dictators come and go,” he says cheerfully. “Empires come and go. It’s always in circles, because at the end of the day we are dealing with humans.”

Forge, 41, is out of costume and sipping coffee at his West Hollywood hotel after a night of hard rock spectacle, with pyro eruptions and a big stage meant to convey threatening Gothic arches and stained glass. Offstage, Forge is less explosive, dressed in a treasured 1988 Candlemass tour T-shirt, his light auburn hair short and swept upward on top. He’s a thoughtful interview and quick with a joke, a family man with a wife and fraternal twins back in Stockholm. The previous night’s concert in Orange County was the final stop of a co-headlining arena tour with the Danish band Volbeat designed as a prelude to the March 11 release of the band’s fifth album, “Impera.”

During rehearsals ahead of the tour, Forge got “a very mild case” of the Omicron virus. Then the eight other touring members of the band tested positive, along with four crew members. “The whole band had it at the same time, so we just had COVID rehearsals,” he says. The tour happened as scheduled, and Ghost will be back in the U.S. later this year.

The band’s last record, 2018’s “Prequelle,” earned a Grammy nomination for rock album and hit No. 3 on Billboard’s Top 200. The band counts Metallica and Dave Grohl among its high-profile fans, and attracts a multigenerational rock audience, from kids in baby pope gear all the way up to older fanatics nostalgic for ’70s shock rock.

“Ghost has a diverse audience, which I love to see, especially for metal,” says Sammi Chichester, managing editor of Revolver Magazine, a close observer of the metal scene.

Forge is able to find pop hooks even as he mines his own low expectations for mankind. As a result of that catchiness, Ghost has been controversial among certain extreme-metal tastemakers. “It is a routine topic — metalheads love to argue,” says Chichester with a laugh.

The music tends to be more engaging than depressed, despite the ominous religious imagery.

“The lyrics are not about God. They’re about man,” says Forge. “We are, at the end of the day, an occult, pop, satanic sort of rock ’n’ roll band meant to entertain a group of people who are already down with that stuff.”

Any discussion with Forge quickly reveals him as a pop music obsessive, as he casually references Leonard Cohen, the Bangles and the primitive weirdness of the Shaggs. He’s not your typical high priest of metal. “In my adolescence, I was completely a death metal/black metal person in action and message,” he says. “But I always listened to a lot of other things. And that materialized in whatever music I was writing.”

Ghost was created in 2006 with Forge’s recording of a track called “Stand by Him,” built on a slippery metal riff and roots firmly planted in Scandinavian black metal. The music that followed rarely strayed from a growling metal core but showed surprising flourishes from the beginning, from busy keyboard melodies to delicate acoustic guitar.

The band arrived with a fully formed image that adopted a demonic, bizarro take on the Catholic tradition, accented with Gothic flair and comedy. Forge stood at the microphone in the role of a series of demonic popes called Papa Emeritus (Nos. I-IV), in flamboyant papal attire, with a band of musicians called Nameless Ghouls in silver masks. (The Ghouls now appear in what look like gas masks from a dystopian future.)

Forge, who is the band’s only consistent member, kept his identity hidden behind facepaint and pseudonym until he had to reveal his real name during an unsuccessful 2017 lawsuit by four ex-members of Ghost over back pay.

“Impera” was recorded last spring and summer, after the original plan to work with an American producer in the U.S. was canceled as the coronavirus crisis dragged on. Instead, Forge reunited with Swedish producer Klas Åhlund (Ghost’s collaborator on 2015’s “Meliora”), and he took his time composing new songs.

He sketched out a melody for the album’s closer, a nearly seven-minute prog epic called “Respite on the Spitalfields,” on the small electric piano in his daughter’s bedroom. “Twenties” emerged as a frantic chronicle of greed and oppression, in the form of a “demagogue sect leader speaking down to his followers in utter contempt,” he says. The sneering, catchy ’80s rock of “Griftwood” was inspired by former Vice President Mike Pence and leaders who wield the Bible as a means to political power.

The album also arrives as a pair of successful TV series — “Cobra Kai” and “Peacemaker” — have reintroduced an earlier generation of pop-metal to the masses, with prominent use of ’80s hits by the likes of Twisted Sister, Faster Pussycat, Hanoi Rocks, Ratt, Mötley Crüe, Scorpions and Def Leppard.

Ghost isn’t a throwback to the hair-metal era but does share a taste for hooks and melodrama. Forge hasn’t seen “Peacemaker” but spent quality downtime at home in Sweden watching “Cobra Kai” with his teenage daughter. “That series is a slam-dunk,” he says of the show, which continues the story of the “Karate Kid” movies. “And the music is great.”

The Ghost mastermind admits to nostalgia for what was commonly known as “album-oriented rock,” the mainstream rock category epitomized by Journey, Foreigner, Boston and other ’70s and ’80s FM radio stars. “I’m a huge fan of AOR bands,” says Forge, describing the genre as “smart divorce rock played by older men with mustaches who have gone through a little bit in their lives.”

Forge was raised in Linköping, Sweden, by a single mother and indoctrinated into rock early, by a brother 13 years older. Before he was 10, Forge was buying English and German rock magazines he couldn’t read, and absorbing as much metal, punk and classic rock as he could.

As a teenager, his tastes grew even darker and more extreme, as he discovered underground metal rising from Europe and America — then turned away from anything new in the genre after 1994, when he sensed things becoming too polished, spoiling the scary lo-fi sound and image he loved.

As Ghost itself grows more sophisticated in its sound and approach, Forge knows some longtime fans wish he would return to the band’s original recipe. Forge understands the feeling, and admits that he’d love nothing more than to produce new albums from bands of his youth so that he could force them back to an earlier sound.

He says he wants to satisfy fans while also challenging them. “I deal with that professionally in one way, and as a fan in another.”

Forge fully appreciates the intense feelings a music fan can have about a recording artist. Evolution is not always welcome.

“That has a lot to do with the type of personalities that are drawn to the world that we’ve been talking about: metal, hardcore, comic books, sci-fi — it’s a retreat, a safe place of order, organization, knowledge. This is the world that you hide in after school. And now there’s someone coming in there trying to … evolve? It’s disruptive.

“It’s not right or wrong. The future is what we don’t know, as much as it hurts.”

LA Times

[jamverse]

ive been cleaning out a bunch of files on my comp and google drive and i found a plot beat summary of static sound i typed out awhile back. spoilers, obviously, if you care about that, which you shouldn't, because as I've said from the beginning this was never about the plot so much as just screwing around with my characters. I only edited the bigger points so some of the rest might be outdated but close enough. here you go.

SIDE A:

-amaranth takes off to nk's domain to fight in gladiator matches, sees sarah's biotech w/ the same 'royal crest' mark she has and is like "hey where the fuck did you get that"

-oridar/verah are like "theres just this random kid [lily] out in the wastelands who makes 'em" so ama sets off to there to see what the deal is

-brief encounter with a toxinvein that takes out her ship but gets picked up by spurlocke, who as it happens was already going to see lily anyway 

-it's like super obvious that lily's "the lost queen" from 700 years ago so amaranth calls her dad like "holy shit guess who i found"

-ezkiel hears this and freaks the fuck out because they thought they were DONE with that job and the whole shtick of the old rulers, and hightails it the fuck over there to end it for real 

-meanwhile ama's like "ok well i can't take her home or do anything until i fix my ship" so they head Back to where ama's downed ship is

-ezekiel meets them on the way

-amaranth quickly finds a lot of [genuine] reason to be suspicious of ezekiel’s being there, and after calling her dad and getting some more info, her confronting ez quickly escalates to a fight where amaranth gets her ass fucking levelled and also inadvertently zapped with a toxinvein

-she's out cold, ez takes off with lily, spurlocke can't really do shit bc he's just some guy in all of this so he just takes to looking after ama for the moment

-flip back to ezekiel; tldr they end up exposition dumping about the razing and what they are and do as a chosen; most critically bringing up sth abt being a "regulator of cosmic/deity-level threats'' or something

-lily's like "oh ok cool you know that thing you zapped the loud girl with. maybe you should take a look at that, cuz that's kinda what we think that is."

-ezekiel decides an emerging sentient god virus is a more pressing issue than this one loose end from centuries ago and they head back to meet back up w/ the other two to investigate this [nobody Actually knows this is what toxinvein are at this point, but there's enough evidence to tip ez off that there's SOME kind of deity bullshit at play here]

-meanwhile Meanwhile after amaranth wakes up spurlocke gives her the 'hey so you're kinda fucked' rundown on what they know about toxinvein and what to expect now that she has one

-ez/lily get back a bit after this and one last lightning round exposition dump to get all the characters on the same page about who knows what

SIDE B

-crew discusses how to go about investigating more into this toxinvein thing

-lead 1: verah, who ama and ez both talked to, has a noticeable glitching problem Similar to toxinvein; lily and ez go see what that's about

-lead 2: ama got this Ominous Brain Message:tm: while she was asleep; not quite a dream but close enough to it that the fact of the ruler of this place being called "Nightmare King" is probably worth checking out

-there's some filler flavor type stuff here w/ ama and spur going to the city and meeting his band and her getting sensory overload and her having to go chill for a bit+catching up with magnolia but none of it is big plot important

-lily/ez get back from their questioning verah, which also pointed them to NK. they get ready to meet back up with the other two, but are intercepted by the Spy who attempts to drag ez back to NK himself for Other Reasons:tm:

-that doesnt work because ezekiel has the power of god and anime. anyway take a wild fucking guess where the whole crew heads now.

-tldr of the scene at NK's castle is he uses his powers to talk to the toxivein through ama's subconscious; the toxinvein drops the name "ibagreski", which is someone Io is all too familiar with

-squad goes on space trip with io to see ibagreski

-ibagreski's like ''oh lol that's Diode, guess he's finally leaking back into that domain since NK killed my Sentinel there. sucks for you guys but there's nothing that can be done, enjoy your slow apocalypse''

-obviously the protag crew doesnt want to do that but iba's like "unless you have [extremely specific and unlikely circumstances/resources/abilities] we literally can't do anything but wait it out"

-and ezekiel's like 'we do actually have that'

-ibagreski's like 'oh shit lol. yeah you guys can try to defeat Diode yourselves then i guess'

-this requires going back to pangea and summoning raathe, so they do that and then take it back to nk's domain and have it host the rest of diode's power

-big cool anime final battle n they kill the diode/raathe/amalgamated toxivein abomination

-send that whole mess to space hell so diode can't come back again again

-yeehaw

Postgame funsies which I have no clue if I'll ever actually include:

-ezekiel “actually in hindsight i don't know why i'm still tethering myself to this planet i have nothing but bad memories of. i'm fucking immortal and have god powers i'm going to fucking go off and explore space and find something good. also you guys sort of know about the whole genocide thing now so i im assuming you don't really want me around anyway and i dont want to deal with whatever you were planning to do to me. bye.”

-amaranth already had a pretty set life before this so it just goes back to business as usual, save for the newly-installed life support system and mild fucked up glitch powers+adjusting to that. she and magnolia get married at some point probably.

-spurlocke, now having the toxinvein biz sorted out and the favor of a god to call upon [and a bit of help from ezekiel], finally goes back to his homeworld to incite his revolution and overthrow its corrupt state to save what’s left it

-lily actually fucks off to space with ezekiel, at least for the first little while. she'd love to go around seeing/studying more whack phenomenon like toxinvein, and she can also act as something of an...emotional guide to ezekiel, since they aren't nearly as open to experiencing new weird shit as she is.