Having kicked, screamed and fought their way out of Brighton, England in early 2007 with awe-inspiring debut full-length This Is Where The Fight Begins, THE GHOST OF A THOUSAND have rapidly become one of the UK’s most valuable and unique musical assets, thanks to their unhinged, uncompromising and utterly invigorating style. Having spent the last couple of years challenging old perceptions of what British hardcore was made of – collecting a Kerrang! Award nomination and a place in Q Magazine’s T... (more)
Having kicked, screamed and fought their way out of Brighton, England in early 2007 with awe-inspiring debut full-length This Is Where The Fight Begins, THE GHOST OF A THOUSAND have rapidly become one of the UK’s most valuable and unique musical assets, thanks to their unhinged, uncompromising and utterly invigorating style. Having spent the last couple of years challenging old perceptions of what British hardcore was made of – collecting a Kerrang! Award nomination and a place in Q Magazine’s Top Five metal bands, along the way - the quintet are back with an album that doesn’t just tear up the rule book, it sets it ablaze and leaves it on your doorstep in a middle of the night drive by.
Having formed in 2004, vocalist Tom Lacey, guitarists Andy Blyth and Jag Jago, drummer Memby Jago and bassist Gaz Spencer, have relentlessly pushed themselves forward - whether that’s via a punishing tour schedule or annihilating live shows - in the pursuit of greatness. The pinnacle of that boundary pushing ethos is finally here, in the form of New Hopes, New Demonstrations – an album that steps beyond the band’s hardcore roots and squares boldly up to swaggering rock ‘n’ roll, hard rock heroism and, in places, epic opuses. It’s a record that will stand the test of time and prove that …Ghost… are in this for the long haul.
“NHND is still very heavy,” front-man Tom Lacey explains, “heavier than …Fight… in places, but its whole feel is a lot sadder, and its mood changes all the time. This album could have been a straight up sing-a-long catchy hardcore record, but it’s very much not and I think that will come as a shock to some people. I'd like to think that the perception of us as a band within a scene will be blown apart now - the new stuff doesn't to me feel like anything that other bands are doing right now.
“We knew it had to be a more emotional album,” he concludes, “and we wanted it to feel like the band reveal more and more as the record goes on. It starts very bluntly and ends in a completely different place. It’s a lot rougher around the edges and it’s a lot more human. We’ve come a long way as musicians since …Fight... We've shifted the goal posts with this one.”
Recorded in Stockholm’s Studio Grondahl in the winter of 2008, under the watchful gaze of Pelle Gunnefeldt [The Hives, Refused], the band knew they wanted to do something unusual from the get go. “Pelle was our first choice,” Lacey says. “We wanted to do something different and un-tinged by gloss and glamour, and make something weird and dark. We felt Gunnerfeldt had that maniacal edge that would bring that out of us – and he did".
New Hopes, New Demonstrations: a new sound for new times. The Ghost Of A Thousand: a new contender to be your new favourite band.
