Danish/American rock and rollers VOLBEAT have announced a 26-date co-headlining arena tour with GHOST and special guests TWIN TEMPLE, coming to cities including Seattle, Denver, Chicago, Houston, and Phoenix (full dates below).
Said VOLBEAT: “We are so incredibly excited to get back to these cities with a Volbeat headline show, but getting to do it alongside a headline show from our goulish friends in GHOST and bringing the incomparable TWIN TEMPLE with us? How soon will it be January already!? Start getting ready, the thunder and lightning is coming to your town in 2022.”
GHOST and VOLBEAT co-headline tour dates:
Jan. 25 – Reno, NV – Reno Events Center
Jan. 27 – Seattle, WA – Climate Pledge Arena
Jan. 28 – Nampa, ID – Ford Idaho Center Arena
Jan. 29 – Portland, OR – Veterans Memorial Coliseum
Jan. 31 – West Valley City, UT – Maverik Center
Feb. 02 – Denver, CO – Ball Arena
Feb. 04 – Lincoln, NE – Pinnacle Bank Arena
Feb. 05 – Minneapolis, MN – Target Center
Feb. 07 – Columbus, OH – Nationwide Arena
Feb. 08 – Hershey, PA – GIANT Center
Feb. 10 – Newark, NJ – Prudential Center
Feb. 11 – Worcester, MA – DCU Center
Feb. 12 – Camden, NJ – BB&T Pavilion
Feb. 14 – Pittsburgh, PA – Petersen Events Center
Feb. 15 – Toledo, OH – Huntington Center
Feb. 16 – Grand Rapids, MI – Van Andel Arena
Feb. 18 – Chicago, IL – Allstate Arena
Feb. 19 – Cincinnati, OH – Heritage Bank Center
Feb. 20 – Milwaukee, WI – Fiserv Forum
Feb. 21 – St. Louis, MO – Chaifetz Arena
Feb. 23 – Independence, MO – Cable Dahmer Arena
Feb. 25 – Houston, TX – Smart Financial Centre at Sugar Land
Feb. 26 – Dallas, TX – Fair Park Coliseum
Feb. 28 – El Paso, TX – Don Haskins Center
Mar. 01 – Phoenix, AZ – Footprint Center
Mar. 03 – Anaheim, CA – Honda Center
Grammy Award-winning Swedish rockers GHOST have elevated themselves to one of the most esteemed and celebrated bands in the world today. Three consecutive No. 1 Active Rock radio singles, debuting at No. 1 (Rock) and No. 3 (Top 200) on the Billboard album chart, accumulating well over a billion streams, headlining arena tours (including shows at the Forum in Los Angeles and Barclays Center in New York), opening stadium shows for METALLICA, and gracing magazine covers and television screens the world over are just part of their story. The band’s passionate fan base and critical praise also stems from their ability to constantly be pushing their creative boundaries. Their most recent album, “Prequelle”, is loosely based on The Black Plague of 14th century Europe, a metaphor that sadly became a premonition that applies to the societal ills of our times. Though the band’s music at times has dark lyrical content, it never loses its catchy rock edge.
Last October, GHOST mastermind Tobias Forge told Sweden Rock Magazine that he was planning to enter the studio in January to begin recording GHOST‘s fifth album. “The actual recording will last around six weeks and then there’s two to three weeks of mixing and mastering,” he said. “So sometime in March the record should be finished, but it won’t be released until after the summer. As it looks now, knock on wood, we will then go on tour. We won’t release an album until we know that we are actually going on tour. The album release will coincide with the start of a tour. Of course, we could announce an album release date and then, for some reason, it might not be possible to tour, but that’s a whole other matter.”
In March 2020, at final show of GHOST‘s “Prequelle” tour in Mexico City, Mexico, the band officially introduced Papa Emeritus IV, the new character who will front the act for its next LP phase.
Forge performed as a “new” Papa Emeritus on each of the band’s first three LPs, with each version of Papa replacing the one that came before it. Papa Emeritus III was retired in favor of Cardinal Copia before the release of 2018’s “Prequelle”.
In October 2019, Forge confirmed to U.K.’s Kerrang! magazine that there would be a new character fronting GHOST by the time the group’s next LP sees the light of day.
“Prequelle” debuted at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 and featured the chart-topping singles “Rats” and “Dance Macabre”.
In December 2018, GHOST nabbed two Grammy nominations, “Best Rock Album” for “Prequelle” and “Best Rock Song” for “Rats”.
Five years ago, GHOST became the first Swedish rock band ever to win a Grammy — 2016’s “Best Metal Performance” for the song “Cirice”.
Since forming in 2001, VOLBEAT has gone from the clubs of Copenhagen to headlining stages around the world, including the famed Telia Parken stadium in Denmark (becoming the only domestic artist to ever sell out the venue). Over the course of seven record-breaking albums, the band has picked up No. 1 songs (including nine No. 1s on the U.S. Mainstream Rock chart and counting, the most of any band based outside of North America), multi-platinum certifications, awards and accolades (including a Grammy nomination) all over the planet. Their latest album, “Rewind, Replay, Rebound”, was released in August 2019 and has spawned the hit singles “Last Day Under The Sun”, “Die To Live (feat. Neil Fallon)” and “Leviathan”. A live album featuring songs recorded during the subsequent world tour, “Rewind, Replay, Rebound: Live In Deutschland”, was released digitally in November 2020. Most recently, the band shared a “double blast” of brand new songs for the summer: “Dagen Før (feat. Stine Bramsen)” and “Wait A Minute My Girl”. They also contributed a cover of “Don’t Tread On Me” to “The Metallica Blacklist”, with all proceeds from the track benefiting the All Within My Hands foundation and the Børne Cancer Fonden of Denmark.
VOLBEAT guitarist/vocalist Michael Poulsen recently spoke to the 94.9 The Rock Toronto radio station about “Wait A Minute My Girl” and “Dagen Før”. The two tracks, VOLBEAT‘s first new music since 2019’s album “Rewind, Replay, Rebound”, were recorded while the world was in lockdown during the pandemic. Poulsen, Jon Larsen (drums) and Kaspar Boye Larsen (bass) recorded their parts with longtime producer Jacob Hansen in Denmark, while Rob Caggiano (guitar) worked remotely from New York.
“[‘Wait A Minute My Girl’ is] pretty much an old song that I wrote a long time ago; I just didn’t finish it up [until last year],” Michael revealed. “It doesn’t really say much about the coming album, which will be released later this year. Because the coming album is probably the most heavy record we’ve ever done. There’s a lot of heavy riffing, like old BLACK SABBATH, early METALLICA, even some death metal in there. But these two singles that we released, they don’t really represent the album. But this track ‘Wait A Minute My Girl’ is a pure rocker. It’s very much inspired by Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard, RAMONES — those kind of things combined. And it was just one of those songs that made sense to release during the summer because everyone’s been waiting to get something new, something positive. Everybody’s been sitting at home because of COVID and everything. So we thought this track would be a good idea to release. It’s positive. It has all those summer colors that you need to be in a good mood. It kind of represents VOLBEAT in that ’50s-’60s element where you definitely can hear the Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard, RAMONES inspiration. And it’s just a feel-good song. And I feel very good about it. I’m very proud of it. But, as I said, it’s not really representing the full album, because the full album is definitely the most heavy album that we’ve ever done. And this song is more like pop-rock, rock and roll ’50s kind of tune with punk elements.”
He later added: “[‘Wait A Minute My Girl’] is just one of the tracks on the new album that just brings some light. But there’ll be a lot of thunder and lightning for the rest of the material. There’s a couple of those upbeat rock and roll, straight-in-your-face songs, but I would say probably 85 percent of the new album — which has been done since December, actually — it’s pretty heavy.”
In an interview with Brazilian music journalist Igor Miranda, VOLBEAT drummer Jon Larsen was asked if there was any truth to Poulsen‘s previous claim that the group’s new material was shaping up to be more aggressive and more thrash-oriented than the last two LPs. He responded: “Well, it’s definitely heavier — let me put it that way. I wouldn’t really call it more aggressive. It might be — I’m not really sure — but it’s definitely got some of the old vintage VOLBEAT heavy elements to it. There’s definitely some really heavy songs on it. Yeah, there might be a little bit of thrash on it as well — might be even a little venture into Swedish death metal perhaps. A little bit, yeah. Don’t get too scared, though. But, yeah, I think it’s a very mixed album, because you’ve definitely got the more heavier sound. We still have the more happy, punkish, even maybe pop songs, if you wanna call it that. And there’s also, I think, a few surprises on there that will definitely make people go, ‘Okay, I didn’t see that coming.’ But, yeah, I think it definitely has a mix of everything we’ve done up until now. And the vibe for the album, I think it sounds maybe more spontaneous this time, perhaps. And it definitely has a few nods and winks to our past. But, yeah, ‘heavy’ is probably the right word for it.”
“Wait A Minute My Girl” features saxophone player Doug Corcoran and piano player Raynier Jacob Jacildo, who both perform with JD McPherson‘s band and previously appeared with VOLBEAT on 2019’s “Die To Live (feat. Neil Fallon)”. Singer Mia Maja, who has worked with the band since “Seal The Deal & Let’s Boogie”, also appears on backing vocals. “Dagen Før” features guest vocals from Danish artist Stine Bramsen, who is known for her solo work as well as being a member of the band ALPHABEAT. The song, in the tradition of “The Garden’s Tale”, “Maybele I Hofteholder” and “For Evigt”, features both English and Danish lyrics, and marks the first commercially released song that features Stine singing in her native Danish.
