Opus Eponymous

Opus Eponymous is the debut studio album by the Swedish rock band Ghost. It was released on 18 October 2010, on the independent record label Rise Above. It was released in North America on 18 January 2011, and in Japan on 6 April 2011. The album was recorded in the band's hometown and produced by Gene Walker. Opus Eponymous was nominated for a Grammis Award. The Japanese release contains an additional bonus track: a cover of the Beatles' "Here Comes the Sun". Background A band member, all of whom are referred to only as Nameless Ghouls, explained that the songs on Opus Eponymous were written in 2007 and 2008, around two years before the album was released. Tobias Forge said that it was the song "Stand by Him" that heralded the start of the band: "while being together in another band, Ghost started when I played a riff to everybody else. I said that this is probably the most heavy metal riff that has ever existed. Then I showed them the opening riff to 'Stand by Him'. When the chorus came to me, it haunted my dreams. Every time I picked up the guitar, I ended up playing that progression, and when I fit the words in, it seemed to cry out for a Satanically-oriented lyric. This was in 2006. When we came up with the name Ghost, it seemed only natural to build on the foundation of this heavy imagery. Within that concept we were able to combine our love of horror films, and of course, the traditions of Scandinavian metal." The lyrics to "Stand by Him" were originally in Swedish. Forge contacted his former Repugnant bandmate Gustaf Lindström and recorded demos of "Stand by Him", "Prime Mover" and "Death Knell" in early 2008. It was the songs that caused Ghost to become a theatrical band with their Satanic theme: "Very early on, when the material came together in the project phase before it was actually a band, when it was a logo and a couple of songs, it came together by itself because the material and the lyrics sort of screamed a over-the-top commitment to the dark side. It is hard to make that credible and really eerie. What we thought of when we heard the songs is basically a band that looks the way we do now", explained a Ghoul. Although he sang on the demos, Forge did not want to be the singer, preferring to be the guitarist. He approached several vocalists for the role, including Messiah Marcolin, Mats Levén, Christer Göransson of Mindless Sinner, and JB Christoffersson.