GHOST's TOBIAS FORGE: Being Mentored By METALLICA And IRON MAIDEN Is 'Very, Very Inspiring'

GHOST lead singer and founder Tobias Forge — who performs as Papa Emeritus and does the act's interviews disguised as a member of his backing band of Nameless Ghouls — was a guest on a recent edition of BBC Radio 1's "Rock Show With Daniel P. Carter" where he talked about his musical influences. You can now listen to the chat using the audio played below.

Forge said: "Luckily, playing shows with bands, I've also had the great pleasure of being mentored by some of my favorite bands in the world, who've been very, very nice and very supporting: METALLICA, obviously; IRON MAIDEN; FOO FIGHTERS… They've definitely all made myself and the band and the crew really feel welcome.

"I've always been [appreciative], for as long as I've been doing this, especially because I was given a good hand somewhat later than, I guess, most other bands starting out when they're twenty, and they screw everything up and they wake up seven years later: 'What happened?' Whereas I was close to thirty when we started touring.

"Part of my touring regime and touring ethics comes from sitting with [IRON MAIDEN's] 'Live After Death', looking through all those dates, looking through all the things and lists of stuff. [I was thinking] 'This is exactly what I wanna do. They're big in America.' Then you have to play in Saginaw [laughs], and you play four dates in Wisconsin. So that was, like, 'Okay, that's how you tour.' And some of my first really big shows were METALLICA. That also set a standard. So now, being mentored by those bands and being close to them and close to their crew and watching that operation, it's, for me, very, very inspiring, and I'm happy that I have the luxury of seeing that. METALLICA was also one of my brother's favorite bands, so there's definitely moments where — because he passed away, basically, just before GHOST happened — so there's definitely moments there where it's… You have that feeling of, 'Look at this. I'm here watching this. Being asked to… I just played on this stage now. There's James Hetfield playing that song.'"

GHOST will enter the studio in mid-August to begin recording its fourth studio album, a month after the completion of its North American tour as support for IRON MAIDEN. The follow-up to 2015's "Meliora" is expected out sometime early next year.

"If everything goes to plan, by the end of the year we will have a new record recorded, mixed, mastered, delivered, and if nothing happens, we can still aim at an April release," Forge told the Dallas Observer. "The plan as of right now is to come back to America in April or May [of 2018]. We have a tendency to do American tours in April, so we like that tradition. It's a good one and we'd like to keep doing that."