GHOST's TOBIAS FORGE: 'My First Idols Were KISS'

iHeartRadio's Bodhi recently conducted an interview with GHOST leader Tobias Forge. You can now listen to the chat below.

Asked what first made him want to get involved in the music business, Forge said: "I've been interested in music for as long as I can remember. My first idols were KISS. Ever since I was very, very little — like three or four years old — I wanted to entertain, and I wanted to entertain with music. But as I got a little bit older, and when I was able to read, I watched a lot of VHS video when I was a kid. And one favorite film that I had… One was, actually, about a band, but it was not necessarily so business oriented, [and that] was 'The Great Rock 'N' Roll Swindle' [the 1980 British mockumentary film centering on the British punk rock band SEX PISTOLS], which painted a very vivid and weird idea of being a rock band, which completely sucked me in — I was completely in awe of that film. And, obviously, little did I understand at that point, but I understood later what a chaotic band and what a screwed-up career SEX PISTOLS had. But it definitely colored my thinking. I wanted a band to be somewhere in between KISS and THE ROLLING STONES and SEX PISTOLS — just outrageous and over the top, [with] these fictional characters, basically.

"The first book I ever read — from start to finish — was Bill Wyman's autobiography when it came out," he continued. "I got it for Christmas just when it was new, and at that point, I was, like, eight, nine years old. And it's a thick book as well. When I look at it now — I still have the book — it's, like, 'Wow! I can't believe that I read that when I was eight years old.' He speaks a lot about girls, and he speaks a lot about [the] financial situation of THE ROLLING STONES in the '60s. It's funny, because that book ends in 1969. And THE ROLLING STONES was — and still is — one of my favorite bands of all time. So I'd say it's a mixture of those bands. THE ROLLING STONES, and what they were, in 1969, 1970, '72 — like their '72 American tour — that is the pinnacle, one of the pinnacles, of rock and roll for me."

Upon its release via Loma Vista Recordings in June, GHOST's latest album, "Prequelle" landed at position No. 3 on the Billboard 200 chart, shifting 66,000 equivalent album units during its first week of release. Of that sum, around 61,000 were in traditional album sales.

GHOST's first-week tally benefited from a concert ticket/album sale redemption offer in association with the band's spring U.S. theater tour, as well as a pair of arena dates later this year.

"Prequelle" was tracked last year at Artery studios in Stockholm with producer Tom Dalgety (OPETH, ROYAL BLOOD) and mixed in January at Westlake Studios in West Hollywood, California with Andy Wallace (NIRVANA, SLAYER).