{"id":269575,"date":"2025-07-17T14:54:10","date_gmt":"2025-07-17T14:54:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/269575\/"},"modified":"2025-07-17T14:54:10","modified_gmt":"2025-07-17T14:54:10","slug":"tobias-forge-says-phone-ban-on-ghosts-recent-tour-was-life-changing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/269575\/","title":{"rendered":"Tobias Forge says “phone ban” on Ghost’s recent tour was \u201clife-changing”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tobias Forge<\/a> has shared that implementing a ban on phones at recent Ghost<\/a> shows has been \u201clife-changing\u201d.<\/p>\n

The comments come as the Swedish metal band brought their largest ever \u2018Skeletour\u2019 concert<\/a> to the UK this spring, and announced shortly beforehand that they were going to implement the \u201cphone-free\u201d rule to encourage fans to be more interactive with the performances.<\/a><\/p>\n

There were mixed responses, with some claiming that it makes the performances feel \u201ceven more special\u201d, while others criticised it as leading to extensive queues in Birmingham<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Now, though, as the band prepare to kick off the US leg of the tour<\/a>, the frontman and founder, Tobias Forge, has said that the decision was a success from his point of view, and made a \u201clife-changing\u201d difference towards his mindset towards touring.<\/p>\n

\u201c[It\u2019s been a] fucking life-changer. Life-changer for the existence of the band, absolutely,\u201d he said while at a Q&A event at HMV in Manchester (via Blabbermouth<\/a>). \u201cJust walking off stage [on the] first night was just, like, \u2018This has completely changed the entire outlook of how this feels\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that there are a lot of bands that are looking at this and just, like, \u2018OK, so how do we do that too?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

He also explained that the decision came as he started to notice crowds were getting less involved in the live show as they were too distracted filming it \u2013 sharing that it would often feel like there were \u201c18,000 people there and 10,000 phones\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re not even bouncing anymore. And you\u2019re just like, \u2018What is this? What has happened?\u2019\u201d he added. \u201cAll of a sudden, the crowd that you\u2019ve seen for 13 years has just got less and less and less engaged in exchange for these phones. What\u2019s that about? What the fuck?<\/p>\n

\u201cI came to a point where I was like, \u2018I don\u2019t think I wanna do this. If this is how it\u2019s gonna be, I\u2019d rather not do it\u2019\u2026 That\u2019s how worthless it became because of the phones. Especially a show like ours.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ghost are not the first to opt for a phone-free policy at gigs \u2013 last year, Bob Dylan announced a very similar scheme for his UK tour<\/a>, while Jack White did the same for a run of shows in 2018<\/a>, and Placebo declared their 2022 gigs to be a \u201cphone-free experience\u201d<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The comments from Forge also come after he told NME about another potential change that could be on the way for Ghost. Speaking as part of an In Conversation interview<\/a> this spring, the musician explained that there could be an end to the band\u2019s lore on the horizon<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that there might be an end to the storytelling because it\u2019s not productive to have this endless soap opera. If fans need the lore in order to like the band, then that element will probably be over quite soon,\u201d he revealed.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cIf there is a way where the music can be enough and remains enjoyable, though, I am just as needy as any other artist in the sense of milestones that I want to achieve. There are still places that I want to play and still things I want to do that will be another feather in my hat. I am very lucky that I\u2019ve been able to achieve many of those things, but there are still levels of success that I want.\u201d<\/p>\n

Elsewhere in the same interview, Forge said Ghost are \u201cliving proof\u201d that the concept that \u201crock is dead\u201d is not true<\/a>, shared the impact that Black Sabbath had on him<\/a>, and hinted that he may be thinking about a career in film.<\/a> Check out the interview in full above, or read it here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The band\u2019s latest album, \u2018Skelet\u00e1\u2019 arrived in April and was given a four-star from NME <\/a>\u2013 which described it as seeing the band \u201cbroaden their musical scope and explore a tapestry of human emotion\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile it may not boast the same instant hooks of some earlier albums, the latest offering does instead offer something more substantial,\u201d it read. \u201cThrough a rich exploration of genres and a new level of emotional depth, it becomes clear that \u2018Skelet\u00e1\u2019 was made with a new vision in mind, and comes as the promising start of a new Ghost chapter.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since then, Forge has joined Opeth to perform Queen\u2019s \u2018Bohemian Rhapsody\u2019 for Swedish royalty<\/a>, launched a Mother\u2019s Day-inspired dildo<\/a> (which quickly sold out), and appeared at Black Sabbath\u2019s final live show<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tobias Forge has shared that implementing a ban on phones at recent Ghost shows has been \u201clife-changing\u201d. The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":269576,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3936],"tags":[77,3981,269,453,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-269575","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-metal","10":"tag-music","11":"tag-rock","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114869152256834164","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269575","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=269575"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269575\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/269576"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=269575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=269575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=269575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}