Ghost beer - Grale!

Finally here, the beer (or "ale" to be correct) from Ghost.
Called Grale, it´s a play on words because its an ale, but also the religious symbol of "The Holy Grail" - the cup from which Jesus Christ drank during the last supper if you believe that stuff.

Since I´m not much of a beer-drinker I cannot give a judgement on the taste, but I have heard from several others that it tastes quite nice and I´ve seen many people recomending it. The alcohol level is of course 6,66 %.

The ale isn´t all that easy to get a hold of, even here in Sweden.
First of all; beer and alcohol can only be bought at special stores.
Second; none of these stores actually carry the ale, so it must be specially pre-ordered by you, the customer.
Third; it is only sold in boxes of six. Plain, brown, ugly cardboard boxes.

There is a limited run of 10 000 bottles (1 666 boxes) and according to Ghost official facebook page there are not that many left by now.

The labels look really great and the only complaint I have is regarding the box. It would be very easy to have a Ghost-sticker or Grale-label on the box to spice it up a bit.

 

Posters.

I will eventually fill up with lots more posters, but for now I will concentrate on one particular poster. The first time I got to see Ghost was in early June 2011, at the small festival "Muskelrock" in the South of Sweden. This is also the place where I first saw this glorious poster for sale and I desperately wanted it - but I had no cash! I had travelled by myself and knew no-one to borrow from! I had to leave without being able to buy it.
For several months I regretted this. The memory of the lost poster haunted me. I saw it in front of me when I closed my eyes and I searched the web for it but never found it.
I was lucky enough to catch the band some months later at "Malmöfestivalen" and to my big relief the poster was still available and I bought two copies.
One of them remains rolled up in a tube and the other one is hanging proudly on one of my walls, alongside some other Ghost posters that will be presented at a later time.

Ghost-wall

The poster itself is quite large at about 70 x 100 cm (you will have to do the maths yourself to translate that into foot or inches...) and it´s a very high quality screenprint on thick paper. 

Several years went by and I kept on searching for the poster occasionally, but I never even found a picture of it. Not until Sweden Rock Magazine, in their July 2013 issue, had a big special on Watain and their main man Erik Danielsson, who of course is the man behind some of Ghosts great designs and this poster in particular. 

At the end of the article there is a small special on Erik and his work with Ghost, and there - in the background lower right-hand corner - I saw the poster for the first time except for the one on my wall!

The only other time I have ever seen the poster was very recently (this is written november 29, 2014) at the Swedish auction site Tradera. At the end of November 2014 it was offered up for sale - to my knowledge - for the first time ever. It sold for SEK 876, which is about $ 115. To be honest I thought it would go for at least $ 200.

The poster is limited to 100 copies, each of them hand-numbered and signed by Erik Danielsson. It is long, long out of print and it looks great. It should sell for a lot more than $ 115.

My theory is that this poster is so rare that most collectors don´t even know it exist. It was only ever sold in Sweden, at the early stage of the band´s career. When the hype around the band reached its epic proportions, the poster was long gone and stored away safely among the few collectors who lucky enough to get one.
Perhaps collectors saw the poster on Tradera but thought it was a fake, some kind of home-order cheap print to cash in on the band´s hardcore following. I´m here to tell you that this poster is state of the art. It´s the real deal and it´s absolutely GREAT!

More posters to follow shortly.

Bootleg-LPs + 10" and 12" singles

As I wrote in my last post regarding 7" bootlegs, I don´t collect any of these releases. When I see them for sale online I will save the pictures and any desciption regarding quantity, different editions etc, but that´s it.

Here we go!

Front cover

Back cover

Black vinyl with dark blue print

White vinyl with light blue print

White vinyl with red print

THE EARLY RITUALS - LP

This probably the first bootleg LP issued on Ghost.

Only one side of the LP is playable as the other is a screen print. The different versions available:

Black vinyl with dark blue print.

White vinyl with light blue print.

White vinyl with red print.

It contains the three demos that the band recorded and distributed freely in late summer 2010.

There are supposedly 250 copies of each version, but I think that is onylt rue for the latter two. 

The black vinyl edition was the first to reach the market and it was either made in bigger quantities or it was reprinted at some point. There are simply too many black vinyls out there for it to only exist in 250 copies.

*********************************************************************************

Black vinyl

Clear vinyl

Back cover

LIVE IN SAN FRANCISCO - 13 DATES OF DOOM

The show was recorded at the "Bottom Of The Hill" clum in San Francisco on February 1, 2012, but this album was not released until more than a year later, mid 2013.

It was made in 10 copies total (five copies black vinyl, and five copies clear vinyl) and also comes with a certificate of which number you have. It is also individually numbered on the back cover.

*********************************************************************************

Front cover

Back cover

Black vinyl

Clear vinyl

OLD RITUALS

Not much information about this one, except that there is supposed to exist 10 copies on black vinyl and 10 copies on clear vinyl.

*********************************************************************************

 Front cover

 Back cover

 Glow in the dark vinyl

 Glow in the dark print

A GHOLISH TALE

Great sounding (soundboard) recording of four tracks from the band´s appearance at the Graspop Metal Meeting on June 30, 2013.

This album comes in two different editions, each produced in 250 copies.

Well, look at the pictures above. The green is glow in the dark material and it is reversed on the two editions.

*********************************************************************************

 Front cover

 Back cover

Night blue vinyl - 50 copies

Light grey marbled vinyl - 30 copies

 Aqua marbled vinyl - 20 copies

 Stickered plastic sleeve

 Testpress,  hand-numbered, 15 copies total

 Testpress, back cover

HAUNTED LUXEMBOURG
Recorded at the Herchesfeld Roesler Festival Grounds on July 1, 2014, as support to Iron Maiden.
This is a quite nice release with a very good overall design. As shown above, the vinyl comes in three different editions in various colours + a black testpress edition. Each album also comes in a plastic sleeve with a sticker. Each colour of the vinyl is matched by the colour of the sticker. Great!
 If you are into collecting vinyl bootlegs, this is one of best ones out there.
*********************************************************************************

 

LIVEEVIL - VOLUME ONE

Not sure if this is really an unofficial release, I would say that this is semi-official, if there is such a thing? Only one Ghost song (the standard studio version of "Death knell") and the rest are various artists, all of whom are probably also a part of the "Liveevil"-festival.

500 copies and not very hard to track down.

*********************************************************************************

INFESTISSUMAM PICTURE DISC

Official South-American fan-club picture disc limited to 250 copies.

Yeah, right.

This is not official, probably not South-American, not issued by a fan-club and definetly not limited to 250 copies.

This is most likely a European bootleg made in well over a thousand copies. It is very easy to find almost everywhere and if it really was limited to only 250 copies and only produced for a fan-club in South-America - well, it would have been long gone by now and impossible to find.

Ghost bootlegs! 7" vinyl singles + flexi discs

Let me state right away that I´m usually a huge fan of the vinyl bootleg and hunt after them like crazy!
That being said however, I am NOT a fan of this recent trend of mega limited editions - often only five or ten copies. Not only is it almost impossible to find them, but if you do manage to track one of them down the price asked for them are nothing short of ridiculous.
I like to try to get as complete a collection as possible, but those limited quantities and accompanying prices effectively kills both the collecting spirit and the wallet.

For this reason, I do not collect bootlegs by Ghost and none of the records listed above are my own. I still like to keep an eye open for what´s out there and have saved pictures of bootlegs over the past three years when I have found them. I don´t have any first hand information on any of them and all I know is what can be read on the pictures. More colors available of some release, a second run produced of another - I have no idea! When I find it I will add it, but for now, this is all I know.
All pictures come from searches on eBay over the years.

Besides the first entry below, which was actually the first one that ever appeared for Ghost fans, the bootlegs are not presented in any particular order.

*********************************************************************************

Here comes the sun/Interview (Metal Injection Youtube interview)

This single was the first vinyl bootleg that was ever produced for the Ghost market.

10 individually numbered copies available: 1-5 in clear vinyl, 6-10 in black.

A piece of paper is included with number and additional information on the release.

*********************************************************************************

Live Ceremony 

(Intro + Con Clavi Con Dio/Elizabeth)

Recorded live at Hellfest, Clisson, France, June 19 2011.

66 copies total. Clear vinyl (haven´t seen any other color)

*********************************************************************************

Live Ceremony At Music Feeds Studio 

(If You Have Ghosts/Ritual)

Recorded live in Music Feeds Studio, Australia, January 2014.

50 copies total. Black vinyl.

*********************************************************************************

Here Comes The Sun

Recorded live at Cupolen, Linköping, Sweden December 15, 1012 + 

The Roxy, Los Angeles, CA. USA February 2, 2012

Same song on both sides?

Allegedly 300 copies total, mostly black, but clear vinyl also exist.

*********************************************************************************

Live Ritual

Recorded live at Fuzz Club, Athens, October 8, 2011

66 copies total, black and clear vinyl.

Same as above, but a picture disc. 50 copies.

*********************************************************************************

Con Clavi Con Dio

Recorded live at Hellfest, Clisson, France, June 19 2011.

1-sided disc with image on one side and music on the other. 

20 copies.

*********************************************************************************

The Secular Summoning

(Secular haze/I´m a marionette)

Recorded live at Cupolen, Linköping, Sweden December 15, 1012 

Picture disc, 50 copies.

*********************************************************************************

Con Clavi Con Dio

Recorded live in Fuzz Club, Athens, October 8, 2011

Clear flexi disc, 10 copies.

*********************************************************************************

 Live At Roadburn, Midi Theatre

(Stand By Him)

Recorded live at Roadburn Festival, midi Theatre, Tilburg, The Netherlands, April 4, 2011.

Clear flexi disc, 10 copies.

*********************************************************************************

Live At Coachella

(Year Zero)

Recorded live at the Coachella Festival, Indio, CA. USA on April 21, 2013.

Both black flexi and clear flexi available.

10 copies, but I´m not sure if it´s 10 copies total or 10 copies of each color.

*********************************************************************************

 Live At Coachella

(Ritual) 

Recorded live at the Coachella Festival, Indio, CA. USA on April 21, 2013.

At this time I have only the clear flexi confirmed, but probably both black flexi and clear flexi exist.

(see above entry)

10 copies, but I´m not sure if it´s 10 copies total or 10 copies of each color (if more than one exist).