In 2008, Ghost frontman Tobias Forge was part of the band Subvision and also played bass in Magna Carta Cartel. At the time, they had been working on the follow-up to Subvision's So Far So Noir, but after a few discussions, Forge felt that this work could go on to become his solo project, 'Passiflora'.
After hand burning a handful of copies to hand out to record companies, 'Passiflora' failed to be picked up by any label and the project was scrapped. Whilst Tobias Forge went on to bigger and better things with Ghost, the hand burnt CDs that Forge handed out to record companies and friends made their way into the hands of collectors, and eventually became an underground market with copies in recent years selling for up to $5000 due to its rarity, making it one of Discogs most paid for sales.
The album became sacred to those who owned a copy and despite it being in the hands of others for over 15 years, 'Passiflora' remained unheard by eager fans without a physical copy, with only a demo version of 'House of Affection' and a live version of 'The Breeze' on Youtube. That was until the 13th of February this year...
A mysterious link was anonymously messaged to several fans, the sender claiming they made a 'Valentines Day playlist' to the recipient. When opened, a playlist that contained 'Passiflora' was available, under the guise of a 'Slime Tutorial', with each track listed as 'slime tutorial 1', 2, 3 etc. The first 'tutorial' contained a typical 'shit post' image of a dog, whilst the others had the official 'Passiflora' album artwork as their thumbnails. Many fans questioned the legitimacy of the tracks, but those in the know managed to confirm and link any small details they knew about the tracks to verify this is indeed the Ghost frontman's scrapped project.
Fans were ecstatic to finally hear this album, especially being able to make connections to current-day Ghost songs, for example on the track 'Red Lights', the lyrics 'It's the sound of deadlines whistling past your ears' were reused on Ghost's 'Kaisarion' (Impera 2022).
Whether Forge is aware or not of the leak is yet to be seen, but given 'House of Affection' has been on Youtube for years without being pulled, it's unlikely any action will be taken.
