King Diamond Live
At the Country Club, Reseda, CA, August 16, 1986

King Diamond had the best concert this year. If you are broke, have to travel miles to see a show, and could only afford one, this is the concert to see.
The stage is dark and foggy and the organ begins for "The Candle". There is blueish fog surrounding an old castle with gabels, and the band begins with great energy. King's strong voice pierces through the darkness.
Next they play "Haunted" and the guitars really shine through. Now they go back to the Mercyful Fate days of "Come to the Sabbath", and King sing it much better than the old days. His voice has improved greatly and getting much stronger, and there some nice guitar changes at the end. The band has a lot of motion with them running around the stage.

He introduces "The Portrait" with such a growl to his voice and begins singing with the best clear voice. The song is about a lady who paints a portrait of the little girl Molly, and she is dying as her mother is painting each stroke, and the life goes out of her into the picture. King expresses this with many different voice expressions from growling and the strongest, highest clear voice.
Then King talks about the unseen things that look at us at night that are so real as he introduces "Lurking In the Dark".

Picking up his favorite book, "The Jonah" they begin playing well with lots of unusual scales that asound so well together, that only this group can play. Then they go back to the time of "Gypsy" and they are more like gypsies than ever before.
Their favorite night "Halloween" which they must celebrate everynight was played with much energy put to it. King has the best scream and vibrato to be heard as you can hear him howl miles away. And he always looks the part for it. Mikkey Dee pounds away like a madman on all his drums displaying his half man half beast superhuman strenght as he torches the drums. And they go directly into "Dressed In White".
Going back to the time of "Evil" the guitars playfully play around the drums and then sound like thunder that shakes the whole room. King plays not so nice with his doll with some of his classic vampire expressions. He has a future in horror movies. King steps back and the spiked gate on the gabel falls on him and possibly through him. Everyone wonders if King is OK.

But he is probably OK because he gets right up and and the intro of "The Oath" begins and he enters the stage with more power than ever. While singing this Satantic song, he is French kissing and putting a goats skull into his mouth while he is glowing bright red. This visual effect has a strong impact. Andy LaRocque begins his guitar solo and is very efficient while playing in different keys and then explodes. Then he plays many fast leads on many scales with great dexterity and very gracefully. The band joins him and they all go directly back to the Inferno with "Charon".
If you missed this show: thats too bad, but there may be hope when they come back again.

King Diamond Interview
This interview takes place in 1986 after King left Mercyful Fate and formed King Diamond. He talks a lot about new band members, recording studio, and new plans with the help of band manager Ole Bang.

BAND HISTORY

The members of King Diamond's band are all self-taught in playing, and never had any real training. In fact, they started long time ago, when most of them were only fifteen years old.
The two new members drummer Mikkey Dee, and lead guitar Andy La Rocque have not have much past experience. Mikkey played in a local band called "Geisha", and Andy did some guitar work with a local Swedish band called "E.F.-Band".
Now for the old members who were in Mercyful Fate, Timi Hansen (bass) and Michael Denner (lead guitar) were also mainly self-taught. Timi did not play in any band before Mercyful Fate, just some school party bands. Michael played with Time during Mercyful Fate, but he also played in the "Brats" before that. (The Danish band not to be confused with the American band with the same name). Before the Brats Michael had is own band called "Van-Denner". King Diamond played in some local bands, such as "Brainstorm" and "Black Rose" before joining "Brats". King joined the Brats after the release of the Brats LP and singles, so his first final production was with Mercyful Fate.

STAGE SHOW

King Diamond's new stage is a 12 foot high construction that is effectively used to display the errie King Diamond stage set. King's ideas are basically his own, largely inspired by his favorite artist Alice Cooper. King received his scary looking skull and bonet from a good friend in Denmark, and at a later time, he picked up a goat skull in New York during the MF tour, and later He added another human leg bone to his collection, similar to the one on his Mic holder. In the event that something should go wrong, the extra is there, just in case.

TOUR

According to the band, American audiences are basically the same as European audiences, but maybe a little wilder. That's probably because American audiences are larger than those in Europe.
Touring-wise, the band finds Europe more free and relaxed, as opposed to the hectic bustle of the United States. We would like to stay in the United States for a while, but I can't think any of us would want to live there for very long.
On their tour, there were solos like the ones with Mercyful Fate, so you can guarantee that there will not be bored by long, boring, dull solos that many bands have a reputation for. There was a short guitar solo and a short drum solo to introduce the new band members.

HOW DOES KING WORK ON HIS UNIQUE VOCAL STYLE?

At the time of writing a song he spends a lot of time working on the vocals at home, by making the basic tapes before deciding where to put the vocals. During songwriting he makes plans for his special vocal arrangements so it fits the song rhythm. Inspiring ideas naturally come to him giving him creativity for his unique songs.
King started out as a guitar player but his band needed a vocalist, and they said that he could do the job well; so that is how his singing career got rolling. At first he may have been bad, like most beginning singers, but through persistance and many long, long hours of daily practice his voice unfolded to its strong, vibrant quality of today. In order to sing high notes as loud and clear with much vibrato like he does, you must develope your upper regesters of your voice which may take many years. Back then he was aiming to sound like Deep Purple's Ian Gullian and David Byron from Uriah Heep.

WHAT HAPPENED TO HANK SHERMAN AND KIM RUZZ?

Hank formed a very commercial band called "Fate" whose music is aimed at a very young audience. This is very different from Mercyful Fate days,
Kim is a postman in Copenhegen and currently not in a band.



KING'S JOB AS A RECORD PRODUCER

King has produced "Fatal Portrait" together with Rune Hoyer and Michael Denner.
Producing the LP meant a lot to King. The record companies like to have a "professional" producer, and for many bands that is what is best, especially when the band has no idea of how to produce. The producer is in charge and knows exactly how to make the certain instrument sound that is wanted. The engineer handles the buttons and has some idea of what to do to get the to get the right sound out of the instruments, but the producer is the real creater, giving the instructions to the engineer to do the rough work. Usually the producer is told by the band what the sound should be like, and passes the orders to the engineer to realize it, and the two of them may or may not be happy with it, and possibly do it again. In their case the engineer was extremely competent. King had all the ideas of how the recordings should sound and went into and went into a top quality 48 track studio. He knew there was no reason not to get what he wanted.
He has spent many long nights trying out different things and different harmonies. Each guitar was recorded in two separate rooms, the basement and "soft room" twice; so many different sounds were mixed together. It is very exciting, and the new LP will be made by the same people. They are now in the studio working on this project.