King Diamond

King Diamond (born Kim Bendix Petersen, June 14, 1956, Denmark) is a heavy metal musician known for his wide vocal range and Satanic shock rock image. As the frontman for both Mercyful Fate and the eponymous King Diamond, his music has had an influence on many bands across a variety of metal sub-genres; Metallica, for instance, occasionally performed lengthy medleys of Mercyful Fate songs during their concerts.

Biography

Mercyful Fate era

Diamond's first band, with whom he played guitar, was called Brainstorm. Feeling creatively dissatisfied, Diamond left Brainstorm and began singing with local Danish hard rock band Black Rose. It was during his time in Black Rose that Diamond began experimenting with horror themed theatrics as well as shaping the malevolent quasi-Satanic stage persona that he would become known for in the future. In 1980, he left Black Rose and joined the punk-metal band Brats. It was in Brats that Diamond met the three musicians (Hank Shermann, Michael Denner, Timi Hansen) that would join with Diamond in 1980 and become Mercyful Fate. Because of the group's stage presence, make-up and occult lyrics. Their musical style is somewhat reminiscent of heavy metal, power metal, progressive metal and rock opera. As a vocalist, Diamond is known for his use of falsetto, mixed with mid-range vocals in most of his music.

On stage, Diamond uses a trademark microphone stand consisting of two femur bones in the shape of an inverted cross. Also a live trademark, was Melissa, a full human skeleton, which Diamond would sing to. In the mid-1980s Melissa's skull was stolen after a performance in the Netherlands. It was claimed to have been finally returned in 2006.[1], however this was denied by King Diamond himself. He was once sued by KISS bassist Gene Simmons because Simmons claimed that Diamond's use of face make-up was too similar to his own. Diamond has changed the design of his make-up often over the years. With Conspiracy, he wore a mesh of black and white line war paint, with some red "blood" made to look like a wound coming out of his forehead. With his last album The Puppet Master, he used very little white and mainly had black inverted crosses going up and down his face.

King Diamond era

Following the 1984 release of Don't Break the Oath and the subsequent tour which saw them play in the U.S. for the first time, Diamond, frustrated by creative differences with Shermann, split ways with Mercyful Fate and took with him two of his bandmates (Hansen and Denner) to form a new band under his own name, King Diamond.

A distinct feature of Diamond's music is his frequent use of lyrics and music to create characters and tell stories in the form of concept albums. Albums meld together as one story - features present already in The Fatal Portrait album, but carried to more intricate levels with the albums, Abigail, Them , and The Eye to the dramatic story, Conspiracy. Typical of both the Abigail and Conspiracy tours was that King Diamond re-enacted the scenarios on stage, using special effects in the show much in the style of metal-musician Alice Cooper, of whom Diamond is a fan. King Diamond albums also often feature dueling guitar solos. On the CD inserts, the performer of each solo is credited, often using a symbol.

He and his band members are currently working on a 2007 full album release.

Mercyful Fate Reunion

Mercyful Fate re-united in 1992, while the band King Diamond continued as well up until 1999, at which point he decided to put Mercyful Fate in retirement and continue on with King Diamond. He released House of God in 2000, Abigail II: The Revenge in 2002, and The Puppet Master in 2003. He released a double disk live album from the Puppet Master Tour (his first in over a decade) and another warm up tour in 2005.

In late 2005, King Diamond appeared on the Roadrunner United - The All-Star Sessions album. He did vocals to a song called "In the Fire". The song is on an album being released by Roadrunner Records featuring multiple musicians working together to create individual songs. Also in late 2005, King Diamond lent his vocals to a Cradle of Filth song, "Devil Woman".

Satanism

Despite numerous claims otherwise, Peter H. Gilmore, The High Priest in The Church Of Satan, has confirmed in an interview on the news show "The Hour" that King Diamond is in fact a member of the Church. However, Satanism of this variety is merely a philosophy influenced by Nietzsche and other individualist philosophers and should not be confused with Theistic Satanism or Devil Worship.

Many familiar with Fate's mid-1980s period will recall a spring 1984 interview with British heavy metal magazine Kerrang! correspondent Dave Dickson, who, after some introductory remarks and questions about the then-current Fate album Don't Break The Oath, took Diamond to task on his Satanic beliefs. Dickson made frequent references to infamous occultist Aleister Crowley, by whom Diamond denied being influenced. Diamond made his admiration of LaVey very clear in this interview, which some have said led to the demise of Mercyful Fate, though Diamond always has denied this. In the same interview he claims to have cursed Manowar. Fate had briefly toured the UK as support act for Manowar, and there were personality conflicts between the two bands.

Diamond's personal brand of Satanism has been paradoxical to many. He has said "I don't go for evil things" ... "the words Satan and Lucifer do not mean evil to me" and "I don't have anything against Christians or their beliefs" (interview in MegaMetal Kerrang! #1, "The King's New Clothes", early 1986).

However, LaVey's Brand of Satanism is not a strict religion and all of its members have slightly varying beliefs as such it is entireley possible that he does follow LaVey's teachings. He adorns himself with an inverted crosses, the sigil of Baphomet, from the LaVeyan perspective, and has written lyrics openly hostile to Christianity as is evidenced in the song "The Oath" in which Diamond uses such lyrics as "I deny Jesus Christ, The Deceiver, and I abjure the Christian faith holding in contempt the whole of its works". However, with the albums released under his own name, he has downplayed the overt Satanism in favour of a "horror movie" approach, though he still wears the inverted crosses, both as jewellery and makeup.

Discography

King Diamond has participated on all Mercyful Fate and King Diamond albums. For a complete listing see King Diamond discography and Mercyful Fate discography.

Popular culture references

Liner notes to King Diamond/Mercyful Fate A Dangerous Meeting, a compilation album released by Roadrunner Records in 1992.

King Diamond is referenced in the motion picture Clerks 2, during a scene where the characters Randal Graves and Elias Grover are discussing Elias' love of Transformers. To mock the Born Again Christian Elias, Randal then begins singing King Diamond's "Welcome Home." He is joined by Jay, who climbs into the restaurant through the drive-through window as they begin singing "Invisible Guests". In an extended version of this scene on the DVD, Jay goes on to proclaim his love for King Diamond and black metal. Both songs as well as the dialogue of the Transformers scene (labeled "The First of The Fallen") appear on the Clerks 2 soundtrack CD. The song "Welcome Home" is also featured in one of the internet exclusive trailers for Clerks 2, which can be viewed on the www.clerks2.com website.

Dethklok: Metalocalypse

King Diamond has recorded various voices for 4 episodes of the Adult Swim show Metalocalypse, including Dr. Ronald Von Monoldburg ("Skwisklok"), Employee 421 ("Murdering Outside the Box"), the manager at Dimmu Burger ("Go Forth and Die"), and The Blues Devil ("Bluesklok")

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