King Diamond
Encyclopedia : K : KI : KIN : King Diamond
King Diamond (born Kim Bendix Petersen, June 14, 1956, Denmark) is a heavy metal musician known for his shifting vocal patterns and 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, Mercyful Fate are often considered thematic progenitors of what would become black metal. Their musical style is somewhat remenicent of heavy metal, power metal, progressive metal and rock opera. As a vocalist, Diamond is known for his use of growling and falsetto throughout 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 the skeleton was stolen after a performance in the Netherlands. 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 melt together as one story - features present already in The Fatal Portrait album, but carried to more intricate levels with the album Them , and its sequel, 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 feature often dueling, guitar solos. On the CD inserts, the performer of each solo is credited, often using a symbol.
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. In the song, he uses his trademark falsetto mixed in with his deep demonic growling. Also in late 2005, King Diamond lent his vocals to a Cradle of Filth song, "Devil Woman".
He and his band members are currently working on a 2006 full album release.
Satanism
Unlike many other heavy metal artists who have used occult-related themes for shock or theatrical value - (Black Sabbath, Slayer) - or parody, intentional or not - (Venom) - Diamond openly claims to be a Satanist and a follower of the late Church of Satan leader Anton LaVey, with whom he became friends during the later years of LaVey's life. This is arguable at best. There also are many interviews and much evidence to support that Diamond is not at all Satanic, in any sense of the word. He's been quoted as saying such things as: "It's all for show". He's also talked at length about how people have a perverse sense of good and evil and that while many "good" people only do good things, they have a perverse interest in "evil".This has caused much controversy in Diamond's career. In the early-to-mid 1980's existence of Mercyful Fate, some potential fans were repelled by the open and overt Satanism in Fate's lyrics, while others embraced it.
Many familiar with this time 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.
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" (in direct contrast with the philosophy of Anton LaVey and the Church of Satan), yet he adorns himself with inverted crosses, Baphomet symbology and has written lyrics very hostile to Christianity. However, with the albums released under his own name, he has downplayed the overt Satanism in favor of a "horror movie" approach, though he still wears the inverted crosses, both as jewelry 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.See also
- Mercyful Fate
- Mercyful Fate discography
- King Diamond
- King Diamond discography
- Black Rose
- Brats (pre-Mercyful Fate)
References
Liner notes to King Diamond/Mercyful Fate A Dangerous Meeting, a compilation album released by Roadrunner Records in 1992.External links
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.