King Diamond Interview From 2008
Metal Blade Invades Ozzfest Part 2: King Diamond
By Darren Cowan
One of the best features of Ozzfest 2008 was the collaboration of guest musicians who came together in honor of fallen guitar great, Dimebag Darrell. Some of the biggest names in the history of heavy metal joined forces for a variety of classic tunes; most were of a fitting nature, although not from the Dimebag catalog, like Pink Floyd’s “Wish You Were Here.” One of the biggest surprises came when the festival announced a very unusual guest for the Ozzfest fold (considering its mainstream nature), King Diamond. Even more surprising was King Diamond’s performance with Metallica. The dark lord and heavy metal’s most popular group joined on stage to perform the Mercyful Fate medley that Metallic released on their Garage Inc.
King Diamond explains how this massive collaboration began:
“Lars was on his way to L.A. with James to master their new album. He called me up and said he was talking to James about Mercyful Fate and he wondered if I would like to join them on stage. Hank and I did it in Milan back in ’99 in Europe, but that was the last time they played that Mercyful Fate medley. They asked me if my back was ok. Yeah, it is so much better; I am sure it would hold up. I wouldn’t feel better going on a full tour now because of the long rides on a bus, but that stadium (Pizza Hut Park) is five to seven minutes away from here, which was very convenient for me, too. It was just a few days before it happened. I got busy rehearsing those old songs. We rehearsed for two hours the day before and did the soundcheck the next day.
As stated above, King Diamond joining Metallica on stage was perhaps the biggest surprise of the night. Although not announced until a couple of days before the show, his appearance on the Dime tribute was official noted on the evening’s itinerary. His performance with Metallica was of a clandestine nature. King comments, “Nobody knew we were going to do it because that was something nobody talked about. It was a secretive thing, so I don’t think anybody expected it when it happened.”
King Diamond discussed his performance with Metallica with much enthusiasm. He excitedly recounts: “It was just awesome! They are so pro it is unreal! They hadn’t played these songs for so long, but in a two-hour rehearsal they picked it up. It was totally tight and just as it should be. It worked well and the audience was on cue. From what I’ve seen of pictures of it, it must have looked pretty cool. One of the pictures I saw was of my painted face filling up the screen behind us. It must have looked really cool to see that gigantic horror face come on stage right after midnight.
King Diamond and Metallica share a kinship that goes back much further than their performance at Ozzfest. King reminisces, “I clearly remember the first time we ever met. It was in San Francisco in 1984 when we played with Motorhead and Exciter. We were told there was a band outside called Metallica who really wanted to get in. The drummer was from Denmark. We knew Lars’s dad because he was a famous tennis player. We told them to let them in. We talked to them, and then they came on stage and headbanged with us doing our encore.”
King adds, “There are so many memories that we treasure a lot with them. They recorded Ride the Lightning and Master of Puppets in Copenhagen at the Sweet Silence studio. They used Mercyful Fate’s rehearsal room to prepare a lot of their stuff. When they were done rehearsing, we would come in and do our own rehearsals. They might even have borrowed an amp or two. We would come into the studio and listen to some of the stuff they had done. So, it goes far back.”
King lending his voice to Mercyful Fate numbers was quite fitting, even though he did it to Metallica’s instruments, but his earlier presentation was of a much odder nature. During a truly creative rendition of Pantera’s “New Level,” King Diamond unified his eerie wails with Max Cavalera’s (Soulfly/Cavalera Conspiracy) tough voice during the chorus and pre-chorus. This song also included Scott Ian of Anthrax and former Grim Reaper guitarist, Nick Bowcott. the Dime Tribute: (King did the pre-chorus on “New Level” with Scott Ian of Anthrax, the guitarist of Grim Reaper and Max Cavalera singing. Max sang the whole song and King Diamond joined him for the chorus and pre-chorus.
King’s spoke with much less fervor on this showing than his twelve minutes with Metallica. Before addressing this topic, King takes a long breath to collect his thoughts. King replies the question in a fashion that both expresses disappointment yet does not disrespect this musical memorial. “I don’t want to say anything bad about it. I have the highest respect for Dimebag, and I consider him to be a good friend. He played that solo on the “Voodoo” album. I saw him work in the studio. I met him several times before that tour. It was totally for him and for Vinnie’s sake. I just felt like it could have been better. I think the songs could have been performed better, but that’s just my opinion.
King continues, “It seems like there was confusion on stage. I didn’t know what I was going to sing until about five before I went on. They had some kind of rehearsal at Vinnie’s house, but I didn’t get a chance to go there. Vinnie lives in Arlington; I live in Frisco, which is north of Dallas. The drive there is about an hour and a half for me. I couldn’t drive an hour and a half both ways, in the middle of the night with my back being in the shape it is in. That is not the best thing for my back at the moment. It was what it was. I always want things to be perfect. It wasn’t perfect, but I’ll do anything for Dime’s memory. I would do it for Vinnie and for Rita as well. Circumstances like my not getting to rehearse made it less than perfect for my part, but I think it was important that I was there.
King Diamond’s performance with Metallica came as great news for fans awaiting King’s return to touring. However, King’s inability to drive an hour and a half leaves no doubt that a tour is not in his immediate plans. A twelve-minute set does not even approach the question of how his back will hold during a full, hour-or-more set. “I can’t say if it would bother me to play an hour-and-a-half set. That I haven’t tried, but it was ok when I did those twelve minutes. I was careful on stage. I wear this Lombard support that I got from the pharmacy. It helps with the soreness. That worked out ok, but it would be tough riding on a bumpy bus for twelve hours. An airplane…nah ah, not now. I could probably handle first class for three hours, but ten hours in an airport with suitcases and stuff; nope, that’s not gonna happen right now,” King emphatically states.
King says his pain and mobility is much greater than it was when he first injured his back. King experienced a great amount of pain during the beginning stages of his injury. “I would have these pain attacks,” King explains, “that would last fifteen minutes. Had I lived on the third floor, I probably would have jumped out. I would do anything to make it stop. It is the most excruciating pain that a human being can experience. That’s why all these expert doctors who have looked at it say there is nothing worse. You can have the worse toothache and headache combined and it is like watching birds or playing in the park. There is no comparison. You really feel like you would do anything just to make it stop. When it finally started getting better and I could walk, it felt like someone had just stuck a knife into my side and started turning it around inside. Now, I can walk and do things, but I have to be careful. I can’t sit in the wrong chair. If I’m at the doctor’s office and I have to wait fifteen or twenty minutes, I will have to stand up. I can’t lift anything heavier than a gallon of milk.”
King’s debilitating injury put his North American tour with Kreator, Cellador and Leaves Eyes on hold. The injury happened right before he was set to tour, but after he finished mixing Give Me Your Soul. At first King and his evil minions did not know the full extent of his injury. “Then we had to wait for the doctor to tell us how bad the injury was. There is a ninety percent chance that it will heal on its own, but it might take time. How long…no one can say.” King further relates, “It’s probably one of the biggest tests I’ve had in patience and will power to keep going. That part is hopefully behind us now, but we are going to be very careful before we start full power again.”
The King Diamond band may be on a hiatus of an unknown amount of time, but he has much to do from him home. His forthcoming releases will surely keep the packs of fans at bay. “I’m going to be working very soon on this vault of private footage we have of King Diamond and Mercyful Fate. There is going to be a double DVD of each band. You can say they are official bootlegs, but they are of very good quality because they are from our own private recordings. There is some very interesting stuff. There is footage from a show in 1982 before we got signed. This was a show we played in Copenhagen; it’s not a full show—about twenty-five minutes or so—but it’s the earliest footage we have.”
There is something from 1984 from Amsterdam,” King expounds, “that is very good quality, which is about fifty minutes. Then we have some stuff from the reunion [Mercyful Fate] that is really good stuff. It goes back to 1986 and up through 1990. We played an outdoor show in the center of Copenhagen right in the middle of recording The Eye. It was a bright Sunday afternoon. There were lots of people there. We have that from, I think, four different camera angles. Even though it is a private recording, it is very rare to see King Diamond in broad daylight…and it works! We also have the actual reunion show, which was supporting Metallica in Copenhagen. That one is in broad daylight, too. That was the actual reunion show. It was thought that our headlining show in Dynamo was the reunion show, but the one with Metallica was the actual reunion, which was the day before.”
King has not released an album under the Mercyful Fate banner in nine years, yet all the talk of Mercyful Fate led to the question: Will we see a Mercyful Fate reunion? King replies, “You never know what is going to happen. If the stars line up the right way, it is certainly possible—absolutely it is possible! I never said that there isn’t going to be another Mercy album. That would be stupid because I would love to do it, but because of the contracts Mercy has, it is hard to see what will happen. Who knows what the future will bring; anything is possible. I would certainly not say there is no chance that Mercy is not going to do something. There is more of a chance that Mercyful Fate will do something than not do it.”
“Who knows who will be involved in it? That is a whole different issue. All of those guys have other jobs. I really can’t say much about it, though. It is a really strange period of time to talk about this right now because there are things happening that I can’t even tell you right now,” King slyly states. King subtly reveals, “And that might have a little bit to do with Mercyful Fate, but I can’t even give any hints. There will be much speculation, and there is much business that has to be sorted out, but because of this, I can say there is a much bigger chance that Mercyful Fate will be doing something than they won’t.”
Kings explains the lineup, “Who knows what will happen. Those are the things you don’t really know. Sharlee D’Angelo is very busy with Arch Enemy. There is a lot of value in the original guys. Timi Hansen-Bass, Michael Denner and Hank Sherman-guitar, and Bjarne [Holm] is the drummer who has been with us the longest and we are the closest to that is the lineup possibility, but who knows? They all have their work. Michael Denner has his own record shop. I don’t even know where Timi Hansen works right now.” King concludes, “There are all kinds of options that are open. If the right opportunity presents itself, who knows what will happen?”
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