King Diamond

Early days

King Diamond's first heavy rock band was called Brainstorm (1974–76), with Jeanette Blum (Jean Blue) vocal and bass, Michael Frohn (Mike West) guitar and Jes Jacobsen (Jesse James) drums. King Diamond left Brainstorm and began singing with local Danish hard rock band Black Rose. It was during this time in Black Rose that King Diamond began experimenting with horror themed theatrics as well as shaping a malevolent quasi-Satanic stage persona. He left Black Rose and joined the punk-metal band Brats where he met Hank Shermann. Soon after, the two of them were asked to help Michael Denner (also formerly a member of Brats) with his own project Danger Zone. This band included Timi Hansen and the mentioned musicians would join with King Diamond in 1980 to become Mercyful Fate.

Mercyful Fate

Following Mercyful Fate's 1984 release of Don't Break the Oath and the subsequent tour (which saw them play in the U.S. for the first time), King Diamond split ways with Mercyful Fate. With him, he took two of his bandmates (Hansen and Denner) to pursue a solo career under his own name.

Mercyful Fate reunited in 1992 (while King Diamond simultaneously continued his solo career) and recorded five more studio albums. In 2000, King decided to put Mercyful Fate on hold and continue on with his solo career. Though Mercyful Fate continues to remain dormant, the band is still under contract with Metal Blade Records. Also in 1999, King Diamond and Hank Shermann performed the song "Evil" live with Metallica. This performance also featured King Diamond without his famous makeup. In recent interviews, King Diamond has stated that Mercyful Fate will record and tour again when the timing is right, saying "It's definitely not finished."

King Diamond

In 2001, King Diamond worked out a deal with the band Usurper to sing backup vocals on the song "Necronemesis" in exchange for them shifting their recording schedule around to accommodate the recording of Abigail II: The Revenge. In 2004, King Diamond contributed vocals to "Sweet Dreams", which was the final track on the album of Dave Grohl's heavy metal side project Probot. In late 2005, King Diamond appeared on the Roadrunner United – The All-Star Sessions album, contributing vocals for his song "In the Fire", which featured multiple Roadrunner Records musicians (past and present) working together to create individual songs. King Diamond also guested on the Cradle of Filth song "Devil Woman" in late 2005.

In April 2006, King reunited with Mikkey Dee (Motörhead drummer) at a sold-out gig at Kåren in Gothenburg, Sweden. In 2001 King referred to Dee as "one of the best drummers of all time and that's something that has bothered us since he left."

King Diamond released his album Give Me Your Soul... Please, on 26 June 2007. Following the release the band received a Grammy nomination in the "Best Metal Performance" category for the track "Never Ending Hill." He was forced to cancel a United States tour due to a herniated disk, causing severe back pain, which puts him in intense pain almost all of the time. He attributes the problem to the long stressful hours spent working on the album.

King made an appearance at Ozzfest on 9 August 2008 at Frisco, TX alongside Metallica, performing a medley of Mercyful Fate songs previously released on Metallica's Garage Inc. album. Earlier in the day, he also performed a cover of the Pantera song "A New Level" with Vinnie Paul, Scott Ian, Max Cavalera, and Nick Bowcott.

In 2009, King Diamond was revealed to be a playable character for the rhythm game Guitar Hero: Metallica, appearing with Mercyful Fate's song "Evil." Complete the song on any instrument and any difficulty to unlock him.

On 29 November 2010, King was taken to the hospital, where they discovered several blockages in his arteries due to his heavy smoking habit. They determined that he had several heart attacks and that he needed triple-bypass surgery. The surgery was performed successfully, and on 11 December 2010 it was announced that he was at home recovering. All his musical projects at that time were then placed on hold.

On 7 December 2011, King appeared on stage with Metallica at The Fillmore in San Francisco to celebrate Metallica's 30th anniversary.

In June 2012, King performed his comeback concert, on Sweden Rock Festival.

On Saturday 8 September 2012, King appeared along with Mark Tremonti on VH1 Classic's That Metal Show discussing his surgery and various details about upcoming events.

King then appeared on Volbeat's 2013 album, Outlaw Gentlemen & Shady Ladies, for guest vocals on the track "Room 24." In August 2013 King Diamond performed at Open Air Bloodstock Festival UK.

Slayer was chosen to headline the 2015 Rockstar Energy Mayhem Festival. The bands HELLYEAH, King Diamond, The Devil Wears Prada, Thy Art Is Murder, Jungle Rot, Sister Sin, Sworn In, Shattered Sun, Feed Her To The Sharks, Code Orange & Kissing Candice will also be participating in the Rockstar Tour. The festival is slated for 26 stops to run from June 26 through August 2.

Other media

King Diamond was a special celebrity guest star in four episodes of the Warner Bros. adult-oriented cartoon Metalocalypse as The Blues Devil, Ronald von Moldenberg, a fast food manager, and one of the Klokateers in 2006 on Adult Swim.

Stage presence

On stage, King Diamond uses a microphone handle consisting of a femur bone and a tibia bone in the shape of a cross. King Diamond had previously used a human skull, called Melissa, on stage. In the mid-1980s Melissa was stolen after a performance in the Netherlands.

King 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 album The Puppet Master, he used very little white and mainly had black crosses and inverted crosses going up and down his face.

Influences

King Diamond cites Arthur Brown, David Byron, Alice Cooper, Ronnie James Dio, Ian Gillan, Ozzy Osbourne and Robert Plant as his primary influences.

According to King Diamond's biography on his official website, the first two albums he bought were Deep Purple's Fireball and Black Sabbath's Master of Reality.

Religion

King Diamond follows Satanism, which he does not see as a religion, but a philosophy by which he lived even before reading Anton LaVey's The Satanic Bible. Michael Moynihan calls him "one of the only performers of the '80s Satanic Metal who was more than just a poseur using a devilish image for shock value". King has expressed concern that religion has led so many people to kill and destroy each other. He stated that he cannot comprehend why religion has caused so much death and destruction when it is logically impossible to prove the presence or absence of any god. He states that he has reached a point in his life where he has completely given up believing in anything religious.

Marital status

King Diamond is married to Livia Zita, a Hungarian-born singer who has made appearances as a backup vocalist on the albums The Puppet Master and Give Me Your Soul...Please, as well as during live performances. She is also his business partner, and is currently working with him to compile old footage for two planned DVD releases of King Diamond and Mercyful Fate live performances. She also helped him make remastered editions of the King Diamond albums The Spider's Lullabye, The Graveyard, Voodoo and House of God.

In 2017, they became parents for the first time as they welcomed a son named Byron.

Legacy

Metallica has performed an 11-minute tribute to Mercyful Fate and released it on their Garage, Inc. album. It features five of their songs. When James Hetfield sings it, he does not sing in a falsetto like King Diamond, but in 2008 (and again in 2011, with Hank Shermann, Michael Denner and Timi Hansen) King Diamond performed "Mercyful Fate" with Metallica, and put the screams in where necessary.

King has been on the covers of many rock and metal magazines and influenced many artists including Metallica's Lars Ulrich, Cradle of Filth, Cage, and Andy DiGelsomina of the Wagnerian opera metal project Lyraka.

American heavy metal band Cage devoted him "King Diamond" song (album "Hell Destroyer", 2007).

Discography

Awards