More details revealed about King Diamond and Mercyful Fate upcoming releases

The renowned Danish heavy metal singer King Diamond was interviewed by Oran O’Beirne for the latest issue of Fistful Of Metal magazine. King discusses the eagerly awaited new King Diamond album during the conversation, providing fans with new studio updates, confirmed song titles, and a unique look at the ambitious concept trilogy that has been lingering in the back of their minds. Not only that, but he also shares important details regarding the upcoming Mercyful Fate album and what fans may anticipate from the legendary band’s most recent phase. This is what he stated about how he made it through the challenging grunge era, when metal faltered and was metaphorically pushed back into the background.

I didn’t care. I don’t want to play something that I don’t feel inside, and if I had to, I would stop. Record labels have approached me in the past and asked me to focus on writing ‘radio-friendly’ songs. That’s actually what happened around the time of ‘Abigail’. Roadrunner Records at the time asked us for four ‘commercial/radio-friendly’ songs and I just told them, ‘Yes. No problem. That’s the direction we’re going in anyway.’ When they finally heard the album, they were on the phone asking, ‘Where are those songs?’ They eventually let it go. Thankfully, they were happy with the album and it was released the way I wanted it. I just don’t want to deal with that kind of stuff. Don’t tell me what I should be doing. If people don’t like it, then they should just go and listen to something else. I don’t really know how we survived the ’90s, but we did, and that’s all that matters. It was like we were on some back road to a highway — we were still moving, perhaps not as fast, but moving all the same.

He also spoke about his health complications that happened a few years ago.

It was certainly a wake-up call and I definitely learned a lot about what the body can and cannot handle. Honestly, I nearly died three times due to a lot of complications. I should not be here. I was on a ventilator and woke up earlier than expected, and as a result, nearly choked to death. I couldn’t follow the rhythm of the machine, which is extremely dangerous. My wife was by my side sleeping in a chair beside me, and when she woke, she saw me trying to pull the tube out of my mouth in desperation. Had I done so, my lung would have collapsed.

And of course about the new releases.

Well, for starters, the original name that we had picked was ‘The Institute’. However, that has now changed to, ‘St Lucifer’s Hospital 1920’, since the start of the U.S. tour. There very well may be a track on the album called ‘The Institute’. We were supposed to release the album this year, and in fact the album was supposed to be completely finished prior to the live shows, but I just want to make sure that it’s the best material I’ve ever released. Right now, we are gearing up to film the next video for the single ‘Lobotomy’, which will definitely be released later this year. Other songs that are completed are an intro track called ‘Under The Surface’, ‘The Institute’, ‘The Nun’, ‘Faceless’ and, of course, ‘Spider Lilly’. There’s another track, which I’m not sure is going to be on the album yet, called ‘Deep In The Darkness 1920’. Andy has been working on at least five tracks, one of which has as monster chorus that we plan to record with a choir. The plan is that this album will be the first of a trilogy, and I already have all three album titles.