King Diamond's legendary guitarist Andy LaRocque and bassist Pontus Egberg spoke to BraveWords for a Streaming For Vengeance chat recently and talked about their current tour and new music which is expected to completed this spring (2025) and will be released shortly after their European summer festival tour in 2025.
King Diamond has never performed in front of so many people in their entire career, and there was a point when things looked bleak. But those days are long gone.
“Yeah, I mean, just follow the flow,” Egberg tells BraveWords in an excerpt from a Streaming For Vengeance chat which airs tomorrow (Thursday, November 13th) at 9AM EST. “When we came over here, the first tour back in ‘86, some of the places we played back then were just small local bars and clubs, actually. There were a few of those, you know, and then it actually has been growing for all those years, except for the very early, I believe 2000s? It was not very big at all. We played some weird places back then too, and actually after. I would say in 2012, after King had his surgery and everything, we started to play a lot of festivals. The whole thing with King Diamond just got a lot bigger since then. It was about 10 to 12 years back that it has been growing quite a bit. Yeah, so I’m amazed by that. We can only think our fans for that. We can only be grateful.”
And the horror of it all, watching the band perform is one of the craziest and scariest events to witness live!
LaRocque laughs: “Well, what can I say? We just try to. These stage sets, they come in a very large part from Kings own head, and incorporate things from the storyline of the upcoming album or albums. It’s just a fun spectacle to watch, I think. There’s a lot of stuff going on. We deliver the music, King the setting, and Jodi (Cachia) of course, the brains of the acting. There’s a lot of stuff going on. And the story and the stage is kind of evolving around a thing called Saint Lucifer‘s Hospital, where everything happens, crazy stuff, you know? And we were actually down at an asylum outside Philadelphia called Pennherst a few days ago to shoot a few parts of the video that’s coming up, in a couple of weeks I believe. We did some video shooting in the grand rehearsal in Dallas right before the tour, did some shooting at the asylum that’s going to be in the video as well, for a song called Spider. Yeah, it’s going to be crazy, I think. The whole stage is like Saint Lucifer’s Hospital.”
King Diamond are performing two new songs called "Spider Lilly" and "Electro Therapy”, but the grand finale is a special moment LaRocque says.
“I must say though, of course when we play ‘Abigail’ the people go crazy, but the reception of the new songs has been very good. People seem to be really interested in hearing new music, so that’s really nice.”
And about the full album?
“South America tour, all that, you know,” Egberg lays out the master plan. “ Once we get back from the tour, we’re going to try to finish the album, then we have a European solo tour coming up and our own headline shows. Then after that, the album is going to be released, then we don’t really know what’s going to happen. But, I mean Japan, South America, Australia, will be awesome. So, we’ll see.”
Watch King Diamond legends guitarist Andy LaRocque and bassist Pontus Egberg on Streaming For Vengeance tomorrow (Thursday, November 13th) at 9AM EST.
King Diamond's North American headlining tour will run through December 6 in Dallas, Texas. Support features Overkill and Night Demon. Additional backing vocals for the King Diamond set are provided by special guest, Myrkur.
Secure your tickets at kingdiamondcoven.com.
Remaining tour dates:
November
14 - Mission Ballroom - Denver, CO
16 - The Complex - Salt Lake City, UT
18 - Orpheum - Vancouver, BC
20 - Edmonton Convention Center - Edmonton, AB
21 - TCU Place - Saskatoon, SK
22 - Grey Eagle Resort And Casino - Calgary, AB
24 - Keller Auditorium - Portland, OR
25 - Moore Theater - Seattle, WA
27 - Fox Theater - Oakland, CA
29 - YouTube Theater - Los Angeles, CA
30 - The Theater At Virgin Hotels - Las Vegas, NV
December
1 - Cal Coast Credit Union Open Air Theatre - San Diego, CA
2 - The Van Buren - Phoenix, AZ
4 - REVEL - Albuquerque, NM
6 - The Factory In Deep Ellum - Dallas, TX
* no Overkill
King Diamond 2024 touring lineup:
Andy LaRocque - guitar
Mike Wead - guitar
Pontus Egberg - bass
Matt Thompson - drums
Myrkur - additional backing vocals, keyboards
