Exclusive: King Diamond tells us the horrific story behind Give Me Your Soul...Please
If you are familiar at all with Black Metal, or Heavy Metal in general, then King Diamond should need no introduction. His work with Mercyful Fate, as well as his solo career, have inspired legions of bands across the world. His classic albums such as Them, and the classic Abigail have taken tthe idea of concept albums into a dark and horrific place. But could King somehow best his own landmarks? On July 26, King Diamond will release what is being heralded by critics, fans, and King himself as his best work to date. Entitled Give Me Your Soul...Please, has created a modern day Horror classic that rivals the best of Stephen King. Meanwhile guitarists Andy La Rocque and Mike Weed are more inspired than ever while the production allows you to hear every note of Hal patino's bass. King himself sounds more sinister and shows more emotion in his vocals than ever before. After a decades long career as one of Metals most influential statesmen, King may have just recorded his magnum opus. However, one of the great things about any King Diamond release is the story, so I invited King to tell us about the story itself. Here, in his on words, a true Metal legend will tell our readers exclusively about the horrific storyline behind Give Me Your Soul...Please. It is of course a huge honor to have King Diamond on the site, but a warning to those who are faint of heart...you may want to read this with the lights on...
Our distributor in Denmark called our tour manager who does all kinds of stuff with us and said "I just saw a painting on some artist's web site that I think you should check out". We checked it out and it was right up our alley. We bought the art work from the guy. That was a long time ago. The story is not based on the front cover, but naturally you want the cover to be a part of the story. We changed the cover to fit the story. Originally it was called "My Mother's Eyes", and the little girl was standing there with eyeballs in her hand, but they aren't there anymore to fit the story. We added a frame around the actual piece of artwork so now it looks like it's a mirror hanging on a wall that you see this girl in a bloody dress in. You see a shadow also on the side of the mirror on the wall as if you yourself was standing there looking at that mirror. That thing around the mirror was taken from the mirror I had hanging in my hallway. It has a lot to do with me. Now you know that the frame around that mirror that you see there is the frame I have around the mirror in my hallway.
Overall, as is the case with many other King Diamond stories than this one there is so much more of me in these stories than i would ever like to admit. that's always been the case. After a story has been written i sit down and look at it and I say "Oh my god, how could i show so much of myself in this?". Surely some of these things are purely imagination but there are certainly things that I've experienced myself and other things that I've experienced but I've changed them to fit the story. It's a full concept horror story. Something about the story that is very different than anything I've done before is that I wanted to try to write this story in the present time, instead of it happening in the past and being told. It's almost like a horror story with music but kind of like 24. It happens as you listen to it on this album. Not inspired by 24, even though I love that show, but it's that kind of thing. It takes place as you listen to it, which there's definitely a chance that it won't work but i think it worked perfectly.
Metal Blade has put out one song, "The Never Ending Hill", the first song after the intro. It's not the most horror themed or theatrical song. You can never pick one song from King Diamond and say that it represents the whole album. There's no way to do that. There's way too many different moods going on throughout the album. That song that they have put up for download is the first song and it's kind of a nice lyric. It's kind of nice. It talks about a nice sunset, golden clouds fly by my eyes. I live on Neverending Hill, Devil Lake is near there. You can see my black car Magic, who is right near the house now. He's put into the story as well. He chases butterflies down by the lake. Some of the fans who have heard that song say "It sounds too sweet for a King Diamond song", but by the third song it's going to get so dark you can't see a thing. The moods are very, very explicit in this album. But there are things in that first lyric that make you wonder. There is one line that says "Time is never, ever standing still" which everybody knows that, but then it says "except on Never Ending Hill". There are weird things going on here. Instead of saying this beautiful sunset is going on beyond the trees, suddenly the sun is drowning in Devil Lake, a weird way of describing a nice sunset. There are definitely little things that give you hints that everything is not normal here, that things aren't as nice as you might think. The response from the fans just based on that one song, my god. wait til you hear the whole thing because there's so many different things going on. the album grows in theatrical intensity. You get about half-way through and it gets very theaterical. There's a little horror piece called "Pictures In Red" and from there on out it gets more and more theatrical. Songs like "Shapes Of Black" is a pure horror song.
Of course, it's not just a horror stoy. Writing in the present time brings the listener much closerto what goes on. Instead of hearing "and then I heard the spirit and the little girl was looking at me", you hear it described as "I see these spirits on my bed". "The girl is close, I can feel her eyes looking around my soul". Then you are much closer to it because that's more powerful. it's happening right now and you can feel what's happening. It's not like it already took place awhile ago. It's much more intense. The story is that there is a boy and his sister and the little boy is not quite sure where he is. "What is this place?", he asks. Then his sister tells him "don't you remember, little brother, we've died...we're dead". But there has been a mistake and they are saying that the boy committed suicide and can't get into heaven. "I'll try to find you another soul". She says I must go the old place, but I can never stay there". "Now to this house I go".
So now you get the idea these two spirits have both died, but you don't know at this point how they died. What it's all about is this girl trying to cross over back into our world to claim a soul for her brother for some reason. Later on in the story you find out the horrible way that they died. The way that is sadly too often, it could be a parent or sometimes someone they know. It's horrible when you hear about these incidents. There is no way unfortunately that you can predict when this will happen. They always say "oh, I thought they had such a perfect life, I never saw this coming". If there was only a way that you could pinpoint these things beforehand and stop these completely senseless killings of these innocent kids. But it happens, and it happens in the story. At some point after some other ordeals, the spirit of the girl comes to my house and she brought with her a few other spirits who who are more experienced, that can better show themselves and materialize in our world. She doesn't have all that that power yet. She's a little girl, she can only make herself solid in this world if it's pitch dark, which happens throughout the story. First the lights flicker and go out when the spirits enter my house. Later on, I'm lighting candles everywhere in the house to get light in the house. I get the feeling that the less light I have, the more spirits are coming and the closer they get to materializing. I'm trying to keep them away because I don't have a good vibe from them.
During the night I collapse on the floor in my hallway and suddenly I see these pictures being sent into my mind by this spirit girl. By the way, the blood that you see on the front cover on the white dress is not her own blood, it's her brothers blood, which makes it even more horrifying. There is a song called "Give Me Your Soul" where i can see what happened to him. It happens as you hear the music go by. That's when i can see it in my mind. I see this girl leading this boy down to the cellar, I know this little girI saw her earlier in my mirror out in the hallway. Now at this point I see their dad coming to the cellar where they're playing and it's obvious he's in a rage. He's screaming with an axe in his hand. The next thing you know the axe is coming down onto the little boys head. It splits his head and blood is spraying all over the little girl who is standing there witnessing this.
The next thing you hear is what happens when they die and go to the other side. I'm not religious, you probably already know that, but I respect all kinds religions and I wish that people didn't judge each other by what they believe in. No one has ever proven that they believe in the only true god. If someone could prove that then everyone would believe it. thats why it's called a "belief". We follow a certain belief that it might be this way. I would also never come and say "there are no gods". That would be so stupid of me to say, because how would I prove that? There is no proof. In this story, I talk about Heaven and Hell, to have something to go by. There are thirteen judges who say to this boy that he was a suicide and therefore he must go to Hell.. The boy says "No, there has been a mistake". Suddenly, the lyrics say, "Daddy's hands are squeezing her neck. There are pictures in red, the little girl is dead. Daddy's got a hole in his head".
So now one of the judges makes a mistake. Imagine that someone lives a perfect life and is a nice person and they think they are going to a nice place. Then they come up there and one of the judges gets it wrong and tells you that you are going to the bad place. You've got to be kidding me! It's not right! that's what happens in this story. So now this girl and her little brother really need each other in this new world they are in. They are in limbo waiting for their judgement to be carried out. That's when the little girl says "I'll get you another soul, little brother". I'll go back into the world and find someone who is free of sin and bring their soul back to you. That's when she comes to my house to steal my soul. Eventually, there are no more candles in the house and no electricty and everything is so dark that now these spirits have formed in this world. I can see her clearly even though it's pitch dark in the house. There is a full moon this night so I can see her in the shine of the full moon. I experience some communication with her after they try to kill me several times and convince her that "you don't want my soul". "If you take my soul you can be dead sure that your little brother will go straight to Hell". But she needs to convince another soul because they need each other up there. They don't have any other family waiting for them there. She then feels herself moving on and in the very last song the girl says "I'm moving on to THIS house. The listener feels that she is coming for them.
Hopefully she'll be nicer to you than she was to me.
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King, I bow before you! I can't express how awesome it is to have THE King Diamond on this site, and I encourage all of you to learn more about his band and his new album at Covenworldwide.org and King Diamond on Myspace. Give Me Your Soul...Please kicks all kinds of ass, so pick it up when it comes out on June 26!
