Yeah, it totally ruled.
SPOILER ALERT
SPOILER ALERT
KING!
King Diamond made an incredible return to touring in North America last night to a sold out crowd of around 1200 people at Center Stage in midtown Atlanta. This time around he brought his full stage show (2 levels, backdrop changes, and assorted cast of characters).
Set:
1. The Candle
2. Sleepless Nights
3. Welcome Home
4. Never Ending Hill
Let It Be Done (pre-recorded-- not live)
5. The Puppet Master
6. At the Graves
7. Tea/Digging Graves/A Visit from the Dead (good sections of Tea & AVFTD were played, while just a brief part of DG was...)
8. Evil
9. Come to the Sabbath
10. Shapes of Black
11. Eye of the Witch
Encore:
12. Cremation
13. The Family Ghost
14. Black Horseman
Insanity (pre-recorded outro as band left stage)
Seeing King make his return to touring in the US post his triple bypass some years ago was incredible. Having seen King once solo before and also with Mercyful Fate on the 9 tour, I knew he could put on a great show and that the crowd would probably be pretty loud, but this was easily the best across the board. King had his two-tiered stage and numerous visits from Grandma throughout the evening. As King has done on his last couple tours, his wife was also on the side of the stage providing intermittent backing vocals/harmonies.
The initial portion of the show started with an 8 foot wrought iron fence on the front of the stage that remained in place until Let It Be Done. A large pentagram/goat's head hung in the middle, bookended by two upside down crosses. Grandma first came out in the wheelchair during Welcome Home. She made other appearances throughout the night, the best being during Cremation when King, Dr. Landau, and the Reverend Sammael forced her into a coffin. King proceeded to perform some magic, throwing some "fire" into the coffin which then began to smoke. The trio then dropped the sides of the casket to reveal a smoking skeleton which was pronounced dead by the good Dr. and numerous signs of the cross performed by the reverend. The woman who played Grandma also played a puppet, a ghost, bringer of tea, and other roles as needed.
Overall King and the entire band looked and sounded quite good-- Wead and Andy can obviously shred when needed, and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. The crowd was loud as hell, and sang most of the classics throuout the night (the Fate songs were particularly raucous).
Well worth the $50.
Merch was CASH ONLY:
T shirts $20/$25 (tour shirt, plain logo shirt, Fatal Portrait, Them, Give Me Your Soul, Abigail, one or two others
Long sleeve Halloween tour shirt $35
zip up hoodie $45
Beanie/scarf $30-$40 I think
Other odds and ends
Jess and the Ancient Ones sounded good, looked a little sedate, and the crowd was pretty polite to them, clapped after each song,etc. They played about 40-45 minutes-- they played:
Prayer for Death and Fire
Sulfur Giants
Devil (in G Minor)
Come Crimson Death
They also played 2 other songs I didn't know. They had a handful of shirts for $15-$20.