King Diamond Brings Abigail, Jonathan, Grandma, and more to Atlanta for Some Good Ol’ Family Fun!

kingdiamond_tour2015King Diamond/Exodus
November 16, 2015
Atlanta, GA
The Tabernacle

In 2014, Danish metal legends King Diamond returned to the US and staged their most successful North American tour to date. The tour had King Diamond, the man and band, performing a jaw dropping, awe inspiring tour production that was easily the best metal show I saw last year. As a matter of fact, with the exception of Iron Maiden, I am hard pressed to think of any metal act on the road today that can top that. Well, needless to say, King & Co. topped themselves by staging the Abigail 2015 North American tour. This tour had the band performing the legendary album, Abigail, it its entirety and you can bet your sweet little ass that I was not going to miss this show.

On this tour stop, King Diamond was ironically performing at The Tabernacle which is an old church. I’m sure God was literally kicking shit knowing that King Diamond was bringing his awesomeness to his former house with inverted crosses, a huge ass pentagram, and his bitchy old grandma just to name a few. The venue was pretty packed with only the top tier balcony closed off. This was a bigger crowd than what was present for last year’s Center Stage Theater show and with that bigger crowd came a much bigger energy of excitement and anticipation.

Kicking things off were thrash legends Exodus. Exodus has pretty much been metal’s biggest opening act for going on 30 years now. Much like Cheap Trick, Exodus seems to land some amazing tours as a support act and honestly I am totally OK with this. Since former singer/songwriter Steve “Zetro” Souza returned to the fold, a new breath of life has been breathed into Exodus and that classic, old school vibe and passion for metal returned! Gone is the meathead bro rantings of Rob Dukes and here is the gracious, appreciative, and humbled rantings of Zetro.

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The band kicked things off with “Exodus” and right out the gates the crowd was whipped into a frenzy. Two new songs from the band’s last release, “Blood In, Blood Out”, and “Body Harvest” were next and what I love most about this new material is that it captures everything that I loved about Exodus as a kid and brought back that same energy that I loved in them so long ago. Zetro worked the crowd like the true class act metal pro that he is and the crowd happily resided in the palm of his hand. It’s so great to see Exodus with a truly great front man after all these years.

In addition to the new songs just being stellar, I also feel that the new material, as opposed to sounding dated, actually makes the older, classic material sound fresh and new to the ears. It’s amazing that after all these years, “Bonded by Blood” and “The Toxic Waltz” can be played and they can sound just as flooring today as they ever did. Closing out their 45 minute set was the now signature closing, “Strike of the Beast.” Once again, Gary Holt is missing from the fold since he pretty much has decided that his allegiance seems to lay strong with Slayer. While I can’t blame him, I’ll be honest and say that I didn’t really find myself missing him. Once again, Heathen guitarist Kragen Lum was sitting in for Holt and he did an amazing job as always. It’s just awesome to see that Exodus continues on even when Holt is MIA and on this night they proved once again that they could do it just as good if not better without him.

When the house lights went down, the crowd erupted with a huge roar as the intro “Out from the Asylum” played, the audience lost their minds and without missing a beat the band kicked into “Welcome Home” as King serenaded his g-g-grandma and helped her out of the chair. From there, the old bitch didn’t stand a chance as the band slid right into “Sleepless Nights” which, as always, was flawless. No matter how many times I hear that song live, it’s just as exciting as the first time I ever heard it. Before launching into Abigail, King Diamond delivered a couple of Mercyful Fate songs, the last of which being a real surprise with “Melissa.” This song absolutely killed it and this was without a doubt one of the highlights of the opening set. Hearing how great this song sounded live gave me a whole new perspective on this one and made me feel like I need to go back and re-listen and explore some Mercyful Fate. King and his band were absolutely on fire. When “Melissa” drew to a close to the music of “Funeral”, we all knew that the time had come for what we had gathered for: Abigail!

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“Arrival” brought up a huge roar from the crowd as fists were thrust into the hair in unison. I couldn’t get over how the crowd was reacting. Most of the time Atlanta crowds can be on the lame side but for King Diamond I almost felt as if I was at a European festival or something. The stage production was slightly different from the last run and featured some new backdrops that created a whole new vibe to go alone with the story of Abigail. “The Family Ghost” brought a huge roar from the crowd as the pit opened up and swallowed just about everyone that got near it. Watching the show from side stage was one of the most amazing experiences as I got to see guitarist Andy La Rocque at work. Watching that man play guitar is like watching art manifest itself right before your eyes.

The highlight of the night, for me, was when the henchmen brought out acoustic guitars and the band slide right into the ominous intro for “The 7th Day of July 1777.” This song absolutely destroyed me. Drummer Matt Thompson is a fucking beast on the drums as he attacked this song with everything he had. King Diamond himself was delivering without a doubt the best vocal performance I have ever heard him deliver. His vocals were so strong and crystal clear as he stormed through the story of Abigail, Jonathan, and the other cast of characters. The night was brought to a close with “The Black Horsemen” and with that the show was done. I couldn’t believe that it had already been about 75 minutes or so already as it just seemed to fly by.

The performance, the story, everything about this show was so captivating that time literally flew by in the blink of an eye.  On paper, part of me wants to say, “King Diamond should’ve played longer” but when you see this show for yourself and you see what a massive undertaking it is to perform this album, you almost don’t want to see more as it just seems to end perfectly with you really wanting more. As the band took their final bow, King himself literally walked from one side of the stage to the other making eye contact with the fans, thanking them for coming, and letting them all know that he knew and appreciated their presence. King Diamond is a class act of the highest degree and I can’t even begin to say how great it has been to have him back. King Diamond and his band were absolutely flawless and it’s shows like this that make me so proud to be a fan of a band. Long live the King indeed!

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