Live Review: King Diamond – Manchester

Live Review: King Diamond - Academy, Manchester

30th June 2025
Support: Unto Others, Paradise Lost

Words: Dan Barnes
Photos: Tim Finch

There’s an infernal heat about town tonight as the King makes his long-awaited Manchester debut. Heck, any chance at all to see King Diamond on England’s shores should be grasped as firmly as possible; his mere presence causing the walls of the cavernous Academy to ooze with fetid moisture.

Beginning the evening’s entertainment is Portland, Oregan’s Unto Others, whose early set was winding to a close as a braved the stifling heat of the auditorium. Barely a matter of months since the band played Manchester’s Star & Garter, they are back, purveyors of heavy, gothic metal in the vein of Tribulation, In Solitude and, coincidentally enough, Paradise Lost.

For the Yorkshire legends are tonight’s main support, after what seems like an extraordinarily long time away from the stages of Manchester, the veterans have a new record and headlining tour all set for the Autumn. As it is, we’re treated to a run through of Paradise Lost’s back-catalogue, making some of the usual, and some of the not-so usual, stops along the way.

Draconian Times’ epic opener, Enchanted, begins proceedings but it appears Nick’s microphone is experiencing technical issues. Quickly sorted and the dark, gothic strains fill the room with an odd balance of melancholy and elation. Former Kill II This and drummer on the band’s In Requiem record, Jeff Singer, makes his return to the kit, to continue Paradise Lost’s never-ending cycle of drummers – so much so that they would give Spinal Tap a run for their money.

From that 2007 album comes The Enemy, with its fat rumble and haunting keys; Nick says they’ve brought the heat over from Halifax but I’m having trouble believing that as I was over in their town last Tuesday watching Deftones and got suitably drenched. No Hope In Sight from the 2015 return to the roots record, The Plague Within, arrives with slow and brooding progression and green / indigo spots, giving the stage an entirely otherworldly aspect.

Pity the Sadness takes us back to the Shades of God recordand the multi-layered construction of those epic compositions. For the introduction to The Last Time, Nick states he doesn’t sweat after being shot down – a less-than-subtle reference to the certain no-longer-working-Royal, as well as recommending Stella when you need to keep hydrated. The band’s obligatory closer remains Say Just Words, the insatiably poppy hit 1997’s One Second record.

Having a run through of a whistle-stop tour it reminds you of just how eclectic Paradise Lost’s body of work is. From the deathy-doom of Lost Paradise and Gothic, through dalliances with electronics, and onto darker, gothic experimentation, they are a band who never seem to have rested on their laurels and the upcoming Ascension, due mid-September, is expected to add a further layer to the legends. As they left the stage, Nick calls “Hail to the King” in tribute to the majesty that awaits us.

Hard to believe that a) this is King Diamond’s first Manchester show, and b) that HRH – or Kim Bendix Petersenwhen he’s not in character – has just turned sixty-nine years of age and can put artists half his age to shame.

Having made no secret of his admiration of Uriah Heep frontman, Dave Byron, it’s little surprise that the house lights dim and the PA is filled with Heep’s occult flavoured The Wizard, setting the scene for the performance’s devilishdelectation. The opening scene-setter, The Funeral, gives way to Arrival, with the King clad in top hat and cloak, looking for all the (under)world like one of the coachmen from Abigail’s album cover.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen the Academy’s stage so built up; two tiers, accessed by wide staircases, set in the ceiling, holding Matt Thompson’s drumkit. Regardless of his age, the King has not lost that high-pitched vocal that went on to inspire the likes of Dani Filth and a whole slew of tribute-payers.

As with an Alice Cooper show, a King Diamond performance is a much about the theatrics as it is about the music. A Mansion in Darkness sees a lost lantern-bearing female wandering the stage, as long-time collaborator Andy LaRocque and guitar partner, Mike Wead, trade licks and build soaring sonic structures.

Clutching his familiar crossed bones microphone, the King becomes both a narrator of macabre tales – a Lovecraft or Poe – and the central protagonist / antagonist. Halloween arrives early and bathes the stage in orange light and shadow; Voodooopens with the rhythms of the American southern bayou region and finds one of the actors entranced into a zombie by the enticing beats.

New tune, Spider Lilly, comes with nursery music and the main girl herself; the King is seen ripping the head from a doll at the song’s climax, admonishing the crowd with “It was only a doll, for fuck’s sake” as the gasps ring out.

Sleepless Nights is an undeniably eighties tune with big riffing; there’s a change of wardrobe for the Them duo of Welcome Home and The Invisible Guests, which sees the King serenading a (seemingly) empty chair; gone is his top hat, in favour of long and straggly blond locks, looking akin to House of a Thousand Corpses’ Otis Firefly.

Kim announces that following the end of the current tour, the band will be back to finish the new album, their first since 2007’s Give Me Your Soul… Please, scheduled for release next year, Saint Lucifer’s Hospital 1920 promises to see the band take on another dark tale of tragedy. And, if that weren’t enough, he also announced a new Mercyful Fate record next year too, twenty-some-odd-years after the last album, 9.

The Candle, Eye of the Witch and Burn, along with second newbie of the night, Masquerade of Madness, drives the show to its conclusion of eerie atmospherics and punishing heavy metal. The band leave the stage, only to return for an encore of Abigail and the outro tape of Insanity from The Eye.

Clearly not letting age slow him down, Kim’s alter-ego of King Diamond is promising much over the next couple of years. A new record and a new Mercyful Fate disc is sure to keep him busy until retirement, whenever that might be.

Let’s just hope tonight’s show has reminded all involved that a King Diamond show outside of London is a viable option, and he’s welcome (home) here any time he likes.

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