Mercyful Fate's Don't Break the Oath 9781501354380, 9781501354373, 9781501354410, 9781501354403

Table of contents :
Cover
Halftitle page
33 1/3 Global
Title page
Copyright page
Epigraph
Contents
Figures
Acknowledgements
Tracklisting
A Note to the Reader
1 Introduction: A Broken Yet Completed Circle
I. A Brief Career Summary
II. Concepts and Reception
III. Reasons for Choosing Don’t Break the Oath
IV. About the Chapters of the Book
2 Sounds, Atmospheres and 43 Minutes of not Breaking the Oath
I. Some Notes on the Album
II. ‘The Coven Sings’: Influences and Backgrounds
III. ‘Seven People here are Joining Hands’: About the Recording of the Album
3 The Satanic Endeavours: Intentional Transgressions and Antinomian Discourses
I. Pacts Unpacted
II. A Note on King Diamond’s Conviction
III. ‘When the Black Book Appeared’: The Relation to the Black Metal Scene
IV. The Satanic Verses of Mercyful Fate
4 Diabolus in Musica and Other Musical Modes of Symbolic Satanism
I. Five Musical Modes of Symbolic Satanism
II. Nightmare
III. The Oath
IV. Come to the Sabbath
5 Unmasking the Masks of Masculinities: (Dis)appearances of the Paint Mask
I. Aspects of Masculinities in Heavy Metal
II. King Diamond’s Paint Mask
III. Unmasking the Masks of Masculinities
6 Queer-Satanism Galore: Otherings of the Oath
I. A Note on Queer
II. Hegemonic Masculinities vs. Queering
III. The Endeavours of Queen Diamond
IV. The Concept of Queer-Satanism
7 Conclusion: Rewriting the Heavy Metal Canon of Hegemonic Masculinity
Notes
References
Index

Citation preview

Don’t Break the Oath

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33 1/3 Global 33 1/3 Global, a series related to but independent from 33 1/3, takes the format of the original series of short, music-based books and brings the focus to music throughout the world. With initial volumes focusing on Japanese and Brazilian music, the series will also include volumes on the popular music of Australia/Oceania, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and more.

33 1/3 Japan Series Editor: Noriko Manabe Spanning a range of artists and genres – from the 1970s rock of Happy End to technopop band Yellow Magic Orchestra, the Shibuya-kei of Cornelius, classic anime series Cowboy Bebop, J-Pop/EDM hybrid Perfume, and vocaloid star Hatsune Miku – 33 1/3 Japan is a series devoted to in-depth examination of Japanese popular music of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Published Titles: Supercell’s Supercell by Keisuke Yamada Yoko Kanno’s Cowboy Bebop Soundtrack by Rose Bridges Perfume’s Game by Patrick St. Michel Cornelius’s Fantasma by Martin Roberts Joe Hisaishi’s My Neighbor Totoro: Soundtrack by Kunio Hara Shonen Knife’s Happy Hour by Brooke McCorkle Nenes’ Koza Dabasa by Henry Johnson Forthcoming Titles: Yuming’s The 14th Moon by Lasse Lehtonen Yellow Magic Orchestra’s Yellow Magic Orchestra by Toshiyuki Ohwada Kohaku utagassen: The Red and White Song Contest by Shelley Brunt

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33 1/3 Brazil Series Editor: Jason Stanyek Covering the genres of samba, tropicália, rock, hip hop, forró, bossa nova, heavy metal and funk, among others, 33 1/3 Brazil is a series devoted to in-depth examination of the most important Brazilian albums of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Published Titles: Caetano Veloso’s A Foreign Sound by Barbara Browning Tim Maia’s Tim Maia Racional Vols. 1 &2 by Allen Thayer João Gilberto and Stan Getz’s Getz/Gilberto by Brian McCann Gilberto Gil’s Refazenda by Marc A. Hertzman Dona Ivone Lara’s Sorriso Negro by Mila Burns Milton Nascimento and Lô Borges’s The Corner Club by Jonathon Grasse Racionais MCs’ Sobrevivendo no Inferno by Derek Pardue Naná Vasconcelos’s Saudades by Daniel B. Sharp Forthcoming titles: Jorge Ben Jor’s África Brasil by Frederick J. Moehn Chico Buarque’s Chico Buarque by Charles A. Perrone

33 1/3 Europe Series Editor: Fabian Holt Spanning a range of artists and genres, 33 1/3 Europe offers engaging accounts of popular and culturally significant albums of Continental Europe and the North Atlantic from the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Published Titles: Darkthrone’s A Blaze in the Northern Sky by Ross Hagen Ivo Papazov’s Balkanology by Carol Silverman Heiner Müller and Heiner Goebbels’s Wolokolamsker Chaussee by Philip V. Bohlman Modeselektor’s Happy Birthday by Sean Nye

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Mercyful Fate’s Don’t Break the Oath by Henrik Marstal Various Artists’ DJs do Guetto by Richard Elliott Bea Playa’s I’ll Be Your Plaything by Anna Szemere and András Rónai Czesław Niemen’s Niemen Enigmatic by Ewa Mazierska and Mariusz Gradowski Forthcoming Titles: Los Rodriguez’s Sin Documentos by Fernán del Val and Héctor Fouce Massada’s Astaganaga by Lutgard Mutsaers Nuovo Canzoniere’s Bella Ciao by Jacopo Tomatis Amália Rodrigues’s Amália at the Olympia by Lilla Ellen Gray Ardit Gjebrea’s Projekt Jon by Nicholas Tochka Vopli Vidopliassova’s Tantsi by Maria Sonevytsky Édith Piaf’s Recital 1961 by David Looseley Iannis Xenakis’ Persepolis by Aram Yardumian

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Don’t Break the Oath Henrik Marstal

Series Editor: Fabian Holt

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BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC Bloomsbury Publishing Inc 1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018, USA 50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP, UK 29 Earlsfort Terrace, Dublin 2, Ireland BLOOMSBURY, BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published in the United States of America 2022 Copyright © Henrik Marstal, 2022 For legal purposes the Acknowledgments on pp. xi–xii constitute an extension of this copyright page. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. Bloomsbury Publishing Inc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any third-party websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes. A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN: HB: PB: ePDF: eBook:

978-1-5013-5438-0 978-1-5013-5437-3 978-1-5013-5440-3 978-1-5013-5439-7

Typeset by RefineCatch Limited, Bungay, Suffolk Series: 33 1/3 Europe To find out more about our authors and books visit www.bloomsbury.com and sign up for our newsletters.

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Satan has great taste in metal. – Comment on YouTube about a performance featuring Mercyful Fate

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Contents List of Figures x Acknowledgements xi Tracklisting xiii A Note to the Reader xiv 1

Introduction: A Broken Yet Completed Circle 1

2

Sounds, Atmospheres and 43 Minutes of not Breaking the Oath 15

3

The Satanic Endeavours: Intentional Transgressions and Antinomian Discourses 31

4

Diabolus in Musica and Other Musical Modes of Symbolic Satanism 53

5

Unmasking the Masks of Masculinities: (Dis)appearances of the Paint Mask 75

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Queer-Satanism Galore: Otherings of the Oath 91

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Conclusion: Rewriting the Heavy Metal Canon of Hegemonic Masculinity 109

Notes 111 References 117 Index 127

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Figures

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1

Mercyful Fate in Copenhagen, 1983. 5 Photo: Ole Bang.

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An extract from the Danish Heavy Metal fanzine. 9 Hot Rockin’ (No. 6, 1985).

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Extract from Easy Sound’s studio booking calendar for 1984. 16

4

King Diamond’s paint mask as of 1984. 81 Photo: Fin Costello/Redferns.

Acknowledgements A multitude of voices have joined my inquiry into Don’t Break the Oath, making it an equivalent to a musical process in which different sounds constantly interfere with each other for the purpose of creating a work of honour. These voices belong to first and foremost a cast of seven people: a Black Metal musician, a studio engineer, a Black Metal connoisseur, a scholar specializing in Satanism and an expert vocal coach, as well as the producer and the assistant engineer behind Don’t Break the Oath. For this reason, I sincerely thank, respectively, Anders Majnlund, Jon Trier Ottosen, Linda Nørgaard, Jesper Aagaard Petersen and Anne Rosing, as well as Henrik Lund and Niels Erik Otto. Furthermore, I would like to thank Niki Corfixsen, Søren Kjærgaard, Anders P. Jensen and the rest of the staff from the Rhythmic Music Conservatory – not least Lars Brinck, the former head of artistic and musicological research. I would also like to thank Black Metal scholar Tore Tvarnø Lind, author and journalist Jens ‘Jam’ Rasmussen, Mercyful Fate Mk I guitarists Michael Denner and Hank Shermann, former Mercyful Fate manager Ole Bang, journalist Stephen Skriver, photographer John Mortensson as well as the two Mercyful Fate aficionados Hans Kildegaard Larsen and Rasmus Heide. Thanks indeed also to scholar Liv Fangel-Hansen for the useful discussions and to proofreader Helen Clara Hemsley for the careful inspection of the manuscript. Special thanks to Fabian Holt, editor of the 33 1/3 Europe series, for approaching me in the first place. Also special thanks

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to Kulturministeriets Forskningsudvalg [The Research Board of the Ministry of Cultural Affairs] for supporting my research project which this book is a substantial part of. And special thanks indeed to King Diamond for contributing to the book. Finally, thanks to my beloved brother Mikael whom I have shared so many insights with concerning Don’t Break the Oath ever since our adolescence back in that city by the sea. And countless thanks to my beloved family for bearing with me: Vibe, Villum, Tøger.

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Tracklisting Side 1: A Dangerous Meeting (5:13) Nightmare (6:21) Desecration of Souls (4:57) Night of the Unborn (5:02) Side 2: The Oath (7:34) Gypsy (3:10) Welcome Princess of Hell (4:06) To One Far Away (1:34) Come to the Sabbath (5:18)

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A Note to the Reader This book concentrates on Don’t Break the Oath, the second album by Mercyful Fate. Throughout the book, I refer not only to the tracks of the album, but also to detailed parts of them, marked with references to the time codes of the tracks. Although it is not a condition for the reading of the book to have knowledge of the music on the album in advance, it will indeed be an advantage to have the album within reach while reading, preferably in a digital format. In addition, my investigations will from time to time make use of musical terminology and thought. If the reader is not familiar with music theory of any kind, it will be possible to skip these parts, provided that the ensuing conclusions are taken at face value.

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1 Introduction: A Broken Yet Completed Circle I. A Brief Career Summary Mercyful Fate appeared on the Heavy Metal scene in the first half of the 1980s and gained international recognition almost immediately. The band was noticed by audiences, colleagues and music executives for at least two reasons: They displayed an unusually well-crafted sound and revealed a fresh take on the genre conventions of Heavy Metal, and they differed from metal bands as such by being subject to one single, basic ideological concept – Satanism – rather than to the mixed varieties of themes common to the metal scene at the time. In their ‘classic era’ constellation from 1981 to 1985, which I will refer to as their Mk I era, Mercyful Fate consisted of five musicians, all of them young white males with a predominantly working-class background: King Diamond (né Kim Bendix Petersen) on vocals, Hank Shermann (né René Krølmark) and Michael Denner on guitars, Timi ‘Grabber’ Hansen (né Timi Holm Hansen) on bass and Kim Ruzz (né Kim Thyge Jensen) on drums. In this constellation, the band released the eponymous debut EP (1982), the debut album Melissa (1983) and the follow-up album Don’t Break the Oath (1984). Here, the band orchestrated a combined sonorous, lyrical and iconographical

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Don’t Break the Oath 2

embracement of the satanic concept, which was almost unheard of in Heavy Metal, and they did it with a discipline and a strong sense of perfection that supported their quest. These efforts made the band stand out as innovators in the manner of – though not at any rate comparable with – other strong conceptual entities such as electronic pioneers Kraftwerk or industrial pioneers Throbbing Gristle, both flourishing during the 1970s, that is the formative years of the members of Mercyful Fate. In their home country of Denmark, which is my home country as well, Mercyful Fate is to this day regarded as the most influential Heavy Metal act ever to come out of the country, being deeply acknowledged by metal communities and fans. The band is widely considered an indispensable part of the national musical canon, and music enthusiasts are just as proud of Mercyful Fate and King Diamond as they are of fellow Dane Lars Ulrich of Metallica. Quite tellingly, the untimely passing of bass player Timi Holm Hansen in 2019 was mourned by many Danish metalheads and colleagues, Ulrich included (Ustaer 2019). Don’t Break the Oath was released in the midst of a golden era of Heavy Metal, during which creativity and maturity converged and secured the genre mainstream access, as well as artistic recognition and media attention. This helped not only British but also quite a number of continental European bands to gain access to Heavy Metal markets in the Western world and other territories, too. Among these bands were Mercyful Fate, securing an international following in the Netherlands, Belgium and to a certain extent England, in the wake of the debut EP which was even voted EP of the year in the American metal magazine Metal Mania. After the release of Melissa, their following broadened to the rest of Europe and

Introduction

eventually to the United States with Don’t Break the Oath, securing the band a minor breakthrough in this territory. Much to the surprise of the metal world, however, the band broke up only seven months after the release of the latter. It was a decision that seemed quite irrational, given the attention they enjoyed and the strong shared ambitions of the band members. But it proved to be inevitable since tensions between the co-founders of the band, Shermann and Diamond, prevailed as a result of insoluble disagreements about the band’s future. One can indeed wonder whether the band as a whole had become exhausted and drained after four intense years of ceaseless rehearsing, writing, recording and performing. And one can wonder whether the satanic image had become too frustrating for the band to deal with, not only because it resulted in many misunderstandings, but also because Diamond was the only one in the band who called himself a Satanist, leaving the other four members to be regarded as stanists without being it. The story behind the break-up is quite telling: On 12 April, 1985, that is the day after Mercyful Fate’s only local concert on the Don’t Break the Oath tour, Diamond called each of his band members on the phone to inform them that he was leaving (Edward 1986). The decision, which immediately ended the band’s career for years to come, had been made a month in advance (ibid.). The concert took place at the renowned rock theatre Saga at 25 Vesterbrogade, Copenhagen, only half a mile from the very building which until 1982 had been the home for the no less renowned record store Bristol Music Center at 25 Frederiksbergsgade (at the main pedestrian street ‘Strøget’). In the basement, record store dealer and metal connoisseur Ken Anthony had earned a reputation for endorsing new exciting metal records to a growing crowd of young metalheads from all

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over the country, as well as Sweden and Norway (Rasmussen 2010, 121). In late 1978, he became a mentor for the teenager Lars Ulrich, a relationship that would continue when Ulrich moved to Los Angeles with his parents in the summer of 1980 (ibid.) and soon after co-founded Metallica. Anthony also became a mentor for his peers Shermann on the one hand, and Diamond on the other, the two not yet knowing each other at this time. Anthony played a pivotal role in the creation of Mercyful Fate, by proposing to Shermann that Diamond should be the new singer in his metal punk band Brats (Rasmussen 2010, 129–130).1 Shermann and Diamond soon found a strong kinship with each other, enabling them to leave Brats in order to start a Heavy Metal project that, at the suggestion of Anthony (ibid., 136–137), ended up being called Mercyful Fate. Anthony also volunteered as manager for the band in the beginning (ibid., 139) and helped them get started. For instance, he took Diamond and Shermann to MarktHalle in Hamburg, Germany, around 200 miles from Copenhagen, to watch Judas Priest on their British Steel tour (Diamond 2021a). This was the first time Diamond and Shermann saw the band, and it was a seminal event for them (Diamond 2021b). The date was 12 April, 1980, that is exactly five years before the date of the break-up of Mercyful Fate Mk I. And because Saga happened to be the venue for what would become the very last concert, Mercyful Fate ended their career in their Mk I formation only a few minutes’ walk from the record store which had played an invaluable role in the establishment of the band. Although the circle was now broken, it was also completed. However, perhaps just as surprising, Mercyful Fate reformed in 1992, in a Mk II and later a Mk III formation, King Diamond now dividing his time between his own band, also called King Diamond, and Mercyful Fate. In an act of frenzied activity, the

Figure 1 Mercyful Fate in Copenhagen, 1983. A press photo of Mercyful Fate from 1983 with King Diamond (number two from the left) without paint mask although wearing earrings with inverted crosses – and a Judas Priest T-shirt bought at the band‘s 1980 concert at MarktHalle, Hamburg. Photo: Ole Bang.

latter released a total of five albums during the 1990s with Diamond and Shermann as the only stable members. Since then, the band has not released any albums, but performed concerts in 2008 and 2011, before once again resuming its career in 2019. As of 2021, the band was in the process of writing new material (Diamond 2021a).

II. Concepts and Reception Introduction

During their Mk I era, Mercyful Fate proved capable of expanding the genre markers of Heavy Metal in several ways. This had especially to do with the trademark double register voice of lead singer King Diamond in which he combined his chest voice and head voice (also known as the falsetto voice) in an

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innovative way. Due to the homosocial nature of the genre, the music in question seemed to be intended primarily for male audiences. With Diamond’s insistent use of the double register voice, however, Mercyful Fate adhered to the genre conventions related to hegemonic masculinity (Connell 1987) but, rather unusually, also incorporated approaches that highlighted notions of femininity, spirituality and devotion, pointing towards new ways of negotiating hegemonic masculinity as a given premise of popular music discourse, Heavy Metal included. In this way, Don’t Break the Oath displayed contours of a queer positioning that attempted to subvert elements of hegemonic masculinity inherited in the genre. Don’t Break the Oath is particularly interesting in this context since the queering aspects of King Diamond were indeed ahead of their time when the album was released, which meant that not many experienced the album in that way, probably. The satanic approach of the band, which soon became the focal point for the media and critics (although apparently less for the fans), placed the band in the tradition of shock-rock, in the vein of the 1970s icon Alice Cooper or their own contemporaries W.A.S.P., and endowed Mercyful Fate with a controversial aura which proved to be both a strength and a weakness. On the one hand, it secured the band quite a lot of attention and attracted audiences who wanted to rebel against their own Christian background, but on the other, it alienated the band in the midst of the Satanic Panic era of the 1980s and definitely overshadowed their innovative musical qualities, King Diamond’s vocal style included. Even to this day, Diamond’s lyrics, voice and stage appearance continue to be viewed as either charismatic, innovative, uncompromising and entertaining in the name of horror and Satanism or eccentric, lyrically one-sided and

Introduction

definitely a challenge to the ear. These criticisms are undoubtedly some of the reasons why Mercyful Fate, in terms of media attention, sales and audience hype never became a major scale band, but remained underground, albeit with a considerable following. There is indeed a symbolic quality to the fact that although Don’t Break the Oath entered the British Heavy Metal album chart as number five following its release, it pretty much missed the American Billboard 200 chart, being right below the visible line at number 202 (Kaye 1997). In Denmark, the band enjoyed considerable respect from the very beginning, quickly gaining the status of being considered the leading band on the national Heavy Metal scene. But the band remained largely unknown to the broader audience since Heavy Metal was not at all part of the mainstream culture in Denmark at the time. The use of international English rather than Danish as the singing language distanced the band further from domestic culture, since most artists at the time performed in Danish, leaving the use of English to not only Heavy Metal, but also Post-Punk and New Wave music. According to a retrospective interview with guitarist Michael Denner, the band set out with the goal of being no less than ‘the heaviest band ever’, a goal that he claims the band succeeded with ([The Metal Voice] 2019). This view was actually shared by their contemporary metal colleagues in Copenhagen: Front singer Alex Savage (né Alex Nyborg Madsen) of Witch Cross once remarked that in comparison with everyone else on the Danish metal scene at the time, Mercyful Fate were ‘very harsh’ (Rasmussen 2010, 149; italics in original; translated by the author). And looking back at their 1981 debut concert in the Western suburb of Taastrup in Greater Copenhagen, guitarist Michael Stützer from the pioneering Thrash Metal band Artillery said:

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It was [. . .] so different in many ways, although King [Diamond] was not yet a great live singer. But it really worked, and still there was something in his voice which attracted me. Hank’s [Shermann] riffs were gorgeous, and Mercyful Fate were the most original thing that had happened in a very long time. There was so much weight and aggression in the music, and the band appeared to be so weird that you either loved it or hated it.

Don’t Break the Oath

Rasmussen 2010, 143; translated by the author

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The band benefited from the dedicated work of the four musicians in synergy with King Diamond’s visionary force. As a singer, he had a star quality and an artistic commitment, which was rare among Danish musicians of the early 1980s. And his sense of showmanship was extraordinary as well. On the thriving alternative music scenes in Copenhagen of the time, Diamond seemed to be in a league of his own, paralleled perhaps only by the prodigy-like Martin Hall, a singer, musician and songwriter who at the age of 17 had recorded the eerie, strange and visionary debut album The Icecold Waters of the Egocentric Calculation (1981) with his Post-Punk band Ballet Mécanique. Like Mercyful Fate, the band released another album within a year (For, 1982, released under the name Ballet M), before departing. Careers were indeed intense back then, but also short and unstable. The combined legacy of Melissa and Don’t Break the Oath has long secured Mercyful Fate a small, but safe and sound spot in the history of Heavy Metal. In addition, the band is to this day recognized as one of the very few pioneers of Black Metal, a subgenre within Extreme Metal (Kahn-Harris 2007, 21–23) that at the time was defined primarily by its occupation with occult imagery and radical musical textures. Even though I personally remain sceptical about the idea of ‘Nordicness’

Figure 2 An extract from the Danish Heavy Metal fanzine Hot Rockin’.

Introduction

In the fanzine Hot Rockin’ (No. 6, 1985), the reception of Don’t Break the Oath was so positive that the album as well as the band appeared in several categories for the year 1984. Note, however, that while guitarist Hank Shermann shared a spot with Iron Maiden’s Dave Murray as one of the most remarkable guitarists of the year, King Diamond was absent on the list of vocalists (‘sanger[e]’).

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(Marstal 2020, 89–90), Mercyful Fate as well as their Black Metal peers Bathory from Sweden were admittedly forerunners for an inherently Nordic conceptualization of Black Metal, especially in Norway and Sweden, but also Finland and Denmark, which has emerged since the 1990s. The legacy of Mercyful Fate runs quite deep. To mention a few examples: In 2013, the magazine Noisecreep voted the band number five on its list of the ten best European Heavy Metal bands of all time, only surpassed by icons Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest and Motörhead (Ramirez 2013). The nomination was even more remarkable as Mercyful Fate had released considerably less material than any of the other four bands. And in 2014, the magazine MetalSucks voted the band number 15 on its expert-curated list of the 25 best Heavy Metal bands of all time ([MetalSucks] 2014). In addition, both Melissa and Don’t Break the Oath have been featured on numerous lists ranking great Heavy Metal albums. It is widely known that the band managed to influence a number of Thrash Metal and Death Metal bands of their own time, most famously Slayer and Metallica. Lars Ulrich of the latter, who had learned about Mercyful Fate in the United States through his correspondence with Ken Anthony (Rasmussen 2010, 141), has referred to Melissa and Don’t Break the Oath as two of the best Heavy Metal albums ever made (Hegnsvad and Maegaard 2008, 108). The legacy of Mercyful Fate also influenced metal bands such as Cradle of Filth and grunge bands such as Alice In Chains and Nirvana.2 And as already touched upon, Mercyful Fate became a point of reference for the Second Wave of Black Metal in especially Norway and Sweden throughout the 1990s and well into the twenty-first century, although this was due to the band’s satanic dedication and visual concept rather than to their musical style.

III. Reasons for Choosing Don’t Break the Oath

Introduction

The two albums Melissa and Don’t Break the Oath are closely related not only because of their similar styles, approaches and lyrical themes, but also because they were released with a tight interval of merely ten months (30 October, 1983, and 7 September, 1984, respectively), mirroring the consecutive releases of Black Sabbath’s two first albums in 1970 at an even shorter interval of seven months. The interrelatedness of the Mercyful Fate albums also had to do with the fact that most of the songs were written and arranged even before the recording of any of them. This means that, according to King Diamond, the songs on the first album could just as well have appeared on the second, and vice versa (Kaye 1997; Popoff 2020, 95). It has become the inevitable fate of both albums that they have often been compared to each other and rarely viewed in their own right, independent of each other. This is at least the case in Europe, where both albums were widely accessible, while Don’t Break the Oath was the first known album by the band in the United States and elsewhere. It makes sense, then, to describe the two albums as a pair of evil twins with two different temperaments: While Melissa is more raw and confronting, Don‘t Break the Oath is more artistically mature and with an even more resolved focus on the satanic concept. Moreover, it has a more grandiose feel to it and stands out as being more confident, more refined and more hard-edged. In addition, the machinery of the musical arrangements provides the lyrics with a mesmerizing air of elegance and decadence. On the other hand, it also makes sense to view the two albums rather as distant siblings, being actually very different

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from each other concerning their phenomenological impact. I will pursue this approach here, because I find it to be more fruitful for the scope of this book, leaving the opportunity to focus on Melissa for another writer. I find Don’t Break the Oath to be the most ground-breaking piece of work the band has produced to date,3 since it captured the aura and intensity of the band in a way which underlines not only the aforementioned innovative approaches, but also the spiritual ethos of the band, bringing it much closer to, for instance, the mythical elements of Led Zeppelin than to generic Heavy Metal of its own time. In addition, the artistic merits of the band are indisputable on the album, being a solid reason for considering Don’t Break the Oath at the expense of Melissa. To further elaborate on this argument, Don’t Break the Oath is very much to the point in terms of not only style, attitude and atmosphere, but also songwriting, production and sound. Its nine tracks constitute a whole which still thrills and mesmerizes me as I dwell in the richness of the musical arrangements that are executed with great artistic logic, while the layout of the album with its visually stimulating front cover and photos further enhances these qualities. Being a somewhat reluctant Heavy Metal fan that finds much early 1980s metal to be too dominated by default genre conventions as well as dubious lyrics to arouse sufficient musical interest, the album stands out for me as one of the few from this era, which continues to make me reconsider my view. And being a Dane, Don’t Break the Oath is an album in which my own musical horizons intersect: It is a national as well as an international Heavy Metal album whose sound always will make me feel at home and abroad at the very same time.

IV. About the Chapters of the Book

Introduction

This book offers empirical-based insight related to Don’t Break the Oath as well as to its impact by combining research methods such as musical and lyrical content analysis, studies of related Heavy Metal literature and personal interviews with various experts, as well as contributors to the album. Apart from investigating the album’s place in international Heavy Metal history and offering a critical account of the recording and legacy of the album, featured in Chapter 2, the narrative of the book will comprise three focal points that explore the central themes of the album further. The first focal point, investigated in Chapter 3, broadens the ongoing discussion in music studies that focuses on the spiritual realm. The construction of the occult concept and imagery is here related to the sonorous, lyrical and iconographical elements of the album, including King Diamond’s trademark double register style singing and its satanic implications, his voice being regarded as part of a gendered body. This theme is elaborated upon in Chapter 4, where musical realizations of symbolic Satanism are taken into consideration. The second focal point, investigated in Chapter 5, focuses on hegemonic masculinity in Heavy Metal and analyses the ways in which Mercyful Fate on the one hand abided to the genre conventions of the concept, and on the other subverted it not least by King Diamond’s use of a paint mask constructed as a ‘mask of masculinity’. Finally, the third focal point, presented in Chapter 6, introduces the hitherto untheorized concept of queersatanism in order to analyse how the satanic concept intersects

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Don’t Break the Oath

with the queering elements inherent on the album, and how negotiations of gender discourses are crucial for the album understood in the light of gender and queer practices in the twenty-first century. In this way, I aim to contribute to the ongoing interest in queer in relation to Metal Studies, although by no means in any exhaustive way. And since Don’t Break the Oath in several ways can be seen as a break away from wellestablished discourses of Heavy Metal, a queer approach is, so to speak, inscribed also in other chapters of this book.

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2 Sounds, Atmospheres and 43 Minutes of not Breaking the Oath I. Some Notes on the Album When Mercyful Fate entered the Easy Sound studio in Copenhagen that Monday morning on 30 April, 1984, to begin recording what would become Don’t Break the Oath, they were on a roll: The band had gained further momentum after the release of Melissa, and they were keen to improve their merits even more. Guitarist Michael Denner has revealed that while the band had just hoped for the best with Melissa without any expectations, things had changed now: The members were all certain that the material for the new album would take them into ‘the big league among bigger metal bands’ ([The Metal Voice] 2019). Like its predecessor, Don’t Break the Oath was conceived and produced far away from the English and North American epicentres of Heavy Metal: In Copenhagen, which at the time was indeed a remote and peripheral region in relation to the international music markets as such. The recording sessions for the album were spread over exactly a month, ending on 30 May. The sessions were done in-between recording sessions with other artists, a circumstance that is documented in the original studio booking calendar, presented to me by producer Henrik Lund (Lund 2020).

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Figure 3 Extract from Easy Sound’s studio booking calendar for 1984.

Don’t Break the Oath

In this original calender which has survived to this date, the two last days of the band’s session are marked (29 May and 30 May). Note the misspelling of the band’s name (Mercyfull).

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The album consisted of nine tracks, distributed on the two album sides with four tracks on side A and five tracks on side B.1 All but one were driven by the trademark sound of the band: The restless yet controlled energy, the dark, yet joyous spirit, the continuous knitwork of dual guitars, the presence of complex musical elements and the shrieks of the vocals. The result was, at times, kaleidoscopic in a mesmerizing sense of the word, at other times bewildering in its complexity. And, the strategy followed the vein of the band’s former recordings: Instead of pursuing the generic Heavy Metal elements of hedonism, heroism and self-affirming postures, the band insisted on making ‘serious’ music in the sense that it called for concentrated listening in order to be properly consumed in comparison to the

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headbanging and sing-along-friendly material of, say, AC/DC, Iron Maiden or even Judas Priest. Even though the aggressive and ponderous sound of the album made it suitable for playing out loud at private parties among adolescents, and even though the artwork and the printed lyrics on the inner sleeve made it a rewarding choice for young males wanting to provoke parents with inherited Christian values, the album primarily proved its worth as an object of immersion. The band was on a mission from literally the beginning of the album: The first track ‘A Dangerous Meeting’ opens with the sound of a forceful and determined one-note based guitar riff in the first two bars (0:01–0:04). It is then repeated (0:05–0:08), and with the addition of a second guitar, playing in unison with the first one. Since the second guitar broadens the aural space of the music, the band creates the impression of being a kind of musical army, leading the attentive listener to think that the meeting with this band could be really dangerous, and that careful attention is required. At the same time, this arrangement detail was a clever nod to Judas Priest who had used exactly the same approach in the first seconds of the opening track on Defenders of the Faith, ‘Freewheel Burning’ (0:00–0:01/0:02–0:03) as well as in the first seconds of the following track, ‘Jawbreaker’ (0:04–0:06/0:06–0:09). This album had been released in January 1984, a few months before Mercyful Fate went into the studio. Given Mercyful Fate’s general interest in Judas Priest (Popoff 2020, 249; Rasmussen 2010, 106–107), they must have, beyond any doubt, been familiar with the album. The title might even have been influenced by Judas Priest as well: To defend a faith is, in fact, equal to not breaking an oath.

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Don’t Break the Oath clocks in just over 43 minutes, making it quite a substantial album in terms of length. Each track has its individual qualities, given the impression of the carefully thought-out conception of the album, including the penultimate intermission track on side B, the less than twominute-long wordless lament ‘To One Far Away’. On a microlevel, the texture of the music varies from track to track, providing a sense of constant yet subtle change in approach. According to sound engineer Jon Trier Ottosen, the small alterations in the guitar sound from track to track suggest that the guitar amplifiers used in the studio have slightly different settings (Ottosen 2020). The sense of an overall unity between the tracks, however, is enforced by the homogeneous appearances in terms of sound, production and song-writing as well as in terms of the lyrical concern with the satanic agency. Even though the music on the tracks are composed by Hank Shermann, King Diamond and Michael Denner in various combinations or alone, it sounds as if it is made by the very same person or team, benefiting greatly from the collective arrangement skills of the band members. The tracks are realized with a level of musical complexity that is clearly above average compared to much other Heavy Metal of the time. As already touched upon, the tracks rely on the use of numerous formal sections, modulations as well as the quite complex use of singing textures. In addition, the band uses tireless tempo shifts, sometimes in combination with changing metres as well as changes between full- and halftime tempi.2 A general reliance on Progressive Rock aesthetics as well as sporadic references to baroque music and pseudo-British-styled traditional music makes the album as a whole varied and, so to speak, rewarding to listen to even for listeners with a more limited interest in Heavy

Metal. Finally, the album benefits from the intrinsic musical machinery of the band members who constantly interacts with each other in ways that could only be achieved as a result of the multiple hours of rehearsing and the growing number of concerts as well.

II. ‘The Coven Sings’: Influences and Backgrounds

43 Minutes of not Breaking the Oath

Like almost every Heavy Metal band coming out of Europe in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Mercyful Fate was influenced by the British Heavy Metal scene. According to at least one opinion, the band developed its own sound by combining ‘the speed of Judas Priest with the doom of Black Sabbath’ (Prato 2003). King Diamond acknowledges that the singing style of Judas Priest’s Rob Halford was a huge influence (Diamond 2021a), and Michael Denner refers specifically to the band’s second album Sad Wings of Destiny (1976) as a cornerstone for Mercyful Fate’s artistic development ([The Metal Voice] 2019). Interestingly enough, Mercyful Fate biographer Martin Popoff referred to this very album when describing his earliest memories of the band at the time when Melissa came out, claiming that never since Sad Wings of Destiny had anyone heard a band ‘who sounded like they had sold their souls to the Devil’ ([The Metal Voice] 2020). Popoff also refers to Judas Priest as ‘the benchmark’ of Mercyful Fate (ibid.). Numerous Mercyful Fate tracks seem to draw from various kinds of inspiration from Sad Wings of Destiny, not only due to the complex formal schemes of the tracks, but also the rich backing vocals, the twin guitar dynamics, the sound effects,

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the use of additional keyboards as well as acoustic guitars and, on a more technical note, the dubbing of guitar parts. All of these elements are present on Don’t Break the Oath, and at least one of them is present in each of its nine tracks. One of the absolute main album tracks on Sad Wings of Destiny, ‘The Ripper’, can in some respects even be seen as a blueprint of the Mercyful Fate sound, while the ensuing ballad ‘Dreamer Deceiver’ might have informed the realization of the aforementioned ‘To One Far Away’.3 The Black Sabbath influence was indeed audible as well. Mercyful Fate undoubtedly had learned from the band when establishing their dark textures, the consistent use of minor, especially minor-pentatonic scales, the dramatic musical arrangements and the sporadic preference for unorthodox melodic approaches such as singing in unison with the bass line. Black Sabbath had done this on tracks such as ‘N.I.B.’ (Black Sabbath, 1970) and ‘Iron Man’ (Paranoid, 1970), and Mercyful Fate had followed suit on the two solely King Diamond-penned songs on Don’t Break the Oath, ‘Come to the Sabbath’ and ‘The Oath’.4 The doomed atmosphere as well as the tempo changes and twin guitar solos in ‘Killing Yourself to Live’ (Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, 1973) might have served as inspiration as well. Moreover, the counter-position in ‘Spiral Architect’ (from the same album) of an acoustic, dreamy introduction followed by an electric, energetic contrasting section might have influenced the counter-position of the two final tracks on Don’t Break the Oath, ‘To One Far Away’ and ‘Come to the Sabbath’, which in combination with each other resemble this change of mood. But also the formal complexity of several tracks on Sabbath Bloody Sabbath in addition to the general use of tempo changes on this album, as well as Master of Reality (1972), might have been an influence.

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Mercyful Fate was also related to Judas Priest and Black Sabbath in terms of attitude. Deena Weinstein notes that in contrast with many other Metal and rock bands of the 1970’s, who, according to her, lived out an ‘invidious masculinity’ (2016, 12), these two bands ‘were not concerned with sex or romance. [. . .] Unlike the commercial [H]eavy [M]etal bands whose focus was on pleasure, partying and excess, these masculinists focused on serious issues, issues of good and evil, life and death’ (ibid.). Among other influences, approaches by Deep Purple can be heard, not least in ‘Nightmare’, whose opening (0:00–0:23) to the retrospect embarrassment of King Diamond (Popoff 2020, 87) very much resembles the opening (0:00–0:13) of ‘Flight of the Rat’ (Deep Purple in Rock, 1970) – even being in the same key and almost the same tempo. And echoes of Led Zeppelin’s riff work and use of breaks can definitely be heard in songs such as ‘A Dangerous Meeting’ (2:52–2:56) and ‘Come to the Sabbath’ (4:25–4:48). In general, Mercyful Fate also learned from the aesthetics of the Progressive Rock genre that had played a pivotal role for a lot of Heavy Metal, not least in the first half of the 1970s: The outcome during this period by bands such as Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, Judas Priest and Uriah Heep generally thrived on an intended musical complexity influenced by Progressive Rock aesthetics. The recording of Don’t Break the Oath paved the way for various approaches to processing the vocal tracks, as well as the inclusion of instruments such as the organ, spinet and synth, none of these unknown to Progressive Rock or, for that matter, Heavy Metal influenced by Progressive Rock. In the case of ‘The Oath’, tubular bells (not unfamiliar to Heavy Metal either) were used as well as horror-like cinematic sound effects in the vein of Black Sabbath’s genre-defining track ‘Black

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Sabbath’ (Black Sabbath, 1970).5 Moreover, in the manner of Progressive Rock, Mercyful Fate often refrained from making use of the formal verse/chorus-dichotomies that had become an idiom in much Heavy Metal material during the late 1970s, including genre defining anthems such as AC/DC’s ‘Highway to Hell’ (Highway to Hell, 1979), Iron Maiden’s ‘Run to the Hills’ (The Number of the Beast, 1982) and Accept’s ‘Balls to the Wall’ (Balls to the Wall, 1983). The use of dynamics, a much-featured parameter in Progressive Rock, was also present on Don’t Break the Oath to a great extent. Admittedly, most songs thrived from an all-present forceful sound, in which all band musicians played more or less all of the time. Yet several parts of the album contrasted with this, not least through the long intro to ‘The Oath’, ‘To One Far Away’ in its entirely and, among many lesser examples, the opening of ‘Nightmare’ with bass and drums only. As a band of the time, however, Mercyful Fate was inevitably influenced by the New Wave of British Heavy Metal phenomenon (usually referred to as NWOBHM) that flourished in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and which changed the sound of Heavy Metal in several respects. For instance, “the enhancement of angry performative styles” (Cope 2010, 95) became a defining feature of the NWOBHM scene. This enhancement was made possible by the incorporation of elements such as double-kicks on the bass drum (originally developed by Deep Purple drummer Ian Paice for the track ‘Fireball’ (Fireball, 1971)), ‘rapid 16th guitar rhythms’ and ‘rabid vocalizations’ (ibid.).6 English bands such as Judas Priest, Motörhead, Iron Maiden, Venom and Diamond Head were of ‘particular importance’ for the wave (ibid., 96), and not many metal bands in Europe were able to or wanted to escape the influence of this all-compassing movement.

Mercyful Fate also made use of the generic five-piece NWOBHM line-up comprising lead vocals, two guitars, bass and drums. This line-up had famous precursors such as the Rolling Stones, Aerosmith and AC/DC, and soon became the preferred line-up for the majority of bands influenced by NWOBHM, presumably because the twin guitar constellation proved to be necessary in order to be a convincing contemporary Heavy Metal band, and because the pioneering work by Judas Priest – along with the hard rockers Thin Lizzy – had proved this constellation to be musically valuable. In this sense, the sound of Mercyful Fate was formed not only by music from the former decade, but also music from their own era. Moreover, the band differed from most bands on the NWOBHM scene by being influenced by Progressive Rock and, as already mentioned, the Heavy Metal scene of the early 1970‘s.

III. ‘Seven People here are Joining Hands’: About the Recording of the Album 43 Minutes of not Breaking the Oath

In order to learn more about the recording of Don’t Break the Oath, I approached the recording staff who worked on the album: The producer and engineer Henrik Lund as well as the assistant engineer Niels Erik Otto, both of them still living in the capital region of Denmark. At the time, Henrik Lund co-owned the Easy Sound studio together with his brother Niels Erik Lund, situated in the rather posh district of Østerbro, Copenhagen, at 70 Østerbrogade, the district’s main street, right in front of the square Trianglen. Together with Sweet Silence Studios in another part of the city (where Metallica’s

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second album Ride the Lightning had been finished two months before the recordings of Don’t Break the Oath began), Easy Sound was considered to be the leading studio in Denmark. Its merits were earned due to three components: the strong producing and engineering skills of the Lund brothers, the use of state-of-the-art equipment and the rather unusual recording facilities: A hall measuring 108 x 55 x 32 feet, making it one of the largest pop and rock recording studios in Europe.7 After signing with Roadrunner Records in 1983, then a brand new metal record company based in the Netherlands, financial reasons necessitated that Mercyful Fate’s debut album should be produced in Copenhagen and not, say, in the Netherlands or England where the band had recorded a few tracks before. The company asked Lund to produce it, and when the band soon after had material for another album, the recipe was repeated: The same musicians, the same musical and lyrical concept, the same record company, the same studio and the same producer, although this time assisted by a new engineer. Don’t Break the Oath was created primarily by the five members of the band, in collaboration with Lund and Otto, ironically giving life to the disastrous satanic ritual referred to in the opening track ‘A Dangerous Meeting’ in which ‘[s]even people here [sic] are joining hands.’ But, during the song, they all happen to die, and their souls go to Hell because they didn’t do the ritual ‘correctly’.8 One can indeed wonder whether these words predicted the band’s dissolution as well as the end of the collaboration with Easy Sound, in the wake of the recordings. It seemed that Mercyful Fate paid more attention to production details during these sessions than in the case of Melissa, since the band was granted more studio time,

according to Lund around 15 studio days, including basic recording, overdubs and mix (Lund 2020). During the recording of Melissa, Lund’s lack of experience with the genre had become a problem for not least Michael Denner who many years later remarked that even though he acknowledged Lund’s skills, the latter’s lack of knowledge about metal aesthetics was a disappointment ([The Metal Voice] 2019; Popoff 2020, 81–82). Things got better on Don’t Break the Oath, Denner admitted, but still, the end result was only satisfying to him to the extent that the crafting of the songs was so convincing ([The Metal Voice] 2019). For his part, though, Lund has much more positive memories of the recording sessions, especially the second album which he claims to be quite inspirational for everyone involved. He remembers the conditions surrounding the recording sessions in this way: As a band, Mercyful Fate definitely stood out, at least for me. I was used to working with completely different Danish artists, first and foremost pop and rock musicians who had been trained in music since their childhood and had a very easygoing attitude towards making music. But, the band contrasted so much with all that. They were so determined and dedicated to their cause, as if they had nothing else to cling to. We never worse, promoted an all-or-nothing attitude. Lund 2020

Lund adds: The band had a very tight sound because they had spent so much time in the rehearsal space and doing concerts. But their musical knowledge and experience seemed to be restricted to

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spoke about it, but it seemed to me that they, for better or for

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the very genre of Heavy Metal, and to their own repertoire as if they couldn’t possibly play anything else than their own songs. They seemed to be completely self-taught musicians, for better or for worse. For instance, in the early 1980s guitar tuners had not yet become standard equipment for musicians. So, much to my surprise, I was sometimes asked to help the band tune their instruments. Such incidents confirmed my impression of the musicians as being somewhat unorthodox. 9 Lund 2020

Otto agrees, although with a few reservations: Mercyful Fate was well prepared, and they knew what they wanted. But it seemed that the sheer energy or power was the most important element for them, at the expense of actual musical skills. I remember that especially the two guitarists had a really hard time. When they played along with the other band members, which they did while recording the basic material for the album, everything was fine. But as soon as they were asked to overdub their own guitar parts for the sake of creating a quite dense album sound, they ran into trouble. The guitar solos usually took long time to record, too. We did them as separate parts, but even though they knew what to play, the lack of fellow band members around them made it difficult. So there were many mistakes made during these recordings, but

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of course, none of that ended up on the album.

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Otto 2020

Concerning the material for the album, Henrik Lund says: The band just showed up with their equipment and loaded it into the studio themselves. There were no demos made

beforehand, and since I had not visited the band in their rehearsal space, I wasn’t familiar with the material at all before we began recording. Usually the arrangements of recorded songs are more or less created in the studio that serves as a rehearsal space as well. This was not the case with Mercyful Fate: They knew exactly how everything should be, so the recordings were, to a certain extent, just as much a documentation of these arrangements as a production of them. I had a say, however, in making the arrangements a bit less complex. But, in general I let the band determine much of the production since they had a very clear picture of how everything should be. Lund 2020

43 Minutes of not Breaking the Oath

On YouTube, one can listen to a few Mercyful Fate concerts from before the recording of Don’t Break the Oath. The concerts reveal that the arrangement of the songs that ended up on the album were more or less worked out beforehand in detail. This is documented in a clip of ‘The Oath’ performed at a concert in Copenhagen on April 5, 1984, some weeks before the band began the recordings.10 Apart from the long intro part (0:00–1:59) that was definitely made and arranged in the studio, the clip documents that the arrangement was designed in advance. Even the guitar solos are more or less identical to the recording. And a concert from Eindhoven, recorded a year before, on 9 April, 1983 also available on YouTube, reveals versions of songs to be included on Don’t Break the Oath being very close to the recordings in terms of arrangements.11 This is the case not least concerning ‘Come to the Sabbath’ and ‘A Dangerous Meeting’ (then entitled ‘Walking Back to Hell’).12 Asked about how much material the band brought into the studio, Lund says:

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Back then, artists often recorded more material than they needed to keep possibilities open or to have some extra tracks that could be used as B-sides for singles. But quite typical for Mercyful Fate’s working ethos, they only recorded exactly the nine tracks that ended up on the album. As I remember it, we recorded all the basic tracks for the songs more or less live, and then I would stop the tape machine if the recording lost intensity, and then start recording again a few bars before where they left off. I also combined different takes of the band in the mix process. ibid.

He continues: King Diamond was singing along to every single recording of the band, and he was very focused each time. This might again have to do with the unorthodox musicianship of the band: Unlike most musicians I used to work with, they were reluctant to separate vocals and music, since they all needed each other to grasp the quite complex arrangements of the songs, including the breaks and tempo shifts. For the same reason, Diamond had been placed in a separate vocal area so we could capture his vocals without any sound bleed from the instruments. He could sing for hours without getting tired, and without slackening his intonation or timbre. We actually ended up using some of those recordings in the final

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mix, because his timing along with the band was excellent.

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ibid.

Finally, Otto adds: I think the band had a strong will that kept the whole machinery together. They focused on the music rather than

partying or anything. I liked that discipline, because it meant that the music was the prime focus and that everyone was concentrated and focused all the time. Otto 2020

These considerations provide an important perspective on the recording of Don’t Break the Oath, delivered by two people who were the closest and, to a great extent, the only participants in, and witnesses to, the making of the album, apart from the five band members themselves.

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3 The Satanic Endeavours: Intentional Transgressions and Antinomian Discourses I. Pacts Unpacted The concept of Satanism was a trademark for Mercyful Fate in every respect. In order to understand how the band envisioned this trademark, I will begin this chapter by looking at some of the historic preconditions of the concept. During the second half of the 1960s, Satanism gained considerable attention in popular culture discourse, with the emergence of horror movies such as Rosemary’s Baby (1968), directed by Roman Polanski and starring Mia Farrow as a woman who unknowingly gives birth to not the son of God, but the son of Satan. The movie was a commercial and artistic success, and it initiated a public interest in horror films containing satanic themes with later box office movies such as The Blood of Satan’s Claw (1971) and The Exorcist (1973). In rock and Heavy Metal, Satanism became a topic of interest as well from the late 1960s onwards. In this way, the music fulfilled the prophecy of traditional blues music that had always been criticized for being ‘the Devil’s music’ (Farley 2009, 75), just like Rock ’n’ Roll music (Stephens 2018, 2). So, to

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a certain extent, a satanic discourse became part of the noisy, confrontational and ‘loveless’ metal scene whose insistence on loudness made it sometimes sound like it really was an attempt to raise Hell on Earth. Similarly, satanic references began to pervade the lyrics with titles such as ‘Devil’s Daughter’ (Uriah Heep), ‘Race With the Devil’ (Judas Priest), ‘666’ (Anvil) or ‘Sign of Satan’ (Warlock). The songwriters behind such utterances were not Devil worshippers of any kind, but it apparently made sense for them to sing about – and for their audiences to listen to – such lyrical tropes, due to the semantic compliance between the hard-lined musical characteristics of Heavy Metal and the inclusion of lyrics that often evolved around tropes related to occultism. In a simultaneous analysis of the Heavy Metal scene of that era, conducted in 1984, Will Straw even noted the ‘satanic imagery and motifs from heroic fantasy illustrations [. . .], which in the late 1970s came to dominate the iconography surrounding Heavy Metal’ (1984, 117). Although the satanic ideology was and still is associated with sheer provocative entertainment on the one hand and anti-establishment empowerment on the other, it is indeed a spiritual force as well that cannot be dismissed as only a fashion or a style. And even though many Western citizens especially practice a secularized version of Christianity rather than a committed one, it seems that their world-view is often unconsciously shaped by normative positions related to Christianity, making them assume that it is always something ‘good’ while, for instance, Satanism is always something ‘bad’ (Petersen 2020). If this is the case, it might explain why the bias against the ideology is so prevalent: According to Jesper Aagaard Petersen, a specialist within the academic studies of Satanism, it remains a real satanic quest to ask this critical question to Western citizens of today (ibid.).

The Satanic Endeavours

Before Don’t Break the Oath is taken into closer consideration in a satanic context, a few considerations regarding the album title might prove useful. Since the phrase itself does not appear in any of the sung text lines on the album, it makes sense to understand it as an overall admonition, concerning the obligation by the individual to the higher cause. The phrase is related to the ritual Black Mass in which the High Priest proclaims: ‘If you ever break this oath, we shall pronounce sentence upon you in the name of Our Lord Satan’. The words can be heard on ‘Satanic Mass’, the proto-satanic band Coven’s more than thirteen-minute-long documentation of a Black Mass (Witchcraft Destroys Minds & Reap Souls, 1969). Few artists have ever sung about making deals with God, Kate Bush being a notable exception with her ‘Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God)’, released 11 months after Don’t Break the Oath as a forerunner for her album Hounds of Love (1985). In contrast to this song, numerous novels, poems, plays and songs have evolved around the topic of making deals or pacts with the Devil. Goethe’s play Faust (1808/1831) is probably the best-known reference with its depiction of the sixteenth century scholar Heinrich Faust, who signs a contract with the Devil by using a drop of his own blood as ink. He thereby sells his soul in order to achieve mundane success while on Earth, in return for being a servant in Hell in the afterlife. The Faust myth, which originates from a sixth-century legend about the cleric Theophilius of Adana, has always fascinated artists and audiences, with Thomas Mann’s novel Doctor Faustus (1947) being the most influential modern reference. ‘A pact with the Devil’ can be a metaphor for the individual’s personal struggle with moral or ethical dilemmas, in which one is forced to ‘sell one’s soul’ and by this faux pas compromise

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one’s own ideals or beliefs in order to, for instance, get a position or gain access to a lucrative market. ‘A pact with the Devil’ can also be a metaphor for being tempted to make immediately rewardable choices in life, knowing that they eventually will turn out to be dead ends, with perhaps devastating consequences. In other cases, however, the words are definitely not a metaphor but rather the result of spiritual insight. This was beyond any doubt the case for King Diamond, who soon after the formation of Mercyful Fate decided to put his beliefs into the hands of Satan and make a pact, not by ‘selling his soul’ but rather by offering his loyal conviction to the cause understood as a pact in which he gained control over his own life, his feelings and his talents. In this way, the album title may be both an admonition and a reminder of the negative consequences of misconducting one’s spiritual commitments to a cause, be it satanic or, for that matter, Christian. This said, one should be cautious to assume that the devilry content on Don’t Break the Oath can be taken at face value in relation to King Diamond’s personal conviction: While the lyrical content may be quite dramatic, it might not be in accordance with modern Satanism which is not about practicing the clichés of satanic agency, but rather a belief in which one’s own potential is the locus of realization for the sake of seeking a stable control over one’s own body and intellect. In this way, there is an important philosophical point hidden in the rather tedious musical fact that on ‘The Oath’, where Diamond’s voice actually breaks on the first syllable of the last word in the exclamatory line ‘Our lord Satan’ (6:13– 6:15). As Petersen notes: ‘For King Diamond, as for his mentor Anton LaVey, Satanism is about expressing individuality and living for oneself’ (2013, 168), while bloody Satanism is primarily the result of a Christian interpretation of it, meant to portray it

as non-civilized. On the other hand, Diamond’s explicit depictions of, for instance, bloody rituals and anti-Christian dogmas on Don’t Break the Oath is in accordance with the shock-rock doctrine and the theatrical approach which Mercyful Fate set out to pursue from the very beginning, and which would probably not have been possible to fulfil, had the band pursued a more downplayed or delicate approach to Satanism.

II. A Note on King Diamond’s Conviction King Diamond has always explained his own satanic conviction by referring to Anton LaVey’s collection of essays and rituals entitled The Satanic Bible (LaVey 1969): ‘When I read The Satanic Bible, it presented to me a life philosophy. It doesn’t tell you that you must believe in a god, it’s about the power of the unknown’ (quoted in Hartmann 2020). Yet he points out as well: If you think a Satanist is what Christians often describe it to be, sacrificing animals and you’d like to get your hands on a little baby and taste [its] blood then [. . .] I’m definitely not a Satanist. But if you’re referring to the philosophy that LaVey has in his book [The Satanic Bible], yes, I lived by that Satanist, then yes I am. Patterson 2013, 20

According to Jesper Aagaard Petersen, Diamond here refers to a progression of phases known from The Church of Satan in

The Satanic Endeavours

philosophy even before I read that book, if that makes me a

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which the first phase deals with explosive notions of Satanism, including anti-Christian activities, while the second phase is focused on the ideology of Satanism as a religion of the self (Petersen 2020). The lyrics on Don’t Break the Oath are indicative of such a tension between a personal ‘second phase’ belief and a ‘first phase’ artistic interpretation of it in which a certain use of clichés and well-established notions for the sake of entertainment is at hand (ibid.). This does not explain, however, why King Diamond’s antiChristian views – that count as a ‘first phase’ matter – have continued to occupy him even many years after he became a Satanist. In 1982, before the release of the debut EP, Mercyful Fate had been challenged by a Danish priest, who had heard a demo by the band on the radio that made him warn people against the band in public, leading to a debate on national television between the priest and Diamond (Baddeley 1999, 128; Popoff 2020, 84–85). Diamond must have found the incident to be of symbolic importance since he in an aggrieved manner referred to it in an interview conducted in Toronto during the Don’t Break the Oath tour.1 A similar debate had taken place on Danish national radio when a priest was invited to review the album, four days after its release. Being shocked about the satanic concept, the priest discussed the matter with King Diamond who pointed out that the lyrics did definitely not encourage youths to become Satanists, and that the lyrics at some point [‘A Dangerous Meeting’, that is] warned about the dangers of playing with occult forces without respect (Lambek and Kramshøj 1984). In an interview on Danish television around 1990 on the Friday evening family show ‘Eleva2ren’ [The Elevator], Diamond once again had appeared on a panel with a priest.2 Even though Diamond stated here that ‘God’ and ‘Satan’ within a Christian

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context were two ‘gods’, which had absolutely nothing to do with Satanism, he maintained his severe criticism of Christianity originally brought forward on not least Don’t Break the Oath, and pointed out that the historic crusades and witch-hunts were the result of pure evilness in the name of Jesus Christ, which stood in contrast to Satanism that advocated against evilness. Diamond’s resentment revealed that the tensions between the ‘first phase’ and ‘second phase’ were still real to him, and that an anti-Christian attitude was still of utmost importance. On Don’t Break the Oath, the occupation with priests was part of the anti-Christian agenda as well: In ‘Night of the Unborn’, it is stated: ‘The spirits of the unborn will play tonight/ [. . .] They will make a fool of the priest’. And in ‘Come to the Sabbath’, the lyrics include a wish to put ‘an evil curse on the priest who took the life of Melissa’, that is the protagonist that the debut album is named after. In an indirect way, this priest is remembered in the track preceding ‘Come to the Sabbath’, the wordless lament ‘To One Far Away’, in which the loss of Melissa is being mourned (Diamond 2021b). Melissa was actually the nickname for a human skull that Diamond always had with him on stage until it was stolen after a concert. Petersen stresses, though, that ‘the play with stereotypes and grey areas’ (2013, 168–169) is actually part of the satanic practice. This way of playing, between fun and seriousness or between art and philosophy, has often been overlooked by commentators outside Heavy Metal circles (Petersen 2020). Of course, this was part of Heavy Metal discourse long before Mercyful Fate came into existence. Here, exaggerated fantasies about violence, death, resentment and injustice often dominated the imagery of lyrics and iconography, but these fantasies were decoded by fans as fantasy rather than as a call

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to arms. There seemed to be an act of mutual agreement between the bands on the one hand, who set out to empower and entertain the fans with wild imagery in the fashion of masculinist heroism (Straw 1984, 118), and the fans on the other, who in return promised not to view the carnivalistic content as much more than part of the fun. A part of this playing process, however, is the freedom of the listener to use the lyrics and imagery for one’s own purposes, which means that they can sometimes be taken at face value as well. This is, for instance, the case of the declamatory denouncement of Jesus Christ in ‘The Oath’ (2:13– 2:48) that will be discussed later on in this chapter. The denouncement has undoubtedly empowered and inspired many listeners throughout the years, encouraging them, if only momentarily, to denounce their own Christianity (however secular it was in the first place) and thereby also denounce their own Christening as a baby and Confirmation as an adolescent. But even so, Dayal Patterson’s reflection about the relation between personal belief and lyrical content is of interest here: ‘While it’s clear that Diamond distinguished between his own beliefs and the more traditional, horror-styled Christian concept of Satanism featured in Mercyful Fate songs, it’s likely that such subtleties escaped many fans at the time’ (2013, 20). The subtleties also seemed to escape the media and religious circles, since Diamond ‘won the respect of figures in both the occult and rock worlds for his well-mannered sincerity and (strangely) humane philosophy[,] the press regarded him as a laughable fake, while the anti-rock lobby perceived him as nothing less than a corrupter of morals’ (Baddeley 1999, 123–124). Admittedly, Diamond celebrated the gospel of Satan in ways that were not for the faint of heart. His painted

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face-mask and energetic gaze provided him with a scenic presence more like a non-human, or, perhaps more precisely, a human representing a non-human force. And as a person who identifies as a white male, his appearance has been in accordance with the traditional depictions of Satan, gendered as a male in the shape of a white-skinned human being of Western descent, mirroring the bodily appearances of the people whom Satan/the Devil/Mephistopheles meet (including Dr. Faust in Goethe’s play Faust and Adrian Leverkühn in Thomas Mann’s novel Doctor Faustus). One can wonder whether Diamond played the role of the Christian cliché of a Satanist in such a convincing way that everyone – despite the mutual agreement mentioned above – was tricked into believing that he meant every single word of what he proclaimed, and that the musical support of these beliefs authenticated his quest. If so, a paradox was inscribed into the fabric of Mercyful Fate Mk I that made it possible to get the point precisely and miss it totally at the very same time. It is my belief that many listeners, myself included, have been subject to such a tension or confusion from time to time when listening to Don’t Break the Oath. In a Danish historical context, the anti-Christian views of Diamond are also of interest, being comparable to the nineteenth century philosopher and author Søren Kierkegaard, who, towards the end of his life, turned harshly against the National Church, which he claimed had abandoned the Christian quest of walking in the path of Jesus Christ. Unlike Diamond, though, Kierkegaard never advocated for antiChristian views, but rather for the individual adoption of a much more radically dedicated Christianity. Kierkegaard’s attack on the church not only scandalized his own reputation, but also caused outrage and resentment for years to come,

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making him a kind of dialectic shock-rocker in his own right. Unlike Kierkegaard, however, Diamond’s attack largely remains an issue between himself and the fans: Apart from the aforementioned few debates with priests on Danish radio and television, his critical approach has been ignored by the church, and Christian citizens in the country – who, for instance, having seen King Diamond burn a cross on the television programme Heavy Metal on Danish television in October 1984 (see note 5 to this chapter), have not reacted at all.

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III. ‘When the Black Book Appeared’: The Relation to the Black Metal Scene

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The satanic concept of Mercyful Fate was not totally unique, but part of a zeitgeist. In the early 1980s, a small number of Heavy Metal bands found a shared interest in combining the pursuit for a more brutal or extreme sound with a thorough interest and investment in Satanism, being one of the most radical concepts in Western thinking. The earliest band to do so was Venom, and it was quite appropriate that the name for this new approach, Black Metal, was taken from the title of their second album (1982). Other bands on the scene included the aforementioned Bathory and Hellhammer (later to become Celtic Frost) supplemented by, at least in terms of definition, Thrash Metal pioneers Slayer, although the band was never really associated with the Black Metal scene. Despite the shared satanic endeavours and extreme sound approaches, the mentioned bands did not necessarily have much in common, and were not necessarily affected by each

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other: It is worth noting that 1) Mercyful Fate made their concert debut months ahead of the release of Venom’s 1981 debut album Welcome to Hell, 2) that Diamond revealed in 1983 that Mercyful Fate had not heard about Venom at all “until relatively recently” (Popoff 2020, 53) and 3) that King Diamond, three years later, categorized Venom as a band that Mercyful Fate felt no kinship with ([The Creeper] 1986). As already mentioned, Heavy Metal lyrics had for a long time focused not only on tropes such as danger, disaster, destruction and death, but also various metaphors and expressions related to Devil worship. However, the satanic inclination of the Black Metal scene distanced these bands enormously from virtually all other metal bands of the time that had included the name ‘the Devil’ in their lyrics for the sake of entertainment or shock-rock effects.3 Instead, these bands pursued a much more conceptual approach to satanic elements, to the extent that these elements became ‘a trademark feature of Black Metal’ (Introvigne 2016, 470). From the very beginning, Black Metal had employed an anti-establishment attitude towards the commercialized Heavy Metal institution by reacting against the perceived ‘sellout syndrome’ of the successful NWOBHM movement in England and the no less successful Glam Metal scene in the United States.4 Mercyful Fate, however, were at odds with this premise since their sound to a large extent referred to the NWOBHM aesthetics in terms of style and musical approach. This view is supported by the fact the Melissa and Don’t Break the Oath were made with a commercial pop producer in a state-of-the-art recording studio, resulting in a hi-fi album sound that contrasted with the lo-fi aesthetics of not least Venom and Bathory. Still, the lyrics and shock-rock live appearances of the band made it hard to view Mercyful

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Fate as mainstream Heavy Metal of any kind, at least at the time. The historical context of Western Occultism proved to be an important inspiration for the Black Metal scene. Occultism had attracted attention during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century when Literats such as Baudelaire and Isidore Ducasse (under his pen name de Lautréamont) revived an interest in the matter, as did Nietzsche with his nihilistic work The Antichrist (1894). The most important figure, however, was the occultist and writer Aleister Crowley, often referred to as The Great Beast 666, although he never actually called himself a Satanist (Petersen 2020). His doctrines gained a renaissance during the second half of the 1960s, probably because they profiled on the fulfillment of bodily pleasure, understood as a spiritual endeavour (Baddeley 1999, 43ff.) that happened to be in complete accordance with the counterculture zeitgeist. On the other hand, though, the doctrines also pointed in the opposite direction, since they helped sceptic anti-hippie people balance the concern for ‘peace, love and understanding’ with a preferred ‘war, hate and resentment’ attitude instead. Since Crowley’s message seemed to fit into the philosophy of the counterculture so well, it was he who gained the full attention in popular culture discourse (and subsequently in Heavy Metal) at the expense of other profiled Satanists. According to traditional Christian thought, Satan is dangerous and unwanted. To quote a Danish study on Christian rhetoric, Satan is ‘the prime intrigant, the father of lies who operates in the dark, makes traps for people and chains them to their own misfortune’ (Nielsen 2009, 108–109, translated by the author). This is why Christianity views Satanism as ‘the adolescent or anti-social behaviour of transgressing boundaries

Parallel to New Age, Satanism is not a single movement with the single voice of doctrine, but a ‘milieu’ with a multiplicity of debating voices. What they have in common may be as

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and “living out” a mythical frame’ (Dyrendal et al. 2015, 5). It should be remembered, though, that Satanism understood as a concept forms part of Christian tradition as well, for instance through ‘theological metaphysics, Biblical passages, Gnostic speculations [and] demonology [. . .]’ (Petersen 2008, 16). As a modern religion, however, Satanism also managed to reinvent itself, as Anton LaVey founded the Church of Satan in 1966. The Church of Satan played an important role in providing Satanism with a modern and downplayed framing of the knowledge related to the ensuing philosophy, and its emergence secured ‘a stable presence and an organized, continuous existence as a recognizable movement ideology’ (Dyrendal et al. 2015, 3). The Satanic Bible, considered to be the most read document about Satanism today (Faxneld 2015, 65), had a strong impact on several bands related to the first wave of Black Metal as well as Slayer. And ‘when the black book appeared’, as Diamond sings in ‘Nightmare’, he soon adopted the philosophy that much to his surprise, the book coincided with his own views to a degree where he felt that the book merely confirmed his own views (Diamond 2021a). For this reason, the book became of such importance to him that he referred its content numerous times in the lyrics for Don’t Break the Oath as well as Melissa, and as well as bringing a copy of it on stage with him.5 In Western history, Satanism has been viewed as ‘a declared religious or philosophical position’ (Flowers 1997, 5). According to the authors of The Invention of Satanism, it is the case that:

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much the intentional act of declaring oneself a Satanist as any specific point of view. [. . .] Satanism comprises immanent, materialistic, as well as transcendent, idealistic views of the Self and, one could add, atheistic and theistic views of Satan.

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Dyrendal et al. 2015, 4

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In late modernity, Satanism has been viewed from the outside as embodying ‘social narratives of evil’ (Petersen 2012, 182) by means of transgression and the cultivation of antinomianism (Petersen 2011, 352), although Satanists would definitely claim that this is a Christian depiction of it that does not have much to do with reality. While Christianity is a religion of the other (Mark 12:31), Satanism (as already stated) is a religion of the self. And while Christianity is about turning the other cheek (Matthew 5:39), Satanism is about vengeance. So it should come as no surprise that for non-satanic audiences, who indulge in occult box office horror movies and Heavy Metal music, Satanism was and is first and foremost understood as fascinating and entertaining, yet destructive by nature. The discourse of genre is a topic of relevance as well. In his seminal book on Heavy Metal, Running With the Devil, Robert Walser approaches the topic by quoting John Fiske: ‘Conventions are the structural element of genre that are shared between producers and audiences. [. . .] [They] are central to the pleasures a genre offers its audience’ (1993, 28). In Heavy Metal, the abovementioned references to the Devil in lyrics, song titles and album titles, as well as in the imagery surrounding the music (album covers included), are indeed part of these conventions. The very title of Walser’s book is indicative of this, referring to the Van Halen track by that name, the opening track of their seminal, eponymous debut album from 1978. In this respect, the satanic content of Melissa

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and Don’t Break the Oath was discursively acknowledged as a genre convention long before Mercyful Fate came into existence. For many attentive listeners, Heavy Metal music seems to invoke a feeling of affirmation or empowerment, a sense of being in control or having access to superhuman forces that the music installs in one’s heart and mind. Moreover, according to Sabatino DiBernado, it can be ‘guided by a daimonic desire for liberation from totalitarian control by means of an extreme irreverence toward self-authorized dogmatic authority [. . .]’ (2015, 205, italics in original). In this respect, Robert Walser emphasizes the importance of the ‘intentional transgression’ (1993, 42) of the default use of guitar distortion in Heavy Metal that connotes power or, in DiBernado’s phrasing, ‘distorted communication’ (2015, 201) rather than failure (since the distortion of, for instance, a radio signal is by default considered to be a wrongdoing) (Walser 1993, 42). This is the case also for the two other kinds of ‘distortions’ often encountered in Heavy Metal. The first of these is the character of the singing voice embodied in the use of natural voice compression or rasping, as well as screaming, wailing, shouting or growling. The second is the content of the lyrical tropes that often deal with negative, brutal or destructive elements of human existence – elements, which are, metaphorically speaking, distorted. In the case of Mercyful Fate, there are plenty of reasons for being empowered by the considerable use of all three kinds of ‘distortions’, since they relate to a transgressive and antinomian state of mind, which itself can be empowering, affirmative or liberating. This is perhaps especially relevant for listeners who already feel at odds with the authorities as such or indulge in pure mayhem without compromising their real-life conditions.

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IV. The Satanic Verses of Mercyful Fate

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Since King Diamond has always been the sole lyricist in Mercyful Fate, the lyrical content of the band is closely related to not only his personal beliefs and values, but also to his own approaches and narratives. While the Melissa lyrics were more diverse, including topics such as pharaohs and Halloween, the lyrics for Don’t Break the Oath were specifically dedicated to the satanic cause by constantly referring to well-known satanic practices, beliefs and rituals, and numerous direct or indirect quotations from The Satanic Bible or the Black Mass liturgical text. This might partly explain why the lyrics often appear to be quite unorthodox in comparison to the lyrics of most other Heavy Metal bands, not only in terms of content, but also with the fashion of using prose sentences rather than text lines. Throughout the album, the lyrics – printed on the inner sleeve of the original LP version of the album – attempt to embrace satanic philosophy as a set of rules as well as a practice of these rules, resulting in a variety of occult and satanic incidents being presented along the way. In the concluding track ‘Come to the Sabbath’, the listeners are finally invited to join, hence the title. And by listening closely to the musical content of the song – written solely by Diamond – it becomes clear that to join the satanic cause is to join a fête dedicated to joy and self-liberation on the one hand and a moral redress on the other. The anti-Christian aspect of the lyrics on Don’t Break the Oath is prevalent, and the track ‘The Oath’ ‘depends heavily on an established Christian context in order to work properly’ (Petersen 2013, 169). This should come as no surprise, since

‘Satanism certainly arises from and frequently utilizes antinomian discourse taken from well-known “registers” of transgression, most notably anti-Christianity’ (ibid.). But it should also be noted ‘there is an ambiguity involved, stretching transgression from prank and play to religious commitment (and frequently mixing the two poles)’ (ibid.). In other words, the satanic content of the lyrics on Don’t Break the Oath should not – or at least not only – be taken at face value, but also as a kind of spectacle that combines drama with horror, in order to create an entertaining yet scary universe. As pointed out above, the lyrics in the first verse of ‘The Oath’ can be heard as a manifesto for the anti-Christian position that Diamond advocates for. After the eerie organ-based intro, the band enters the first verse of the song with aggressive speed, backing King Diamond when he sings: I deny Jesus Christ the deceiver And I abjure the Christian faith

In so far as the ‘I’ in the lyrics coincides with King Diamond himself, these lines define him as an antichrist in the Biblical sense of the word. In the Gospel of John, Chapter 2, verses 22–23, it is stated: Who is the liar? It is whoever denies that Jesus is the Christ. the Son.

This anti-Christian stance follows the LaVeyan concern that Christianity is ‘the hegemonic ideology with which his satanic religion is in conflict’ (Petersen 2012, 175). This stance is closely

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Such a person is the antichrist – denying the Father and

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related to the lines performed a bit later in ‘The Oath’, referring to different names for Satan: In the name of Satan, the ruler of Earth Open wide the Gates of Hell and come forth from the Abyss

Like most tracks by Mercyful Fate, the lyrics to ‘The Oath’ as well as all other tracks on Don’t Break the Oath are not only overtly anti-Christian in their content; they are also inherently satanic. The lines are intentionally spiritual in their assertion of the notion that Satan, not God or Jesus Christ, is the true ruler of the Earth. This becomes clear in the final words of ‘Come to the Sabbath’. I believe it to be no coincidence that the album ends with a statement which reassures the listener that the oath made with Satan is intact: If you say Heaven, I say a Castle of Lies (. . .)

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My sweet Satan, You are the One

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A diabolic duality is present in these lines, since the word ‘you’ is used differently in the second line than in the first line. The ‘you’ in the beginning is an imagined hypocritical Christian who preaches fundamental Christian virtues while the ‘You’ in the end is Satan, ‘the One’. The numerous repetitions of these two final words in the fade-out of the song emphasize a mesmerizing relationship between the real and the surreal: The words ‘You are the One’ (5:09–5:10) are technologically reproduced via delay (5:10–5:17), emphasizing their status as famous last words in the form of ‘unreal’ utterings, as if the sound of Diamond’s voice metaphorically speaking keeps ringing post mortem, almost in the manner of Orpheus, while Diamond himself is absorbed into the silence, finally handing

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over his soul to the Devil and thus keeping his promise of not breaking the oath. I would like to dwell on this ending a bit, since I find it vital to the understanding of the album as a whole. Phenomenologically speaking, the very last word in the phrase – the word ‘One’ – gains further weight by the fact that it is sung on the tonic, that is the F sharp note (‘F#’) in the F sharp minor key (‘F#m’). Therefore, it is the basic note, note number one, so to speak. The note is reached with help of the ascending melodic progression D-E-E#-F# in which ‘you’ is sung on D, ‘are’ on E, ‘the’ on E# and finally ‘One’ on F#, as if a journey has eventually come to an end, by reaching the top of a mountain. The very key of F sharp minor is of significance here as well: It is a juxtaposition of the most basic of all keys, the C major key that is the first one in the harmonic sequence of fifths, being notated without any accidentals and therefore regarded as the most ‘simple’, the most ‘pure’, or, one might even say, the most ‘divine’ key. The juxtaposition of C-F# exhibits the tritone interval, sometimes referred to as the diabolus in musica (see the next chapter). In addition, the minor key (of F# minor) is the juxtaposition of the major key (of C major). Together with the words, these self-referential elements of the context of the end phrase form a final, powerful act of the satanic inclination of the album. The use of delay on the vocal phrase in question, however, does not only relate to the lyrics: It is also a clever musical reference to Judas Priest. In the former chapter, I pointed out that the very first seconds of ‘A Dangerous Meeting’, the opening track on Don’t Break the Oath, refers to the Judas Priest album Defenders of the Faith (1984) with the introduction of a guitar riff that is doubled in its repetition, being played in unison by both guitars. Here, the delayed vocal phrase of

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‘Come to the Sabbath’ mimics the very ending of ‘Island of Domination’, the concluding track of Sad Wings of Destiny. The final vocal phrase (4:05–4:17), made on the last syllable in the word ‘domination’, is repeated here with the use of delay. It continues until it fades out – alone, since the band has stopped playing, just as it is the case for ‘Come to the Sabbath’. For connoisseurs of satanic literature, the lyrics to Don’t Break the Oath might appear to be collage-like, since they make explicit references to Black Widow, which along with the aforementioned Coven counts as a proto-satanic band of the psychedelic era. In 1970, Black Widow had a minor hit with the song ‘Come to The Sabbat’ [sic] from their debut album Sacrifice. It is an anthemic, joyous, yet eerie song, making repetitive use of the line ‘Come, come, come to the Sabbat/ Satan’s there’. The title and incentive of the song is obviously an inspiration for ‘Come to the Sabbath’, being joyous and an inviting gesture to the listener as well. By doing so, Mercyful Fate engages in a small yet visible tradition in rock history and contributes to creating a visible link between the very beginning of satanic rock and the Black Metal genre. However, the lyrics for Coven’s aforementioned ‘Satanic Mass’ play an even more prominent role, including these: ‘By the symbol of the Creator, I swear henceforth to be a faithful servant of his most puissant Arch-Angel, the Prince Lucifer [. . .]’.” Any Mercyful Fate fan would recognize these words verbatim from the opening sequence in ‘The Oath’ (1:29–1:49) along with the words in the following verse: ‘I deny Jesus Christ the deceiver, and I abjure the Christian faith, holding in contempt all of its works’ (2:12–2:47). Diamond puts these words in a different order, however, creating a new piece of art detached from the original context. Since Coven is older, it is safe to consider their wording to be more ‘original’, but much is

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uncertain as to where the exact words originally came from. According to author and Black Metal connosseur Linda Nørgaard, they were most likely compiled from trial texts and fragments and translated from Latin and French sources like Jules Michelet’s La Sorcière (1862, translated to English the following year as Satanism and Witchcraft) and the seventeenth century Abbé Étienne Guibourg’s version of the Black Mass, as well as other possible sources (Nørgaard 2020). The Satanic Mass liturgy is also referenced elsewhere in popular culture, for instance in novels and short stories that Diamond was probably familiar with at the time of writing the lyrics. It is the question to what extent Diamond’s lyrics proved able to keep track of modern accounts of Satanism as such. It seems that Diamond presents a rather stereotypical view of negative satanization in which Satanism, according to Jesper Aagaard Petersen, is primarily concerned with ‘altmodisch connections to Goetic magic, pacts, black masses, and sacrifices [. . .]’ (2013, 185). Such connections have since been sanitized by LaVey and other Satanists, in order to get rid of the stereotyped reasons for othering Satanism (ibid.) that became a serious problem for The Church of Satan during the Satanic Panic in the mid-1980s. Petersen adds that as a result, even the Devil was sought ‘disembedded from a diabolical frame and reinserted into the self-religious discourse of empowerment and self-actualization’ (ibid.) This is the case for the use of satanic symbols as well: Even years before co-founding Mercyful Fate, King Diamond made use of a face paint mask (see Chapter 5). When in the band, he included an inverted cross into the mask, a symbol that can be seen repeatedly in the art work on Don’t Break the Oath as well. Petersen claims, though, that the inverted cross has long been replaced by the ‘material’ pentagram, often referred

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to as the ‘inverted’ five-pointed star, as the prime symbol of Satanism today (Petersen 2008, 15–16). So, without reducing the empowerment, drama, eloquence and the serious commitment of King Diamond, the lyrics for the songs on Don’t Break the Oath (as well as Melissa) appear somewhat more akin to a collection of stereotypes of negative satanization than to an artistically articulated view on what modern Satanism is and could be about. And still, it should be noted that the use of the inverted cross might as well be part of the playing with expectations and perhaps even prejudices in which it is not always clear to which extent the provider of the content – in this case Diamond himself – takes things for granted or not. These considerations do not at all belittle Diamond’s own spiritual belief, being, as he has stated numerous times, something completely different from the spectacle of the lyrics. In addition, the push and shove of moral values related to the individual commitment to societal tasks, including the destabilization of established sexual norms as well as norms of behaviour, helped create a normative critique of societal matters, by which the use of anti-Christian imagery was one of the means.

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4 Diabolus in Musica and Other Musical Modes of Symbolic Satanism

The Devil ought to know something about music. – Thomas Mann in Doctor Faustus (1947)

I. Five Musical Modes of Symbolic Satanism This chapter investigates the ways in which Mercyful Fate musically incorporated elements in order to support or emphasize the satanic vision of the lyrics. During the preparation for this book, I had a number of listening sessions with the guitarist Anders Majnlund, founder of the Danish Black Metal band Slægt (sometimes referred to as Slaegt) who has released two albums to date. As a musician and composer, Majnlund refers to Mercyful Fate Mk I as an important influence. Our mutual interest in the band let us to discussing the implications of the album in many respects. To our amusement, we found out that both of us originally got hold of the album as a present for Christmas from our grandmothers. At any rate,

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neither of them knew that they were actually handing their beloved grandchildren anti-Christian artifacts, which they would certainly never had done, had they known what Mercyful Fate was about. At one point I asked Majnlund whether he was able to hear satanic elements in the music of Mercyful Fate (Majnlund 2020). He confirmed this by saying that even though he felt reluctant to point out where it exactly could be heard, there was no doubt in his mind that the music was just as satanic (in a symbolic sense, that is) as the lyrics and imagery. He added that in his opinion, Mercyful Fate was completely the opposite of Iron Maiden whose music for The Number of the Beast did not sound satanic at all (ibid.) (see note 3 in chapter 3). Majnlund’s insisting eagerness as well as his intuitive insight made me consider how an analysis of Don’t Break the Oath could possibly support his view. By taking a closer look at the music, it turned out that Majnlund was right: Mercyful Fate really seemed to have established a number of strategies or modes on the album for creating symbolic Satanism in terms of sound. However intentional they were, they served the purpose of creating a musical counterpoint to the lyrics or even formed a synergy with them. I got the impression that the idea behind Don’t Break the Oath was to present a concept so inherently satanic that it would be perceived that way even if the listener did not pay attention to the lyrics or even understood them. These insights were new to me, since they have not been investigated or referred to in the sources that deal with the band’s relation to Satanism (including Baddeley 1999, Introvigne 2016, Patterson 2013, Popoff 2020, and Rasmussen 2010). There, the satanic concept is regarded as a matter of words and imagery only, missing the opportunity to strengthen

the identification with musical elements that symbolically correlate to Satanism. My findings showed that (at least) five different modes could be identified. Two of them are already well-known in Heavy Metal discourse: a) the use of diabolus in musica and b) the display of musical virtuosity. The three other modes for musically implementing discourses of symbolic Satanism are, to my understanding, specifically related to Mercyful Fate’s musical practice: c) the double-register singing style; d) the use of multifariousness and spatial voices and e) the incorporation of numerological references.

a) Diabolus in Musica

Diabolus in Musica

Although perhaps best known to metalheads as the title of the 1998 album by Slayer, the Latin expression diabolus in musica [the devil in the music] is sometimes used within music theory to designate the musical interval between two given notes of the diminished fifth (or augmented fourth), usually called the tritone. On the piano keyboard, it can be identified among other possibilities as the interval between the key C and the key F sharp, that is three whole tones (hence the name ‘tritone’) or half an octave. In tonal music, the harsh dissonance of the interval results in an uncomfortable sound, at least to the traditional ear. Even though the expression may be associated with Medieval or Renaissance music theory, it was not used until much later. In popular music culture, there was a renewed interest in the interval, partly due to the emergence of Heavy Metal, where it to a large extent became a genre characteristic, being used as a dramatic and harsh harmonic effect, connoting resentment, anger, meanness or danger.

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During the Middle Ages and early Renaissance, the interval was only rarely used in the melodic lines of church music due to a common view that it had an inherent ‘destructive’ dissonant character, causing composers to use it with caution. It seems to be a myth, however, that the interval was strictly forbidden at the time. But it was purposely left out in the influential hexachordal system initiated by Guido of Arezzo (c. 991–after 1033), restricting its use considerably. Until the end of the Renaissance, the diabolus in musica was ‘regarded as an unstable interval’ (Drapkin 2001, 748). The interval gained renewed recognition during the nineteenth-century romantic epoch, where it was socially codified specifically for transgressive purposes, for instance in Franz Liszt’s Dante Symphony (premiered in 1857) where the dark sonic textures of the bass bassoon, tuba and double basses can be heard in the opening section, alternating over several bars between the tritone interval F and B, that is the diabolus in musica, symbolically depicting the gates of Hell. In addition, the interval was ascribed to connotating something ‘evil’ in various Romantic operas (ibid., 749). To this very day, the interval has played a pivotal role in popular music discourse, not least Heavy Metal, where the interval was appropriated as a transgressive means as well, which secured a sense of resistance or hostility in the harmonic base of the music in question. Theologically speaking, the interval became an antinomian prototype by repeatedly exposing the very interval that in the most bristling way defied this beauty. There is indeed a symbolic value in the fact that in the intervallic system, the tritone is placed between two very stable intervals of the perfect fourth and the perfect fifth, and therefore:

becomes associated with the demonic though an ironic listening that hears the sonic signification of the diminished 5th as a fall from musicological ‘perfection’ (viz., the perfect 5th) transcribed in a theological register as the signification of a fall into [. . .] the sonic space of imperfection – a half-step into the abyss. DiBernardo 2015, 197

Diabolus in Musica

The ironic listening, however, is probably not the sole reason for the correlation between the tritone interval and the demonic ascription of it, since the social codifications of the interval, as suggested earlier, are of importance as well. Nonetheless, the harsh and inherent unstable dissonant character of the interval often provides the music in question with an eerie feel and creates a sense of uneasiness or bewilderedness. This makes it possible to regard it as an antiChristian act and, in a more general way, as a means to the realization of anti-establishment practices, confirming Nicola Masciandaro’s notion that ’The Great Negation of Satan is present in various ways in Heavy Metal since it is a negation in itself of the social norms of life’ (2012, 8). The appearance of the devil’s tritone points to the fact that an illuminating synergy between music, lyrics and semantic elements is at stake here. This is also the case for Don’t Break the Oath where the interval can be heard on numerous occasions throughout the album in the use of passing notes, as ornamentations or as part of the guitar riff work on ‘Nightmare’, ‘Desecration of Souls’, ‘Night of the Unborn’, and ‘Come to the Sabbath’. This is the case even though Diamond remembers that the band did not use the interval in any intended way while arranging the tracks for the album, rather on the contrary, since they had agreed that it would

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be perhaps a bit too obvious for a satanic inclined band to do so (Diamond 2021). Here is one example: In the already quoted lines in ‘The Oath’ – ‘I deny Jesus Christ, the deceiver/And I abjure the Christian faith’ – the use of the interval supports the lyrics by being used as a musical assessment. It can be heard in the unison guitar/bass riff that accompany the melody and unfold metrically as a four-bar pattern heard twice, for each of the sequences (2:12–2:23 and 2:35–2:47). Each time, the first two bars alternate between the two notes C and E before landing on F# in the last two bars. But when the pattern is repeated and goes back to C, the tritone interval F#-C (that is the diabolus in musica) is heard. In the first part of the instrumental section that follows (2:47–3:04), the interval is present as well in the guitar/bass riff with the notes E-A-E-E-D#. Since the A is a stressed note on the first downbeat of the bar, it is more noticeable than the E that precedes it, and since the D# is held longer than the other notes, the diabolus in musica relation A-D# prevails in the ear. This is supported by the recurring ‘answer’ to this riff in the same section in the form of the bass harmonics (also called flageoletto) on the note A. It is heard four times like a tolling bell, providing the ‘seriousness’ of the distance between the two notes in relation to a spiritual dimension (Marstal 2018, 16–17). Finally, the guitar/bass riff for the latter part of the instrumental section (3:04–3:19) alternates primarily between the notes B, C and F# in which the intervallic relation C-F# (that is the diabolus in musica once again) is heard several times. In this manner, the musical counterpart to the lyrics creates a space in which the Devil makes itself heard not only during the anti-Christian declamation in the lyrics, but also through an instrumental emphasis of the weight of the words.

b) Musical Virtuosity

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The use of musical virtuosity as a means of expression has been part of popular music discourse at least since the emergence of post-World War II jazz. In Heavy Metal, virtuosity became valuable to quite few musicians, especially in the late 1970s. Robert Walser (1993) is particularly concerned with this matter and analyzes the musicianship by the late Edward Van Halen and Yngwie Malmsteen, both known for incorporating mind-blowing guitar techniques almost in the manner of romantic virtuosos such as Paganini. Similarly, an important aspect of NWOBHM was the increased focus on the accomplished musicianship as was the case for bands like Judas Priest and Iron Maiden: The guitar solos were often executed in a daring fashion, and the tempi were often fast and hectic as was the case in the emerging Thrash Metal and Speed Metal genres of the early 1980s. Mercyful Fate proved indeed able to meet these expectations, and the band was generally considered to perform with a high level of musicaltechnical efficiency. An example is the concluding and carefully laid out row of solo parts in ‘Night of the Unborn’ (3:21–4:59). The symbolic satanic dimension of virtuosity is especially poignant on Don’t Break the Oath, since it refers to the Faust myth where unusual skills were obtained as a result of a pact with the Devil. With reference to the rather sensational myth concerning blues musician Robert Johnson’s assumed Faustian pact with the Devil, in which he was given his extraordinary musical skills in exchange for his soul, Helen Farley points to the notion that musical virtuosity as such can be ‘bought’ with one’s soul, making the claim that Heavy Metal is ‘just as much, if not more, the Devil’s music’ as blues music (2009, 82).

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It should come as no surprise that especially the guitar is the locus of virtuosity, being an alter ego of the singing voice in much Heavy Metal. This has been noticed by Nick Stevenson and Susan Fast, pointing to, for instance, the ‘homosocialized’ relation between Robert Plant and Jimmy Page in Led Zeppelin (quoted after Hawkins 2009, 101). Similarly, Mercyful Fate benefited from the likewise homosocial relation between King Diamond and Hank Shermann, and to a certain extent between King Diamond and Michael Denner. In this sense, the guitar parts – in, for instance, ‘Come to the Sabbath’ – become a prolongation of the vocal phrases, ‘reperforming’ them in an equilibrist manner that are possible to do on an electric guitar, but by sake of nature cannot be done with a human voice.

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c) The Double-Register Singing Style

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The consistent use of a ’double register’-style of singing was almost unheard of before Mercyful Fate. Even though the effect of combining the chest register and the falsetto register was occasionally used by male singers in popular music and is known in the centuries-old tradition of yodeling, it is reasonable to credit King Diamond for making an innovative contribution to the history of popular music by developing this trademark sound. Technically, Diamond preferably makes use of a reinforced falsetto, which is physiologically different from what is usually referred to as falsetto. The falsetto register of the adult male voice is actually disconnected with the chest register, or rather: the vocal cords are disconnected, which is why there is a clearly audible break between them when going from one register to another and back. Diamond attempts to bridge the

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disconnection by constantly shifting between them. But, it is not as simple as it might sound, since Diamond makes use of the type of reinforced falsetto called voix mixte. Here, the falsetto unfolds itself with the support of a part – bigger or smaller – of the chest register voice. Had he only used his falsetto voice, he would run out of air much too quickly, and he would have a hard time making himself understood, and pronunciation of words becomes difficult. But, the various uses of voix mixte in the high-pitch register help him to achieve all this. At the same time, when singing with a reinforced falsetto there is inevitably a loss of the overtones related to the chest voice, which means the sound of the voice (or the grain of it) is less distinct (Rosing 2020). This might explain why the sound of the high-pitched Diamond can be perceived as more ‘neutral’ or even ‘otherworldly’ in contrast to his chest voice that has a rich amount of overtones. An example of the use of reinforced falsetto is the unusual high pitched lead vocal part of ‘Night of the Unborn’, which for natural reasons ‘lacks’ some timbre although it is no doubt one of the most engaging and, to the listener, satisfying vocal parts on Don’t Break the Oath. In general, King Diamond’s vocal timbre is sonorous yet mellow and resonant, but also accurate, stern and whining (with regards to the head register phrases) rather than, say, vibrant or sensual. The combined use of the head and chest registers is a stylistic inflection that at the same time is in accordance with his individual agency as a singer. Furthermore, his variety of different voice qualities is an extension of the multi-vocality of Satan, which will be analyzed below, and also a queered performance of white male hypermasculinity (see chapters 5 and 6). The singing style and timbre of Led Zeppelin’s Robert Plant has been a considerable inspiration for King Diamond, although

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he never has adopted Plant’s very bodily presence and swaying rhythmic style (Fast 2001, 43) but stuck to a more declamatory, yet precise approach. Inspiration also includes David Byron of Uriah Heep and Ian Gillan (Rasmussen 2010, 140), both of whom Mercyful Fate supported when they performed at the Odd Fellow Palace in Copenhagen in 1982. However, Diamond’s extended use of the falsetto register amounts to a degree where it can be said to represent an inversion of the hypermasculinity of Heavy Metal, being what Ian Biddle and Freya Jarman-Ivens refer to as ‘explicit expressions of non-male masculinity’ since, among other forms of expression, ‘falsetto [is] seen to be the stuff of “anti-masculine” musics, situated in a dialogic relationship with the traditional “cock-rock” canon [. . .]’ (2007, 7). Similarly, Stan Hawkins points to the fact that: the discourse surrounding the high register male voices that have been commonly associated with the feminine. With its obvious associations with castrati singers, the high male voice (spoken or sung) always teeters on the edge of emasculation. Yet any notion of androgyny in these highpitched voices differs significantly from that found in styles such as rock, [Heavy] [M]etal and soul.

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2009, 120–121

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As mentioned in Chapter 2, Mercyful Fate made use of the preferred line-up in the NWOBHM era: A lead singer, two guitars, bass and drums, all male. In this context, the instruments in question functioned as ‘gendered operators’ (Biddle and Jarman-Ivens 2007, 10) that contrasted with the presumably ‘non-masculine’ head voice or falsetto voice of King Diamond’s vocal work. Especially the high register of his singing voice could be understood as a musical emulation of the voice of

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Satan, as depicted in traditional Western mythology: as a male whose masculine powers are extraordinary. Diamond often works at the extreme ends of his registers, but without any relaxation in the voice at any time in terms of both frequency and dynamics. It seems like he is always pushing his voice to make it work as hard as possible. And because the core of the voice is so strong, it is actually possible for him to do so (Rosing 2020). Throughout the tracks on Don’t Break the Oath, Diamond displays, artistically speaking, a completely mature singing style, in which he, quite unusually for the Heavy Metal genre (and popular music in general), tirelessly combines his middle-pitch chest register (voce di petto) (Miller 1977, 99–126) with his high-pitch head register (voce di testa, that is head voice or reinforced falsetto) (ibid.) while sporadically making use of more radical voice elements such as growling, squeaking and wailing.1 Diamond’s vocal material seems to be perfectly suited to the double register singing style (Rosing 2020) as a combined musical and lyrical concept of Mercyful Fate. The anti-Christian and stereotyped notions of Satanism, which Diamond (as shown in the former chapter) at the same time acknowledged and distanced himself from, thrives from and rejuvenates itself through ‘inverted states’ as opposed to ‘default states’, for instance by conducting Black Masses as an ‘inverted’ version of the Catholic Mass, as a means of mocking the celebration of Jesus Christ. The use of the reinforced falsetto voice could be seen as a way of musically incarnating this intention, showing that the ‘not normal’ is the ‘new normal’ and vice versa. Since Satan ‘speaks’ through inversions of default settings, Diamond’s male falsetto voice is in accordance to the satanic aesthetics to such a degree that one can feel tempted to wonder if the sound of Diamond’s

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voice might resemble the imaginary sound of Satan’s voice. This is not the only way of viewing the double-register style, however, since it also contains other gendered (and gender queer) elements discussed in Chapter 6. The consistent use of falsetto may be depicted as a reversal of the adult voice, bringing forth the child voice or the ‘innocent’ version of the voice of a grown-up person. With the onset of puberty, childhood as a physical state is left behind, never to be reached again. This means that the ‘purity’ or ‘innocence’ of the child voice vanishes as the human being involved becomes biologically mature. It is therefore reasonable to assume that the use of child voices can provide a desired sense of ‘purity’ or ‘innocence’, perhaps even ‘nostalgia’, thus portraying the ‘unreal’ reality as a surreal memory. A profiled moment in this respect is the final seconds of ‘Nightmare’, where Diamond, with an intended unpolished and raw timbre repeatedly sings ‘You are insa-ane, you are insaane’ (4:54–5:05) as if a child were mocking another. It is achieved by using a proto-musical phrase that is known in many parts of the world as an archetype phrase sung by small children, in a Danish context sometimes to the nonsense song ‘Avra for Laura’. In this rather bizarre way, Diamond points towards the child as the bearer of a more perfect state of mind than the adult life. A similar point is brought forward in the aforementioned horror movie The Exorcist (1973) in which a girl is possessed by a demon, thereby establishing a ‘double-up’ detachment from all the adults who the girl is attached to: as a child and as a possessed individual. Diamond’s voice proves able to perform notions of nonnormal satanic activities because it is accustomed to exposure: According to Stan Hawkins, the dandified pop voice ‘is a powerful transmitter of subjectivity through attitude’ (2009,

151). This is also the case with Diamond, with the addition that his own subjectivity is further fueled according to the very focused lyrical approach in which his subjectivity primarily shows him as being a defender of the faith – the satanic faith.

d) Multifarious and Spatial Voices The very discourse of the satanic is engulfed in a multitude of voices, messages and manners. During the recordings of Don’t Break the Oath, King Diamond sometimes managed to give an impression of performing the role of or, in glimpses of outbursts, even being Satan, not in a moral sense, but in terms of presence. An example of this is the hysterical laughter on ‘The Oath’ (1:47–1:56) as if Satan suddenly appears from behind the door. But perhaps more important, Diamond managed by virtue of his skilled voice-control to mimic a multitude of voices that is a characteristic of Satan. At least this is how Satan is presented in the gospel of Mark, where Jesus meets Satan (here identified as a male): Then He [Jesus] asked him, “What is your name?” And he [Satan] answered, saying, “My name is Legion; for we are many.” Mark 5:9, NKJV

Diabolus in Musica

Satan is depicted here as one entity (Jesus assumes this, at least), but is at the very same time numerous entities: Satan does, it turns out, not only speak in tongues but also with tongues. On Don’t Break the Oath, King Diamond, like Satan, makes himself heard with a multitude of voices, making “the dead boy’s choir” (referred to in ‘Night of the Unborn’, 2:02–2:05) very much come alive: Sometimes Satan howls, growls and groans, sometimes Satan tempts and allures with

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an irresistibly sweet voice, and sometimes Satan’s voice can be a whisper, or it can be deafening. Again, The Exorcist proves to be a point of reference for Diamond, being a horror movie aficionado (Diamond 2021a) inspired or informed by the multiplicity of voices by the protagonist, a girl. She happens to be possessed by a demon and speaks in different ways, suggesting an odd relation between sound and perceived reality, sometimes almost as if the voice originates from other sources than herself. This point is made clear in Erik Bünger’s documentary movie A Lecture on Schizophonia (2013), using the seminal scene from The Exorcist in which the priest tries to bring the girl back to life, causing her to scream and moan with sounds that almost take over her very body.2 The term schizophonia denotes the split between any original natural sound and any technical rendition of it, for instance via the telephone or as a sound recording (Schafer 1969: 43). The word itself is purposely rooted in the word schizophrenia (ibid.), being ‘a nervous word’ (ibid., 47). I will broaden the term a bit to denote the multitude of voices which all happen to derive from the same original source, in this case the voice of King Diamond. The most profound example of this can be heard in ‘Nightmare’ in the rather virtuoso vocal performance (4:47–5:19) that includes the ‘You are insa-ane’ passage mentioned before. Here, at least five or six different voices are heard laughing, screaming, moaning, declaiming, mocking and singing predominantly without words, using various registers and various sound effects as well. The passage provides the listener with an impression of how a legion of demons may sound at least in a nightmare defined by a profound loss of control. The performance is authenticated by the fact that the song’s lyrics are actually based on a ‘terrifying’ nightmare that Diamond once had (Popoff 2020,

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88). No wonder that the musical accompaniment here repeatedly makes use of the diabolus in musica interval. The multifarious and spatial vocals on Don’t Break the Oath are heard in other ways as well. In his vocal performances, Diamond tirelessly changes the perspective of the vocalist, not just by jumping between chest voice (full voice) and head voice (falsetto), but also by jumping in and out of the tracks with long, intense vocal efforts, followed by long periods of vocal silence. This artistic practice may on the one hand suggest an intentional inconsistency in the vocal duties that can be detected as occultic in nature. On the other hand, though, it tends to strengthen the relation between the vocal and instrumental parts in which the latter offer a break from the often dramatized and vigorous vocal phrases. At times, the instrumental parts also offer elements of suspense in relation to the lyrics. The tendency can be heard several times where the vocals are suddenly absent for an unusual long period of time, that is in ‘Nightmare’ (from 1:20 to 2:24); in ‘The Oath’ (from 2:48 to 3:24 and again from 4:55 to 5:54); and in ‘Come to the Sabbath’ (from 0:33 to 1:21 and again from 2:58 to 3:51). The idea of ‘jumping’ in and out of the picture is occultic in itself, since Satan also literary ‘jumps’ in and out when appearing. In this way, Satan contradicts the omnipresence of God, always characterized by its calmness and steadiness. As mentioned above, this idea also has a musical parallel on the album, through the many changes in metre and tempo not only increase the complexity of the songs, but also provide them with a sense of intended instability or even impatience that can be said to be satanic in its content, given the context here. The multitude of voices is a sine qua non in the vocal duties of Don’t Break the Oath, due to the constant shifts between chest voice and enforced falsetto singing styles, as well as the

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use of different timbres, sometimes informed by the use of studio technology (different kinds of reverb, panning, delay, flanging and distortion). According to tradition, Satan is also completely unpredictable and unstable, a truism that has a musical correlation on the album, due to the continual and often quite surprising shifts in tempo and metres throughout the tracks on the album. The already mentioned whiteness of the voice – Kim Bendix Petersen having a clear ‘white’ voice quality in both registers – is of particular interest, since Satan (just like God) is usually personified as an individual with white skin and Occidental characteristics of the face and body. Of course, this is a function of the cultural hegemony of Eurocentrism in which a white bias is preferred, at the expense of other ethnic appearances. Furthermore, Satan is traditionally depicted as a male, being identified with the personal pronominal ‘him’, so the gendered aspect of King Diamond’s voice is of significance, too. Even though Satan speaks with a multitude of voices, one can ask: What might be the generic sound of Satan‘s voice? The traditional white male ascription of the characteristics of this voice as not only white, but also as male is obviously a patriarchal projection just like when God is perceived in the Biblical tradition as a ‘he’ rather than ‘it’. This observation is supported by the fact that musical performances are always conducted in ‘gendered spaces’, and it is not possible to ignore the gendered aspect of any musical event with recourse to the often false notion of ‘gender neutrality’. According to Ian Biddle and Freya Jarman-Ivens, this means that ‘sonic gestures become codified, having gendered meanings ascribed to them over a period of time and generated through discursive networks, and those meanings are mutable according to the cultural, historical, and musical context of those gestures, and the

subsequent contexts into which they are constantly reinscribed’ (2007, 10–11; italics in original). It is tempting to ask oneself whether King Diamond succeeds in offering the listener, as well as the Black Metal scene, an authentic take on the notion of the very voice of Satan, thus presumably being a trustworthy tribute to Satan by the actual sound of the voice. If only we could ask Faust in Goethe’s drama or Adrian Leverkühn in Thomas Mann’s Doctor Faustus how the voice of the Devil sounded, we would then know more about this matter. But we cannot, and the two authors’ works do not contain hints about the sound(s) of Satan’s voice.

e) Numerological References

Diabolus in Musica

One of the main ingredients in Satanism is the power of numerology, that is the use of certain numbers used for the reason of obtaining a certain sense of order or force. The occult power of the most famous Satanist number 666 is evident, since it represents the soul of the human, which is of concern for Satanism, the religion of the self. This means that various ways of displaying the number six is quite common on Don’t Break the Oath. One of the ways in which it happens is via the use of the abovementioned diabolus in musica, since the tritone is defined by being equivalent to six semitones, thus invoking the number 6. The number 9 is a sacred number as well, since it is the multiplication of the number 3 with itself, and since the inversion of the crucial number 666 is – physically spoken – 999. On Don’t Break the Oath, the number 9 plays a central role since there are nine tracks on the album. This fact is supported by producer Henrik Lund’s earlier comment that Mercyful Fate had exactly the number of tracks that they needed for the recordings.

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However, the number 3 is also of utmost importance, being the first sacred number and the first perfect number, which represents the Pagan Trinity as opposed to the Biblical Trinity. According to occult belief, the pairing of threes into groups of two (3+3) or three (3+3+3) underlines the principle of the intensification of the number, leading to a sense of greater power. Similarly, the crucial number 666 can be understood as three pairings of the number 3 in this way: 6 (= 3+3) + 6 (= 3+3) + 6 (= 3+3). To a surprisingly great extent, Don’t Break the Oath makes use of this. The music of Mercyful Fate makes no exception to the metric formulas used as a basic norm in almost all kinds of popular music: The use of the 4/4 metrum, as well as the use of bar patterns that consist of four bars each – sometimes expanded to eight bars. So, the use of the numbers 3 and 6 are not necessarily a breakaway from this deeply embedded musical practice, but rather an attempt to integrate musical elements related to these two numbers in the arrangement, although only in exceptional cases on a structural level. Examples of how numerological elements related to Satanism can be identified in three of the songs on Don’t Break the Oath, are listed below. Of course, these elements are not necessarily the result of any satanic approach, since they seem to be predominantly unintentional (Diamond 2021a), nonetheless leaving a bit for the ‘feinschmeckers’.

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II. Nightmare Intro (0:00–0:23): This part makes use of a traditional four barpattern that is repeated three times before the verse part begins, that is 3 x 4 bars. In each four bar-period the snare

drum plays three strokes in each of the first three bars, followed by a drum fill in the fourth bar. This sums up to nine strokes (3 + 3 + 3) in each of the patterns. Since the patterns are heard three times, the strokes are heard 9 + 9 + 9 times, thus being the inversion of the crucial number 666. Guitar break (2:05–2:19): A guitar riff consisting of four bars is played twice. Towards the end of each four bar-period, the rest of the band (bass, drums, the second guitar) plays a rhythmic pattern consisting of three notes, each time ending on the diminished fifth, that is the diabolus in musica note. After the break, when the guitar riff continues along with the full band, the three-note pattern continues as well in the two following verses (2:19–3:21). Verse (3:49–5:19): In this hectic and dramatic verse, played in the metre of 6/8, we hear a unison four bar-riff that is repeated. In each of the three first bars, the riff makes use of a three-note figure. Harmonically, this figure stands out every time, with the use of dissonances: The use of root notes in the first three bars is contrasted each time, first time with a diminished ninth, the second time a diminished fifth (that is the diabolus in musica), and the third time with the diminished ninth once again. When the vocals enter the song, it makes use of a wordless theme that is heard twice (4:01–4:11) and later repeated (4:29–4:40). This theme consists of three clearly separated parts, two short ones, followed by a long one. Diabolus in Musica

In general, throughout most of the song, the band makes use of syncopated rhythm patterns, consisting of three notes as part of the overall musical arrangement.

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III. The Oath Break (3:20–3:35): The part consists of six bars, each in the complex metre of 11/8 (a characteristic in some Progressive Rock), divided into three periods each consisting of two bars (3 x 2). In each bar, bass, drums and one guitar play three notes at a time, that is six notes for each two bar-period (1 x 6). Since there are three periods in this part, the band plays six notes three times in a row, summing up to 6 + 6 + 6 times (that is de facto the case even though the band makes use of an anacrusis or upbeat on two occasions, adding more notes to the whole). In general, throughout most of the song as it unfolds after the long eerie intro (0:00–1:59), the band also makes use of syncopated rhythm patterns consisting of three notes as part of the overall musical arrangement.

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IV. Come to the Sabbath

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Break 1 (0:30–0:44): In this part, the band makes a series of breaks with three double-strokes in each bar, resulting in six strokes in each of the first three bars (6 + 6 + 6) but continues with another four strokes, though, before the part is over. Each set of strokes is contrasted with a solo acoustic guitar ‘answering’ with the same four-note motive, each time playing three different notes. Break 2 (0:59–1:12): Here, the band begins every bar of the 4 x 2 bar sequence with a three-note break exactly like the one used throughout the most of ‘Nightmare’. In the first bar of each of

the sequences, the three-note break is contrasted with a diminished fifth, that is the diabolus in musica. Outro verse (4:49–5:16): This part, which also is the end of the album (since ‘Come to the Sabbath’ is the last track), ends with the sole presence of vocals singing, ‘You are the one’, referring to the Devil. After the words are sung, they are repeated six times (3 + 3) (plus another almost inaudible one) by the use of delay.

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5 Unmasking the Masks of Masculinities: (Dis)appearances of the Paint Mask

Heavy [M]etal is, as much as anything else, an arena of gender. –Robert Walser, Running With the Devil (1993)

I. Aspects of Masculinities in Heavy Metal The study of masculinity and the implications of masculinist agencies have concerned scholars in a broad range of fields, especially since the 1970s, the decade where the hitherto unchallenged status of masculinity and patriarchal inclined heterosexual maleness began to be questioned. According to Deena Weinstein, this tendency had begun a decade earlier ‘when popular culture joined social movements aimed at demarginalizing racial, class, age and gender Others’ (2009, 17). In musicology, popular music scholars have also studied the subject especially in relation to rock (including Heavy Metal) and hip-hop since these genres seemed to be most concerned with elements of maleness. Many of these studies have shown

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how social, cultural and class-related aspects of masculinity are woven into the fabric of these musics, just as much as aspects of gender, race and sexuality. It has even been suggested that ‘[m]asculinity is if anything even more central to metal culture than whiteness’ (Kahn-Harris 2016, 28). Popular music discourse has favoured masculine approaches, at the expense of approaches by ‘gender Others’ that has to be confronted if a more balanced world of music is desired by music consumers of all genders. In this respect, Ian Biddle and Freya Jarman-Ivens point out that ‘[t]he masculinedominated nature of the music industry is notorious [. . .]. The dominant ideologies of gender are such that, in popular culture as a whole, that which is perceived and produced as “masculine” enjoys widespread hegemony over that which is described and produced as “feminine” ’ (2007, 3). Similarly, Leerom Medovoi claims rather polemically that on a historical note, ‘rock [Heavy Metal included] provided a male preserve of masculine heroes whose story is the struggle for masculinity against the ever-present danger of selling out to the feminizing terror of pop’ (1991–1992, 158; quoted in Weinstein 2009, 18). This is one of the reasons why Niall Scott defines masculinity in Heavy Metal with the general designation of being, in short, ‘monstrous’ (2016, 121). From its very onset, Heavy Metal was indeed related to constructions of masculinity, articulating ‘a dialectic of controlling power and transcendent freedom’ (Walser 1993, 108), being ‘heavily male-dominated’ (Straw 1984, 115): The use of distorted guitars, rumbling drums, frenzied bass lines, as well as shouting vocals, constituted a suitable musical counternarrative in which hegemonic masculinity, also sometimes coined as patriarchal hegemony (Weinstein 2016, 12), was embodied. In this respect, the genre continued to be viewed

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as ‘a bastion of masculinity’, being ‘a reactionary movement to the feminist ideologies of the 1960s [and] a defensive response to threats on the masculine identity’ ([Thombyrne1] (2015). As a cultural construct, elements of hegemonic masculinity (Connell 1987) continued to be a crucial element in the identity formation of bands of all kinds. But although the emergence of the NWOBHM era changed Heavy Metal in several ways, it did not change this gendered perspective in general: The scene continued to evolve around notions of (heteronormative) maleness, male stereotypes and male-gendered expectations. The music in question was often explosive, loaded with energy and occupying the attention span of everyone near it, without seeking permission first. As already touched upon, the lyrics typically dealt with power but also with chaos, warfare, destruction, injustice and violence as well as reckless excess. In addition, they focused on agency in the physical, outer world rather than in the mental, inner world – or, perhaps better, on reason rather than emotion (Hoch 1979, 13), the former being historically viewed ‘as a prime cultural signifier of masculinity’ (Gibson 2009, 49). And although the dress codes of the scene during the NWOBHM era included denim and T-shirts, the codes also involved black leather clothing, giving an impression of being in control. In addition, the iconography of the album layouts very often focused on mythology and heroism inspired by fantasy literature understood ‘as a masculinization of the fantasy elements present within psychedelic culture’ (Straw 1984, 118). In the musical practices of the NWOBHM era, the execution of hegemonic masculinity had to do with these matters: The constant sound of usually two distorted guitars produced raw timbres; the drums were hit much harder than in other music, making them more noisy, as well as more compressed in their sound, and the wailing vocals were like extreme utterances of

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the male voice, resurrected from imagined battlefields or other fighting arenas. All this mirrored notions of unsophisticated rawness and sheer power that the music intended to evoke in the (usually) male, heterosexual listener. As a result, it seems that Heavy Metal constituted itself around notions of hegemonic masculinity or even masculinities, because other positions were not really possible: In an article about the politics of the mosh pit, Jonathan Gruzelier reflects upon the means by which Heavy Metal is ‘protecting the masculinist code of the genre [. . .]’ (2007, 73), pointing out that this code ‘relies on masculine valorization’ (ibid., 71). He refers to Deena Weinstein who is quite clear about the omnipresence of masculinity in the genre, since the audience ‘is more than just male; it is masculinist [. . .]’ (Weinstein 2000, 104, quoted after Gruzelier 2007, 60). Things have changed considerably during the twenty-first century concerning the genre’s gendered habitus: The emergence of female musicians, music executives, and not least audiences, have challenged notions of hegemonic masculinities in Heavy Metal communities all over the world; many males have become more aware of the gendered aspects of the genre; and Black Metal – although very maledominated – has perhaps been especially instrumental in doing that by refraining from masculine heroism and by being inclusive to queer people (see the next chapter). Since hegemonic masculinity is traditionally related to heterosexuality, it comes as no surprise that straightness at least before the turn of the millennium was the often tacitly assumed heteronormative locus of the genre. In this respect, the conventions of the genre have historically promoted traditional heteronormativity, in contrast to the rather restricted, but prevalent elements of genderplay in pop and, to

Unmasking the Masks of Masculinities

a certain extent, rock (see later in this chapter). Robert Walser remarks that, ‘Heavy [M]etal is, inevitably, a discourse shaped by patriarchy’ (1993, 109). But he also points out that like all other kinds of identity, masculinity is inherently an insecure domain and subject to both confirmations and alterations of it (ibid.). In other words, the hegemonic masculinities of the genre are not at all a constant, but rather an area of constant negotiation, because, as Walser was quoted for in the opening of this chapter, Heavy Metal is indeed an arena of gender. To a large extent, Mercyful Fate adapted the masculinist codes mentioned above not only because of their affiliation with the NWOBHM scene, but also because the artistic vision of the band required a strong belief in the value of masculine expressiveness. This might explain why the working ethos of the band seemed to be immersed in approaches of traditional notions of masculinity, inhabiting an ‘all-male space’ (Jarman-Ivens 2006, 199) in terms of intention, approach and execution. In this sense, the band did not differ from most other Heavy Metal bands of the time. Concerning the homosocial nature of the generic male band, Matthew Bannister has shown how the ‘brotherhood’ in the case of the Beatles in their pre-fame era contained the paradoxical power relation that things were egalitarian and hierarchical at the same time (2017, 36). This was indeed the case of the masculinist discourse of Mercyful Fate Mk I as well, since the five members shared ambitions and functioned as an equal-working community in terms of arranging the songs, while all the decision-making in terms of artistry as well as organization was strictly hierarchical, conducted by founding members Diamond and Shermann. They ruled for an unconditionally and continuous dedication to the cause as a condition sine qua non for everyone in the band, resulting in a strict and focused rehearsal schedule, keeping the band at

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work four long nights a week apart from when they were playing gigs. This strategy put the rest of the band under pressure, since the hierarchical nature of the band did not allow them to negotiate their role. As a result, Michael Denner left the band for two weeks sometime in 1982 due to the pressure of these commitments, making it necessary to hire a stand-in guitarist during that period before he returned to the band (Rasmussen 2010, 139). King Diamond’s very stage name – which has no symbolic meaning whatsoever but just sounded right to him (Diamond 2021a), and which he had adopted at a very young age as a guitarist in his first band Brainstorm (ibid.) – also embodied a masculinist discourse. This is the case since the use of the word ‘King’ refers to the highest possible status a male person can socially achieve: the status of being a king, that is the ultimate masculine position in society, and the very person who in premodern times was not only the ruler of society but often also (the ascribed male) God’s (male) representative on Earth. The word ‘Diamond’ further stresses this point, since the spiritual meaning of the word has to do with faithfulness, being the very reason why diamonds are used in wedding rings. For Diamond, however, the faithful part was coded in a masculine way as well, being equal to the unconditional and subdued quest for the truth (here in the form of Satanism), no matter how high the price. This could lead one to think that Mercyful Fate Mk I is not a relevant subject to study in the light of hegemonic masculinity, since the band did what practically everyone else did on the Heavy Metal scene, at the time. But, it is not that simple, not at all: In the case of Mercyful Fate, the execution of maleness was supplemented or contrasted by other gestures that pointed in other directions and displayed a more subtle way of playing

with performative notions of gender in the band. One of these gestures, King Diamond’s use of the double register voice, was discussed in the former chapter. Another one is his generic use of the paint mask, a part of his stage persona that will be investigated below.

II. King Diamond’s Paint Mask In numerous sources, Diamond has mentioned the dramatized live appearances of Alice Cooper as the primary influence, that is his exaggerated use of black mascara witch to a certain extent resembled a mask. Diamond especially refers to Cooper’s concert at the Falkoner Centre in Copenhagen on 3 September, 1975, on his Welcome To My Nightmare tour.

Official press photo of Mercyful Fate, 1983. Note the inverted cross on the forehead of King Diamond’s trademark paint mask (cf. page 99–100). Photo: Fin Costello/Redferns.

Unmasking the Masks of Masculinities

Figure 4 King Diamond’s paint mask as of 1984.

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Diamond attended this concert and, according to Dayal Patterson, reacted in this way: ‘If I ever get in a band, I’m going to use makeup’ (2013, 19). However, during my interview with Diamond, he revealed that an even earlier and just as defining influence was the Genesis concert at the same venue on 21 February, 1975, on their The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway tour. Seeing front singer Peter Gabriel performing with various kinds of paint masks and costumes made him imagine doing something similar on stage (Diamond 2021a). Paint masks had been used by the early shock-rocker Screamin’ Jay Hawkins in the early 1960s, and in the psychedelic era at the end of the decade, it was also used by, for instance, Robert Plant’s pre-era Led Zeppelin band Band of Joy (Davis 1983, 48; quoted after Fast 2001, 19) and most notably rock icon Arthur Brown. The use of paint masks became widely known during the 1970s within two distinct genres: hard rock/ Heavy Metal (most notably Alice Cooper and Kiss) and Progressive Rock (most notably Peter Gabriel). Along with his custom-made, bottomless microphone stand, consisting of real human bones (a tibia bone and a femur bone, respectively), the paint mask soon after these concerts became a trademark too for King Diamond as an immediately recognizable stage presence relic, having since becomed an institution of not only Black Metal, but of Heavy Metal too. His mask of choice, however, more or less coincidentally resembled elements of the paint mask style used by Gene Simmons of Kiss, which – in contrast to the other members of the completely paint-masked band – only made use of black and white, like Arthur Brown’s masks preferably had done.1 Using a paint mask was indeed an unusual remedy for an amateur musician at the time far away from the epicentres of

Unmasking the Masks of Masculinities

hard rock and Heavy Metal. Nonetheless, it was Diamond’s intention to use it as an artistic statement. Asked if his paint mask was subject to homophobia of any kind he replies that this was not the case, because the bands he played in at the time did not perform that many concerts, and because the paint mask already was a point of reference for concert goers in the 1970s and early 1980s, via the visual appearance of the (assumed) heterosexual artists Kiss, Alice Cooper and Peter Gabriel of Genesis (Diamond 2021a). Originally, Diamond’s paint mask consisted of just black paint. Later on, white paint was added. In the manner of the DIY attitude of the band, Diamond applied the mask himself, without learning how to from anyone else (ibid.). The paint itself was in general a combination of black lines, with black paint around the eyes, on a white background. Diamond resumed and refined this practice with his next band, the hard rock band Black Rose, and eventually this artistic intention was seamlessly transmitted into the conceptual frame of Mercyful Fate that made him include an inverted cross painted on the forehead. King Diamond’s performative use of the paint mask (fig. 4) has clear elements of dandyism inscribed in it. It seems to ring true for the case of Diamond when Stan Hawkins states: ‘Indeed, the drive behind dandyism is to turn oneself into an “original” by masking things’ (2009, 39). As Hawkins notes, the word dandy had in earlier times been ‘synonymous with something unsettling and propelling’ (ibid., 96), and yet at the same time, ‘gender-bending has always been associated with dandyism’ (ibid., 93, note 2). In addition, the heavy use of make-up and wigs was part of the American showmanship of Heavy Metal for bands like Mercyful Fate’s contemporaries Twisted Sister. In this sense, Stan Hawkins claims that popular music is often the

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result of a ‘dialogic relationship of visual and sonic material as established by the viewer, as much as by the performer. This implies that the recording not only contributes to the visual construction of identities, but also reconfigures them as part of the process of pleasure’ (ibid., 41). This is indeed the case for Diamond: Since he always benefited from a profiled visual appearance, the listener easily imagines him wearing his paint mask even in the studio. Producer Henrik Lund, however, informed me that during the recordings of Don’t Break the Oath, Diamond did not bear any kind of face painting. Diamond adds that no one would have seen it anyway since he recorded the vocals in a separate area, which for the sake of atmosphere was almost dark, lit up by a few candles and, sometimes, two small spotlights (Diamond 2021b). It is not a coincidence, though, that the words ‘masculine’ and ‘mask’ have the first three letters in common: According to Paul Hoch, the shortened prefix ‘mas’ stems from the Latin word ‘masca’, meaning ‘mask’ (1979, 96). According to the connection between the two words, any performance of masculinity involves the wearing of a mask whatever the purpose is: to refrain from being viewed by others in toto or to acknowledge the role-play of masculinities as such. Harry Brod’s article ‘The Masculine Masquerade’ (1995) deals with this matter and argues that even though masculinity as such has historically been subject to concealment, it always unfolds itself as a masquerade, since gender performances are, literary speaking, gender roles that are performed, not given (ibid., 14). But, the masculine mask serves the function of being a genderplay much more than a given determined by historical, social and psychological conditions of the time. With reference to Hoch 1979, Brod adds that the ‘masculine mask is also worn in

Unmasking the Masks of Masculinities

order to attain a normative, performance-orientated, phallic, heterosexual and masculine sexuality’ (ibid., 17). So, the mask can both function as a means to secure a heteronormative masculine order, and as a means to subvert it. During the Mercyful Fate Mk I era, Heavy Metal discourse maintained both functions. While it is quite easy to see how such an order was secured by strategies of hegemonic masculinity as described above, the subversion of the order may be more subtle. However, Deena Weinstein has showed how Heavy Metal perhaps more than any other genre of popular music has conducted shifting incarnations of genderplay throughout the history of the genre (2016, 11). While the execution of hegemonic masculinity among (male) Heavy Metal musicians, as well as (male) fans, risked resembling a cliché, being often viewed as a form of music that ‘encompassed a patriarchal sound and an ideal image of the white, hegemonic, heterosexual, sexist, fixated on physical strength and technical control’ (Heesch & Niall 2016, 2), there was genderplay going on elsewhere. Especially the American Glam Metal scene at the time played with gender when the musicians of Guns ’N Roses, Twisted Sister and others began having hair styles and using make-up, which was usually attributed to women, and to a certain extent even clothing, as a way of bringing a new kind of attention into the bigger picture. But, as Florian Heesch and Niall Scott point out (with reference to Diederichsen 2013), it had ‘less to do with the questioning of conventional gender differences and relationships, and rather more with men appropriating traditional feminine style elements from a wider range of culture and conquering which goes beyond traditional male territory, ultimately strengthening male hegemony’ (2016, 3). Unlike Glam Metal, King Diamond’s use of the paint mask in unison with his double register singing style, analyzed in-depth in the

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former chapter, displayed a much more complex relation to the intrinsic Heavy Metal discourses of masculinity and fulfilled a potential for challenging these notions.2 As a remedy, the paint mask – or at least the use of heavy make-up – appealed to a number of British male pop, Post-Punk and Goth artists of the early 1980s as well, apparently because it perfectly mirrored the zeitgeist of the time in which elements of pastiche, irony and camp, as well as playful post-modernism, prevailed. Perhaps just as important, the masks supported the androgynous appearance of such diverse acts as Adam & the Ants and Culture Club, for whom they helped create a carnivalesque atmosphere which stood out against the heteronormative standards of pop. But obviously, the early 1980s also saw a renewed interest in the use of paint masks manifested within the very two genres that had made the phenomenon known in the first place: Progressive Rock and Heavy Metal. Apart from Mercyful Fate, lead singer Fish of the neoProgressive Rock band Marillion appeared with a paint mask as well, bringing the two singers at the forefront of a renewed interests in this matter. Within these two genres, it almost looked as if a torch was passed on in the very year of 1983: This was the year when Kiss abandoned the use of masks (although they resumed them again in 1995); when Peter Gabriel displayed his painted face for the last time in his career on the cover of his live album Plays Live; and when Mercyful Fate and Marillion, respectably, released their debut albums Melissa and Script for a Jester’s Tear. But, while Fish remained the last in line of face painted singers in his genre, Diamond’s face paint became the prime point of reference (rather than Kiss, Alice Cooper or for that matter Arthur Brown) for future Black Metal musicians, and continues to do so.3

III. Unmasking the Masks of Masculinities

Unmasking the Masks of Masculinities

Fish added new layers of meaning to the paint mask within the context of Progressive Rock, rejecting Gabriel’s theatrical use of them in favour of a more existential approach, where the mask took the task of being a self-inflicted stigma as well as a signifier of vulnerability and melancholia. King Diamond also added new layers within the context of Heavy Metal. For him, the selfcelebratory elements of the paint mask as well as the ‘alienating’ uses of it were abandoned in favour of a more existential approach. But Diamond’s layers had to do with completely other elements, such as the self-Othering process in which the mask evoked the darkest, or most grotesque elements of one’s personality. Moreover, the mask was a signifier of seriousness, proving his commitment to the cause. And as already noted, the mask promoted an explicit satanic content by portraying the inverted cross on his forehead. The mask, however, also helped him question elements of hegemonic masculinity inherited in the conventions of the Heavy Metal genre as well as in the fabric of the band itself. Unlike the Glam Metal scene, whose appropriations of femininity served the ultimate goal of strengthening male hegemony, as described by Heesch and Scott above, Mercyful Fate’s aspirations had a more binding result, making it less a genderplay than a challenge to the gender norms that pervaded popular music discourse of the time. I believe that this challenge was very much related to the satanic approach of King Diamond in particular that tended to transcend notions of masculinity, sexuality and even hegemony. Although Western societies around 1980 had slowly begun to

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acknowledge and encourage homosexual activism as well as strategies of queering, the two were ruled by heteronormative values and clear-cut notions of gender, meaning that the use of make-up by a male person was widely regarded as a severe transgression of the norms. But, since the use in the case of Diamond unfolded within the context of Satanism, it became the very symbol of world-weary Luciferian agency, being transgressive by definition. In addition, the identity of the makeup belonged to the persona King Diamond, not the real human being Kim Bendix Petersen, who would probably never wear make-up, being a white working-class heterosexual male from the southern suburbs of Copenhagen. In his analysis of Annie Lennox’‘masquerading identity’, Stan Hawkins points to her use of masking as ‘a distancing strategy’ (2002, 121). This might be the case for King Diamond as well: His use of the paint mask can be seen as a way of blurring his own masculinity, embodying a present distance or a distant presence in relation to the normative expectations of the (male) listener. Or, perhaps better, the mask presented a way for Diamond to distract the spectator by downplaying his own masculine appearance and, by the use of the double register voice, hinting at a double-gendered identity with the chest voice ascribed with masculine connotations, and the head voice ascribed with the feminine. In this respect, Diamond’s use of the paint mask reminds the spectator that the bare male face, even a face, which has never had a mask on it, is in itself and by itself also a mask – a mask of masculinities. Harry Brod points out that ‘the masquerade always invokes a distinction between the artificial and the real. Behind the facade of the mask lies the real face, to be revealed when the masquerade is over’ (1995, 17; italics in original). But he also points out that the performance of the gender ‘is all there is’, because ‘the real face’ is an illusion (ibid.).

Unmasking the Masks of Masculinities

This consideration puts the aspect of genderplay in a new light, as it seems that this play never ends, and that ‘natural gender positions’ are likely to be unreal. A mask of masculinities is inscribed on the very face of every male, and it is not possible to unmask oneself at all. Only by putting on another mask – for instance the paint mask type of King Diamond – it became possible, albeit in glimpses, to unmask the original mask. The weight of history is on Diamond’s side in this matter: To use face paint as a male is an ancient tradition of cultural knowledge related to the ritual use of war paint of men about to enter a battle for the sake of scaring or provoking the enemy or displaying their status. Here, the face (or body) paint becomes a symbol of force, power and control and belonging to a certain community, sometimes even used for spiritual purposes. In this way, Diamond’s face paint approach is (also) related to pre-modern notions of masculinity when notions of gender were much more difficult to grasp, which in itself is a queer point of departure. Moreover, the face paint might have similar end goals as pre-modern pagan war paint, in this case to scare Christians and perhaps initiate a cultural war against Christianity. So, to sum up, Diamond’s face paint mask can indeed be seen to constitute a challenge to the norms of hegemonic masculinity in Heavy Metal. Although this insight might have been reached by means of intuition, it seems to be an artistic stance that is closely related to the double register singing style, since this also pointed to the fact that masculinity as such is not a stable given, which is why the traditional view of the male falsetto as emasculating should be given up completely. The only stable aspect in the story of face painting is the fact that it has, with very few exceptions, been used exclusively by male artists. The genderplay of female artists in popular

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music has been expressed in other ways (although the use of make-up has been viewed as mandatory among female artists), and the occupation with gendered masks has not had much impact here. In this respect, King Diamond relates to a phenomenon which, in a paradoxical manner, has become an inherent element of the very hegemonic masculinity that his use of the paint mask seeks to challenge.

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6 Queer-Satanism Galore: Otherings of the Oath I. A Note on Queer This chapter focuses on aspects of Mercyful Fate’s agency that relates to the term queer. When Don‘t Break the Oath was released, there was only very limited attention paid to this aspect in popular music discourse, not least in Heavy Metal. However, the term turned out to be of great relevance to the discourse during the 1990s, when extensive gender studies began to pervade musicological studies of popular music. Since then, the term has proven very useful in describing the often complex processes related not only to issues of gender, but also to issues related to matters such as inclusion/expulsion and majority/minority. I find the term to be a great help in comprehending Don’t Break the Oath as an album which not only challenges the norms of hegemonic masculinity (as described in the former chapter) but also is at odds with the perceived norms of Heavy Metal as well as popular music culture. Queer is often seen in relation to issues of gender identity and sexuality, but can on a more general level be used to designate positionings that break away from and thus expose the norms of a given discourse, in this case Heavy Metal

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discourse as well as popular music discourse, in order to show what these discourses have not achieved until now. David Halperin puts it this way: ‘As the very word implies, “queer” does not name some natural kind or refer to some determinate object; it acquires its meaning from its oppositional relation to the norm. Queer is by definition whatever is at odds with the normal, the legitimate, the dominant. There is nothing in particular to which it necessarily refers’ (1995, 62). Similarly, Sara Ahmed points to the fact that the etymology of the term originates in the Indo-European word ‘twist’ and thus describes something that is at odds with or disturbs the given norms (2006, 67). Queer sometimes stirs up pure gender trouble, at other times creates a feeling of unease, a feeling of not really knowing what is going on. And sometimes it manifests itself completely unintentionally in combination with apparently coincidences. As Stan Hawkins notes: ‘The tendency towards the desirability of a resistance to the norm is the raison d’etre of queering. [. . .] The element of queer is always open to multiple meanings’ (2009, 95–96). Throughout the history of popular music, challenges to ‘given’ conceptions of gender, especially the male gender, have always been crucial. To quote Hawkins again, it is the case that ‘[m]asculinity in popular music is without doubt spectacularized in countless ways, where music performance brings masculinity in close proximity to that which it emasculates. Given the instability of “manliness”, many fault lines are open to exploitation’ (ibid., 119). The phenomenon of queering rejects, negotiates, destabilizes or expands established concepts of gender to an extent where they become unstable, uncomfortable or even unrecognizable. According to queer theorist Nikki Sullivan

Queer-Satanism Galore

queer is even a verb, an action (2003, 50). Queering is thus a subversive process, happy to spread confusion. After queer theory came into existence, a necessary and thoughtful critique of the hegemonic norms of heteronormativity has become even more possible to make. This is also the case within musicology, where re-readings of the history of music in the light of this critique (see, for instance, Leibetseder 2016) have become not only possible but, I would add, also mandatory in the sense that all the elements that we did not have a suitable language for earlier on can now be investigated with due respect. Hegemonic masculinity, a phenomenon so inherent in the self-understanding of the Heavy Metal genre, has been met, for instance, with the queer notion that, in Stan Hawkins’ words, ‘masculinity belongs to no single gender, sexuality, race, or discipline’ (2006, 279). So, to indulge in ‘the intricate relationship between queerness and masculinity’ (ibid., 289) in relation to Heavy Metal is not as anachronistic as it seems, since queering has always been one of the possible positions that artists could engage in. In its Mk I version, Mercyful Fate was a band whose very existence in some respects can be said to be queer. And while the fate of the band may have been relatively merciful [sic], given the impact of their music and the importance of their innovative elements in terms of music, lyrics and concept, the band was often internally ‘unbalanced’ in ways which were at odds with everything considered ‘normal’. King Diamond’s practice of challenging hegemonic masculinity, analysed in the former chapter, can easily be said to be a queering of his own position. But Mercyful Fate was at the same time subject to a number of incidents that more or less willingly put them in a position that took the form of a queering of the norms. Here are a number of examples that

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all point to a situation where the band on a somewhat unintentional note developed a habit of undermining or perhaps even subverting the norms, habits and conventions of show business: a) The band really struggled to achieve what they did, because the level of ambition and willingness was so high among all its members. However, they disbanded at the very height of their career, never to reap those expectations, which the sensation and controversy following the release of Don’t Break the Oath had stirred up especially in the United States. Not many bands would ‘fail’ so drastically at the very moment when, finally, half the world was watching them – or, perhaps, at the very moment when the band was about to reach a level of popularity beyond the dedicated fanbase they had played for until then. In that case, the break-up can be understood as a radical way of protest against the very premises of popular music in a capitalist world, in which world domination is always seen as the ultimate measurement for success. b) The band’s aforementioned vision of being ‘the heaviest band in the world’ was, at best, challenged by the production sound on Don’t Break the Oath that came out so much cleaner and hi-fi sounding than even the most mainstream oriented acts of NWOBHM. This becomes evident when listening to other albums in this era: As already touched upon in Chapter 3, the aesthetics of Don’t Break the Oath are almost unashamedly delicate compared to albums of the time by especially Black Metal bands Venom or Bathory, but to a certain extent also Iron Maiden or Diamond Head, not to mention Motörhead. c) The band attracted a lot of attention due to the satanic concept, but it was King Diamond’s concept alone, which the four other band members did not share, even though they were loyal to it. The photo shoots of the band say it all: One guy

in full satanic service with a paint mask and a Hellish attitude, and four other rather anonymous guys looking like they could have been members of any generic metal band of the time (see, once again, fig. 4, page 81). Even though everyone in the photos probably appeared like they wanted to, this contradiction in terms would have been almost unthinkable for, say, a British or American band of the time.

II. Hegemonic Masculinities vs. Queering

Queer-Satanism Galore

In recent years scholars such as Amber R. Clifford-Napoleone have pointed towards the necessity of looking at Heavy Metal in relation to queering. The point is that Heavy Metal should not be analysed as a masculine culture at all, even though the genre is usually mostly associated with elements of hegemonic masculinity since it is (also) an arena of queerness: ‘Though [H]eavy [M]etal may appear to be a masculine, heterosexual space, it is resolutely a queer space’ (2015, 5) and ‘[the performed masculinity of the [H]eavy [M]etal scene is nothing more than a drag show’ (ibid., 11).1 This is a very refreshing statement although it does not necessarily relate to the masculine codifications of the genre conventions of Heavy Metal or to the homosocial values of the genre shared among male musicians and fans ever since its earliest days. Nonetheless, the statement supports the important notion put forward in the former chapter that masculinity as such is not a given but rather a mask. In this way, the agency supports the view that Heavy Metal might be understood as much more than notions of sturdy hegemonic masculinity discourses.

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As the former chapter showed, however, it should come as no surprise that Mercyful Fate proved able to extensively meet queer criteria: The band emerged at a time when queered aspects of the Anglophone popular music culture were on the rise. While the practicing of hegemonic masculinity on the one hand played an important role in Heavy Metal and rock, androgyny performed by especially male artists as well as queering strategies with David Bowie as a pioneer had also begun to play a certain role in pop and indie rock (the aforementioned Culture Club and Adam & the Ants are indicative of this, as are The Smiths, The Cult and The Cure). Mercyful Fate managed to combine the two positions, probably unintentionally, although the reputation of being an extreme metal band with a shock-rock-oriented live show mitigated the androgynous aspects of the band. Nonetheless, the queering aspects of the band enriched, nuanced and subverted its agency of practicing hegemonic masculinity. Queer elements are sometimes revealed in surprising ways, and queerscapes evolve due to interconnected incidents. One example is the given name of Kim for two of the band members, drummer Kim Ruzz and King Diamond (Kim Bendix Petersen). In Danish, the name is almost exclusively a boy’s name. Ironically enough, it was also the name of the singer Kim Larsen, who is widely considered to be the greatest and most popular figure in Danish popular music of all time. His stardom and mainstream success clearly contrasts with the much more marginalized Heavy Metal genre, not to mention satanic Heavy Metal. This is even more poignant since Kim Larsen in 1983, the very year of Mercyful Fate’s album debut, released the album Midt om natten [In the Middle of the Night], to date the bestsold album in Danish music history.

Queer-Satanism Galore

In the United States, however, where Mercyful Fate as already mentioned made an impact following the release of Don’t Break the Oath, Kim is almost exclusively a girl’s name. So in this way, the unisex character of the name underlines a vague queer reading of the band line-up. To queer matters further, the Danish metal scene in the 1980s was joined by the female metal singer Kim ‘Powerbaby’ Sixx (née Lone Jensen) (Rasmussen 2010, 191), suggesting that Kim could easily be a girl’s name as well on the national metal scene of the time. In recent times, the name keeps interfering in Danish popular music culture: In 2020, Quim (né Kim Frandsen) – who identifies as a male – entered the pop scene, suggesting a queer positioning by the queer spelling of his given name. Another example is the dressing habits of Hank Shermann on stage shortly before the break-up of the band in April 1985: While the other instrumentalists of the band dressed more or less like Heavy Metal artists were supposed to, Shermann preferred pop or even disco-like outfits and sometimes even wore pink sweat suits (Kaye 1997; Popoff 2020, 105) or other kinds of jogging suits on stage ([The Creeper] 1986). Producer Henrik Lund, in addition, remembers that while King Diamond trusted Shermann completely in terms of musical direction during the recording of Don’t Break the Oath, he was often dissatisfied with the way he dressed (Lund 2020). To go against the Heavy Metal dress code of preferably denim and leather is a way of deconstructing elements of hegemonic masculinity as such and therefore a way of queering the norms. Interestingly, this queer strategy is a completely different one than the one laid forward by King Diamond and the unforeseen result of internal tensions. A third example is the musical confusion of style in live performances by Mercyful Fate in the time before the break-up. According to Dayal Patterson, Shermann would sometimes

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incorporate elements of funk in the manner of Mother’s Finest into his solos, compromising the artistic integrity of the band [Patterson 2013, 24; Popoff 2020, 103]. Both in terms of attire and playing habits, Shermann’s actions obviously were not made as a result of mutual agreement between the band members but took on the character of being apparent protests against the conceptual profile of the band. It was a conflict that related to the inherent distinction between Satanist Diamond and the four other band members with presumably no intention of being anything else than great musicians in a great band. Finally, a fourth example is the peculiar spelling of the song entitled ‘Welcome Princes of Hell’ on Don’t Break the Oath. King Diamond has explicitly confirmed this to be the correct title for the song (Popoff 2020, 94). But when the album was released, however, the title of this track proved to be misspelled on both the album cover and inner sleeve as ‘Welcome Princess of Hell’. This misspelling, which probably occurred due to a linguistic ambiguity (since the words Princess/Princes both look and sound quite similar when pronounced or sung), has to this day been kept on the subsequent physical releases of the album, as well as on streaming services. How this incongruence came into existence in the first place remains a mystery (and one can wonder why the band never approved the finished cover and the inner sleeve to Don’t Break the Oath before it was released). Seen in a queer perspective, however, this incongruence is exactly the point, which relates to both the double register singing style and the masks of masculinity. The band met the criteria of queering in other ways too. To be queer (also) means to feel or to be deemed marginalized, odd or looked down upon. As discussed earlier, this was the case for the rather small Heavy Metal scene in Denmark in the early 1980s, which in some respects struggled to be recognized

and accepted, especially by the critics, as performers of serious music. To be a Black Metal band at a time when the genre was still in the process of being defined, also contributed to the frustration, although probably also helped make the band the most radical metal band in Denmark at the time. Even though Mercyful Fate had a considerable following from the very beginning, the media noticed the band, for sensation’s sake, rather than for its artistic merits.

III. The Endeavours of Queen Diamond

Queer-Satanism Galore

The queer-related elements of Mercyful Fate are also of interest in a national framework. In his book The British Pop Dandy, Stan Hawkins points to the notion brought forward by several scholars that British rock has been labelled ‘feminine’ in contrast to ‘masculine’ American rock (2009, 97). Given the fact that Mercyful Fate were inspired by both American and English artists, it seems, then, that the ‘feminine’ side was more prevalent than the ‘masculine’ one in terms of singing style. Similarly, Hawkins remarks that ‘[. . .] institutionalized masculinity promotes the historical and social conditions that form the narratives of pop texts, and the queering antics of these artists offer an opportunity for reconfiguring masculinity. In particular, “signifying queerness” magnifies the constrictions of a special type of performativity informed by the values of body politics and homosociality’ (ibid., 12). With these considerations in mind, one can indeed wonder whether King Diamond queered his own heterosexuality into a non-sexual identity in order to make as much space as possible

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for the satanic message. Or one can wonder whether his double register voice can be said to embody an intergendered position, – that is being in-between the feminine and masculine at one and the same time – rather than an imagined androgynous person where gender is undifferentiated, or perhaps even regendered. In that case, Diamond can been understood as a human Heavy Metal depiction of the Hindu deity Ardhanarishvara, a portrayal of Lord Shiva being half male and half female – the word ‘literally meaning a non-dual composition of half woman and half man’ (Shahi 2020, 261). Interestingly, a third eye – in Indian spiritual traditions a symbol of enlightenment or a manifestation of foresight – is usually depicted on the forehead of the composite deity, that is the very place where the face mask of Diamond reveals an inverted cross. While the play with androgyny in Heavy Metal discourse might well be ‘yet another tactic for dealing with the anxieties of masculinity’ (Walser 1993, 128), the intergendered approach might be a tactic for downplaying or, at times, even neutralizing these anxieties understood as a powerful coding of gender. In a study of Jeff Buckley, Shana Goldin-Perschbacher claims that Buckley’s ‘widely ranged gender singing styles suggest a kind of transgendered vocality, that is a vocality that resists identification with his biological sex’ (2007, 215). This characterization might be suitable for King Diamond as well. This said, his voice is not biased against expressive vulnerability like Buckley’s and succumbs to a more declamatory, selfassured style, not unfamiliar to Heavy Metal male singers as such. But if masculinity does not belong to any single gender, sexuality, race, or discipline, as Hawkins noted above, this must apply to femininity as well. So, in a queer perspective, the uses of head voice or falsetto as a means of expression has absolutely nothing to do with

Queer-Satanism Galore

emasculation at all. Rather, they claim the femininity of King Diamond’s voice to be the very core of it to a point where it makes sense not only to acknowledge Mercyful Fate as pioneers of a meta-genre called Queer Metal, but also to name the band Queen Diamond.2 Or, on a more radical note, the uses call for a ‘gender queer’ position in which one according to Rebecca Carbery is ‘someone whose gender falls completely outside the gender binary or as not having a gender at all [. . .]’ (quoted in Leibetseder 2017, 302). In the preface to the twentieth anniversary edition of Jack Halberstam’s seminal book Female Masculinity, it is stated that ‘[t]he term “feminine masculinity” [. . .] describes multiple modes of identification and gender assignation [. . .]’ (2018/1998, 2). One of these possible modes apply not to females performing their own masculinity, but males performing a feminized or, understood in a binary gender logic, ‘inverted’ version of masculinity in which non-masculine elements are introduced within an inherently masculine discourse. Halberstam ends the preface with this notion that makes room for potential queer readings: ‘Female masculinity continues to apply pressure to hegemonic forms and even as it represents a seemingly oldfashioned form of queer identification, it may also hold the seeds of future genders’ [ibid., xxi]. The femininity of King Diamond’s persona is at stake as well in the homosocial relation between him and Shermann. The almost intimate dual relationship between the singer and the guitarist(s) has been described by Deena Weinstein as a crucial feature in many Heavy Metal bands in which both are equal (2000, 25) and, one could add, both support each other musically and morally. The homosocial aspects of the guitaristsinger relation in rock has been noticed by scholars Nick Stevenson (2006, 65, quoted after Hawkins 2009, 101) and, as

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mentioned earlier, Susan Fast (2001, 44–45), for instance the relation between David Bowie and his guitarist Mick Ronson in the Aladdin Sane era in the early 1970s, and between Robert Plant and Jimmy Page in Led Zeppelin. Since the guitarist, due to the power of distortion and the sheer force of sound, usually takes the role as the masculinized or strong part, the singer takes the feminized or vulnerable role. Mercyful Fate benefited from the likewise homosocial relation between Hank Shermann/Michael Denner and King Diamond in which the gender dynamics were similar, the former taking the role of the masculine Other to Diamond’s feminine or definitely de-masculinized persona. Diamond’s alleged femininity might also have to do with the already mentioned strong inspiration from Plant, being a ‘feminized’ singer per se, which Susan Fast claims had a female singer as his prime inspiration, namely Janis Joplin (2001, 45). In addition, and indeed unusual for a male Heavy Metal vocalist, Diamond was apparently inspired by a female vocalist, namely the theatrical vocal by Jinx Dawson (Rasmussen 2010, 341), the front singer of Coven, whose expressive and powerful voice treatment sometimes included distorted phrases, bursts of laughter, moans, operatic elements and, on the staged ‘The Making of Witchcraft’ (Witchcraft Destroys Minds & Reap Souls, 1969), the use of delay effects. Although the lyrics in the songs realized by Mercyful Fate Mk I were often dramatic and bloody, they also touched upon spiritual and, at times, even vulnerable elements. In particular, the focus on female characters understood as satanic muses and wise witches, or attributed positive spiritual qualities, although the track ‘Nuns Have More Fun’ from the debut EP (which happens to be the unofficial title of it as well) as well as the artwork is an exception. King Diamond, it seems, never saw

Queer-Satanism Galore

any contradiction between being a heterosexual male in an extreme metal band on the one hand and incorporating his two artistic trademarks, namely the double register voice and the paint mask, on the other. In this respect, his queer masculinity is in accordance with positions being identified on the Finnish Black Metal scene of the early twenty-first century, as opposed to heteronormative masculinity (Sarelin 2012). But at the same time, Diamond managed to downplay the masculine attitudes that front singers within the Heavy Metal genre often made use of, described as ‘cock rock performers’ in which the male body and heterosexual sexuality is on display, and in which ‘mics and guitars are phallic symbols’ (Frith and McRobbie 1978, 372). Rather typical for the downplaying of attitudes, Diamond’s mic was never used in such a way, since he would always take advantage of his trademark microphone stand while performing on stage, as described earlier. It remains an open question, however, whether his queer masculinity strategies were part of the intentional shock value mentioned earlier as one of the very definitions of the first wave of Black Metal. The case of Diamond necessitates some biographical remarks about his upbringing in the 1960s and 1970s. Even though heteronormative values prevailed in Denmark as well as other Western societies throughout these decades, Denmark was an unusually liberal country of the time in terms of sexuality, for instance, being the first country in the world to legalize visual pornography in 1969. The following year saw the emergence of a strong, well-organized and determined women’s liberation movement called ‘rødstrømperne’ [the red socks]. It had its base in Copenhagen, with demonstrations, happenings and gatherings. The city also became the centre of the gay liberation movement during the 1970s. The movement reclaimed the derogatory term ‘bøsse’ [gay] for homosexuals by

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using the name Bøssernes Befrielsesfront [The Gay Liberation Front] and became a quite visible part of the subcultural milieu of the city based around activity centers such as Bøssehuset [gays’ house]. For people living in Copenhagen during the decade, both movements were so present in the everyday culture of the city as well in the media that a broad social acceptance of them evolved, not least in the youth culture of the city that both movements were a part of. Musically, both subcultures shared their activities with everyone, with open concerts and the release of albums made exclusively by women or gays – most prominent, perhaps, was the singer and songwriter Bent Jacobsen’s album Bøsse [Gay] (1975). The album, backed by some of the most profiled musicians at the time, consisted of songs about being gay, performed in a high-pitched, soft and joyous voice, earning Jacobsen a spot in popular music history for having produced one of the first albums ever to focus entirely on issues related to the life as a homosexual male. According to Hank Shermann, Brats’ first concert with Michael Denner (before King Diamond joined the band) in late 1979, took place at an event in Bøssehuset, proving the fact that straight males such as the members of the band also engaged in activities arranged by gay activists. Shermann reveals that the band was hired because the gay arrangers liked their leather outfits, which made them popular, although the audience did not really like the music (Rasmussen 2010, 119). But even though the concert took place before King Diamond joined the band, it says something about the gay movement involvement, and acceptance among young heterosexual males living in the city at the time, future members of Mercyful Fate included. Although Diamond acknowledges that he has never thought of his early artistic merits in the light of sexuality in

favour of the occult (Diamond 2021a), it is plausible that he more or less consciously learned from the examples of these subcultures, in which masculinity was being challenged, widened, nuanced and negotiated. If this is the case, it is no wonder that Diamond decided to include manners of singing that broke away from the norms of hyper-masculinity, and that provided him with a new set of artistic possibilities and strategies. Still, Don’t Break the Oath was released at a time when ideals of hegemonic masculinity and heteronormativity were deeply intertwined in Heavy Metal discourse, meaning that Diamond’s actions were probably viewed by many fans to be the result of pure showmanship more than anything else.

IV. The Concept of Queer-Satanism

Queer-Satanism Galore

In order to show how queering aspects of Mercyful Fate in the early stages, and the concept of Satanism are intertwined, I will use the term queer-satanism. This term refers to the ways in which the two categories ‘queer’ and ‘Satanism’ reflect and interact with each other. Both designate well-proven and wellestablished strategies for being critical of the norms, whether they adhere to heteronormativity, hegemonic masculinity or other gendered concepts. To engage in any satanic activity or to even listening attentive to satanic lyrics can be seen as a radical break with the norms of popular music discourse that in itself becomes a fulfilment of a queer position. Satanism understood as a process of reversing matters identifies as a queer strategy of subverting the norms of hegemonic masculinity. Especially the momentary replacement of the male full voice or chest voice with the head voice or falsetto is not only an inversion of the norms in a satanic perspective, but

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also in a queer perspective. Moreover, the use of the paint mask is a strategy of downplaying or perhaps even challenging norms of hyper-masculinity in Heavy Metal that also can be said to be a queer strategy. A rather peculiar addendum is that satanic communities in the United States especially attract LGBTQIA+ people. It seems that Satanism today is the haven of marginalized people who defy the norms of everyday discourse and the established values of society as such. This is a position that, ironically enough, was offered to everyone by Jesus Christ when he walked the Earth (Petersen 2020), working for the tolerance and inclusion of everyone no matter who they were, a position which contrasts many Christian societies where issues of heteronormativity, traditional gender values and the preference for white members are prevalent. In 2019, co-founder of the organization The Satanic Temple, Lucien Greaves estimated that more than 50 per cent of the membership identified as LGBTQIA+. Moreover, Greaves revealed that the organization is involved in Pride parades, and supports gay marriage. The organization Church of Satan, founded by Anton LaVey, shares these views as well. On its website, it says: ‘We fully accept all forms of human sexual expression between consenting adults. The Church of Satan has always accepted gay, lesbian, bisexual and asexual members since its beginning in 1966’ ([The Church of Satan]. n.d.). For some, this is a very obvious position for the satanic religion to pursue. An article on The Church of Satan website in 2016 stated rather polemically that ‘Satan loves queers’ (as opposed to the homophobic conservative Christian dogma ‘God hates fags’), claiming that ‘Satanism has treated queers of all sorts more favorably than any other organized religion, and since its very inception’ (Gallows 2016).

Similarly, a trans woman and member of The Satanic Temple said this in an interview in OUT magazine in 2018: There are parallels between being queer and being satanic. [. . .] There’s a natural fit in the Satanic Temple for LGBTQ folks because they find acceptance here that they might not find in other religious movements. Tirado 2018

The words ‘queer’ and ‘Satan’ are of national significance in relation to Mercyful Fate’s Danish origins: In 2020, the Danish industrial project Klutæ (formed in 1991) released the album Queer for Satan. In an ambiguous way the title can be read as it is in English, while it means something slightly different in Danish. Here, the phrase would read: ‘Queer, God damn it!’ said or shouted as a command rather than as a suggestion. In terms of the queer aspects of Mercyful Fate, I will claim that this is the very point: They are commands and suggestions, at the same time.

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7 Conclusion: Rewriting the Heavy Metal Canon of Hegemonic Masculinity It is my belief that the canon of old-school Heavy Metal will soon be rewritten, due to the changing notions of gender, sexuality and race in the early twenty-first century. The mere fact that this canon, especially related to the music of the 1970s and 1980s, was particularly biased towards white, hegemonic masculinity makes it harder to endure the tastes, aesthetic judgements and expectations of new generations of listeners, born long after this music happened to excite and engage its earliest audiences. The once tacitly assumed heteronormativity of a lot of this music has turned out to be almost unbearable in its lack of ambiguity, seen in the light of the queer tendencies of today that pervade not only LGBTQIA+ communities, but also straight communities to re-negotiate social and sexual interaction. In addition, the overt sexist connotations of surprisingly much Heavy Metal music and iconography of the period makes it hard to believe that they will be kept alive in mainstream the popular music discourse of music streaming. Even the most convincing historical (or just nostalgic) reasons for defending this music – which all too soon will be revealed

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by middle-aged or elderly white male gatekeepers all over the Western world – might not be enough. A result of the rewriting might well be a decline in the interest in songs and bands that prove unable to stand the test of the re-negotiation processes that undoubtedly will have both aesthetic and ethical implications. Yet another result will be a renewed interest in music that actually proves itself able to be of relevance to Heavy Metal audiences in the twenty-first century. Mercyful Fate Mk I might prove to be one of the acts that will stand the test and may even attract renewed interest due to the band’s once pioneering attempts to break away from the norms of the genre in their own era. Especially Don’t Break the Oath is concerned with ambiguous notions of masculinity as well as a number of queer-related approaches. Moreover, its occupation with heteronormative standards of its own time is downplayed. For these reasons, the album is of perhaps even more relevance today for Heavy Metal audiences than it was in the 1990s, the 2000s and even the 2010s. The investigations of the album presented on these pages – including the chapters on Satanism and masculinity – hopefully points in that direction, proving that at least some Heavy Metal of the early 1980s can be listened to and understood in the light of gender and queer perspectives of the twenty-first century. This said, the musical and conceptual qualities of the album will hopefully also make audiences listen to it, in the time to come.

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Notes Chapter 1 1 For a short overview of Mercyful Fate’s biography in the early years, see [Ruthless Metal] 2021. 2 Apparently, Nirvana would listen to Melissa while on the tour bus, on a regular basis (Rasmussen, 2013). Perhaps they also knew Don‘t Break the Oath. If so, the characteristic howls in ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ (Nevermind, 1991) (for instance 1:31–1:39) might well be a clever nod to the howls in ‘Come to the Sabbath’ (for instance 1:50–2:03). 3 This view is supported by the fact that Metal Hammer in 2020 ranked Don’t Break the Oath as the most profiled release of all releases by Mercyful Fate and King Diamond releases (Lawson, 2020).

Chapter 2 1 The album was originally released on vinyl and cassette only, and not released on CD until the following year. 2 ‘The Oath’ is the most spectacular example of this on the album: After the slow intro, a fast tempo is introduced at 1:59, played in full time in around 168 BPM in 4/4 metre. At 2:47, the tempo drops to around 133 BPM, still in full time, and at 3:02, this is changed to half time. At 3:20, the metre is changed to 12/8 metre, and only 15 seconds later, at 3:35, the

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metre is changed again to 6/8 before the original tempo and metre (from 1:59 onwards) is resumed at 3:58. The result is very playful and intricate yet also artistically speaking restless and, at times, even disturbing. 3 Many years later, Mercyful Fate covered ‘The Ripper’ for the tribute album A Tribute to Judas Priest: Legends of Metal Vol. 1 (1997). 4 ‘The Oath’ has widely been regarded as the main track on the album ever since the release. In a review in the Danish metal magazine Hot Rockin’, in November 1984, for instance, the track was called the best metal track of the year ([Rocky!] 1984). 5 Tubular bells have been in use in Heavy Metal since Black Sabbath’s title track from their eponymous debut album (1970), and the doomed sound of the bells can also be heard, for instance, on Iron Maiden’s ‘Hallowed Be thy Name’ (The Number of the Beast, 1982) and Metallica’s ‘For Whom the Bell Tolls’ (Ride the Lightning, 1984).

Notes

6 Such techniques are displayed in the form of double-kicks on ‘Nightmare’ (for instance 0:23–0.42 and 0:54–1:05), ‘Night of the Unborn’ (for instance 4:29–4:49) and ‘The Oath’ (for instance 6:17–6:52); rapid 16th guitar rhythms on the guitar solo parts on ‘Night of the Unborn’ (for instance 4:29–4:49) and rabid vocalizations on ‘The Oath’ (for instance 1:47–1:56 and 6:07–6:16).

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7 Easy Sound soon became the preferred choice for many leading Danish pop and rock artists, and it contributed significantly to attracting international stars as well: Quincy Jones and Van Morrison visited the studio, and in 1985, the Miles Davis album Aura – a suite written by the Danish composer and trumpeter Palle Mikkelborg for the 1984 Léonie Sonning Music Prize presented to Davis – was recorded here.

8 The lyrics might, by the way, be influenced by the American proto-satanic band Coven’s song ‘Coven in Charing Cross’ (Witchcraft Destroys Minds & Reap Souls, 1969). Coven was one of the first bands ever to incorporate occult thought into popular music discourse. In the lyrics for the song, ‘thirteen cultist’ are, by the process of a satanic ritual, reduced to the number seven. 9 King Diamond confirms this notion when he refers to himself as a completely self-taught singer and musician (Diamond 2021a). 10 The clip can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=_EHsgT0hjak. 11 The clip can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=QxaDfowP50U. 12 On the compilation Return of the Vampire (1992), containing demos from 1981 and 1982, songs such as ‘Desecration of Souls’ (then entitled ‘On a Night of a Full Moon’) and ‘A Dangerous Meeting’ (then entitled ‘Death Kiss’) can, however, be heard in different arrangements.

Chapter 3 1 The interview can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=CiYeBybivKU. 2 The interview can be seen (with English subtitles) here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJzcVH1Yv7k, and here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2gC5yM-JZcY.

Notes

3 A dichotomy between diabolism in Heavy Metal as a commercial gimmick and as a committed relation is at stake here: It is worth noting that Iron Maiden’s The Number of the

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Beast (1982), widely considered a watershed in the history of Heavy Metal, was released around the same time when the first wave of Black Metal emerged. Even though its title track famously spawned the immersive hook-line ‘Six six six/the number of the Beast’ and dealt with the lyrical subject’s somewhat haunted and painful memories of a rendezvous with the Devil, the much more conceptual satanic content of the first wave of Black Metal made such tracks a lot more sensational and less credible than they probably were intended to be. Perhaps the wave even, completely unintentional, compromised such noncommittal inclusions of satanic imagery once and for all. So it makes sense to say that there is clearly a before and an after regarding the relation between Heavy Metal and Satanic lyrics with the emergence of the first wave of Black Metal. 4 Similarly, a sense of anti-establishment also dominated other newcomers on the more or less musically related scenes of the early 1980s such as Thrash Metal, Death Metal and Speed Metal, all of which soon to be labeled by the common term Extreme Metal (see, for instance, Harris 2007). 5 This is revealed in an interview on Danish national television from the television programme Heavy Metal, 16 October, 1984 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_zrGoWyB1Q and youtube.com/watch?v=P_zrGoWyB1Q&t=15s).

Notes

Chapter 4

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1 An almost systematic change between the two registers, chest voice (CV) and head voice (HV) can be heard numerous times on Don’t Break the Oath. One example is the opening

verse in ‘A Dangerous Meeting’: Diamond sings the vocal phrases with, respectively, CV (0:47–0:51); HV (0:52–0:58); CV (0:59–1:04) and HV (1:04–1:11). Another example is the first verse of ‘Gypsy’, in which a similar pattern emerges. Here, Diamond sings the vocal phrases with HV (0:01–0:06); CV (0:07–0:13); HV (0:14–0:18); HV (0:18–0:20); CV (0:20–0:21); HV (0:22–0:23) and HV (0:25–0:28). 2 An excerpt of the movie can be seen here: https://www. erikbunger.com/a-lecture-on-schizophonia/.

Chapter 5 1 By coincidence, Simmons’ mask type was actually called ‘The Demon’ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiss_(band)#Makeup_designs). In 1988, Diamond was sued by Kiss, claiming that his masks resembled Simmons’. The lawsuit was later dropped.

Notes

2 The term ‘corpse paint mask’ did not come into existence until the second wave of Black Metal, especially Mayhem (NO), came around years later. Here, it was used for the paint mask by the original singer Dead (né Per Yngve Ohlin) who tried to resemble the face of a corpse. The connection between King Diamond’s paint mask and Dead’s corpse paint mask is unclear, although the latter in an interview mentioned Mercyful Fate as a crucial inspiration (‘When I heard Venom and Mercyful Fate, it felt like I lost an important part of my brain, and I worshipped them’ (Kriss-Toff, n.d.)). The term, however, has widely been adapted for describing Diamond’s paint masks as well. Due to the anachronistic and imprecise character of the term in relation to Diamond, I will refrain from using it here.

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3 Apparently by coincidence – since Mercyful Fate did not know of Marillion at the time (Diamond 2021b) – the dreamy, instrumental synth-driven part in ‘The Oath’ (3:35–3:55) resembles, although in a different metre, the instrumental synth-driven part (and the ensuing vocal part) in ‘Assassing’ (Fugazi, 1984) (4:17–5:02), and to a less extent the worldweary, much slower intro to ‘Cindarella Search’ (the B-side of the single version of ‘Assassing’, which can also be heard on the live-album Real to Reel/Brief Encounter (1984)) (0:13–0:24), suggesting a hint of kinship between the two bands.

Chapter 6 1 The concept of queer space is theorized in Clifford-Napoleone 2015, 10–24, and further elaborated in Clifford-Napoleone 2016, 45–49.

Notes

2 This happens to be the name of an American King Diamond/ Mercyful Fate cover band, consisting of female musicians only.

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Personal Interviews Diamond 2021a: King Diamond, online, 5 February, 2021. Diamond 2021b: King Diamond, online, 2 March, 2021. Lund 2020: Henrik Lund, Hellerup, Denmark, 3 March, 2020. Majnlund 2020: Anders Majnlund Jørgensen, Copenhagen, Denmark, 26 February, 2020. Nørgaard 2020: Linda Nørgaard, Valby, Denmark, 7 March, 2020. Otto 2020: Niels Erik Otto, Copenhagen, Denmark, 23 June, 2020. Ottosen 2020: Jon Trier Ottosen, Copenhagen, Denmark, 27 February, 2020. Petersen 2020: Jesper Aagaard Petersen, online, 22 December, 2020. Rosing 2020: Anne Rosing, Hellerup, Denmark, 5 March, 2020.

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Index Note: There are no entries of the words ‘Mercyful Fate’, ‘King Diamond/Kim Bendix Petersen’ and ‘Heavy Metal’ due to the frequent mentioning of them throughout the pages of the book. For the sake of limitations, the parenthentic entries of sources throughout the pages are not present either.

‘A Dangerous Meeting’ (Don’t Break the Oath track) 17, 21, 24, 27, 36, 49, 113, 115 A Lecture on Schizophonia (Erik Bünger documentary movie) 66, 115 A Tribute to Judas Priest: Legends of Metal Vol. 1 (Judas Priest tribute album) 112 Abbé Étienne Guibourg 51 AC/DC 17, 22, 23 Accept 22 Adam & the Ants 86, 96 Aerosmith 23 Ahmed, Sara 92 Aladdin Sane (David Bowie album) 102 Alice in Chains 10 androgony 62, 86, 96, 100 Anthony, Ken 3, 4, 10 antichrist 7 Anti-Christ, The (Nietzsche treatise) 42 anti-Christianity 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 46, 47, 48, 52, 54, 57, 58, 63

antinomian 44, 45, 47, 56 Anvil 32 Ardhanarishvara 100 Artillery 7 Aura (Miles Davis album) 112 Ballet M 8 Ballet Mécanique 8 Balls to the Wall (Accept album) 22 Band of Joy 82 Bannister, Matthew 79 baroque music 18 Bathory 10, 40, 41, 94 Baudelaire, Charles 42 Beatles, The 79 Biddle, Ian 62, 68, 76 Black Mass 33, 46, 51, 63 Black Metal 8, 10, 40, 41, 42, 43, 50, 51, 53, 69, 78, 82, 86, 94, 99, 103, 114, 115 Black Metal (Venom album) 40 Black Rose 83 Black Widow 50

127

Index

Black Sabbath 10, 11, 19, 20, 21, 22, 112 Black Sabbath (Black Sabbath album) 11, 20, 22 Blood of Satan’s Claw (movie) 31 Blues 31, 59 body 13, 34, 66, 68, 89, 99, 103 Bowie, David 96, 102 Brainstorm 80 Brats 4, 104 Bristol Music Center (record store) 3 British Steel (Judas Priest album) 4 Brod, Harry 84, 88 Brown, Arthur 82, 86 Buckley, Jeff 100 Bush, Kate 33 Bünger, Erik 66 Byron, David 62 Bøsse (Bent Jacobsen album) 104 Bøssehuset (venue) 104 Bøssernes Befrielsesfront 104

128

Carbery, Rebecca 101 Catholic Mass 63 Celtic Frost 40 Christianity/Christian 6, 17, 32, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 42, 43, 44, 46, 47, 48, 50, 58, 89, 106 Church of Satan 35, 43, 51, 106 Clifford-Napoleone, Amber R. 95, 116 ‘Come to the Sabbath’ (Don’t Break the Oath track) 20, 21,

27, 37, 46, 48, 50, 57, 60, 67, 72–73, 111 Cooper, Alice 6, 81, 82, 83, 86 Copenhagen 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 15, 23, 24, 27, 62, 81, 88, 103, 104 Coven 33, 50, 102, 113 Cradle of Filth 10 Crowley, Aleister 42 Cult, The 96 Culture Club 86, 96 Cure, The 96 Dante Symphony (Franz Liszt work) 56 Davis, Miles 112 Dawson, Jinx 102 Dead 115 Death Metal 10, 114 Deep Purple 21, 22 Deep Purple in Rock (Deep Purple album) 21 Defenders of the Faith (Judas Priest album) 17, 49 Denmark/Danish 2, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 23, 24, 25, 36, 39, 40, 42, 53, 60, 64, 96, 97, 98, 99, 103, 107, 112, 114 Denner, Michael 1, 7, 15, 18, 19, 25, 60, 80, 102, 104 ‘Desecration of Souls’ (Don’t Break the Oath track) 57, 113 Devil, the (see also Lucifer and Satan) 19, 32, 33, 34, 39, 41, 44, 49, 51, 53, 57, 58, 59, 69, 73, 114 Devil’s music, the 31

diabolus in musica 49, 53, 55–58, 67, 69, 71, 73 Diamond Head 22, 94 DiBernardo, Sabatino 45 discourse, Heavy Metal 6, 14, 37, 55, 79, 85, 86, 91–92, 100, 105 discourse, popular music 6, 31, 42, 56, 59, 76, 87, 91, 105, 109, 113 distortion 45, 68, 102 Doctor Faustus (Thomas Mann novel) 33, 39, 53, 69 double register voice (King Diamond’s) 5, 6, 13, 55, 60–65, 67, 81, 85, 88, 89, 98, 100, 103 Ducasse, Isidore 42 Easy Sound (recording studio) 15, 16, 23, 24, 112 empowerment 32, 45, 51, 52 Eurocentrism 68 Exorcist, The (movie) 31, 64, 66 Extreme Metal 8, 114

Gabriel, Peter 82, 83, 86, 87 gender/gendered 13, 14, 39, 62, 64, 68, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 83, 84, 85, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 100, 101, 102, 105, 106, 109, 110 genderplay 78, 80, 85, 87, 89, 100 Genesis 82, 83 Gillan, Ian 62 Glam Metal 41, 85, 87 God 31, 33, 36, 48, 67, 68, 80, 106, 107 Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von 33, 39, 69 Goldin-Perschbacher, Shana 100 Gospel of John, The 47 Gospel of Mark, The 65 Goth 86 Greaves, Lucien 106 Gruzelier, Jonathan 78 Guido of Arezzo 55 Guns ’N Roses 85 ‘Gypsy’ (Don’t Break the Oath track) 115 Halberstam, Jack 101 Halford, Rob 19 Hall, Martin 8 Halperin, David 92

Index

Falkoner Center, the (venue) 81 Farley, Helen 59 Farrow, Mia 31 Fast, Susan 60, 102 Faust (Goethe play) 33, 39, 69 Faust, Heinrich (Dr.) 33, 39 Faustian myth 33, 59 female(s) 78, 89, 90, 97, 100, 101, 102, 116 Female Masculinity (Jack Halberstam book) 101

femininity 6, 62, 76, 85, 87, 88, 99–102 Fireball (Deep Purple album) 22 Fish 86, 87 Fiske, John 44 For (Ballet M album) 8 Fugazi (Marillion album) 115

129

Index

Hansen, Timi ‘Grabber’ 1, 2 Hawkins, Stan 62, 65, 83, 88, 92, 93, 99, 100 Heesch, Florian 85, 87 hegemony (cultural, male and cultural) 68, 76, 77, 85, 87, 101 Hell 22, 24, 27, 32, 33, 41, 48, 56, 95, 98 Hellhammer 40 heteronormativity 77, 78, 85, 86, 88, 93, 103, 105, 106, 109, 110 heterosexuality 75, 78, 83, 85, 88, 95, 99, 102, 103, 104 Highway to Hell (AC/DC album) 22 Hoch, Paul 84 homophobia 83, 106 homosexuality 88, 103, 104 homosociality 6, 60, 79, 95, 99, 101, 102 Hot Rockin’ (music magazine) 9, 112 Hounds of Love (Kate Bush album) 33

130

Icecold Waters of the Egocentric Calculation, The (Ballet Mécanique album) 8 intergender 100 Invention of Satanism, The (anthology) 43 inversion 62, 63, 69, 71, 105 inverted cross 5, 51, 52, 81, 83, 87, 100 Iron Maiden 9, 10, 17, 22, 54, 59, 94, 112, 113–114

Jacobsen, Bent 104 Jarman-Ivens, Freya 62, 68, 76 Jesus Christ 37, 38, 39, 48, 50, 58, 63, 65, 106 Johnson, Robert 59 Jones, Quincy 112 Joplin, Janis 102 Judas Priest 4, 5, 10, 17, 19, 21, 22, 23, 32, 49, 59, 112 Kierkegaard, Søren 39, 40 Kiss 82, 83, 86, 115 Klutæ 107 Kraftwerk 2 Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, The (Genesis album) 82 Larsen, Kim 96 Lautréamont, Comte de 42 LaVey, Anton 34, 35, 43, 47, 51, 106 Led Zeppelin 12, 21, 60, 62, 82, 102 Lennox, Annie 88 Léonie Sonning Music Prize 112 Leverkühn, Adrian 39, 69 LGBTQIA+ people/communities 106, 107, 109 Liszt, Franz 56 Lord Shiva 100 Lucifer (see also Devil, the, and Satan) 8, 50, 88 Lund, Henrik 15, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 70, 84, 97 Lund, Niels Erik 23

Michelet, Jules 51 Midt om natten (Kim Larsen album) 96 Mikkelborg, Palle 112 Mother’s Finest 97 Motörhead 10, 22, 94 Murray, Dave 9 Nevermind (Nirvana album) 111 New Wave 7 New Wave of British Heavy Metal (NWOBHM), the 22, 23, 41, 59, 62, 77, 79, 94 Nietzsche, Friedrich 42 ‘Night of the Unborn’ (Don’t Break the Oath track) 37, 57, 59, 61, 66, 112 ‘Nightmare’ (Don’t Break the Oath track) 22, 43, 57, 64, 66, 67, 70–71, 72, 112 Nirvana 10, 111 Noisecreep (music magazine) 10 Nordic/Nordicness 8, 10 Number of the Beast, The (Iron Maiden album) 22, 54, 112, 113–114 numerology 55, 69–73 Nørgaard, Linda 51 ‘Oath, The’ (Don’t Break the Oath track) 20, 21, 22, 27, 34, 38, 46, 48, 50, 65, 67, 72, 111, 112, 115 occult/occultism 8, 13, 32, 36, 38, 42, 44, 46, 67, 69, 70, 105, 113 Odd Fellow Palace (venue) 62

Index

Majnlund, Anders 53, 54 male(s) 1, 6, 17, 39, 60, 61, 62, 63, 65, 68, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 92, 95, 96, 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 110 maleness 75, 77, 80 Malmsteen, Yngwie 59 Mann, Thomas 33, 39, 53, 69 Marillion 86, 115–116 MarktHalle (venue) 4, 5 Masciandaro, Nicola 57 masculinity/hypermasculinity 6, 13, 21, 61, 62, 75–80, 84, 86, 87, 88, 89, 92, 93, 95, 98, 99, 100, 101, 103, 105, 106, 110 masculinity, hegemonic 6, 13, 76–80, 85, 87, 89, 90, 91, 93, 95–97, 105, 109 masculinities 75, 78, 79, 84, 87–89, 95 Master of Reality (Black Sabbath album) 20 Mayhem 115 Medovoi, Leerom 76 Melissa (Mercyful Fate album) 1, 2, 8, 10, 11, 12, 15, 19, 24, 25, 37, 41, 43, 44, 46, 52, 86, 111 Mercyful Fate (Mercyful Fate EP) 1, 36 Metal Hammer (music magazine) 111 Metal Mania (music magazine) 2, Metal Studies 14 Metallica 2, 4, 10, 23, 112 MetalSucks (music magazine) 10

131

Orpheus 48 Otto, Niels Erik 23, 24, 25, 28, 29 Ottosen, Jon Trier 18 OUT (queer magazine) 107 Paganini, Niccoló 59 Page, Jimmy 60, 102 Paice, Ian 22 paint mask (King Diamond’s) 5, 13, 51, 75, 81–90, 95, 103, 106, 115 Paranoid (Black Sabbath album) 11, 20 Patterson, Dayal 38, 81–82, 97 Petersen, Jesper Aagaard 32, 34, 35, 37, 51 Plant, Robert 60, 62, 82, 102 Polanski, Roman 31 Popoff, Martin 19 Post-Punk 7, 8, 86 Progressive Rock 18, 21–22, 23, 72, 82, 86, 87

Index

queer/queering 6, 14, 61, 64, 78, 88, 89, 91–107, 109, 110, 116 queer-satanism 13, 91, 105 Quim 97

132

race 76, 93, 100, 109 Return of the Vampire (Mercyful Fate compilation album) 113 Ride the Lightning (Metallica album) 24, 112 Roadrunner Records (record company) 24 Rock ‘n’ Roll 31

Rolling Stones, the 23 Ronson, Mick 102 Rosemary’s Baby (movie) 31 Running With the Devil (Robert Walser monography) 44, 75 Ruzz, Kim 1, 96 rødstrømperne 103 Sabbath Bloody Sabbath (Black Sabbath album) 20 Sacrifice (Black Widow album) 50 Sad Wings of Destiny (Judas Priest album) 19, 20, 50 Saga (venue) 3, 4 Satan (see also Devil, the, and Lucifer) 31, 32, 33, 34, 36, 38, 39, 42, 44, 48, 50, 61, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 106, 107 satanic 2, 3, 6, 10, 11, 13, 18, 24, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 40, 41, 44, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 53, 54, 58, 59, 64, 65, 67, 70, 87, 94, 95, 96, 99, 102, 105, 106, 107, 113, 114 Satanic Bible, The 35, 43, 46 Satanic Panic, the 6, 52 Satanic Temple, the 106, 107 Satanism 1, 6, 13, 31–44, 47, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 63, 69, 70, 80, 88, 105, 106, 110 Satanism and Witchcraft (Jules Michelet book) 51 Satanist 3, 35, 36, 39, 42, 44, 51, 69, 98 Satanization 51, 52 Savage, Alex 7

schizophonia 66 Scott, Niall 76, 85, 87 Screamin’ Jay Hawkins 82 Script for a Jester’s Tear (Marillion album) 86 sexuality 76, 85, 87, 91, 93, 100, 103, 104, 109 Shermann, Hank 1, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 18, 60, 79, 97, 98, 101, 102, 104 shock-rock 6, 35, 40, 41, 82, 96 Simmons, Gene 82, 115 Sixx, Kim ‘Powerbaby’ 97 Slayer 10, 40, 43, 55 Slægt 53 Sorcière, La (Jules Michelet book) 51 Speed Metal 59, 114 spirituality 6, 12, 13, 32, 34, 42, 48, 52, 58, 80, 89, 100, 102 Stevenson, Nick 60, 101 Straw, Will 32 Stützer, Michael 7 Sullivan, Nikki 92 Sweet Silence Studio (recording studio) 23 Theofilius of Adana 33 Thin Lizzy 23 Thrash Metal 7, 10, 40, 59, 114 Throbbing Gristle 2 ‘To One Far Away’ (Don’t Break the Oath track) 18, 20, 22, 37 traditional music 18, 31

transgender 100 transgression/transgressive 31, 42, 44, 45, 47, 56, 88 Twisted Sister 83, 85 Ulrich, Lars 2, 4, 10 Uriah Heep 21, 32, 62 Van Halen 44 Van Halen (Van Halen album) 44 Van Halen, Edward 59 Van Morrison 112 Venom 22, 40, 41, 94, 115 Walser, Robert 44, 45, 59, 78, 79 Warlock 32 W.A.S.P. 6 Weinstein, Deena 21, 75, 78, 85, 101 ‘Welcome Princess of Hell’ (Don’t Break the Oath track) 98 Welcome to Hell (Venom album) 41 Welcome To My Nightmare (Alice Cooper album) 81 white (skin)/whiteness 1, 39, 61, 68, 76, 85, 88, 106, 109, 110 Witch Cross 7 Witchcraft Destroys Minds & Reap Souls (Coven album) 33, 102, 113

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