thing caused BRATS to go their seperate ways; I started a new band called DANGER ZONE with Timi Grabber, whilst Hank joined forces with an already notorious singer named King Diamond who had been working with a band called BLACK ROSE. DANGER ZONE wrote five numbers for a demo, and we decided to ask Hank and King to come along and work with us on the recording. The demo complete~ we realised that the four of us clicked; so we set about writing new material; and looking for a new name. Our ex-manager's girlfriend came up with MERCYFUL FATE and it stuck." WHAT HAD YOU BEDi DOING UP TO THIS POINT KING? "As Michael mentioned, I'd been working as vocalist and rhythm guitarist with BLACK ROSE. People talk a lot about FATE being a 'Horror Meta~' band. Well. the roots of that can be traced directly back to BLACK ROSE. Our biggest influence was ALICE COOPER, and much of what he stood for emerged in our show. For example I was carried on-stage wearing a straight-jacket~ by two male nurses and placed in a wheelchair. After the first song I'd throw off the straight jacket, toss the wheelchair into the audience and get On with the rest of the show. We used various props; splitting a pigs head; slaughtering a baby full of pigs blood etc. It was, and still is my philosophy that when the audience pays to see you play live~ they expect !!lore than just a perfect reproduction of the vinyl they have. Rather they come to see a show and a showman. ALICE was one of the great showmen of his time and I aim to emulate him. That's why an audience expect a visual and aural experience when they COme to see us. Take the Aardschokday earlier this year over in Holland. We opened the proceedings midafternoon in bright sunlight and yet were the only band which really got the fans involved in the show. There were still 2000 people outside when we came on stage, and when they heard us start-up they began rioting because it was taking so long to get in. The local police ordered that they all be allowed in free, to defuse a potentially explosive situation! The response from the audience to the show was magnificent. We burnt the cross, and exploded the nun, despite the fact that we work on a tiny budget. Many much more wealthy bands do nothing for their fans. It's all one-way traffic: they rake in the money and give little or nothing in return." DID THE KERRANG REVIEW UPSET YOU? TIMI GRABBER - "Nobody likes to be described in the terms KERRANG used. They send somebody like Neil Jeffries to review a Metal festival when he'd be far happier at a MEN AT WORK gig!! We just felt sorry, that all the FATE fans in Europe and N.America who weren't present were told nothing of interest. Quite honestly it's just a case of journalists forgetting their responsibility to their readers." HOW DO YOU SEE YOUR STAGE SHOW DEVELOPING IN THE NEAR FUTURE? KING DIAMOND - Of course, we have a great many ideas which we hope to put into practice when the finance and technolog'J become available to us. Without giving too much away. we are at present working with one of Europe's leading pyrotechnic experts on many different fOrms of special effects. Furthermore, we aim to be the first band to combine our lyrical imagery with onstage magic and illusion. We want people to
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go home thinking 'Well I saw it and heard it, but I don't know how they did it!'" HOW DID YOU COME TO RECORD FOR EBONY RECORDS? HA1~ SHERMANN - BasiCally up to that point we had been fairly frustrated. Although we had dOne support spots to GILLAN and GIRLSCHOOL back home, we were having some difficulty interesting the major record labels. It was by this time early 1982, and MERCYFUL FATE had ~lready r.ecorded two four-track demOS. John Kibble had been knocking on all the majorlabel doors, but nobody was willing to take that big chance; although a lot of the A & R people liked what we were doing. Then, Daryl Johnston asked us up to record a couple of numbers for the compilation !~etallic Storm". We did "Black Funeral" amd "Walkin l Back To Hell", the first of which appeared on the LP; whilst the latter, though scheduled to appear on the follow-up Ebony release, was at our request omitted due to a line-up change." THE NEXT STEP OF COURSE WAS THE NOW INFAMOUS 4-TRACK MINI-LP ON RAVE-ON RECORDS. WHAT LEAD TO FATE RECORDING IN HOLLAND? KING DIAMOND - "After the Ebony release we began to receive some good publicity in Holland through Aardschok maga~ne and Radio Hilversum. Rave-On being located in the same town as Aardschok meant they soon caught wind of us and Offered us the deal. We recorded during September '82 and also played our first Dutch gigs. The reception of both was so strong there, that we were able to return again in March and June of '83 for more concerts. There's really no doubt that the Dutch headbangers are amongst the finest and most knowledgable in Europe, if not the World. Just <after the release of the EP, Aardschok held