I was a teenager once upon a time. In fact, I started this blog when I was 18. My point here is that I dabbled with Satanism and the occult, and I was that edgy kid that used to walk around yelling "Hail Satan!" to scare and offend people. And admittedly I still think faux-satanism is fucking hilarious. So when I heard Mercyful Fate for the first time I immediately fell in love. I was more than in love. I went and downloaded the whole fucking album.
Yes, downloaded. I'm 22 and own about 270 albums and my last name isn't Gates. I did what I had to.
And then I went on a journey of exploring everything about King Diamond and Mercyful Fate. You see, for some reason I wasn't aware that there was a such thing a Satanic-themed music. So when I discovered Mercyful Fate, I legitimately started a Satanic music collection. I remember I would go onto music downloading sites and type in "Satan" or "Lucifer" under the metal section and just download everything en masse. And most of it was cringeworthy even by my seventeen-year-old edgelord standards. But there were definitely some bangers -
This shit isn't even metal and it has nothing to do with Lucifer. It's the album version of clickbait...
But Mercyful Fate was legitimately metal, and legitimately about some pretty gnarly shit. When I found out that Metallica were inspired by them early on, it was a wrap I went and "bought" all of their records. I've talked about how fucking diverse Fate is but gotdamn, Mercyful Fate is diverse.
Their first record / demo is basically all straightforward proto-heavy-metal bangers about horror / sacrilegious / devil shit. Except "Devil Eyes." I mean, its' lyrically the same as everything else on the record but it's straight up disco-metal. I don't know if the King felt like one of the Bee Gees that day, but from the rapid drumming throughout to the more subdued riffing, "Devil Eyes" is just a straight up disco song.
It's the same case for "Gyspy" off of The Oath. If someone else was singing the song and the guitars were tuned up just a tad bit, it would be a damn pop song. And since I'm used to King's voice, I'd argue that it 100% is a damn pop song. The title track is a five-minute masterpiece about taking an oath to Satan that sounds every bit like the lyrics would imply. But this is a damn near power-metal / pop rock ballad about a gypsy woman. And it doesn't take away from the record or make it any worse.
You see, I think tracks like "Devil Eyes" and "Gypsy", (especially the latter where King does that high-pitched "oh, no, no, no") completely make it so you can't take the Satanic shit seriously. And even if you do, you can't actually be afraid of it, if it's going to be this silly. Cause this shit is over-the-top ridiculous. Which makes me completely understand why King decided to break off and make his own "more serious" music.
Well, it's definitely at least more high-concept if it isn't more serious...
(Editor's Note: Apparently, Hank Shermann wanted to make pop rock, which admittedly would've absolutely solidified Fate as household names. But some people (a.k.a. King) just aren't willing to go commercial. Imagine a world where King and crew blew up in the US, returned to form in the 90s, and proceeded to keep making banger-ass records. You know, like Metallica did?)
And by extension, it makes occult practice / satanism look silly as all hell. I think that's a bigger reason why King didn't want to be involved with Mercyful Fate later in his career and wanted to build a reputation as the scary occult crypt-keeper of metal. Cause his solo records are grim. Half of the time, they're so grim, they're not even fun to listen to. They just feel dreary and long-winded. But to my understanding King did actually practice some sort of occult magic and ritualistic bullshit. (I don't care what it's called, because I don't take it seriously. And that's King's fault.) Apparently "Welcome Princes of Hell" is about some shit that actually happened to King. That song is about him summoning demons and shit into his house and partying with them. It's badass shit if you take it at face value and it's almost the only example of Mercyful Fate making the occult sound cool and serious. But they spelled the name of the song wrong on the record, and "Welcome Princess of Hell" sounds like an atheist edgelord fanfic.
And honestly I played with grimoires and looked into summoning all of that shit. And to each his own, but it's not my cup of tea. It's not even something you can do while tripping balls, because it will have you paranoid that you summoned some ruler of the fifth ring of hell and he's going to put a financial curse on you. It sucks. But gotdamn this shit is hilarious. I used to think "Burn in Hell" was the most badass shit I'd ever heard. I would be tapping my foot along saying "Yeah, fuck Jesus, fuck them Christians!" But now as an old man, I'm tapping my foot along saying "Goddamn, Denner and Shermann can riff like a motherfucker, but these lyrics are goofy as hell." You see I've actually listened to nuanced Satanic lyrics. I've seen folks slip subtle shit into lyrics and song titles. I've listened to other Satanists / Luciferians actually make metal music that isn't just "Fuck Jesus, hail Satan, I love Hell, woohoo!"
But take a song like "Doomed by the Living Dead." King has a unique ass voice, the riffing and the drumming is heavy as fuck, boy. And the switch-up to the chorus is something amazing. But then he shrieks "Say goodbye to all your holy angels." And he says that absolutely ridiculous shit with vigor and spite.
And you can't help but crack up because it's dead serious but it makes no sense. And I know I may be being too harsh on these guys since English isn't their first language. But it's not like they didn't have a producer / any English-speaker around them to tell them this sounded fucking silly.
Then take "Nuns Have No Fun" which is also an amazing song. The opening of this song is so damn graphic, I'll leave you to go look it up. (It involves a certain holy figure being tortured and assaulted.) And then the bridge hits and you hear, "C.U.N.T., that's what you are!" Firstly, these aren't even really song lyrics. This is something a vandal would spray-paint on a building or an upset child would scratch onto a church pew. Secondly, the song goes from violent torture and rape to an Australian cheerleading chant. And this is what we in the writing business call "mood whiplash." You're supposed to ramp things up, not scale them down. You can't help but laugh at how abruptly the lyrics switch up in intensity. And honestly when I think of it, there's no way this isn't intentional. They do it way too often. If the lyrics are too brutal then King starts saying silly shit. If the song sounds too intense then King shrieks something in broken English or there's a damn near Euro-pop-esque breakdown. In the few cases where they manage not to undermine their own intensity, either the next song is absolute shlock, or something immediately distracts from it. It feels like ritualistic magic how often this is the case.
And that's why I'll always come back to this band.
Whether it be because you actually take this shit seriously and want to summon Bigbill the Colonel of Hell to get you fifteen girlfriends, or you just like offending people, or if you're a music fan, or if you need a good laugh, Mercyful Fate is goddamn enjoyable.
And that's the difference between what makes Mercyful Fate timeless and King Diamond's solo material so boring. He takes himself far too seriously. His shit is too high-concept. It's about bitches getting stuck in paintings and grandmas getting trapped in voodoo dolls. Which in itself is silly when you take it out of context. But Mercyful Fate, this shit is just Satan, witchcraft, and defiling nuns, while Satan laughs along. And you laugh along as well.
That's all I had to say...
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