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The Graveyard

King Diamond - The Graveyard Audio CD

A fair review of the King Diamond "The Graveyard" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all King Diamond reviews here, or go back to the King Diamond tabs.

Band: King Diamond
Title: The Graveyard
Rating:

Release Date: 1996-10-01
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Graveyard 2: Black Hill Sanitarium 3: Waiting 4: Heads on the Wall 5: Whispers 6: I'm Not a Stranger 7: Digging Graves 8: Meet Me at Midnight 9: Sleep Tight Little Baby 10: Daddy 11: Trick or Treat 12: Up from the Grave 13: I Am 14: Lucy Forever

King's Most Underrated Album
I truly suggest to metal fans to try this album. Graveyard is brilliant, and right up with Them, it remains one of my favorite King Diamond albums. In my estimation it is King's most commercial sounding album, and perhaps that's why some mags gave it just a so-so review, I disagree. I think the album is fantastic, the songs are amazing and the guitar, as always is strong. The story, oh my god, the story is King's best since Them and Abigail. King Diamond fans most likely have this album, if you're a heavy metal, hard rock fan, or if you love Metallica and heard about King through their cover albums or Guitar Hero, you must own this record! Black Hill Sanitarium, Digging Graves and Heads on the Wall are freaking amazing. Heavy Metal fans are often time dismissed as the bane of society due to the trip, poorly executed bands who due to their lack of skill write silly lyrics and use alot of imagery to sell records, but the usual heavy metal fan loves intricate guitar work and interesting lyrics. Those kind of fans really will get into this album. King is quite theatrical, but his act isn't "staged", he truly is a story-teller. King isn't an image, he's a man that enjoys telling stories and presenting them through amazingly intricate hard rock music. It's alot different from other bands that are squeezed into this category. King is unique and his voice is unusual, it takes a bit of getting used to something that you're not used to hearing, but give this a try. I grew to love his voice and I remember the first time I heard it, I didn't know what to think other than , wow that's bizarre! He's one of a kind!.

Great Album
Awesome story, music and vocals. Having all of King Diamonds albums, this one stays in my cd player the most. One of the best. Give it a couple listens and if your a fan, you will agree.

not kings best
the production is horible and i play in a band and we payed 800 bucks and had a way superior sounding cd than this from a band whom does this for a living. i gave this cd 1 start and thats just for the story hes trying to get across in this. the music is not that good at all and this is my least favorite of all the line ups. mabye king was just spreading himself too thin at this point being back in mercyful fate. every so often i throw this voodoo and abigail in to see if i was just being too hard and i cant even listen to them all teh way through. they just bore me.

Amazing, perhaps King's best.
I fall into a rare breed of Diamond fans (not Neil. King). I didn't get into KD until the mid-late nineties, so I wasn't around when he was at his (arguable) peak, plus I also don't really have any reference point for the early albums since I got into all his albums around the same time. So, even with this in mind, I can pinpoint my fascination with The Graveyard upon various factors:

1. Story is both realistic and supernatural. The elements that make it "scary" are almost more of the realistic elements, and the supernatural elements are almost benign in comparison which makes for a cool twist (not to mention the "twist" ending).

2. I think that King's mental hospital patient (channeled undoubtedly from Alice Cooper's character on From the Inside), has the characteristics of an "Anti-hero", something that isn't too prevalent in the "good vs evil" themes in heavy metal.

3. The music, though dryly produced, is some of his catchiest material. Black Hill Sanitarium comes out with an almost Panteraesque riff to cover a lot of ground within its minutes. It also has songs like "Sleep Tight Little Baby" which is probably the most anguished sounding King had been since "Melissa"'s title track.

But the real treat music wise is the "Danny Elfman meets Black Sabbath" spectacle of "Digging Graves". I've never heard a Metal song that sounds more like Elfman's material for "Nightmare Before Christmas", even on a Savatage album.

Solowise, Laroque and Simonsen are a little restrained this time around, but the riffs on the album are ingenious. The music is a bit stripped down from those early albums, but not utterly simplified like on such albums as "House of God".

4. Vocal wise, this is probably my favorite performance of King. He is so maniacal, so deranged (in a humorous way which I believe is somewhat intentional) that we believe he is that nuts. Its fun to hear him use his ENTIRE range of voices, from the early Fate groan, to the very Alice Cooper sounding nasal midrange, to the classic falsetto and more.

Conclusion: This is definitely the most underrated King album of all. I believe it to be a peak in a way, as most of the albums after this I haven't liked as much. Voodoo pales in comparison in many ways to the melodies contained on this album.

I think King has come close with The Puppet Master, as that was his best in years, and I haven't listened to Give Me Your Soul Please enough to warrant a final judgement, but The Graveyard stands alone among King Diamond albums. I believe this to be his best nineties album other than Spider's Lullabye, and its comparable (production wise) to Fate's own Into the Unknown (ever notice how they kind of seemed to overlap with their songwriting style and production, each KD and Fate released during the same period?) .

King Diamond Has Done Better, But This Is Still Good.
I confess like several others, I did fall into the trap of holding almost everything King Diamond did up to his "Abigail," "Them," and "Conspiracy. 3 1/2 stars would probably be more accurate. " I grant that this one of King Diamond's more plausible stories, but as many of you know, King Diamond has a way of making his supernatural forces really plausible and frightening. And I did miss that. But of course, it would be wrong for us to want Mr. Diamond to keep repeating himself. The story starts with yet another character fighting to keep his sanity (and losing). He was sent to a mental hospital for supposedly molesting a young girl. He escapes from the institution and is determined to prove who really did it. Through Mr. Diamond's good writing, we somehow know that despite the character losing his sanity, he is telling the truth. Moving on, he hides out in a graveyard, abducts the girl, and taunts the true molester. While we may fear that this is a departure from King's formula, it proves anything but so. King Diamond will be the first to admit that even the character he is playing is not someone to be admired or cheered for. So, rather than a fake Hollywood good vs evil scenario, we have a corruption vs insanity scenario that makes it impossible to cheer for either side. Apparently King Diamond knows something Hollywood doesn't. (If you can't cheer for either side, the true horror of violence becomes prevalent!) I don't consider the latter content of the story fit for printing, but it is frightening. While the music on this record may seem toned down, King Diamond is making use of yet another technique. He keeps the music at a lower notch while we are still trying to figure out what is happening. And as the picture becomes clearer and we know what is happening, the music picks up with speed and intensity. You will notice a huge difference between the early 'Black Hill Sanitarium' and the much later 'Trick or Treat' and 'I Am. ' Some of you may call the content of this record sick even for King Diamond. But the truth is, he is virtually exposing a hypocrisy of human nature. As humans, we can be prone to glorifying violence, and in this record, King Diamond exposes violence for what it really is. .

You can see a complete list of all King Diamond discography, or go back to the King Diamond tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.