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House of God

King Diamond - House of God Audio CD

A fair review of the King Diamond "House of God" 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: House of God
Rating:

Release Date: 2000-06-20
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Upon the Cross 2: Trees Have Eyes 3: Follow the Wolf 4: House of God 5: Black Devil 6: Pact 7: Goodbye 8: Just a Shadow 9: Help!!! 10: Passage to Hell 11: Catacomb 12: This Place Is Terrible 13: Peace of Mind [Instrumental]

Not the first to buy!
If you dont have those albums, buy them before this one. Fatal Potrait, Abigail, Them, Comspiracy, The Puppet Mater, The Graveyard first. Its good, but those are better.

Another great record from the King
It certainly isn't his best, but it is great none-the-less. This is another great record from King Diamond. What I can't seem to understand is all of these other reviews complaining about the blasphemous lyrics. Who the hell are you? Certainly not real metal fans. If you know anything about King Diamond you know that he was the frontman for Mercyful Fate where he sung mostly about satanism and other blasphemy. Lyrics include "I deny Jesus Christ, The Deceiver, and I abjure the Christian faith holding in contempt the whole of its works". Get over it, idiots. If you are a christian, or at least one without a sense of humor then you are looking to the wrong man for music.

THE BEST SINCE THE EYE
and by golly it was. After having the spiders lullabye, teh graveyard and voodoo not do much for me i was not going to buy this cd but i saw a add in a metal zine about it being his best in years. this is the 2 time one of his stories had me interested the other up to this point was the eye. this one finally wasnt about a girl or a wheelchair and no one named missy. and i love the intro where he used vocal effects instead of trying to sound scary which always fails. but the music on this is more emotional than on any other release. i think it was just the rite story with the rite music that made this a amazing cd afer 3 that we nothing to rave about.

great cd that (eventually) grows on you
At the forefront of course is Kings insane vocal technique (you either love it or hate it). Wow, at first I couldn't really get into this cd, but after several listens it really grows on you.

The concept of this album follows the theory that the Nazarene survived crucifixion and married Mary Magdelene and had offspring and died an old man. Being a Gnostic myself I don't really follow this theory but there are some Gnostics that do, so whatever works for you I say.

Anyway it turns out that Jesus mummified remains are hidden in the catacombs in a french church (based on a real building?!) King being the central character is suckered in to guarding this mysterious church by a wolf/attractive woman. Being in this church he is privy to spiritual info that man is not strong enough to take, (Jesus survived the crucifixion and the "Forced of the Universe" kept his mummified remains hidden away so man could not "torture" him again, and these entities actually control GOD, The devil and other man-made spiritual beings) This info drives Kings character insane (gee, thats never happened to any King first person characters before lol) and unable to stand the hatred he feels eminating from the mummified Nazarenes remains and the confessions from the entities he suicides by hanging to escape, you hear him die on "This Place Is Terrible. "

The first song "Upon The Cross" has King doing a deeeep gutteral growl that make most death metal vocalists sound like Shirley Temple lol.
Of course being a concept album, the first song is an intro that starts out with peacefull choral chanting that is soooo peacefull that you could almost leave your body to it, only to be broken up by King growling comprehendable lyrics!!! Yes I know most death metal vocalists make you run for the lyric sheet, but this is clear as day, and it sounds so much harsher than the incomprehensible vocals on most death metal cds (& for the record I am a huge death metal fan).

Anyway "The Trees Have Eyes" the 2nd song is a standout and an obvoius single (not that KD releases singles lately) the drum sound is almost galloping where King is horse riding toward the hidden (evil) church. (Apparently this was based on a real church in France!!) Yes the good old King Diamond "make the music fit the lyric mood technique is alive and well.

"Follow The Wolf" continues the story of how King gets in the church. Great lead break in this song.

"House Of GOD" is a weepy song that gradually picks up speed. It has the lyrics "I Grabbed A Silver Crucifix, Expecting Evil To Be Next" which I'll elaborate on further. Some of the high pitch vocals on this song seem to be for the hell of it.

"Black Devil" is a well written up tempo number, and I suppose the sex on the alter stuff is supposed to be blasphemous, but comes of as more braggart.

"The Pact" has a great grove to it, and I assume the penning their names in blood, and further sex on the alter braggings are supposed to be blasphemous, but to these ears seem cliche' and an attempt to create controversy. King don't worry about that the whole Jesus sidn't die on the cross, had offspring and GOD is a puppet on higher strings theories will create enough controversies (and probably death threats from those "forgiving literallists") that it was redundant.

"Goodbye" basically just continues the story doesn't really add anything musically to the cd.

"Just A Shadow" shows Kings spiral into insanity and the music really fits the lyrics. The band really come together in this song.

"Help!!!" (yes with 3 exclamation marks) is a powerfull song as King delves further into his insanity lyrically while the chainsaw style guitaring and music makes the listener feel as though they are drowning in insanity. Brutal stuff. Especially King begging for "HEEELP" you can really hear the desperation in the vocals.

"Passage To Hell" is a very atmospheric song and the music during the chorus is straight from "Life After Death" on the Voodoo cd. When King tells us "STairs down below, Stairs I know my feet must GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH" you feel like your climbing down into the catacombs.

"Catacomb" is a cool song where all the mysteries are solved, great guitar work in this song. When King finds the mummified Nazarene and asks "Jesus Christ, what have they done to You?" sounds way cool. There are some techincal errors in this song that I will expose in my summation.

"This Place Is Terrible" is a good song where the insanity is completed. The guitar work has a sense of finality to it. And hearing King choke after hanging himself is stunning you can see him falling from the church tower to his hanging death.

"Peace Of Mind" is the compulsory instrumental, it almost seems to tell us that in death he found peace, nice soft intertwining guitars, personally I usually skip this song.

Now for the mistakes:
1)In the cd cover King tells us that this is a story that someone told him first hand over 200 years ago (I didn't know King was that old lol) and that King has told the story "as if it happened to me" (himself). Now if this guy who forwarded the first hand account of this story DIED at his own hand TRAPPED in the church, alone, how was the story told???? Oiuja board anyone???
Also in "Catacomb" King stumbles upon the mummified remains of the Nazarene, who survived crucifixion and went on to grow old with a family, why the hell are the mummified remains wearing a "crown of thorns" obvoiusly to identify the remains with the Jesus myth. Also whats the point of using a silver crucifix if your fearing evil (in the song House Of GOD) if the crucifix is not a symbol of the alleged death & resurection of the Nazarene then if he survived crucifixion it would have no talismatic power?? Unfortunately, that is an oversight.

All in all an enjoyable cd, I give it 8 out of 10

.

Good music, bad theology

This is King's more controversial album to date, but I gotta say that I preffer his purely "ghost" stories that don't have anything to do with religion. I would have given this record more stars if it wasn't for the theme.

Okay, I'm a catholic, so the whole idea in which this record is all about is not precisely pleasant to me. Not just because it is offensive to my faith, but because it is based on very bad historical sources (the kind of ones no serious historian would take into account). The idea of Jesus married to Magdalene is a very old "heresy" if you will, never proved, but always deared by those antagonists of Christianity.

Anyway, leaving the topic behind (the reason why I discounted two stars from this album), I think the music and the overall production may be ranked around King Diamond's best. He never sounded so mellow, yet still powerful, and tracks like "Help!", "Follow the wolf" and "Catacomb" you gotta hear over and over again. This is not a follow up to Voodoo (my King's favorite album for two reasons: the topic -I live in Louisiana, and I think this is his best-told story- and the music, which is so incredible). I think the House of God musical concept was very ambitious, unique among the gothic metal industry and, why not, genious. It shows mature musicianship, song-writing and story-telling. Even though there's a weakness in the end. In the beginning of the booklet, King writes that this story happened to a friend of his, but he choses to tell as if it happened to himself. Until here, things are fine. But, in the end of the story, the main character commits suicide. . . so, in a logical manner, how did this story ever became known by anybody? By revelation?

In "This place is terrible", King makes a bizarre use of theology. He claims that there is some kind of entity which is superior to God and Satan, which happen to be just "nothing but puppets on their strings" (was he already thinking about the puppetmaster??). Then he explains that good and evil are just relative and partial (Christians have the belief that good is an absolute entity and comes from God, and evil is the departure from goodness, therefore evil is not an value in it itself, but a "void"), but, if you pay real attention to the overall song, this so called "superior entity" gives the impression of being as evil as the devil that we "know". . . (the main character is so terrified about "it" that ends up commiting suicide), and thinking about it, how could a mixture of good and evil not be evil? Cyanide dissolved in water still kills doesn't it?

This reminds me of the Abigail II album in which beginning it is claimed that "her spirit is not evil, nor is it good", but we know that Abigail is evil, therefore she wouldn't be looking for revenge, would she?

To conclude, as you may have guessed, my recommendation is: ENJOY THE MUSIC, FORGET THE THEOLOGY.

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.