Stories From Hell

SAINT LUCIFER’S HOSPITAL 1920 🏥 EUROPE 2025

King Diamond 🇩🇰 Columbiahalle Berlin DE 🇩🇪
♦️June 7th, 2025♦️

King and the boys (and girls!) played the first club show of their European tour in Berlin Germany, at the famous Columbiahalle, which was originally built as a sports hall for the US Air force back in the 1950’s. Since 1998, it has been concert venue, with a standing room capacity of 3,500 plus 1,400 seats.

This being a SOLD OUT show, energy is high and so is the anticipation and excitement. Also, this time the band has some opening acts in tow; Angel Witch and gothic-doom metallers Paradise Lost who both hail from the UK.

Since we have started this little recap series, I’m pretty sure we have gone over the set list a couple of times now, and since the second date of the tour at Mystic Festival, the setlist has remained consistent. So I won’t touch on that very much from now on (even though the setlist is badass!), I would like to focus on what makes each particular show special and unique. But as a refresher, the setlist is as follows:

-Funeral *tape*
-Arrival
-A Mansion In Darkness
-Halloween
-Voodoo
-Them *tape*
-Spider Lilly
-Two Little Girls *tape*
-Sleepless Nights
-Out from the Asylum *tape*
-Welcome Home
-The Invisible Guests
-The Candle
-Masquerade of Madness
-Eye of the Witch
-Burn
Encore:
-Abigail
-Insanity *tape*

Now onto the highlight reel!

Man, where to begin? Like I said earlier in this post, this show was SOLD OUT completely! And understandably so. Imagine going to a club show, just like you would see King and company play here in the USA, (around 3,000-4,000 capacity clubs) when most of the time in Europe you’ll see them headlining huge metal festivals. What an opportunity for fans in Germany, as well as those who traveled from near and far to the gig, to see the some of the most badass men and women in the business do their thing up close and personal.

The band sounding absolutely top notch, on point, feeling great and having the best time, the light show spectacular, the sound crystal clear and that bass just thundering in your chest. The overall energy of the evening is nothing short of incredible; Fans singing along to every song, even to the pre recorded tapes that are played in between some songs! Fists and horns in the air, drinking beers and headbanging with fellow metalheads. Sounds like the perfect recipe for an unforgettable evening in my opinion.

And so do believe that there were meet and greets offered at this show, which were able to be purchased at the merch booth. And from what I’ve heard, the meet and greets were very well done and fans got plenty of time to chat with King and Andy. Fans were also able to bring a limit of two items to have signed (I would struggle so bad with trying to figure out what to bring!), as well as get photos taken, and there was also a q&a after the show.

During band introductions, after King had introduced Hel, he introduces Mike, “from Sweden… Stockholm, precisely. Please welcome on the lead guitar, Mr. Mike Wead!” And then in true King fashion he then introduces Pontus, in a funny way, “same thing, everything except for the name here, right?” To which Pontus shrugs and laughs. “Okay. Please welcome here, on the bass guitar, mister Pontus Egberg!”

The crowd then immediately and very enthusiastically begins chanting, ‘Andy’ over and over. King interrupts them with,
“What the f**k is wrong with you? Look! There’s that muppet man up there. Longtime drummer and amazing extraordinaire, Mr. Matt Thompson!”

The crowd cheers and then King gives them permission with, “Now you can do it.”

Of course the crowd knew exactly what to do next. The crowd proceeds to loudly chant Andy’s name in unison, until King says, “The one and only mister Andy LaRocque!”

I love little funny moments like that. 😆

Also, I want to add that in Germany, it is quite common at concerts, whenever you buy a beer or even a water, the cup is decorated with photos and artwork from the band that you’re seeing. There were exclusive cups with artwork from the Saint Lucifer’s Hospital 1920 backdrops and t-shirt graphics as well as a photo of King himself taken by Jeremy Saffer. Pretty cool, right?

Any of you guys that went to see King Diamond at Columbiahalle last year, let us know what your favorite part was, any special memories you have from the show, and if you have photos, share them with us! We want to see them.

Next recap we will revisit MetalFest Plzen in Plzen Czech Republic! 🇨🇿

Photo credit: Black Label Photography

🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷 LEX LEGION 🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷

Today the world gets its first taste of music they’ve been starving for for decades. A collaboration of four of the greatest musicians the world has ever seen and has been brewing for decades. Pete Blakk, Nils K. Rue, Hal Patino
Andy La Rocque and Mikkey Dee have joined forces to create ‘LEX LEGION’

“LEX”: Latin for Law or statute

“LEGION”: From Latin Legio referring to major unit of Roman army.

When put together it loosely translates to
“Law of the Legion” or an army bound by its own rule/Laws.

Released by MNRK Music on 6-12-2026 the self titled album is now available worldwide.

I have listened to it five times this morning and it’s everything the band said it would be heavy
fresh and its own unique sound. I heard maybe two songs that would remind you of something King might come up with or in this case Andy.

All around it’s a very good album but you can decide for yourself then let us know what your thoughts are-

♦️♦️FATAL PORTRAIT OF THE DAY♦️♦️

“And daddy’s got hole in his head”

Management knew someone who has worked with Slipknot. I had these ideas for this thing here, this song, the storyline and all this stuff. There was some new things coming into it. And I saw what this girl Missy Munster from Los Angeles had done before. I saw a crown, but it was different than what I had in mind. I wanted it much shorter. It was much taller at the end and different. So I asked, "Can you do this? Can you do that? What about this?" There was a mask she had done with a ram's head she had done earlier as well. I told her "But I can't use it like that. Can you do it this way?
Can you close it so it becomes almost a whole head instead of just a front mask?" And she did these things like we hoped for, and the jackets and the robes.

Actually, she went to a...I don't know if it was a museum, but it was where they had an exhibit of old 17th century clothing. And she got to copy a pattern and measure, I think with gloves on, this 17th century bishop's coat. So that's what they are based on; actual patterns from the coat. She made one red and one black - that was my choice. I wanted it to have crosses on the back. She did an amazing job. She really recreated that style that would have been used in the 17th century.
King Diamond-

Dave Pehling
CBS NEWS-

Photos By: Artmania Festival

"There was one great tomb more lordly than all the rest; huge it was, and nobly proportioned. On it was but one word, DRACULA."