Metal Blade Records founder and CEO Brian Slagel recently sat down with The Metal Voice and gave an update on both the new King Diamond and Mercyful Fate records. Slagel said the new King Diamond record should be out sometime in 2023, while the new Mercyful Fate record is due "sometime soon-ish."
"I had a really good conversation with [King Diamond] the other day, and he's working on both King Diamond and Mercyful Fate. I might have heard a demo or two that sounded really, really good.
"I don't know when either of these records are gonna come out, 'cause King likes to do things at his own speed. It's, like, 'Hey, whatever works for you is totally fine with me.' But I was very happy with what I've heard so far. So hopefully everybody will be pretty happy.
"Mercyful Fate is doing a bunch of festivals this summer — knock on wood — as long as they don't get canceled. And then they're also playing Psycho fest in Las Vegas, which I think will definitely be the only U.S. date. There's a possibility there could be a Canadian date somewhere along the line here too. But we'll see.
"But there will be a new King Diamond record, I'm hoping, in 2023. And there will also be a new Mercyful Fate record sometime soon-ish."
King Diamond has been working on the follow-up to his 2007 album Give Me Your Soul… Please for a few years. All we know so far is that it's called The Institute and there's a song on there called "Masquerade Of Madness" that was released in 2019. King Diamond recently revealed on Twitter that he's working on a ton of lyrics for the record that "in due time" will be unveiled.
