When KING DIAMOND announced in July that Andy La Rocque was leaving after four decades, the statement was all pride, gratitude and shared memories, and almost no detail. Speaking to Metal Injection's Frank Godla, the singer has now filled in the gaps — and what he describes is a parting that arrived slowly rather than suddenly.
"We are certainly still friends. That's never gonna change," King said of the guitarist who joined him in 1985 and played on every KING DIAMOND album from 'Fatal Portrait' onward. "I think it's a gradual thing that's just been going different directions for a while." The decision itself was settled inside two days, but the drift behind it had been running far longer, and the frontman pointed to the road as the sticking point: "I don't think he likes touring that much as we're doing now."
The replacement, by contrast, was never in question. Gus G — FIREWIND's founder and Ozzy Osbourne's guitarist across three albums — came recommended independently by MERCYFUL FATE's Hank Shermann and by Metal Blade founder Brian Slagel, and there was no shortlist behind him. "He's the first person we talked about for this," King said. "We never talked about having an audition or anything like that."
He was also direct about what La Rocque's exit does and does not change on the writing side, which is where most of the fan worry has landed. King writes roughly seventy per cent of the music himself and all of the lyrics, and he says the cupboard is far from bare: there is enough material, music and words alike, for the next three albums.
Those albums now have a rough shape. Both KING DIAMOND and MERCYFUL FATE are in the studio, and MERCYFUL FATE goes first — the album is due to be finished by December 2026 for an expected May 2027 release. The new KING DIAMOND record follows around April 2028. That would be the long-trailed 'Saint Lucifer's Hospital 1920', the first part of a horror trilogy that has been circling since the single 'Spider Lilly' appeared in December 2024 and a 2024 tour was named after it.
The 2026 KING DIAMOND lineup is King Diamond on vocals, Gus G and Mike Wead on guitars, Pontus Egberg on bass and Matt Thompson on drums.
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