from the musicians on his different takes. The band found this procedure very irritating but, in retrospect, Diamond understands "that he didn't want a bunch of amateurs hanging over his shoulder." At that time, the label asked the band to do a cover song, so the band recorded Led Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song". The band skipped it because they felt it did not fit very well with the lyrics and feel of the album. According to Shermann, Diamond's performance was very surprising, because he sounded very close to Robert Plant's original vocals. Release In December 1983, the "Black Funeral" single was released. It contained on the B-side the song "Black Masses", which was recorded during the Melissa sessions, but had been deleted from the album. It was the first song recorded in the initial session and the sound was not completely satisfying, so the track was reduced to a B-side only. Touring On 3 December 1983, Mercyful Fate were booked to support Ozzy Osbourne in Copenhagen, but due to an illness on Osbourne's part, the show was canceled. Later that same month, the band performed a headline show in Copenhagen as preparation for their upcoming European tour. The European tour started in the Netherlands on 19 January 1984 at The Dynamo, in Eindhoven. The next day, they performed a set at The Countdown Cafe in Hilversum, which was broadcast live on Dutch national radio. On 21 January, they performed in Amsterdam, at The Paradiso Theatre, where the skull of Melissa was stolen from the altar on stage by a fan due to very incompetent local security. Then the band went touring Italy on February, where they performed 6 shows, and on the following 3 March, they started their UK tour supporting Manowar. Originally, 11 shows were booked, but it turned out that Mercyful Fate would only play one. That first and only show took place at St. Albans City Hall in Hertfordshire, where the main act crew did not leave Mercyful Fate time for a sound check and for properly set up their equipment. Manowar's sound engineer even tampered with Mercyful Fate's soundboard during their performance, which was reduced from 45 minutes to 25. Manowar refused to comply to Mercyful Fate and Roadrunner's request for better treatment, which forced the band to leave the tour with great financial loss to themselves, not to mention disappointment of their British fans. On 5