Who says black metal is all about the negative stuff? There are a lot of things that celebrate true friendship — group church burnings, arian gangs and satanic cults, just to name a few. Read on for details on one such story.
Fans of black metal probably needn’t read this, as they must’ve stumbled on this story many times before. But for the rest of you, here’s an interesting question and a piece of trivia: Do you know what was Mayhem singer’s (appropriately named Dead) last note, before he slit his wrists and shot himself in the head in 1991? And the million dollar question, what did guitarist Euronymous do when he found the body?
The note read “Please excuse all the blood,” and that’s the not-so-interesting part of the story. When entering the room where the deed happened, Euronymous (Øystein Aarseth) did what any good friend would do — he ran outside to the nearest store, and bought a disposable camera so he could take photos of his bandmate’s corpse, only after rearranging a few things.
Rumors had it he also made a stew from pieces of the brain, as well as necklaces from various bits of shattered skull. The first story has been confirmed as false, whilst the second has been confirmed as true — he gave out necklaces with pieces of Dead’s skull to musicians he deemed worthy (we’d say mentally unstable like he was, but I don’t want any black metal fan’s death threats on my ass). One of the photographs was stolen and used for the bootleg album “Dawn of the Black Hearts.” You can view the album cover here, though it’s not really recommended you open it if you’re at a work place.
But wait, the story doesn’t end yet.
Guess the karma finally picked up, so a few years later, Aarseth had an unfortunate meeting with an old friend – a friend called knife, held in the hands of Burzum’s Varg Vikernes. And they met 23 times that night, leaving Aarseth with a severe condition of death. Details on the murder were never quite clear (but were pretty fucked up nonetheless). Anyway, Varg was sentenced to 21 years in prison for both the murder and some previously committed church arson.
And the only way to end this article celebrating friendship: the following year (May of 1994), Mayhem released their long awaited album “De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas,” featuring lyrics by Dead (Per Yngve Ohlin), guitars and lyrics by Euronymous (Øystein Aarseth) and bass guitar by Count Grishnackh (Varg Vikernes). Friends indeed.
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