‘ She’s in love with herself, she likes the dark… On her milk white neck, the devil’s mark,’ Peter croons in a near-whisper, emphasising the ‘k’ in a way that makes you think of bared fangs.Ĭoncluding with the mildly necrophilic jeer, ‘ Loving you was like loving the dead’ the song remains a deviously cheeky double entendre: it’s both an anthem for goth girls everywhere unashamed of their vanity, and a cathartic track for anyone who has found themselves stuck in a soul-sucking relationship with a narcissist. The song – from Type O’s 1993 breakout album Bloody Kisses – is the sarcastic tale of a vain woman with a penchant for darkness who won’t go out on a rainy, blustery All Hallow’s Eve until she perfects her look by dying her roots jet-black. 1 (Little Miss Scare-All), sung by Peter Steele – the band’s hulking frontman who looked like he just galloped off the cover of a gothic romance novel – still send a tingle down many a spine. We thought, ‘This guy’s going to be around forever.Those breathy words in the middle of Type O Negative’s ghoulish Halloween sing-along hit Black No. “You get to that kind of perspective of ‘Is he going to make it?’ that you can’t plan anything a year from now.” Then Steele found sobriety and was clean for nearly a year until his death. “There were points when we were like, ‘We don’t know if he’s going to live,’” recalls Kelly. When he was at his worst with drugs and alcoholism, no one knew if he would still be around. ![]() There was a point, says Kelly, where Steele had done so much damage to himself that the band couldn’t plan too far ahead. Throughout the years, Steele’s addictive personality left the band wondering what would come next. However, the vocalist-bassist kept his day job - driving steamrollers, snow plows, garbage and dump trucks for the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation - until 1994, when the band was asked to join Motley Crue and King’s X on tour. According to Nielsen Music/MRC Data, Type O Negative has sold 2.5 million albums and accumulated 98.4 million streams in the United States. The group maintained an international presence with 1996’s October Rust, 1999’s World Coming Down, 2003’s Life Is Killing Me and its seventh and final album, 2007’s Dead Again. Crafted like the perfect soundtrack to a more sexualized Nosferatu-inspired flick, from orgasmic opener “Machine Screw” through to the hallucinatory instrumentation of “Can’t Lose You,” Bloody Kisses left its indelible mark on metal. 1 (Little Miss Scare-All)” and “Christian Woman.”Ī pinnacle for the band, Bloody Kisses introduced a more melodious and cinematic Type O, bursting through the new wave of ’90s goth culture and swerving into lanes of thrash (“Kill All the White People”), hardcore and industrial. 166 on the Billboard 200, 1993’s Bloody Kisses was a game-changer, earning platinum status and a deep cult following with the doom-y enthralls of the 11-plus-minute “Black No. The act debuted with Slow, Deep, and Hard in 1991, then followed up with 1992’s The Origin of the Feces. Steele’s gloomy baritone, towering stature (standing at nearly 6’8”), and vampiric good looks - which landed him a 1995 centerfold in Playgirl magazine - led Type O through the New York circuit, from regular local shows at the now defunct L’Amour nightclub in Brooklyn and the East Village’s the Ritz to worldwide tours. After Carnivore ended, Steele reconnected with Silver and longtime compadres Kenny Hickey (guitars) and Sal Abruscato (drums), forming Type O Negative in 1989. ![]() ![]() By the early 1980s, Steele had pieced together the politically incorrect Carnivore, which ran its thrash metal course through 1987. 4, 1962, and raised in Bensonhurst, Steele was in bands with childhood friend and future Type O keyboardist-producer Josh Silver since their teens. “It’s like the lasting impression, and still being in a band, still playing and constantly running into people that are fans.”īorn Petrus Thomas Ratajczyk in the Red Hook section of Brooklyn on Jan. “It’s odd to try to articulate because he passed away,” continues Kelly. I’m glad that I’m still connected to him in that way, but 10 years ago, I never would have thought that people would remember Type O Negative.”īack home near Dallas, where he moved several years ago, Kelly is remembering Peter Steele - his friend and bandmate in Brooklyn-bred goth metal quartet Type O Negative - who died April 14, 2010, from an aortic aneurysm at the age of 48. “But in a lot of ways, it feels like he never left.
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