The following was taken from Guitar School (May 1995).

'Kiss Of Death'.
Bassist Peter Steele and guitarist Kenny lead a black celebration for Type O Negative's first hit album "Bloody Kisses"
by Jeff Gilbert.

Peter Steele, a towering man in black, looks like a not-so-distant relative of the Addams Family. But it's the bassist/singer's voice that really puts him in the company of the "creepy and spooky." As fans of Type O Negative already know, the six-foot-six Goliath's vocals are quite possibly the most cadaverous thing you'll ever hear coming out of your radio. Frankly, just listening to him makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up. "Peter has a seriously deep voice, but it's not electronically altered," says Kenny, guitarist for the Brooklyn-based group. "Sometimes it's a little hard to reproduce live because the band plays so loud."

But that same voice, which seems best suited for haunting English castles or fog-soaked moors, has oozed its way into the mainstream on the back of metal-creep hits like "Black No. 1" and "Christian Woman."

Type O's latest album, "Bloody Kisses," was released in late 1993 but is just now becoming the most unlikely hit-bound sleeper on the charts. It's the season's hottest and most refreshing slab of heavy rock deconstruction and gothic sludge, made uniquely unholy by Steele's chilling vocal chords. And there's at least three more singles just begging to be released, including a rather disturbing cover of Seals & Croft's "Summer Breeze."

"It's not dark, but it does fit with the rest of the songs,"says Steele of the hippie-rock standard. "It's one of my favorite songs. I've been talking about doing it for three years."

A taste for winsome ballads notwithstanding, it goes without saying that Type O Negative can play pretty much whatever they desire, even if that means making their fans uneasy in the process. And that, says Steele, is what the band does best. "We're four dicks and that's the way we want to be. We don't hang out, we don't party. We're completely uncool."


G: Type O Negative is one of those bands that everybody tries to categorize. How do you see the band?

P: Well, I'm on the inside looking out, so it's really kind of hard. When I write songs, I know that I'm influenced by goth, metal, industrial, psychadelia and alternative. I draw my influences from many different areas. If I had to call the band something, I guess I'd call it "gothadelic." There you go.

K: There are so many elements in our music, we can't really be tagged. But the way we do it is so intriguing, you don't get bored. Or maybe you do. Whatever it takes to get the right mood out of the album is how I see it. We simplified all the guitar leads and guitar work on this album because we wanted it to be melodic, simple, and sensual. You can't picture me flying around, playing a thousand-notes-a-second. It would ruin it. If we didn't have leads, like on the new Danzig record, I'd have no problem with it.

G: The songs on Bloody Kisses are fairly long, by radio standards anyway. Is it hard to keep track of where you are in a song during a live show?

K: We always have problems with that (laughs). Especially since we get bored of the set and change it on the road. We don't play the same set from one week to the next. Sometimes we forget which introduction we're doing or one of else forgets something else. But it doesn't matter because the sound is so sludgy, you could fuck up a hundred times and nobody would know what's going on anyhow. That's the wonderful thing about our sound -- it covers all the screw-ups. We weren't actually looking for an original sound when we came up with our sound, we were just looking for a sound to cover all the mistakes (laughs).

G: Now that "Black No. 1" and "Christian Woman" are hits, what do you think about becoming hip in the mainstream?

P: I really don't know what to think. This is not something I've worked for my whole life. Most people go bowling or play cards every Tuesday night; I write really bad songs every Tuesday night. This shit just fell into my lap, but I really don't like doing it. I don't like to play live -- I hate it, actually. I think a person who needs approval from applause is a person with a really weak ego. I don't think I have a weak ego, but I don't think I have an inflated one either. I think my ego is normal. When I'm onstage, I feel like a poodle that's made to jump through a flaming hoop. And if I don't do the right trick, I don't get a dog bone. Whether people like us or hate us, it's too bad because they already paid us. So I just go up there and do what I have to do, and if people like it, that's great, and if they don't like it, that's great too. Makes no difference to me.

G: Do you feel Type O Negative can survive without doing live shows?

P: Probably not. It's ironic; we were just on tour with Motley Crue for the whole summer, and we sold about 50,000 albums thanks to being on tour with them.

G: Isn't Motley Crue and Type O Negative an odd pairing?

P: It IS an odd pairing, but they requested us and we knew that we'd be playing in front of five to ten thousand people every night. I'm not here for my health, and I know that exposure usually translates into album sales. We'd gone from selling approximately 800 units a week to pushing 4,500 a week. We're making somebody really rich. Who that is, I don't know. I wish I could find out because I'd wait outside their house and mug them.

K: That tour was a shock to me because I didn't know what to expect. Usually we get stuff thrown at us; I always expect that. I thought we might get beat up or something, I wasn't sure. It was amazing because it went over really great.

G: Do you think that Motley Crue, who are certainly not enjoying the same kind of success they're used to, needed you more than you needed them?

K: WE Certainly didn't bring anyone in. But I think the audience who came to see them was starving for something new. And we were the only band on the bill that was playing something different, so we ended up being the only band that benefitted. But we were on such a lower level, we could only benefit from it. We moved more merchandise than King's X, who were also on the bill, which was amazing. On an average, we'd sell 10, 12 shirts a night more than them. But that's the wonderful thing about not being able to label what we do. We can play with anybody and get away with it because we incorporate so many elements of so many different types of music. We all have heavy identity crises, and we don't know what the hell we're doing -- or what the hell we want to do. We just try to do everything.

P: I think Motley Crue are great guys, however, since Vince Neil left or got kicked out, whatever the story is, I really think they should have called the band something else. After Ozzy left Sabbath, it just wasn't the same Sabbath, you know?

G: Peter, at first I thought your voice was electronically altered, but talking to you now, I didn't realize you naturally had the kind of deep voice deathcore bands would kill for.

P: Many people think it's synthesized in the studio, but I just have a really high testosterone level that does wonders for my vocal cords.

K: We have such a loud stage volume that it's really hard for Peter to hear himself when he's singing that low. Plus, we don't even care about soundchecks. We're really lazy; we spend about five minutes soundchecking. Our roadies are a bunch of lazy bastards, too.

G: I hear you guys caught some flak from Seals & Croft over your version of "Summer Breeze."

K: They're a bunch of stoned hippies living on a religious commune somewhere in the middle of the country. We caught flak because we have stupid senses of humor. Peter twisted the lyrics around and made jokes out of everything. He didn't like the original lyrics. They were really happy with the music but the didn't like the fact that we made their lyrics into a circus. It's the same thing with our other cover songs. We did "Hey, Joe" which he turned into "Hey, Peter." That's on our EP, "The Origin Of The Feces." "Hey, Peter, where're you goin' with that pick-axe in your hand?" (laughs) Everything we do is classically ridiculous.

G: Bloody Kisses is a hit, Now people will expect the next album to be more accessible.

P: I'm working on the next album right now and plan to make it more commercially accessible. To put it plainly, I plan on selling out. I don't care if people think I'm an asshole or what, but I'm not in this for my health. Making lots of money represents independence. I really don't like to live in the city because I don't like what it's become and I really don't like where my tax dollars are going. I want to take the people that I love with me and get the hell out. I don't know how much money constitutes 'enough money.' Who the hell knows? But when I make enough money, I'll certainly pack my bags and leave. Probably go to Scandinavia. That's where my ancestors are from. I've been living in the same house for about 30 years. Everyone knows where I live. I can't even park my car on the street anymore because people screw with it. It's just part of being in the spotlight.

G: Didn't Type O break up after Bloody Kisses came out?

P: Yeah. After the album came out in August of '93 the band actually broke up for about two months. We didn't know if we wanted to make this our full-time career or if we were gonna try and juggle our day jobs, the band, girlfriends, food shopping, and every other thing that happens in life. I pretty much held the band up because I was sitting on the fence. I used to work for New York and really liked my job. I was making about $35,000 a year hauling garbage for the city. I had great hours, I really liked my job, and I was thinking, "Can I see myself doing this in 10 years? Do I want to be stuck in this city?" And the answer was no, I had to take a chance. Anyone who has ever made anything out of themselves has always taken a chance. I'm not the stupidest person in the world, and I figure if some of these morons can open up candy stores and stuff and do well by taking a chance, I'm sure that I can make it. So far so good.

G: What's the story behind the chain you use as a strap for your bass?

P: It's regular three-quarter inch links.

G: Isn't that kind of rough on your shoulders?

P: I've been wearing this chain for about 14 years, so I'm kinda used to it. However my left shoulder is three inches higher than my right. (laughs) Actually it came from the idea that I was not gonna pay 40 bucks for a nice guitar strap, that I could take any old rusty chain and screw it right into the bass with three-inch sheet-rock screws. The first thing I do when I get an instrument is rip everything off it that's not useful, like the bridge pickup. I take out half the guts and spray paint the whole thing black, including the fretboard and hardware. Flat black. I don't like glitter. Besides, it's just something that's ultimately gonna get fucked up. Let's be real -- fuck it up now, drill holes in it. I've gone through six or seven basses already just by getting really drunk onstage and dropping them or hitting somebody over the head or some shit like that.

G: What's your bass of choice for conking someone over the head?

P: My main bass is an Alembic Spoiler. I've had it for about 12 years, and it's the best bass I have ever played in my life. It feels so good. It's a large instrument, with a two-octave neck, that has a great sound. And it's indestructible. I've thrown the thing clear across the stage. The bass was stolen one time, off the stage. A kid ran out of the club with it, and I put out a death threat. So the bass came back. Everything has happened to that bass. I went to price them again and they're close to $2,000 now. I originally paid $1,200 for it back in '84.

G: Why an Alembic? That's fairly unusual, unless you're a jazz technician like Stanley Clarke...

P: The Spoiler isn't such a fancy model, it's a modified version. But I can't have nice things because I just screw them up. It sounded really good and I came into some money and thought it was worth it. I had a BC Rich fretless Warlock, but I dropped it onstage one night and it split right down the middle. Then, of course, everybody ran up onstage and were grabbing at the pieces. I had this thing by the neck and was swinging it, using it like a club to get people away because they wanted a fuckin' souvenir. I'm looking for an endorsement from anyone who makes a long-scale bass with a two-octave neck through the body. Gibson offered me something, but none of their basses come with a two-octave neck.

K: I like Gibsons; I'm using an SG right now. I used to play a Flying V but it went out of tune all the time. It was an old one, and we tune down so low that the floating bridge was never right; it always went out of tune because there wasn't enough tension. I use the heaviest gauge strings I can buy and STILL have problems. But the SG is a workhorse; they just don't go out of tune once you stretch the strings. So now that I finally got past that problem, Peter goes out of tune all the time. (laughs) But people expect that at a Type O show anyhow, stopping the song in the middle to tune.

G: Are you as punishing with your amps as you are with your guitars?

K: My gear changes a lot because it blows up every month. Smoke onstage, flames shooting out of my amp; it happens all the time. I've been using a new ADA preamp because the first model, the MP-1 just blew up on me, so I got the MP-2. I have a Quadraverb and a MosValve power amp.

P: I have two old Peavey Max bass amplifiers, eight-hundred watts each and the 36/20 bottoms; each bottom includes two 18s, two 10s, and I added some Piezos in there because I use distortion and chorus and delay and I like that sizzle sound, like when you suck all the mids out and it's all bottom and all sizzle on top. I loaded those bottoms with JBLs which are capable of taking what I can pump into them. It's not a complicated set-up because I'm a simpleton. I can't have a bunch of pedals onstage with MIDI cables, because if one fat slob gets onstage and steps on this little piece of plastic, it's over. I use Boss boxes, which are made out of sheet metal. Even when some drunken 600-pound slob charges me onstage, all he's gonna do is turn the pedal off. I tried using those other pedals and stuff, but I'm six-foot-six and I wear size-15 boots. And with the fog machine onstage I can't see what the hell I'm doing so I just need simple stuff. Plug in, let's go.

G: Where do you see your music heading?

P: Fester is a better word. It's really diverse, but what I see happening is that a lot of bands are just jumping on the so-called bandwagon, they're not playing from the heart. They just want to be trendy, which really turns me off. Many people ask me why I think the fans like Type O Negative. I believe it's because we play what WE want to play, and I say what I want to say. I'm not trying to be one of these stupid crossover things like the thrash and rap bands that are so common now. We are the most uncool band out there.

K: We're too self-conscious to take ourselves seriously.

G: Ironically, you'll probably wind up making uncool cool.

P: I'll have to cross that bridge when I come to it.