Lamb of God's Randy Blythe: My "Unpleasant" First Meeting With Type O Negative's Peter Steele | Revolver

Lamb of God's Randy Blythe: My "Unpleasant" First Meeting With Type O Negative's Peter Steele

"Hey, kid! Cheer up! It's not that bad!" Steele bellowed at the singer
lambofgod_randy_credit_travisshinn.jpg, Travis Shinn
photograph by Travis Shinn

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There was no one quite like Type O Negative. They were four Brooklyn dudes who sprung up out of the city's extreme hardcore scene and evolved into legit (if tongue-and-cheek) goth-metal icons. From their 1991 debut, Slow, Deep and Hard to 1993 breakout Bloody Kisses to their 2007 swan song Dead Again, frontman Peter Steele and the band cast a long shadow with their haunting music and inimitable, imposing presence.

Sadly, their influential career was cut short by the untimely death of Steele in 2010 — but the Drab Four's legacy carries on. Type O left the world with so many great songs that continue to inspire generations of gloom-loving, heavy-music fans. Among those is Lamb of God singer Randy Blythe, who also has some prized personal memories of Steele and his band.

Below, Blythe recounts how his "highly unpleasant" first meeting with Steele has turned into an enduring positive memory that helps him get through rough times.

type o negative GETTY LIVE 2007, MICHAEL GOTTSCHALK/DDP/AFP via Getty Images
Type O Negative, 2007
photograph by MICHAEL GOTTSCHALK/DDP/AFP via Getty Images

"I've always enjoyed the witheringly sarcastic sense of humor in Type O's music — [plus] they are very funny dudes in person," says Blythe. "But the first time I met Peter Steele was a highly unpleasant experience for me. 

"On June 2nd of 2007 I woke up on my bus in Nürberg, Germany. Lamb of God was playing the Rock am Ring festival that day and I had an absolutely excruciating hangover. I stumbled off my bus into the sunlight around noon, feeling like I was going to throw up all over myself. I was staggering around the backstage area in abject alcohol-induced misery, literally holding my head in my hands as I tried to find the catering tent in order put something in my stomach to soak up all the booze from the night before. Suddenly I felt this immense wallop on my back, almost knocking me off my already very unsteady feet. As I turned around, trying not to puke — while simultaneously attempting to suck some air back into my into my suddenly emptied lungs — I heard a deep voice rumble at me in a thick Brooklyn accent: 'Hey, kid! Cheer up! It's not that bad!'

"I looked up and there he was, cheerily grinning down at me, all 6 foot 8 of his dark majesty blocking out the German sun like some damn Yankee day-walking vampire. 

"'Fuck. You. Dude,' I gasped. 'Yes, it is that bad.' And stumbled away to die. In that hungover state, I was very, very unhappy to have been 'cheered up' so abruptly by Peter Steele. 

"Despite technical difficulties, Type O killed it during their afternoon set. And to this day, sometimes when things are shitty and I catch myself whining in my head, I'll laugh to myself and say in a deep Bensonhurst accent: 'Hey kid! Cheer up! It ain't that bad!' RIP Peter Steele"