Per "Dead" Ohlin

Dead
Dead (left) and Euronymous (right)
Background information
Birth name	Per Yngve Ohlin
Also known as	"Goateye" , "Dead"
Born	January 16, 1969(1969-01-16) Stockholm, Sweden
Died	April 8, 1991(1991-04-08) (aged 22) Oslo, Norway
Genres	Black metal, death metal
Occupations	Musician (vocalist)
Years active	1987–1991
Associated acts	Mayhem, Morbid

Per Yngve Ohlin (16 January 1969 – 8 April 1991), better known by his stage name Dead, was a Swedish black metal vocalist best known for his work with Norwegian black metal band Mayhem. He also performed as vocalist of the Swedish death metal band Morbid on their demo December Moon.

Roadrunner Records ranked Him #48 out of 50 of The Greatest Metal Frontmen of All Time.^[1]

Biography

Ohlin was born in 1969 in Stockholm, Sweden. During his childhood, he had many brushes with death. As a young child, he suffered from sleep apnea^[2] and it was difficult to wake him up from it. Later, at the age of ten, he had an episode of internal bleeding when his spleen ruptured^[3] after an ice skating accident.^[4] He had to be rushed to a hospital, where he was for a time clinically dead. After this near-death experience he became enthralled with death and dying.

In 1986, he founded the Swedish death metal group Morbid, with which he recorded a demo tape called December Moon. Shortly afterwards, however, he decided the band wasn't going anywhere, and through Metalion, the editor of Slayer Magazine, he got in contact with the members of Mayhem. According to Necrobutcher, he initially sent them a small package inholding a demo tape, a letter, and a crucified mouse. Although Necrobutcher lost the package itself, he kept the tape which had Ohlin's contact details. Ohlin moved to Norway and joined the band in 1988.^[3]

Personality

In interviews, fellow musicians often described Dead as odd and introverted. Fellow bandmember Hellhammer described Dead as "a very strange personality ... depressed, melancholic, and dark".^[5] Likewise, Mayhem guitarist Euronymous once stated "I honestly think Dead is mentally insane. Which other way can you describe a guy who does not eat, in order to get starving wounds? Or who has a t-shirt with funeral announcements on it?"^[6] Drummer Kjetil Manheim later likened Ohlin's personality to that of Marvin the Paranoid Android.^[3]

According to Emperor drummer Bård "Faust" Eithun:

"He [Dead] wasn’t a guy you could know very well. I think even the other guys in Mayhem didn’t know him very well. He was hard to get close to. I met him two weeks before he died. I’d met him maybe six to eight times, in all. He had lots of weird ideas. I remember Aarseth was talking about him and said he did not have any humour. He did, but it was very obscure. Honestly, I don’t think he was enjoying living in this world, which of course resulted in the suicide."^[7]

On the cover of Mayhem's Live in Leipzig, Ohlin printed a message which said: Jag är inte en människa. Det här är bara en dröm, och snart vaknar jag. Det var för kallt och blodet levrades hela tiden (roughly translated: I am not a human being. This is just a dream, and soon I will awake. It was too cold and the blood kept clotting all the time). In an article, journalist Chris Campion wrote that Dead may have suffered from Cotard delusion; meaning that he believed himself to be dead as a result of childhood trauma.^[8]

Performances

For concerts, Dead went to great lengths to achieve the image and atmosphere he wished. From the beginning of his career he was known to wear "corpse paint", which involved covering his face with black and white makeup. According to Necrobutcher, "It wasn't anything to do with the way Kiss and Alice Cooper used makeup. Dead actually wanted to look like a corpse. He didn't do it to look cool."^[8] Hellhammer claimed that Dead "was the first black metal musician to use corpse paint".^[9]

To fulfill his corpse-like image, Dead would bury his clothes and dig them up again to wear on the night of a concert. According to Hellhammer:

Before the shows, Dead used to bury his clothes into the ground so that they could start to rot and get that "grave" scent. He was a "corpse" on a stage. Once he even asked us to bury him in the ground - he wanted his skin to become pale.^[9]

During one tour with Mayhem, he found a dead crow and chose to keep it in a plastic bag. He often carried it about with him and would smell the bird before going onstage, to sing "with the stench of death in his nostrils".^[8]

Self-harm and suicide

In time, Ohlin's social situation and his fascination with death^[3] caused his mental state to worsen greatly. He would often cut himself onstage with a blade or broken bottle. However, he also tried to do so while with his friends, who would have to subdue him and patch him up.^[3] Although this upset many of his friends, Euronymous became fascinated with Ohlin's suicidal tendencies—seemingly because it fit Mayhem's image—and he would often encourage Ohlin to kill himself.^[3][8]

In early 1991, Varg Vikernes sent Ohlin several shotgun shells as a present for either his birthday or Christmas.^[10] In April, Ohlin was left alone in Mayhem's countryside house.^[3] On 8 April 1991, Ohlin slit his wrists and throat with a kitchen knife, but eventually tired of waiting and shot himself in the forehead with a shotgun using the shells sent by Vikernes. He left a brief suicide note, which apologized for having used the gun indoors and ended with: "Excuse all the blood".^[11]

The body was found by Euronymous, who had to climb through an open window as the doors were locked and there were no other keys to the house.^[3][10] Upon finding the body, he got a camera and took several pictures of the corpse. He also allegedly kept bits of Ohlin's shattered skull.^[3] His motive for doing so is unclear; Necrobutcher speculated that forcing others to see the pictures was a way for Euronymous to cope with the shock of seeing his friend dead.^[3][8] After Hellhammer developed the photos, Euronymous initially promised to destroy the pictures, but ultimately didn't: He would carry an envelope with the images in Helvete^[3], and eventually one of the pictures found its way as the cover of the bootleg live album Dawn of the Black Hearts, which was released in 1995.

The suicide caused a rift between Euronymous and his friends, who were disgusted by his attitude towards Ohlin before the suicide, and his behavior afterwards. Necrobutcher and Manheim said that they ended their friendships with Euronymous. Manheim later speculated that Euronymous had wilfully left Ohlin alone in the house so that he would have a chance to kill himself.^[3] Ohlin's suicide was said to cause "a change in mentality" in the black metal scene and was the first in a string of infamous events carried out by its members.^[3][8]

An obituary in a Swedish newspaper stated that Ohlin's funeral was held at Österhaninge kyrka (Eastern Haninge Church) on Friday 26 April 1991 at 10:00 am.^[12] He was buried at Österhaninge kyrkogård (Eastern Haninge graveyard) in Stockholm.

Discography

Title	Band	Recorded	Type
Morbid Rehearsal	Morbid	August 7, 1987	Demo album
December Moon	Morbid	December 25, 1987	Demo album
Dawn of the Black Hearts	Mayhem	February 28, 1990	Bootleg live recording
Freezing Moon/Carnage	Mayhem	April 1990	Studio recording
Live in Leipzig	Mayhem	November 26, 1990	Live performance
Out from the Dark	Mayhem	Early 1991	Demo album

References

1. ^ http://www.roadrunnerrecords.com/news/THE-50-GREATEST-METAL-FRONTMEN-OF-ALL-TIME-19861.aspx
2. ^ http://www.peryngveohlin.com/biographie3.htm
3. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k l m} Martin Ledang, Pål Aasdal (2008). Once Upon a Time in Norway - The History of Mayhem.
4. ^ Pure Fucking Mayhem, Stefan Rydehed (2008)
5. ^ Lords of Chaos (1998): Hellhammer interview
6. ^ Morbid magazine #8: Euronymous interview
7. ^ Michael Moynihan, Didrik Søderlind: Lords of Chaos, First Edition, Feral House 1998, ISBN 0-922915-48-2, p 54.
8. ^ ^{a b c d e f} "In The Face of Death" (20 February 2005)
9. ^ ^{a b} Hellhammer interviewed by Dmitry Basik (June 1998)
10. ^ ^{a b} Until The Light Takes Us - 2009
11. ^ Freyja (March 19, 2010). "The "True" History of Black Metal – 2 of 4". Raginpit Magazine. Archived from the original on 2011-01-02. http://web.archive.org/web/20110102184308/http://www.raginpitmagazine.com/3285/the-%E2%80%9Ctrue%E2%80%9D-history-of-black-metal-%E2%80%93-2-of-4/. Retrieved 2010-04-03. 
12. ^ Dead's gallery

Persondata
Name	Dead
Alternative names	Ohlin, Per Yngve , Pelle
Short description	Swedish black metal vocalist
Date of birth	January 16, 1969
Place of birth	Stockholm, Sweden
Date of death	April 8, 1991(suicide)
Place of death	Oslo, Norway