#don't mind me I'm just sending virtual hugs to Mortiis for being awesome

[euronymous-files]

This would’ve been around spring ’91, when Slayer Mag #8 came out – the one with that legendary Euronymous and Dead interview where they lay down the law in terms of, ‘Black metal is like this, death metal is like that. And it’s a lifestyle.’ All this really resonated with me. I thought, ‘Fuck, I love what they’re saying here. It feels right.’ That interview changed my whole approach to music, my interests, and the direction I wanted to take. […] I never got around to playing him (Euronymous) my music. I was a little concerned that he might not be into it, so I kept dragging my feet a lot in terms of letting him know about the Mortiis project. I was literally terrified that if Euronymous told me it sucked, I wouldn’t want to make more music. I can handle a lot of criticism but, at the time – as an eighteen-year-old – I’d have been devastated if Euronymous said, ‘Dude, it’s shit.’ Because he was very honest and would’ve told me in no uncertain terms if he didn’t like my music. So, I think that held me back. I do recall entertaining this little daydream that it would’ve been fucking cool to release something on his label, but, at the same time, I knew it would’ve taken forever. Euronymous was always dealing with various financial complications. […] I’d just turned eighteen and thought I was going to prison; I had a police detective with a big beard staring me straight in the eye… and I’m like, ‘I am so fucked.’ I wasn’t raised in the fucking Bronx, you know. I didn’t grow up in The Godfather, nor have I ever been forced to survive on the street. I’m a middle-class kid! My parents paid for my first album, for fucks sake. So no, I’m not tough like that. They fucked me and then I had to fucking deal with it. You know, for years. People felt I’d snitched on Faust, but that wasn’t the case at all. It’s true that I did talk to the police because they tricked me. The motherfuckers tricked me. When it came to Varg, I had zero loyalty. I told them everything I knew, because he killed Euronymous. I even testified in court against that dickhead. Still to this day, I’m fucking glad I did that.

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Excerpts from the interview on Bardo Methodology #7

Please please please go read the rest of the interview, it's extremely insightful.