Few stories have a darker ending than that of Per Yngve Ohlin, or as his friends called him, Dead: and even though he departed this Earth over 27 years ago, his legacy continues to revile the world with dramatic, grim twists — which probably would have made him smile like nothing else.

Dead, with and without his signature corpse paint (Photo credit)

On April 8th, 1991, the Swedish-born singer of black metal bands Mayhem and Morbid took his own life with his bandmate’s shotgun. And on November 28th, 2018, a piece of his shattered skull sold for $3,500 in the Serial Killers Ink web store. Amazingly, the irreverent relic was available for less than two days before someone snatched it up.

So who exactly was Dead? Why would someone pay over three thousand dollars for a tiny piece of his skull? And how did anyone come into possession of such a morbid relic to begin with?

A Human Destiny but Nothing Human Inside

For Dead’s friends in Norway, his suicide wasn’t exactly a shocker: Death was an everyday theme in the lyrics he wrote for Mayhem and Morbid, and he spent his final years making it his life’s mission to look like a walking corpse. The lyrics for Life Eternal, which Mayhem recorded with a new vocalist after Dead’s death, are a classic example of his boundless grim fascinations:

“I am a mortal, but am I human?

How beautiful life is now when my time has come.

A human destiny but nothing human inside.

What will be left of me when I’m dead?

There was nothing when I lived.

What you found was eternal death.

No one will ever miss you.”

Left to right: Dead, Hellhammer, Euronymous, and Necrobutcher (Image source)

During live performances, Dead would slice his arms open with broken bottles and spill his blood across the stage. His devotion to the art of black metal ran so deep that he once nearly passed out after a show from blood loss. His bandmates even claimed that he would carry a rotten crow around in a bag to inhale the putrid-yet-inspiring scent of death. A dedication like Dead’s only comes around once in a generation, but unsurprisingly, his passion led him to an early grave.

His Darkest Moments, Immortalized

In retrospect, it’s easy to see the final years of Dead’s life as some sort of twisted, desperate cry for help — but his friends in the black metal scene didn’t think so. When his mangled corpse was found in a Kråkstad cabin one cold April morning, his bandmate Euronymous wasted no time in turning the entire thing into a publicity stunt. He took several photos of his “friend’s” corpse from different angles, and raved about how cool it was in letters to his metal-obsessed pen pals. It was said he even posed the body, manipulating it into different positions to make the best of his little photo-op.

As soon as the gruesome photos were developed, Euronymous mailed them to Mauricio “Bull Metal” Montoya, owner of Warmaster Records in Colombia. The photo of Dead’s corpse eventually found its way onto the front of a bootleg Mayhem album titled “Dawn of the Black Hearts.” The unconventional album art has been endlessly denounced by Dead’s family, and out of respect for their wishes, this article won’t be linking to it. If you choose to seek it out on your own, be warned: It’s very graphic.

A Bizarre Souvenir from the Scene of the Tragedy

You’d think that plastering Dead’s corpse on the front of an album cover for all eternity would be enough for Euronymous, but it wasn’t. He collected bone shards from the scene and sent them to his friends in the mail, complete with letters that raved about how awesomely brutal the suicide was. Morgan Håkansson of black metal band Marduk claims to own a piece to this day. The current bassist of Mayhem, Necrobutcher, is said to own a shard as well — but the rest of the bone-bearers are unknown.

There are no records of Euronymous ever being prosecuted for disturbing the corpse, collecting Dead’s skull shards, or sending the photos to Warmaster Records — in the courts of man, at least.

A Place Among the “Stars”

As fate would have it, one of the people Euronymous mailed Dead’s skull fragment to was Tamas Vamosi, manager of Hungarian black metal band Tormentor. Why Vamosi chose to sell the fragment to notorious death merchant Serial Killers Ink all these years later is anyone’s guess, but I’m willing to wager the $3,500 had something to do with it. The listing for Dead’s skull fragment was complete with a letter of authenticity from Vamosi himself, vowing from the bottom of of his black-metal-hardened heart that the relic was real:

The guys at Serial Killers Ink are no strangers to peddling the darkest items mankind has to offer. A quick glance through their site offers samplings from Richard Ramirez, Jeffrey Dahmer, and countless other killers whose names forever linger in the blackest corners of our minds. It’s no wonder that poor Dead’s skull fragment ended up being listed on such a site — even though you could argue that he was a victim of himself rather than a killer.

A Macabre Coincidence or Something More?

Hopefully, the future will be brighter for the latest owner of Dead’s skull piece than it was for the original bearers. On the night of August 8th, 1993, two years after Dead’s death, Euronymous was murdered. Fellow black metal musician Varg Vikernes sent the young guitarist to an early grave over a mysterious dispute that was never fully made public.

Interestingly, Euronymous wasn’t the only one involved in commercializing Dead’s suicide that found themselves facing a gruesome, untimely end: Remember Mauricio “Bull Metal” Montoya, the record distributor who plastered Dead’s corpse on the front of an album cover? He was found dead in his apartment on December 25th, 2002.

Would you really want a piece of this guy’s skull sitting on your nightstand? (Image source)

Although the two deaths are probably a macabre coincidence, it’s interesting that both of the men who were closely involved with desecrating Dead’s memory met such ghastly ends. Of course, there’s no way to prove that the skull fragment is cursed. But let’s just say that if cursed objects exist, it’s unlikely there’s a better candidate in the entire universe for one than a fragment of Per Yngve Ohlin’s skull.

Dead’s Legacy Lives On

Dead’s was a classic story of an artist being driven mad by inspiration. There’s no doubt that if he lived longer, he would have spread his bizarre ideologies far and wide. His haunting lyrics continue to inspire black metal musicians to this day, and the tragedy of his suicide still manages to haunt countless minds almost three decades later.

On the night he killed himself, Dead probably had no idea that his final image would be burned into thousands of minds across the Earth — or that a piece of his skull would be sold alongside mementos from the most famous killers of all time. It’s impossible to say whether he would have been amused by it, or found it reprehensible. Only one thing is certain: Whoever revered him enough to pay $3,500 for a tiny piece of his skull has a heavy new burden to bear. Now let’s hope that they take it back to Sweden and bury it in his grave once and for all.