How Unhinged is the Death Metal Band MORBID?

I sincerely believe that they are one of the best, if not the best, band to come out of the post-1990 drama ridden death metal scene. A few points that make Morbid stand out way above their peers (if we can even call them that):

• successfully reforms in 2023
• plays excellent death metal since (Rotting Tomb Carnage, Skewered Beyond, etc, no trend chasing like post-reformation Obituary)
• hilarious interviews (I lolled when Slator the bassist talks about how "no trends, no mosh" needs to be taken literally)
• not posers (members of Cadaver, Warkvlt and Entombed)
• has relatives of Dead and Euronymous in the lineup
• is close with Mayhem and the Norwegian BM scene
• literally refuses to tour with Arch Enemy (points for integrity)
• all around excellent music...

How many other bands can claim the same, or even half of it? Morbid is GOATed and there is little you can say to change my mind.

Straight from the first interview, Mats Gonzales when talking about Euroman:

We weren't friends and we weren't particularly close either. I laughed when he got killed.

How exactly is that being "close" to Mayhem?

@SmoothKriminal: Gonzales isn't with the band anymore I believe. Anyway they literally have Euronymous' cousin playing guitar and presumably writing most of the riffs. That qualifies as pretty close IMO.

This. This. This. This.

When people find out I'm Swedish, they always ask me if I like Amon Amarth and At The Gates. I say no, I like MARDUK, MORBID and BATHORY!!!

@Brett: It's his nephew and that wasn't the case when the interview was taken. Again, from their own words:

I was supposed to play bass [...] I wrote all the bass lines, and even some of the riffs too!

That's from Mats Gonzales and he's talking about Rotting tomb carnage so it couldn't be that long ago. Shortly after the reunion I'd say.

@SmoothKriminal: And again, who cares...? Heinrich Aarseth is credited as the primary songwriter on all three subsequent albums. Mats barely played in one for all we know. He used to talk shit about Dead all the time too. Didn't stop them from collaborating on the demos.

Holy guts this band is epic.

Why do all the other "reunited" bands just churn out boring retro-revival and other easy listening slop? Really makes you wonder how much these bands want to be the next Metallica.

Most 'reunions' are as you point out motivated precisely by nostalgia. It's a powerful drug. Don't underestimate how willing fans are to pay to see some out of shape drummer who only ever was present during one single album, claim a 'new chapter' for the band. Hell, look at Disney Star Wars to see the effects of nostalgia brainrot.

Thankfully that's NOT the case with Morbid, but you have to imagine that most of these bands peaked in the nineties. That's nearly 1.5 to 2 generations, and their teenage fans are now nearing on retirement. That sweet pension money has to go somewhere, and labels know exactly when and how to cash in.

Back to the main thread and to Morbid's music, I always preferred the more nuanced approach of Rotting Tomb Carnage and Necrotic Fairytales, a much underrated album, to the sheer brutality of Skewered Beyond. But that's just me.

@Gandalf: dat's cuz u poser man have sum curry saar u need to chil & learn 2 headbang to pant era

It's called Pant-era because those listening to it do so from a pantless masturbatory position. Phil Anselmo would be wise to announce a new "Kleenex on Screen" sequel.

Morbid is pretty based. I'm not sure Mats Gonzales is still the bassist though, and last time I checked their drummer was Samalek (Anders Nordström) not Drutten (whose still plays with Entombed).

As for Aarseth and Ohlin being in the same band (again). IMO as long as they don't start any of the Immortal/Gaygoroth legal drama over the rights to the name, they are fine with me. Grim (Aarseth) also played in Warkvlt, Behexen, Sammath, Desecresy, and a few others bands. He is the one responsible for those killers riffs on Godless Arrogance and Unholy War Metal. If he can reproduce anything half as good with Morbid, which he apparently has already done, it's all perfect with me.

Wikipedia has Slator (Mat Gonzales) in the band from 1987-present. Admittedly it might be an error as in the interview he himself says the one who played bass on Rotting Tomb... is Mordicor (Justin Gallows).

@Autopsy: Fck wikipedia. Seriously what do they know? Also he can't be 1987-Present when the band has obviously disbanded or at the very least went on an extended hiatus. It should be, at the very least, 1985-1986 (as Scapegoat), 1986-1988, 2023-Present. AFAIK Slator only ever played on the demos, all the LPs are credited to Mordicor on bass, and Grim as the main songwriter.

Well the interview was done in 2024 at the earliest, considering he mentions Rotting Tomb... by name at least once. I agree Wiki is pretty garbage for metal info, but there aren't htat many sources besides: Morsay, Metalious, Death Metal Underground, Voice Metal, etc.

Slator was definitely on the LPs. He is credited on the liner notes at least twice on Necrotic Fairytales. The claim that he wrote "most of the riffs" on RTC is probably bullshit as everyone, ESPECIALLY self-conscious bassists, loves to claim they were secretly ghost writers for a well-received album.

The only case where that claim was corroborated was on Mayhem's DMDS... and even then, the main guitarist was dead, so he couldn't really infirm the rumours could he?

Daniel Ohlin isn't the brother of dead, stop repeating this bullsh-t that was started by the fat pos Metalion (Kristiansen) who is known to make up stupid rumours about dead people for clout. He collaborated with Daniel Cohen and Dayal Petterson to write all those "Black Metal is Nazi" propaganda pieces, and in Slayer Mag he would write that Dead (Pelle) was a bisexual swinger and Euronymous (Øystein) had chronic diarrhea. That's the type of nonsense you are dealing with. He also collaborated with Mauricio "Bull Metal" Montoya in sharing the photos of Dead's suicide, again for clout. How they ended up on the bootleg DoTBH is not officially known, but many (including Necrobutcher) suspect it originated with Metalion himself.

The Dead (Ohlin) family is as such: Mikael Ohlin (born 1944) - Anita Forsberg (born 1941), who had three children: Anders, Per/Pelle and Andrea. Many people think Mikael is "Lars" and Andrea is "Anna" but these are the correct names.

The first lie: does "Daniel Ohlin" exist at all?

No "Daniel Ohlin". For all we know, he might as well be a fictional character. He is often associated with the pathological liar and poser Erik Danielsson of Watain, so this might be one explanation (Danielsson once claimed he was going to "resurrect Jon Nödtveidt and restart Dissection... he is second only to Metalion in making shit up to fool idiotic fans).

"Daniel Ohlin" is, at best (and this is me being charitable here, as I have no way to prove it), the half-brother of Dead, born after Mikael Ohlin remarried. And that's the charitable explanation. While there is some evidence Dead's parents divorced (Anders talks about it as a "contributing factor" to Dead's depression), there is zero evidence - NONE - that his father ever remarried.

Now on to the second lie.

Ever since Morbid reformed there have been rumours that Euronymous' and Dead's younger brothers had "reunited" and "made a pact" or some other bullsh-t like that. It's very clickbaity (In one version they even got one of Varg Vikernes' sons to play bass! And people still fell for it!), and was thus promoted 24/7 by the usual suspects (Pitchfork, Babbermouth, Metal Archives, etc). It's also 100% false and easy to disprove.

Morbid's reunion wasn't decided by either "Ohlin" or Aarseth (more on him later), but by the original members Gehenna (John Lennart Valentin Hagström), Slator (Mats Gonzales), Satanas (John Scarisbrick) and Drutten (Lars-Göran Petrov). As for Dead/Per/Pelle, he HATED Drutten, and calling him a "sellout" and a "wimp" for playing with Entombed.

The reunion was initially supposed to happen much sooner (in early 2020), for the 35 year anniversary of Scapegoat/Morbid, but the pandemic and Drutten's health problems (he eventually died in 2021) delayed that reunion. I also think Slator (or someone else from the band) got arrested in late 2019. NOT ONE MENTION OF "DANIEL OHLIN" OR AARSETH BTW.

Eventually, and only after Gehenna abandoned the project, did Slator finally turn to Grim (Heinrich Aarseth) and Samalek (Anders Nordström). It had nothing to do with Grim being from Euro's family... and btw, he is the nephew of Euronymous, the son of Nils Aarseth, the OLDER (not younger) brother of Øystein. It was merely a coincidence that Grim was available as he was touring Sweden at the time (with Warkvlt), and both Samalek and Slator knew of Warkvlt through Klacke (Ivan Marcus Angus Klack) who had played in both bands.

Notice something? Still no mention of any "Daniel Ohlin" at all. It's all smoke and mirrors. Vaporware.

The third lie: vocals on the three LPs.

Always according to Pitchfork/Babbermouth, ever since their reunion in 2023, Morbid have released three full-length death metal albums. They managed to get one thing right at least, although I will point out that Morbid contributed in August 2023 to the "Sadistic Swansongs" tribute, which counts as a fourth album, which somehow - despite featuring bands like Helgrind and Angelcorpse - went completely under the radar of the so-called "expert journalists" at Pitchfork.

Here is where things start to get messy. They credit a certain "Necrobird" - who happens to be this same elusive "Daniel Ohlin" character - with the vocals and bass on "Rotting Tomb Carnage" through "Skewered Beyond". If that was the case, you could easily find evidence of his presence at the very least in the liner notes, right?

...

There is none. Zero evidence of any "Necrobird" playing on any of the three Morbid LPs. Because of the relative opacity of the band and the scarcity of interviews, I can't confirm who the vocalist is on "Necrotic Fairytales" and the others, but I know one thing FOR SURE it's that there is no "Necrobird" playing bass on this album. In the liner notes and the booklet, the band's lineup is presented as follows: Grim for songwriting and guitars, Mordicor for bass, Samalek for drums. No mention of vocals, but we know for a fact that the bass lines were done by Mordicor.

In another interview, Slator praises Mordicor's work on the album - and again fails to mention any "Daniel Ohlin" or "Necrobird".

I can't say this person doesn't exist, in the same way I can't say that Santa Claus doesn't exist. But please let's keep this Metalion/Patterson era silly yellow journalism out of serious discussions about Morbid.

@FatMetalion: Holy shiet this is fckin fascinating. Where do you get all your info man? PS: Are you related to @Erwann or the Ohlin/Aarseth family? I know he is (indirectly) and did an entire breakdown of the complicated history between the Aarseths and the metal scene post-1993 in another thread.

@Aborted: No I'm not related in any way. I don't even live in Sweden, although I grew up there. All the info I've given is readily available on the Internet - once you read past the Metalion slander and Petterson garbage. There are multiple scans of the "Rotting Tomb Carnage" booklet (for example on Discogs) and there is no mention of the fictional Daniel Ohlin character. AFAIK he is just as real as the Lords of Chaos movie. Strange coincidence both appeared at the same time and are pushed by the same people.

I also heard of an incident where Euronymous, Hellhammer, Varg and Snorre Ruch were supposed to have a meeting in the old rehearsal place near Kråkstad (where Dead killed himself). Somehow, Metalion learned of the address and invited himself, evidently none of the members of Mayhem were very pleased with having to discuss private affairs in front of his lard ass. So they sat him in a corner, far away from the main table, gave him a bowl of microwaved lasagna or something (it wasn't dog food as you can see pictures of him eating it happily), and then they started discussing loudly how they were going to burn churches and do human sacrifice while Metalion was in ear shot (but still sitting pretty far away, possibly because he smelled like shit). Then after 10 minutes or so Euronymous gets up, claims the meeting is over, kicks Metalion out of the house, and they start the real meeting discussing riffs and recording for De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas. I wish I still had the photos they literally speak for themselves: the adults on one side, talking about recording DMDS, and the fat pig in his pig pen all the way in the opposite corner, seething with resentment but still happy he got fed. I can't even begin to imagine the sort of contempt Euronymous and the others had for Metalion.

^ I know exactly what photo you're talking about. It was taken by Hellhammer and is part of the 'True Mayhem' collection. 99% sure you can find it online.

So they sat him in a corner, far away from the main table, gave him a bowl of microwaved lasagna or something (it wasn't dog food as you can see pictures of him eating it happily)

Are you sure? I heard stories about how they fed him dog food as hazing. Euronymous did much worse to Dead so it didn't really surprise me (everyone in the scene hated Kristiansen). Anyway I'll send you the photos they are easy to find.

Yes it's a pretty famous picture. It should have been titled "The Pig Metalion in His Natural Habitat" and exposed in Helvete. You can clearly see the social dynamics at play: the alpha males on one side, and the lone loser - the only non musician - at the other end, seething with resentment towards his superiors, fantasising about what lurid scandals to write about his imaginary bullies (although imaginary is a bit of a strong word as they did bully him quite a bit).

No for the second question, it wasn't dog food, at least not on that picture. I know about the stories of Euronymous making him eat PURINA sandwiches this is why I mentioned specifically it was normal food (also they probably wouldn't have voluntarily taken pictures that could be used as evidence against them, then again this is Mayhem and Euronymous we are talking about so I don't know... you should ask Varg Vikernes on X, he sometimes answers these questions -- and he was there on the picture, so he would know).

EDIT: I'm not sure it was Hellhammer taking the picture. In my memory it was always Attila. I could be wrong.

Is this the pic?

I think it was Euronymous' apartment, not the recording place in Krakstad but I'm not sure.

Anyway, for those interested, it shows (from left to right): 1. Metalion/Metalious/Kristiansen, 2. Varg Vikernes/Count Grisnackh (facing the camera), 3. Euronymous (facing away), 4. Snorre Ruch, sitting right of Euronymous (and left of Varg).

You can clearly see his porcine features. No wonder he ended up so bitter and angry at Oystein and MAYHEM, he was clearly excluded from the group. But to get back to the topic of MORBID, I think Skewered Beyond exceeds all expectation. Ok, it's not the atmospheric Death Metal of Rotting Tomb Carnage and Necrotic Fairytales, but it's some really brutal death metal rage right there.