Type O Negative LIFE IS KILLING ME

Type O Negative: Peter Steele (vocals, guitar, keyboards, bass); Josh Silver (keyboards, background vocals); Kenny Hickey (guitar, background vocals); Johnny Kelly (drums, background vocals).
Additional personnel includes: Paul Bento (guitar, sitar, tambura); Pandit Kinnar K. Seen (tabla).
Recorded at Systems Two, Brooklyn, New York.
From the first, sludgy notes of the opening cut "Thir13teen," there's never a doubt that Type O Negative has kept the spirit of vintage Black Sabbath alive with their sixth album LIFE IS KILLING ME, even as Ozzy's been reduced to screaming televised profanities at his kids on MTV. Type O frontman Peter Steele continues to surprise and impress by taking the Sabbath influence and peppering it with various stylistic twists that find him turning a potentially stultifying genre like goth-metal inside out. Guests Paul Bento and Pandit Kinnar K. Seen contribute sitar and tabla respectively to the muscular "Less Than Zero," while Type O keyboardist Josh Silver injects the moody "(We Were) Electrocute" with the kind of synth lines that'll put smiles on nostalgic '80 goth fans everywhere. Any fears that this quartet of native New Yorkers has gone soft get dismissed amid the roiling riffage of the lumbering title cut, the Danzig-like "Nettie," and the equally despairing "Anesthesia." Going on their 14th year together, Type O Negative continues to blaze their own singular path in the worlds of heavy metal and hard rock.

• Format: CD
• Genre: Pop