Øystein Aarseth (1968–1993) went by the stage name Euronymous, and was a guitarist for the infamous Norwegian black metal band Mayhem. He was also the founder and owner of Deathlike Silence, his own record label for underground black metal bands.

Biography

Aarseth joined Mayhem in 1984. At the time he went by the stage name "Destructor". When he joined the band (which then consisted of Jorn Stubberud on bass and Kjetil Manheim on drums) he changed his name to Euronymous, which he claimed means "Prince Of Death" in Greek, but in fact derived from a reference to the Greek demon Eurynomos in the Satanic Bible. Aarseth's presence in the band had a profound effect on all of its members, and on the Norwegian black metal scene as a whole. Aarseth became the single man at the hub of all the black metal goings-on. He opened a record store called Helvete (Norwegian for "Hell") and started his own record label and mailorder, which he named "Deathlike Silence". When Mayhem's vocalist, Dead, commited suicide, Euronymous discovered the corpse and took pictures for use as a future album cover. It is also widely thought that Euronymous consumed portions of Dead's brain and/or made a necklace using fragments of Dead's skull.

In 1993, Øystein Aarseth was stabbed to death by Kristian "Varg" Vikernes (who at the time went by the name "Count Grishnackh"). He was stabbed a total of twenty-three times: two to the head, five to the neck, and sixteen to the back. The exact reasons for the murder are unknown, although arguments over money, as well as jealousy of Euronymous' reputation, are the usual accepted reasons. After Aarseth's death, Mayhem continued recording their upcoming album, De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas. However, Euronymous's mother told Hellhammer, Mayhem's drummer, to remove bass lines that had been recorded by Varg. He said to her that he would personally re-record the bass himself, but the truth is that he had no idea how to, so the album remained the same, featuring Varg on it. Other rumours about Occultus, Mayhem's former vocalist, playing the new bass lines are thought to be false as well.