MAYHEM's ATTILA CSIHAR Recalls 'De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas' Recording

The murder of MAYHEM guitarist Øystein "Euronymous" Aarseth by Varg "Count Grishnackh" Vikernes is a tale that's been told over and over since the tragic event in 1993. But now, as he prepares to release his original tape demo of the recording of "De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas", vocalist Attila Csihar remembers how he became part of the most infamous black metal band in the world, and how soon after recording his world was to almost fall apart.

Exclusively for U.K.'s Terrorizer magazine, Attila bares his soul and remembers the highs and lows of recording what, for most, in an essential album, not just in black metal, but extreme music in general.

Excerpts from the interview, which appears in issue #180 of Terrorizer (on sale now),follow below.

"I was at home [after the recording of 'De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas'] and I was in contact with him [Euronymous] and also with Varg. We would call each other and that would be quite okay. It was once every two weeks we were talking by phone. We were talking about some tours we could do. I was in Hungary, but suddenly in the summer I lost both their contacts. I tried to call the guys but no one picked up the phone. I was thinking maybe people are on vacation and I didn't pay much attention. I think it was in the autumn when some of my friends told me, 'Hey, you have been friends with this band called MAYHEM from Norway?' and I told them, 'Yeah, we recorded something and we are hoping that it is going to be released soon,' and they said, 'Well, I just heard that the guitarist has been murdered.'

"I remember that first moment. I thought, 'You are an idiot, you don't know the fucking story, it's not the guitarist, but it's the ex-vocalist that died, this is bullshit,' and he said, 'No, I just read it in the Hungarian Metal Hammer, so check it yourself.'

"So I was thinking, 'What the fuck is going on?' I went down to the grocery store and picked up the Metal Hammer and there it was, a very small news item saying Euronymous was murdered by Varg Vikernes and I couldn't fucking believe my eyes.

"Snorre [Ruch, also implicated in the murder] was sending me some letters before he was in the band. He was supposed to be the new guitarist of MAYHEM. Actually, Euronymous was very proud to introduce me to him as the guy who was going to write the new songs. Euronymous said he was burnt out after the 'De Mysteriis…' recording and needed some fresh blood in the band. We became very good friends. In fact, everyone in the band was really cool to me and I was friends with everyone, even Hellhammer, although he was a bit more isolated, but the rest of the guys I was in a good contact with and when I heard this news I realized, 'Fuck, I couldn't reach anyone.'

"When you read it with your own eyes in a magazine like Metal Hammer, it does make some sense. So I got upset, you can imagine, and it turned out to be completely, utterly true, so was a bit of heavy information for me and I didn't know what to do or what to say, so actually it was very shocking for me.

"Of course, I was pissed off at Varg, but in a strange way he was a close friend of mine too, so it's something you can't really understand. I don't know the right word in English, but I couldn't understand exactly what was going on. I fell into some kind of depression for a while after this. And the next time I heard about MAYHEM was when Hellhammer called me maybe one year later. He was actually approaching me because Euronymous was supposed to release the TORMENTOR tape and Hellhammer had a copy and he was asking me if he could release it on his new label, Nocturnal Art, so we started to talk about that and at the same time he sent me a promo copy of the 'De Mysteriis…' album."

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