ENTRY 205
Part One (Continued on 206)
From January on, I've been in an emotional whirlwind as I've learned more about Peter Steele. I've been blogging about it lightly here on Tumblr.
First, the fun stuff.
❎ Entry 169 - Meme
❎ Entry 175 and 181 - Pics
❎ Entry 194 - Fan Art
❎ Entry 204 - Type O Eyeshadow
❎ Entry 208 - Meme
❎ Entry 214 - Intro w/ Singers
Then, the others.
❎ Entry 74 - Learning for the first time about who he was as a person after research inspired by comments from fellow fans.
❎ Entry 170 - Experiencing the first death anniversary since having a better understanding of who he was as a person.
The fun stuff is pretty much just a vague, visual representation of my middle-aged self rediscovering Peter Steele, seeing him in a new light, and appreciating him in different ways than I did before. The others are a light walk through of what I started seeing and how I started reacting. There was so much I didn't know. And once I thought I got the jist of it, there was more.
Entry 74, I see comments on Instagram prior to deleting my profile, accusing his last gf of negligence. Seriously disturbed due to the shock of it from the lack of knowledge, I tried looking it up to see if it was true. Couldn't find any info on that but found lots of info on Peter himself.
This is when I found out Peter Steele was the full package. Men that have beautiful faces like that often accompany them with cruel tongues and empty minds. Not Peter.
Intelligent, wise, kind, and humble to name a few. The full package. Making him one of the most gorgeous men to ever exist. A rare find indeed. Combine that with his voice, talent, style, and presence, and you'll soon see why women everywhere would fall to their knees in love and lust for him.
Unfortunately, that full package came alongside an ample amount of heartbreak.
It bothered me to my core to think about a man like Peter suffering so much at the hands of any toxic women he may have given his heart to in the wake of everything.
I took temporary comfort in assuming he was surrounded by friends that would help lift him up if ever he was down, especially his band mates whom I heard he grew up with. I assumed, and life continued on as normal for a time.
The 14-year death anniversary rolls around and as I said in Entry 170, I'm feeling it more than ever before because now, I have a better understanding of who died, making his loss that much more deeper and tragic.
Not only was a kind heart lost, but a pure soul that suffered greatly, making the pain of the anniversary rival even the death itself.
You see, I'm heavily reliant on what I hear, read, and watch because of the obvious fact that I didn't know Peter Steele personally and I wasn't there when certain things were taking place.
I learned more about him and started to favor him above all other singers, including Trent Reznor who I've worshipped since the teen days. I started looking up more pics and performances (eventually inspiring a blog consisting of nothing but pictures of Peter, telling myself to stop lol).
All bittersweet and intriguing but then, a recent article and an older vid that I ended up coming across paved the way for that dreadful feeling at the beginning of the year to return.
This is why I said earlier that I took "temporary comfort." But at that time, I didn't know it was temporary and I didn't know what else was about to cross my path.
My heart broke for him all over again. I'm suddenly reminded of those scary pictures circulating on Facebook with a caption that reads, "the longer you stare at it, the worse it gets."
I'll start with the article, which was released on May 6th of this year (2024), featuring an interview with Sal Abruscato, Type O Negative's original drummer. Word for word, this is what he said and mind you, I'm reading this for the first time while still learning about Peter.
"He was a good guy. He was a sweet guy. He had a good heart. At the end of the day, he had a good heart, but he was also very vulnerable. He was vulnerable. He knew deep down inside becoming successful was gonna be his demise, because I'll tell you, one thing I did see from being on the outside of Type O Negative, watching the deterioration that happened over the years, people used him. He was a nice guy, he was generous, they f*cking used him. And everybody was using him, even his own band members were using him, because he was a workhorse. And everybody tried the best they could. He had a very bad problem, and I know everybody tried the best they could, but it was too little too late."
That wasn't easy to read. Neither was the next part. 💔
"I remember talking to him literally two weeks before he passed, and he told me that all he had left was $3,500 bucks to his name. So he died basically in Pennsylvania alone, in a way. Yeah, he had his girlfriend, yeah, whatever, but all the way out there. Everybody dissipated when the drugs were over, 'cause he had to be sober and clean. He was clean for nine months when he died. And when he told me that, it was like... And he told me people that I'll never name. He told me that he lent money to people, that people never paid him back because he had a good heart. Friends took advantage of him. And it's a shame that it ended like that for him. Had he maybe went to the doctor's on a regular basis too, maybe he could have... But again, the damage was done. But that was the side of Pete was that he was a good guy and a prophetic artist, a prophetic lyricist. Had a vision that went three steps ahead of everyone else. A brilliant guy, very smart, very smart guy in a lot of different ways. Not like 'doctor book smart,' but smart in other ways, artistically and the way he saw things. He was very intelligent."
Vulnerability; pain and love can do that to a person. The thought of this gentle giant who was generous and a hard worker being surrounded by snakes literally makes my stomach turn. "They used him," it said.
"Deterioration that happened over the years," oh my heart. Is that part of the reason why he deteriorated? Were people just taking pieces of him until there was nothing left to take? I despise the thought of the people he was counting on attempting to drain him. Imagine if his millions of fans knew he was being hurt. There would've been an unholy uprising. His fans love him.
I want to ask if Peter Steele would've been around the right people, would success still have been his demise? If he was surrounded by protectors and healers, would the outcome have been the same? I said it in my 74th blog about Peter when I first started learning about him. Men like this, regardless of how big and tall and strong they are, need to be protected. Their bodies are hard but their hearts are fragile.
The creator of something timeless, original, and legendary had $3,500.00 left to his name. Simply criminal after everything Peter had created throughout the course of his career. I was wondering about his income though. I saw a brief home vid of him and one of his cats and I couldn't help but notice his surroundings. It wasn't what I assumed. It just didn't look like a place where an accomplished and famous singer and musician should be living. I was unknowingly soon to get detail on that.
I saw another quick vid of him talking about building a nice, big house in a beautiful wooded area a while back. I looked it up given the home vid I just saw, "that can't be the place he wanted to build." Come to find out he lived in a duplex before he died and that $3,500 would not have afforded the house he wanted to build.
I saw it when I googled where he lived before passing. I thought the entire house was his at first sight and then my jaw dropped to the floor when I read that he lived "on the right side." Peter deserved a monstrous Victorian mansion with beautiful gothic interior, with millions more in the bank to build and decorate with. Criminal and unfair to say the very least.
Aside from this article, I read that Peter was a little awkward growing up, as was I. You grow up knowing friends are often hard to come by. It probably felt good to him in adulthood to be around people and to form connections and to do good things for them, but some of those people were the wrong ones to be that kind of person with.
I can't imagine how disappointed and heartbroken he must've felt finding out many of those people were merely around for drugs and money. Just more loss and abandonment for a good heart and a pure soul. He deserved better.
Sal called him a "prophetic lyricist." Prophetic! In considering the meaning of that word, it makes the lyrics, "life is killing me" gut-wrenchingly sad.
"The way he saw things," that statement was regarding his creativity and intelligence but how did he see his life? How dark were things for him? And the million dollar question, was Peter Steele safe anywhere?
Sal said even his band mates took advantage of him. I wondered about the dynamic between them and Sal. I also wondered if perhaps that's why his last gf didn't want them talking to him before he passed. Although, I did continue to wonder if people were still accusing her of neglecting Peter. There's a lot to wonder and there's a lot of angles to wonder from too.
Wonder, wondered, wondering; it's all speculation. I wasn't there. Lots of questions are gonna accompany me to my grave, unanswered, and I better make my peace with that asap but it's hard. Not like it would change anything, but I still want to know what happened to this man and who was around him.
Who truly had his best interest at heart? Anybody? That's something else I may wonder forever. Who was fighting for him? Who was fighting for his health? Who was fighting for his life?
The whole process did leave me a little suspicious that perhaps nearly everyone around him dropped the ball at some point, in some form or fashion, maybe even when he needed them the most.
People obviously wanted things from him, but who wanted him? Who wanted him to be well? Who cared for him outside of the celebrity? Who cared for him as Peter and not the singer of Type O Negative?
I mentioned the older vid alongside the article I just responded to, but I think I'm gonna break this up into two parts because this already turned out to be quite lengthy.
All in all, his story is weighing on me and I cannot believe that I've loved his music for so long but never knew any of this, and I mean any of it. I just never knew.
And finding this out for the first time makes me wish in such a childish way that either I, or the army of his fans could just somehow go back in time and scoop him up, getting him to safety but as Sal said, "too little too late." He's gone. Still here through music and memory but physically gone, and we can never get him back to fix things for him.
He would be 62 years old if he were alive today. And if he were, I would hope he would have everything his heart could ever desire, especially true love, reverence, happiness, and inner peace.
Eating healthy and staying sober to keep himself going, maybe even a solo project so he could call the shots and have a schedule he's comfortable with. He could hire people that respect him, that will listen to him.
He might've even started a family with a good woman who loves him outside of the celebrity and will take good care of him and his children. That's what I would've advocated for, but who knows.
We can all daydream on what might have been out of desperation for comfort and solace. Comfort and solace from a grueling reality that none of us can change no matter how badly we miss him.
If it was that hard to read about, I couldn't imagine what it was like to go through.
For what it's worth, I'm so sorry Peter. RIP
Part Two and more thoughts later.
