Type O Negative

Type O Negative‘s somber, snail-speed cover of Seals & Crofts’ “Summer Breeze” is the perfect August anthem for goths, given that the pasty pack likes to stay out of the sun. But that song is just one of the Brooklyn band’s moribund makeovers; it also fans the funeral-pyre flames of “Light My Fire.” That ability to marry ’60s pyschedelia and modern doom-metal carries over into its darkly humorous, graphically blasphemous originals as well. On Life Is Killing Me, its spring 2003 release, Type O remains focused on the dark side of the gloom, proclaiming “The Dream Is Dead” and admitting “I Don’t Wanna Be.” But during the group’s anything-but-a-downer live shows, singer and bassist Peter Steele, looking every bit the Conan-meets-Dracula behemoth his booming delivery promises, proves he’s as quick with a tasteless one-liner as the Cryptkeeper.