When Nate Garrett first heard Type O Negative’s (We Were) Electrocute in the 2003 horror movie Freddy Vs. Jason, he was awestruck by the blend of doomy riffs, rich, multi-textured composition and brooding atmospheres. Soon after, Garrett bought the band’s entire catalog and thrilled to every gloomy, glorious moment.
“I had never heard anything like it,” he says. “The songwriting and arranging were so ambitious. But there was always something that hooked you in.”
In the decades that followed, Garrett listened to other gothic metal bands but never found anything that made the hairs on his neck stand up the way Type O did.
So, late last year, during time off from his other band, Spirit Adrift, he created a one-man homage to Type O Negative – Neon Nightmare – and wrote songs that captured the sound, mood and style of the group’s late frontman, Peter Steele.
“Peter had a unique songwriting formula that’s not easy to capture,” Garrett says. “It’s easy to put a chorus effect on a distorted guitar and sing in a low voice, but there’s a lot more to it than that. So much of what he did reflected the wide variety of music he and his bandmates listened to.”
As Garrett prepared the project, he researched old Type O interviews and learned that Steele’s favorite records included Black Sabbath’s Paranoid, the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon and Walt Disney haunted-house soundtracks.
For Neon Nightmare’s debut, Faded Dream, Garrett stayed true to Steele’s vision while adjusting some of the parameters to match his own taste.
“I wanted to do a tribute, not a rip-off,” he says. “My points of reference were Sabbath’s Master of Reality, the Rolling Stones’ Sticky Fingers, Pink Floyd’s Meddle and ’80s horror-film soundtracks.”
With the pieces in place, Garrett’s skill took over and he wrote, performed and recorded like he was guided from beyond. He composed Faded Dream in December 2023 and tracked it in two months at Red Nova Ranch Studio in Cedar Creek, Texas.
Type O Negative fans will surely spot reverential nods throughout Faded Dream – progressive structures, bright downtuned guitar tones, angular riffs and haunting keys.
And there are some other touches, such as the familiar logo design, cover art and lyrical references. In total, the accuracy of the tribute could divide Type O fans.
“I’m hoping the people this record is meant for will be ecstatic and feel like, ‘Oh man, I’ve been needing this!’ ” Garrett says. “But I kind of want some people to be outraged because I feel like that would be a true way to honor Type O, who were always sarcastic and sometimes acted like they wanted people to hate them.”
- Faded Dream is out now via 20 Buck Spin.
