Corpse paint is a style ofbody painting, used mainly byblack metal bands for concerts and band photos. The body painting is used to make the musicians appear inhuman,corpse-like, ordemonic, and is perhaps "the most identifiable aspect of the black metal aesthetic."[1]
Corpse paint typically involves making the face and neckwhite (or pale), sometimes withred marks to signify blood or laceration, and making the area around theeyes andmouthblack. Musicians will often have a trademark style. Other colors are seldom used, yet there are notable exceptions, such asAttila Csihar's use ofneon colors and the bandsSatyricon andDødheimsgard experimenting with color as well.
Outside of black metal, black and whiteface painting has been used by a variety of other musicians such asLou Reed[2] as well asshock rock artistsArthur Brown andAlice Cooper alongside members ofKiss and theMisfits. Corpse paint has also been adopted byprofessional wrestlers (e.g.Sting andVampiro), as well as for the normal beautification or ornamentation denoted bycosmetics.
The earliestrock groups to wear body painting similar to corpse paint includedScreamin' Jay Hawkins,Screaming Lord Sutch andArthur Brown in the 1960s. In the 1970s, examples of black and white face paint by rock & roll performers includedSecos & Molhados,Alice Cooper,Klaus Nomi,Lou Reed[2] andKiss. GuitaristZal Cleminson of theSensational Alex Harvey Band wore face paint and colorful clothes, performing in a menacing demeanor that evoked theevil clown trope.[3] Later that decade,punk rock acts like theMisfits and singerDavid Vanian ofThe Damned also used black and white face paint. On seeingshock rock pioneer Arthur Brown performing his US number two hit "Fire" in 1968, Alice Cooper states, "Can you imagine the young Alice Cooper watching that with all his make-up and hellish performance? It was like all myHalloweens came at once!"[4]
In the late 1970s and '80s, such face paint began to be more associated withmetal performers. VocalistKing Diamond ofMercyful Fate used face paint similar to corpse paint as early as 1978 in his band Black Rose, whileHellhammer and their later incarnation asCeltic Frost also wore similar face paint.Per "Dead" Ohlin was the first to explicitly associate stylized face paint with an attempt to look like acorpse according to drummerJan Axel "Hellhammer" Blomberg ofMayhem.[5]Brazilian bandSarcófago also pioneered the look, being dubbed byMetal Storm magazine as the first band with "true" corpse paint.[6] However,Necrobutcher insists that his band Mayhem was the first to use corpse paint and credits the band's singer Per "Dead" Ohlin with coining the term.[7] Early corpse paint was meant simply to highlight an individual's features and make them look "dead."
Bands of theearly Norwegian black metal scene used corpse paint extensively. Early vocalist of Mayhem Per "Dead" Ohlin started wearing it in the late 1980s. According to Necrobutcher, Mayhem's bass player: "It wasn't anything to do with the way Kiss and Alice Cooper used makeup. Dead actually wanted to look like a corpse. He didn't do it to look cool."[8] In the early 1990s, other Norwegian black metal bands followed suit and their style and sound was adopted by bands around the world. Eventually, someNorwegian bands—such asEmperor andSatyricon—stopped wearing corpse paint, often citing its loss of individualistic meaning, as well as its increased trendiness, due to use by so many bands.
