Favorite Album Covers Thread

[FinalBaton]

Hell yeah, and I also inavriably have a thought for you when I stumble on the M-16 cover.

Especially since it has a song called Napalm in the Morning. That is such a BIL thing



Agent Orange cover is sick af also, of course. gunning down dem poor civilian fvks! HAHAHAHAHA

[BIL]

These brutal Kraut motherfuckers love their NAMsploitation Reminds me a bit of The Ramones' same

KNARRENHEINZ seems like an underrated mascot in the annals of metal.

[FinalBaton]

That is such funny coincidence you post this : I was just muling over this today. Asking myself if that soldier was considered a mascot by the band. If he was officially the same personna on those 2 records sleeves (I always assumed he was. but never saw the band acknowledge it).

Great bit in that interview :

''he's fighting for a peaceful world, [...] but he never gets it''.

Pretty profound and real and epic (and hard-hitting)stuff when you think about it.

[Obiwanshinobi]

The Blacks stand guarding peace
The Whites stand guarding peace
The Yellows stand guarding peace
The Reds stand fearing nothing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-Hr4eo ... .be&t=1073

[BIL]

That is such funny coincidence you post this : I was just muling over this today. Asking myself if that soldier was considered a mascot by the band. If he was officially the same personna on those 2 records sleeves (I always assumed he was. but never saw the band acknowledge it).

Great bit in that interview :

''he's fighting for a peaceful world, [...] but he never gets it''.

Pretty profound and real and epic (and hard-hitting)stuff when you think about it.

HE DRAWS STRENGTH FROM THIS PAIN (ASSASSINATING WITH THE HEAVY FIST )

He's had quite the run, easily suffered as much abuse as Eddie and Vic. At first I assumed In War And Pieces depicted a low point of his misadventures, but now I suspect he's just respawning on yet another futile battlefield. Either that or he's actually the guy in the background.

Favourite Heinz: after the collapse of the Soviet Olympics program, a bonanza of black market ROIDS und HGH fur das Hard Gay aktion! Now Heinz is so friggin manly, he can sell his blood to lesser, soft-dicked men!

The Blacks stand guarding peace
The Whites stand guarding peace
The Yellows stand guarding peace
The Reds stand fearing nothing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-Hr4eo ... .be&t=1073

Blimey, nice post! I was gonna ask "is that Polish reggae?" but didn't wanna sound like a dick, in case it was some storied genre of music I'm oblivious of (there are many ). Seems there's quite a scene, if I understand right from five minutes' googling.

Is that "red borscht with sausage" in the following track? Cracking tune either way The next one up "War Dance" is the real thing too. Got that drop leaf.

[Obiwanshinobi]

I was gonna ask "is that Polish reggae?" but didn't wanna sound like a dick, in case it was some storied genre of music I'm oblivious of (there are many ). Seems there's quite a scene, if I understand right from five minutes' googling.

Aye, Polish reggae-punky party (punk lyrics, reggae music in this case).

Is that "red borscht with sausage" in the following track? Cracking tune either way The next one up "War Dance" is the real thing too. Got that drop leaf.

I must admit your deciphering of it is more accurate than mine at some point. I used to (mis)undestand The Word as "meat" rather than "mit", but your version makes way more sense.

[Herr Schatten]

At first I assumed In War And Pieces depicted a low point of his misadventures, but now I suspect he's just respawning on yet another futile battlefield.

I'm pretty sure Knarrenheinz can't be killed. He will always return, as evidenced by the cover of Better Off Dead. (Incidentally, Sodom's best album, imho.)

[BIL]

Yeah, a definite "ghost of soldiers" vibe from Herr Heinz

[FinalBaton]

Better off dead is so sick, it has jumped towards the top of my list in the last year (I think I talked about that in the last Sodom discussion happening on here)

[Herr Schatten]

Fun fact: During my teenage years I had a poster with the Better Off Dead artwork adorning the wall of my room until one day I decided to cut it up and use parts of it to craft a fancy envelope for sending a love letter to a girl I had a huge crush on. Why we didn't end up becoming a couple still mystifies me.

[BIL]

Never liked this one, at all. Looks like some poor bastard's about to get his rusty sheriff's badge fisted. >_< Antiseptic and grim.

Spoiler

Now this is MUCH BETTER Look out Frau Nurse, he may not look it, but this man is ARMED AND READY

[andsuchisdeath]

[Herr Schatten]

No discussion about Sodom's output in a thread about album covers is complete without mentioning their 1988 live album Mortal Way of Live. The cover was done by renowned artist Sebastian Krüger. Warning: NSFW!

Spoiler

Krüger is better known for his elaborate caricatures of politicians and celebrities, but he did quite a few album covers. Below is just a small selection. I urge you to seek out his other stuff (not just the album covers), you're in for a treat. (I think BIL may enjoy Krüger's portrait of Mick Jagger entitled "Sticky Finger".)



^^ I seem to remember that this artwork was originally planned as a triptychon, but got cut down to these two 'tarot cards' due to timing constraints. I can't find a source for that information, though, so I might be totally wrong.









^^ This CD packaging was a digipak with an unusual altar folding that split the image right in the middle, so you could look at the left and right halves of the picture seperately or together by opening and closing the flaps.



^^ I love how Krüger interpreted the title "Dirty Surfaces" as "Dirty Surf-Aces" in this one. This is the third cover featuring the same gang of anthropomorphic animals Krüger did for Risk. Apparently, the band weren't really entirely happy with those covers, as they felt they made them appear as some kind of 'joke' band, while they were, in fact, very much a serious one in both music and lyrics. On the other hand, they didn't have the heart to turn down those awesome covers their record company had commissioned.

[BIL]

(I think BIL may enjoy Krüger's portrait of Mick Jagger entitled "Sticky Finger".)

Blimey. Spitting Image meets Gynoug.

MAD BUTCHER

Just when I think I've spotted all of Holy Diver's metal references...

[FinalBaton]

That Neurosis album sleeve is a perma-classic and very cool. Times of Grace is pretty iconic also.

And as a Québécois, I gotta salute the Gorguts pick. well done sir

[Obiwanshinobi]

To think that when I was a kid, I got to hear a song from Today Is the Day's Supernova album, when it was new, on the radio station just practically destroyed by authorities running the country about now. Those were the days when state-owned media had something of as mission.

[andsuchisdeath]

To think that when I was a kid, I got to hear a song from Today Is the Day's Supernova album, when it was new, on the radio station just practically destroyed by authorities running the country about now. Those were the days when state-owned media had something of as mission.

That's so cool.

Today is the Day had such a crazy sound for 1993 ( I mean Steve Austin never really stopped being crazy). Talk about being too vicious sounding for AmRep (that's no slight against the label!) too. Then again, I can't imagine an other larger independent label putting out that album at the time (Relapse hadn't branched too far outside of metal and grind in 1993, unless you count the output on "Release"). Too extreme for noise rock, more abrasive sounding than a lot of metal bands, yet hardly a metal band. And their songs were "conventional" enough where they likely wouldn't please people looking for general "avant grade" music. Oh, Willpower also has a great album cover too IMO.

That Neurosis album sleeve is a perma-classic and very cool. Times of Grace is pretty iconic also.

And as a Québécois, I gotta salute the Gorguts pick. well done sir

For sure! I agree Times of grace has become iconic (I guess I'm saying "has become" because I got into Neurosis maybe 6 months before that album was released. And I was a kid then...so idk..sometimes it just feels strange to feel old).

And well, although I'm a big Dan Seagrave fan in general, old Québécois death metal is some of my favorite dm (Gorguts, first two Cryptopsy full lengths, Kataklysm's Mystical Gate of Reincarnation).

[FinalBaton]

For sure! I agree Times of grace has become iconic.

And well, although I'm a big Dan Seagrave fan in general, old Québécois death metal is some of my favorite dm (Gorguts, first two Cryptopsy full lengths, Kataklysm's Mystical Gate of Reincarnation).

Awesome! I take it you know Martyr as well? if not then you definitely should and you absolutely need to hear them.

[andsuchisdeath]

Awesome! I take it you know Martyr as well? if not then you definitely should and you absolutely need to hear them.

Yeah I know them. I don't remembering liking them that much, but this was in like 2002/2003 . I'm assuming what I heard was material from Warp Zone (I had to look at their discogs page to know this).

I'll give their catalogue a chronological listen.

[andsuchisdeath]

Ok, so listened to Martyr's "Hopeless Hopes".

I hear a lot of Symbolic and Human in it, among other things which is cool. It's technical for sure. I guess I dislike the vocals.

I'm half way into Warp Zone now...

[Herr Schatten]

The Coroner covers are all excellent.

What's the third one in your post? It doesn't look familiar, but definitely interesting.

[Obiwanshinobi]

I see the context is ripe for Extreme Cold Weather by Messiah.



Just found these pictures on English Wikipedia...




...but I'm being reluctant to lend an ear, for their being Russian makes me suspect some aggressive "patriotism" behind it (which is a cultural bias, admittedly). I most likely heard them at least on the radio as a lad, though. The name's ringing a bell.

Metal sung in Russian is a necessity, I admit. Case in point - a Russian-singing, Metal-playing, FINNISH band named KYCPK (pretty cool, fan-made Russian video here). Terrifyingly good listened to whilst drunk.
Now, if anyone knows of any good Metal sung in ITALIAN, I'm all ears...

P.S. The film material used in that Demon video blatantly hints at The Demon Seated painting by Vrubel.

Spoiler

[FinalBaton]

For some hard to explain reason, this is a very classic record sleeve to many people. It is very striking and different when you pick a vinyl copy of this. At least it was when I picked mine. I'm not sure if it translates well to a digital thumbnail, but when you flip records in a bin and stumble upon this, it really leaves an impression compared to all the colourful sleeves.



I guess the possible symbolism of it is what get people.

Just having your head about the proverbial water, means that you are barely hanging on and most likely panicked. Add to that the fact that being at water is generally scary with the fear of drowning being very real and that you have this gulf underneath you.

Yet these four young men are facing the situation with bravado, laughing/chilling in the face of danger.

I guess it helps that it's a well composed shot, and a straight photo with no writing is something I hadn't seen often back then, especially a good pic like that. A cool band photo concept as well. Like if you asked a band to give you a promotional pic to add to your review and they gave you that, you'd be like ''Ohhh... this is a cool band pic''.

There's something eerie about it. It is also very stern and very harsh. And it perfectly compliments the mood of the record. There's something very in-your-face/defiant about it as well. As if the band is looking at you and defying you


I'm guessing most people will have heard this record (Spiderland, by Slint), but if you haven't, I highly suggest you do if you're into post-rock and post-hardcore, as it is a turning point for both those genres. it is also recommended to fans of noise rock and experimental rock and other genres that aims to make the listener feel uneasy and that have heavy atmospherics. Masters of tension these fellows are.

[BIL]

Fucken smooth tbh. Like a nihongo take on Lalo Schifrin's darkly grooving Dirty Harry score. Temari / Song of the Devil is gorgeous.

[Obiwanshinobi]

I don't know if this is what Who's Next's vinyl sleeve hides...



...but these are some professionally-taken photos, handsomely printed as well. Print quality is a thing I like about this time and age. Not too bad a CD reissue in general.

[CStarFlare]

http://i.imgur.com/OPuSAPNl.png

Fucken smooth tbh. Like a nihongo take on Lalo Schifrin's darkly grooving Dirty Harry score. Temari / Song of the Devil is gorgeous.

This has been popping up in my youtube recommends a lot lately. I'll give it a spin.

[BIL]

Interested to hear what you think I love stuff like this, but it tends to come to me, rather than the reverse - besides Schifrin's Dirty Harry, the other score I was thinking of is YACK's Elevator Action Returns. The roots of all this breezy, subtly menacing jazz for hardboiled fiction, I'm cheerfully in the dark about, I just know I enjoy it when it comes along.

[orange808]

Will he apologise? He does like to lecture. But, will he apologise?
[img]
https://i.imgur.com/2QdsiXo.jpg
[/img]

[CStarFlare]

Interested to hear what you think I love stuff like this, but it tends to come to me, rather than the reverse - besides Schifrin's Dirty Harry, the other score I was thinking of is YACK's Elevator Action Returns. The roots of all this breezy, subtly menacing jazz for hardboiled fiction, I'm cheerfully in the dark about, I just know I enjoy it when it comes along.

Finally gave it a listen. From the get-go I was thinking how it was giving me Inugami Family vibes, but thought maybe that's just the defining sound of that era of Japanese film music. Then 35 minutes in it actually contains 犬神家の一族 (with a couple more Inugami tracks apparently on an expanded edition as bonus tracks), so maybe there's a connection here.

I've enjoyed Inguami's soundtrack for a decade or more at this point (every once in a while I toy with the idea of snagging a vinyl copy, but they're damn spendy). This hits some of the same pleasure centres in the brain but I think I prefer Inugami's darker vibe is more my style - Kindaichi has too much energy to fully pull me under.

[BrainΦΠΦTemple]

been diggin' these ones a lOt lately