How much does artwork influence you?

[Bigmac]

I find Reinkaos to be quite interesting actually.

The whole album is full of symbolism including the cover. That 11 pointed star symbolizes the 11 Anti  Cosmic gods of Jon's beliefs. Same reasoning behind the album having 11 songs.

Also the Omega symbol instead of the 'O' in Reinkaos, seems to have been his way to tell people that this was his end. I guess Reinkaos (The Return to Chaos) does that too. So he used the album cover to openly tell people of his impending suicide.

Bit of a mad one for sure.

Insightful perceptions there man,.was oblivious to any of that I have to say

Yeah there's a wealth of things to delve into when it comes to that album. It really does tend to be overlooked.

The particular current he followed is know as Current 218 (2+1+8=11), which is the gematric value of Azerate, the collective name of the 11 Anti Cosmic gods.

The first song, Nexion 218 only has one line: "Zazas Zazas Nasatanada Zazas!", which has the letter 'a' appear 11 times.

Incidentally, in Crowley's Liber 418, the above phrase is the 11th note in the chapter it appears in.

There's loads more fascinating things like that dotted throughout the album.

[Pedrito]

  good point Chris. Well King of the Dead has enough of a thrown together look, matched with sheer epic 'hold your hammers high'ness to be a perfect storm, but yes, it sort of makes a balls of my argument, and at the same time, is possibly the perfect example of my original point. The great thing about it is that it's not bland or boring. Does it make sense? Well not really. But at least it's trying to say 'something', whatever that something actually is. It definitely works when that bass riff for Master of the fucking Pit starts, and them vocal kick in 'praayy never kneel..'...yesss!! Massive bicep flexing and Arnold/Conan poses ensue.

Iced Earth a band with some very iffy looking imagery, and yet it seems to work too.

A good example for me would be the 'too clean' looking Solstice reissues. I thought the green cover Halycon was so cool and mysterious and the new one doesn't hold the same appeal.

[Pedrito]

Big fan of Dissection but what the fuck is an anti cosmic god? Something like Kthulu? Somethjng that goes around destroying planets like the lad from the Avengers?

[Bigmac]

From my understanding, they use a Qlippothic apprach to their beliefs, which is essentially the nightside of the Kabbalah.

While the Kabbalah has 10 Sephiroth, the Qlippoth has 11 Qlippah, if I remember correctly it's something to do with D'aath also being counted.

But anyway, each of the 11 Qlippah are assigned a 'God', which seems to be an archetypal representation of a particular stage of consciousness.

So when calling on a 'God', it seems to be something along the lines of using an archetypal image to presence some sort of change in the practitioner. Perhaps calling or awakening something from our collective unconscious, or maybe even tied into Jung's idea of manifesting our shadow selves.

I really don't know is the best answer I guess, most of these things tend to have an esoteric meaning to them.

[Trev]

Dream Theater Images and Words..again, concept, music, art.

Love that album but always hated that artwork, just not a fan of the Hugh Syme style covers

[Kurt Cocaine]

From my understanding, they use a Qlippothic apprach to their beliefs, which is essentially the nightside of the Kabbalah.

While the Kabbalah has 10 Sephiroth, the Qlippoth has 11 Qlippah, if I remember correctly it's something to do with D'aath also being counted.

But anyway, each of the 11 Qlippah are assigned a 'God', which seems to be an archetypal representation of a particular stage of consciousness.

So when calling on a 'God', it seems to be something along the lines of using an archetypal image to presence some sort of change in the practitioner. Perhaps calling or awakening something from our collective unconscious, or maybe even tied into Jung's idea of manifesting our shadow selves.

I really don't know is the best answer I guess, most of these things tend to have an esoteric meaning to them.

If I was to hazard a guess. I'd say he simply spent too much time on the hash.

[blessed1]

I love how much the artwork can enhance or even influence your experience of an album and I've often been turned on or turned off an album because of good or bad artwork. 

you hardly listened to an album that was unreal but had bad artwork and decided you didnt like the music because of it?
maybe im reading what you said wrong.

[Thorn]

Those Holy Terror  albums are a real case in point here alright, great tunes, have em on C-90 cassette copies since forever. Been eying up the  the pic discs in the Invictus store for a while now, any sort of half decent art and logo would have seen them snapped up ages ago.

[Eoin McLove]

I love how much the artwork can enhance or even influence your experience of an album and I've often been turned on or turned off an album because of good or bad artwork. 

you hardly listened to an album that was unreal but had bad artwork and decided you didnt like the music because of it?
maybe im reading what you said wrong.

Yes indeed you are.

[Pedrito]

From my understanding, they use a Qlippothic apprach to their beliefs, which is essentially the nightside of the Kabbalah.

While the Kabbalah has 10 Sephiroth, the Qlippoth has 11 Qlippah, if I remember correctly it's something to do with D'aath also being counted.

But anyway, each of the 11 Qlippah are assigned a 'God', which seems to be an archetypal representation of a particular stage of consciousness.

So when calling on a 'God', it seems to be something along the lines of using an archetypal image to presence some sort of change in the practitioner. Perhaps calling or awakening something from our collective unconscious, or maybe even tied into Jung's idea of manifesting our shadow selves.

I really don't know is the best answer I guess, most of these things tend to have an esoteric meaning to them.

If I was to hazard a guess. I'd say he simply spent too much time on the hash.

It's definite stoner waffle territory alright 

[Pedrito]

Those Holy Terror so albums are a real case in point here alright, great tunes, have em on C-90 cassette copies since forever. Been eying up the  the pic discs in the Invictus store for a while now, any sort of half decent art and logo would have seen them snapped up ages ago.

The artwork suits the album vibe but it's ugly as a granny's fanny

[Ducky]

Dream Theater Images and Words..again, concept, music, art.

Love that album but always hated that artwork, just not a fan of the Hugh Syme style covers

I am a cast iron Rush fanboy of the highest order, but it kinda pains me Syme has done most of their covers - absolute shite, every single one of them.

In fact, I think my early reticence to check out the band came from how utterly crap their albums look. Now I know they're different genres, but recall being in a record shop when I was first getting into music and looking at Live After Death and Permanent Waves... No prizes for guessing what I bought that day (the gas thing is "Freewill" from Permanent Waves is possibly my favourite song, but it took me years to get around to it).

[Pedrito]

You'd stare at Love after Death for hours. Somewhere in time too..class. Rush didn't come around until I was in my early 20's and I found the artwork on Permanent Waves especially to be refreshing. They have some shockers though.

Another band I love who are guilty of poor covers are Fates Warning.

Could easily throw Metal Church into the mix. Not sure they even have a decent cover apart from the first album. Imagine Blessing in Disguise, with a quality cover, it would have that extra half star on every review. Amazing album, nothing to write home about cover.

[O Drighes]

Great mentions of covers here so far but let's remember that Cirith Ungol's, Sepultura's Beneath the Remain, Morbid Angel's Blessed are the sick and many others mentioned here were not actually done for the band, but pieces of work already done taken to illustrate their albums. Great covers indeed, but far from having been made in conjunction with the band's work. Take the overuse of "Triumph of Death" painting's detail on metal covers, it just works on any given metal album.

There are so many bands that had my attention just because of the cover, but then again, so many good albums with shitty covers too (anyone thinking of Infernal Majesty here? That cover put me off for years).

I particularly like when minimalistic covers hit the spot, so more fond of BM imagery than any other style even if many have used older paintings themselves (a.k.a. the whole Norwegian scene), but proper artists doing covers have outdone themselves lately. Personally, I think Paolo Girardi and Eliran Kantor's talent should be praised by a much wider audience than the metal community, given the quality of their work. Has anyone seen the new Bloodbath's cover? That piece should be in a gallery, worth the millions they often pay for fucking rubbish done by the "politically engaged artists".

[Pentagrimes]

Kinda ties in with the Voivod thread but  seeing ads for their early albums' artwork in Metal Hammer as a nipper before I'd actually heard them  was a huge  part of the allure for me. Those records really do go hand in hand with the sleeves. My three favourite Death Metal records are  "Soulside Journey", "Lost Paradise" and "Morbid Tales" and in both cases the covers are inextricable from the music for me, and are a huge part of those records.

And anyone who wasn't suckered into Carcass the minute they saw the cover of "Reek" back in the day is straight up lying

I see less of it now but I loved when a band would stick with one artist for their sleeves, and that artist would create a world for that particular band (eg Maiden, Megadeth,etc). Bring back mascots I say!