THE SAD WINGS

We are all familiar with Judas Priest, but we aren't all familiar with the Mexican band Abril (April). Apparently they begun their journey through rock history in 1984 and released their self-titled debut record in '88, four years after formation. Abril played very synthesizer driven hard rock with a few cool tunes I quite dig! But they also managed to play a few horrid notes as well, at least on the album in focus today: "Testamento", their second record, which took another six years to perfect.

So in 1994 Abril asked a person to do a nice cover for them, and so that person did! The cover for "Testamento" is great! Winged death holds a naked child, who just wants to rock with his guitar, in his hand, probably offering him the journey of his life.. Or more sadly; of his death.



But as you can see, I'm guessing the cover artist wasn't that confident about painting wings, so he thought it would save him some trouble borrowing the shape from Judas Priest's record "Sad Wings of Destiny" from 1976. No shame in that. It's not a total rip, I mean mostly just the shape right? Who ever did the cover did it good and should be proud. Actually the whole sleeve is great but unfortunately I couldn't find any version who could do it justice quality-wise on internet, but this will do:



You get the picture!

JACULA

Ever heard of a band named Jacula? Now days a lot of underground folks have, but did you know that a Italian erotic horror magazine also did exist with that same name, and that the (also) Italian prog-group borrowed their logo from that magazine!? You might as it is pretty easy to google. But now its official.

POWER FROM CHOCK

Let's head back to the comics department! Have you ever heard of a band called Onslaught and their cult record "Power from Hell"!? Yes you have! Or damn should!!

Apart from being an early thrash/death effort in the same vain as many other angry teens at the same time, Onslaught did something in the year of '85 only one other band did that year. They named a song "Death Metal". Who was the other band? Possessed of course! Funny thing though. Possessed has been, by many people, referred to as the first Death Metal band mostly for one reason only; they did a song called "Death Metal". Like with Venom's '82 gem "Black Metal". If it says "***** Metal" then it is "***** Metal"! Right? But the thing is "Seven Churches" was released in October '85 whilst "Power from Hell" was released in February '85 with a back cover that did not only have the mentioned song in the track list but also stated in big letters "Death Metal" and also sorted up the A side and B side by calling them "Death Side" and "Metal Side". What? So wait! Was Onslaught the first Death Metal band? No, probably not, but I wanted to state the obvious and now we are side-tracked because this is an completely different topic which will in the end as always be somewhat pointless.

And for the sake of it we should also name drop Vulcano and remember that they did a track called "Death Metal" too, but in '86, one year before their country men in Cova did the same on a demo. 

The album art for "Power from Hell" is one of those I would think to be original, but really shouldn't because they seldomly are.

 

As you can see it has some finesse to it. The axe carrying demon of the original has on Onslaughts cover a cozy little cloud of smoke emerging from the pentagram below. My example to the far right is from a Swedish horror magazine which published foreign comics. The one in the middle is the original which was probably featured in one of the comics which CHOCK re-published for us in the country of Bathory cavaliers.

...should also be mentioned that Suffocation used the whole image in 1990 for their first demotape.

UNFINISHED BLACK METAL

...to start off with the most obvious:

Exit 13 released in '95 a EP called "...Just a Few More Hits". As cover art they choose to redesign Venom's iconic album "Black Metal". Instead of a pentagram we get a (sweet) leaf and the goat enjoys a little dobbido whilst his eyes gets a little saggy. It's not brilliant but it's well done!! Of course they also exchanged the symbols on the horns. 666 became 13 and the turned cross a bong?

Now, the funny one is of course pictured first. Barrow Wight is a Heavy/Black Metal band according to metal-archives, but a heavy rock band according to themselves. Hailing from Canada these guys has their lyrics set on Tolkien and maybe a slice of clichés? Just guessing from titles such as "In League with Sauron" and "No Sleep till Gondor".
Pictured here is the compilation album entitled "Unfinished Tales". And yes, its Venom's goat in a helmet.



Music wise they do sound a lot like Celtic Frost, Venom and Bathory. Their logo is pretty cool but even that one is heavily inspired by Venoms own. But it's subtile enough to not come out as a rip-off.



And their up coming album is apparently going to be called "Kings In Sauron's Service", sounds familiar? But, why not I guess.

I recommend a listen as they are quite good, but I would have preferred a bit more seriousness.

THE VALLEY OF 1989

Ok.. So fuck it.. I wasn't that interested in unraveling all album covers associated with the works of Gustave Doré, as they are legion, and mostly boring as they are just "stolen". But I guess I will write about some, if they do have an interesting story, or historical ba-boom.

Gustave Doré was known for illustrating such adventure novels as Paradise Lost, Rime of the Ancient Mariner, The Divine Comedy and The Bible. The artwork in question today is from that latter book, The Vision of the Valley of Dry Bones:



So by now most of you would recognize this as the cover for Merciless debut record "The Awakening" from '90. Some of you might even know where we are going next with this post.



So to the left we have Merciless, to the right we have Sacred Crucifix demo from '89, the year "The Awakening" was recorded but yet not released. On the demo we see the watching man on the hill, which is obscured on "The Awakening" due to crop issues. But what I think is so fantastic about these two covers beyond the usage of the same picture is the name on Sacred Crucifix's demo: Realms of Darkness. Sounds familiar? It should as Merciless demo from '89 was entitled "Realm of the Dark". I mean, isn't that two great coincidences?

So, pushing forward. We have these beauties as well:



First the reissue of "The Awakening" on which they had the brilliant idea to mirror the cover and put some color on it. I mean, that's makes it a totally different cover right? I guess they knew about these other releases and wanted their album to stand out on this second coming.

The second is Monastery's EP from '92 "The Process: Church of the Final Judgement" which isn't just a cool title they made up, but actually was a cult worshiping both Jesus and Satan under the sign of a Swastika like symbol. What's funny about this one is that the Bassist and one of two Vocalists was Lars Rosenberg, mostly known for Carbonized and his time in Entombed (Crawl, Clandestine, Hollowman & Wolverine Blues) - pictured below:



Monastery was a band from the Netherlands with two members from Sinister plus Lars, the Swede. I think it's fair to assume that Lars knew who Merciless was and had heard or possible even owned their first album, so the question here is; why did they use the same album cover with Monastery?

Third we have Cat Rapes Dog, which is a brilliant band name and a Swedish Electropunk band. Pictured above is their first EP (not first release thou) from '89!!! Freaky.

Ah.. And I almost forgot that this atrocity also exists:



Jacob's Dream an american heavy metal band which released this album in 2000 through Metal Blade Records on CD, cover pictured to the left. Later on it got a vinyl treatment through No Remorse Record with an updated and possibly even uglier version of the cover art.

Strange how such respected labels do agree to this stupidity. At least they haven't copied the original right off but cut out just a part and added some other stolen (?) art... I guess..