When drawing goes wrong pt2.

I am going to put it out there and say that it was pretty sweet seeing the level of response to the previous bad artwork post. Then the remedial prison, rehabilitation art ball rolled into the MS Paint album covers post, which we all agree was beyond awesome. To quote the head honcho, " we have the best goddamn motherfucking readers on the entire Internet, you guys rule."

On that slushy note, here is another selection of some of my favourite "bad art" album covers. Once again. Despite a complete lack of art skill and in some cases complete lack of human anatomy, I do hold a certain level of respect for these awesome images.

Pretty obvious what these guys think about all the time isn't it? I can wager it isn't being in a band.

God bless the Scorpions for consistently proving themselves to be guitar wielding numb skulls of the highest order. I have a slight bit of respect for the German chumps over the fact that when it comes to making some sort of statement, The Scorpions are always going to express it at a unbelievably low level of both class and awareness. With Animal Magnetism they surpassed themselves and wouldn't manage to beat it until 1996 when they hit us with this guy.....

See what I mean, deep stuff.

Future barbarian, biker, outlaw judge? Who knows but Battle Axe. They charged into the art the same way they approach they're sweet metal jams. With more enthusiasm than skill.

I really dig this one. Its just an awesome image. Plain and simple. Of course maybe the artist wasn't exactly up to the job but I am letting it slide.

It was mentioned last time so here it is. I never thought I would say this but Metal Magic really was a step up for these guys after Projects In The Jungle.

Karisma with a "K". Pretty sure that's a rabid walrus either escaping from some kind of imprisonment or just hanging out. Awesome.

Yes, that is a skull faced nudist raising a severed penis above its head atop a volcano. Thanks for noticing.

Everyones favourite NWOBHM never was's prove that you shouldn't fear evil. Fear death and badly drawn skulls instead.

Some evil, Christ baiting black metal? No? Oh sorry my mistake. You look like your having far to much fun at camp to be actual black metallers. She most certainly is having far to much fun streaking for Satan.

You shouldn't really expect too much when diving into the putrid trough of goregrind/pornogrind nonsense, its meant to be offensive. But this certainly plumbs some stinky depths.

Another one mentioned last time and its a cracker. Really what can you say about this? 

Once again, Any of you guys want to throw some more into the ring? We are open to suggestions for any you can think of to top these.

VOMITORY - Redemption (1999)

The Swedish have always been pretty handy at this death metal lark. If you asked someone to compile a list of favourite death metal bands then surely at least one would be Swedish. Its just the law of averages. Today's post, Vomitory, are Swedish and play death metal.

Redemption is the follow up to the primitive Swede-death brutality of  1996's debut, Raped In Their Own Blood. Catchy stuff, but Vomitory refined the brutality and blasted those teenage Venom and Slayer influences into shape with this album. Catchy, thrashing buzzsaw guitars, drums that shift between all out blasting and d-beat, some monstrous breakdowns and those depth of hell vocals combine with a pretty flawless production job courtesy of Henrik Larsson. From the opening blast of "The Voyage" to the crushing tempo shifting finish of "Partly Dead", there is no let up whatsoever. Swedish death wins again.

GET IT

Encyclopedia Metallum

BRUTALITY

Desekrator - Metal for Demons (1998)

If you have not heard of Desekrator, then you must! These guys rule! I mean, with an awesome band name like that they are guaranteed to rule, am I not correct?! Desekrator were formed as a side-project in Bergen, Norway in 1996. The group formed mainly for shits-and-giggles apparently, and consisted of none other than Ivar Bjornson and Grutle Kjellson of Enslaved fame, Infernus and Tormentor of Gorgoroth fame, and a few other local Bergen all-star bros. They released a demo and a single but only managed to put out one full length on Hammerheart Records.

So what do they sound like, you ask? I'm not really sure to be honest. This is no fancy metal, not by any means! Ha! I've heard gutter punks off Haight Street in SF produce better tunes than this... OK, well perhaps that is an overstatement. Honestly, they remind me of a black metal version of Cranium in a way, only with a more drunken and less focussed direction, sort of like that one band from that one city... What were they called again??

Hey, there are some similarities! Just sayin'...

Desekrator are listed as "thrash" but they're all over the place really. The closest I can describe them is a combination of Cranium and Gorgoroth, with elements similar to Plaag and Tankard perhaps... Actually, I have no way of describing Desekrator accurately. Perhaps this is due to the fact that I only listen to them when I'm drunk? Hmm...

Anyways, certain tracks are solid and well executed while others are intentionally chaotic if not sloppy (ironically akin to something I vaguely remember recording back when I was 15 years old). With song titles like "Texas Joe", "Take us to the Pub", and "Revenge of the Hellhammer" you can't expect anything more than pure ingenious decadence I suppose.

It's obvious that these guys were doing this for a few laughs. Nothing beyond the seriousness of their more established bands at least. In either case, this is an overlooked album with respect to the Norwegian scene.

It's nice to see some of black metal's elite take a break from their kvlt status and have a little fun. I'm not sure if they had intentions to continue this gig or if this was a one-off thing but if you dig your metal on the less serious-side of things, you're sure to dig this!

The best way to listen to this album is when you find yourself completely hammed and want to piss off your neighbor or roommate. If there was a soundtrack to hell this may very well be it, particularly when your roommate is hammed and cranking it at 2am (try falling asleep to it, it just doesn't work).
Point is, this is a great album to throw on to piss off your lady friend and impress your bros with.

This is metal for drunkards. This is metal for bros.

This is metal for demons.

Buy here and here.

Metallum / Last.FM

Karma To Burn - Almost Heathen

Words cannot begin to describe how much I uphold this album! It simply rocks! I recently found it on vinyl at a record store here in my hometown. I remember getting a copy of this album when I did my stint as a DJ at KHSU-FM and while it wasn't technically "metal", I could not stop listening to it! There's crushing, doomy riffage abound, no vokills, a classic rock vibe, and a steady and even paced drive to this recording that blends itself well with the band's overall approach. And for going against the norm even further, they have numbers in the place of song titles! What more could one ask for? Unfortunately, and probably due to the promo coming in a "slip-disc" case (i.e. cardboard sleeve, no jewel case), my CD version is scratched to shit thus I was stoked when I happened across it in vinyl form. I almost figured they were no longer together so I was surprised the band was listed as still 'active' on Metal-Archives and even more surprised that they released a new album titled, V in 2011.

Hailing from West Virginia, Karma To Burn show both their southern roots and their influences on Almost Heathen. They are an obscure band. Roadrunner initially picked them up, and they were forced to record their debut with a vocalist at the demand of the the record company. Almost Heathen was put out by Spitfire Records and this gave the band a bit more freedom to do what they wanted. They have since left Roadrunner and moved to greener pastures at Napalm Records. They are completely instrumental and it's a breath of fresh air to listen to something without vocals (I'm a vocalist, so bear with me here). This album rocks on so many levels! This is what "stoner metal" is all about! (In my opinion at least).

Fans of Corrosion Of Conformity, Down, High On Fire, Dragged By Horses, Machete, Pentagram, and the like will undoubtedly like this album.

So without further ado, I am simply going to allow you the chance to check it out for yourself. I'll even give you a download link (how's that for being nice?!) just don't be a a complete hippie and simply download it... Buy it man, dude! (Wait, I'm asking the IllCon readership to do what again? Ha! I must be high...)

Buy here

Download here

Metallum/Last.FM

Website/Myspace

Blue Öyster Cult - s/t (1972)

And you may be wondering to yourself why you should give this a chance. A reader of this fine blog, obviously worldly and well-schooled by their choice of internet diversion, probably thinks they know the score. But seriously, forget whatever associations you may have picked up over the years. Forget “Godzilla”. Forget the accrued distaste classic rock can leave in a young punk or metalhead in the middle of nowhere, when such things are deemed normative and your Morbid Angel or Dead Kennedys t-shirt is seen as an indicator of the worst sin imaginable: that of difference. And for fuck's sake, forget Christopher Walken and cowbells. Forget all these things and the genius of the first Blue Öyster Cult record can make its grandeur known to you (well, really any BÖC from the '70s is pretty killer, but the first one is heads and tails beyond any of 'em).

Consider:

• The use of umlauts in a band name – How many rock bands did this before BÖC? I can count on a closed fist. How many did it after? Couldn't count on all the fingers in the world.

• The band's name itself – taken from a poem by manager Sandy Pearlman referencing a group of aliens who secretly control Earth's affairs.

• The band's logo – taken from an alchemical symbol denoting lead (the heaviest of metals).

• The (unsubstantiated but hopefully true) rumor that, during the early '90s the band's popularity had plunged to the point where their show guarantee was $200. I've seen bands play living rooms and get paid more than that. Meaning, that at one point in time, it was conceivable that Blue Öyster Cult could have played your living room. They didn't. And probably wouldn't. But it's closer to the realm of possibility than with many comparable bands.

Alchemy? Aliens guiding mankind's destiny? Umlauts? I'm actually surprised this record hasn't gotten any coverage on Illcon before. Theirs is a weird shadow world, a world of Satanic biker gangs (“Transmaniacon MC”), of drug deals gone fatally wrong (“Then Came The Last Days Of May” - apparently based on the murder of three of singer Buck Dharma's friends [and let's consider that name for a minute – how many rock and roll frontmen had a name that was a play on words regarding the transcendence of several religions' concept of universal harmony and balance? It's fucking brilliant in a way that such showbiz rechristenings pretty much never are]), of the power of music as destroyer (“Cities On Flame With Rock And Roll”) and redeemer (“Redeemed”). And then along the way a few detours into bondage-inclined Canadian Mounties, astrological/alchemical musings, and what seems to be a paean to violent foot fetishism.

This.

It can be difficult to understand how to take this weird cross-pollination of ideas. It could be that they were simply trying to move past the initial era when rock and roll had to mean something (maaaaan), before the conceptual side of the music that had started so innocently bloated up into prog rock's worst excesses. But I like to think that there was a more unified vision at work, a manifestation of the dark turn that the era of peace and love had taken by 1972. Perhaps not exactly a literal representation (though much of the drug-related material seems to have had some basis in the tangible world) but an extrapolated vision of star-crossed losers, the ones who had cast their lot with the aspiring world-changers and had come up radically short. It's an almost Pynchonian narrative, a nebulous cluster of ideas in which connecting lines are not drawn for the listener, one that might seem like a forced, inchoate melange of weird-for-weird's-sake iconography if it weren't for the fact that it's treated with some degree of gravity.

Not this. Never this.

While BÖC was intended to be the American Black Sabbath, rarely did their debut album indulge in that kind of heaviness (“Cities On Flame...” is about as close as it comes). Instead, the band showcases a musical versatility that their later albums lack. There are a few musical detours, some jaunty, syncopated lounge jazz rhythmic devices, some lead guitar work that almost sounds like it could've come from a Buck Owens song – but the real heaviness is a sort of slow and eerie atmosphere that sounds like the sonic equivalent of a lava lamp and a black light, Sabbathian only in the sense that it's not far removed from “Planet Caravan.”

So let the good name of Blue Öyster Cult be clearly understood. Scour the dollar bins for copies of this record (but don't pay more than five dollars, if you do you're almost as foolish as somebody who doesn't own the album at all). Let rock and roll raze our cities and let the messages of lust and derangement guide our puny lives as our alien overlords had so obviously intended.

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Blue Öyster Cult -s/t