So Thy Art Is Murder is releasing their new album, Holy War on June 30th with the artwork above. Our friends at MetalSucks joked it was a tribute to vocalist Chris McMahon's love of pullovers.
But it turns out this was not the band's first choice for an album cover. Turns out this is what they wanted the cover to be:
Obviously, with the state of world affairs, I can see the label and management not being okay with this. I can see retailers like Best Buy, Wal Mart and iTunes refusing to carry something with such controversial album art. So it wouldn't be best for business. Guitarist Andy Marsh went on to explain:
“We wanted Holy War to be our most confronting release to date. From the moment the album title was conceived and the lyrics were born we had a distinct vision that the album cover artwork must be equally as confronting, as scary, and as real as what we are about as a band. Unfortunately after circulating our intended album cover around to the distributors and retailers, and after several meetings with the label and those we all work with, we were told we would have to cover the image, or choose a different cover.
Not wanting to alter our desired cover in any way shape or form, we opted to contain it within the album packaging and roll with one of the other images from the layout. Here it is in all its magnificent glory, a child for every religion that has indoctrinated the young and disadvantaged, and sent them off to war and bloody death without cause or reason. This album is for them.”
Are you looking forward to Holy War?
[via ThePRP]
