Our Worst Album Cover Of The Year Tournament’s quarterfinals begin with the last battle in our We Aren’t The World Bracket. In one corner, you have Megadeth’s Photoshopped-out-the-wazoo debutante ball for their new-look Vic Rattlehead; in the other, you have PJ Olsson’s crying, nose-picking, 9/11-remembering cherub. Given the hilarious comments that both these covers have inspired in the past, this may be our toughest race of all four of our quarterfinal matchups! Vote after the jump.
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The Worst Album Cover Of The Year Tournament Weeps For Us All
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I dunno, the weird 90’s college soft rock angel or the very poorly Photoshopped ABOMINATION? Sorry Megadeth, every bad 9-11 tribute in the world won’t distract me from your very UN-METAL album cover, which looks like real artwork under a hideous filter.
Real artwork wins every time.
Both are terrible. At the end of the day, it’s got to be the Megadeth cover for having a color scheme that reminds me vomit after a night spent eating Doritos and ramen and drinking the blue raspberry Mad Dog 20/20.
@Chris N.: Oh man. Looks like Musatine got a copy of Poser! =(
Does the teardrop mean the angel baby killed a member of a rival angel gang? Or is he mourning for his homey?
@Bob Loblaw: 2) The artist fails to understand Manhattan spatially. THE WTC WAS NOT IN MURRAY HILL.
I noted that in the last round. It’s like the artist figured people wouldn’t figure out it was supposed to be Manhattan, so he just threw the two beams in there after the fact, geography be damned.
With the two covers side-by-side, it looks a few of the little angel babies are coming out of the fire trails on the UA cover. Can we just call this one a draw?
OK. Megadeth has an angel maybe helping to blow up the UN. Olsson has a giant disproportioned baby angel shedding a single tear over the WTC while a bunch of midget angels swarm in to attack (or help protect?) the Empire State building, all in a muddled NYC geography. How is this a contest?
The Megadeth cover is bad, but kind of in the same way every metal album cover for the last 14 or so years has been bad. Aimless use of Photoshop to a confusing end doesn’t really bother me so much any more.
It’s clear that whoever designed PJ Olsson cover went to the trouble of PAINTING THAT HORRIBLE IMAGE! American Scream should be winning this in a landslide, but whatevs.
@Bob Loblaw:
Fair points on 1 through 4. But I don’t think it’s hideously ugly…of course, there’s an artist in my city (Ottawa) that specializes in this kind of art, and (s)he is constantly leaving tags of this sort of thing all over the place, so I think I’ve just become immune to anything that looks like this.
I’m not seeing any screaming going on in that American Scream cover, but I’m certainly seeing an abomination in that Megadeath cover. Megadeath for the win!
Doesn’t one tear mean that angel murdered someone in prison? Fact check me please.
I think Nugent/Mustaine is shaping up to be the final showdown…
tough call. Megadeth wins (loses?) for looking like the cover to a really bad 1st-person shooter for a P100 or a SNES. Also, the clumsiness of the title pun which makes me wonder what the word ABOMI means.
It’ll be the battle that militamen and citizen border guards will remember for years to come.
I think the holidays have washed the cynicism out of my system. Neither of these covers are as rotten as they used to be. The angel’s almost cute with those pudgy legs of his.
Still, Olsson wins. American Scream is such a lame name.
@BakerStreetSaxSolo: I see where you’re coming from on the video game thing.
Personally, I think it looks like a poor man’s Iron Maiden record cover.
Not really a contest here. I sense a Megadeth/Nuge showdown as well.
I really wish I could see why so many people hate American Scream. I wouldn’t say I like it, but there’s no way it was one of the Top 8 worst covers of the year…
The artwork for both is too beautifully atrocious to settle this. I think it should come down to who does the corny-est word play. So I give it to PJ.
i voted for olsson because there’s searchlights in the sky and they’re NOT pointing at the giant baby that’s trying to snort the needle. also, who snorts needles? somebody that obviously has no concept of how to ingest their drugs, that’s who.
I voted for Megadeth because I’m against violence to angels.
@matthew: 1) Unless you’re a Native American
mourning the destruction of his natural habitat, you have no cause to
be using the Single Tear.
2) The artist fails to understand Manhattan spatially. THE WTC WAS NOT IN MURRAY HILL.
3) More than one person thought that “American Scream” is a clever play on words.
4) Who is the big angel? God? The artist? Europe, sadly watching us
from the moral highground? I don’t know if this guy’s American or
European, but given his name, the whole thing makes me feel a little
defensive “America, fuck yeah!” in response, which is weird for me.
5) It’s just fucking ugly.
No, this is a poor man’s Iron Maiden cover:
[en.wikipedia.org]
from the United Abominations wikipedia page:
“The album artwork features a new incarnation of Vic Rattlehead chosen from a deviantART contest, the entry which finished in 11th place.”
Really?
Fuller size: [ecx.images-amazon.com]
I think we have a winner.
This is by far the toughest matchup so far. I voted for American Scream, for two reasons (I know - only two!): first, at least you can tell that the Megadeth album is a metal album. I mean, it’s apocolyptic and chaotic and so on some idiotic level it at least succeeds there. The Olsen album, on the other hand, is baffling. Second reason: after seeing this album through two or three rounds now, I never noticed there was a 9/11 tribute going on. An abominable cover that can continually surprise you in new abominable ways just can’t be denied.
A duel for the ages. It’s a tough call, but I hate angels. Vote PJ.
Megadeth makes it easy for you to choose…they stamp the word “abomination” right on the artwork!