Gallery: The Beauty and Total Illegibility of Extreme Metal Logos
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Mark Riddick gave us his picks for the logos that set the bar for metal bands in the 1980s and '90s. Slayer's logo from its first album is a classic thrash metal aesthetic.
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As is thrash metal band Overkill with its sharp, clean lines.
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Christophe Szpajdel's logo for Norwegian black metal band Emperor adapts and streamlines classic middvil blacklister font. Note the evil eye in the lowercase "e."
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The logo of death metal band Absu is classic death metal: intricate, hand-drawn, ominous and barely legible.
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Riddick notes that Demilich's logo from 1990 was one of the first to incorporate nature. "The logo was unconventional for its time which completely speaks to Demilich’s unconventional and technical approach to song-writing," he says. "The Demilich logo was undoubtedly ahead of its time."
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Unleashed's logo from 1989 is one of Riddick's favorites for its balance of beauty and ugliness. "The overall imagery is precise and symmetrical, the inverted cross being the center point, flanked by clean and straight lines, soft fish hook-like curves, and finished off with an outline stroke that’s completely oozing with phlegm," he says.
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Autopsy's death metal logo reeks of gore with its mucus-dripping lettering.
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Dissection's logo from 1989 borrows stylistic tics from death, black, and thrash metal.
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Swedish band Katatonia's logo incorporates blackletter type and a pentagram. Classic.
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Voivod's logo was drawn by the band's drummer, who also designed the band's album covers. Riddick notes its a departure from typical thrash metal logos with a slightly sci-fi feeling.
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Carcass' logo has a thrash metal vibe that take a detour with the slight pen strokes. "The logo becomes quite chaotic and almost gruesome, much like their musical approach early on," Riddick says. "The string-like drips cluttering the logo eventually serves as an important reference point for many future death metal band logos."
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Sepultura, a thrash metal band from the 1980s, feels distinctly Metallica with the sharp horns framing the entire logo.
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"Morbid Angel, one of the earliest death metal bands, adopted some inspiration from the thrash metal genre with the use of an outline stroke and sharp edges—akin to Sepultura’s logo," he says.
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Riddick says Destruction's use of a 3-D element infers speed and power..
