MEGADETH’S TH1RT3EN ALBUM ART: VIC RATTLEHEAD TURNS HIS BACK ON YOU

We got an almost funny number of e-mails complaining about the title of Megadeth’s new album, TH1RT3EN*, after it was announced. And, yes, it’s a very silly album title, and, yes, it seems to be stolen and only slightly altered from the name of a very boring horror movie. But, really, what does it matter? I thought The System Has Failed was overrated, but United Abominations was pretty good, and Endgame was a complete return to form for ‘Deth. If Mustaine and company can maintain (or maybe even surpass) that level of quality, they could call the album We <3 Hollywood Undead and it wouldn’t bother me that much.

Now the band has unveiled the cover art for TH1RT3EN, and, uh, okay. I know I’m one of the last .0001% of the population that actually cares about cool album art, and like I was just saying, if the record is good it really doesn’t matter, but… yeah this is pretty much a total bummer. The concept isn’t necessarily terrible, but the execution… maybe it’ll look better when the large, high-res version is released, but right now it looks like someone who isn’t very good at Photoshop (like me!) cut out the image of Vic and pasted it onto something else. This is the kind of sloppy thing unsigned bands usually send us — not legends like ‘Deth.

In fact, I actually prefer the cover art for the first single from the album, “Public Enemy No. 1”:

TH1RT3EN comes out November 1 on Roadrunner, and hopefully it’s good enough that we forget all about the album art.

-AR

*You have to capitalize the title, or otherwise it looks that much more ridiculous. Th1rt3en. See?