Words by David C. Obenour
Hidden down inside the darkened places. Crawled from out the burrowed maze of catacombs on the plains. The only places that remain free of the hideous glare simultaneously omitting from the sky and deep within the earth. Once majestic cathedrals are long since infested and desecrated. Reality warps the creation of man and maker.
Through the art of longtime collaborator, Matt Stikker, the world has been crafted and corrupted in each listener’s mind before the cling wrap has even been pulled from Witch Vomit’s most recent and most brutal, Funeral Sanctum. The Portland death metal band’s third album, but fourth release to bear Stikker’s artwork, the songs and art together continue to etch a vision of ferocity within the darkness.
Off Shelf: Starting broadly, what do you enjoy about making art for metal albums? Moreso than maybe any other genre, why do you think there is such a connection between the art and music?
Matt Stikker: I love doing album art, and I’m fortunate that I get to do a fair amount of it. The visual component of metal is such a big part of what makes it what it is, and it’s what initially drew me in when I was a kid. Probably because metalheads are a relatively small community, we like to literally put that part of our identity on our sleeve and make ourselves visible to one another. While you don’t necessarily want to judge it outright, you can always identify a metal album by its cover in the record store bin, and the specific look of an album can both convey the sound of the record and give it context. That’s what’s enjoyable about collaborating with metal bands to me, the way that the cover art and the record itself play off each other and combine to define the aesthetic of the album. It’s very much an artistic collaboration in a way that most other commission projects are not.
OS: You’ve been working with Witch Vomit for a number of albums now, I believe this is at least your fourth for them? As a music fan, what do you appreciate about them?
MS: Yeah, I’ve done a bunch of work with these guys and it’s a privilege. Atmosphere and intensity, I appreciate the riffs that go right up the gut but there’s a lot of depth and grandiosity to the songwriting that they’ve embraced more with each release. And they shred, they kick ass live, there’s nothing not to like!
OS: How did you start working with them?
MS: I’ve known Vinnie and Tony for a long time, an old band of mine played with their high school band back in the day so I’ve been aware of Witch Vomit since the very beginning. I did the artwork for the “Webs of Horror” demo tape and maybe did a t-shirt or something back then. In any event, they approached me initially about working together and much to my delight every couple years they keep coming back to me.
OS: What is your collaborative process with them like? Do any of the members share concepts or ideas? Lyric sheets or music in advance?
MS: It’s a pretty ideal process, in that they typically come to me with a solid rough idea and let me run with it. They aren’t afraid to let me work out how to express their subject. As an artist it’s easier when clients have at least a basic starting point for me to work off of, and most bands do come to me with something in mind because metal is such a visually-oriented genre. For “Funeral Sanctum” I think we started with just the general idea of a monumental, evil cathedral type building and they knew right off the bat they wanted that old-school blue aesthetic so it came together really smoothly.
OS: Working together for so long, do you see your pieces existing together? Are they part of the same world or universe? Is there a continuing storyline?
MS: I can’t really say there’s a specific narrative continuity but since they’ve all been done with a similar atmosphere in mind they all share a certain visual vocabulary. Different facets of the same nightmare, maybe.
OS: The cover for Funeral Sanctum seems to be some sort of cavernous vista and an entombed cathedral at the edge of a deep and glowing chasm, backlit with a swirl vortex and winged creatures. That’s just what I see though – what did you envision as the surrounding story for what’s happening in, around, before and after this illustration?
MS: Yeah, that’s it! I guess I don’t approach artwork with a specific narrative or story in mind and more in terms of trying to evoke a particular visceral response—dread, majesty, a perversion of reality. I think we’ve moved increasingly in that direction over their last few releases to match the progression of the music. Or maybe I’m just conveying it more successfully now. [laughs]
OS: How do you feel taking in the cover prepares the listener to experience Funeral Sanctum?
MS: Like any album cover you hope it draws the listener in, there’s a component of mystery and sort of terrified awe to the concept the band presented that hopefully comes across in the artwork. The music has a monumental quality to it that’s reflected and hinted at by the cover, or at least that’s my intent. I always want the work I put in on the visual art to be worthy of the effort that the band has put into the recording.
OS: The new LP also comes with a fold out poster of the full piece. How did this come about? Did that change anything about how you approached doing this cover? Had you done this with Witch Vomit before?
MS: That wasn’t a specific consideration when we were working on the artwork but I appreciate that the band and 20 Buck Spin found it worthy of including in a prominent way like that. I’ve done fold-out posters for one or two other records before, including for my own band Drouth, and it doesn’t really change the way I work but I always give it one hundred percent! No days off. I’d love to have posters for a lot of the records I buy. It’d be cool if more labels considered it a selling point.
OS: Have you done other pieces or merch for Witch Vomit? Other than the obvious considerations for layout, what do you feel is different in saying designing a shirt or poster as opposed to working on an album cover?
MS: I’ve done I think a couple other shirts for them, yeah. It’s a pretty different approach for merch than for album covers, especially ones like “Funeral Sanctum.” Aside from the question of medium—the cover was done with acrylic on canvas whereas for shirts I usually do an ink drawing and color digitally—with merch it’s usually better to keep the subject a little more conceptually streamlined. Shirts and posters are meant to have a quick visual impact and be recognizable from across a room, rather than album art where you still want it to stand out at a glance but it’s a format the viewer can really get close up to and absorb all the details. It’s not like you can’t have cool details in merch graphics, but the format informs the approach because album covers allow you to think bigger.
OS: Are there any album covers new or new-to-you that have really caught your attention recently?
MS: Marald Van Haasteren’s cover for the new Necrot is sick, all his work is unbelievable. Jesse Jacobi’s painting for the most recent Tomb Mold, also really tight, I love his style. I think Wes Benscoter has had like five album covers out recently, one of my all-time favorite painters, his stuff is always top-shelf. Lucas Korte who also contributed artwork to “Funeral Sanctum” does excellent work with ink, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention his artwork for Oxygen Destroyer and other good stuff recently. Dishonorable mention to all the AI-generated trash that certain bands have decided is good enough for them! If you don’t care about the art you create, why should anyone else? Might as well make all the music with AI too while you’re at it. Lazy and dishonest. Support human art!