The 31 Scariest Metal Album Covers of All Time

Here are the 31 scariest metal album covers of all time!

Heavy metal album art is unlike anything else in music, playing into a range of our greatest fears, the most gruesome realities and the darkest corners of our minds. Oftentimes, it can be disturbing and invoke a real sense of horror and terror — and that’s just by looking at the album cover!

It’s all part of the experience with artwork helping listeners to connect the music with any sort of visual representation. It provides a sense of direction for our imaginations to fill in the rest. In this case, it might be our subconscious doing all the work when we’re asleep, plunging us into nightmarish hellscapes.

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When it comes to what makes an album cover scary, the music that accompanies it can bolster this and creates a sense of immersion. Scariness can also be captured through different mediums (photography, makeup and special fx, painting, etc.).

The atmosphere and situations are ones we’d never wish to find ourselves and, even in some more cartoonish forms, it can all be quite frightening.

Take a look at metal’s scariest album covers below!