Symphony X: Re-Occuring Pattern!

[proulxski]

Hey!
I noticed that someone brought up a Thread on 'Special Edition' albums, and they started to talk about the artwork on the cover cases. Me being an artist was very intrigued with the cover-case pictures for all the albums! Especially The Odyssey, and DWOT! Anyway time to get o the point, I noticed this a little while back, and am un-certain if its ever been brought up or anyone knows of it!

On Every Symphony X album case, there is a re-occuring image! Which I call 'The symphony X masks' ON their website and on the S/T Album you see the two masks, well if you look closely they re-occur on every album!

Symphony X-Right on the case very visible
Damnation Game-Just aboce the lady
Twilight In Olympus-Bottom right on one of the pillars
Divine Wings Of Tragedy-In The Stain Glass windows
V:The NEw Mythology Suite-The guy on the case is wearing the mask!
The Odyssey-They are on the bottom right ide of the boat!
*Oh just to plz people, they appear out in the open on the Live album*

Too me this is not only very cool, but artistic as well... Its nice to see they add these little things on the Cover-Cases. It goes to show they put as much detail into the Artwork as they do the music! Which is where I come up with another little question, doea anybody know the who did the Symphony X Artwork?

 

[XR4Tim]

I never noticed this before. I did however, notice the Majesty symbol in all of the Dream Theater artwork.
Tom Thiel did the artwork on The Odyssey, as per the liner notes.

 

[kazahana]

Wow! OMG Thanks! I hadn't noticed this it must be like their logo LOL!!!11eight

 

[proulxski]

RoFlMaO

lol no problem, the friend of mine who introduced me to symphony X and had most of their albums didn't even notice this lol!

 

[bball_1523]

I never noticed this before. I did however, notice the Majesty symbol in all of the Dream Theater artwork.
Tom Thiel did the artwork on The Odyssey, as per the liner notes.

I noticed that on Dream Theater's cd's too, but I can't find it on "Train of thought"

 

[OfSinsAndShred]

Um... yeah, it's almost as if the masks are Symphony X's logo! Wow!

 

[symphonyXjapan]

I thought all true SyX fans knew of this. Anyway, I noticed it myself a while back and was kinda amazed too....when I mentioned it here everyone was like...."Well duh! You didn't notice that before?". Oh well....

 

[DoktorShred]

If you look really close at any iron maiden cover you can see a zombified monster

 

[DoktorShred]

I noticed that on Dream Theater's cd's too, but I can't find it on "Train of thought"

If that wasn't sarcasm, its in the pupil of the eye, as if it was a reflection of a 'dream theater train' driving at it from out of the tunnel

 

[Dark Lucidity]

lol, you didnt notice??

><

It's such a cool logo!

btw best artwork is damnation game!!

 

[Progbass]

I thought pretty much everyone would had noticed it, altleast I've known it for years. But yeah that's pretty cool to have those masks in every album cover, I don't know who started the thing it but it's actually pretty common for prog bands to have certain logo's on album covers, or another thing is to have same kind of song parts on next album than previous.

 

[Smoke and Fire]

I realised it after just 2 albums, though I was a bit lucky to see the masks on the Twilight album...

I wonder if the fact that V has the ONLY cover that shows only ONE mask means anything (like: this is our deepest, most beautiful album ) .

 

[Rose Immortal]

I wonder if the fact that V has the ONLY cover that shows only ONE mask means anything (like: this is our deepest, most beautiful album ) .

Only one mask at a time, you mean. Check the back cover.

 

[dargormudshark]

I noticed that on Dream Theater's cd's too, but I can't find it on "Train of thought"

It's in the eye

 

[dargormudshark]

I thought pretty much everyone would had noticed it, altleast I've known it for years. But yeah that's pretty cool to have those masks in every album cover, I don't know who started the thing it but it's actually pretty common for prog bands to have certain logo's on album covers, or another thing is to have same kind of song parts on next album than previous.

exaclty

 

[proulxski]

I've noticed it for along time, I just wasn't sure if anyone else noticed this! I personally love DWOT one, in the stain glass windows, its sik man, sik!

 

[proulxski]

I forgot to add, if you actually look into it enough they display both masks on the cover of V..Just metaphorically! The guy with the black robe has the other mask, and in the mirror is seeing his counter part, the other mask(who has the white robe-or cloak if you prefer) I have yet to discover the meaning behind these pictures,but I'm almost certain each cover-case for each album has some sort of reasoning behind it!

 

[DoktorShred]

I think its trying to highlight that equal parts of the story happened in the sea (atlantis) and desert (egypt)...or something.

 

[kazahana]

The first creature was spawned from the energies of Ptah-Khnemu - using the Magic of Five. This creation becomes his alter-ego - his dark side - the half-human/serpent creature Montu-Sekhmet.

Call me stupid, but I thought the cover was Ptah-Knemu and Montu Sekhmet. Aside from the quote above, Fallen talks about the split between them.

My Desire to mirror my own image

Ptah-Knemu talks about his desire to create a being from himself. Ptah-Knemu is from atlantis which explains the water part of the cover.

Symmetry divine, there's no force greater

Talk about mirroring.

Feel my hate, I'm banished to this wasteland

Montu Sekhmet is somewhat pissed off about being kicked out of atlantis just because he's ugly as sin. This ties in with the desert part of the cover.


So yeah, I see the cover as a cool depiction of both of the aforementioned parties on different sides of the mirror because they represent opposite parts of the same person - the personified good and evil within if you will, which is characterised by the colour of the robes and masks and the background each character is in. They are trying to destroy each other with their atomic finger power.

 

[Medusa's eyes]

Yeah, I noticed the SX masks quite a long time ago , not as soon as the Dream Theater logo though.

The masks are some kind of 'mark' or rather 'autographs' of Symphony X, aside from the Symphony X logo itself (the characters).