Logo #207: Running Wild

German metal band Running Wild had their mascot Captain Adrian designed by band founder and singer Rolf "Rock'N'Rolf" Kasparek in 1983. They've cornered the "pirate heavy metal" market and there was a point in time at which a battle between Running Wild and Adam And The Ants to amass the most plunder was not entirely beyond belief. Conversely, we now know that the human appendix actually has a purpose. They celebrate almost a quarter-century as a band this year. Don't act so shocked.

Logo #206: Angels and Airwaves

Designed by Blink-182 singer and guitarist Tom DeLonge in 2005. Coincidentally (?), the triple-A of this logo spells the name of DeLonge's daughter Ava. Aesthetically, the logo presents the waves of air in the ups-and-downs of its structure. Sometimes inadvertent brilliance is your greatest entertainment value. DeLonge (the singer who's not as screechy) and Blink-182 are currently at odds and while the odds are against him, we get Angels and Airwaves. For all their distasteful tattoos and overall bourgeois malaise, the Blink-182 camp - in this case, DeLonge - really are quite gifted pop musicians and songwriters. Seeing their lives unfold incessantly and insufferably in every media outlet available is particularly graceless, though. Most distressing.

Logo #205: Fear

Created by Fear singer Lee Ving in 1978. Someone pointed out recently that it's well on its way to becoming a swastika. I just thought it was two letter F's! Fear is Fear. Punk rock. Brendan Mullen of the Masque Club gives a great and illuminating interview with Lee and summary of Fear here in Swindle Magazine. Here's Fear live in 1980 at the Fleetwood in Los Angeles, making friends - and here's John Joseph from Cro-Mags talking about what happened when Fear played on "Saturday Night Live". In terms of directness and implicit threat in L.A. punk rock logos, possibly only Black Flag's icon is in the same cosmos. Punk rock logos are all about simplicity, namely: how many places can I stick this on and how often can I do it without getting caught?

Logo #204: SFA

Brendan Rafferty of SFA (not Super Furry Animals!) tells all: "It was originally (in 1987) black-and- white and was only changed to red to stand out behind the band name in white lettering. The symbol itself was my own variation on a traditional chaos symbol (Nb. designed by Jim Cawthorn in 1962): eight arrows pointing out in all directions. The inner circle, half filled in, was meant to be dark on one side, light on the other. It was a personal design I had tattooed on myself over 20 years ago. It was not meant to be the band's logo. For a while, our band had two singers, including myself. Some shows he sang, some I sang, and other times we both sang. The other singer also had his own personalized abstract tattoo. So, as an inside joke for our friends, whenever we printed flyers to promote our shows, we would draw in his tattoo next to the name of the band if he was singing, my tattoo if I was singing, and both our tattoos if we were both singing. After a while, I was singing most of the shows and my tattoo was always next to our band name. By the time the other singer left the band, we were gaining local popularity and local punks who didn't know us personally (who were writing our name on their jackets) were also drawing my tattoo. The symbol was next to the band name on so many flyers people assumed it was the band's logo. Other people making flyers for our shows also put the symbol next to our band name assuming it was our logo. We never intended to use it as our logo. In fact, we never intended to have a logo at all, but we figured "Why not?" and kept it."

The Song of the Moment is "Only the Lonely" by The Motels, who never had a logo as far as I could find.

Logo #203: Surgical Steel

Everything you ever wanted to know about Phoenix heavy metal band Surgical Steel is here. Designer A.D. Cook: "Wow, a blast from the past. I’m going from memory, but I would saw I designed the Surgical Steel logo in 1981." Earlier: "My time with Surgical Steel was a blast! We had some great times. I met them early in their career as a band, and after creating their logo, we became friends. They proved to be a great bunch of guys. I still have fond memories of those days. I remember one night I was on a date at a pizza place with my new girlfriend and I told her I did the Surgical Steel logo (sure, I was trying to impress her). She didn’t sound like she was totally convinced. Ironically, as we were leaving the restaurant the band was walking in. We all talked for a bit and they confirmed my story. It was hilarious, partly because our paths crossing must have seemed planned to her at the time, even though it was synchronicity. Anyway, I guess she must have been somewhat impressed – we’ve been married now for over 20 years! I have fond memories too of the band coming by my place to have their drums painted and to talk about album covers. They all had wild hair and wore lots of leather. In fact, I remember Jim having purple streaks in his hair for a while. All of my other clients were advertising agencies and corporate guys – straight haircuts and business suits. What a contrast when they would run into each other. It was priceless. Those were some wild days." - A.D. Cook, March 2004

Logo #202: The Pist

Al Ouimet, singer and writer for The Pist: "I designed the logos for the band, as well as all of the layouts and artwork (except for the "Ideas Are Bulletproof" cover). The flag logo was designed at the inception of the band in December of 1992. The tattered flag represented the political/social state of America and the "X" through the stars was a call for unity among all of the divided punk scenes throughout the nation.The molotov guy was designed in 1995 and just looked cool - kind of an evolution of the Neighborhood Watch signs and the logo that the D.O.A. use to use."

Logo #201: Naked Aggression

Singer Kirsten Patches of Naked Aggression: "Cyrus Highsmith, the drummer from our first two 7" records, designed our band logo when he was 17 at West High School in Madison WI in 1992. We needed a band logo for our new punk band, and he came to band practice one day and showed it to us. We thought it was fucking brilliant; it's so simple yet powerfully striking. Most corporations would kill to have a logo that eye-catching. After a lot of discussion, we decided that it symbolized anger building up in a confined space until it explodes - a metaphor that can carry over to many aspects of our personal lives in politics. It also captures the punk spirit by alluding to familiar logos that punk culture embraces, such as the chaos symbol. I have the logo tattooed on my shoulder - it's so eye-catching that to this day, people in the check-out line at the supermarket ask me what it means. When we go play shows on tour, fans come up to me to show me their Naked Aggression tattoos. It's so cool!"

RIP Naked Aggresion guitarist Phillip "Phil" Suchomel (April 19, 1969 - April 25, 1998).

The Song of the Moment is "Clipper" by Autechre.