Doja Cat’s New Album Cover Looks Almost Identical to German Metal Band’s
UPDATE (Aug. 21, 2023): Doja Cat has changed the cover to her upcoming album following the recent controversy. Get more details here.
Doja Cat has a new album underway called Scarlet, and the artwork on the cover looks nearly identical to the design on the cover of German metal band Chaver's upcoming album Of Gloom.
To be fair, both covers feature an illustration designed by artist Dusty Ray, so that likely explains the similarities. The Scarlet cover is white with a pink spider on it and a single drop of blood near the top, but no text. Of Gloom has a speckled cover with a very, very similar pink spider on it, as well as a drop of blood, though the shapes of both the spider and the droplet are the slightest bit different than on Scarlet. Additionally, Chaver's album has their logo on the top of the cover and the title on the bottom in much smaller font.
So they're almost exactly alike... but not quite. What makes the situation even weirder is that both albums will be released the same day — Sept. 22.
Doja Cat shared the album art on her Instagram profile yesterday (Aug. 29), and credited Dusty Ray as the artist in her Instagram story. Upon searching Dusty Ray's Instagram profile, you can see that there is a lot of pink incorporated throughout all of the images on his feed that he illustrated. Many of them are also horror themed, with a lot of blood and gore, different kinds of bugs and other animals.
Spiders seem to be a recurring theme as well. The exact spider and droplet that appears on the front of the upcoming Chaver album was first designed in 2018, according to one of Dusty Ray's 2022 posts. Chaver first unveiled the cover of their album on their Instagram on July 29. Chaver's fans seem to be making light of the situation, making references to Doja Cat's album on one of their recent posts.
"Make a Doja shirt," someone wrote.
"Dusty got some 'splainin' to do," another person commented.
See images of both albums below.
It's unclear whether Doja Cat knew that a metal band was using one of Dusty Ray's spider illustrations for their cover, but she has certainly expressed an interest in heavy music over the last few years. Earlier this year in an interview, the musician said that she wants to make punk music at some point.
READ MORE: Rock + Metal Albums That Had to Be Changed Due to Controversy
"I feel like we have enough pop-punk artists right now. And if there needs to be more, then let there be more, but I don't think I'm the one to do it," she told Variety. "I want to explore more of a raw, unfiltered, hardcore punk sort of thing. It's just something that I'm doing for my own personal fun — getting some drummers and guitarists together. And I don't even know if that's gonna make it out there."
Additionally, in late 2020, the pop artist performed a metal remix of her hit song "Say So" at the MTV Europe Music Awards, which took many of her fans by surprise.