Sold Date: February 7, 2015
Start Date: January 31, 2015
Final Price: $90.00 (USD)
Bid Count: 33
Seller Feedback: 521
Buyer Feedback: 110

VG COPY with rare removed artwork. Please see photos for condition. I can email you photos if you want. USA -  MERCURY RECORDS - SR 61239

RARE...ORIGINAL 1970 FIRST PRESSING ... in triple fold cover of the sought after HEAVY PSYCH 1st album by the mighty COVEN featuring the sexy female singer Jinx Dawson ....

The band's horror-movie psychrock image did not go unrecognized. When Black Sabbath's first album came out in 1970, head writer Lester Bangs wrote in Rolling Stone that they were "something like England's answer to Coven." Then an Esquire magazine story about satanism -- the cover featured Charlie Manson holding a copy of this Coven album -- and made executives at Mercury Records worried about their companies image, and the label quickly withdrew the album making it a limited and very valuable pressing some 40+ years later.

Coven were the first band to introduce the "Sign of the Horns" to rock culture as seen on their 1969 debut album release "Witchcraft". Composed of vocalist Jinx Dawson, bassist Oz Osborne (not to be confused with Ozzy Osbourne of Black Sabbath), Chris Neilsen on guitar, Rick Durrett and later John Hobbs on keyboards, and drummer Steve Ross. Jinx Dawson, blonde siren of the band Coven, was a native of Indianapolis, Indiana born on a Friday the 13th. The difficult delivery of twins, one dead in the womb, was performed by a Dr.Jinks, so her model mother named her Jinx. She began studying opera and the occult , following in her family's secret society footsteps. She, Ross, and Osborne formed Coven in Chicago in the late 1960s. In 1967 to 1968 they toured on concert bills with Jimmy Page's Yardbirds, the Alice Cooper band, and Vanilla Fudge, among many others. Jinx began and ended each Coven concert with the sign of the horns, being the first to introduce this hand sign into rock culture. They were signed to Mercury Records, where they put out this first album, Witchcraft Destroys Minds & Reaps Souls in 1969. The music on the album was underground rock what made it distinctive was the heavy emphasis on diabolical subject matter, including songs such as "The White Witch of Rose Hall" (based on the story of Annie Palmer), "For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge", and "Dignitaries of Hell". The album concluded with a 13 minute track of psyched-out chanting and Satanic prayers called "Satanic Mass". Also included inside the album, was Coven's infamous Black Mass poster, showing members of the group displaying the sign of the horns as they prepared for a Satanic ritual over Jinx, naked at the altar. This is the first photographed use of the Horned Hand Salute and the Inverted Cross in rock music culture, Coven being the first occult rock band and the pioneers in that genre. According to Jinx, "The satanic thing actually was something we were interested in and were studying at the time. When you're younger, you're looking for answers, and a lot of members of the band were looking into the same books at the same time. We studied it, we practiced it."

This content was considered highly unusual for the time. Then called Heavy Underground Rock. Unwanted publicity came to the band in the form of a sensationalistic Esquire magazine issue entitled "Evil Lurks in California" (Esquire, March 1970), which linked counterculture interest in the occult to Charles Manson and the Tate-La Bianca murders, while also mentioning the Witchcraft album and its Black Mass material. As a result of this unwanted publicity, Mercury withdrew the album from circulation, making it limited and oh-so-rare some 40+ years later.....

Black Sabbath3:28

White Witch of Rose Hell3:03

Coven in Charing Cross4:00

For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge4:35

Pack With Lucifer3:25

Choke, Thirst, Die3:20

B:Wicked Woman2:55

Dignitaries of Hell4:04

Portrait2:32

Satanic Mass13:17