GUNS N' ROSES - Appetite For Destruction Album Cover / Logo Designer BILLY WHITE JR. Has Passed Away
July 10, 2023, a year ago
Billy White Jr., who designed the Celtic cross tattoo on the cover of Guns N’ Roses’ debut album, Appetite For Destruction, has passed away.
GN'R guitarist, Slash, shared the sad news, writing: “RIP #BillyWhiteJr og designer of GNR cross logo & long time friend of the band. You will be missed.”
Planet Radio's Scott Colothan reports that Billy White Jr. met Guns N’ Roses through his cousin in 1986 while he was an art student in Long Beach, California. He struck up a friendship with the band, and Axl Rose personally approached him to design the cross logo for Guns N’ Roses featuring the band members’ skulls.
White recalled to Culture Creature in 2016: “One day Axl called and asked if i could draw him a tattoo, after he’d seen a drawing I’d done on my cousin’s wall. I said sure, and we talked. The cross and skulls that looked like the band was Axl’s idea, the rest was me – the knot work in the cross was a reference to Thin Lizzy, a band Axl and I both loved.”
White’s original pencil sketch was sold at auction in 2009, however he didn’t make a penny from the sale.
Read more at Planet Radio.
