Yesterday marked the 52nd anniversary of Black Sabbath‘s self-titled debut, arguably the first heavy metal album ever released. And only two years ago, during the celebration of its 50-year anniversary, was the cover model for the album identified by Rolling Stone as one Louisa Livingstone. That said, while it’s cool that Louisa is part of metal’s timeless history, some might not be as excited by the fact that she’s a hardcore anti-vaxxer who uses her social media to primarily promote anti-vax memes and COVID denier conspiracies.
For those of you who don’t remember, Livingstone was 18 or 19 years old when she posed for designer Keith Macmillan for the cover of the band’s album. She told Rolling Stone:
“I remember it was freezing cold…I had to get up at about 4 o’clock in the morning. Keith was rushing around with dry ice, throwing it into the water. It didn’t seem to be working very well, so he ended up using a smoke machine. It was just, ‘Stand there and do that.’ I’m sure he said it was for Black Sabbath, but I don’t know if that meant anything much to me at the time.”
Livingstone apparently didn’t care for Sabbath’s music, and instead releases electronic music under the name Indreba.
That said, her Twitter account makes it clear that her current focus seems to be on anti-vax propaganda and COVID denier information. While this may be some sort of parody account, the image used in her profile pic — beneath an image of Braveheart‘s William Wallace brandishing a Canadian flag, seemingly in solidarity with the Canadian #TruckersForFreedom anti-mask mandate movement — is the same used by Rolling Stone in a profile of McMillan and his work with Sabbath.
You can check out some of Livingstone’s posts below, but it’s what you’d expect: pro-Joe Rogan, anti-China, anti-mask, anti-Justin Trudeau. If these things make you proud of her, I don’t know why you’re reading MetalSucks. For us, it seems like a huge bummer, but hey, other than being on the cover of the first metal record ever, we have no real association with her, so she’s allowed to believe whatever she wants.
Thanks to Rich for the heads up.