is being played out in the media. Obviously people want to know about it and people are gonna write about it and stuff, and I understand that, but it’s something that [we] would rather not talk about. It’s hard. It’s really fucked.” Title and artwork "Coral Fang", according to Brody Dalle, "symbolises the male anatomy." According to Tony Bevilacqua, the album's original title was "Plastic Fang", but after discovering the title was already taken by the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, they changed it. The artwork for Coral Fang was done by Tim Presley, who was acquainted with the band through Andy Granelli, with whom he had played with in The Nerve Agents. The cover and inside artwork is Presley's interpretation of the album's lyrics. "It is not meant to represent our political stances. Art, to us, is meant to evoke emotion and thought, and is not always open to social commentary,” explained Brody Dalle. The artwork attracted controversy due to its explicit nature, and Sire forced the band to create a "safe cover" for the album to allow it to be sold in national chain stores. "We wanted kids in the middle of nowhere, the middle of America, to be able to buy our record at a Wal-Mart or Best Buy where its like the only place they can buy records kind of thing", Tony Bradley said, "So we had to do that for that reason. It kind of sucks, like we didn’t want to do that; but we kind’ve had to." However, this was not censorship, as, according to a band spokesperson, retailers were given the choice between the artworks; “So if Wal-Mart chooses to stock the safer cover, then that’s their choice, but technically that means there will be no banning of the other one.” On the vinyl issues of the album, a slip-cover is used. Release and promotion The album title of Coral Fang was tentatively announced during recording through MTV News on June 2, 2003, and its track list and US release date of October 14 was announced on September 8, 2003 via the Warner Bros./Reprise Street Team website. A vinyl version of the album was later released via Tarantulas Records on April 26, 2004. It has since been reissued on vinyl twice; for Record Store Day 2017, limited to 4,000 copies on red vinyl, and in November 2019 by Music on Vinyl. In the run