The art of the album cover: a history and a how to, by Richard Evans
Haven't posted for a bit. Bought a new book though! "The art of the album cover: a history and a how to" [1], by Richard Evans. He has designed covers for many bands, such as The Who, The Doors, Van Morrison, Robert Plant, Pink Floyd and Paul McCartney.
The book itself is simply amazing, ranging telling a story of over 70 years of album covers, from the earliest actual album covers in 1940 by Alex Steinweiss, to 2009's album Lady Gaga - The Fame Monster. It describes in detail how the period in time and bands/genres influenced the album covers of that era and often even why so. He describes the album covers as, and I quote, "the timelines of our lives".
I will definitely be using this book a lot for further posts - but might even edit older posts to include more insights/information. I am planning on reading this from the start and get a better understanding of the history and evolution of the artwork, probably also posting some posts purely on this.
People who are interested in album covers, this book is definitely something I would recommend. I am still trying to get more books by different authors, but they are hard to buy physically and I will have to start ordering them. Don't get me wrong, there is plenty. As Evans puts it, it just shows how album covers "[have] become an established form in its own right", and that no other wrapping of commercial products has such status. It seems like it is just underappreciated by the general public (some books on album covers are literally coffee table books with merely pictures and the occasional annotation), though both fans and designers are passionate about it.
References (literature):
1. The art of album covers, a history and a how to, by Richard Evans ISBN 13: 978-0-7858-2677-4 (ISBN 10: 0-7858-2677-7)
Record Label: East City Records Limited Release Date: 2013
It is often easy to spot a great image. The album cover of the debut album of KINSimmediately caught my attention. While I could not find much information on this particular photo, I wanted to cover it anyway as the photographer is pretty interesting.
The photo was taken by Karl Ammann, a wildlife photographer that went to Africa in the '80s. While he came to Africa to shoot the beauty of the country's wildlife, he has shifted his focus now to raising awareness for 'bushmeat', meat taken from (often protected/endangered) species which is sold as, probably expensive, food. This sudden shift of focus came about because of the difference he sees between the Africa he first came to and what it has become.
Karl was called a Hero of the Envorinment by Time Magazine in 2007, saying he "single-handedly raising awareness of the issue of bush meat".
Karl Ammann continues to raise awareness to the trade as he found "key eco-systems and species being destroyed, degraded overcommercialized and exploited".
Record Label: EMI (VK) Columbia (VS) Release Date: September 8, 1987
Another Pink Floyd album. I did not want to do this so fast after the other one, but I couldn't help myself as I've read this story before. In fact one of their albums have an even more remarkable story but I decided not to shoot up all my ammunition right from the start. As usually is the case, this album, by Storm Thorgerson/Hipgnosis(an artgroup Thorgerson started), is created as "realistically" as possible. What that means you'll find out in a moment.
I vaguely recall reading something about police or traffic halts/jams regarding this album cover, but have been unable to find the information (it's been too long). If I do find the information (or you do and notify me) I'll add it as soon as possible.
The Momentary Laps of Reason cover shows Saunton Sands, a beach in the south of England, also used for parts of the live-action/animated musical film Pink Floyd - The Wall (obviously based on the album with the same titled). It is also featured in a video of the song "Angels" by Robbie Williams. This same beach is used as a military training area a few times per year (yes, I only added this because it looks cool. If I could add explosions within context, I totally would):
Hercules transport airplane landing on Saunton Sands
Alright so you're possibly thinking thinking: "Beds on a beach. Big whoop."
Well, the photo took roughly two weeks to create[1] (this reference is unverified, at least by me) and required the crew to actually, physically place 700 wrought iron hospital beds. There is a hang glider in the sky as a possible reference to the song Learning to Fly on the same album. The dogs are most likely a reference to the songDogs of War. According to Wikipedia (album page), the river of hospital beds was inspired by a phrase from"Yet Another Movie" (another reference to a song titled the same) and
"Gilmour's vague hint of a design that included a bed in a Mediterranean house, as well as "vestiges of relationships that have evaporated, leaving only echoes."
I wonder what he's holding in his hand - not even the biggest version of the cover enlightened me, it appears to be some kind of big magnifying glass - perhaps another reference to light and their light shows?
I have yet to see this mentioned elsewhere, but his pose makes me think it might be a reference to the songSorrow. It is perhaps even more clear in the following version (not used for promotion or covers for as far as I know):
Hung head, bend forward, beach starting to flood
How immense the amount of beds is can be seen by watching thispromotional video:
"700, yes 700, wrought iron hospital beds separately made up and positioned on the beach. Madness to do it at all, but we had in fact to do it twice cos it rained suddenly the first time, dank grey dizzle, and we couldn't see the distant half of the beds."
According to Pink Floyd Onlineit took the crew over three hours to bring the hospital beds from London to Devon (which is the county the beach is in). After arranging them on the beach (which probably took quite a while) and the crew realized it would take more than one day to shoot the cover, they allegedly left one bed on the beach overnight to see if the sea had any effect on it. The next day, the bed was nowhere to be found.
According to the Telegraph, which seems to have some extra information, Thorgerson recruited 30 helpers and 4 tractors to move and assemble the beds. It took them six hours to arrange and (as it started raining) the whole process had to be repeated two weeks later.
An image from the CD released of their tour at the time:
Please note, this post contains NSFW (Not safe for work/youngsters) images. Click below to reveal them.
The Suburbs ~ Si Sauvage
Record Label: Self-released through kickstarter (no label) Release Date: August 27, 2013
Si Sauvage - this relatively recent album was released by The Suburbs. It is rather special in numerous ways. It is the first album the band has released in 27 years (longer than I am old at the moment of writing this), features most of the original band members, it was launched through a kickstarter project and it has a lovely cover.
The designer, Kii Arens, had a brief musical career around the time the Suburbs were around. In fact, his stage debut was in 1986 where he opened for them. For the cover's design he wanted to go back to the success period of the Suburbs, the '80s.
"The '80s decadence, [that was] so fun to be part of. The over-the-top stuff, pomposity, sexuality – the world suddenly deciding Adam Ant had talent."
"[The Suburbs] paid attention to what they looked like on stage," he said. "I wanted to make an album cover over the top and push the buttons. We seem to be becoming a little more conservative. I don’t think that belongs in the realm of rock 'n' roll."
What is (or what I find) particularly interesting about the piece is that it vaguely resembles the cover of Roxy Music's Country Life. Roxy Music was one of Chan Poling (Suburbs frontman) his favourites.
Roxy Music ~ Country Life
Though in my opinion the cover is relatively mild compared to some older albums, it is true that nowadays we seem to have returned to less shocking imagery. Kii Arens:
“I’m glad the band allowed themselves to use this more daring cover,” said Arens, who also shot more traditional portraits of the Suburbs. “There was talk about cropping the panties but Chan said, ‘No way! The panties are staying in.’ Good for him!”
In case you were wondering, the models are Irina Voronina (Playboy centerfold 2001), and Leigh Yaeger, an artist.
Roxy Music ~ Country Life
Record Label: Island, Polydor (UK) Atco, Reprise (US)[1] Release Date: November 15, 1974
Photographed by Eric Boman, this cover was considered rather controversial at the time of release. It was subsequently censored in multiple countries, including the United States, Spain and the Netherlands. This was done by simply taking the back of the album, which was a picture of just the woods, and putting it on the front. Michael Ochs(some photographic archivist of mainly rock and roll) therefore called this "most complete cover-up in rock history".
Censored cover (US/The Netherlands)
Censored cover (Spain)
The cover was such an icon that people have mimicked it or have been inspired by it later on. Next to the influenced Suburbs album, there is also...
Sweet Apple ~ Love & Desperation
Robots in Disguise ~ Boys
with one of my favourite comedians:
Noel Fielding
Dum Dum Girls ~ Blissed Out
References (literature):
1. Michael Ochs (2002). Record Covers, Taschen, p.545
Couldn't find an album cover to do next. Luckily I have scraped the internet before for album covers, downloading about 200k if not more covers, so I just went through a few of them.
Beck Hansen. To be specific, his fifth studio album, the second at a major record label company. But that's about all we can say for sure. Basically everything about this album is ambiguous, open for interpretation, numerous stories go around and they are hard to verify. There is not too much to go into detail about on this album cover, so this might be a short post, but should still be interesting have you not read about it yet.
I know this is not about the albumcover, but I had to find out anyway. The name, version one:
The name Odelay actually comes from "Oh Delay" because the album was taking so long to record, according to Spin in an interview with Stephen Malkmus, who has worked with Beck (actually Beck has produced been his producer).
The name, version two:
Supported by Wikipedia (without a source), Odelay comes from the Spanish word (Mexican slang) "órale". This is also supported by numerous other sources, but noteworthy is what is written on WhiskeyClone, which seems to be supported by the lyrics of the song Odelay:
"Apparently when Al Hansen taught Beck how to rhyme as a little boy, Beck's first rhyme was "Pull down your pants and do the hot dog dance." Beck once told a story about how he once worked as Hot Dog Man at a kid's birthday party, which gives the phrase a little autobiographical resonance. His use of of the word "orale" (which mutated to "odelay")—a mutated Spanish word he used to hear while growing up in a predominantly Mexican neighborhood—also references his past."
The cover. Unless you know a lot about dogs or was curious about this cover (or both, like me), you may not know that it actually depicts a rare Hungarian breed of dog clearing a hurdle. The dogbreed is called a Komondor. Here's some random Google images to give you a better idea:
I know. This one will probably throw you off again.
Sure, it's an odd breed. So why did Beck pick this picture? There are numerous stories going around, so let's see if we can falsify some.
FeelNumb claims Beck chose the picture at the last moment (sounds a bit dodgy to me considering the album allegedly took long to create) when his girlfriend showed him this picture:
MentalFloss claims to have a quote from art director Robert Fisher:
"The photo was taken by a famous dog photographer called Ludwig, who lived a few blocks from the office. She was in her late seventies, and was enthusiastic to have a visitor. Beck felt that it was kind of ambiguous, unrelated to the music, and was chosen almost at random. The viewer could read into the cover whatever they wanted. Odelay also sounded a bit like a dog command."
According to AIGA Design Archives, this particular photo was picked because it's "simple, strong, memorable—and in some weird way works with the album title. I wanted the type on the cover to hint at Beck’s roots in folk music." This appears to be a particularly reliable source, as their sole purpose seems to be to preserve artwork.
Then again, people that preserve art will probably not mention it if something was done last minute rather than an elaborate thought process. One thing we do know for sure, is that Joanie Ludwig took the picture, possibly together with Nitin Vadukul.
I'd put my money on it that the girlfriend story is just a myth, but believe what you want. The cover is still awesome.
The Velvet Underground ~ The Velvet Underground & Nico
Record Label: Verve Release Date: March 12, 1967
We go back in time but like in the previous post about The Dark Side Of The Moon, we are going to talk about stickers. Andy Warhol's banana stickers. I always thought he was a bit of a creep (I mean..look at him), but I do like some of his art and this album is a good example of such art. Andy Warhol, the artist. Film maker, painter, sculptor, manager and whatnot. The most famous person in Pop Art (to date). He is the creator of the album cover of The Velvet Underground's most notorious album and basically put the Velvet Underground in the picture. Coincidentally, like Thorgerson in the previous post, Lou Reed of the Velvet Underground also died last year, in 2013. Another tribute! Unfortunately, this album sold only roughly 30.000 copies in the first five years.
Quick history lesson. Andy Warhol met the Velvet Underground while they were playing in nothing but a cafe. He was introduced to them by film maker Paul Morissey, who had seen the band play there at their first gig. Andy Warhol was at that moment interested in multimedia (film making) and 'real', down to earth things and the Velvet Underground had it all. Paul Morissey? He was just after making money in the rock-and-roll business.
From A brief history of album covers[1]:
"[the album cover] perfectly captures late-60s Pop Art as Andy Warhol saw it, using simple, recognizable popular culture imagery for mass production"
Andy Warhol is listed on the album as the producer of the album. He was however not your typical producer. Rather than managing the band and telling them what to do, he just let the band do whatever they wanted to do. All he really did for the band was create the iconic cover. According to The Velvet Underground and Andy Warhol story, Lou Reed, says the following:
"Andy was the producer and Andy was in fact sitting behind the board gazing with rapt fascination.. at all the blinking lights. He just made it possible for us to be ourselves and go right ahead with it because he was Andy Warhol. In a sense he really produced it, because he was this umbrella that absorbed all the attacks when we weren't large enough to be attacked... As a consequence of him being the producer, we'd just walk in and set up and did what we always did and no one would stop it because Andy was the producer. Of course he didn`t know anything about record production...He just sat there and said, Oooh that`s fantastic, and the engineer would say, Oh yeah! Right! It is fantastic, isn't it?"
The banana sticker
On the right you see the cover, slightly peeled. That's right. It was possible to peal the banana sticker off and reveal a pinkish banana. Well, that was only possible on the early copies, a 1980s re-issue in Japan and on a 2008 re-press. Most editions thus do not actually have the sticker and the ones that do are rare collector's items by now. While one of the reasons for the album to be delayed was that the Verve did not want to release more than two weird albums in one year (they had just released Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention`s). The second reason is that in order to create these covers a special machine was needed. Luckily MGM Records was more than happy to pay for these costs as it realized Warhol's connection to the album would surely boost sales.[2][3]
Behind the sticker
Lawsuits. Don't you love them? Believe it or not, the album led to a lawsuit twice, once for the front and once for the back. Let's start chronologically and start with the back cover lawsuit.
Back cover lawsuit:
The first issue of the album contained an image of actor Eric Emerson (don't worry I hadn't heard of him either, apparently he starred in some of Warhol's movies) projected upside-down (really hard to see) on a wall behind Velvet Underground. Emerson demanded payment or he would sue them and MGM decided to recall all copies rather than pay him. His projection was airbrushed away, already printed editions were sold with a large black sticker to hide the projection. Interestingly, the projection was restored for the 1996 CD reissue. (from: Wikipedia - Album page) Unfortunately for the band, among other things, due to all the commotion their launch was less of a success than it could have been.
Top: Eric Emerson (upside-down, arms stretched out left & right)
bottom: gone!
Black sticker to hide Eric Emerson
Front cover lawsuit:
In 2012 (unfortunate for Lou Reed, who would die only a year after), rather than someone suing Velvet Underground, they sued the Andy Warhol Foundation (from Courthouse News Service). Lou Reed and John Cale claimed they were unlawfully licensing the band's iconic banana to third parties.
The Warhol Foundation in turn claimed they had copyright interest in the design, whereas the Velvet Underground partnership says the banana picture cannot be copyrighted, as it came from an advertisement and was public domain. The lawsuit was dismissed due to reasons that are way too boring to even elaborate upon (there are numerous articles on the web that do this in great detail) and settled outside of court.
Oh hey, did I mention this album is featured on the book that inspired me to use this blog name?
L'inspiration
References (literature):
A brief history of album covers (2008), ISBN 978-1-84786-211-2
Harvard, Joe (2007) [2004]. The Velvet Underground and Nico. 33⅓. New York, NY: Continuum International Publishing Group. ISBN 0-8264-1550-4.
Bockris, Victor & Malanga, Gerard (1996) [1983]. Up-tight: The Velvet Underground Story. Omnibus Press. ISBN 0-7119-5223-X.
Record Label: Harvest, Capitol Release Date: March 1, 1973
[I may have made a mistake in the references, do mention if I have - note to self, never start messing with reference numbers just before publishing]
There are little album covers that are as iconic as the prism on the album cover of Pink Floyd - The Dark Side of the Moon. I decided to start off my quest to dig up information on album covers here.
A quick introduction:
The album was created by Storm Thorgerson, or rather the artgroup he founded called Hipgnosis. He cofounded the group with Aubrey Powell. He made artwork for rock artists such as Dream Theater, Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, The Scorpions, Europe, Genesis, Muse and many, many more.
Unfortunately Thorgerson has died last year, but that won't stop us. There will be plenty of album covers by Thorgerson on this blog. In fact, I think I will create a separate post on Hipgnosis and/or Storm Thorgerson one day. Anyway. Back to the dark side of the moon.
The album's iconic sleeve, designed by Storm Thorgerson (wikipedia), features a prism that represents the band's stage lighting, the record's lyrical themes, and keyboardist Richard Wright's request for a "simple and bold" design.
This is more important than it may seem. Pink Floyd were among the pioneers of light shows and were actually famous for them.
"Wish You Were Here" during their "Division Bell" tour at Earls Court on 17th October 1994.
Photo by Syd Young (Click to go to Flickr)
It is likely that neither anyone at Hipgnosis nor anyone from Pink Floyd really realized how big everything was about to turn out. Pink Floyd was what everyone was looking for and the marketing wise this album was a bomb. Most of the success of the album had to be analyzed afterwards rather than be estimated beforehand. From A brief history of album covers[1]:
Pink Floyd's light shows had been a hallmark of the band's live performances since their 60s days performing in London's UFO Club. Storm Thorgerson and Aubrey Powell reflected this with one of the most iconic album sleeves of all time for The Dark Side Of The Moon, with their design of a prism refracting white light into a spectrum: simple physics and something record buyers might relate to from school. 'The prism was a way to talk about the fact that this band ... would do light and sound [at their shows]', Thorgerson has recalled. It is also claimed that Roger Waters wanted a sleeve that reflected 'madness of ambition', and that the triangle is the symbol for ambition.
To top it off, the simplicity and recognizability turned them, and the prism, into an icon. An icon which is still immensely popular today. The cover continues the trend to have visuals that trigger interest, without having the need to put the band's name and album name on the front. Examples of earlier albums:
Obscured by Clouds
Atom Heart Mother
The album was released in a gatefold LP (those things you can open and close like a birthday card, there are pictures down below). The sleeve was designed by Hipgnosis and George Hardie. Hipgnosis had designed several of the band's previous albums, some which broke earlier traditions. When EMI was presented with the covers of Atom Heart Mother and Obscured by Clouds, they expected traditional designs with words and a bandname. Hipgnosis realized the text is usually subordinate to the visuals (or the text becomes part of it). Apparently Richard Wright (a pianist) told them to make something "smarter, neater—more classy"[2] for The Dark Side of the Moon (no clue how he got involved with this). The prism design was inspired by a photograph Thorgerson saw in a brainstorming session with Powell.
The relationship between Pink Floyd and EMI Records was an interesting one, as we can read in an interview with the band. Source: Classic Albums (an interview Dave Gilmour)[3]:
"Did EMI have any idea what they were getting?"
"We were always incredibly arrogant with EMI, and record companies in general. Our attitude basically was that we'd deliver them a record and they would sell it. We would deliver them the finished music and the finished art work, and they would sell it. They never had any real say in what we did, how we did it, or anything, except that, of course, keeping one's eye on how they actually do marketing is totally impossible. You can't completely control it. But we always figured that as long as each record did a bit better than the last one, or made them a significant profit, then they couldn't really say anything to us. So we weren't under that particular type of whip, as so many people have been."
the Silver Surfer
Back to the cover. Hipgnosis showed Pink Floyd seven designs, but all four members agreed that the prism was by far the best. One of these designs that was turned down was what had to become a photo (it was a drawing at this stage) of the Silver Surfer from the Marvel Comics, a legend confirmed in an interview with Storm Thorgerson by Rolling Stone. The drawings of the other designs were lost (also mentioned in that interview).
So why the Silver Surfer you ask? Thorgerson wasn't really interested in the character at all, but he thought it was nice symbolically: Floyd as the surfer and his fans as waves, going wherever he goes.
The design represents a number of things[4]:the band's stage lighting, the lyrics, and Richard Wright's request for a "simple and bold" design. And, as mentioned before, possibly Roger Waters' 'madness of ambition', where the triangle is the symbol for ambition. Thorgerson confirms the triangle standing for 'thought and ambition' in the aforementioned interview with Rolling Stone. Waters also pitched the idea of the light spectrum continuing through to the gatefold[5]. Another interpretation is that the light represents unity, while the prism represents society. The refracted light would symbolize absence of unity[6].
The gatefold design depicts the heartbeat sound that is used throughout the album, complementing the music and blending visuals and music together:
The heartbeat's sonar wave & the spectrum continues through the gatefold
The back contains Thorgerson's suggestion of another prism recombining the spectrum of light, allowing for interesting layouts of the album in record shops.[7]
Second prism on the back
Observant readers (or Pink Floyd fans, colour maniacs...) may have noticed the colour spectrum of the album is 'missing' a colour: indigo. Well, this is only because the general distinction of colours is using seven colours, Hipgnosis for some reason decided to go against this and go with six. Not only that, as you may remember from school, a spectrum in real life is a gradient with no definite boundaries and the prism would already separate the colours from the point where the light enters it.
The album came with two posters and several pyramid-themed stickers. One of the band in concert, the other an infrared photograph of the Great Pyramids of Giza that Powell and Thorgerson took. [7]
Poster with pictures of Pink Floyd in concert
Pyramid themed stickers
Infrared poster of the Great Pyramids of Giza
As little as they expected EMI to mess with their creativity, in turn they left most of the album design to Hipgnosis. From Classic Albums (an interview Dave Gilmour)[3]:
"What was the band's input on the art work?"
"Well, the input we have is that Hipgnosis come up with ideas and we say yes or no. And when they came in with the prism thing, it was obviously very strong, and I think we pretty well all agreed instantly that it fitted perfectly. And I still think so. And, in fact, the amount of times that people have tried to copy the idea, and tried to do something similar, has proved that most people think of it as a very, very powerful image."
"Do you have any theories as to why this record became such a monster? It's more than just a big record.""[...] Like I said before, we did know, long before it came out, that it would sell. We knew commercially, if you like, that the package - the record and the cover and everything together - was going to be far, far stronger than anything we had done before."
"Pink Floyd in their infinite wisdom perused our 7 complex detailed roughs for this cover in a drab basement room at Abbey Road - submissions over which we at Hipgnosis had toiled for weeks - but managed to decide within 3 minutes which one they liked. No amount of cajoling would get them to consider any other contender, nor endure further explanation of the prism, or how exactly it might look. That's it, they said in unison, we got to get back to real work, and returned forthwith to the studio upstairs. Appropriateness was the key. The refracting glass prism referred to Floyd light shows - consummate use of light in the concert setting. Its outline is triangular and triangles are symbols of ambition, and are redolent of pyramids, both cosmic and mad in equal measure, all these ideas touching on themes in the lyrics. The joining of the spectrum extending round the back cover and across the gatefold inside was seamless like the seguing tracks on the album, whilst the opening heartbeat was represented by a repeating blip in one of the colours. But to look back now and reflect upon how the actual artwork itself had no colour, being just a tint lay, and how the spectrum was missing a colour anyway, and how the whole design was only cobbled from a standard physics textbook diagram (albeit cunningly), and how there was another album called DSOM only a year previously, all of this just goes to show how such matters pale if a design feels 'appropriate'. How fitting it is to be fitting!"
A video of Storm talking about working with Pink Floyd (might be a bit hard to understand him, but I found him genuinely funny and intriguing. give it a shot):
References (literature):
A brief history of album covers, ISBN 978-1-8478-6211-2
Harris, John (2006), The Dark Side of the Moon (third ed.), Harper Perennial, ISBN 978-0-00-779090-6
Classic Albums, ISBN 0-563-36246-4
Classic Albums: The Making of The Dark Side of the Moon (DVD), Eagle Rock Entertainment, 26 August 2003
Schaffner, Nicholas (1991), Saucerful of Secrets (first ed.), London: Sidgwick & Jackson, ISBN 0-283-06127-8
Weinstein, Deena (2007). "Roger Waters: Artist of the Absurd". In Reisch, George A. Pink Floyd and Philosophy: Careful with that Axiom, Eugene!. Open Court. ISBN 978-0-8126-9636-3. p.86
Harris, John (2006), The Dark Side of the Moon (third ed.), Harper Perennial, ISBN 978-0-00-779090-6
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