Urban Outfitters and Restoration Hardware sell black aluminum frames specifically designed for 12" records. The vinyl album now doubles as both pop artifact and usable music format, and in seemingly equal amounts. Flea market bin-flippers search for records that pique their interest both by sleeve and content. Often the sleeve is an end in itself, or can at least prompt an investigative listen. Most of the record covers contained within this list, whether released during or after the vinyl era, are the kind that would stop one's finger-flipping. In this regard the list serves not just as a mockery of bad art, but as a eulogy for the era of The Record.
Mp3s and their cigarette pack-size players kill the record cover, if not the format and concept of "the album" itself. Some concession is made with thumbnail jpegs of a record cover on a tiny screen, but this is only because the music is being transferred from the physical format into the digital form. Once music is released solely in digital form, accompanying artwork will likely remain as a downloadable bonus for a while, but will eventually likely be replaced with short animations, a more interactive and fluid video, or nothing at all.
All of these possibilities are unfortunate and ironically counter-intuitive to the progression of pop music over the past 50 years. Critics and audiophiles can whine otherwise, but pop music is indelibly linked to visuals. Iconic arti sts not only realize this but revel in the marriage of sound and image. A musical world without Warhol's banana, the Polaroid collage of the Talking Heads, or the Kangols and Adidas of Run-D.M.C. loses part of its flavor. It also abolishes at least 50% of the merchandising potential of bands. Pop, from bubblegum to rock to hip-hop, unifies style and substance. Certainly corporations with interests in the music industry will continue to offer visual content to accompany music. Most likely they'll be carried away by technology, meaning the sixth Killers album could come with a thematic video that loops on an iPod screen rather than a static image.
Yet music is marketing. Whether one denies commercial intentions or not, the fact is, musicians seek an audience and can only do so by creating a product, whether it be shamelessly corporate or vehemently DIY. The best way to market is with a brand. The best way to brand is with a logo. Record covers work like logos. A record cover, beautiful or hideous, can stop shoppers in their tracks. A strong cover image becomes associated with the music within. Consumers and producers need the album cover, at the very least to serve as advertisement for new music. I hope this list, though silly and sarcastic, reminds readers of the pleasures of albums in an age of MP3s.
Finally, my criteria of what is "bad" warrants mention. Some of these images are downright vulgar. Some of them show a complete lack of artistic skill and execution. A greater portion fail because they neglect to serve their purpose: to represent and sell the music inside. Most album covers are "bad." But this is expected, as most albums are bad. In my mind, true, inexcusable failure occurs when the means and resources are at hand, but nothing comes together. Or when an established artist takes a wrong turn. Expectation is everything. Mission to Mars deserves consideration as The Worst Movie Ever over an Ed Wood film because of the budget, cast, and creators involved. Then again, sometimes nothing beats plain funny. Which is why, in the end, I hope that a similar list can be created in 30 years. Music not only evokes imagery, it desperately needs it for fulfillment.
The Cranberries
Bury the Hatchet
Storm Thorgerson's artwork fluctuates between the iconic and the inane. This one falls into the latter category. It breaks from Thorgerson's proud realism: His Pink Floyd covers were actually staged on beaches and in fields. Here, Photoshop stabs art with its little pixelated scalpel. Unless that really is an actual giant eyeball tormenting that naked man, like his soul. In that case, I apologize.
Genesis
Foxtrot
Why do hipsters reject Genesis? Animal Collective couldn't try any harder to mimic them, from the prog-jamming down to the stupid album art. In 10 years, Geologist & The Mechanics will top the charts with an inspirational ballad and Panda Bear will record a slick blue-eyed soul album for yuppies, write some songs for a Disney cartoon, and play a butler in a movie. Then your kids will make Animal Collective the butt of jokes, and you'll be just like That Guy defending Genesis to anyone who's born post-Bret Easton Ellis.
Grateful Dead
Terrapin Station
Dancing turtles are among the reasons why so many have an innate bias against the Dead. Iconography rife with twirlin g hippie animals, LSD teddy bears, and grinning skeletons have ruined the band's image to such an extent that coming around to American Beauty and Live Dead now marks the 5th Rite of Passage for growing music geeks, the stage that typically follows "Getting Past the Idea That All Reggae Is the Same."
Erste Allgemeine Verunsicherung
Ding Dong!
Apparently, Austrians aren't ones for subtlety when it comes to dick jokes.
Jacky
Circo Encantado da Jacky
A market research firm's 10-country study, "What Do Children Do Every Day?", indicates that 57% of Brazilian children and adolescents aged 2-17 spend at least three hours a day in front of the television-- higher than the percentage in the other surveyed countries: Canada, the U.S., China, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, England, and Spain. A good reason for this might be because they have children's television stars like Jacky, ne Jackeline Petkovic, who carry silicon implants and pose in magazines like Sexy and Playboy.
Minami Haruo
Sekai
From Anthropologie's Fall Collection for Men:
- The Venice-by-the-sea dress
Graphic blossoms in shades of sage, violet, and cobalt blue tumble over calf-grazing silk. Full kimono sleeves, a deep v-neckline, and an obi sash add an Eastern air. By Corey Lynn Calter. Dry clean. USA.
$228.00
Danny Kaye
Po Po the Puppet
Danny Kaye went on to play Geppetto in a TV adaptation of Pinocchio, becoming the first actor to go for the cy cle of playing puppet, puppetmaker, pirate, and jester. Almost there, Johnny Depp!
Heintje Davids
Heintje Davids
Heintje
Heintje
The Dutch can make a microphone out of a tennis ball, an electric razor, some insulating tape, and rubber tubing.
Mtume
Juicy Fruit
Like the gum, the flavor of Juicy Fruit lasts less than a minute and carries an aftertaste rich with traces of sweat and pubic hair.
Joan Armatrading
Track Record
Every week on "America's Next Top Model", Jay Manuel forces contestants into elaborate, silly photo shoots in which m odels often slip into visual puns. Fashion, like pop, needs elements of camp and comedy. That said, Track Record looks like a K-Mart ad demonstrating the range of available products, from sporting equipment to music instruments. Tyra would criticize Joan's profile, Miss J. would mock the white sneakers, and Janet Dickenson would point out her fat patella. Seriously, that's the biggest kneecap I've ever seen. I look at this cover and just see knee. Take so me Muy Thai lessons with that thing, Joan.
Climax Blues Band
Rich Man
Of all the figures from Fisher-Price's line of Little People, the Rich Man fetches the most money on online auction sites. Child Safety groups lobbied to remove the toy from store shelves, mostly because of the "really smokes cigar" feature, which not only sets blankies afire but when detached is a potential choking hazard.
Deep Purple
Sandinavian Nights
Perhaps that's not a typo and Sweden has a beach-themed casino where washed-up 1970s bands plod through their hits.
Komputer
The World of Tomorrow
Silicon Teens
Music for Parties
Laugh all you want at visionaries who believe buildings will someday have no walls and skies will turn purple due to worsening global climate. It may not seem to make much sense architecturally, but schools are starting to teach child ren shoebox diorama construction instead of engineering fundamentals. The PTA thinks Sally's shoddy popsicle-sticks-in-Reebok-box reconstruction of the Rodney King beating for the History Fair is "cute" and "poignant," but let's see them golf-clap when Sally is all grown up and designing their high-rise eldercare apartment complex. Dystopia!
Kinky
Atlas
My Don Rickles Guide to Punchlines tells me that the only two options here are:
- "Mexican Air Force," and
- "The Mexicans, with their water, and the diarrhea."
Cerys Matthews
Cockahoop
While invading Wales, 9th century Vikings wore a spiked ring fashioned of bronze and phurdpflaap (horse guts) around the penis, which they called the "Cockahoop." These were designed to enhance the pillaging, but mostly the raping. Still smarting more than a millennium later, the Welsh steered clear of Cerys Matthews' oddly celebratory album.
Ultimate Spinach
The Box
Sharks are reverse Popeye. Feed them spinach and they grow hives, lose their sense of smell, and projectile vomit on to tourist boats. Pretty much the exact opposite of what happened when Robin Williams drank the chunky bucket of chum in that Robert Altman movie.
Main Source
Breaking Atoms
Hey, PMRC, rappers are so cute and innocent! They think the universe is made out of candy and bubblegum!
Neil Young
Everybody's Rockin'
In 1983, Geffen Records sued Neil Young for making "unrepresentative" music. The label demanded that Neil repay the $3 million he had received for the electronic Trans and bubblebilly Everybody's Rockin'. Neil raised the stakes by countersuing Geffen for $21 million, charging breach of contract and fraud. Both suits were dropped in 1985. Law students take note: Geffen had a case, even if it was ruined by the infamous "Neil Young's not making Neil Young records" semantics. The label's lawyers needed only to produce a large reproduction of this album cover, as convincingly "rock'n'roll" as The Adventures of Ford Fairlane. Neil seems carved out of wax, propped up inside a faux-retro diner, begging for the sweet release of a grease fire.
Adman
Jammin'
We run this field day shit. Scorin' mad ribbs, strictly blue and red. Tacked 'em up on the headboard tail-fin of the racecar-shaped bed. None of that "participant" shit, that purp' and orang'. MCs try n' pull up to this, but they bet ter stick to the arm hang. Drenched in Hennessey-flavored Gatorade. Y'all Cali Sunny D, taste like razor blades. Dads fixes Acuras at the auto bodyshop, moms kicks in accents on bootleg copy Photoshop.
Corey Feldman
Love Left
An album cover so hideous for an album so pointless you almost have to respect that Corey Haim allegedly lost his teeth due to heroin use, tried to sell the teeth on eBay, took the teeth down because of the website's "no human tissue" clause, begged a pawn shop for pizza money, suffered a drug-induced stroke, fell into a coma, had to leave the hospital for lack of insurance, moved back to his mother's home in suburban Toronto, hired a "holistic web designer" to create an unfruitful website, put on about 50 pounds, caught work in a record store, and received a titular diss on a UK charting single by, of all bands, the Thrills. Almost.
Ken
By Request Only
This record pops up on "Worst Covers" lists often enough that it's garnered serious collector's value. A cover this funny can only be a massive disappointment upon listening. The LP sleeve should just hold a smaller version of the cover that can be removed and passed around for laughs.
moe.
No Doy
Real Life
Happy
Lists reveal so much of your personal biases and nit-picking tastes. Some might think I have something against images of bald dudes with spikes in their head. In my defense, I do really love Frank Black.
The Monkees
Pool It!
A water aerobics cover from an over-the-hill act, Pool It! might as well feature the band playing shuffleboard or leaning on walkers. The Monkees longed for creative control, and when they earned it, the world got Cocoon 3.
As a transitive verb the "pooling" being done in the title can only refer to the Monkees' shame. This picture should hang in A&R offices like those dangling cat posters in guidance counselor cubicles, warning bands of the dangers of hanging on to a dream.
**
NOFX
Heavy Petting Zoo
As Fat Mike scratches his head wondering why his attempts to "rock the vote" failed to kick an unpopular president out of office, hopefully the motor action of his fingers dragging across his scalp will help him recall the image of a dude fingering a sheep. Look, the Left appreciates the effort, all votes count, blah blah blah, but they could use leadership from people who don't amuse teens by singing songs about intercourse with the overweight called "Hotdog in a Hallway". On the bright side, hiring Gallagher for his watermelon smashing antics did little to get Rockwell elected in 1964.
**
Quasi
Hot Shit
Locking herself in the Lincoln Bedroom to smoke a quarter-bag of purple haired B.C. weed, Nancy Reagan sat down for a marathon session of Atari 2600. It was Tuesday. After 134 rounds of QBert, Lincoln's portrait explained to Nancy th at QBert, with his massive hose-nose, "totally symbolized a coke head." He continued, "Coilee is a pusher, looking f or his money. Ugh is a total NARC. Wrong Way is a fiend looking to bogart your stash." Nancy got out her acrylics and painted Q*Bert getting his brain fried. This portrait hung in the oval office for 11 years. Somehow, Quasi got a hold of the image. If you get high enough, Lincoln's portrait will tell you it's a "huge political statement against today's GOP."
**
- Sparks
- Pulling Rabbits Out of a Hat
More than any other cover on this list, this Sparks misstep embodies "disappointment." Prior to Rabbits, Sparks wrapped their albums in some of the best artwork in rock history, typically staging striking, funny photographs. Kimono My House, Propaganda, Indiscreet, and No. 1 in Heaven all merit consideration for a Best Covers of All Time list. Even after the silliness of Angst in My Pants and Whomp That Sucker, this tacky painting signals that the band was nearing its irrelevance.
Young MC
Ain't Goin' Out Like That
Let's see: potbellied, bald-headed, pout-faced, bootleg Tarheels, the posture of a 40 year-old man forced to perform a song centered on mean principals at Long John Silvers openings... That's exactly how you're goin' out.
Accept
Balls to the Wall
Homoerotic to the point that Accept could only have been a label-invented diversion from Judas Priest. The bandname even sounds like a motivational diversity-preaching ensemble for hauptschule assemblies in the greater Dusseldorf area. Balls to the Wall posters prompted Deutschland dads to retool the focus of their "we need to talk" talks from satanism to sexuality, especially upon learning Accept's singer and guitarist, Udo Dirkschneider and Herman n Frank, translate loosely as "silicon buttplug" and "her lady penis."
Budgie
Bandolier
Kula Shaker
Summer Sun
It's an age-old metaphor in England, tracing back to an Edwardian fable:
Who'd you wager in a scrapper?
A budgie on a bareback
or a knight on a rollerbike?
The Brits took it too far when they turned the idiom literal in the post-apocalyptic animated sci-fi flick, Lead F eathers, which spawned two flat-out awful album covers.
Classix Nouveaux
Tokyo
Sure, you could point out the geographical discrepancy between the title and the imagery, but how many new millennium bands have copied wholesale from this album cover? The White Stripes "borrowed" the color scheme and shadowy figures for their breakthrough White Blood Cells. Wilco "paid homage" to the shot of Chicago's famous corncob condos for their Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. Billy Corgan "modeled" his wardrobe and image on the lead singer. And people say Gang of Four set the standard for everyone.
Sammy Dread
Road Block
All Jamaican covers pale in comparison to Dr. Alimantado's Best Dressed Chicken in Town, but this painting looks like how Trent Lott would depict a black artist-- running from the police, disregarding construction signs, and a massive joint between his lips. Sammy Dread!!
Marshmallow Coast
Ride the Lightning
Part Chimp
I Am Come
Do bands even care? These almost reek of attempts to encourage downloading through crap packaging, at a time when cre ating a desirable CD art is in the interest of underground art bands. For one, a well considered cover at least hints that you might have a trace of skill as artists. How are people expected to take you seriously if you can't even dr aw a good duck?
Artists who live and die by album sales can only benefit from beautiful, elaborate packaging. A decade ago indie alb ums came wrapped in delicate screened velum. Sub Pop pressed die-cut, three panel 7" sleeves for meaningless bands. To keep gas in your tour truck, I suggest hiring Robert Sabuda to design a bold cardborigami contraption that cradle s the CD in blossoming intricacy. People might buy that.
Righeira
Vamos a la Playa
"In July 1945, the U.S. Office of Censorship intercepted a letter written from someone in Washington. Addressed to a Chicago newspaper, the letter claimed Hitler was living in a German-owned hacienda 450 miles from Buenos Aires. The U.S. government gave this report enough credibility to act on it, sending a classified telegram to the American embassy in Argentina requesting help in following up the inquiry. Besides giving basic information the telegram added that Hitler was alleged to be living in special underground quarters. 'Source indicates there is a western entrance to the underground hideout which consists of a stone wall operated by photo-electric cells, activated by code signals from ordinary flashlights. Entrance thus uncovered supposedly provides admittance for automobiles.' It continued that Hitler had provided himself with two doubles and was hard at work developing plans for the manufacture of long-ran ge robot bombs and other weapons."
The Death of Hitler: The Full Story with New Evidence from Secret Russian Archives
By Ada Petrova and Peter Watson
St. Martin's Press, 1995
Todd Rundgren
A Wizard, A True Star
Even three ears could not prevent an aging Todd Rundgren from entering his "Matrix phase" and producing 12 Rods while writing a song called "I Hate My Frickin ISP". This cover reminded me of Rundgren's 2004 album Liars, which had slipped my mind in preparing this list. I feel obligated to mention that it easily could have been included.
Cat Stevens
Mona Bone Jakon
A major disconnect between cover and content, the spitting trash can sits miles away from Cat Stevens' meditative folk. Perhaps the image symbolized Cat's contraction of tuberculosis prior to recording the album, but merely looking at the painting feels like contracting TB after reaching into a wet wastebin. Slip this art over a hypothetical Vanilla Fudge record called "P'tuh!" and it doesn't seem so bad. Instead, it's Stevens' Hard Nose the Highway.
Milton Babbitt
The Music of Milton Babbitt
Certainly, it's ugly. But imagine how David Cross must feel.
Badfinger
Ass
Badfinger's leader Pete Ham worshipped Paul McCartney-- until the notoriously vegetarian Beatle incessantly hectored the singer about his surname during the recording of what would be Badfinger's final album for Apple Records. Ham's porkmongering ancestors influenced the songwriter from his anti-sugar curing anthem, "Mean Mean Jemima", to his Christ mas ham-shaped coif. McCartney insisted Ham change his name to Peter Mama Buddha and swore Ham "smelled of crackling," until Pete and the gang scrapped the album and left Apple for the more pro-pork Warner Bros. As a final act of spite, McCartney released Ass sleeved in this mocking depiction of a headphone-clad mule ignoring the almighty Tuber Diety.
Breakwater
Splashdown
In the late 1970s, SC Johnson Wax, Inc. created an imaginary team of hard-scrubbing superjanitors to promote its line of industrial urinal cleaners. In a pilot commercial, the team magically shrunk, flew into a distressed urinal basins, and attacked the sticky mess. After completing the mission, the team, dubbed "Breakwater," posed like big game hun ters in their urine-stained boots, chillin' on the sparkling porcelain for a victory shot.
SC Johnson went so far as cutting a promotional album for the fictional band of janitors, until test marketing showed it skewed "too urban." Breakwater was soon replaced with the Scrubbing Bubbles-- the now-iconic moustachio'd Greek pac men who "work hard, so you don't have to." This deeply offended Greek-Americans, but SC Johnson Wax stated they could "live without the demographic."
Electronicat
21st Century Toy
In the future guitars will not have strings, but rather a face you repeatedly punch to obtain varying tones of crying.
Little Feat
Hoy-Hoy!
Going into this endeavor, I foresaw the inclusion of Hoy-Hoy! causing the greatest ire. Assuming Little Feat fans discovered the site. Assuming Little Feat fans still exist. Because, though pop artist Martin "Neon Park" Muller created one of the most lasting album covers in Weasels Ripped My Flesh, his tacky paintings left Little Feat' s LPs completely immune to critical revisionism or even casual recommendation to anyone under the age of 30.
Older Record Store Clerk: "You like the Band and Steely Dan. Have you ever checked out Little Feat?"
Impressionable Young Music Nerd: "Wait, that band with the jackelope/antlered German shepherd/horny poolside tiger looking at the jello mountain/angel bone/sexy duck?!"
Holly McNarland
Stuff
As appealing as he can be, the Jack Russell is not the ideal pet for everyone. He has his share of terrier aggression towards other dogs and is deadly toward animals he considers to be prey. Thus cats, hamsters, gerbils, and coffeehouse performers can be in jeopardy if the dog is not supervised or confined.
Martin Mull
Martin Mull
George Lucas put his six-part Star Wars opus to bed with the release of Revenge of the Sith. The DVD's accompanying "definitive" sexilogy boxed set contains the tinkered-with, digimuppet-enhanced cuts of the films. ILM's Prius-sized hair-simulating supercomputer rendered four straight days to add flowing brunette locks to the head of Lobot, Lando Calrissian's cyborg sycophant, after doctors diagnosed Lucas' nephew with alopecia areata.
Lucas now intends to laze away the days by purchasing older films and touching them up as he sees fit. First in his sights: Desmond Davis' Clash of the Titans. Never satisfied by the liberal use of the Kraken, a Scandinavian my thological figure wedged boldly into a Greek mythology film, Lucas will replace the Ray Harryhausen beast with longtime friend Martin Mull.
Willie Nelson
Shotgun Willie
Some fundamental NRA rules for safe gun handling include:
1. ALWAYS keep the gun pointed in a safe direction.
2. ALWAYS keep your finger off the trigger until ready to shoot.
3. ALWAYS keep the gun unloaded until ready to use.
4. Whenever you pick up a gun, immediately engage the safety device if possible, and, if the gun has a magazine, remove it before opening the action and looking into the chamber(s) which should be clear of Willie Nelson.
Ted Nugent
Scream Dream
Nuge, dude, look. This isn't a nightmare, or "scream dream," at all. It's a gift from the gods! You can rub one of your guitarhands as a slide against your other guitarhand! Pickups'll pickup pickups in a gnarly buckshot of electro- fried guitarpowder! What for other people is warming hands over a campfire will for you be a wall of doe-killin' bad ass noise.
Public Image, Ltd.
That What Is Not
Yeah, it's a vagina. You win. Neat.
Anthrax
Fistful of Metal
I've studied this Anthrax cover for hours and still I'm unable to work out the physics. Is the fist bursting out of his mouth? Is this a severed head? Mouthful of Metal seems more apt for the image, and fittingly describes the orthodontically aided fanbase of Anthrax.
Pantera
Metal Magic
Mock-metal bands pop up a lot these days. Pinback's Rob Crow fronts Goblin Cock. The Darkness topped charts on that farting frog ringtone island. Even Burger King created Coq Roq, an avian Slipknot parody brainstormed for pimping deep fried poultry sticks. But metal mocks itself just fine. In a recent interview, the singer of Disturbed described the death of "Dimebag" Darrell as "the 9/11 of rock." Carrying the analogy, the cover of Metal Magic must be the Holocaust of Camaro hoods.
Be-Bop Deluxe
Axe Victim
In July 1972, Jean "Edith Bunker" Stapleton checked herself into Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, complaining of severe headaches. X-rays revealed hyper-calcitrated dysplasia in her "jowl bone" and the growth of a rhomboidal network of st range knobs on her forehead, likely caused by CBS studios' overuse of high-powered tungsten lights on her "good side. " In a tasteless move, Be-Bop Deluxe mockingly touched up contraband copies of the x-ray for their 1974 debut.
Beach Boys
Keepin' the Summer Alive
Commonly considered the Beach Boys' worst LP, Keepin' the Summer Alive suffers most from the artwork. Honestly, the music reaches higher points than M.I.U. Album or L.A., if only for the inclusion of "When Girls Get Together", a late-1960s Brian Wilson collaboration with Al Jardine originally intended for the lost Landlocked album*.*
Most of Landlocked turned up on the overlooked Holland, but final act of Keepin' the Summer Alive certainly contained the last vestige of post-Pet Sounds Beach Boys genius. M.I.U. looks less embarrassing on the shelf. Yet, the details on Keepin' endlessly amuse. Bruce, Al, Mike, and Brian hover close to the heating unit. Brian sits under an umbrella in a biodome. The polar bear seems to be yawning. If only Dennis and Carl had been kept in a sealed chamber, the recent Wilson renaissance would be all the sweeter.
**
Cher
I Paralyze
The Edgar Winter Group
They Only Come Out at Night
Herbie Mann
Push Push
Every year the music critic community gathers for a Halloween party at Richard Meltzer's extended-stay hotel room. Marshmallows roast over the Sophomore Album Bonfire, while effigies of a White Guitar Rock Band turn on a hot spit. Party prerequisite: All attendees must come dressed as their favorite album cover. Robert Christgau perennially cheats, hovering around the Bobbing For Adjectives Written On Apples barrel, invariably clad in an "Ali Farke Toure as Oops! I Did It Again" get-up. Check out the Norwegian karaoke with ILMers in their CocoRosie unicorn chain-hump costume. Man, it's a blast. Inevitably, at least two people show up as Edgar Winter (writers are naturally pasty people) and Cher's I Paralyze and end up making out on the stack of faded Crawdaddys, while Jim "Push Push" DeRogatis just stands around with his flute, watching.
Elvis Costello
Spike
The "spike" refers to the pang of doubt that shot through Elvis Costello's spine as he recalled that infamous old Ray Charles incident while the art director applied black paint to his face.
Kim Fowley
Fantasy World
In 1982, my father crafted a much stronger Jawa costume with bold yellow swim goggles to emulate their little greedy glowing eyes. But I can admit defeat. The Christina Ricci get-up Dad made for me in Halloween 1998 can not touch Kim Fowley's design.
REO Speedwagon *
- You Can Tune a Piano, But You Can't Tuna Fish
REOSW's YCTAPBYCTF firmly establishes a two-decade continuum of Pun-Titled Rock in Northern Illinois. Without this album the world wouldn't have Joan of Arc classics such as Gin & Platonic, To've Had Two Of, Stemingway & Heinbeck, and If It Feels/Good, Do It. Or laureate-level lyrics from Braid like: "You're the only one I live for/ Ever got shorter" or "We'll keep honor/ We'll keep on her."
Andy Bey
Experience and Judgment
Brothers Johnson
Light Up the Night
Quincy Jones
Smackwater Jack
Their massive, Quincy Jones-produced album Right on Time showered the Brothers Johnson with royalties and fame. Jones, wearing his magical "universe shirt," purportedly crafted from the actual "fabric" of space-time, imbued the album with nebular splendor and cosmic allure. Still calling himself "Smackwater Jack" after having mistaken a water bong for a bottle of SoCo at a Diana Ross fte, Jones purchased an illuminated telescope for the Brothers Johnson to commemorate their "stellar" accomplishments.
Focused on more earthly concerns, the Brothers Johnson took to hanging out in planetariums where they would hold the illuminated optical device to their groin and ask passing women to "take a peek into the pink telescope." Boy, did it backfire when, upon doing just that, the passing women would look to the sky and see Andy Bey's smooth-lovin' visage, hovering in the star-speck'd heavens.
Caramel
Caramel
One day, the dawn of Photoshop will be seen as the absolute nadir of human artistic endeavor. That day will be February 10, 1998, when Caramel by Caramel is released. The advent of a new technology typically results in growing pains, but a decade later Photoshop remains tacky. People forgot the "photo" element of Photoshop, instead trying to pimp their ride with all fuzzy dice, no car. Christ, it's like an Adobe walk-thru using rejected Primus props.
Jimmy Witherspoon & Eric Burdon
Guilty!
When Guilty! cover model Herman Frund got the tattoo of incarcerated black men across his forehead his agent promised it would not pigeonhole him exclusively in the world of Racist Modeling. Sure enough, the only job Frund procured following the shoot for Guilty! would be as the box model for Kap'n Klan's Truncheon Krunch Cereal.
Lords of Acid
Pussy
For her "Butterfly" single and video, Mariah Carey intended to finally let go of all her inhibitions, insisting on rubbing her bare vagina all over the camera's lens. Eventually, the director fought for a reshoot, not out of fear of offending, but because the footage looked like "a giant squid attacking a sub." Mariah still forced her ideas into the single packaging, suggesting she squeeze the head of her kitten, Nipples, between her thighs. The art director note d they could achieve the same effect in graphics editing, but Mariah insisted on grounds of realism and "that look of pained resignation." Tommy Mottola wasn't havin' it, and sold the image to Lords of Acid.
The Mars Volta
De-Loused in the Comatorium
You might think that this baffling, silly image is merely homage to the Hipgnosis-designed covers of 1970s prog giants. However, several (hat)emails sent to me in 2003 confirm that if you "listen without shit in your ears," "Drunkship of Lanterns" explains that the gold Telly Savalas head represents the death of the Mars Volta's childhood friend Julio Venegas.
Nantucket
Nantucket
Sometimes album covers are so overwhelmingly awful that the little details are lost. Yes, that's a lobster in tight denim hunting a nude sunbather. But please note its shoes.
Nazareth
The Fool Circle
Infighting erupted as Nazareth members debated the name of the creature depicted on the cover of their 1981 album, The Fool Circle. Guitarist Zal Cleminson insisted the animal was a "holphin," while bassist Pete Agnew, who found the image hanging above a fireplace in an exclusive gay equestrian club in Fort Lauderdale, claimed that "scientists" called the beast a "dorse." The argument escalated into fisticuffs, prompting singer Dan McCafferty to plead, "Bros, perhaps we should remember a little man from Nazareth named Jesus?" At any rate, they were all wrong; the animal is "porny," and its existence conclusively demonstrates evolution and thus precludes "God" and "Jesus."
Weezer
Maladroit
Most of Weezer's original fans jumped ship the moment this image hit Amazon.com's pre-order page. The Green Album may have contained "Hash Pipe", but the album's otherwise dizzy aroma of Krazy Glue-tight arrangements, Hard Candy nail polish veneer, and Cinnabon harmonies offered a cheap high that fit into the band's repertoire. The futura "weezer" left-justified on the spine even provided continuity from The Blue Album to Pinkerton. The effortless snapshot of the group on the cover hinted at bubblepunk Ramones knock-offs and Bop posters.
Maladroit visibly announced that the band (i.e. Rivers Cuomo) retired any notion of concern towards image or consistency, which suits college rock bands but reeks of rigor mortis in the world of power-pop. Pinkerton's Hiragami revealed Cuomo's asian fetish; Maladroit proved him to be just tacky.
Black Cat Bones
Barbed Wire Sandwich
My aesthetic nerve center finds this cover quite beautiful, but my logistical nitpicking brain argues for its inclusion on this list. Clearly, the creature's dental imprint would cut an arc of greater width and of lesser curve in the side of the sandwich. How could the band let that slip? Also, that isn't barbed wire. Way to screw up a perfect concept, haunting make-up work, and stunning photography, Black Cat Bones.
Bloodrock
Bloodrock USA
Wet Willie
Wet Willie
Sharing a theme, these two albums grant music historians evidence enough to suggest Garishly Cartooned Giant Fingers Causing Head Trauma on the Covers of Boogie-Rock Records existed as a definite genre in the mid-1970s.
An anatomy guide would have served each cover artist well. Bloodrock's artwork resembles a doodle from DC Comics fan Jerry Seinfeld wherein the Martian Manhunter takes out "Puddy," clad in his notorious leather 8-ball jacket. Wet Willie aim more for a medical depiction, humorous for its gross errors. The ossicles should sit further inside the canal. The angle of the eustachian tube veers at least 10 degrees too steep. Was an ENT even consulted on this? Not to mention the amount of time it would take the parotid, submandibular, and sublingual glands to produce that much spit to carry into an avaiting ear. Jesus, people, take a class.
Doktor Kosmos
Cocktail
Russian folk medicine holds that drinking a short glass of mouthwash cures herpes. Doktor Kosmos learned the hard way that this just is not true. However, he did develop a taste for Scope and later composed a concept record about his plight.
Dschingis Khan
Mosaku
In place of the American archetypes of the Village People, the Germans assembled a collection of Teutonic icons for t heir own disco-pop chartbusters, Dschingis Khan. Clockwise from top: Kommunisten Klaus, Kevin Spacey auf Yul Brenner, Beefeater Luftlinen Stewardessen, der Yanni, Herr Bumblerocket, and Mutti Mutti Hausfrau.
Emerson, Lake & Palmer
Tarkus
Music critics are given to fits of nonsensical fantasy metaphors for sonic description in place of critical thought. Guitars "pitter patter like lemur tears drawn into the maw of turbine engine blades." Drums "crumble like tumbling chunks of rebar and mock-marble from faux Babylonian fountains in the Home Depot garden department."
Music critics also hated ELP, so Emerson responded with his own ridiculous mash-up of imagery, the Tarkus. Part armadillo, part Sturmpanzerwagen A7V, the Tarkus steamrolled across the "rainbow" of critically lauded musical diversity, leaving writersaurus dinosaur bones in its wake. Sure, critics just pulled out their bigger pens to write off the band's classical-minded prog and plug the mounted guns of the Tarkus-- but did they remember the nostril cannons? Advant age: Tarkus!
Gentle Giant
Acquiring the Taste
Is this trying to be suggestive? Not overtly salivating anilingus? It's OK, darling, he may be a giant mouth, but he's gentle. Just don't ask what the black liquid beading on the tongue might be.
The Kinks
Schoolboys in Disgrace
The pasty Brits avoid the sun, as the sun avoids the British Isles. Coppertone needed new markets and repackaged thei r suntan lotion as "Bottom Balm" for punished public school students.
Richard & Willie
Funky Honkey, Nasty Nigger
At first I found this cover amazing. Then I noticed that nobody, puppet or person, salutes the flag. Before anything else, I am a Patriot, and this is offensive.
Rolling Stones
Dirty Work
No cover goes so far to completely tarnish the reputation of a Valhalla-ensconced band while demonstrating the crushing awfulness of 1980s aesthetics as Dirty Work. Keith knees Mick in his citrus groin with his fought-for black slacks, as this was all obviously Jagger's idea. Charlie's hides in his camouflage blouse, blending into the blue background. The entire image is only of significance as it captures the turning point where heroin finally turned Keith's face from "Keith Richards" to "Dried Apple Head Doll."
Chumbawamba
Anarchy
Nurse With Wound & Whitehouse
The 150 Murderous Passions
Many liberals, such as Nurse With Wound or Whitehouse, reluctantly endorse the practice of third trimester abortions, but only the fiercely far left, such as manifesto punk jugband Chumbawamba, condone the practice of the fifth trimester abortion, where a six-month-old child is forced back into the uterus and left to die.
The Dirty Projectors
The Glad Fact
Many Americans do not realize that, like the British, our Canadian neighbors to the north use a slightly altered vocabulary. In the UK, "math" is incorrectly called "maths" and a "seeing-eye dog" is mockingly called a "blind dog." Likewise, in Canada a television is called a "cathoder" and pizza is called "cheesy tomato pie in the round." Also, probably tracing back to the strident morality of settling Huguenots, the Canadians name the penis the "dirty projector," much to the amusement of at least one American band.
Fortran 5
Avocado Suite
Royal Trux
Sweet Sixteen
Sebadoh
Bakesale
While many consider Millie Jackson's Back to the Shit the epitome of Poor Toilet Artwork, it's too obvious and honestly not so terrible. Black tile cuts strong angles into the white in what is, stylistically, a well-framed image. Millie's expression guarantees the consumer will find a woman fully, emotionally into her work on record. To heighten their effect, imagine these three as a narrative.
Scorpions
Fly to the Rainbow
Scorpions
*Virgin Killer ***
Fotomaker
Fotomaker
Fotomaker
Vis-a-Vis
Deciding which of the middle two covers offends more and crosses more lines opens the debate over what is truly more pornographic: full, stark nudity or the objectified, cropped body, oozing adult looks and suggesting what might be off camera? Under pressure to respond to the "gay" accusations following their Fly to the Rainbow album, the Scorpions pushed a little too far in asserting their heteromasculinity. A German metal band holds little claim to some Jock Sturges "art, not porn" defense. Conversely, Fotomaker responded to creepy "heteromasculinity" accusations by going too gay, while retaining the creepy edge that world came to not care about at all.
** Image censored
Butthole Surfers
Electriclarryland
Such a cheap image belongs in the scaled-down plastic case of a compact disc. At the dawn of the 1990s, designers started to think of album art in 4.75" x 4.75" frames. Viral fonts from online designers like Chank and Larabie spread like mold into typography. CD naysayers who worshiped their vinyl continually pointed to the diminishing size of the album cover as analogous to the diminutive stature of the format. Most of these same people likely shouted "sell-out" at the Butthole Surfers' Buzzbin flirtations. Every Christmas, ashamed parents force themselves into Sam Goody's to pick up discs from the wishlists of their puberty-swollen kids. They hang their head and mumble the needed CD. This was the "Orgy - Candyass " of 1996.
CocoRosie
Noah's Ark
According to Oxford's Volume of Mythical Anatomy, a unicorn's "horn" is also the creature's phallus. But their nipples do indeed secrete diamonds. Credit where it's due. The way in which the "bottom" of this rape-chain vomits rainbows perhaps references Shakespeare, playing on:
BOTTOM
I will discharge it
in either your straw-colour beard,
your orange-tawny beard,
your purple-in-grain beard,
or your French-crown-colour beard,
your perfect yellow.
Like Bottom, CocoRosie too play the part of Pyramus, throwing themselves to the critical lions before commiting career suicide with this artwork.
Deerhoof
Milk Man
After fading into video game obscurity, Pac Man turned to the world of modern art. In his series of paintings called "Power Ups", Pac Man explores the relationship between sexuality and violence, questioning his own mixed desire to consume what he both fears and desires.
Fleetwood Mac
Mystery to Me
Despite the enormous stature of Fleetwood Mac, few are familiar with Mystery to Me and other albums from the transitional post-Peter Green, pre-Buckingham/Nicks era when the McVies led the group. Forced to finally define just w hy this album always topped my internal list of worst covers proves to be difficult. It touches on all the elements of "fantastically horrible." Cartoon covers rarely work, and mesh awkwardly with the traditional blues-folk realm of Fleetwood Mac. A disconnect between cover and content makes the painting both artistically and commercially ill-advised. Here, a massive phallus appears to sprout from the back of the crying gorilla which is eating cake and books. That absurd sentence reads like magnetic poetry, but plainly describes this icon of awful.
The cover also serves as evidence towards the theory that an album's sleeve can effect its legacy. Slim difference divides Mystery to Me and Penguin with their predessor, Bare Trees. Bare Trees, however, comes slipped inside a wintery photograph of a deciduous, misty forest, an image which continually comes to mind when l istening to the stark acoustic tracks. Compare the current ratings of these three albums, and try and deny revisionism can live and die by the artwork.
Chris Lee
Cool Rock
At the McDonald's Museum in their corporate headquarters outside Chicago, there is odd historical ephemera for the amusement of the fast food curious. Did you know the company looked to take its prideful hiring of the mentally and physically challenged to new politically correct levels by starting a franchise of restaurants completely run by the handicapped? Tardee's, as it was to be called, allowed the employees to create their own menu, resulting in signature items such as the Mac'n'Cheese'n'Marshmallow on a Flip Flop, and the Machoman Hulk Batman Burger. Alas, investors backe d out and the chain never got past the boardroom. Tardee's CEO Chris Lee swallowed his disappointment and boldly turned to a career in rock, declaring it to be "cool." Unfortunately, his compact disc bears the unfortunate distinction of being the only album to make this list solely on the use of the artist's headshot.
Jim O'Rourke
Eureka
Xiu Xiu
A Promise
Jim O'Rourke and Xiu Xiu are said to be "big in Japan." This phenomenon is starting to make more sense. So are phonebook-thick cartoon porn comics where schoolgirl squirrels experiment in the shower. Don't pat yourself on the back, guys.
Phish
Billy Breathes
Perhaps the only album to credit a "nose hair groomer." Editorial has contractually obligated me to include this cover in an effort to even out this album's inclusion on Pitchfork's Beta-Version Best of the 1990s list. Oh... that's be en completely wiped from the site? Heh. Nevermind. We had, uh, Jesus Lizard there. No, wait, it was a Finnish proto-neo Lapland-laptop folk record. Yeah, totally.
Type O Negative
The Origin of the Feces
Christian Rock bands can be so predictable in their recycled iconography. It's always bolts of sunlight breaking thr ough clouds, crosses, arms raised to the sky, close up shots of Jesus shitting, doves, blah blah blah.
Regurgitate
Carniverous Erection
Poor Brent "Data" Spiner is so desperate to break free from the "Star Trek" Convention circuit he's forced to find work wherever. It's bad enough Regurgitate asked him to model as their tongue-chewing cock, but the contract didn't mention how unclean and crusty he would look in the final image. Grandma Spiner cancelled the Christmas Cards once the final proof came through. However, Brent now divides his time between "Star Trek" and Regurgitate conventions, and both "Data" and "Carniverous Erection" call for the same shade of face paint. Money saved there.
