Worst "Special Edition" album cover changes

Classic cover


New one


The Queen now is looking the clock

 

It looks like the old 8 track

 

I like the slip cover idea. But too late, I guess.

 

That was a strange decision, thankfully they did have the proper cover as part of the book i believe so you could swap it out.

 

Although not special editions, in 1980 when RCA reissued the original Wooden Nickel era Styx albums, they replaced the original artwork with cheesy graphics AND gave the albums new titles. Styx, Styx II, The Serpent is Rising and Man Of Miracles became I, Lady, Serpent and Miracles respectively.

 

Yeah the original was much more subtle.

 

I don't have mine yet but isn't that just a clear slip case that you can remove to reveal the original artwork?

 

Yes.

 

When Bunny Wailer reissued two of his albums a few years ago he felt the need to photoshop new covers for them and mess with the tracklistings too. Fans regarded the effects as a tacky attempt to appeal to a new audience.

Orig:


Remix/Reissue


Orig:



Reissue with added unrelated tracks:

 

I don’t know, I never thought of that.
I hope that’s all it is.
Sill... they should’ve just kept it white.

 

Man, I first bought that album decades ago - in the late 70's - and it's always had the green cover. Was the alternate there only issued in a few countries? I've gotten used to the green cover over the years, and think the alternate looks odd.

Led Zep Special Editions get my vote.

I actually think the Phil Collins covers are great, and quite brave in this era of image means all.

With others, seeing Station to Station in color is jarring. The black and white image is better, and for me is nicely cropped.

 

My slipcover came inside of a thicker box

 

Loads of Tangerine Dream albums have had their original covers replaced with usually inferior, 'generic' updates...

Clannad's Macalla and Sirius had changed artwork when they were reissued on CD

 

You shoulda said it was bush league.

File this in the missed opportunity pile.

 

The only ones I actually love are the "Reverse Negative" Zeppelin reissues. I especially love the color tones on II and Houses. Beautifully done and very classy looking.

But most "Revisionist Artworks" usually just detract rather than enhance, in my opinion.

 

The 1999 Mute reissue of Suicide's second album looked strange. Vega and Rev in full 1972 hippie gear. Instead of the familiar shower scene.

Not the biggest fan of the altered artwork on the vinyl only reissues of Alan's post-"Deuce Avenue" albums either. Of course every Suicide related reissue is nice but....

 

That's what I did (still have that version too). I did the same thing with the (thankfully) two-sided Blu-ray insert of Valley Girl, but that's a different...tangent. (Hideous, the new artwork for that)

 

It's a clear slipcase. The book is white, with "The Beatles" embossed on it, with a number -- just like the original. The slipcase looks awesome.

 

This is the strangest example I've seen. WHY?

 

The Mute reissue of Why Be Blue was even worse, IMHO. It's like they weren't even trying to come up with new artwork and accidentally left a lazy placeholder graphic to be printed on the cover.

Original version:


Reissue:

 

“The pits” doesn’t even begin to tell...

 

The 1985 reissue of Kiss’ Creatures of the Night is a real head scratcher. I get that they wanted Creatures to appear as the rebirth so they put it in the non-makeup era retrospectively. But Bruce Kulick? Dude wasn’t on either Lick It Up or Animalize so looking at the album covers chronologically created unnecessary confusion.
And why did they think Saint and Sinner and Killer needed to swap places all of a sudden? A real hot mess, this one.

 

Because it's a period "modern" typeface (all in lower case) replaced with something that just looks like a rubbish computer font.

 

thought it was silly that Paul Simon had the cigarette airbrushed out of his hand on the cover of the Old Friends box set