Brilliant albums with horrible album covers

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Timos, Oct 22, 2020.

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  1. CWChrome

    CWChrome Senior Member

    Location:
    Ohio
    Emerson, Lake & Palmer - Trilogy

    Love the album, but boy...what a horrible cover.
    It wasn't going to be their last horrible cover either.
    Hard to understand, that such a talented band would sign off on covers for Trilogy, Love Beach, In the Hot seat and Black Moon.
     
  2. Zack

    Zack Senior Member

    Location:
    Easton, MD
    This cover is at least interesting. Lots going on (see the pizza in there?)

    And Sticky Fingers worse? One of the most iconic album covers of all time.
     
  3. jaypee65

    jaypee65 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vienna, Austria

    For the first reissue of "Kind of Blue" on cd, Sony manage to screw up twice: a picture without any relationship with the music and... an inverted picture (Miles doesn't play tumpet with his left hand). I mean, who got the brilliant idea to change an iconic picture of an even more iconic album... Probably the same guy that came with the idea of "new" Coca Cola...
    That's the moment I realized that no matter how big and important the label was, they mostly didn't care for their music.

    [​IMG]
     
  4. qwerty

    qwerty A resident of the SH_Forums.

    I met a girl at a party, who told me she worked for her father's company, which was a music publisher. She was working on a DVD compilation history of Daddy Cool (the Australian band). She also told me how whenever she tells people her jobs, she usually has an excited reaction by music fans who reflect how she must have a dream job (which is what I was thinking at the time). She then followed it by saying she understood people's passion in music and their desire to immerse themselves in it. All very good, until she disclosed that she had absolutely no - that is zero - interest in any type of music. It was just a job to her that she found ho-hum and knew many people would kill to have. A story of a job for Daddy's little girl. No wonder I though the Daddy Cool DVD ended up being on the average side.
     
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  5. jaypee65

    jaypee65 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vienna, Austria
    Of course, not everyone in that business is either incompetent or cynical. But I find amazing to see how labels either let great material locked in their vaults instead of making it available (I mean, how complicated would it be to digitilize it and sell it as download only on their own website?) or simply reissue it as a mere commodity without any respect for musicians or the fans (like the example you mention).
    This is why I'm alway happy to get those jazz or classical reissues made by "grey-zone" European labels of albums that are not copyrighted anymore and that, often, haven't even been properly reiussed by their original labels.
    CD-crisis? Indeed. But the customers shouldn't be the only one to take the blame...
     
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  6. Fletch

    Fletch Senior Member

    Location:
    Nowhere, man.
    Wasn’t the pitch wrong on a few tracks of this issue also?
     
    squittolo likes this.
  7. George the Cat

    George the Cat Forum Resident

    Location:
    Brighton
    Neil Young has released quite a few with very poor covers.
     
    peskypesky likes this.
  8. jaypee65

    jaypee65 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Vienna, Austria
    Yeah, also. But it seems that even the early releases had that problem.
     
  9. Jon-A

    Jon-A Forum Resident

    Location:
    Madison, WI
    Yes, and they can be less knowledgeable than the normal fan. For example: the basics of properly remastering a record are not a secret: present the music as faithfully to original intent as possible, correct obvious errors, and don't interfere. Yet still record companies routinely mess it up. Sometimes to the extent that you wonder if anyone in the process actually listened to the thing. Back in the day, the common opinion was, logically, that the earliest transfers to CD would be inferior and subsequent reissues would be better. A learning curve, and all. And that was true...sometimes. But now we often find the first CDs, with minimal tweaking, were the best - and record companies have been finding new ways to sabotage reissues ever since. Cover art too.
    :mudscrying:
     
    jaypee65 likes this.
  10. Wordnat2

    Wordnat2 Square as hay, dull as cattle.

    Location:
    Boise
    Wow. In what universe in this considered a horrible album cover?
    I know that taste is subjective; I also know that some of y’alls subjective taste is pure cringe.
     
  11. MadMelMon

    MadMelMon Forum Resident

    To be fair, Iggy hated the cover when he saw it. Years later he admitted that the label had "done him a solid" by choosing what eventually became an iconic photo.
     
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  12. mbrownp1

    mbrownp1 Forum Resident

    You couldn't be more wrong if you tried.
     
    Mikewest, Fullbug, moodyxadi and 9 others like this.
  13. jimjim

    jimjim Forum Resident

    No
    Not sure but I have an 80s vinyl reissue on Epic that's has the same cover (minus the yellow border). Maybe they no longer had rights to use the flag image then?
     
  14. MOE DOLLAZ

    MOE DOLLAZ Well-Known Member

    Location:
    Hazard County
    great cover
     
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  15. MOE DOLLAZ

    MOE DOLLAZ Well-Known Member

    Location:
    Hazard County
    wrong
     
    SoporJoe likes this.
  16. Seabass

    Seabass Old Git

    Location:
    Devon, England
    Really?
     
  17. MOE DOLLAZ

    MOE DOLLAZ Well-Known Member

    Location:
    Hazard County
    yes
     
  18. Mr-Beagle

    Mr-Beagle Ah, but the song carries on, so holy

    Location:
    Kent
    The cover has never bothered me
     
  19. Man at C&A

    Man at C&A Senior Member

    Location:
    England
    I like the Pet Sounds sleeve. It could be just because I love the album so much. The green and yellow colouring and font is definitely nice though.
     
    Timos, moodyxadi, TheMovieRad and 5 others like this.
  20. 21st Century Schizoid Cat

    21st Century Schizoid Cat Sleepy soul

    Location:
    Philadelphia
    I hated it so much that for my digital copy I made my own cover using the inernal gatefold artwork.
     
  21. Man at C&A

    Man at C&A Senior Member

    Location:
    England
    I like this one too. Simple and a nice shade of green. Were the UK pressings textured? I've never noticed. I've only had a late 70s pressing through my hands. I don't know if I like the album or not!
     
    moodyxadi likes this.
  22. paulisdead

    paulisdead fast and bulbous

    [​IMG] [​IMG]

    The Drum reissues of The Easybeats' Best of Vol. 1 and 2. These tacky covers make the group look like a country act that sings about truck driving.
     
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  23. paulisdead

    paulisdead fast and bulbous

    squittolo likes this.
  24. paulisdead

    paulisdead fast and bulbous

    [​IMG]

    A strange album cover. Not sure if I like it or I think it hurts the music. I'm sure the pregnant clown theme helped with sales of the album. Shame, because it's a really underrated album.

     
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  25. mwheelerk

    mwheelerk Sorry, I can't talk now, I'm listening to music...

    Location:
    Gilbert Arizona
    I love this cover. Album and cover one of the best.
     
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