You will have all seen these icon album covers before. You may have grown up listening to one of these bands and I’m sure some of these albums are more like the soundtrack of your youth. I found these bands later on in life but I can assure you I love them as much as you. This is the rundown of my top 5 favourite album images of all time and a few cheeky facts thrown in as well.
No. 5- The Clash – London Calling
One of the most iconic images in rock n roll history
The image depicts lead singer Joe Strummer smashing up a bass guitar at New York’s Palladium in 1979
The picture taken by Pennie Smith who tried to convince Joe it was too blurry to be an album cover, but she was overruled!
No. 4- The Beatles- Abbey Road
Famously over analysed as Paul McCartney’s funeral procession
Taken outside the world famous Abbey Road Studios in London on the 8th of August 1969
Photographer Iain Macmillan was given only ten minutes to take the photo whilst he stood on a step-ladder and a policeman held up the traffic
No. 3- Nirvana- Nevermind
The album cover shows a baby boy, alone underwater with a US dollar bill on a fishhook just out of his reach. According to Cobain, he conceived the idea while watching a television program on water births with Dave Grohl
The naked baby on the cover of the album is Spencer Elden who has been offered large sum of money to re-create the famous image
David Geffen was worried that the baby’s genitalia would offend people, but Kurt Cobain made it clear his only compromise would be to place a sticker over the baby’s genitalia saying "If you're offended by this, you must be a closet paedophile"
No. 2- Pink Floyd- Dark Side of the Moon
Designed by British design company Hipgnosis, who had worked on the previous 2 Floyd albums
The light band on the album cover has six colours, missing indigo compared to the traditional division of the spectrum into red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet
Some stoner, teenage fans are convinced that the rainbow is a hint that the album is synced to the Wizard of Oz
No. 1- The Beatles- Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
The Grammy Award-winning album packaging was famously designed by Peter Blake
The collage depicted around 60 famous people, including writers, musicians, film stars, and a number of Indian gurus as requested by George Harrison
Adolf Hitler and Jesus were also requested by John Lennon, but ruled out on common sense grounds and the fact Lennon once said that The Beatles were bigger than Jesus
Those were my top 5 favourite albums with a few weird and wonderful facts about each one. These pieces of artwork look great when transferred on to t-shirts. At GF we’ve been printing custom garments for years, from local bands to famous album covers. We do it all! You can place an order on our eshop, ring 029020 755 733 or send an email to info@goldenfinishes.co.uk
