Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Album Cover Art

Let's continue our look at Gigwise.com's 50 most controversial, weirdest, best and worst album cover art as compiled by their crack staff:


Controversial


28. Millie Jackson: ‘Back To The Shit’ (1989) Just what I want to see, some pop diva taking a dump. Add to this some great tracks like "Muffle That Fart" and "Love Stinks" and you have a tasteless album cover.

Millie Jackson is an R&B/Soul music singer/songwriter. Her vocal performances are distinguished by long, humorous, and explicit spoken sections in her music; She has also recorded many disco songs, some dance music songs, and a few country styled songs. She is the mother of R&B singer Keisha Jackson. Great example Mom.....

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Weird


28. The Mars Volta: 'DeLoused In The Crematorium' De-Loused in the Comatorium is the first studio album by the progressive rock band The Mars Volta. Based on a short story by lead singer Cedric Bixler-Zavala, and sound manipulation artist Jeremy Michael Ward, it is the hour-long tale of Cerpin Taxt, a man who tries to kill himself by overdosing on a mixture of morphine and rat poison. The attempt lands him in a week-long coma during which he experiences visions of humanity and his own psyche. Upon waking, he is dissatisfied with the real world and jumps to his death. The story of Cerpin Taxt is based on the death of El Paso, Texas artist (and Bixler-Zavala's friend) Julio Venegas.

De-Loused became both critically and commercially their biggest hit, eventually selling in excess of 500,000 copies despite next-to-no promotion, and was featured on several critics' "Best of the Year" lists.

The album cover is the work of famed artist/designer and oddball Storm Thorgerson, who is responsible for some of the best cover art in the industry.

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Worst


28. El Vez – ‘Son Of A Lad From Spain?’: El Vez (born 1960) is the stage name of Robert Lopez, a Mexican-American rock and roll artist, who performs and records original material and covers classic rock songs. Mixing the styles of Elvis Presley and many other American rock artists with his own Latin-American heritage and music, he is known for expressing revolutionary views through his the satire and humor in his songs.

Lopez's main persona and style is very similar to Elvis Presley, as his stage name suggests. However, he is not strictly an Elvis impersonator; on his recordings and in his live show, he covers many non-Mexican artists, such as John Lennon, Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, T. Rex, Queen and the Beatles. Also known as the "Thin Brown Duke", "The Chicano Elvis"or "The Mexican Elvis", he got his start in the Latino punk band The Zeros and played in Catholic Discipline with the folk singer Phranc. The guy is a walking (and sleeping) parody of himself.

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Best


28. Smashing Pumpkins: ‘Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness’ Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness is the third album by American alternative rock band The Smashing Pumpkins, released on October 24, 1995 on Virgin Records. Produced by Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan, Flood and Alan Moulder, the 28-track album was released as a two-disc CD and triple LP. Led by the single "Bullet with Butterfly Wings", the album debuted at number one on the Billboard charts, a first for the group. The album spawned four more singles over the course of 1996 and has been certified nine times platinum.

Praised by critics for its ambition and scope, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness earned the band seven Grammy Award nominations in 1997. The album was voted the 29th greatest album of all time in 1998 by Q magazine readers. In 2003, the album was ranked number 487 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.

Art direction for the album cover is credited to Frank Olinsky and Billy Corgan. The actual illustrations are digital collages put together by John Craig. The design for the album cover was inspired by a combination of the face from the painting Fidelity by Jean Baptiste Greuze and the body from the painting Saint Catherine of Alexandria by Raphael. Why she is floating in space, I have no idea.

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