Listing Albums Artwork
Date: October 11, 2018 19:37
Rocky mentions this in another adjoining thread, and we haven't done this. (At least not recently): a thread where we rank album's artworks.
I very much believe that the artwork brings a lot to the final product. How it helps to create the identity of this piece of work. Even at this later stage in recordings, with digital files taking over; you still usually get some kind of visual image of the music.
Colors - I always, always think of "emotional rescue" as the blue album, GHS is yellow, Tattoo You is red. I am realizing these things as I type: 'Between the Buttons" is British and foggy.
What would be an overview?
Well IMO, in '89 the Stones' albums artwork went down the crapper. I don't want to say "They took so much care up until then, and then boom" because I don't think that is what happened. It's most likely Jagger alone, maybe Charlie is involved, with some suits; and they are making bad decisions. 'Steel Wheels", "Flashpoint" and "Babylon" look like something Mussolini had hanging in his office. "No Security", "Grrr" and "Bigger Bang" are beyond comprehension. "Voodoo", "Primitive Cool" seem to spring from the same well.
So as unpopular as 'Dirty Work's cover is, it is the last in the line of 'real' covers for me. It is the Stones being the Stones in '86. Myself I always liked DW cover pic. DW also had the inside cover w/ cartoons.
"Undercover" is okay when you took it all as a package. The early releases (and I got UC on the day it came out) had the stickers, the inside sleeve with the plush red drape, liner notes and especially the address to get the whole Fan Club package, which was awesome.
Not wild about 'Tattoo You" - the images are okay, but there was no info, no liner notes.
'Emotional Rescue" - this was still in the days on albums being albums, and it was probably an experiment gone a little wrong. The heat photography. It didn't help that the music was not very exciting.
"Some Girls" - there is no way to separate the brilliant packaging from the brilliant music. Everything was right on time with this release. It was all New York; it was all that Punk asked from them. There was good natured controversy with the photos.The idea of the hair dresser theme, and then the blurbs about each individual Stone-ette.
"Black & Blue" was a weird one. the photo is just odd. Mainly Jagger is a bit much. I think Keith and Ron's make-up kind of helped. The inside photo is great, and the liner notes were a huge part of this album.
IORR - very good because Guy Pelleart's book was everywhere; Bowie used him; plus it had decent liner notes.
GHS - I always thought that the main cover did not match the album. That the cover art could have been used for another record. The pic of the soup was better. There is a brownish inside sleeve with Jim Horn, Preston etc.
Exile - one of the great alltime covers. It's scattered, nervous, schizoid; there is the Deep South, there are ICONIC images of Mick and Keith with Jack Daniels and beer singing at the mike, unshaven - one of the greatest Stones photos ever! Jagger's often inaccurate liner notes, but info to be memorized immediately; the postcards of course. A classic.
Sticky Fingers - another classic. "SF was probably even more decadent than Exile because it is much darker and tight. Everything about the cover is high art: Warhol's model, the inside with the underwear, the working zipper, the balls to use an image like that.
"Ya-Ya's" - is very good because it says America right away. And while there's a donkey, and Charlie jumping on a lonely highway, it still calls out 'Live!'.
'Let it Bleed" is always considered one of the great ones. It has never done all that much for me. Only early copies, and then lat re-releases have the inside cover.
"Banquet" - I understand that the band fought for the bathroom wall, and that it meant a lot more in '68 than it would now, but IMO the white RSVP cover is way better. Coupled with that great, great inside picture. Again - I see that pic, and I hear "Jigsaw Puzzle". The music and image are one.
'Satanic" is fun of course, but I'd say - even for those times it was a little silly. There is no undercurrent whatsoever; no threat, no suggestion of new ideas to explore, new realms to conquer. I see Jagger in that hat, I see Charlie and Bill looking uncomfortable and ridiculous. There is a bit off the image when a little toddler runs rampant in the kitchen with his Fruit-of-the-looms on his head, banging pot-lids together; happy as can be.
'Buttons" is once again a perfect cover for it's record. The most British of all Stones releases, it shows the band bleary eyed in London fog, huddled together in their coats. You hear "She Smiled Sweetly" or "Something Happened to Me yesterday"; you know about the drug busts.
'Aftermath' - most excellent. And I always think of the UK version; the red one.It's the last of those early albums where you always had the five kind of posed in a groupshot. But the back cover with the great credit of "Mick Jagger - lighting" switches it up. And again - those images make me think of LA studio and all the songs from this album. Brian on marimba.
'Got Live if you want it" - one of the very early covers that cemented the band in my visual memory banks.It's one of the covers that I stared at for hours. Brian's jacket; that shot of Keith singing at the mike; and the call out for "Billy Wyman"; Charlie's snare on 'Satisfaction'.
"out of our Heads", "December's Children", 'Now' are kind of the same album to me, visually.
"No 2" is tight. IMO it is darker than the first one.
"Hitmakers" - Honestly, until I read about it years later I never even noticed the whole thing about their name not being on the cover. Love that photo, the ties, the bit of awkwardness , and I hear every note from the grooves coming from the glossy shot as well.
Other
"Hot Rocks" - the best part about that cover are the ones with them hanging in that ravaged castle.
"Gimme Shelter" - its a great shot, and it came to me when I was still about 12 or 13. Love any live pics from 70/71 with Mick and Keith wearing clothes from So America.
"Stone Age" - I knew this album and cover way before I knew anything about "Beggars Banquet" and the story of the cover.
The single "JJF" - this was a big picture for me too that I stared at for hours. I remember saying to my buddies "You see Keith's thumbnail? Red! he is obviously a homosexual" haha, keep in mind I was about 10 years old. I already knew I was going to do everything possible to also be a Rolling Stone.
"Have you seen you Mother Baby" 45 single - this is the image that started everything for me. I still have a poster of it hanging on my wall. I had got the 45 for Xmas one year as a 6 or 7 year old.It was a life changer.I couldn't tell Keith and Bill apart. I used to think Bill was the guy.
Please don't leave me hanging guys.