Sure, a photograph of the artist is probably the simplest route to take when designing an album cover, but a painting or a drawing can sometimes proves to be far stranger. Here are 14 album covers with an illustration of the artist.
1. The Beatles - Revolver (1966)
Though the off-kilter cover of Rubber Soul vaguely hinted at the Beatles' interest in psychedelia, the cover of Revolver took it even further, placing a bizarre black-and-white collage of Beatles photographs between illustrations of their faces.
2 & 3. The Who - A Quick One/The Who By Numbers (1966/1975)
The Who were actually drawn onto the covers of two of their albums, but in very different styles. 1966's A Quick One features psychedelic images of the quartet, rendering bassist John Entwhistle momentarily left-handed, while 1975's The Who By Numbers features crude caricatures of the band drawn by Entwhistle.
4 & 5. Bob Dylan - Self Portrait/Blood On The Tracks (1970/1975)
The only indication that the cover of Self Portrait is a painting of Bob Dylan's face is the album's title. A more recognizable Dylan portrait would appear on the cover of Blood On The Tracks five years later.
6. The Beach Boys - Endless Summer (1974)
For this 1974 greatest hits compilation, three of the Beach Boys (not even the entire band) are bizarrely depicted poking their heads through some shrubbery, as if they've been stranded on an island for a few years.
7. Descendents - Milo Goes To College (1982)
The cover of the Descendent's Milo Goes To College is a simple caricature of singer Milo Aukerman, though the only things that really indicates this are his trademark glasses and the word "Milo" in the album title.
8. Minutemen - 3-Way Tie (For Last) (1985)
The cover to the Minutemen's final album 3-Way Tie (For Last) was painted by guitarist D. Boon, and depicts the band's heads mounted on a wall, though they all look pretty happy about it.
9. Pulp - His 'n' Hers (1994)
There's really no reason why the cover of His 'n' Hers couldn't have been a photograph, but it adds a certain level of mystique and sophistication that a photo couldn't capture.
10. OutKast - ATLiens (1996)
Though OutKast's debut album Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik was well received, many feel that the group's weirdo aesthetic truly began on 1996's ATLiens, which is made plainly obvious by its awesome sci-fi title and artwork.
11. Lauryn Hill - The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill (1998)
The cover of The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill is neither a painting nor a drawing, but Hill's face scratched into a wooden desk (though this could have just been the result of some very good photo-doctoring)
12. Blur - Blur: The Best Of (2000)
Even though Blur were definitely the handsomest band to come out the Britpop scene, there's just something so unsettling about the beady-eyed portraits used for the cover of this 2000 compilation.
13. Joanna Newsom - Ys (2006)
Pretty much anything you need to know about Joanna Newsom's music can be learned from the cover of her second album Ys: a portrait of Newsom dressed in a medieval outfit, sitting in what is probably some palace in Middle Earth.
14. Erykah Badu - New Amerykah Part Two: Return of the Ankh (2010)
The cover to Erykah Badu's New Amerykah Part Two: Return of the Ankh isn't exactly a portrait of Badu, but rather a portrait of some sort of mechanical tin woman (or robot) who bears a striking resemblance to Badu.
What other album covers feature an illustration of the artist? Let us know in the comments section!
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