Banned Album Covers

Started by cron, May 21, 2004, 02:04:13 PM

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cron

The Guardian.



Dilated Peoples, Target Practice
Dilated Peoples' single was issued by ABB not long after 9/11. Controversy erupted over the song Target Practice, as well as over the cover art, which featured an electronic map of the world with cities, including New York, apparently targeted for attack.  



Roger Waters, The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking
When Pink Floyd bassist Roger Waters stepped out in 1984 with his first solo album, it grabbed the attention of feminist activists. After enduring charges that he was a sexist, and assertions that the graphics "encouraged rape", a new cover was issued with the offending buttocks covered by a black bar.


Tad, Jack Pepsi
In 1991 the Seattle grunge band TAD, and their label, Sub Pop, were forced to change the cover art for their pro-drunk-driving single, Jack Pepsi. Any response from the other implicated firm, Jack Daniels, remains unknown.


Jane's Addiction, Ritual de lo Habitual
When singer Perry Farrell submitted his original artwork to Warner Brothers for the band's 2nd album, in 1990 the label reportedly wasn't too thrilled. They gave it a go, until a few stodgy retail chains squawked. Under corporate pressure, and forced to reconsider, the guys opted to change to minimal text, simply quoting the free speech guarantee within the First Amendment.



Ice Cube, Death Certificate
When Ice Cube broke from NWA to go solo, his 1991 album carried on the tradition of controversy. The cover, showing Uncle Sam on a mortuary gurney (a visual metaphor for the death of the American dream?) and his various intolerant and violent songs led to condemnations in US Billboard magazine, widespread retail boycotts, and, in Oregon, an official statewide ban on displaying the rapper's image in retail shops.



Guns n' Roses, Appetite for Destruction
hile no one has ever expected enlightened behaviour from heavy metal bands, Guns N' Roses probably set some kind of record for managing to offend a huge portion of potential fans with their songs. But the final straw for some was the robot-rape-scene cover (by the noted artist, Robert Williams) used for their 1987 hit album. After protests and denunciations, Geffen Records replaced it with a tattoo-styled, skulls-and-cross motif.



Alice Cooper, Love it to Death
When Warner Brothers started taking flak over the cover-image on 1971's Love it to Death, the questionably "offensive" thumb (centre) was airbrushed away on all later printings. The streets of America were thus made safe once again.


Black Crowes, Amorica
When Amorica was released by Universal in 1994, replete with pubic hair, there was immediate uproar. Under pressure from powerfully conservative retail chains, the band was forced to accept a substitute.



The Five Keys, On Stage!
After this album was released in 1957, Capitol Records reportedly received a bit of heat over the Virginia-based doo-wop stars' cover photograph. The angry complainants imagined that the forefinger (seen far) of lead balladeer, Rudy West, was a penis - and thus a decision was made to airbrush the offending digits out for subsequent issue.



The Beatles, Yesterday and Today
When Capitol released Yesterday and Today, cobbled together from other albums including Revolver and Help! the Fab Four, reportedly outraged that their art was being "butchered", posed for this photo. Capitol released it in June 1966, but faced with rejection by distributors, they had to recall thousands of "Butcher" LPs. Panicked, they rustled up a gloomy and unflattering photo - ever since known as the Trunk Cover - and pasted them over the recalled jackets. In that process, they created one of the holy grails of record collecting.
context, context, context.

SoNowThen

You forgot the best one:

Smell The Glove by Spinal Tap
Those who say that the totalitarian state of the Soviet Union was not "real" Marxism also cannot admit that one simple feature of Marxism makes totalitarianism necessary:  the rejection of civil society. Since civil society is the sphere of private activity, its abolition and replacement by political society means that nothing private remains. That is already the essence of totalitarianism; and the moralistic practice of the trendy Left, which regards everything as political and sometimes reveals its hostility to free speech, does nothing to contradict this implication.

When those who hated capital and consumption (and Jews) in the 20th century murdered some hundred million people, and the poster children for the struggle against international capitalism and America are now fanatical Islamic terrorists, this puts recent enthusiasts in an awkward position. Most of them are too dense and shameless to appreciate it, and far too many are taken in by the moralistic and paternalistic rhetoric of the Left.

cron

Quote from: SoNowThenYou forgot the best one:

Smell The Glove by Spinal Tap

haha but that one never got released  :(
context, context, context.

ᾦɐļᵲʊʂ

Holy Wood by Marilyn Manson

I Get Wet by Andrew WK
"As a matter of fact I only work with the feeling of something magical, something seemingly significant. And to keep it magical I don't want to know the story involved, I just want the hypnotic effect of it somehow seeming significant without knowing why." - Len Lye

meatwad

Quote from: WI Get Wet by Andrew WK

what did the cover look like?

Dirk



I think this got banned in the US:

At wave level, everything exists as a contradiction. Everything is existing in more than one stage/place at any given moment. Everything must move/vibrate and constantly change to exist. Everything, including buildings, mountains, oceans and thoughts.

modage

Quote from: DirkI think this got banned in the US:
THE STROKES: IS THIS IT
supposedly they changed it voluntarily, because they decided they were unhappy with it but it was too late in the rest of the world.  although that is suspect, and it surely would've been banned had it been released that way here.
Christopher Nolan's directive was clear to everyone in the cast and crew: Use CGI only as a last resort.

The Perineum Falcon

Quote from: themodernage02
Quote from: DirkI think this got banned in the US:
THE STROKES: IS THIS IT
supposedly they changed it voluntarily, because they decided they were unhappy with it but it was too late in the rest of the world.  although that is suspect, and it surely would've been banned had it been released that way here.
But you can buy it at Best Buy.
We often went to the cinema, the screen would light up and we would tremble, but also, increasingly often, Madeleine and I were disappointed. The images had dated, they jittered, and Marilyn Monroe had gotten terribly old. We were sad, this wasn't the film we had dreamed of, this wasn't the total film that we all carried around inside us, this film that we would have wanted to make, or, more secretly, no doubt, that we would have wanted to live.

ᾦɐļᵲʊʂ

Quote from: Dirk

They just put a big black sticker on 3/4 of the disk revealing his name and his eyes up so people woudlnt' see blood, which he is said to have broken his nose to bleed for.
"As a matter of fact I only work with the feeling of something magical, something seemingly significant. And to keep it magical I don't want to know the story involved, I just want the hypnotic effect of it somehow seeming significant without knowing why." - Len Lye

NEON MERCURY

Quote from: WThey just put a big black sticker on 3/4 of the disk revealing his name and his eyes up so people woudlnt' see blood, which he is said to have broken his nose to bleed for.

man. i am so glad his 15 mins. are up......

meatwad

Quote from: WThey just put a big black sticker on 3/4 of the disk revealing his name and his eyes up so people woudlnt' see blood, which he is said to have broken his nose to bleed for.

Sorry. I thought you guys meant a single for "I Get Wet", i forgot the album was titled that, and had seen the album cover before. And someone had told me about him breaking his nose for the cover, but i think i read some interview with him where he claimed it was so kind of animals blood.

SHAFTR

Quote from: NEON MERCURY
Quote from: WThey just put a big black sticker on 3/4 of the disk revealing his name and his eyes up so people woudlnt' see blood, which he is said to have broken his nose to bleed for.

man. i am so glad his 15 mins. are up......

I thought he was a joke but I saw him live and it was one of the better shows I've been to.  Also, the album I Get Wet is actually pretty good.
"Talking shit about a pretty sunset
Blanketing opinions that i'll probably regret soon"

Ravi

Lennon and Ono's Two Virgins album cover was covered up because they were naked.

ᾦɐļᵲʊʂ

Quote from: SHAFTR
I thought he was a joke but I saw him live and it was one of the better shows I've been to.  Also, the album I Get Wet is actually pretty good.

It's easy to say he sucks, but when you pop in the CD, you can't help but head bang to it.
"As a matter of fact I only work with the feeling of something magical, something seemingly significant. And to keep it magical I don't want to know the story involved, I just want the hypnotic effect of it somehow seeming significant without knowing why." - Len Lye

tpfkabi

wasn't Mechanical Animals  by Marily Manson covered up? i think they had to put an outer cover on it.
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