Recommendations of the Editorial team
The 100 Best Album Covers of All Time (100): Spinal Tap – “Smell the Glove”
The album is undoubtedly the best invention of the last century – but the music isn’t the whole story. The album cover has been a cultural obsession for as long as there have been albums. Since 12-inch vinyl records came out in cardboard sleeves in the 1950s, musicians and fans have been fascinated by the art featured on the covers. When The Beatles revolutionized the game with their cover of “Sgt. Pepper” in 1967, it became a way to make a visual statement about where the music comes from and why it’s important. But the art of the album cover is constantly evolving.
That’s why we celebrate this art: the 100 best album covers of all time, from Biggie to Beyoncé to Bad Bunny, from Nirvana to Nas to Neil Young, from SZA to Sabbath to the Sex Pistols. We have rap, country, jazz, prog, metal, reggae, flamenco, funk, gothic, hippie psychedelia and hardcore punk. But all of these albums have a unique look that fits their sound. The most memorable covers become part of the music – how many Pink Floyd fans have scratched their heads at the sight of the prism on the cover of “Dark Side of the Moon” after rolling up their smokes with it?
What makes an album cover a classic?
What makes an album cover a classic? Sometimes it’s a portrait of the artist – think of those Beatles crossing the street or Carole King in Laurel Canyon with her cat. Others opt for iconic, semi-abstract images such as Led Zeppelin, Miles Davis or My Bloody Valentine. Some artists show where they come from, like REM, who represents the South with Kudzu, or Ol’ Dirty Bastard, who welcomes the Brooklyn Zoo with his food stamp card.
Many of these covers are by legendary photographers, designers and artists such as Andy Warhol, Annie Leibovitz, Storm Thorgerson, Raymond Pettibon and Peter Saville. Some have cosmic symbolism that fans have to decipher, others rely on star power. But they are all classic images that have become an important part of music history. And they all show why the world’s love for albums will never end.
The 100 Best Album Covers of All Time (100): Spinal Tap – “Smell the Glove”
It wasn’t all that easy to discuss “the problem with the cover” of the (non-existent) 1982 album “Smell the Glove” by Spinal Tap (a completely fictional heavy metal band), as recounted in a scene in the documentary “This Is Spinal Tap”: “You put a greased-up, naked woman on all fours, with a dog collar around her neck and a “Leash and an outstretched man’s arm holding onto the leash and pressing a black glove into her face so she can sniff it,” says artist representative Bobbi Flekman (Fran Drescher).
“Don’t you find that offensive?” Well, someone did, and so Spinal Tap ended up with an all-black cover. The band members placated it by saying it looked like black leather, a black mirror, death and sadness.
Then Nigel Tufnel (Christopher Guest) got it: “There’s something about it that’s so black that you wonder, ‘How much blacker could it be?’ And the answer is: ‘Not anymore. No longer black.’”
The joke manifested itself in real life with the soundtrack album by Spinal Tap, a punk band called None More Black, and “black albums” by Metallica, Jay-Z, Prince, the Damned, and many others. Additionally, years later Spinal Tap released their original album cover, albeit somewhat toned down, on the cover of their single “Bitch School”. –