Squaring the Circle: The art of the album

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I am showing my age, but I grew up in a time when the vinyl album was the main way to buy music and album covers were really important. The music video was not really a thing and so your visual impression of a band or artist was through the album cover. It was also a source of information as there was no Web.

A lot of albums would feature photos of the artists or often scantily clad women, but others stood out for more striking imagery. A lot of that came from Hipgnosis. These are a few that I own. The Led Zeppelin one was apparently very expensive to produce.

Albums

I have just watched this documentary about Hipgnosis on Netflix and it was right up my street.

Founder Aubrey 'Po' Powell narrates most of the story. His business partner Storm Thorgerson died a few years back. It goes into some depth about key works they did and has contributions from musicians such as Roger Waters, David Gilmour and Nick Mason (Pink Floyd), Robert Plant and Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin), Sir Paul McCartney, Peter Gabriel, Graham Gouldman (10cc) and Noel Gallagher. The latter is a fan and there is a line from him at the end saying Oasis could not afford the company's services. Glen Matlock of the Sex Pistols gives the view from those who despised how the mega bands had nothing to do with the life they experienced.

The company used to operate from a grotty office in Denmark Street with no toilet. Some of the shops you can see in the old pictures are still there, but that area has changed in other ways. They worked with photography and other old technology as computers did not get involved until later.

The 1970's were a real time of excess in the music industry. Lots of drugs were consumed and lots of money was made. Hipgnosis were getting £50,000 or more for a commission at a time when that could buy a very nice house. It seems Storm cared more about the art than the money and could be difficult to work with. They would fly to exotic location to take photos that could have been done in a studio, but customers were happy to cover the cost to get the prestige.

When I went to the Pink Floyd exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum they had some of the album art blown up to giant size.

Things went wrong for Hipgnosis when they moved into making films and the pair split up over money issues. Storm kept working on album covers for more recent artists like Muse.

I would say their work is art and many people will have it hanging on their walls. With it being so abstract you could read what you wanted from it. I think part of the reason for the revival in vinyl is having the physical item to hold and look at. On Spotify or iTunes you tend to just have a small image and you lose things like sleeve notes. The CD was also a less satisfying format in that respect, although some people get clever with it.

The music industry has changed a lot since the 70's. There is still plenty of creativity going on, but it is often outside the mainstream and artists can bypass the big labels to reach their fans.

I am not sure of the link to Hipgnosis Song Fund who took on the name and have been doing big deals to buy the publishing rights to lots of music. Their founder also features in the documentary.

I will say it is well worth a watch, especially if you have nostalgia for that music and the period.

Rock on!



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24 comments
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I lost pretty much all of my album covers when our basement flooded. I am still pretty annoyed by that. I have all the records thankfully, but there were some liners that were just amazing and I wish I still had them.

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That's a shame. I have most of my old albums, but I don't think there's much with real value.

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Great post! I still love vinyl, and the artistry was important to sell the album. I was born in the early seventies and got into music in the early eighties. Of course by then the music video and MTV ruled the industry. But even then artistry was important, and of course scantily clad women always sold well. Back then you went to the local music shop to buy music, and if the cover art sucked it didn't usually sell well!

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I bought some albums just because of the covers! You couldn't always hear it first. Things have changed.

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I’ve never had an album though but it won’t be a bad idea to have one
Right?

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What would you do with it as I assume you have no deck?

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(Edited)

Deck?
What does deck mean?
I know so many definitions of it so i gotta know the exact one you’re talking about

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You need a record deck/player to play a vinyl album. Did you know what I meant by an album?

I see you respond to a lot of posts, but it has to mean something to you too. Don't just play the numbers game. Have fun.

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I really love the album art. I don't own any vinyl anymore, but if I had the space (and money) I'd buy some just for the album art. As is, I often find myself stopping by the used record store and just flipping through the albums, admiring the art.

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I'm tempted to get some frames to hang some up as it is so cool.

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I have a few vinyl records, but most of that is before my time lol. I'll have to make do with CDs, which aren't quite the same, but at least they are still a physical item. Something to open, to hold, to read while listening to the album.

And I'm still very much a fan of the 'album', as a complete body of work to be appreciated in its entirety. I don't think spotify and youtube playlists allow people to enjoy the music in the same way, constantly jumping from random song to random song.

There is nothing like choosing a interesting looking cover and buying on a whim, it can be hit and miss, but some of my fave albums where chosen on the strength of the cover and nothing more

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Some of my early experience of music were my mum's 45s of Elvis and the Everly Brothers. I even had some 78s. The CD was magical when it came along, but I didn't get a player until I was in my 20s. I was not a massive record buyer, but still have a stack of vinyl. I have acquired a few new discs in recent years, but those are more as collectables.

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yep my parents had some records, mum had Cliff Richard, Michael Jackson and Everly Brothers, my Dad had Iron Maiden and Deep Purple.... Dad had better taste haha!

I still buy CDs regularly, and I still think CD is the most accesable format... Vinyl has the nostalgia factor for sure, but I think lots of people buy it to be 'trendy'. The idea of Spotify and streaming annoys the hell out of me. CDs for the win!

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I bought Hemispheres (Rush) due to the artwork, and not because it was a naked bloke. The album turned out awesome and got me into the band. I also bought a Yes album but that didn't work out well at all. It got left on the shelf, I wasn't ready for them.. yet. This was the very early 80's, and the prog bands had the best artwork.

I remember going into one of those old fashioned used record shops (that no longer exist). There were two sections I remember, Contemporary (what the hell is that?) and Progressive (I didn't know the term then).

Lucky for me, the artwork drew me to the latter. The music followed.

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Roger Dean who did a lot of Yes covers is also in this documentary. I would think putting a naked bloke on a cover was controversial at the time. I wonder if it lost Rush some sales given their mostly male audience.

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Fue sin duda una bella época, yo también conservó uno de Baltimora y Tarzán boy, y mi padre me dejó varios de Pink Floyd antes de marcharse a USA.

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Singers who work hard to make an album like this and then bring it to the market, it's incumbent on all of us to support things like this so that they can succeed.

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Hey Steve hope all is well! How’s the guitar pick collection going? I’m doing a blog about In through the out door, kinda cool you have that album in your blog photo!

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Hey! I'm still collecting and gained a few lately. Hope things are good with you.

!BEER

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Things are awesome hope all is well! Enjoy the holidays!