By: Ben Clark

Here is a list of album covers since forever that have stood out to me. These albums aren't all albums I listen to, in other words, these are strictly based on the design aspect of each album. There is no specific order, and there are several other albums that nearly made the list, but I can't name them all. Here is my top 20 that I have compiled:

Radiohead – “In Rainbows”
I have to admit, I don’t listen to Radiohead all that much. However, their “In Rainbows” album was really cool looking. It’s very Radiohead also. This may be the first time I have ever noticed anyone using slashes and underscores to incoherently separate letters in a singular word like this. As a designer, this inspired me to try this technique.

The Velvet Underground & Nico – “The Velvet Underground & Nico”
This album is an instant classic because of the artwork of Andy Warhol, but what really makes this album art incredible is how interactive it is. This is the first time I had seen such a hands-on CD cover and helped me decide that I wanted to be a graphic designer. You peel off the yellow banana to find a pink banana under it. I’m all about pop art and minimalism, but when you add interactivity, I’m sold!

Madness – “One Step Beyond”
Ahh, what a nice conceptual photograph. Great ska band, too. The simplicity of this album cover is what makes it. Black and white, interesting photograph, album name portrayed in a creative way. There’s not much more to say than, “this is awesome.”

Paramore – “RIOT!”
Hand-rendered typography is almost always a thumbs up in my book. This is done so well, especially. Hierarchy with color gives it that pop and I honestly love that they didn’t use any white space in this piece. Full-bled type gives that tension and rage that alludes to the album name RIOT!. The designer even managed to fit the band’s name in there, even though it didn’t need to be. I applaud him/her for that. Great cover.

Rage Against the Machine – “Evil Empire”
I love the pop art aspect of this cover. The bright colors and minimal imagery makes me want to pick up the album immediately and listen.

Nirvana – “Nevermind”
Classic. This will stand to be great for decades to come. At first glance, it comes as a shock factor that an infant could drown, being submerged in a pool like that. It also gives the illusion that someone was luring the child in the water by displaying a dollar bill on a fishing hook. Not to mention that for its time, this was shocking because of the nudity.
“Weird Al” Yankovic even mimicked this cover in his Off the Deep End parody album. Although he was reaching for a donut on a fish hook and was not showing nudity.

Green Day – “Dookie”
This album is named after another word for poop, so naturally it’s going to raise some eyebrows already, but add this great, intricate illustration with an exploding volcano and you have a recipe for awesome! I’m not a fan of Green Day, but this is one of the best album covers I’ve ever seen. You can’t judge a cover by its music! <<see what I did there? Changed it up.

The Beatles – “1”
I could honestly choose several Beatles albums to go on this list. Are you surprised, though? Being one of the biggest bands in history, they’re bound to have amazing designers for their albums. I like this one especially because of its simplicity and DIY (do it yourself) look. It looks like this numeral 1 was actually painted instead of just typed on the computer. Any time I can get away from the computer to create a design, I certainly do. It makes an enormous difference.

Red Hot Chili Peppers – “Californication”
When I see this album, I think of these things in order: 1. Oh man… great album. I love pretty much every song on here. 2. Look at those colors. There is so much visual vibration going on and I love it! 3. Conceptually, this idea of the reflection in the water with the flip-flop of imagery is just fun to look at. It’s kind of surreal in a way.

Pink Floyd – “Dark Side of the Moon”
I’ll be the first to say I do not listen to Pink Floyd, although I do respect them for their music. I respect them more for just about every graphics they have on their stuff. Pretty much every album they have come out with has been amazingly designed. This is one that stands out to me the most, though. No type needed. There is such strong imagery here that it’s hard to forget. The great thing about this album, too, is that if you showed a triangular prism to anyone with rainbow colors coming out of it, they would immediately think of Pink Floyd. Enough said.

CAKE – “Fashion Nugget”
I swear I’m not putting this album in just because I love CAKE so much. What makes this album so great is that it stands up against all of their other albums with a sense of equality. This is my favorite of all of them, but they all share that slightly rugged pop art/minimalism that I crave oh so much. It has limited color and imagery and always the same type treatment. Love it!

The Black Keys – “Brothers”
There’s not many time when I’ll rave on Cooper Black being used (the typeface), but it couldn’t be more appropriate in this case. Cooper Black was, a lot of the time, used back in the 70s for custom t-shirt designs. Given that The Black Keys have that slight grunge to their blues/rock sound, it certainly doesn’t stand up for its time. Don’t get me wrong, that’s what I love about them. They are amazing! The main thing that I love about this album is that it is so blatant by simply saying “The name of the album is Brothers”. Very little color is used and just roughly slapped on a black background. It’s almost like they said, “Here ya go. This is what we have to offer. If you don’t like it, you don’t like it.” Thumbs up!

Battles – “Gloss Drop”
Two words. So gross. Their single EP was equally as gross. It was entitled Ice Cream. Even though it’s gross, I still absolutely love it. Their sound can get a little ‘all over the place’, so the album art relates pretty well in that aspect.

Beck – “The Information”
This has to be one of the coolest concepts for an album I’ve ever seen. The album comes with a blank cover with “Beck” on the front only, with grid lines. When you open it, there are several stickers that you can decorate the album cover yourself and for a while after it came out, you could submit your layout to his website. Check out what solutions some people came up with.

The Dirty Projectors – “Bitte Orca”
This album cover is highly unrecognized I feel like. This is one of my favorites I’ve ever seen, though. I’d love to see the process on this, although it doesn’t look like it took too much to design. Cool idea all around though.

The Yeah Yeah Yeahs – “It’s Blitz!”
Part awesome, part gross, but I love every bit of it. No need for type apparently. This makes me want to purchase a high speed camera, or whatever they’re called. My girlfriend is a photographer, so I’m going to try and convince her she needs one so I can use it on occasion. Ha!

The Offspring – “Americana”
I’ll admit, this isn’t the most amazing album cover, but ever since I simply glanced at it when I was younger in a CD store, this image has been permanently engrained in my memory. That has to mean something. It is weird looking and pretty gritty, but there’s also that strong imagery that I can’t get out of my head. For that, it’s a winner for me.

Son Lux – “We Are Rising”
This may not look like an amazing album at first glance, but you will more than likely change that opinion rather quickly once you watch the making of this album in this video:

Death From Above 1979 – “You’re A Woman, I’m A Machine”
One of the best albums I’ve heard, still to this day. Nevertheless, it’s also an awesome cover. I’m all for combining humans and animals, plus that bright pink stands out amongst the crowd of CDs—as it should. Fantastic everything!

The Blood Brothers – “Young Machetes”
I know, kind of crazy and a tad scary looking, but it totally works for this band. They are one of the best experimental hardcore bands to ever exist if you ask me. Knowing that it’s a hardcore band, tell me this album is not awesome looking.

Of Montreal – “Skeletal Lamping”
One of my favorite album covers of all time. I don’t think I’ve ever gotten so excited when I unfolded this beast of a cover! The video below shows it getting unfolded, but he’s kind of slow when unfolding it. In short, it folds out to this amazing di-cut stretching out approximately twenty inches squared. The illustration inside and out is so intricate and cool looking, that you just want to hang it up on your wall… as did I. I say go ahead and purchase this album right now just for the experience of unfolding it, haha! (You think I’m kidding… it’s actually an amazing album music-wise, too.)

Ben Clark is from Nashville, TN. He's no writer, but graphic design and illustration is totally his jam. He absolutely loves Christmas - a lot (primarily Santa Claus), believes that waffles are far better than pancakes, and enjoys good music (also to share it). So, lucky you.