-
Columbia Records Hires Alex Steinweiss as its first Art Director
Steinweiss is credited with inventing album covers and cover art. Before Steinweiss, records were packaged in plain cardboard covers with only lettering on them. After other record companies saw Steinweiss' work on Columbia albums, they followed the trend and began putting artwork on the covers of their albums as well. -
Beatles release "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band"
The artwork for this album won a Grammy on its own. It featured cutouts of famous people and The Beatles dressed in Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band costumes. -
The Beatles' "Abbey Road" album is released
This is one of the most iconic examples of album artwork in history. When you see this phoograph, you know that it is a Beatles record. This is an example of an actual photograph being used for album artwork as opposed to an illustration. -
Pink Floyd releases "Dark Side of the Moon"
This is another iconic example of album artwork. This cover was created by the design team "Hipgnosis" -
Ramones release "Ramones"
This cover features the members of the band leaning against a brick wall in NYC. This has become one of the most "imitated" album covers of all time. Many bands have taken this idea of "black and white against a brick wall" idea and used it on their album art. -
Metallica releases "Master of Puppets"
This is another iconic album cover. It features a field of white cross tombstones. This is most likely a statement about war veterans and soldiers that have fallen fighting the war. -
CD becomes the most popular form of music distribution
CDs were much smaller than records, so this gave designers much less space to create album artwork. Most people that are really into music would agree that listening to music on record is much better than a CD or digital file. Albums were meant to be enjoyed from start to finish while admiring the artwork. This practice has been lost in the fast paced lifestyle we live today. -
Nirvana releases "Nevermind"
This is an example of a controversial album cover. This cover was an idea that Kurt Cobain conceived while watching a TV program on water births. Many people found the use of a naked baby offensive, but the album was released hat way despite of the public's opinion. -
A Day to Remeber releases "Homesick"
This album cover really has no importance to the history of graphic design, but it is one of my favorite album covers of all time. This is my inspiration for doing graphic design. -
Apple Introduces the "iTunes LP" format
Due to the popularity of online music downloading, album art lost its purpose for a brief moment. When apple released its "iTunes LP" format for music downloads, album artwork came with the .mp3 files in a .jpeg form.
