The Cover-Up 1.0

This is the inaugural edition of The Cover-Up, the poorly punned* section devoted to the bad album art out there. We're keeping it well-known today, but certainly expect lesser-knowns to crop up for offending your eyeballs.

Prince - Planet Earth


Insulting a Prince album cover is like shooting fish in a barrel. While you can't assume the quality of the music he's going to put out with each full-length, you can always assume atrocious cover art. Can someone actually defend Dirty Mind or Lovesexy and not be a pompous pooshovel? What sets this release apart from past releases is that the cover looks like a tribute to all of the bad hip hop mixtape covers out there. Maybe it's parody, but I doubt it.

Common - Finding Forever


Common decides to bounce back from his classic throwback Be with this and oh boy is it a doozy. Be played it safe, but sometimes playing it safe is the way to go. And if you're going to release a classic hip hop album, a cover like Be's is a surefire way to start things off. That cover had Marvin Gaye written all over it.

So back to Finding Forever's cover. Where does it go wrong? Inappropriate headgear to hide Common's cueball head? Check. Monk hoodie. Random shit popping up all over? Check. You've got a hodgepodge of things just dropped in there, including the Chicago skyline, astral shit, a bird and the sun. Remove Common's head and you'd probably have an album cover that would crop up on a Rooney album.

Korn - Untitled


Two things are brought to mind when looking at this. The first is Magic: The Gathering artwork.


The second is the artwork from the Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark book series.


Hopefully, that was the first and last time Korn will be mentioned in this blog. This concludes the first Cover-Up. Suggestions are welcomed.

*or penned! GROAN