It's a wrap

Earlier this year, Storm Thorgerson died. The name didn't ring a bell, but apparently he is the artist who designed some of the most famous album covers in the last 40 years: he produced work for Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Peter Gabriel and Muse to name a few. In the seventies, bands turned away from the standard portrait on the sleeve, sometimes not even wanting the name  of the album on the outside. The first to avoid this was Atom Heart Mother by Pink Floyd, released 1970, which I used to have, with the photo of the cow(but no photos of the band) inspired by Warhol's cow wallpaper, and possibly the cover Warhol produced himself in 1967 for the Velvet underground, showing a banana. The later Dark Side of the Moon cover, designed by his company Hipgnosis, is reputed to be one of the best ever album sleeves.Peter Gabriel's first three covers were designed by him, all confusingly with the same eponymous title.

Also born in 1944, but still alive, is another famous album designer from the 70s, Roger Dean, whose work was mainly seen on Yes covers, but also those of Osibisa and Uriah Heep.