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text or evoke the feeling of the music featured on the
record. It may be music-for-this-that-and-the-otherincluding-dancing,
in which case the dress and pose of
the girl model will provide a reasonable clue. Or it
might be an "ominous horizon" or "brooding heaven"
cover for the apocalyptic grandeur of Beethoven or
Bruckner.
When it comes to "Design" covers, artfulness-or
artiness-is the thing, and these manifest themselves in
enormous variety. Sometimes the whole cover is built
around nothing more than ingenious typography and
layout as applied to the title and artist information
which in former days would have appeared in conventional
format. Neil Fujita, Design Director for the
Columbia and Epic labels, has come up with some brilliant
examples of this type and has been recognized
accordingly by design and graphic arts societies. It is
in this field that the artist is able to come closest to real
"creation" and it is not surprising that many of the most
aesthetically interesting and genuinely worthwhile efforts
in the field have been of this type. These, in fact,
are the covers which seem to grow the most pleasing to
live with over a long period of time.
The "big name" artist, be he pop or classical, will
several times in the course of his recording career become
the subject for a "Personality" cover; for his name
and prestige constitute the "sell" aspect in itself, with
no need felt for the usual extended promotional copy.
Here's Louie or Ella Sings Rogers and H mt represent
the kind of titles in point that will be decked out with
a striking character photograph. More recently record
covers have appeared without accenting the name of
the artist at all. Boy Meets Girl was the main title
appearing on a Decca disc, without other prominent
indication of the artists involved, other than a photo
of Sammy Davis, Jr. and Carmen McCrae. The sales,
nevertheiess, upheld the implied optimism of the cover
designer. Now we even have the cover with no title
at all other than the artist's countenance in four-color
Kodachrome, as witness Leopold Stokowski on Capitol's
Landmarks of a Distinguished Career.
Which brings us to "Cheesecake," which as applied
to the art of record merchandiSing has b egun to take Oll
some special attributes. Quite apart from the so-called
"party records" whose content is presumed to be risque
or bawdy, there are plenty of "respectable" records
issued by companies of honored and long-standing reputation
which are tricked out with a deliberately provocative
girl cover. The psychology would seem to
parallel that of the paperback book publishers who
apply the same treatment to their re-issue of literary
classics of Hawthorne, Whitman, or Edith Wharton.
Art directors are by no means agreed on what does
prompt them to provide this type of cover for, say, an
Erroll Gamer, or a Mantovani release. Some claim the
need for variety to differentiate clearly the new disc
from earlier ones by the same performer. Others indicate
that the "cheesecake" approach is a perfectly valid
solution-among many-for the continual problem of
satisfying visual appeal conditions in to day's ultracompetitive
atmosphere. Be this as it may, "Cheesecake"
art will turn up on all kinds of records-whether
it be Hifirecord's Jazz Erotica (not erotic at all, by the
way, but an excellent collection of small combo work),
Audio Fidelity's Port Said, or London's new Ansermet
issue of Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps. -The manager
of one well-patronized New York record shop has
asserted that sexy record covers repel many would-be
customers-"Not so much for reasons of moral ob)ection,
but more out of a false sophistication many buyers
develop, which leads them to b elieve such albums are
seeking to overcome inferior contents with desperate
resorts to 'the ever saleable'." H ere is a point which
some companies would do well to ponder, especially
where those of their artists subjected to this doubtful
form of promotion are scarely in need of it!
All record companies follow the same basic procedure
in working out the covers for their product, which
is to say that sales, promotion, art personnel-and to a
more limited extent the artist-and-repertoire p eople
concerned with the recording-will discuss title and
(Continued on page 26)
Off-beat i!iustrations are frequently
used to good effect (Good Time Jazz).
Evocative rather than directly literal representation
is seen in this recent Capitol album.
HIFI & MUSIC REVIEW