Iconic Album Covers

In this blog I will be researching into album covers from the past to analyse and help me understand what makes an artist stand out.

The first album cover I found was David Bowie - Aladdin Sane

Aladdin Sane is the sixth studio album by English musician David Bowie, released by RCA Records on 13 April 1973. The follow-up to his breakthrough The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, it was the first album he wrote and released from a position of stardom.

Aladdin Sane was released in the UK on 13 April 1973. With a purported 100,000 copies ordered in advance, the album debuted at the top of the UK charts and reached No. 17 in America, making it Bowie's most successful album commercially in both countries to that date. The album is estimated to have sold 4.6 million copies worldwide, making it one of Bowie's highest-selling LPs. The Guinness Book of British Hit Albums notes that Bowie "ruled the (British) album chart, accumulating an unprecedented 182 weeks on the list in 1973 with six different titles."

The second I found was Blondie - Parallel Lines

Parallel Lines is the third studio album by the American rock band Blondie. It was released in September 1978 by Chrysalis Records to international commercial success. The album reached No. 1 in the United Kingdom in February 1979 and proved to be the band's commercial breakthrough in the United States, where it reached No. 6 in April 1979. In Billboard magazine, Parallel Lines was listed at No. 9 in the top pop albums year-end chart of 1979. As of 2008, the album had sold over 20 million copies worldwide. The album spawned several successful singles, notably the international hit "Heart of Glass".

In a review of post-punk albums from the 1970s, Spin magazine's Sasha Frere-Jones said Parallel Lines may have been "the perfect pop-rock record" and Blondie's best album, while Christian John Wikane from PopMatters called it "a creative and commercial masterpiece by Blondie ... indisputably one of the great, classic albums of the rock and roll era." In the opinion of Pitchfork critic Scott Plagenhoef, the album popularized "the look and sound of 1980s new wave" with classic songs that showcased the depth and complexity of Harry's sexuality and singing. Sal Cinquemani from Slant Magazine was also impressed by her singing, which he felt varied from "purring like a kitten and then building to a mean growl", and cited "Heart of Glass" as the album's best track because of her "honey-dipped vocal".

Parallel Lines was ranked at number 140 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, number 18 and 45 on NME's 100 Best Albums of All Time and 500 Greatest Albums of All Time respectively, and number 7 on Blender's 100 Greatest American Albums of All Time. Rolling Stone wrote that the album was "where punk and New Wave broke through to a mass U.S. audience". The album was also ranked at number 94 by Channel 4's list of 100 greatest albums of all time. Parallel Lines was ranked the 76th best album of the 1970s by Pitchfork.