Let it bleed
Vanusa RCA Victor Records
(37 votes, average: 3.70 out of 5)
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Let it be
George Harrison “All Things Must Pass” Apple Records (1970) (I got my copy that year.) A triple album with the #1 hit “My Sweet Lord,” “Isn’t It A Pity,” and many other beautiful songs. Album design and photography: Tom Wilkes.
Wilkes was partner in a Long Beach advertising firm when he became art director for the 1967 Monterey International Pop Music Festival for which he created all of the graphics and print materials, including the festival’s psychedelic poster that was printed on foil stock. Music producer Lou Adler, who produced the landmark music festival with singer John Phillips, said Wilkes “caught the spirit of the time” with his festival graphics. The Monterey pop festival “catapulted” Wilkes’ career into the music industry, his daughter said, beginning as art director at A&M Records.
During his heyday, Wilkes designed or provided the art direction or graphic design for scores of album covers, including designing the covers for the Rolling Stones’ “Beggars Banquet,” Neil Young’s “Harvest,” Eric Clapton’s “Eric Clapton,” Joe Cocker’s “Mad Dogs & Englishmen” and George Harrison’s “Concert for Bangladesh” and “All things Must Pass.”
As he did with many of the albums, Wilkes also shot the cover photo of Joplin for her 1971 “Pearl” album, which shows the flamboyant singer lounging on a settee. (Their photo session was the night she overdosed.)
In 1973, Wilkes won a Grammy Award for best recording package for the Who’s rock opera “Tommy,” as performed by the London Symphony Orchestra and Chamber Choir.
Wilkes passed away in 2009. He was 69 years old.
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(52 votes, average: 3.77 out of 5) Loading ...The two sides of Bijelo Dugme
Two by Bijelo Dugme Yugoslav Rock
(62 votes, average: 4.13 out of 5) Loading ...Blues cigar
Mississippi Fred McDowell “1904-1972″ Photo by Baron Wolman Just Sunshine Records Recorded September 8-10, 1969 at Malaco Sound Recording Studios, in Jackson, Miss.; prod. by Tommy Couch; Fred McDowell, g, voc; Jerry Puckett, b; Darin Lancaster, dr Liner notes by Michael Cuscuna Mississippi Fred McDowell taught a young Bonnie Raitt the slide guitar and his recording of “You Gotta Move” was covered by the Rolling Stones on “Sticky Fingers.” There’s a nice story about Fred’s last live recording session on Oblivion Records You can buy a print of this cover shot at Wolfgang’s Vault
(54 votes, average: 3.81 out of 5) Loading ...Strange times
Conjunto Antonio Mafra “7 e pico 8 e coisa 9 e tal” Orfeu Records
(41 votes, average: 3.37 out of 5) Loading ...Cocksucker blues
“Exile On Main Street” The Rolling Stones Cover art design and photography by Robert Frank. Frank’s, 1958 publication of The Americans, a book of photographs with an introduction by Jack Kerouac, changed modern photography. In 1972, he directed “Cocksucker Blues,” an infamous, seldom-seen and much bootleged, cinema verite documentary of The Stones American Tour that year. In conjunction with the Metropolitan Museum’s current Robert Frank exhibit of The Americans, I attended a screening of CB. After years of having only a crappy VHS dupe, it was amazing to see the band misbehaving – and performing – on a clean print in the museum’s theater. And how strange to see this notorious, dirty, “underground” movie being celebrated and analyzed at the Met, the bastion of high art.
(47 votes, average: 3.77 out of 5) Loading ...Joy and pain
“Laughin’ to Keep From Cryin’” Lester Young, Roy Eldridge and Harry Edison Verve Records (1958) What a great candid shot of Eldridge and Young in a private, unguarded moment of comradery. The title says a lot for these brilliant musicians who suffered through segregation and humiliation their whole lives. Especially Young who as a sensitive young artist felt the heartbreaking brunt of racism in the army and never quite recovered. This lp is one of Young’s final recordings. The title is shared by a Langston Hughes novel from 1952.
(44 votes, average: 4.05 out of 5) Loading ...Hooker with a heart of gold
John Lee Hooker Plays and Sings the Blues Chess LP 1454. Early fifties recordings (When Hook was a younger stud) compiled and released by Chess in 1961. Personnel: John Lee Hooker vocals; guitar. (Eddie Kirkland guitar on “Just Me and My Telephone”.) Studs Terkel writes the liner notes. Another cool cover photo by Chess house photog Don Bronstein. This is back porch music from the heart of the Delta. “Although he often reworked themes by earlier bluesmen during this period, it was rare that Hooker outright covered another artist’s material. So his riveting interpretations of Muddy Waters’s ‘Please Don’t Go’ and Big Maceo Merriweather’s ‘Worried Life Blues’ peak this collection”
(46 votes, average: 4.39 out of 5) Loading ...Jump ball
“Viva A Vida” Pocho e Orquestra RGE RGE Records Brazil
(48 votes, average: 4.02 out of 5) Loading ...Good Buddys
“The Buddy Holly Story” Compare the U.K. Coral (top) and U.S. Coral Records (bottom) releases.
(21 votes, average: 3.90 out of 5) Loading ...
