2 album covers in our archive
Pixies is featured in Behind the Covers' archive with 2 album covers from the 1980s. Released across 4AD and 4AD / Elektra labels, the artwork sits in the alternative, indie, rock tradition. Each cover is documented in our archive with design notes covering photography, conceptual, surreal, debut album, controversial, surrealist. Below you'll find the full story behind each Pixies cover — designers, photographers, label history, and the visual choices that defined the release.
A topless flamenco dancer arches against a crumbling wall, a crucifix glinting beside her, a torn movie poster behind. Pixies' debut buries Catholic imagery, a broken guitar neck, and a strange tonal reversal into one sepia frame. The story of how it was built above a London pub in a single day is stranger than the photo.
Simon Larbalestier's heavily manipulated photograph of a macaque — distorted through multiple exposures and analog techniques — captures the Pixies' surrealist sensibility, connecting to the album's themes of nature, primitivism, and the relationship between humans and animals.
