“band portrait”

2 cover stories in our archive

Behind the Covers' archive includes 2 album covers documented under the "band portrait" design theme, spanning the 1980s, 2000s. These covers sit within the alternative, rock, pop, punk tradition and feature work by Dave Matthews Band, The Jesus and Mary Chain. Each entry below includes the cover artwork, the designers and photographers behind it, and a short story about the visual choices that defined the release.

Busted Stuff by Dave Matthews Band — album cover art

Busted Stuff by Dave Matthews Band (2002)

For Busted Stuff, Dave Matthews Band turned the machinery of album promotion into the album cover itself: bassist Stefan Lessard sits beneath a wall of pasted posters carrying fragmented portraits of his bandmates. Danny Clinch photographed the scene, while Thane Kerner's digital collage work helped make the sleeve feel simultaneously like a street photograph, a band portrait and a poster campaign already coming apart at the seams.

Label
RCA
Designer
Thane Kerner, Danny Clinch, Catherine Dee, Dave Matthews
Photographer
Danny Clinch
Genre
Alternative
Decade
2000s
Read the full story →
Psychocandy by The Jesus and Mary Chain — album cover art

Psychocandy by The Jesus and Mary Chain (1985)

The cover of The Jesus and Mary Chain's Psychocandy turns a homemade band photograph into a red-and-black blur of faces, grain and shadow. The front-cover photographs were made in Jim and William Reid's shared East Kilbride bedroom, while the finished sleeve credits Greg Allen with art direction and a group of photographers rather than one definitive front-cover author.

Label
Blanco y Negro Records
Designer
Greg Allen
Genre
Rock, Pop, Punk
Decade
1980s
Read the full story →

Related design themes