5 cover stories in our archive
Behind the Covers' archive includes 5 album covers documented under the "confrontational" design theme, spanning the 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, 2010s. These covers sit within the hip-hop, electronic, alternative, rock, metal tradition and feature work by Death Grips, Eminem, Rage Against the Machine, Sonic Youth and others. 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.
Death Grips used a pre-existing black-and-white illustration by Chicago artist Sua Yoo for The Money Store, then modified it by adding the band's name to the submissive figure's chest. When the cover was unveiled in 2012, the group said its dominant and submissive figures were meant to carry ideas about sexuality, individuality and outsiders into the album's visual identity.
Jonathan Mannion photographed Eminem seated outside 19946 Dresden Street in Detroit for the standard cover of The Marshall Mathers LP. The subdued sepia-toned image turns Eminem's former home into the central visual subject, while Jason Noto's art direction and design keep the typography secondary to the location photograph.
The cover uses one of the most searing photographs in 20th-century journalism — the self-immolation of Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc in 1963 Saigon — making an unambiguous political statement that aligns the band with the most extreme form of political protest.
Two cool kids in sunglasses share a cigarette under a hand-lettered confession about murder and the open road. The drawing looks like a comic panel — but it traces back to a real paparazzi shot from one of Britain's most notorious trials. This is the story behind Sonic Youth's Goo.
You are lying on the ground in a downtown LA alley, six young men staring down at you, one aiming a handgun straight into the lens. That is the view N.W.A handed the world in 1988, and the photographer who took it had never shot a rap group in his life.