6 cover stories in our archive
Behind the Covers' archive includes 6 album covers documented under the "monochromatic" design theme, spanning the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s. These covers sit within the rock, r&b, pop, funk, electronic, alternative, hip-hop, indie, folk tradition and feature work by Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Prince, Björk, Eminem 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.
Swiss surrealist H.R. Giger created his first album cover for this progressive rock masterpiece, featuring his signature biomechanical imagery that would later define the Alien film franchise. The gatefold reveals an intricate maze of organic machinery.
Prince's purple-tinted double album cover features a stark, minimalist portrait that launched his iconic color association. Photographer Allen Beaulieu captured the brooding image in a single session, creating one of the most recognizable album covers of the 1980s.
Björk's face emerges from a sculptural ruff collar like a futuristic Elizabethan portrait, created through painstaking digital manipulation that took months to perfect. The image merged high fashion with alien beauty, establishing a new template for electronic music artwork.
Eminem's breakthrough album cover features a stark, unsettling portrait that perfectly captured the controversy and raw honesty of his music. The image became one of hip-hop's most recognizable covers, marking a shift from flashy rap imagery to intimate vulnerability.
Peter Saville transformed a simple mathematical formula into one of the most striking album covers of the 2000s, using pure geometry and bold color to capture Bloc Party's angular post-punk sound in visual form.
The close-up of Mitchell's face bathed in monochromatic blue transforms a portrait into an emotional statement — her sadness and longing literally coloring everything. She described making the album as feeling 'like a cellophane wrapper on a cigarette pack.'