I can name numerous times when an album's art work either lured me into purchasing an album by an otherwise-unknown-to-me artist or turned me off. Back when hanging out in record stores, flipping through album bins, was the highlight of my day/week.

On: Any and all Roger Dean covers

Genesis Live's amazing stage photo of spectre in the pink triangle mask!

Anthony Phillips' Peter Cross albums, starting with The Geese and The Ghost and Private Parts and Pieces

Cocteau Twins and all 1980s 4 AD releases.

David Sylvian

Off: All Gentle Giant, Magma, and Soft Machine releases from the 1970s. Their album covers just didn't draw me in! 

How 'bout you?

The artwork has always been very important to me, as I've thought of albums as a kind of multimedia - not least LP's. 

Besides that, I've seen throughout the years that if I like the cover, the probability for I'll like the music is much larger.

It's a bit like I can perceive the music looking at the cover, and imo that's not least the purpose of good artwork.

If I remember correctly, I haven't bought much based on the cover alone. In the early days of my music interest I read the Rock Lexikon and a book collecting all Sounds album reviews from 67-77 (both German language publications), so I had a good number of things I wanted to buy and check out when I found them on flea markets (not much money available at that age of course). Cover alone was too risky for me and it pretty much stayed like that. I always had too many ideas what to buy for my money (or later time). I may have occasionally preferred an album with cool cover from a band I already had on my list, or even knew already, so after having heard Going For The One as my first Yes album, I'd buy Yessongs, Tales, Relayer on occasion but avoid CTTE and the Yes Album.

But with the proliferation of the internet and being able to find out about things this was a fairly limited activity. 

Grave New World by Strawbs and the Original Happy to Meet, Sorry to Part by Horslips being two stunning examples.

Same goes for metal as well. It took me ages to listen to Iron Maiden's Dance of Death, and that was entirely based on the album cover  Luckily, the album was actually quite good

For the most part, I had a large majority of the HIPGNOSIS album covers, not just because they were far out, but also because they had a streak of a comment, that actually spoke about their music. And it was always a good treat, but I knew right away that something like the cover from the album UFO (I think it was) that had that 50's theme and what might have been a flying saucer, was actually a hubcap. So I thought that the music was not that big a deal and heard it, but passed on buying it.

In general, a very large majority of the Hipgnosis album covers.

But there were other magnificent covers. AD2's cover for Yeti, Dance of the Lemmings, Carnival in Babylon and Wolf City were way out of this world and very with it. 

There were many other covers, and many of them were the SF scene that had magnificent art on them, and a bit later, the Roger Dean stuff, of which I also had a sizeable number of albums. 

All in all, the majority of stuff was actually very progressive and different, and for me that was the great eye opener, and of course, enjoyment.

The only real clear case for me to have bought an album because of its sleeve only would be Crime Of The Century. That sleeve spoke millions to me (even though nowadays, I find the window bars rather cheap-looking. 

C'mon --

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.pinterest.com%2Fpin%2F498421883756405508%2F&psig=AOvVaw3aAuUFGgzBMUWe5DZgCSYT&ust=1651621417717000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CAwQjRxqFwoTCJCTurH_wfcCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAS" rel="nofollow">

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fultimateclassicrock.com%2Femerson-lake-palmer-tarkus%2F&psig=AOvVaw3aAuUFGgzBMUWe5DZgCSYT&ust=1651621417717000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CAwQjRxqFwoTCJCTurH_wfcCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAD" rel="nofollow -    -- John F. Kennedy

some good photography also speaks to me---Like George Harrison on All Things Must Pass---or Phil on Face Value....or Yes on Yes Album.

But for those of us who lived in a time before the accessibility and availability of the internet, it was a very different world. Some record stores did have listening posts, but by no means all. And even those that had listening posts did not always offer a choice of what to listen to. So sometimes one might buy something without hearing anything on it prior, or maybe having heard only one song from it elsewhere giving an indication of how the album might sound (which was often found afterwards to be not particularly representative of the whole).

Now, admittedly, it was still a gamble to buy something completely unknown, so normally the unknown album was by a band or artist I already had some degree of familiarity with. But, especially when I was very young, knowing I wanted an album by [band x], and finding several to choose from, I would choose by the cover art.

And as I grew older, and was starting to experiment with listening to different things, the cover art would still be a major influence in what I chose. After all, given a record store filled with hundred of albums, if there is not much knowledge of what something sounds like, and not much opportunity to listen to it to find out how it sounds, I had to take a gamble based on something - and cover art generally seemed to do the trick. I was let down surprisingly little, and made some wonderful discoveries based on cover art alone.

Even though there is now no longer any need to ever buy something based on cover art alone, I still make a point of buying at least one album every year that I know nothing about, but which has cover art that attracts me. There has been the odd dud, I admit, but in almost very case it has been a good decision, and I’ve ended up with an appreciation for an album and band (or artist) that I quite likely would never have listened to otherwise.

I would never recommend buying everything without listening first, and as rose tinted as nostalgia might be, I would never wish to go back to the days where sampling music before you bought it was a lot harder to do. But I do think it can be worthwhile to take a gamble every now and then. There’s something really satisfying about listening to something for the very first time, and having no idea what to expect. That sense of nervous excitement and anticipation (and, yes, a little worry and fear) is lost entirely when you listen before you buy.

Hi,

50 years ago, the best way to tell what the music was about, when it wasn't on radio or tv or anywhere else, was by ... yep !!! THE COVER.

The comment is understood, but sad, since all covers of any "cd's" and even "cassettes" for the last 40 years, all downplayed the value of the art altogether. It lost its importance, and its taste, if not touch and even hilarious moments.

The modern era, is one of the worst, in terms of "art" and its exposing the music for what it is or isn't. Most bands do not care much and some of them create a cover that "shows what they are trying to do in the album" and when you listen to it ... it's garbage time, for the most time, not to mention pretentious by many bands, and totally off center, or you can take a DT cover, and laugh ... that's supposed to have meaning?

That's not to say that ALL album covers 50 years ago were great, but when you take on some of the best, it shows something that is not valuable, or visible today ... for example ... JT's cover for PP was very with it ... the end of "classical" material as we knew it, and here was the new one. I loved the Roger Dean stuff with YES, but there was a problem ... it was ethereal and not helpful to their material, but the immense color and vision of Fragile, and then CTTE and then TFTO ... simply blew out a lot of the cover business and its strength as "art", which obviously no one will ever deny Roger Dean that moment. But YES's music, specially after those 3 covers, did not live up to the "art" moments, other than as a commercial success in many ways, even including a couple of Hipgnosis covers.

CD's today, don't have the "art" on them ... and if they do, the SMALL picture is not as effective as the album covers which were 12" by 12" ... and you could see it and remember it. No one remembers or talks about a whole lot of CD covers ... just to give you an idea, which in the end, is what all this is about.

Heck, I still have FLASH's first album spread out on my wall! I won't put up Traffic's album cover because it was on line with the flowers in your hair moment of insanity at the time ... but I also have Kate Bush, Man (Back to the Future poster from the album), Renaissance (Turn of the Cards) on my wall for example ... show me a CD that stands up as well!

Bear in mind that those were the days when you could go into the local record shop and get your friendly shop assistant to put sides of albums on for you ad infinitum. 

Hi,

I thought slightly different.

I am of the opinion that some folks understood the meaning of the word ART a lot more than just a radio song, and they wanted to do something about it, instead of just another song for the radio (at the time), however it was quite well understood and had been for many years that trying to get on radio was not going to happen since it was owned by the record companies who only played their product and not anyone else's ... and later only someone they could "deliver" to the record stores.

The art, while out of it sometimes and over done (love 10CC but Deceptive Bends takes the cake!), at least you knew there was some appreciation for the art itself, and it was a nice way to get a good view of the band ... except to get the same 7 songs in the LP ... which were not worth the price of the album in the first place.

Record store? There is no such thing anymore. And places like the ______ is really a sad example that lists things "you might like" (that is so pretentious!!!) specially when most of the listings are totally off base and out of line, but somehow ... SOMEHOW it relates to previous searches that you made! Cold day in fudging hell that is true, but let them think whatever they think.

And that process, hurts a person looking for music ... and only finding something that sounds almost the same as the stuff they already have. 

So, what do you have left? Places like PA ... although getting some folks to get off the star train is never going to happen! Again, I don't think they are into the music, otherwise the appreciation would go much further beyond any special liking for anyone! The more music I hear the less "Gods" I find ... and that's the best way to enjoy it all, and be surprised when you hear something new and far out! 

That depends on the store, I guess. In my experience, if a store did have a listening post, you could ask until you were blue in the face, but unless the shop assistant wanted to hear what you wanted to, it was unlikely to happen. One store I frequented even had a card on the counter telling customers to please not ask for a record to be played.

Also, consider the fact that if you have just asked your friendly shop assistant to play a record, and then someone else asks, what then happens? That, more than anything else, is why there is often a reluctance for a store to play something over the speakers, rather than redirect them to a listening post.

From the age of about 7 to 14, I would say almost 99% of my purchases were based on cover art.

From the age of 14 to 21, it was not as high, but still easily greater than 50% of my purchases would have been based on cover art, I would think.

It has really only been in more recent years, where the internet has made it almost impossible to not be able to listen to something first, that cover art no longer has quite as much influence. It would probably be possible for me to buy 100% of what I buy after listening first. And I have to actively choose not to listen first, if that’s what I want to do..

I’d also like to say that I disagree with Pedro when it comes to cover art being ignored in the age of cassettes and CDs. Cassettes were only ever a secondary market, really. They were the product of convenience, that you could play on the move. Even though many people (like myself) bought only cassettes, we were well aware it was an inferior product in so many ways - but convenience and cost were enough of a pro, to outweigh the cons. And while it might have been far harder to see the detail of the cover art on a cassette, it was rare for the release to not be on lp as well, where it could be seen in all its glory.

Because record stores tended to give prominence to records (duh) over cassettes, so when I saw I bought albums because of the cover art, even though I bought them on cassette, it was the cover art of the lp that attracted me, and had me search through the cassettes to find the album with the cover art I had seen in the record section.

And cover art is absolutely a consideration when it comes to CDs.

That's funny: Soft Machine - Fourth and Third are among my favorites. And Magma? How can one not be drawn to Kohntarkosz? I find the Magma symbol in itself visually attractive and like all their classic-era covers. 

Some albums I bought mainly because of the covers, while knowing very little about its musical content (all bought very cheap, in an era when this music was totally unhip). Of course the first purchase was more of a gamble than the second:

Univers Zero - Heresie (with the original drawing)

Kraftwerk - The Man Machine and Trans Europe Express

Genesis - Trespass and Foxtrot

The Enid - Aerie Faerie Nonsense (which I didn't like at all)

Tangerine Dream - Phaedra, Stratosfear, Alpha Centauri, Zeit, Rubycon

Klaus Schulze - Moondawn, Timewind, Blackdance...

Jethro Tull - Benefit, Stand Up, Minstrel...

That's all I can remember.

Ugly covers that I think of as a stay away-warning (from the top of my head):

Every single Dream Theater, Pendragon, Arena and Symphony X-album I’ve ever seen.

I think all Tool-albums are ugly too (but I don't mind their music so much)

Beggars Opera - Get Your Dog Off Me

Air Cut - Curved Air (horrible design, but a pretty great album)

King Crimson - In the Wake of Poseidon (the painting reeks of banal amateurism, but I love the album though)

I still buy many albums based on the cover, but mainly jazz and mainly looking at the year of recording and line-up. The ones I go for usually look nice as well. Just looking like it's a 1960's-early 1970's jazz-album is a good look imo.

Weeeeeell, it depends on which sides of the Pond you were.

In NA, it was hard to get someone in a downtown record shop to play an album (those were systematically sealed). I was lucky enough to have a Records On Wheel in Mississauga and the owner (a guy resembling Roger Earle of Savoy Brown & Foghat) would sometimes play out a record (provided he had time), but he certainly listened to what I told him I liked and suggested albums (he even promised to take them back for a trade if I didn't like it (something I never challenged him on - because he was spot on in 90% of the cases).

In Continental Europe, back the 70/80's , a lot of records were not sealed and some store clerks could be persuaded (provided he was cool and not too busy) to play a few tunes, but he would handle it. Not aware about trying cassettes out, though. Some larger shops had listening booths too.

Of course, the CD changed that: lost independant record shop would have a CD deck (or two) with headphones directly plugged in  and we'd select the empty jewel cases and the owner would take the disc out and let people have an ear at it ar your ease (provided that this wasn't rush hour and too many guys lining up behind you). Much harder to buy something you didn't like then.

==============

As for the %-age of albums bought by sleeves alone (but never the rate you give), it was a factor early on, but with some experience growing (and my buddies' as well) most of my buying was done having listened to the albums at a buddy's house. It was also not just the artwork alone, but also the track lengths (and titles) and the line-up & instruments.

And for cassetttes, it might seem secondary today, but it was significant in the 80's when music became portable (ghetto blasters and walkmans), and yes, unless it was forms of metal music, artworks seemed less important. Don't forget that it wasn't "the CD that killed the vinyl" crap you still hear today from Opus vinyl deists, but more like the "Cassette that killed vinyl and CD that killed the cassette" truth. I knew plenty of people that didn't even care to look at vinyls and went straight to cassettes.

On some continents (namely those on the equator), in the 80's, record shops were having more casettes in stock than vinyls, because vinyls tended to warp due to the heat - even local pressings of local artistes had the problem.

I like the cover of GG's Acquiring the Taste, and find Magma's covers cool and exiting. 

Can you tell some more about that?

As I see it, the relation between the artwork and the music has somehow changed when comparing the 70's to the modern albums.

Im going back to the late '60s when, certainly where I lived in Surrey, England, all the record shops (and record departments in department stores), had a number of listening booths fo you to sit in. 

Hi,

Never saw that here on the West Coast, however we were way luckier than most folks in that we had Tower on the Strip, the Warehouse in Westwood, and if you went north, Rasputin's was the place to go ... a totally insane place at the time since the minute you walked in you get a massive headache ... where the fudge do you start? We also had one of the best ever ... Moby Disk in Van Nuys that did nothing but imports and for many years that I am aware of no one could EVER touch them! And I doubt anyone else will including online "imports" folks most of which have the same English and American bands listed!

By 1999/2000, Portland's Tower gave up on imports and unusual things and decided to go to top ten, something that Tower was not exactly about, even in Hollywood, but it might have been that the times had changed. When I left the store here, with one ECM album -- they did not even have a decent Keith Jarrett --- of all people, an American!!! -- I told them they were making a gross mistake and three months later they were closed. A few months later (maybe more) Tower was just about done as well anywhere else and the one in Seattle, around 2005 (I think it was) was the worst and saddest joke for a record store I have ever seen. It didn't even deserve its name!

You knew right away that the time of the albums was over. That the art itself was not important or valuable or meaningful despite many of us wanting to feel otherwise.

I'm OK with things changing, but I really think that the major issue today with most musicians is the lack of appreciation for the arts and their mingling with it ... it's like the only art they know is their DAW and forget the rest, and that's likely not a good connection, although I find that more important in writing and painting (for example) where the area of opportunity is more inside you than outside with more folks/musicians to work with.

Hopefully we can get back some sort of artistic merit to more work ... but seeing yet again, another grundge or metal band that can only show their mugs on the album is really the worst ... and quite possibly the one thing that hurts them more than not ... being exactly the same as all the others ... such a record company idea ... it's unbelievable!

Again, looking at it from the UK perspective, it's possibly significant that a decent proportion of the bands that came through in the mid to late '60s (and possibly early '70s) either originated in art colleges or from individuals attending art college (or architectural school in the case of Pink Floyd), so art was as important to them as music in their formative years. 

to borrow records from libraries, and I chose which mostly depending on how much I liked the artwork.

Cassette sales in 'Merica were at their peak in the 80's, all due to the portability of players as Sean Trane mentions, including the Sony Walkman. I was always a cassette buyer in the 70s and 80s, but that really took off for me once I got a Walkman around '82 and then started driving. I saved my money and outfitted my car with an Alpine car system and played cassettes all the time. As well I dubbed almost all my records to cassette, I can't tell you how many blank cassettes I bought.

As for blank tapes, they continued to sell loooooong after cassettes themselves had lost their market. We all, I’m sure, had hundreds of blank tapes from the cassette era - of albums copied from friends, and recorded from the radio, etc. But even after people stopped buying cassettes, and started buying CDs, there were still quite a few years where blank tapes were still bought - only now it was to copy not just albums from friends, but our own albums on CDs. Because early portable CD players were stupidly expensive, and prone to skipping; and very few cars had CD players unless one was specially installed - again with early models being very expensive and prone to skipping. It would be some time before anti-jogging technology had advanced, and car CD players were common enough, that the blank tape market would dry up - even while it was almost impossible to buy a new album on cassette!

Hi,

Nope.

Space Pirate Radio, Moby Disk, the early Tower, the Westwood Warehouse, Rasputin's ... they had ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with "educational" radio whatsoever. In fact, SPR was on a commercial radio station in its early years and the station was number one within 3 months of it starting. And UCSB, as well as such huge amounts of idiocy and rich folks like USC and UCLA wouldn't know progressive from punk music if you asked them! Heck, they still teach Hitchcock as what "movies" are about!

What has become known as "progressive" extended far more than just our imaginations and what we thought was the reason. It might be that in England, the college circuit was very important, but that circuit did not exist in America, where many colleges use their money to bring in over rated classical this or that and then make it look like it is a "cultural event". I can't imagine it being different in England, a place that worships tradition for their poop not stinking and then publishing articles that makes them seem clean and clear, still not realizing that 200 years ago it was all about adding more powders and smells to make sure you did not stink!

I guess I misunderstand your term "secondary market", to me that means sold on the used market. You mean it it was a second choice to vinyl in the 70's/80's........?

The covers have meant a lot to me, and still do, not only due to the artwork but also as physical objects which can look very well-made and be nice to keep in hands. 

The only time I was drawn to an album purely by the cover was a random spotting on a listening post in the Virgin music store back in the day - gave it a brief listen whilst I was there and purchased it immediately. It's still a favourite album of mine, if a somewhat lesser known (but excellent) work from the New Age genre.

https://www.discogs.com/master/148739-Caroline-Lavelle-Spirit" rel="nofollow - https://www.discogs.com/master/148739-Caroline-Lavelle-Spirit

Having said that back in the day I was always drawn to anything with a cover by Roger Dean or Hipgnosis (with varying degrees of satisfaction once listening to the enclosed disc).

Hi,

As time went by, I would say that by 1980, we did not have to go by the cover a whole lot. We were already quite well versed in/around music from Europe, and even Japan, and essentially we did not need to wait for the "editorial" cover by Hipgnosis to tell us how good something is/was.

By then, I was already on a different idea ... and about the only folks I followed (religiously!!!) was Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze, Vangelis, Ange, Banco, PFM, AD2, Can, PH/VdGG and so on, which kinda made "chasing" records and material out there kinda silly ... besides the fact that American music lost its "Fillmore" touch, and became almost exclusively radio minded, now that (by 1980) the corporate rapists had bought out all the FM stations to make sure there were no independents out there "stealing" their sales! 

(PS: It's still hard to believe that folks discussing "progressive" still don't want to hear about that, and how it closed down the "imports" so fast ... which made it look like "progressive" died. It didn't die ... but it was not as easy getting some of the materials, when almost all of them were "imports" again, and we were lucky that we had a couple of super record stores and providers that made sure we could get the stuff.)

But covers, were kinda "done" and the music was not showing itself "better" than before, and all of a sudden we got the cover star bands ... and it was time to let it go for the new music instead!

Mostly I would buy albums for their art if pigs flew or heads rolled.