Leafing through a pile of my old vinyl records recently I came across what is possibly the only 3 sided album in existence (Monty Python’s Matching Tie and Handkerchief). One side had two concentric grooves and it was pure chance which one your stylus would play.
This got me thinking - are there any other uniquely different albums out there ? I vaguely remember a Stephen Stills triple live album which only had enough material for 5 sides leaving the 6th blank…and wasn’t there a Melanie album with a scratch ‘n’ sniff sleeve? And a record by Zigue Zigue Sputnik which had genuine ads between the tracks?
Bet you can think of a few more gathering dust in the attic.
An old Jefferson Airplane album cover,Long John Silver, could be folded into a cigar box with a photo of the most luscious bud inside. The inner sleeve was a picture of cigars, for ‘camo-ing yer stash against the narcs’.
The original Stones 'Exile on Main St." had a bunch of postcards in it. Their ‘Her Satanic Majestys Request’ had a 3-D prism effect over the photo on the front to make it look that much more trippy. Can’t forget ‘Sticky Fingers’ with the real zipper and photo of ‘whity tighties’ inside.
Those were some odd covers. I don’t know of any other vinyl tricks (3&5 sides, etc.).
Now you’ve started me thinking about elaborate album covers :
Alice Cooper’s School’s Out could be folded to make a school desk complete with lid (and also came with a pair of white paper panties for some reason)
Them there was Catch a Fire by Bob Marley and The Wailers which came in the shape of a ZIPPO lighter with flip-top.
And didn’t Todd Rundgren have a record with a make-it -yourself pyramid… I remember assembling this and placing it to face due North. According to Todd, if a rusty razor placed was then placed inside it would miraculously turn sharp.
Pride of place though goes to PIL’s Metal Box which housed three 12" singles in a circular metal film canister. The sleeve was deliberately designed that way (according to John Lydon) so it wouldn’t fit next to your other records …
Now you’ve started me thinking about elaborate album covers :
Alice Cooper’s School’s Out could be folded to make a school desk complete with lid (and also came with a pair of white paper panties for some reason)
Them there was Catch a Fire by Bob Marley and The Wailers which came in the shape of a ZIPPO lighter with flip-top.
And didn’t Todd Rundgren have a record with a make-it -yourself pyramid… I remember assembling this and placing it to face due North. According to Todd, if a rusty razor was then placed inside it would miraculously turn sharp.
Pride of place though goes to PIL’s Metal Box which housed three 12" singles in a circular metal film canister. The sleeve was deliberately designed that way (according to John Lydon) so it wouldn’t fit next to your other records …
Joe Jackson did another 3-sided album with Big World. Too much to fit on one disc, too little for a double album, so Joe decided to leave side 4 blank.
My prize weird album gimmick is a copy of Jethro Tull’s Thick as a Brick, complete with fold-out newspaper. It’s a really weird read.
Led Zeppelin’s “In Through the Out Door” had several different covers. And the inner sleeve, which appeared to be a black and white picture, had a gimmick of its own. If you wiped it with a damp cloth, it revealed a lot of different colors.
Elton John’s Captain Fantastic originally came with two booklets: one of lyrics and the other was like a scrapbook, containing reprints of news clippings from his early career, and photos taken by family and friends.
There were any number of albums that came with posters–I can remember that Wings over America did, as did the original Star Wars soundtrack. But there were many more, of course.
Jim Steinman’s Bad for Good album came with a 7-inch EP inside. Guess he couldn’t fit everything on the LP, so he just included an extra record.
As many posts have pointed out, LPs could contain more than just a little booklet of liner notes and/or lyrics, as on a CD. Still, regardless of the size of the CD and its case, I can’t imagine that anybody nowadays would go to the trouble or expense of producing the items that used to be included with LPs.
A Heaven 17 album had the groove on the final song
loop back into itself, so it would play the final
(60/33.3333) seconds over and over and over…
A Scruffy the Cat CD (I know, not an LP, but I think it’s
relevant) had a make-your-own cardboard rocket toy (back
when CD’s came at the top of those very tall empty
cardboard packages)).
The Dead Kennedys had a great poster collage of assorted weirdness and Weekly World News clippings, poster size, two-sided, in ‘Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables’.
There was something I remember about XTC ‘English Settlement’ original release LP (maybe import-only) having a paper doll type cut-out puppet theater.
Grateful Dead album covers actually speak (or was that the blotter?)
Funny trick: go to a thrift store and look at the old albums. Find ‘Dark Side of the Moon’ and just check and see how much stash was cleaned on the inside. I’ve done this trick in thrift stores in two cities, it never ceases to amaze.
Pearl Jam has attempted at least some creativity with some of their albums (even the CDs) :
Ten came with a poster (okay, lots of albums do that).
Vitalogy was modeled after the E.H. Ruddock’s book with pages from the book mixed with the lyrics. The CD was in a sleeve in the back, and the dimensions were set up so that the spine of the book was along what is usually the top or bottom of a CD case (shorter side).
No Code folded out in four sleeved sections to about the same size as the record (also sold). One of the sleeves contained a set of several ‘polaroid’ style pictures on cardboard which were chosen from the pictures on the album cover. see album cover artwork here.
I think it’s entirely possible to put fun stuff in modern albums, but it could be major labels are reluctant to spend the money on it rather than use the packaging techniques that their other albums have (of course, that doesn’t stop the band from doing it, so some of them should get creative).
One further question : Were there any records (vinyl, that is) that had ‘bonus hidden tracks’ like on some CDs, with a large amount of silence, followed by the song, on the final track?
Well, there was “Her Majesty,” the little 20-second McCartney ditty that ended the Beatles’ ABBEY ROAD album.
Jazz saxophone semi-great Rhasaan Roland Kirk made a 2-disc album in the early 1970s called THE CASE OF THE THREE-SIDED DREAM IN AUDIO COLOR. The label on Side 4 read: “This is side four of a three sided album. There is no music on this side. Grooves have been cut into the record so that no damage can be done to the stylus or tone arm if this side were accidentally placed on the changer.”
I listened to that side once, just to see…I think I remember that Rahsaan coughs, RIGHT in the middle of it. Or maybe he blows a raspberry.
Grateful Dead albums are filled with fascinating things…
THE GRATEFUL DEAD, their 1967 first album, has “We Trip,” backwards, hidden in the filigree.
The color changes in LIVE DEAD (1969) make the tops of the letters read “Acid.”
The script in AMERICAN BEAUTY (1970) can also be read as “American Reality.”
The weird alien-looking script on FROM THE MARS HOTEL (1974) reads “Ugly Rumors” when you hold it up to a mirror upside-down. A pun on the “ugly roomers” at the Mars Hotel…
Um lessee … there was some Zepplin album that if you went over either the jacket or liner with a wet brush. it would turn to water colors. I think Johnny Winter And might have been the first band to release a three sided album. The orignal Jethro Tull Stand Up album wasn’t a double set but when you opened it there was a pop up of the band. Rolling Stones Through The Past Darkly cover was in the shape of an octagon.
There are more. I’ll be back!
i have the greatest poster; its from the faces album ‘a nod is as good as a wink to a blind horse.’
its about 30" by 48", or so, and it consists of thousands of tiny polaroids taken by the band during a tour.
its got lots of nude groupies and other post-show hijinks, and lots of hotel room stuff, all mixed up with pictures of booze, and different kinds of pills, and stuff like that.
ive had this poster for more than 20 years. i liberated it from a cool next-door neighbor back in the day; he didnt mind. anyone else seen it?
An early 70’s Jackson 5 album had a picture of the group in a frame. The picture was perforated, so presumably you could punch it out and hang it on your wall.
Many years ago, when both the world and I were young, I had a friend who ran a collectible records place. He had some odd and amazing stuff (including his wife, but I digress). Anyway, most of his business was unusual colors of vinyl and picture discs. Remember those things? Clear LP’s with the album cover or something embedded in them? You couldn’t play them, of course, or eventually the clear PVC stuff would get all white and you wouldn’t be able to watch David Bowie spin around and around while singing along to “Changes”.
My favorite odd album memories are these two:
A release of a song called “Indigo Eyes” (sorry, I no longer recall the artist) that was pressed onto baby blue vinyl. It was particularly valuable since it was a misprint - seems nobody down at the record factory knew that indigo was DARK blue…
A 45 of The Archies singing “Sugar Sugar” that I cut out of the back of a Honeycombs box - remeber when they made those? It didn’t stand up long under my repeated playing, though. I think the problem was compounded by the fact that I was still only allowed to use those damn blunt plastic scissors.
They let me use sharp objects now. But everybody stands WAY back.
My friend had an old Richard Pryor stand-up comedy album that was a “picture-disc” in the shape of Pryor’s head! We listened to it once and I remember being nonplussed that the material was completely clean – not a single curse word on it.
