So who'd be on YOUR "Sgt. Pepper" cover?

Cafe Society
1

So, pretend that you’re in a current pop rock group. But not just any old pop rock group, you’re in THE most-popular, zeitgeist-defining, sensation-of-a-generation pop rock group - basically the Beatles for the new millenium generation. You’re next album (that you’re recording now) is set for a release date of June, 2007, coincidentally the 40th anniversary of the release of “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.” (Yes, baby boomers, it will be 40 years next June!) In honor of this momentuous occasion, your band has decided to do an homage cover for the new disc featuring an updated cast of characters. Assuming that anybody you choose can & will go on the cover, who’d you pick?

Let’s just add some ground rule - they can’t have been on the original Sgt. Pepper album cover. There also must be an equal number of personaes - 72 on the original cover, 72 on yours. Of course, 4 of the characters will be you & your bandmates (you’re a quartet, natch) in the prominent, center position. 4 more will be images of you & your bandmates from your first disc in the second row. That leaves 64 folks spread out among four rows to smack onto your cover. Who do you pick?

My choices, in no particular order:

  1. Terry Gilliam
  2. Graham Chapman
  3. Stephen Hawking
  4. Chelsea Clinton
  5. Bessie Smith
  6. Gumby
  7. Stephen King
  8. Julian Lennon
  9. Stella McCartney
  10. Zak Starkey (a.k.a. Ringo Starr Jr.)
  11. Dhani Harrison
  12. Rufus Wainwright
  13. Martha Wainwright
  14. Divine
  15. Richard Pryor
  16. Gilda Radner
  17. Lily Tomlin
  18. Matt Groening
  19. Andy Warhol
  20. Matthew Shepard
  21. “Dr. Bob”
  22. Tom Baker (a.k.a. Dr. Who #4)
  23. Julia Child
  24. Rev. Al Sharpton
  25. Carl Bernstein
  26. Bob Woodward
  27. Heidi Fleiss
  28. Robert Mapplethorpe
  29. Patti Smith
  30. Neil Gaiman
  31. Steve Jobs
  32. Janis Joplin
  33. the Dalai Llama
  34. Alex Rodriguez
  35. Janet Reno
  36. Larry Kramer
  37. John Cameron Mitchell (as “Hedwig”)
  38. Patty “Tanya” Hearst
  39. Bill Clinton (arm in arm with his good buddy -
  40. George Bush Sr.
  41. Ralph Nader
  42. Ani Difranco
  43. Johnny Cash
  44. Christopher Reeve (as Superman)
  45. Quentin Crisp
  46. Frank Zappa
  47. Jack Kirby
  48. Stan Lee
  49. Ken Kesey
  50. Parker Posey
  51. Father Mychal F. Judge
  52. Rodney King
  53. Opus the Penguin
  54. Bono
2

Jeez, not gonna do all seventy-two, but off the top of my head, I’d have Robert Heinlein, Harlan Ellison, Breece DJ Pancake, John Irving, and Tom Laughlin in a good Billy Jack kick. I’d replace Johnny Weissmuller with Gordon Scott.

Sir Rhosis

3

Plus, just for the hella it, I’d have the dopers CalMeacham, RealityChuck, Fenris, and Wendell Wagner, all whose posts I look for and find informative.

Sir Rhosis

4

Looks like you need to add ten names…

Interesting idea for a thread, but I have to log off now. I’ll post a list if I get enough uninterrupted computer time in the next few days.

5

You have good taste, sir.

6

D’oh!

  1. Homer Simpson
  2. Alex Richards (a.k.a. Kramer)
  3. Annie Liebovitz
  4. Billy Tipton (biologically female jazz musician who lived for decades as a man)
  5. Charles E. Schulz
  6. Golda Meir
  7. the Marlboro Man
  8. Laurie Anderson
  9. Salvadore Dali
  10. the Cowardly Lion (“Wizard of Oz”)
7

M, for Monroe.

Now that’s a nitpick.

8

I thought that was Michael Richards who played Kramer.

9

D’oh!

D’oh!

10

Just discovered this thread, loved the idea, and thought I’d bump it. I’d pick:

  1. Keira Knightley
  2. Bob Dylan
  3. George Washington
  4. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain
  5. Abraham Lincoln
  6. James T. Kirk
  7. Spock
  8. Dr. McCoy
  9. Rick Blaine
  10. Ilsa Lund
  11. Harry “Breaker” Morant
  12. J.S. Bach
  13. Mr. Incredible
  14. Eddie Morra
  15. John Lennon
  16. Paul McCartney
  17. George Harrison
  18. Ringo Starr
  19. James Bond (Sean Connery)
  20. James Bond (Daniel Craig)
  21. Jesus Christ
  22. Pope Francis
  23. The Dalai Lama
  24. Nelson Mandela
  25. Her Majesty the Queen (1952)
  26. Her Majesty the Queen (2013)
  27. John F. Kennedy
  28. Jackie Kennedy
  29. F. Scott Fitzgerald
  30. Barack Obama
  31. J.R.R. Tolkien
  32. Aragorn
  33. Frodo
  34. John Marshall
  35. Winston Churchill
  36. Sam Kinison
  37. Frank Lloyd Wright
  38. Queen Elizabeth I
  39. Sir Francis Walsingham
  40. William Shakespeare
  41. Scott Joplin
  42. Jelly Roll Morton
  43. Alan Parsons
  44. Elvis Presley
  45. Stephen Hawking
  46. Matt Groening
  47. Francis Urquhart (Ian Richardson)
  48. Sherlock Holmes
  49. Dr. Watson
  50. Clara Barton
  51. Albert Schweitzer
  52. Katherine Jefferts Schori
  53. Josiah Bartlet
  54. Isambard Kingdom Brunel
  55. Robert A. Heinlein
  56. Isaac Asimov
  57. Arthur C. Clarke
  58. Joe Haldeman
  59. King Arthur
  60. Gandalf
  61. Harry Potter
  62. Clarence Darrow
  63. Harry Truman
  64. my wife
11

Looks like fun.

  1. Santa Claus
  2. Walt Kelly
  3. Joey Heatherton
  4. Superman
  5. John F. Kennedy
  6. Emmett Kelly
  7. Annette Funicello
  8. Mason Williams
  9. Terry Pratchett
  10. F. F. Bruce
  11. Bruce Metzger
  12. Raymond E. Brown
  13. Neil Gaiman
  14. Sophia Loren
  15. Barbara Eden
  16. Daniel J. Boorstin
  17. Dmitri A. Borgmann
  18. Flip Wilson
  19. Batman
  20. Merlin
  21. Thomas A. Edison
  22. Albert Einstein
  23. Madonna
  24. Cyndi Lauper
  25. Billie Holiday
  26. Green Lantern
  27. the Flash
  28. Walt Disney
  29. Aretha Franklin
  30. Linda Ronstadt
  31. Bing Crosby
  32. Bog Hope
  33. Dorothy Lamour
  34. Fred Astaire
  35. W. C. Fields
  36. Gardner Fox
  37. Carmine Infantino
  38. John Cleese
  39. William Gaines
  40. James A. Michener
  41. Dorothy Parker
  42. Robert Benchley
  43. my uncle Frank
  44. Mel Blanc
  45. Mel Brooks
  46. Raquel Welch
  47. Bill Cosby
  48. Jackie Chan
  49. Tim Powers
  50. Dustin Hoffman
  51. Samuel L. Jackson
  52. Stan Lee
  53. Robert Gordis
  54. Doctor Who (the 4th one)
  55. Wonder Woman
  56. Isaac Watts
  57. Amy Irving
  58. Richard Dreyfuss
  59. C-3PO
  60. R2D2
  61. Montague Summers
  62. Avner the Eccentric
  63. Clyde Beatty
  64. Marcel Marceau’s Mr. Bip
12

Yeah, yeah, yeah - I couldn’t get behind a new Sgt. Pepper’s cover if it didn’t have the Beatles on it.

I would include:

1-4 The Mop Tops (4)
5 Stevie Wonder
6 Stephen King
7 Quentin Tarantino
8 The Edge
9 Norman Borlaug
10 Doug Englebart
11 Bill Gates
12 Michael Milken
13 Barack Obama
14 OBL
15 Andrea from “90210” (cause geek girls are hot)
16 Barney (GWB’s scottish terrier)
17 Marvin Gaye
18 Andrew Lloyd Weber
19 James Cameron
20 Kanye West
21 Beyonce
22 Heath Ledger
23 Ken Jennings
24 Watson (IBM Computer - I might be thinking of “Deep Blue”, btw)
25 Mark Twain
26 My Dad
27 My wife as a little girl
28 My daughter
29 Rob Ford
30 Van Earl Wright
31 Ted Koppel
32 Dan Patrick/Kieth Olbermann (wearing sombreros)
33 Michael Jordan
34 Barry Sanders
35 Greg Maddux
36 Tom Glavine
37 Herschel Walker
38 Dale Murphy
39 Sid Meier
40 Psy
41 Karen Gillan (especially wearing this)

I’ll think about the final 23…

13

Spiro Agnew
Aristotle
Alan Arkin
Louis Armstrong
Joan Baez
Chuck Berry
Boadicea
Humphrey Bogart
David Bowie
James Brown
Lord Buckley
Kate Bush
Julius Caesar
Neal Cassady
Charlemagne
Cleopatra
Walter Cronkite
Charles Dickens
Walt Disney
Bob Elliott
The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers (Freewheelin’ Franklin, Phineas T. Freakears, and Fat Freddy Freekowtski)
Ella Fitzgerald
Robert Fripp
Peter Gabriel
Mohandas K. Gandhi
Jerry Garcia
Ray Goulding
George Frideric Handel
Katharine Hepburn
Buddy Holly
Mick Jagger
Joan of Arc
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Rudyard Kipling
Jim Kweskin
Lao Tze
Donovan Leitch
Abraham Lincoln
Little Richard
Bob Marley
Chico Marx
Groucho Marx
Harpo Marx
Zeppo Marx
Roger McGuinn
Jim Morrison
Isaac Newton
Florence Nightingale
Harry Nilsson
Charlie Parker
Keith Richards
Will Rogers
Pete Seeger
William Shakespeare
Mother Teresa
Hunter Thompson
J.R.R. Tolkien
George Washington
Hank Williams
Frank Zappa

14

I would LOVE to go to a party with all of those folks!