bonatoc said:

ufoclub said:

SMH at peeps who don't like the Lovesexy cover.

From Dirty Mind to Lovesexy it was all great... then he had one off but rare design hits with Rainbow Children and... I'm trying to come up with another one... oh yeah, 3121 and AOA looked good.

Exodus was cool.

By the way, isn't it a Prince drawing?

no

bonatoc said:

lynx said:

Easy one. It's a tie between the 12-year-old photoshop of Musicology and the putrid Lovesexy album cover

What's "putrid" about the Lovesexy cover?

Maybe it appeals more to an european audience. You need to be familiar with the works of Pierre et Gilles, clearly an influence on Jean-Baptiste Mondino for the post-processing of the picture.

Putrid might be strong word. With such a great album musically, this cover could have been so great. Instead, it just screams so much "I don't give a **** what anyone including Warner Brothers thinks, I'm going to make a cover that most people will hate, because I'm Prince damn it and I can do whatever I want. To me, it just screams arrogance and I've always hated it and always will.

I think you take it way too seriously.

Prince's heaven depicted in Lovesexy is as cartoonish as TBA's hell is.
Miles understood: you're missing the Chaplin's point.

The guy is naked for chrissake! First it's funny, then it's very, very feminist, or gender-equality-like in 1988,
and in fact, quite the Eighties Male social revendication on his relationship with his body image.
And the female's body image.

"I wish we all were nude", remember? It's a serious statement about pureness for Prince. Naked, you have nothing left.
This coming from a pretty straight, on the verge of macho guy.
But then again, the vaudeville of IIWYG...

Sex has never been trivial to Prince.

[Edited 12/16/17 14:41pm]

bonatoc said:

I think you take it way too seriously.

Prince's heaven depicted in Lovesexy is as cartoonish as TBA's hell is.
Miles understood: you're missing the Chaplin's point.

The guy is naked for chrissake! First it's funny, then it's very, very feminist, or gender-equality-like in 1988,
and in fact, quite the Eighties Male social revendication on his relationship with his body image.
And the female's body image.

"I wish we all were nude", remember? It's a serious statement about pureness for Prince. Naked, you have nothing left.
This coming from a pretty straight, on the verge of macho guy.
But then again, the vaudeville of IIWYG...

Sex has never been trivial to Prince.

[Edited 12/16/17 14:41pm]

Hmmm...funny? I've never looked at that album cover and thought funny. Other people thought it was funny when I bought it though.

You think *I'm* taking it too seriously, you should read your post.

I love Prince and they way he dealt with sexuality, in many ways he taught me more about sex than anyone else. Still, this album deserved better IMO, and it really felt like Prince wanted to be outrageous for the sake of being outrageous.

hyperpessimist said:

Overall his good covers are the exception IMHO (Dirty Mind, 1999, ATWIAD, Parade, SOTT, Lovesexy, Come, 3121... maybe a couple more)

Unfortunately, I have to agree.

About Lovesexy, yes, it´s controversial, but it had good art direction.

[Edited 12/19/17 12:00pm]

Yeah, I highly doubt Prince intended the Lovesexy Cover to be humorous. He seemed rather serious about the whole concept of the album - something he wouldn't do again until TRC.

One cover I've always had mixed feelings about is SOTT. I've grown to find it absolutely brilliant but at the time I was really thrown off. Why is he out of focus? Why is he in drag on the single and covering his face witha big black heart? I know it was Cat and not him but folks were confused, trust me. Then on the last single (If I was Your Girlfriend), he comes out with one of the most beautiful covers he's ever done. I think that might have worked better as the SOTT cover and put the existing cover on the back or in the inner sleeve somewhere.

"Prince" is just a terrible cover, btw. I know it's become iconic in its way, but that thing just oozes 70's disco cheese, right down to the heart dotting the "i". Yeesh.

thanks2joniandu said:

For me all of the ones by Steve Parke are terrible. I love his book Picturing Prince but what Prince saw in his art direction is beyond me.

.

You beat me to it. The design department of Warner was good, but when he moved to Parke, it never really recovered, although I like The Rainbow Children and One Nite Alone... Live!

herb4 said:

"Prince" is just a terrible cover, btw. I know it's become iconic in its way, but that thing just oozes 70's disco cheese, right down to the heart dotting the "i". Yeesh.

At the Salford conference in May, the keynote speaker put that cover next to a number of album covers by female soul singers of the time, and suggested that Prince was riffing on that aesthetic. Donna Summer's One Upon A Time was a specific example.

That made me look at it as subversive - especially considering people thought it was a woman singing on his early songs (on the radio - before he was known), and Camille, and how much he pushed gender norms of the time (particularly for an African American man in 1970s United States).