It’s time to post some girl-related album art again, and let’s start with a couple from Finnish symphonic metal band Nightwish. These are both single covers, and the first is a beautifully illustrated image for a fantastic but melancholy song called Eva (originally from the album Dark Passion Play) about a mistreated little girl who runs away from home. In the image, we can see the girl is wearing a period costume from late 19th or early 20th century. She stands on her front lawn at night, carrying only a few meager belongings and looking back at the home she is about to leave, perhaps forever. It’s a lonely image for a sad song. Poor Eva.
Artist Unknown – Nightwish – Eva (single cover) (2007)
Oh, and if you’d like to hear the song itself, you can check it out here. I find it quite moving myself. And the lyrics are here.
The next image is for the song Ever Dream, which was released before the album it would appear on, Century Child. In this case, however, the cover art for the single release has little to do with the content of the song. It’s just a nice romanticized image of a little girl.
Artist Unknown – Nightwish – Ever Dream (single cover)
This next cover image is one of my favorites that I’ve encountered over the last several months. It’s from the band Royal Bliss, and the album is called Waiting Out the Storm. The cover image artfully references The Wizard of Oz, as well as featuring some really lovely border art that recalls Constructivist poster designs.
Artist Unknown – Royal Bliss – Waiting Out the Storm (cover)
Artist Unknown – Royal Bliss – Waiting Out the Storm (cover) (detail)
The next cover design I’m fairly certain comes from Jugend originally, but I do not know which issue or who the artist is. I just thought it was a lovely composition. The band is Tangemeenie and the album is The Gilded Age. Beyond that I know nothing about it.
Artist Unknown – Tangemeenie – The Gilded Age (cover)
And here is another stunning album cover design, this time for Wild Child‘s album The Runaround. A nice use of digital photocollage here.
Artist Unknown – Wild Child – The Runaround (cover) (2013)
Here are a couple from female singer Tei Shi. The first cover image—for Tei Shi’s rendition of Beyoncé‘s No Angel—looks to be a simple family snapshot of Tei Shi herself as a child, possibly in a Halloween costume or some sort of ballet outfit. I love her tutu! I have never seen one with that color combination before. The cover itself has no text.
Photographer Unknown – Tei Shi – No Angel (single cover)
This second image is for Tei Shi’s single M&Ms and also seems to be a childhood snapshot of the singer herself, this time in a swimsuit and painted face and holding a bunch of balloons. A birthday party photo perhaps?
Photographer Unknown – Tei Shi – M&Ms (single cover)
Now here’s a classic! This is the cover of the Rolling Stones album It’s Only Rock ‘n Roll, which came out in 1974. The design is a photocollage where the artist, after completing the collage, then went and hand-painted over the photos. I’m guessing the little girls came from photos taken at one of Isadora Duncan’s dance schools. The costumes are right at any rate, and notice the poses of the girls in the bottom left-hand corner and compare it with this image. There’s something oddly suggestive about this image, hinting that the Rollings Stones have sex appeal to females of all ages, including little girls.
Artist Unknown – The Rolling Stones – It’s Only Rock ‘n Roll (cover) (1974)
Here’s one I’ve been meaning to share for ages and just never quite got to it. But here it is now. This is the cover image for The Enchanter Persuaded album by Sinoia Caves (a.k.a. Jeremy Schmidt), an electronica musician. I quite like this album, especially the songs Through the Valley and Evil Ball. The photographer is Dewitt Jones, and the photo originally appeared in the April 1976 issue of National Geographic as part of a story on the poet Robert Frost (a big thanks to one of our readers for providing this information!)
Dewitt Jones – Sinoia Caves – The Enchanter Persuaded (cover)
Last but not least, here we have the cover for Little Dragon‘s Nabuma Rubberband. Little Dragon is an electronica band from Sweden. This is a great cover, very dynamic.
Artist Unknown – Little Dragon – Nabuma Rubberband (cover)
The Rolling Stones’ cover was made by Belgian painter Guy Peellaert, co-author of the famous psychedelic pop-art comic book Jodelle. He attended the recording sessions invited by Mick Jagger, who also invited to do the album cover after seeing his work in the book Rock Dreams, which featured illustrations of various rock musicians such as the Rolling Stones. Peellaert’s painting strongly resembles Henri Gervex’s painting “The Coronation of Nicolas II” (1896). In 1974, Peellaert provided the album art for David Bowie’s “Diamond Dogs”.
Nightwish is my favorite band. Symphonic metal isn’t quite as popular in the U.S. as it is in some parts of Europe. Imagine my surprise to see one of their album covers when I loaded the page. 🙂
Hi Steohawk. I discovered these album covers by searching for a particular music video by either Nightwish or Tarja. I didn’t find the video (I couldn’t recall the song, I only remembered it had a young girl in it), but I did find these singles covers. Yeah, Americans tend to be very insular in their tastes, so those who like metal and those who like symphonic music don’t overlap much here. A pity. I quite enjoy symphonic metal myself.