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    Historical Survey of Rock Album Art (PICTURES, COOL STUFF TO SEE)

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    • Monkey King
      Monkey King
      last edited by
      Monkey King
      spiral
      Monkey King
      spiral

      So some of you might recall me doing a big project on RYM where I went through rock history and reviewed lots of albums year by year.
      Well it's still ongoing! And what a journey it's been, with still so much ground to cover. I have for the moment largely completed my first go through on 1967 through 2004. With 20 albums listened to per year and reviewed and ranked.

      But anyway, RYM (Rate Your Music) has a feature for when you make lists, as I have for each year roughly between 1967 and 2004 and onward.
      One of the features you get to have is picking a picture for the list header, and an option you have for that is to pick one of the album sleeve arts from your list.
      When you pick that option RYM takes you to a selection screen where it shows all the cover arts lined up, you click on whichever you want.

      But what REALLY is cool about this? Is that you get to get a great collected look at a bunch of the art of each year (for my lists) lined up gallery like.
      And in looking at these sexy sites, I couldn't help but notice many interesting patterns and so on! Trends, dominating colors, dominating graphic design concepts etc. It's really cool!
      And this is even statistically sound to! I picked the 20 albums I did for each year not on any art basis at all, so it's truly a random sample in that regard. (aside from the lack of Metal of course)

      So without further ado!

      1967

      ! 1968
      ! 1969
      ! 1970
      ! 1971
      ! 1972
      ! 1973
      ! 1974
      ! 1975
      ! 1976

      ! 1977
      ! 1978
      ! 1979
      ! 1980
      ! 1981
      ! 1982
      ! 1983
      ! 1984
      ! 1985
      ! 1986
      ! 1987
      ! 1988
      ! 1989
      ! 1990
      ! 1991
      ! 1992
      ! 1993
      ! 1994
      ! 1995
      ! 1996
      ! 1997
      ! 1998
      ! 1999
      ! 2000
      ! 2001
      ! 2002
      ! 2003
      ! 2004
      !

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      • J
        JourneybyTrain
        last edited by
        J
        spiral
        JourneybyTrain
        spiral

        This was nice to look through, good to see In the Flat Fields, always been one of my favorite album covers. Are you doing the top 20 on the yearly charts or what?

        Monkey King 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • Monkey King
          Monkey King @JourneybyTrain
          @JourneybyTrain last edited by
          Monkey King
          spiral
          Monkey King
          spiral

          @JourneybyTrain:

          This was nice to look through, good to see In the Flat Fields, always been one of my favorite album covers. Are you doing the top 20 on the yearly charts or what?

          Hell no lol. Especially not for the recent years (RYM has very reactionary taste I've noticed once things get too modern).
          It's a long combination of research of lots of sources, and attempting to cast a wide net. I've searched the charts sometimes when I needed filler.

          J Pochipochi 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • J
            JourneybyTrain @Monkey King
            @Monkey King last edited by
            J
            spiral
            JourneybyTrain
            spiral

            @Monkey:

            Hell no lol. Especially not for the recent years (RYM has very reactionary taste I've noticed once things get too modern).
            It's a long combination of research of lots of sources, and attempting to cast a wide net. I've searched the charts sometimes when I needed filler.

            Agreed, though it's nice to find obscure film noir and random jangle pop albums.

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            • J
              Jewelery Bonney
              last edited by
              J
              spiral
              Jewelery Bonney
              spiral

              Sweet as hell.
              '82 and '83 are my favourite because Bad Brains are in there! They are unreal, hardcore punk at it's finest.

              Monkey King 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • Pochipochi
                Pochipochi @Monkey King
                @Monkey King last edited by
                Pochipochi
                spiral
                Pochipochi
                spiral

                @Monkey:

                Hell no lol. Especially not for the recent years (RYM has very reactionary taste I've noticed once things get too modern)

                RYM's 2010+ chart is just the 8.0+ tracks on the blogosphere realm best new music says pitchfork media. like there's good stuff there but it's really obvious that the internet age is overwhelming and scary and the same few community of editors is influencing who is listening to what based on the same blogs they cover taste from

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                • Monkey King
                  Monkey King @Jewelery Bonney
                  @Jewelery Bonney last edited by
                  Monkey King
                  spiral
                  Monkey King
                  spiral

                  @Jewelery:

                  Sweet as hell.
                  '82 and '83 are my favourite because Bad Brains are in there! They are unreal, hardcore punk at it's finest.

                  lol im trying to focus on the cover art itt!!

                  my fave is 84', 00' is cool too

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                  • C
                    Chicken
                    last edited by
                    C
                    spiral
                    Chicken
                    spiral

                    I've always wondered why DFA1979's elephant trunk covers are so memorable.

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                    • Pochipochi
                      Pochipochi
                      last edited by
                      Pochipochi
                      spiral
                      Pochipochi
                      spiral

                      i do think it's funny how at least three albums in every decade have like the exact same shape composition

                      Monkey King 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • Monkey King
                        Monkey King @Pochipochi
                        @Pochipochi last edited by
                        Monkey King
                        spiral
                        Monkey King
                        spiral

                        @Holy:

                        i do think it's funny how at least three albums in every decade have like the exact same shape composition

                        lol yeah
                        When I used to have Kiss's debut in 74' it was apparent that having "our faces in black looming out at people" was a thing then

                        I'm really pumped to see how the patterns hold up with cycle 2's 20 records per year added on.

                        –- Update From New Post Merge ---

                        this lines up with my theory of the Boomer glory years being dominated by rustic/rural sounds, and the late 70's/early 80's stuff lining up with the emergence of urban rock sounds

                        earth tones earth tones earth tones with like 69-72 especially
                        then lots of neons and industrial blacks and whites 77-82

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                        • Cyan D. Funk
                          Cyan D. Funk
                          last edited by
                          Cyan D. Funk
                          spiral
                          Cyan D. Funk
                          spiral

                          the best part about this is that the album is actually really really good

                          –- Update From New Post Merge ---

                          no srsly though, by the looks of things by the time of the new millenium it looks like few bands decided that a simple design with like 2-3 colors on a single color background was good enough

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