I don’t know that this makes it on a lot of best album cover lists. It’s always been on of my favorites though.
I’m a huge history buff, and I just thought this cover did a wonderful job capturing the past – the Gothic lettering, the little pipes to either side of that, the sepia, that incredible pic.
That last bit kind of reminds me of those dress-up photo booths at amusement parks with an ol’ timey or Wild West theme. Stephen Stills and David Crosby are absolutely perfect. The haircut on the guy on the right though (Dallas Taylor, the drummer), is definitely a little too 20th Century for me though.
The artist was Gary Burden, who also did CSN’s first album, as well stuff for the Mamas and the Papas, Steppenwolf, the Eagles, America, and many more.
The photographer was Tom O'Neal, who was then known as Tom Gundelfinger (can't imagine why he changed it).
He's got only 11 album credits to his name, with most of them being lame-o shots of John Denver. He did do a cool one of John Phillips though:
The location was David Crosby’s back yard. Hard to believe, but the tree is still there.
The idea was all Stephen Stills’. A native Southerner, he was a big Civil War buff. He actually had O’Neal take the photo using an old wooden box camera with a with a glass plate negative. The band had to hold their poses for a full 2 minutes. The dog just wandered in from nowhere, becoming immortal in the process.
Not a bad album at all. “Teach Your Children,” “Woodstock,” ”Our House” … I'm pretty sure there’s a copy of it up in my attic somewhere.
Probably the best super group of all time. No other really great album covers though. This is probably my fave (tho really rather tame):
It does convey an excellent feel for their trademark classic harmonies though.
Hey, here are our first parodies:
No comments:
Post a Comment