Most album covers are representational. No matter how odd they might be (and there’s plenty of odd stuff in this blog), they are very rarely abstract. And that’s why I like this one.
Now, it’s not totally abstract, of course. But it is rather hard to tell exactly what’s going on here.
The artists include band front man Thom Yorke, along with artist Stanley Donwood (AKA Dan Rickwood). The two met at Exeter University, where they both studied art. Donwood actually has designed all of Radiohead’s stuff (often with help from Yorke), and is considered by some to the band’s “sixth man.”
What was Donwood trying to accomplish here? I’ll let him speak for himself: “At the time I was consumed with thoughts of nuclear winter, denuded trees, dust-filled empty highways and houses with no glass left in the windows and no life left in the rooms. White was the colour of death and no mistakes could be erased; only covered up; only concealed, rather ineptly. Only hidden, but badly. If I had known then what I know now I probably wouldn't have bothered to get up in the morning. The last twenty years have been quite horrific; the fiendish aggression of the Twentieth Century bleeding into the new millennium with a vengeance.”
Whoa! Well, one thing I always did like about the band was its pessimistic and very non-commercial outlook. But really?
The album is indeed a downer. Incredible music, but a very bleak look at our modern world.
As for that music, the band is surprising popular for a group that has produced some pretty avant-garde stuff. In fact, they often remind me of some of my favorite contemporary classic composers – Crumb, Riley, Penderecki, et al. That said, there is also some stuff of theirs that is definitely a struggle, even for me. Of course, they then go and mix it up with some hard rockers like “Electioneering” and sweet ballads like “In Rainbows.”
Here are some more Donwood album covers I particularly like:
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