In 1980 Andy Warhol created a series of now iconic portrait paintings of Blondie’s frontwoman Deborah Harry, herself of course a living icon on her own artistic merit. The portraits were not made as a commission for a record cover. Debbie Harry bought one for […]
All posts filed under: Pop & Rock
Velvet Underground’s Scepter master tapes (and 100 bananas) at The Warhol
Last year November I received an email from Matt Gray, manager of archives at the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, with truly fantastic news: “We recently identified the master tapes to The Velvet Underground & Nico album from a large donation from Warhol’s estate. Exciting to say […]
Designer Acy R. Lehman: the cool gabriels and the peelable banana
During my visit to the archives of the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, two years ago, I noticed an interesting name on the purchase order for the cover art of the 1956 jazz album Cool Gabriels on RCA’s Groove label: A.R Lehman. To fans of […]
Elvis has never left the building
Now let’s throw some Elvises in the mix! The famous Silver Elvis paintings Andy Warhol has created in 1963 for Irving Blum’s Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles, have proven to be immensely popular for appropiation, and they still are. Also on record covers. I know, […]
Enzo Avitabile and his not so comfy chair
What makes writing this blog very rewarding, is when fellow collectors get in touch, and share their knowledge of local Warhol (or Warhol inspired) covers. Recently I got a message from Paolo Verda, an Italian architect, art and music lover, writer of prestigious books on […]
Andy Warhol was mad, David Shrigley is bananas
This post is not about an Andy Warhol design, but about a record cover done by the British artist David Shrigley that has a lot of Warhol going on. In 2012 the Californian label Castle Face released the tribute album The Velvet Underground & Nico, […]
Official Velvet Underground banana release on 7″
Over the years the iconic yellow banana Andy Warhol had created for the Velvet Underground’s debut LP, has found its way to the sleeve of several 7″ records for other bands, like Abwärts’ Sonderzug Zur Endstation, or the split single Banana Split by Hickey and […]
Billy Squier: “I asked Warhol to do the cover for my new album, and he said: ‘OK’.”
Why should I just write about the how and why of Billy Squier’s Warhol portraits on the cover of his 1982 hit album Emotions In Motion, when we can hear it from the rocker himself. This is Billy Squier in an interview on “Rolling Stone […]
I’m Talking, with Marilyn Monroe’s Lips!
With a little help from our friends, we will eventually manage to track down every Warhol cover or pastiche ever produced, worldwide. Two years ago Kevin J. Kinney, a Warhol enthousiast from Milwaukee, Wisconsin – who prefers ‘old school’ crate digging at record fairs and […]
“The Huckleberry Finn of the avant-garde”
A few months ago on eBay a copy of Walter Steding and The Dragon People’s 12″ single The Joke was for sale, accompanied by an original press promo sheet. In an earlier post I wrote about Andy Warhol’s involvement in Steding’s music carreer as a manager. […]
Four pencil drawings of Aretha Franklin
Aretha Franklin looks very regal on Warhol’s cover portrait for her album Aretha. A true Queen of Soul. I have never seen the original source picture that Warhol used for the portrait. It is probably a promotional picture delivered for this purpose by Arista records. Unlike […]
Glorious longbox suits Aretha well
When we talk about record cover art, of course in 99,99 % of the cases the very frameable 12″ LP format is meant. But once in a while also other formats deserve our attention. In Warhol’s long career as cover artist, starting as early as […]
Andy Earhole 