Cover of the Week: Satanic Majesties Request
Hereby (is that the right word?) begins an occasional series that aims to celebrate, applaud or simply take the piss out of album covers from the psychedelic and prog era. First up for this admittedly dubious honour are The Rolling Stones and the album cover of 1968′s Their Satanic Majesties Request.
What can you say?
Michael, dear boy, what the devil had you, Keith, Brian, Bill and Charlie been smoking to think you might get away with this? The album may be great (despite the critical mauling it received) but the cover?
Despite roping in the same photographer as used on The Beatles’ more iconic cover, this ain’t no Sgt. Pepper.
It just goes to show what happens when you not only let the band design the album cover but also feed them a blotter pad’s worth of industrial-strength acid beforehand. Where can you possibly start in describing the sheer badness of this, and more importantly, is Mick wearing that hat for a bet? It’s difficult to say what was going through the Rolling Stones’ minds, what they thought they might be dressed as, or if they even knew where they were.
I suppose it does exude a certain charm, possibly summing up the naive foolishness of the flower-power generation in a way words could never muster.
What is certain though is that raiding the local infant’s dressing-up box and stealing the sets for their next school play is neither big, clever, nor the smooth road to a ridicule-free existence.
The cover of Their Satanic Majesties Request can be seen as a textbook example in how to make one’s self look like a prize berk.
The rather excellent contents of this album cover will be reviewed on Head Full of Snow within the fortnight.
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Ludicrous but likeable – and those Alice in Wonderland Colours! The heads/torsos seem almost to have something of a ‘pasted on’ quality? Focus isn’t too sharp (could be me and not the picture), but Jagger seems to be prefiguring the Gary Moore ‘gloomy pout’!
(things you might not know dept.:- the Comsat Angels covered the track ‘Citadel’)
Don’t recall too many musical offerings critical of Flower Power etc. at the time (Bonzo Dogs took the piss and Zappa must’ve recorded some funny/satirical stuff I’m sure), but The Nice’s ‘Flower King of Flies’ had that theme….
….On one of my favourite albums of all time – & worthy of inclusion on HFoS one day? The Nice’s ‘Thoughts of Emerlist Davjack’ was Keith Emerson et al’s 1st major offering to a waiting world, and established him to this day as the ‘Jimmy Smith’ supremo of rock keyboards.
‘….Emerlist Davjack’ was a hugely atmospheric record (a ghost drags itself through the studio at the start of ‘Dawn’) that brought Emerson’s ballsy yet classically learned Hammmond L100 organ pyrotechnics into the national spotlight; it had the non-virtuosic but always wonderfully apposite Davy O’List (formerly of The Attack) on guitar – his huge great arc of sound a few minutes into the track ‘Rondo’ is one of the timeless joys of recorded electric guitar – as are his brilliant ‘violin-type’ parts on ‘The Cry of Eugene’ – just a sheer joy to listen to.
(on various later compilation/re-issue liner notes O’List seems almost to have been written out of ‘The Nice’s history following his early departure from the group – but he does appear also on the ‘BBC Radio Sessions’ CD, and on a similar ‘In Europe Live’ CD).
A great, storming, groundbreaking album then – one of my favourite half-dozen prog lp’s of all time, I think (Gentle Giant’s ‘Three Friends’ is in there somewhere too). The group gained headlines with their on-stage flag-burning and knife throwing, but really the music said it all – powerhouse drumming from Blinky Davison and huge, chunky, Vox Peardrop bass & vocals from Lee Jackson.
I saw The Nice in 1968 (? – I was definitely there in the sixties, precisely because I DON’T remember!) as part of a huge, unwieldy, Hendrix package tour at the Royal Albert Hall, together with The Move, Amen Corner, The Herd, Eire Apparent, and Pink Floyd. The price? ….an unbelievable 21 shillings & sixpence!
We really were spoilt rotten………Party In The Park, curl up in shame…..
I must admit I think ‘Flower King of Flies’ is the only Nice tune I have, on an old psych compilation somewhere, though their backcatalog has recently been reissued and expanded, so I’ll have to stock up. I’ve just ordered ‘Emerlist Davjack’ (£5.28 from Amazon) on your recommendation, so there’s every chance it’ll be making an appearance on these pages in the near future.
I seem to recall reading somewhere that Zappa’s ‘We’re Only in it for the Money’ album was a direct response to Country Joe and the Fish’s ‘Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin-To-Die’, parodying the over-sincerity of Joe and others on the San Francisco psych scene of the time. As for others, I think maybe The Move’s ‘Vote For Me’ and ‘Flowers in the Rain’ were also taking the piss.
As for that line-up, has to be the bargain of a lifetime. Certainly not one to be repeated in these sour times.
Thanks for bringing your valuable perspective to the proceedings, Martin.