Think back to the covers of the Animorphs book series, and you’ll know exactly what we’re talking about here. You know, that mid-transformation stage where the kid is halfway to becoming a rat.
Here are three album covers that give off the same type of energy as the grim-visaged animal children who haunted our middle school dreams.
‘Diamond Dogs’ by David Bowie
David Bowie’s eighth album, Diamond Dogs, was released in May 1974, and the album art is still as striking today as it was back then. On first glance, it looks innocuous enough: Like Bowie is just lounging naked on the floor. But the full spread album cover reveals Bowie as a half-man, half-dog creature.
Belgian artist Guy Peellaert painted the spread based on a photograph by Terry O’Neil. The dog body was based on a Great Dane that Bowie brought to the photo session. Peellaert later said he didn’t originally intend to paint the cover art, but found the concept “so interesting I couldn’t resist,” as quoted in a 2010 book on Bowie’s London years.
Initially, the cover garnered controversy, as the original painting included an anatomically correct dog body. RCA Records airbrushed out the genitalia, but several uncensored versions of the album managed to find their way onto shelves.
The original painting was restored for the album’s 1990 re-release, but for a while, the uncensored Diamond Dogs was one of the most expensive records of all time.
‘Born This Way’ by Lady Gaga
Lady Gaga released Born This Way in May 2011 with an album cover that didn’t initially inspire a lot of positive reactions from fans and critics. Or any positive reactions, actually.
In theory, Gaga represented as a half-woman, half-motorcycle like a Transformer in mid-configuration seemed pretty cool. But in practice, many people found it looked “like a cheap Photoshop job,” as quoted in The Guardian.
Fans took to Gaga’s official forums to vent their frustrations with the cover art, which was photographed and designed by Nick Knight. But Lady Gaga had previously expressed her vision behind the polarizing art. “The cover with me half-female, half-motorcycle is meant to be or [is] symbolic of the fact that I’m endlessly always changing in so [many] transformative ways,” she explained at the time.
Years later, the Born This Way album cover still looks cheesy and dated. But, with the distance of time, fans have since looked back on it fondly.
‘Weathered’ by Creed
Creed’s Weathered was released in November 2001, and for an album representing the band’s darkest time, they sure picked a goofy album cover. Daniel Tremonti, brother of guitarist Mark, designed all of the band’s past cover art, and Weathered was no different.
The artwork features a tree carved with the faces of Scott Stapp, Mark Tremonti, and Scott Phillips, chiseled by an unseen man. Only his arms are visible as he wields his tools.
All the critics who thought Born This Way looked like cheap Photoshop must have missed Weathered. Still, it was 2001, so we’ll cut them some slack. More impressively, Creed incorporated their album artwork into an interactive online game called Creed Quest.
Using the art from Weathered and Human Clay, Daniel Tremonti’s design firm launched the game in 2002. It included trivia questions, scavenger-hunt-style games, and mysteries designed around weekly short stories. Clues could be found in album artwork, lyrics, and visuals.
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