Classic Album, FUCKING TERRIBLE Cover Art

lol at first glance i thought the hype sticker at bottom left was yet another dubious 90s graphic design decision

The Stevie covers are great. Superunknown is fine, a bit generic and of its time, but not grievously bad by any means.

That FSOL cover is ghastly.

the lifeforms cover is amazing so i guess they had to immediately counter it

Tbf Stevie couldn’t actually see his cover art so at least he has an excuse.

I’d like to nominate Frank Ocean - Channel Orange, deserves a better cover than orange with some text.

i love that FSOL cover.

I dunno even the shitty art made pre-personal computers was better than a lot of the generic shit that’s popped up since. Feel like there was a period where everybody’s album cover looked like a handbill for a shitty tropical house club or something. Nb: I’m probably full of shit

agree, mark e… see even the early crude digital art was better

it's the intense over saturated colours that i love.
yeah, it is dated, but i care not (see the shamens covers from this period for some seriously dated coverart !).
i just think that the whole cd booklet suited the album brilliantly.

My recollection is that in the late 1990s there was an abrupt leap in the sophistication of CGI / early PhotoShop album art. There was the "we can do CGI" pre-modern era, with grey aliens holding a spliff / robots dancing / bees flying over a fractal landscape etc:
https://i.discogs.com/kCk40WSmGccEVa_znPsW8HonMZVq33q7OXz2lzRKYQ4/rs:fit/g:sm/q:90/h:590/w:600/czM6Ly9kaXNjb2dz/LWRhdGFiYXNlLWlt/YWdlcy9SLTExNzA4/NS0xNTc1NjIyNTUw/LTg1MjIuanBlZw.jpeg

Then there was the modernist Buggy G Riphead stuff, which was better-executed but conceptually still in love with novelty. And then there was the post-modern Tomato / Designer's Republic stuff, which felt a lot more sophisticated:
https://i.discogs.com/thHFxphlLVWsiKEjsFGh-Y6VlCJUZ7ixCu-m49hiEoE/rs:fit/g:sm/q:90/h:595/w:600/czM6Ly9kaXNjb2dz/LWRhdGFiYXNlLWlt/YWdlcy9SLTIzMjE0/LTExNzkzMTMyNjIu/anBlZw.jpeg

I picked those two examples because that compilation series spanned the three eras. FSOL's graphic language circa Dead Cities is odd - the visuals for "We Have Explosive" came from Run Wrake's Jukebox, which was edited into the video for the single:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MwPys3JQZ74

As a consequence it doesn't look like the rest of the album. In my opinion it has aged better.