Top 10 Controversial Album Covers

A picture that realizes its album’s title to perfection, Pulp shrouded themselves in cover-art controversy when they released This is Hardcore! An image that leaves little to the imagination, this album art struck controversy when advertisement posters were placed around London, prompting graffiti artists to deface them with messages condemning the content of the poster. It’s all peroxide blonde, dangerous red and nearly visible nipple... With eyes as dark as the shadows that surround her, this is glamor. This is vulgar. This is Hardcore!

Depictions of Jesus Christ rarely pass us by without at least a little suspicion of blasphemy, but when The Game stain-glass windowed the deluxe edition of his fifth studio album, there was more than just a murmur along the pews! This dark-skinned Son of God appears to be going through a rebellious stage! He’s melted down the Wise Man’s gold and made a nice medallion... He dons a bandana, he’s tattooed with a teardrop, and he appears to advocate marijuana usage... Perhaps we all skipped that week at Sunday School!

A portrait of a pretty girl... If anything sounds like a safely stylish album cover choice, then it’s that. Right? Wrong! Ann Kirsten Kennis is the subject of Vampire Weekend’s Contra cover, but she wasn’t at all happy about it. A photo originally taken in 1983, the model sued the band for using the image without permission. A case that was eventually settled by an undisclosed payout in 2011, Contra proved more than a little costly for Vampire Weekend.

Eric Clapton’s Blind Faith must have been blind stupid to think they’d get away with our next entry! The supergroup’s only studio album featured on its cover a topless female youth holding a phallic-ally representative aircraft in her hands. Bob Seidemann, the producer of the picture, claimed he was going for a balance between the age of technological achievement, and the age of innocence... What he ended up with was banned from most record stores!

Death metal delights Cannibal Corpse are no stranger to the controversial album cover. We might have featured Tomb of the Mutilated here, but we’ve gone for the previous record, Butchered at Birth, instead! In terms of artwork that will raise more than a few eyebrows, this combination of blood, bones and disembowelment is a sure-fire winner. Throw into the mix the general concept of clinically morbid midwifery, and you’ve grossed out to the max! It’s an album that makes you want to wash your hands after touching it!

A controversial character throughout his career, it’s thought that Jimi Hendrix himself was displeased by this particular slice of controversy! The legendary guitarist was unhappy when the UK release of Electric Ladyland made the news for the nudes, rather than the music! Against a black background, 19 naked female models were photographed in a quite unflattering way in an apparent attempt to realize Jimi’s Ladyland idea. It didn’t especially work, but it won’t be forgotten!

The golden boys of British music, even the ‘Fab Four’ found themselves some album cover controversy along the way! The ‘Butcher Baby’ image from their 1966 Yesterday and Today album is as iconic as anything else that Beatlemania has thrown up! A smilingly sadistic picture, the original album sleeves were quickly recalled upon release, and some were pasted over with a more conventional promotional image. Thus began a frenzy for ‘first’, ‘second’ or ‘third state’ covers! An original, un-pasted ‘Butcher cover’ record is now worth thousands!

An album title that doesn’t exactly inspire positive thoughts, the image to accompany this bootleg live Mayhem record, and the story that surrounds it, surpasses even the most somber expectations. The cover shows Mayhem’s lead singer, a man known as ‘Dead’, moments after his horrific suicide. Found by fellow band member ‘Euronymous’, the scene was arranged by the latter so as to make a better picture, photographed, and included on the album... Dead’s note simply read, ‘Excuse all the blood’... Black metal doesn’t get any blacker than this!

A graphic representation of death is followed by a graphic representation of life. John Lennon and Yoko Ono would become infamously exhibitionist, but their Two Virgins album cover was one of their first high-profile forays into full-frontal-dom! An image taken by the couple themselves on a time-delay camera, the voyeuristic shot was deemed way too explicit for record store shelves. Brown paper bags were used to preserve decency and save blushes, as this cover art was promptly covered up!

Before we unveil our top pick, here are a few honorable mentions.
- “Is This It” (2001)
The Strokes
- “Nine Lives” (1997)
Aerosmith
- “Christ Illusion” (2006)
Slayer
- “Amorica” (1994)
The Black Crowes
- “Sonic Jihad” (2003)
Paris

We’ve had death. We’ve had nudity. We’ve had youthful innocence. The most controversial of our crop is a highly questionable combination of all three! The cover for “Virgin Killer” is as aggressive and offensive as its title demands. Featuring a naked, prepubescent girl with her genitalia minimally obscured by a shattered glass effect, it’s an image that shocks you every time you see it! An album cover extreme enough to have been previously blocked for use on Wikipedia, it’s gotten more offensive with time. The only thing that might not raise eyebrows is its topping today’s countdown!

Do you agree with our list? Which album cover do you think is most controversial? For more shocking top 10s published daily, be sure to subscribe to WatchMojo.com.