10 Things You Didn't Know About Famous Music Album Covers
8. Beggars Banquet - The Rolling Stones (1968)
By 1968 The Rolling Stones were known for causing controversy. Stories of drug-fulled orgies clung to them like cigarette smoke and hard booze. As a result, their label tried to avoid any further bad press, taking a pretty firm stance when it came to controversial album covers.
To give the label execs their due, the original cover for the band's ninth studio album is pretty grim. Looking akin to the establishment where Mark Renton loses his precious suppositories in Trainspotting, the picture conjures up some rough imagery. The band used a toilet in a Los Angeles Porsche dealership for the location of the shoot, and set about making it as least appealing as possible. The Stones themselves scrawled the album lyrics all over the walls, along with a reference to Bob Dylan and the line "Wot no paper!".
Because the notion of people going to the bathroom in the '60s was so unthinkable, the record label was not happy, resulting in the album release being pushed back and the use of a plain white record sleeve. Once the world was less squeamish about toilet humour, subsequent albums were released in all their grotty glory.