Vinyl Records with Similar Album Art - Who Copied Who? | Vinyl Rewind 

With the Cash and Dylan albums, that was a record company decision; they both recorded for Columbia Records, both worked with the same producer at the time (Bob Johnston), plus it was likely a popular album design, because Dylan had a similar cover for his Greatest Hits Vol. 2.

One of my favorites is the Stones doing the cover of Their Satanic Majesties Request with the exact same photographer who did the Sgt. Pepper photoshoot a few months after it came out. Of course the albums are very different musically, but still they made an obvious choice to make their cover so similar to the Beatles lol

Have you ever done a full-on showcase video for your collection? That would be awesome!

In the "tribute" category, I always loved Soul Asylum's EP "Clam Dip & Other Delights" a parody of the "Whipped Cream & Other Delights" cover. The title is also a reference to "clams" which are mistakes made while playing an instrument.

I have always heard that The Beach Boys really liked Jan and Dean and did a lot to help them in their career. I don't remember ever hearing anything about these covers. I can't imagine that The Beach Boys didn't know about the similarities. Maybe they didn't mind... Or were paid... Neither cover seems to be really "artistic." I'm guessing they were probably both designed by (or for) the record company. Very interesting. I'd like to look into this more when I have time. Thank you

Easy Listening LPs are a gold mine for these things. I'm pretty sure you'll find a lot with the Tijuana Brass clones. Have you thought of doing a video of your top 10 album art?

St Peppers v We're Only in it for the Money by the Mothers !

Would be interesting to know if any of the similar albums were on the same record label. Back in the day, before artists had a real say in what their album art looked like, the art was determined by the art dept of the record label. So maybe the same designer designed them both because he was in the stable of the record company's art dept.

I literally had London Calling in my hand when noticing this video. Well done.

Awesome Idea

I have a book called "Album Cover Album" that gives a history of album cover art, and I noticed a few of these because of how the album covers were grouped according to genre and style. Sometimes the book grouped similar covers together to highlight the effect. Sometimes the book's editors had trouble figuring out which covers to include because so many were similar.

That was enjoyable. If you consider doing a sequel or part II... I was waiting for Dylan's Desire and the John Phillips solo album. If you don't have both, google 'em.

I love your videos. I watch them all every time a new video comes out. I love your content

Cool video! Excellent subject and you're right that was very fun - some of those covers are so close!

This video is so well done and well thought out for the comparison with Bob Dylan I'd also thrown Gustavo Cerati - Bocanada into mix with it being a sort of similar looking cover design as well. Keep up the good work love watching these videos!

Another great informative and entertaining vid. Well done.

Glad you got around to making this one!

love these kind of videos!!

Bob Dylan's Desire definitely nicked the cover art from John Phillips' Wolfking of LA album. Guitarists Rick Derringer and Trevor Rabin both issued solo albums in 1979. Both were called Face to Face and donned eerily similar cover art as well.

Like you said a couple of those are just the style of the times basically. But yes I have seen PLENTY of similar album art. I love your channel, dude. So informative. Keep ut the good work!

This was a great concept for a video. I like this kind of content.

One I found puzzling was Jay Ferguson's Thunder Island cover being reworked by ELP's Love Beach album. I figured ELP was totally out of ideas since it was the last studio album of theirs.

You should do more quick, fun and interesting videos like this! This was great. I’m sure you could find even more examples for a second part.

Love your videos. Peace, brother.

I literally just listened to all summer long about 15 minutes before watching this video

Your content is top tier man

You have no idea how much we love Marty Robbins in my household 🥰

Very cool stuff eric

One that immediately stuck out for me was the 1998 album _Big Calm_ by Morcheeba. That sleeve was inspired by the 1966 Ray Conniff compilation _Hi Fi Companion._

You remind me of a Supply Officer I had in the navy used to play college football for them. Nicest guy you’ll ever meet.

After Beatles '65 was released in the US, various artists started titling their records similarly, mainly older artists like Frank Sinatra and Duke Ellington. All of a sudden there was "Sinatra '65" and "Ellington '65."

Hey wait. Those 3 Beatles vinyls on the wall. I recognize those from Matt Williamson's Pop Goes the 60s RU-vid channel. Those were 3 whatif albums he created!

There is an interesting video I saw somewhere once about how a ton of old record of singer songwriters had album covers of them sitting in the same chair. It’s like a peacock rattan or wicker high back chair. Really astonishing how many albums have it

There is a japanese band called Color Filter that has an album called Blueberry and it's pretty similar to Simon & Garfunkel's Sounds of Silence album cover.

Imagine being Marty Robbins, and just happening upon that Rex Wells record in the wild. It would be like an out of body experience or something.

Think it might be cool to explore trends in album covers for psychedelic rock. Particularly those that were "dipping their toes" into the genre. (Monkees's 'Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn, & Jones Ltd.' etc.)

What do you think about the cover of Meet The Residents? Would that fall under parody?

Fun video. Thanks.

That Rex Wells album was my first record album (i was six). Use to play it all day long. There's a song listed on the front "Barney and Clyde" which is Bonnie Parker's poem set to music.

What copy cat album covers are you found?

The Beetles and the Stones did on an early album a shot of them looking down at the camera. One was Out Of Our heads for the Stones looking down off some stairs and the other was Meet the Beetles or With the Beetles, the famous hotel look down. Both had the groups looking down different but similar in that they had the band looking down.

@ 7:38 - Check out "Bo Diddley Is A Gunslinger" cover from December 1960.

Queen's "News of the World" is based off of an issue of Astounding Science Fiction (October 1953)

Eric that was a fun video I never put 2an2 together on some of those album’s

Please do something on The Moody Blues. I don’t know what but I would love if you did. Great work!

This kind of record talk is close to my heart. Discoveries like these similarities keep our collections going. One great example is Elvis’ Christmas Album (red themed with wrapped gifts) from 1957 which is the same design and layout as Mario Lanza’s Christmas album of the previous year. The difference? His is grey. I love that. Perry Como’s Golden Records and Elvis’ Gold records volume 3 and 4 are also very similar.

Ironic that Dean Torrence (of Jan & Dean) became or perhaps already was a graphic designer and won awards for his album covers.

talking about Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits, Gustavo Cerati (famous Argentinian rock star) paid homage to it on his second album Bocanada:)

Album covers are the youtube thumbnails of the music world, when something works everyone does it! Also I would mention that on that Jan and Dean album I am pretty sure Brian Wilson has some songwriting/producer credits, so the influence of the Beach Boys runs deep.

There's the late 60s period where the Beatles put out albums and then the Stones albums were in the same vein. Sgt Peppers/Satanic Majesties then White Album/Beggars Banquet

You should also do a one with album cover homages. Though most of the video would be Whipped Cream and Other Delights

great video

I haven't really noticed this in my own collection but maybe I should look more. I've noticed it while going through discogs and other sites for ideas for albums to listen to tho. like for instance there are SO MANY british/european prog rock albums that have similar looking paintings of grotesque looking faces on them, lol. Maybe I should put together a digital collection of them sometime, lol.

Marty Robbins' outfit and pose seem to be based on the character of Palladin from the show "Have Gun, Will Travel" which was popular at the time.

I grew up listening to that Marty Robbins album Cheers Dad RIP.

3:22 I'm going to guess and say that the record company is the copycat in this one. Guy Lombardo first came to fame in the 1920s, doing charleston and foxtrot and danceable jazz and was advertised as having a 'Sweet' sound for decades (as opposed to what might then have been called 'hot' jazz). Most of Lombardo's highest selling recordings were 78 speed singles, made long before the two albums you're holding up and most of the Guy Lombardo sold in LP format from the 50s on were compilation albums of Lombardo's most popular songs. I would guess that whatever record company happened to produce the Three Suns likely saw these compilations and decided that they were in the same ballpark of music and tried to capitalize on it.

This is genius idea, love it

Elvis Presley released a whole bunch of albums with almost identical covers, with a photo of him on stage wearing white overalls and with a black background. One is called "I got lucky" another is called "Raised on Rock" and then we have "Elvis Now", "Elvis", "Today", " From Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee" and "Promised Land". All those covers are almost identical. My guess is that Elvis didn't care about the covers and just told RCA to put a cool picture of him on the cover.

Double Fantasy and Press To Play have a similar look I think.

I love the content

Very interesting!

We're only in it for the money and the Rutles cover. Two of my favs.

You should see Peggy March & Bennie Thomas "In Our Fashion" and Skeeter Davis & Bobby Bare "Tunes For Two". Both released in the same year and on the same record label being RCA Victor.

Check out the album "Freedom Wind" by the Explorers Club. You'll be delightfully surprised.

I found both Gunfighter albums on youtube. Did Rex Wells copy the music as well as the cover? The Marty Robbins album is available in a digital version. It's very well produced with gentle acoustic guitars and superb vocal arrangements. Thank you for making me aware of it. Rex Wells' album is gentle and tasteful too. The youtube version is ripped from an old LP, so it sounds more muffled/vintage than the digital version of Robbins' album. Side 2 sounds quite different, less tasteful and more generic country. Found this information: "There is no such artist as Rex Wells, the songs on this album are done by Tompall & The Glaser Brothers on Side 1 and The Willis Brothers on Side 2. A knockoff of "Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs" by Marty Robbins, later reissued on the Modern Records label under "Billy The Kid - Gunfighter Ballads" 1962". Actually Tompall & the Glacer Brothers did the superb backing vocals and wrote one of the songs on Robbins' album! And seems they partcipated on his next album too. I guess there's much more to the story. Could you recommend other albums in this genre?

The Mothers of Invention's "We're Only In It For the Money" & The Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper"

Only example I have to share is from the CD world (sorry, know this is a vinyl chan), Rush Retrospective II 1981-1987, and The Best of the Thompson Twins Greatest Mixes, wonder if the same person designed the covers

I don’t know if you’ve watched Brandon Herrera’s gun meme review but the Marty Robins memes are great.

@VinylRewind Are you planning on doing a Revolver box set review or unwrapping?

There was a CD of an artist called El Pulpo in local shop. With parody of AC/DC's Stiff upper lip cover. Just didn't buy it, because thought it was too expensive just for funny cover

Please do another video if you come across more!

Check out Nick Lowe, Jesus of Cool/Pure Pop For Now People, then Julie London, Calendar Girl, then David Whitfield, From David with Love. I think that trio trumps them all.

Had to click on this! 💥

Leonard Cohen - Death Of A Ladies Man & Mike Randle ( From Love ❤️) My Music Loves You.

My favorite is the Allan Sherman record where he's covered in spaghetti! Mocking the Herb Alpert " Whipped Cream" cover.

sgt pepper and satanic magesties request? White Album and Begger's Banquet?

Wait until you discover all the albums that basically has the same chair!

I have many records but I haven't noticed this, so a pretty cool video. But I don't think the lounge records count lol.

One you should add for next time is the self titled album by the band Free wih the latest album by Lorde. You may have to use strtegically placed stick on notes to show the covers though.

Lorde’s Solar Power cover is a very similar idea to Free’s self titled album from 1969.

The debuts for The Doors and The Stooges are pretty similar. Definitely my favorite 🎃

Meet The Beatles - Meet The Residents The cover allegedly drew the attention of Capitol Records, who threatened legal action if the cover were not changed. In response, the Residents pressed a stereo edit of the album with new artwork, presenting the original "crawfish" photo on the front (although the original defaced cover is still printed in the back, although in smaller size). It is unknown if the threat of legal action from Capitol was actually real, given that all subsequent re-releases of the album have again featured the original 1974 artwork. WIKI

Tangerine Dream by Kaleidoscope(1967) looks strikingly similar to Rubber Soul by the Beatles(1965)

What about a video discussing all those circa 1964 low budget knockoff albums of the Beatles with names like The Liverpools, The Bedbugs, The Beetles etc. etc.?

I'm kind of new to vinyl collecting, I started seriously beginning of this year. I went from 80-something and a Cruiser to 250ish and an LP-120 with Klicpsh "The Fives'" with a Tube pre-amp. I'm a big Beatles fan and while I have watched a few (as far as I know, you only mention owning the mono in The White Album video) of your UK vs. US videos you seem to be holding mostly stereo versions. I wonder what your school of thought is on the mono versions? I didn't go too crazy on the US versions unless someone gifted them to me or I found them for cheap. I just jumped in for the UK mono stuff for their earlier LPs. I have Please, Please, Me, A Hard Days Night, Beatles for Sale, and HELP! in mono. Yet, I really LOVE the stereo UK of The White Album and wondering if I should try to get Sgt. Pepper's in mono or not. (sorry I know off topic but this is your latest video.)

People forget music is a business. The industry wants to make profit, and will do what ever it to takes to get your money.

Is that the Jan and Dean album the Beach Boys wrote songs for? I think they wrote and played on Little Old Lady from Pasadena.

The rip off of the Marty Robbins album cover just cracked me up! Was Crown one of those labels that were always on sale at supermarkets (like Tops)? I have a copy of Voodoo by Robert Drasnin on Tops. By the way, what brand of integrated amp is that? It looks like a Wavelength Audio (because of the oval badge on the front).

Looking quickly at the `Soft and Sweet` covers I'd say they used the same model.

Hey Eric I hope all is well

Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits Volume 2, too.

here's a good one! mc solaar - qui sème le vent récolte le tempo (1991) vs menelik - O.Q.P. (2000)

Pawn Hearts (Van Derr Graaf Generator) and The Game (The Bay City Rollers)

My favorite is how Bob Dylan's first self-titled album was copied by Glen Campbell's "Gentle On My Mind." Campbell covered Dylan a few times during the mid- and late- 60s. The back of the "Gentle On My Mind" album cover has this essay about how Campbell is a "song-poet." I think that was a very blatant effort to cash in on Dylan's appeal.

Definitely no album art copying going on, but Fleetwood Mac's first album with the Buckingham Nicks lineup ( actual title: Fleetwood Mac) is often referred to as the Fleetwood Mac white album, which of course is a reference to the album actually titled The Beatles, but commonly known as The White Album.

We’re only in it for the money is a direct parody of sgt. peppers

Two albums that I can think about with almost the same album covers is John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band and Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band. Though they really don't count since they're companion albums. I love the music on both, but if you're getting a copy of the one made by John ('cause Yoko's album is experimental rock and you might not like it), you have to look at the back cover to really see the difference.

Probably one of my favorite tributes is Kamikaze by Eminem’s tribute to License To ill by beastie boys. He’s paying tribute to some of the founding fathers of hip hop.

Just think the up set when some opens a gift present to find the wrong record. With the reply by person who gifted it to you - You told me to buy you Gunfighter Ballads you even told me it's the one with the cowboy in black with the red cover?

6:33 You're woefully wrong about Jan and Dean. If anyone copied anyone at the beginning it's the beach boys copying Jan and Dean...who'd been around for years before the beach boys. 👍