July 27, 2012
Born in Suffolk, England with a name like Brian Peter George St. John Le Baptiste de la Salle Eno—who would have thunk he was descended from a few generations of postmen.  However, a quick revision later and he was  forever known as Brian Eno, musician, prime innovator of ambient music, composer, record producer, and visual artist.  Yes, another art school product.  After finishing school he moved to London and spent his time experimenting with various methods of visual art.  In 1971 he met up with
Andy Mackay of Roxy Music and was invited to join their band as they needed a keyboardist but due to head butting with Bryan Ferry, the band’s front man, he parted ways with them in 1973.

There are tons of websites devoted to the man and his accomplishments.  Here’s one: http://www.enoweb.co.uk/
 
The cover I picked today is Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy).  This was Eno’s second solo album and its concept as per Wikipedia is based on a variety of topics ranging from “espionage to the Chinese Communist Revolution.”  Dark, somber and pretty depressing, it kinda freaked me out the first time I saw the cover.  The gatefold album features four lithographs from an set of 1500 unique silk screens portraits of Eno by Peter Schmidt.  The artist, a Berlin born Brit who taught at the Watford College of Art in Hertfordshire, UK, had quite an artistic collaboration with Eno and created many other works for him.  As a side note, the two developed ‘Oblique Strategies’ which was a set of 7 x 9 instruction cards used to help with production of this album.  Each card was printed with an adage or a saying to help artists (particularly musicians) break their creative blocks. It was formaly published in 1975.
 
The polaroid photos of the artwork are credited to Lorenz Zatecky and the lettering to John Bonis.

This Record:
Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy) by Brian Eno
12 LP, 33 rpm, Gatefold Sleeve
1974, Island Records

Go to www.ricsrecordsrack.com for more information. My records are in super mint condition and still available, unless specified otherwise. Email if you require a detailed description of the condition of a particular item (ricsrecordrack@yahoo.com)

June 20, 2012
Stranded is the third album by art rock band Roxy Music released in 1973.  It reached number one on the UK album charts. 
 
The sleeve was designed by expert art historian Nicholas de Ville and the cover concept was Brian Ferrys’ as was the model on the cover.  Marilyn Cole was his girlfirend at that time and the 1973 Playmate of the Year.

Go to www.ricsrecordsrack.com for more information. This Record is still
available.

Below is a picture of the album.  The video is Psalm from the album Stranded.

May 30, 2012
It's 'Sexy Wednesdays' or 'Sexy cover day' today.
Here's Roxy Music's fourth album cover released in 1974 and called "Country Life".  Photographed by Eric Boman, the cover features two scantily clad models: Constance Karoli and Eveline Grunwald.  Brian Ferry met them in Portugal and persuaded them to do the cover shoot as well as help him with the words to the song: "Bitter Sweet".  The cover was controversial in some countries special the United States, Spain and the Netherlands where it was censored before release.  As a result the American LP release featured a bunch of trees instead of the two models posing in front of the trees.

Author Michael Ochs known for his extensive collection of photos related to rock music dating as far back as the 1950s described the cover released in the US as the "most complete cover-up in rock history".
Go to www.ricsrecordrack.com for more information.