Kanye West raised a big hullabaloo over the weekend when he tweeted that the cover art for his upcoming album, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, had been banned for it’s nudity. Def Jam, his record label, suggests otherwise — Kanye was just encouraged to go in a more family-friendly direction so that stores like Wal-Mart would stock his album. In either case, the album art, though certainly suggestive, is far from the most shocking thing that has graced the record aisle. For starters, there’s the whole terrifying metal artist group to consider, as well as some cheeky pop stars with a taste for the offensive. Click through for album art that’s worthy of a Twitter kerfuffle.
1. Eric Bana, Out of Bounds
This was a shot of Bana streaking across the field during a game — a photoshopped version, sadly. The cover art was later replaced by a less, um, cheeky, picture.
2. The Beatles, Yesterday and Today
The Beatles changed their cover to a far less bloody one after the album art was banned.
3. The Black Crowes, Amorica
This one was also edited — heavily — to be sold in family-friendly CD stores. The final result was just the triangular American flag on a black background.
4. Butthole Surfers, Butthole Surfers
The original cover art for the band’s debut EP raised a stir thanks to its bizarre use of nudity.
5. Chumbawumba, Anarchy
Yes, really. And yes, definitely banned.
6. Jimi Hendrix, Electric Ladyland
The artwork for the UK version of the album apparently didn’t arrive in time, so Hendrix and friends put their noggins together and used this picture that they found. It was later changed to the US artwork, which is what you find on reissues.
7. Mayhem, Dawn of the Black Hearts
After Mayhem member Dead committed suicide, the band snapped these grotesque photos of his corpse to use as their album cover. They also collected some of the bone fragments to use as jewelry.
8. Poison, Open Up and Say…Ahh!
Poison’s second album, with this image of a demonic woman, was considered too raunchy for the general buying public, particularly parents. It was sold under a second cover, which edited out all but the model’s eyes.
9. Scorpions, Virgin Killers
Perhaps universally regarded as the most offensive album art of all time, the original cover for this album — which we’ve edited, above — showed a nude prepubescent girl with only a shattered glass spot covering her. Needless to say, this didn’t fly, and the Scorpions changed the cover art to a picture of themselves.
10. U2, Achtung Baby
Though it takes some hunting, U2’s bassist Adam Calyton is sporting some full-frontal nudity on the cover (though in the US version the offending region was x-ed out)