Our Countdown Of The Coolest Album Covers Ever

12. London Calling by The Clash

Designer: Pennie Smith/Ray Lowry

It remains a fact of rock ‘n’ roll that there is nothing cooler than a) smashing your guitar, b) being able to afford to smash your guitar or best of all c) not being able to afford to smash your guitar but doing it anyway. The Clash went one better by d) smashing a bass. That thing weighs a lot. Pennie Smith’s shot captured that essential sense of abandonment and loss of control, and Lowry’s design, paying homage to the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll, Elvis’s self-titled album, hammered home the point further. Often imitated, never bettered.

11. Tutu by Miles Davis

Designer: Eiko Ishioka/Irving Penn

Miles Davis was, of course, a true musical pioneer: a multi-faceted performer and songwriter, and capable of alternating between subtle beauty and extroverted flamboyance. But this superb cover image captures the man behind the music simply, and starkly. Unbelievably cool.

What band is next? The hint is, there is a female singer…