The girl on that Scorpions cover is Lana Topham – who is now more gainfully employed as Pink Floyd’s archivist!
How do you tell the difference?
This is what the artist said of the cover:
I could not get my hands on the image until out of the mist a concept began to emerge. To symbolize the achievement of human creativity and its expression through technology a spaceship was the material object. To carry this new spore into the universe, innocence would be the ideal bearer, a young girl, a girl as young as Shakespeare’s Juliet. The spaceship would be the fruit of the tree of knowledge and the girl, the fruit of the tree of life.
It is hard to split the difference I agree. As for what he said doesn’t really matter imo. People can and will say anything to justify something that offends others.
Sorry forgot to mention (again) I actually don’t blame the artist it’s the responsibility of the record company. They should’ve have approved it.
Interesting. So do you think that Mary Whitehouse was right in her assertions?
I’m not that familiar with what she said (although I have heard of her) and tbh I don’t normally use other folk as my moral compass.
Question, would you be happy if it was your 11 year old daughter.
The other thing rock and roll doesn’t necessarily have a great track record when it comes to gender equality, it’s exploration of women in the industry is legendary and I for one wouldn’t believe anything they say re it’s “artistic” merit.
This is the thread I needed on a Monday morning!
It’s interesting to reflect that the album cover in question was regularly posted in the ‘What are you listening to’ thread for many years with little comment. Now it’s deemed inappropriate and no longer acceptable. I accept that the forum membership hasn’t stayed static but many of us have been here for many years…
True and I never flagged it but always found it tasteless. Think someone did and Richard stepped in.
She found offence with a great many televisual productions.
I’m impressed that you came to your morality with little input from others.
Would I be happy if it were my daughter? Probably not. But I don’t think that my morality should be imposed on others. I am surprised that you seem to dismiss everything that happens in rock and roll has no artistic merit.
We seem, these days, to be moving more and more towards Victorian attitudes - or at least their professed attitudes (unfortunately, the Victorians were not anything like as moral as they seemed to think they were).
Think you’ve miss understood me I’m certainly not Victorian by any means. If that was a woman on that cover topless I couldn’t give a toss, but it’s not it’s a 11 year old girl.
As for art and rock and roll I certainly don’t dismiss anything I was purely making a point that people will say anything to justify their actions. You’re entitled to your opinion and I respect that but I still think someone in administration shouldn’t have approved that cover.
I also agree that it’s not my place to sensor what anyone else sees, I’m just expressing my opinion.
Fair enough.
I don’t think I’ve got that one. Jump on it was Montrose’s “Smell the Glove” moment…
Ah, don’t know it, my search turned up something akin to a bikini shot.
I think it was due to it being a crotch, rather than a bikini shot, if you get my drift…
