Album Covers with Six People on Them – Sextets

A composite image of 25 music album covers with sextets - six band members on them.

We had the idea of featuring album covers with six people on them and were immediately struck by how many groups don’t put a picture of themselves on the cover. It takes a compilation like the 20th Century Masters series to feature the groups. Group photos on album covers seem to have hit their heyday in the 1960s and 1970s and then faded. Unless you are selling your look like on the cover such as the PussyCat Dolls 2005 release “PCD”.

A sextet (or hexad) is a formation containing exactly six members. The term is commonly associated with vocal ensembles or musical instrument groups. In popular music, we tend to associate it with jazz or big band music.

The covers featured here below show 6 people on them. It could very well be that the group had a change of personnel so the next album you’ll see more or less band members.

Favorite album cover? Blondie’s 1982 “The Hunter” with Debbie Harry’s lioness mane. Missed in this pass: The Association and The Little River Band. 

1957 The Monotones
1965 The Joe Cuba Sextette – “Comin' At You”
1966 The Paul Butterfield Blues Band – “East-West”
1967 Jefferson Airplane – “Surrealistic Pillow”
1970 The Allman Brothers Band – “Idlewild South”

1973 The Isley Brothers – “3 + 3”
1974 Blue Swede – “Hooked on a Feeling”
1977 Foreigner – “Foreigner”
1978 Firefall – “Elan”
1978 The Doobie Brothers – “Minute by Minute”

1981 The English Beat – “Wha'ppen”
1982 Blondie – “The Hunter”
1983 The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band – “Best of”
1984 The Jacksons – “Victory”
1985 Animotion – “Obsession”

1993 The Brady Bunch – “It's a Sunshine Day”
1997 Puff Daddy – “No Way Out”
1999 Spanky and Our Gang – “Greatest Hits”
1999 Village People – “The Best of the Village People”
2001 38 Special - 20th Century Master – “The Best of”

2001 The Commodores – “Anthology”
2002 The Soundtrack of Our Lives – “Behind the Music”
2003 The Blind Boys of Alabama – “Amazing Grace”
2003 The Waitresses - 20th Century Masters – “The Best of”
2005 The Pussy Cat Dolls – “PCD”

 

A Sunday Walk to Trattoria del Moro

Left: Chiesetta di San Marco alla Maresana, Bergamo Italy.
Right: Filone della Maresana, Trail 533 runs on crest of ridge.

Despite the beautiful sunny and warm Sunday, it’s the season for cassœula. Cassœula is a winter dish typically found in Western Lombardy. We had this classic Lombardo dish today at Trattoria del Moro, one of our favorite Sunday lunch spots.

The dish includes mainly pork meat – typically least valuable parts, Verzino sausage, and sometimes other meats like chicken and goose. These are cooked in a casserole with onion, carrot, celery, and black pepper for several hours, after which the cabbage is added, and cooking continues. Cassoeula is served with polenta and a red wine. This dish is served after the first frost of the season, to let the cabbage be softer and tastier.

The dish traces its origin to the end of the pig-slaughtering season, when the least valuable parts of the pig used for cassoeula and the better cuts of meat would be hung to cure to improve the flavor.

To get to Trattoria del Moro from the center of Bergamo, you can drive or walk. If you walk there, you earned the meal! The walk will take you 1.5 to 2 hours and is relatively easy with good shoes and a little huffing and puffing up trail 533. From the Piazza Carrara in Bergamo, head to the Atalanta Stadium (officially called Gewiss Stadium) and continue on to Monterosso neighborhood. From the Monterosso neighborhood center, head to Via Quintino Alto a few steps away. On Quintino Alto you’ll find the start of Sentiero 533: Bergamo (Monterosso) – Selvino. The trail is marked with a street sign Via Filone della Maresana. It’s a trail and it climbs quickly. Filone means “line or branch” and refers to the ridge of the hill that leads from Quintino Alto to Maresana.

As the trail name implies, you could follow it all the way to Selvino - and we have, see this post – but for today, you’ll only follow it up the hill.

The Filone - Trail 533 - takes up to the popular spot called Maresana, where you can park, walk, and picnic. You can also eat at Trattoria La Maresana. Across the road from the trattoria, find a paved biking/walking trail. Follow that all the way to Trattoria del Moro.



Left: Sign at Quintino Alto where Filone della Maresana starts.

Center left: A persimmon tree.
Center right: Fence shadows in Ponteranica, Bergamo, Italy.
Right: A trail leading up to Maresana from Quintino Alto.

Left: Trattoria del Moro - Affettati sott'olio e sott'aceto.
Center: Cassoeula - at typical winter dish in Lombardy. 
Right: Tagliolini con funghi porcini at Trattoria del Moro.

Music Album Covers with Famous Works of Art on Them

A composite image of 25 music album covers with famous works of art on them.

Did you every look at an album cover and think “Hey, that looks familiar?” That question is usually followed by a brief lament for the shallowness of your cultural literacy. At least that's what happens to us.

Here are 25 albums that include famous works of art, paintings and murals. Some of the album covers use a slightly altered form of the original (like inserting the artists' own faces), or just a portion or detail from the original. These are albums that we’ve encountered over the years and our preference is more toward popular music: rock music, experimental. (If you looked at classical music covers, we'd bet you’d find a lot of classical painting references.)

One of the ways we use to find interesting music is to look for interesting album covers. When Hieronymus Bosch (1450-1516) is used as a cover, you can expect something with a rock twist. With Thomas Hart Benton (1889 – 1975) , something with an Americana angle. With Vincent Van Gogh (1853 – 1890), something jazzy or lighter. What other trends do you see?


Row 1

"The Garden of Earthly Delights" (1490 – 1510) detail by Hieronymus Bosch (1450-1516) and used by Pearls Before Swine “One Nation Underground” (1967).

“The Garden of Earthly Delights ” (1490 - 1510) detail by Hieronymus Bosch (1450 - 1516) used by Deep Purple in a modified form on their third release “Deep Purple” (1969).

"The Battle of Trafalgar" (1805) by Nicholas Pocock (1740 – 1821) and used by the Bee Gees “Trafalgar” (1971).

“Tragic Prelude” (1942) mural detail by John Steuart Curry (1897 – 1946) used by Kansas for their self-titled debut (1974).

"Negro Attacked by a Jaguar" (1910) by Henri Rousseau (1844 – 1910) used by Osibisa on their release “Osibirock” (1974).


Row 2

“Water” (1566) by Giuseppe Arcimboldo (1526/7 – 1593) used by Kansas on their release “Masque” (1975).

"Bal du moulin de la Galette" (1876) by Pierre Auguste Renoir (1841 – 1919) used by Rod Stewart in “A Night on the Town” (1976).*

“Tiger in a Tropical Storm” (1891) by Henri Rousseau (1844 – 1910) used by Michael Franks on his release “Tiger in the Rain” (1979).

"Two Tahitian Women with Mango" (1899) by Paul Gauguin (1848 – 1903) used by Michael Franks on his release “Object of Desire” (1982).

"The Veteran in a New Field" (1865) by Winslow Homer (1836 – 1910) and used by Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers on their release “Southern Accents” (1985).

Row 3


“Persephone” (1939) by Thomas Hart Benton (1889 – 1975) used on Hector Zazou’s release "Geologies" (1989).

"Flaming June" (1895) by Lord Frederick Leighton (1830 – 1896) and used by Malcom McLaren “Waltz Darling” (1989).

"The Ballad of the Jealous Lover of Lone Green Valley" (1934) by Thomas Hart Benton (1889 – 1975) used in the compilation “Appalachian Stomp” (1989).

"The Garden of Earthly Delights" (1490 – 1510) detail by Hieronymus Bosch (1450 - 1516) and used by Dead Can Dance on their release “Aion” (1990).

“Café Terrace at Night” (1888) by Vincent Van Gogh (1853 – 1890) used by Thomas Talbert Jazz Orchestra on the release "Warm Cafe" (1991).

Row 4

“The Sources of Country Music” (1975) by Thomas Hart Benton (1889 – 1975) used in the compilation “Appalachian Stomp (More Bluegrass Classics” (1992).

"Bacchus and Ariadne" (1522/3) by Titian (1488/90-1576) used by the Crash Test Dummies on their release “God Shuffled His Feet” (1992).

“Olive Trees with Yellow Sky and Sun” (1889) by Vincent Van Gogh (1853 – 1890) used by Deuter on his release "Sun Spirit" (2000).

“The Fall of Man” (1592) by Cornelis van Haarlem (1562 – 1638) used by John Wesley Harding on the release "The Garden of Eden" (2003).

“Hylas and the Nymphs” (1896) detail by John William Waterhouse (1849 – 1917) used by Susumu Yokota in his release “Symbol” (2005).**

Row 5

"Liberty Leading the People" (1830) by Eugène Delacroix (1798 - 1863) and used by Coldplay in their release "Viva La Vida" (2008).*

"Netherlandish Proverbs" (1559) by Pieter Bruegel the Elder (1525/30 - 1569) used by Fleet Foxes on their debut "Fleet Foxes" (2008).

“Flora” (ca. 1591) by Giuseppe Arcimboldo (1526/7 – 1593) used by the Clientele on their release "Bonfires on the Heath" (2009).**

“Birds on Money” (1981) by Basquiat (1960 – 1988) used by the Strokes "The New Abnormal" (2013).**

"A Pelican and Other Birds Near a Pool" (1680) by Dutch artist Melchior d'Hondecoeter (1636 – 1696) used by William Doyle on his release "Great Spans of Muddy Time" (2021).