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”