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A silver robot, a dead man in its hand—and somehow, 24 years later, it’s holding Queen.

Before News of the World terrified a generation of record store browsers (and one future Family Guy creator), it lived quietly on the cover of a 1953 sci-fi magazine. The artist, the story, the robot—they were all about something deeper: what happens when machines obey… but don’t understand.

So how did this forgotten pulp illustration become one of rock’s most haunting album covers? Why did Queen go back in time to find it? And what exactly is that robot feeling as it stares at the damage it’s done?

Grab a copy and listen along with us. Questions, comments, recommendations?
We’d love to hear from you at Albumartthecoverstories@gmail.com or check our Spotify Song List with a song from each album we have covered: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2NrDU39yE9CJcHU6YJT8jj?si=Y1JAE4LWTDmKEDE9QGlB2A&pi=ly2xwE-ERRu-2

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They were Black teenage girls in the 1950s, creating a sound that would shape popular music—and doing it in an industry that wasn’t built for them to succeed on their own terms.

We Are the Chantels isn’t just an album—it’s a story about talent meeting opportunity… and running straight into the realities of race, control, and who gets credit in the music business. Their voices helped define a genre, but the recognition, the power, and the rewards didn’t always follow.

This is what it sounds like when something new is born—and who pays the price when it is.

Grab a copy and listen along with us. Questions, comments, recommendations?
We’d love to hear from you at Albumartthecoverstories@gmail.com or check our Spotify Song List with a song from each album we have covered: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2NrDU39yE9CJcHU6YJT8jj?si=Y1JAE4LWTDmKEDE9QGlB2A&pi=ly2xwE-ERRu-2

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A girl sitting in a Jacuzzi.
A pair of bare feet that turned out to belong to the photographer.
A fisheye lens.
A drink called Silk Panties.

That’s the accidental recipe for the cover of the Deftones’ Around the Fur.

But who was the girl in the hot tub? Why did the band pick a photo that feels like you’re standing just a little too close to something private? And how did a picture taken at a random party end up selling millions of records?

Sometimes album covers come from art directors, concept meetings, and mood boards.
And sometimes they come from a party, a camera, and a moment that didn’t know it mattered yet.

Grab a copy and listen along with us.

Grab a copy and listen along with us. Questions, comments, recommendations?
We’d love to hear from you at Albumartthecoverstories@gmail.com or check our Spotify Song List with a song from each album we have covered: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2NrDU39yE9CJcHU6YJT8jj?si=Y1JAE4LWTDmKEDE9QGlB2A&pi=ly2xwE-ERRu-2