I was so inspired when I did the Beauty and the Beat cover for the 2010 GoVegan calender that I decided to do an entire “album cover” theme for the 2011 Calendar.
I’m a huge music fan and I have a deep affection for album cover art.
I fell in love with music early on … probably because my Dad was always playing music in the house. I would lay on the floor in my Dad’s den and put on The Beatles, Miles Davis, etc and search the album cover (and liners) for information about what I was listening too.
As I grew older (and started to buy my own albums) the ritual was the same. I would lay on the floor and listen to the album (in it’s entirety) and look at the album cover for secrets. Sometimes it would be a “thank you” to a producer I read about on another album. Sometimes there was a secret message etched into the vinyl with a cryptic inside joke that I would never understand.
Holding a 12×12 piece of album art while I listen to the music is a ritual of the past … so the 2011 GoVegan Calendar is my love letter to the lost art of album covers. Vegan style!! 🙂
My tastes run pretty obscure so I tried to choose iconic album covers for the 2011 Calendar that everyone would know … what I didn’t anticipate was that so many of my friends (under 40) wouldn’t have a clue what half these covers are that we’re paying homage too. Oh dear … if that doesn’t make you feel old. I don’t know what will. 🙂
January starts with a veganized version of the Supertramp cover Breakfast in America. I’m not really a fan of Supertramp but being the thrift-store junkie that I am … you ALWAYS see this album cover in the bins. It’s a really cool album cover … if you look closely (click on photo for bigger version) at Manhattan in the background it’s made up of items from a diner like coffee cups, egg cartons, salt and pepper shakers, etc.
We tried to replicate the same thing by using my cookbooks and items from my kitchen, etc (notice the Knight Rider lunchbox?). It took a lot of re-shoots to get the city-scape right but Rudee (as usual) did a bang-up job with all the graphics.
The hardest part of this photo was holding up a glass of orange juice … Oy vey. I had to hold it at a certain angle to mimic the waitress (who is mimicking the statue of liberty) plus try and look cute at the same time. My arm was sore for 3 days after. *laugh* I guess it’s time to hit the gym.
The first lyrics for Breakfast in America are “Take a look at my girlfreind. She’s the only one I got…” and since the album is called Breakfast in America I decided to re-write the lyrics to be about pancakes.
The recipe for January is for Banana Pecan Pancakes … and they are delish!! “Take a look at my pancakes. They’re the only one’s I got…” 🙂
I’m 40 and my husband is 42. We loved going page by page and guessing each one (and we did pretty darn well)!! The “veganized” lyrics were fantastic!!
THANKS AMY!! 🙂
I got the calender for Christmas and the whole group sat around naming the album covers. I love every month!! The Bowie homage is my favorite 🙂
Me and my non vegan girlfriend REALLY like the Banana Pecan Pancakes. The blended soy milk with a banana creates a fantastic bubbly matrix that makes for fluffy pancakes. They are the best I’ve had (and there’s a place here in San Diego that makes a good vegan blueberry pancake).
I’m also enjoying the calendar in general very much, and also think that the Growie/Bowie photo is very effective. The others are all fun too! Sorry that you wore yourself out with the orange juice glass. As a prop man I could have helped a little with that (paint the OJ on the inside of the empty glass, or if you have a tough time with the color matching a glass within a glass with the orange juice between the two glasses).