Description

The idea was simple: the Beatles would pose as a fictional band, the Lonely Hearts Club Band, surrounded by their fans after a performance. Pop artists Peter Blake and Jann Haworth turned that idea into a crowd. They mounted life-size black-and-white photographs on hardboard and tinted them by hand, then added waxworks, including the Beatles' own figures, along with hairdressers' dummies and models of Sonny Liston and Diana Dors. Michael Cooper photographed the assembled scene.

The guest list came from the band and the art dealer Robert Fraser. John Lennon and Paul McCartney supplied names, George Harrison added several Indian gurus, and Ringo Starr was happy to go along with the others. Not everyone made it. Gandhi was modelled but removed because EMI's chairman, Sir Joseph Lockwood, feared offence in India. Lennon asked for Jesus and Hitler: Jesus was never made, given the furore over his "more popular than Jesus" remark, and Hitler, though modelled, ended up hidden behind the band. The actor Leo Gorcey was cut when he asked for a $400 fee, leaving a gap in the crowd. Elvis Presley was left out on purpose, because the band thought too much of him to make him just another face.

The effort paid off. The cover became a puzzle that listeners studied for years, and Blake and Haworth won the Grammy for Best Album Cover, Graphic Arts, at the ceremony for 1967.

Credit

Cover concept and collage by Peter Blake and Jann Haworth; photography by Michael Cooper.