Psychedelic Rock Album Covers That Will Blow Your Mind

We’ve rounded up some of the best psychedelic rock album covers to help you trip out. From The Beatles to Pink Floyd, these covers will blow your mind.

The Beatles – Abbey Road

The Beatles – Abbey Road is one of the most iconic album covers of all time. The image of the four band members crossing Abbey Road has become one of the most recognizable and imitated images in history. The cover was designed by English artist, Sir Peter Blake, who also designed the cover for The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album.

Pink Floyd – Dark Side of the Moon

Dark Side of the Moon is the eighth studio album by English rock band Pink Floyd, released on 1 March 1973 by Harvest Records. It built on ideas explored in Pink Floyd’s earlier recordings and live shows, but without the extended instrumentals that characterised their work following the departure of founder member Syd Barrett in 1968. It was produced by Pink Floyd and engineered by Alan Parsons.

The album was an immediate commercial and critical success; it topped record charts in several countries and sold more than 40 million copies worldwide, making it one of the best-selling albums of all time. In 1974, it won a Grammy Award for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked Dark Side of the Moon as the greatest album of all time and included it at number 55 on its list of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. Since its release, numerous writers and music critics have interpreted its lyrics and visual imagery to explore notions within philosophy, cosmology, science fiction and mental health; many consider its themes to be universal ones about human mental experience.

Led Zeppelin – Houses of the Holy

Led Zeppelin – Houses of the Holy (1973)

Psychedelic rock album covers often feature mind-bending images that can be hard to look away from. The art style is often used to depict otherworldly or fantastical concepts, and it’s not uncommon for the music itself to reflect these themes. Led Zeppelin’s Houses of the Holy is a perfect example of this, with its mind-bending cover art that suggests a hidden world behind our own.

The Grateful Dead – American Beauty

Formed in 1965 in San Francisco, the Grateful Dead were one of the most influential bands of the psychedelic rock era. The back cover of their fourth studio album, American Beauty, released in November 1970, featured a rose with the band’s name printed in a spiral. The artwork was created by Stanley Mouse and Alton Kelley, who also designed covers for other bands such as Jefferson Airplane and Big Brother and the Holding Company. American Beauty was one of the band’s most successful albums, reaching number 12 on the Billboard 200 album chart.

Jimi Hendrix – Electric Ladyland

This 1968 album from the legendary Jimi Hendrix features one of the most iconic psychedelic rock album covers of all time. The image, which was designed by Hendrix himself, features a nude woman with long flowing hair that seems to form the shape of a guitar. The woman is actually Hendrix’s girlfriend at the time, model Elfreda NCArora.

Cream – Disraeli Gears

Cream – Disraeli Gears
This album cover is a prime example of psychedelic rock album covers. The colors are bright and vibrant, and the image is trippy and mind-bending. This album is sure to blow your mind!

The Doors – Strange Days

The Doors – Strange Days: Released in 1967, this album was one of the first to feature computer-generated imagery on its cover. The image is a composite of 21 photographs, taken by Joel Brodsky, that were then printed on top of each other to create a single image.

Jefferson Airplane – Surrealistic Pillow

Released in 1967, Surrealistic Pillow was the second album by psychedelic rock band Jefferson Airplane, and it is considered one of the defining works of the genre. The album’s cover features a photograph of the band surrounded by dozens of cartoon characters, many of them naked, in a tableau that was inspired by the work of French surrealist artist René Magritte.

The artwork caused quite a stir at the time, with some critics decrying it as offensive and calling for it to be banned. But today, the album’s cover is widely recognized as one of the most iconic and influential images in rock music history.

The Rolling Stones – Beggars Banquet

Beggars Banquet is the seventh British and ninth American studio album by English rock band The Rolling Stones, released in December 1968 by Decca Records in the United Kingdom and London Records in the United States.

It is a return to roots rock following their experimental pop records, Aftermath (1966), Between the Buttons (1967) and Their Satanic Majesties Request (1967). It was the first album entirely produced by Jimmy Miller, who went on to produce most of their albums through Sticky Fingers (1971).

The album was recorded during a series of sporadic sessions that took place between January and October 1968 at Olympic Studios in London and Mick Jagger’s Stargroves country estate in Hampshire. Although “Street Fighting Man” was recorded first, it was banned from airplay by several radio stations due to its lyrical violence, forcing the band to release “Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing in the Shadow?” as the lead single. Beggars Banquet peaked at number three on both the UK Albums Chart and US Billboard 200.

In 2003, Beggars Banquet was ranked number 57 on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. In 2004, it was ranked number 38 on Pitchfork Media’s Top 100 Albums of the 1960s. In 2009 it was ranked as the greatest album art of all time by spin magazine.

King Crimson – In the Court of the Crimson King

In the Court of the Crimson King is the debut album by the British rock band King Crimson, released on 10 October 1969 on Island Records in England and Atlantic Records in America. The album was co-produced by Robert Fripp and Peter Sinfield, and was engineered by Tony Arnold and Robin Black. It was recorded at Wessex Sound Studios in Islington, North London, in August and September 1969.

The album is notable for its time signature changes, sound effects, use of atonality, and innovative songwriting which would be influential to progressive rock. It is considered a classic of both the progressive rock and psychedelic genres. Despite its commercial success upon release – reaching number 5 on the UK Albums Chart – In the Court of the Crimson King was not well received by many music critics at the time. In later years, however, it has been reappraised and seen as an influential and innovative work. Reviewing for Rolling Stone in November 1969, John Mendelsohn described it as “the best psychedelic album ever made”, while AllMusic’s Retrospective review said it “may well be” one of prog’s finest debuts.