Cover Critique: Rolling Stone’s Barack Obama Endorsement
Designers weigh in.
By Dylan Stableford, Folio Magazine (courtesy of Music Press Report)

A pretty interesting survey of how various designers rate RS’s cover depiction of Barack Obama.

While the verdict is still out as to whether 2007 was a complete bust, a bright spot was veteran punk rock photojournalist Theresa Kereakes’ celebrating three decades of punk rock’s uppers and downers with her moving art show, Punk Turns 30.

Working the West coast circuit since she was a teen, and later going bicoastal, she amassed a cache of visually explosive iconography, including signature snaps of Darby Crash, Jeffrey Lee Pierce, Patricia Morrison  and bands The Cramps, Dead Boys and Germs, as well as group shots of stars during downtime.

While this past fall provided a gothic backdrop for shows in Oxford, MS  and Memphis, TN, this month the traveling photo exhibit, Unguarded Moments: Backstage and Beyond was assembled for Atlanta.

The underground odyssey continues on into the spring with likely stops in New York, New Orleans and Washington, D.C.

Meant to mention this last week: On the website/blog Cover Stories, Mike Goldstein takes an album cover, and writes about it at length–extraordinary length–including (in some cases) Q&As with the photographers behind those covers. Not all the LPs covered thus far have been to my taste, but it’s a pretty cool idea for a site.

The link comes courtesty of the always invaluable Music Press Report, which also features an interview with Goldstein about this particular venture.