I hear he also gets no regard. ;)
Hard to believe there are 10 years between "I Don't Get No Respect" (1970) and this album.
Let's get a close look at that warning in the upper right...
This is the sort of thing they did before the PMRC (Parents Music Resource Center) came into being and made Parental Advisory stickers mandatory. I suppose they could still do this, but most companies seem content just putting the sticker on the front, vague though it may be at times.
Comedy records long had warning labels of some type (at least since the 1950s.) Whether it was the based on the material or language (or both), it was mostly to help older consumers sort out which records they can play and which ones they shouldn't in mixed company at the next bridge party. But they were mostly ignored by record dealers and placed out on the floor where anyone could buy them (I bought my copy of Robin Williams' Reality.....What A Concept! LP - with a similar warning label on the back, in 1979 at age 12. I think this Rodney Dangerfield album came out around the same time.)
ReplyDeleteContemporary rock music on the other hand was something most parents and older, more conservative people simply just didn't listen to at all. Which was why the PMRC felt like such an invasion. No one ever complained about these senior citizens playing Rusty Warren's "bounce your boobies" records at full blast next door about being dirty old people, yet young people owning Judas Priest records made them suicidal devil worshipers (go figure.)
The warning label was also on the back for commerce reasons. Had they been on front, some stores (namely in the Bible Belt) would have to keep them behind the counter due to local blue laws regarding pornography in many Bible Belt areas, small towns and such.
In fact, some rock bands even made up fake warning labels, such as on the back of Motley Crue's 1983 Shout At The Devil LP, which read in tiny letters on the back cover WARNING: THIS RECORD MAY CONTAIN BACKWARD MESSAGES. It didn't. But at the time of it's release, many Christian groups were spreading the rumour that all secular rock music had pro-Satanic backward messages and Motley Crue just saw it as a way to sell records to rebellious kids.