Beggars Banquet - Cover Art

Cover Art

By June, the sessions were nearly completed in England, with some final overdubbing and mixing to be done in Los Angeles during July. However, both Decca Records in England and London Records in the US rejected the planned cover design – a graffiti-covered lavatory wall. The band initially refused to change the cover, resulting in several months' delay in the release of the album. By November, however, the Rolling Stones gave in, allowing the album to be released in December with a simple white cover imitating an invitation card, complete with an RSVP. For those aware of the cover intrigue, an advertisement in the back of Rolling Stone magazine soon announced that "the Stones want you to have the banned cover" allowing completists to buy the original artwork as a full front and back album slick that they could glue or tape over the released version. Meanwhile, the idea of a plain album cover was also implemented by The Beatles for their eponymous white-sleeved double-album, which was released one month prior to Beggars Banquet. The similarity garnered widespread accusations of Beatle-esque imitation when Beggars Banquet was finally released. In 1984, the original cover art was released with the initial CD remastering of Beggars Banquet.