From ‘White’ To ‘Black,’ Here Are The Most Iconic ‘Color’ Albums Of All Time

There are a lot of different ways to name an album if you are a musician. Maybe you call it Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water. Or, you know, something not stupid. However, some albums aren’t really “named,” in the traditional sense, or they are self-titled albums, which means they share a title with the name of the band. Such albums could be kind of tricky to talk about. Take, for example, The Beatles’ self-titled album they released in 1968. You don’t know it as The Beatles, though. You know it as The White Album. Thus began the popularity of “color” albums, which are further discussed in this video.

Several other iconic albums are known by the color of the artwork. Weezer has gone to this well three times already, and they are now planning on doing it a fourth time. On the other hand, on occasion an album will be given a title that is just a color. Jay-Z’s “final” album, released in 2003, was called The Black Album. That’s its official title, and, fittingly, the album cover is also black. Then, of course, there’s Taylor Swift’s supremely popular album Red, which does away with words like “the” and “album” altogether.

It’s a pretty shrewd way to title an album, officially or otherwise. It’s fairly easy to recognize a color, after all. Of course, as physical releases become less common, people will associate albums with colors less and less. We’ll always have The White Album, though.

×