Fifty years ago, the Beatles walked across a street in London for a photo shoot that would become the cover of their next album, Abbey Road an anniversary that was commemorated on Thursday with crowds and news crews. But for John Kosh, the Apple Records art director who had to turn those shots into an album cover, that was only step one in creating one of rocks most recognizable covers.
In 1969, Kosh was what he calls the creative art director for Apple Records, the Beatles label, and had an office on the first floor of the building. Hed already designed album and single covers for John Lennon (including his and Yoko Onos Unfinished Music No. 2: Life with the Lions) and other Apple artists. Hed witnessed Lennon and Paul McCartney record The Ballad of John and Yoko, watching as the two supposed nemesis had fun playing all the instruments themselves. Paul was on drums, John was doing the lead vocal, Paul came down and played bass, he recalls. It was two guys having as much fun as you can imagine but theyre not supposed to be talking to each other! Its almost as if they were back in Hamburg.
'Abbey Road' Vs. 'Let It Be': Which Was the Beatles' Last Album?Beatles Fans Celebrate 'Abbey Road' 50th AnniversarySugar Ray's Mark McGrath: 5 Songs That Make Me Cry20 Insanely Great Van Halen Songs Only Hardcore Fans Know
By the time he had to work on Abbey Road, Kosh had heard the stories of turmoil within the band and had already designed what he thought would be their next and last album, then called Get Back. Since it would follow the White Album, Kosh came up with the idea of having four separate portraits of the group against a black background for contrast. They were kind of falling apart, and that was supposed to be their swan song, he says. So a black album was my answer to the White Album. It was supposed to be the last thing they were going to do. Was I wrong! (When the album was finally unveiled the following year, it sported the same look but a new title, Let It Be.)
Sure enough, Kosh was at Apple one day in the summer of 1969 when he and publicity head Derek Taylor were invited by Lennon to listen to an acetate just cut in the basement studio of the building. It was fucking Abbey Road, says Kosh. Im sitting there and listening to this, and very few people had listened to it by then. When it came to I Want You (Shes So Heavy), I nearly fainted. It was so good.
With Abbey Roadnow replacing Get Backon the release schedule, Kosh had to quickly devise a new coveras he recalls, in a matter of two days. We had a deadline, he says. We had to go to press and the album was late and you just had to deal with it.
The designer remembered the shots that photographer Iain Macmillan (who died in 2006) had taken outside Abbey Road studios and knew that the album would be named after that street. In a quick and pivotal decision that would resonate for decades, Kosh decided not to use the bands name on the cover and let the photo speak for itself. We thought, if you didnt know the Beatles by now, where have you been? he says.
According to Kosh, Lennon, Ringo Starr and George Harrison all signed off on the idea, as did Apple Corps head and longtime Beatles confidante Neil Aspinall. Kosh has no memory of McCartneys reaction to the absence of their name, but does have still-startling memories of a middle-of-the-night call from Sir Joseph Lockwood, who ran the Beatles corporate label home, EMI. I heard a string of invectives that was stunning, Kosh says. He was saying I would destroy the Beatles because I didnt put their name on the cover and no one would buy the album. I was shivering after that call. (Peter Brown, the longtime Beatle associate and co-manager, has no memories of Lockwood being angry with the band, so his comments over Abbey Road may have been an exception.)
As Kosh recalls, he went to work the next morning and, by chance, Harrison was also there at an unusually early hour. When Kosh told him about the call, Harrison dismissed it, giving Kosh the go-ahead, and Abbey Roadwould be released the following month with its original visionno artist name or title on its front.
Kosh looks back on the analyses and conspiracy theories that followed with amusement, starting with the Paul is dead rumors that sprang from supposed clues in the photo. He recalls being in the office when an Apple executive called McCartney in France to make sure he was, in fact, alive; Fuck off, McCartney said, hanging up the phone.
Kosh, who has been based in Los Angeles since 1973, went to design the covers of Hotel California,Whos Next, and many other landmarks of the era. But his work on Abbey Road stands apart. Surely the most parodied jacket of all time, its been recreated on releases by Kanye West, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, George Benson, Booker T. and the MGs, Sesame Street, rapper Chubb Rock, and McCartney himself.
Youre not designing an icon when youre doing it, he says. Youre paying the rent and enjoying yourself. I remember seeing the Chili Peppers one in particular and thinking, My God, how great is that? It was thrilling for me to have people have a laugh taking the piss out of me.