Awful Type

The Grateful Dead's "American Beauty" album's cover is extremely difficult to read. Granted, the dead released this album in 1970 and were known for their psychedelic antics, their album cover is practically illegible. All of the letters are capitalized and are connected by their centers. Once you get through the A, M, E, R, it is really difficult to decipher the I and the C. The C almost connects with itself, creating the illusion of an O. The flame like appearance of the letters makes for a cool effect but hinders the viewer from separating the letters.

The word "beauty" is even more difficult to read than "American" because the colors are reversed. The letters appear to be larger on the bottom than on the top and because the letters curve around the circle, your eyes are forced to follow.

Looking at this for a long period of time gives me a headache, but I assume the dead appealed to their clientele by making such a "trippy" album cover. The designs on the sides make it even more difficult to decipher the words because other than their obvious difference in color, they resemble the designs that the words form. Whenever I look at this cover I first see a design and finally once my eyes adjust I can make out the words.

Although the dead intentionally created the words to look psychedelic, the graffiti, wave of the words makes them very difficult to read. Even though the dead marketed towards their audience and created some of the best music of their time, their album covers give me headaches from time to time.