A Mongrel, Sir?

What's this? It's only an album cover you won't find anywhere else on the internet, is what this is. Think about that for a second or two. Enough. Now read the next sentence awready. You may find a link to the photographer's site (the great Barry Feinstein - he took the cover shot for that Byrds album down below), but that shows the original shot only, and in black and white. This is the full artworked-up and printed cover for Joe Cocker's second, eponymous [oh well done! - Ed.] album. Which they didn't use, replacing it with the ho-hum monochrome image you're familiar with.

Why? Why was this fantastic cover shelved and replaced with an inferior, cheap-looking design? We shall never know. But this is the iconic [bravo! - Ed.] image of Joe. The heavy tweed suit (for a day at the seaside), the collarless shirt with studs and armbands. The dog on a rope. This is Joe bringing British working class style to Santa Monica, and he's pissed that someone out of shot has called his pedigree mutt a mongrel. Was this the original album title? Looks like it, doesn't it?

Questions - questions! My mind is a raging torrent, flooded with rivulets of thought cascading into a waterfall of cascading alternatives. Perhaps you, too, dear reader, have questions. Questions about life. Love. The Universe, and our place within it. Do us a big favor and keep them to yourself, ya dope.