Hidden Findings discovered in Backspacer Cover (Updated)

1…1617192122…26

Comments

  • Posts: 2,743
    krymsin wrote:
    Don't know if this has been posted yet, but Tom Tomorrow explains the message behind the art in this article (i think it's on page 2):

    http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-1613 ... row-part-1

    Thank you for posting the link and I am going to quote from page 2 of that article that has to do with this thread and what we have been doing. ;)

    ________________________________________________________________

    Examiner: Can you give me a rundown as to what each panel means?

    Perkins: Having the band open up and talk to me was with the understanding that what we talked about stay private. I don't mean to be coy, but it's not my place to do that.

    Examiner: Fans are looking at the panels and trying to trace back their origins.

    Perkins: I'm glad everyone's having fun looking for this stuff, but I would caution people they shouldn't confuse the map for the territory, as they say in semiotics. Even if you do find the photo I used for source material, it may just be a photograph. It may not mean anything at all. The reason I used it more likely has something to do with a private conversation I had with someone in the band, and that's not something you can Google.

    If I had the meaning of life, I don't think I'd be hiding it in album covers. (laughs)
    JA: Why do I get the Ticketmaster question?
    EV: It's your band.
    ~Q Magazine


    "Kisses for the glow...kisses for the lease." - BDRII
  • Leigh-on-Sea, UK Posts: 3,057
    *Goes back to boring life*
    Nature drunk and High
  • Posts: 2,743
    UncleSpaggles wrote:
    *Goes back to boring life*

    Yeah, I'll be missing this thread too. :(
    JA: Why do I get the Ticketmaster question?
    EV: It's your band.
    ~Q Magazine


    "Kisses for the glow...kisses for the lease." - BDRII
  • Posts: 333
    But I still want to know how he came about the red mini dress legs, since others are pretty well known legs.
  • Posts: 239
    doesn't mean we can't still try to figure it out

    my obsession has been the fiery train
    "If you love someone, set them free. If someone loves you, don't fuck up." -ev

    6/29/03 - Montreal, QC 10/1/04 - Reading, PA
    10/3/05 - Philadelphia, PA 5/12/06 - Albany, NY
    6/27/08 - Hartford, CT (FRONT ROW CENTER!)
    8/2/08 - (ev) Boston, MA 6/9/09 - (ev) Albany, NY
    8/21/09 - Toronto, ON 5/10/10 - Buffalo, NY
  • Posts: 1,454
    kenobi77 wrote:
    i know the fire technically isn't there, but this train is "hellbound" and as the myth goes there's fire in hell...also not sure if this has already been posted as a possibility and i'm apologizing now for not sifting through every thread...at work right now and my lunch is pretty much over LOL.

    as for the boy, the second song on this album is called "lost and lonely child"

    anyway...

    Savoy+Brown+-+1972+-+Hellbound+Train.jpg

    Good find, that is pretty close!
    Take me for a ride before we leave...
  • Posts: 235
    The song 'Johnny Guitar' contains the line "With a leg under the red dress I wish I could see"...

    Is it possible the one on the left in the cover pic could just be there to represent this line from the song ?

    And as long as I'm stretching here...

    "Yeah on top the girl responsible for original sin" - the girl from 1,000,000 BC !!

    I got nuthin'...
    There's a lot to be said for nowhere...
  • Posts: 239
    IamMine wrote:
    show previous quotes

    Thank you for posting the link and I am going to quote from page 2 of that article that has to do with this thread and what we have been doing. ;)

    ________________________________________________________________

    Examiner: Can you give me a rundown as to what each panel means?

    Perkins: Having the band open up and talk to me was with the understanding that what we talked about stay private. I don't mean to be coy, but it's not my place to do that.

    Examiner: Fans are looking at the panels and trying to trace back their origins.

    Perkins: I'm glad everyone's having fun looking for this stuff, but I would caution people they shouldn't confuse the map for the territory, as they say in semiotics. Even if you do find the photo I used for source material, it may just be a photograph. It may not mean anything at all. The reason I used it more likely has something to do with a private conversation I had with someone in the band, and that's not something you can Google.

    If I had the meaning of life, I don't think I'd be hiding it in album covers. (laughs)

    not that our intention is to scrutinize the work or anything like that, but we also have to take into consideration that the artist probably doesn't his work being "picked apart" so to speak. it's like when you walk into a gallery and you actually get to talk to the artist and you ask "what made you wanna paint that?...where did you get that idea??"...they usually look at you with a face like "what's it matter, it's there, enjoy it" but what they actually say is "oh i don't know, i guess i've just had flowers on the brain and i've been experimenting with..." etc etc. you don't often get a clear answer and kind of just have to accept it for what it is.

    the woman in the red nightie has got to be real, it's just a matter of time before we find the original widely-published shot, like the other two girls were in.
    "If you love someone, set them free. If someone loves you, don't fuck up." -ev

    6/29/03 - Montreal, QC 10/1/04 - Reading, PA
    10/3/05 - Philadelphia, PA 5/12/06 - Albany, NY
    6/27/08 - Hartford, CT (FRONT ROW CENTER!)
    8/2/08 - (ev) Boston, MA 6/9/09 - (ev) Albany, NY
    8/21/09 - Toronto, ON 5/10/10 - Buffalo, NY
  • Posts: 2,131
    kenobi77 wrote:
    not that our intention is to scrutinize the work or anything like that, but we also have to take into consideration that the artist probably doesn't his work being "picked apart" so to speak.

    Not that they don't necessarily want their work scrutinized, but artists know to expect it. Visual artists are all completely aware of the volumes of work analyzing paintings by Degas, Warhol, DaVinci, Scorsese, Cristo, Basquiat, etc... Any artist who actively makes their work available for public consumption and says they don't like the attention it gets is full of it. They may not like getting the attention themelves, but they hope and expect that their work is scrutinized over.

    Continue the scrutiny.
    "A lot more people are capable of being big out there that just don't give themselves a chance." -Stone Gossard
  • Posts: 472
    edited September 2009
    not that our intention is to scrutinize the work or anything like that, but we also have to take into consideration that the artist probably doesn't his work being "picked apart" so to speak. it's like when you walk into a gallery and you actually get to talk to the artist and you ask "what made you wanna paint that?...where did you get that idea??"...they usually look at you with a face like "what's it matter, it's there, enjoy it" but what they actually say is "oh i don't know, i guess i've just had flowers on the brain and i've been experimenting with..." etc etc. you don't often get a clear answer and kind of just have to accept it for what it is.

    The real reasons for not wanting to be asked a question like "Where did you get that idea?" is because the artists usually don't know and they're scared somebody will find out. Mind you, there is a standard element of craft involved (eg. layout, foreground, background). But a piece of artwork would only be an empty shell if it were craft alone. It is the core idea embedded that makes it come alive. Really the truth of the matter is 'they make them up out of their head'. And there is a huge vulnerability in that notion. Mike McCready expresses as much in SVT when he worries about losing his "creative edge". Eddie describes finding the right lyric can be like waiting for a beam of light to strike him.

    Anyway, I find the best art can not only withstand scrutiny, rather it grows by actively engaging the work. Speaking of which, with all of these Backspacer reviews coming in from different publications, I realize music with any depth tends to be wasted on most professional music critics who are only interested in how it relates to the altar of 'pop culture' they seem to kneel before. But back to the cover art. Even if we are imagining what wasn't even intended by Mr. Tomorrow, that's okay because it enables us to help elevate Backspacer to a level of insight all Pearl Jam albums deserve. To delve deeper is key because the best music, novels, paintings, etc., always know you better than you can know them; which leaves plenty to discover.

    That said, I would love to find the reference used for the locomotive. All along I sort of figured the kid in that illustration represented Jeff. I kept googling things like "Montana steam locomotive" without any success.
    Post edited by pleatherman on
  • Posts: 2,098
    Oh come on.
    If there was a prize for this...............Hidden meanings..............
    It would have been solved by now.

    You lot have to try harder. :lol:
  • Posts: 239
    thank you red dot...heavy hands and pleatherman i totally agree with both of you, which is why i will continue to spend my lunch hours at work google-imaging. :D
    "If you love someone, set them free. If someone loves you, don't fuck up." -ev

    6/29/03 - Montreal, QC 10/1/04 - Reading, PA
    10/3/05 - Philadelphia, PA 5/12/06 - Albany, NY
    6/27/08 - Hartford, CT (FRONT ROW CENTER!)
    8/2/08 - (ev) Boston, MA 6/9/09 - (ev) Albany, NY
    8/21/09 - Toronto, ON 5/10/10 - Buffalo, NY
  • South Jersey Posts: 9,179
    ok, let me preface by i certainly didnt read all 25 pages of this thread although i have tried to keep up over the weeks...i finally just got Backspacer today, listened to it only once (avoided the leak), and looked thru the artwork one time in its entirety.

    A total longshot but here it goes:
    Regarding the picture (#7), you know- the one with the robot and the tv on it's head and the spaceships in the background....I think, and its a long shot and please dont flame me but could it be, a picture of "Smitty", the band's tour manager as a child? I would have never thought of this until I saw the inside artwork with the 1-eyed Chewbacca thing holding the tv and to me, again in just my opinion is "Smitty". Go ahead and roast me here. Just my initial thoughts and reactions!!

    My apologies if this was already offered/suggested in the 1st 25 pages.
    -EV
    www.operationyellowribbon.org
  • Posts: 239
    ok am i digging too deep LOL???

    this picture is found at: http://www.daysofyesterday.com/odd.html

    train_boy.jpg
    "If you love someone, set them free. If someone loves you, don't fuck up." -ev

    6/29/03 - Montreal, QC 10/1/04 - Reading, PA
    10/3/05 - Philadelphia, PA 5/12/06 - Albany, NY
    6/27/08 - Hartford, CT (FRONT ROW CENTER!)
    8/2/08 - (ev) Boston, MA 6/9/09 - (ev) Albany, NY
    8/21/09 - Toronto, ON 5/10/10 - Buffalo, NY
  • Posts: 1,237
    UncleSpaggles wrote:
    This is probably gonna get me in hot water (even that phrase seems politically incorrect), but I think the legs have to belong to a black woman - having a black man surrounded by white women may be still too soon for some states..?

    Feel free to laugh at me, I'm from the UK.

    i say tanned, not black...
    no problem with all white women + black "pimp"
  • Posts: 2,098
    I'm loving this Thread. Even now that no-one is viewing it.
    So while we continue with the Backspacer cover discovered, I'm lovin the way the PJ Home page has been changing every few days.
    Subtley.
    Who? noticed the new single hand today on PJ Home.? :ugeek:
  • Posts: 139,725
    Jo wrote:
    I'm loving this Thread. Even now that no-one is viewing it.
    So while we continue with the Backspacer cover discovered, I'm lovin the way the PJ Home page has been changing every few days.
    Subtley.
    Who? noticed the new single hand today on PJ Home.? :ugeek:
    ;)
    "...Dimitri...He talks to me...'.."The Ghost of Greece..".
    "..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
    “..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
  • Posts: 1,443
    I think I know who the red dress woman is...

    "Johnny Guitar Watson staring at me
    riding on three wheels a woman on his knee
    with a leg under a red dress I wish I could see..."

    "On the left the girl in red so innocent
    ...
    Can't help but wonder where and who she is."

    Seems like maybe they don't quite know either... ;)
    Maybe I'm reading too much into it... but it clicked when I looked at the lyrics today.
    PJ: St. Paul 6.16.2003, St. Paul 6.26.2006, St. Paul 6.27.2006, Hartford 6.27.2008, Mansfield 6.28.2008, Mansfield 6.30.2008, Beacon Theater 7.1.2008, Toronto 8.21.2009, Chicago 8.23.2009, Chicago 8.24.2009, Philly 10.30.2009, Philly 10.31.2009, Columbus 5.6.2010, Noblesville 5.7.2010

    EV: Los Angeles 4.12.2008, Los Angeles 4.13.2008, Nashville 6.17.2009, Nashville 6.18.2009, Memphis 6.20.2009
  • Posts: 239
    Arcticangel wrote:
    I think I know who the red dress woman is...

    "Johnny Guitar Watson staring at me
    riding on three wheels a woman on his knee
    with a leg under a red dress I wish I could see..."

    "On the left the girl in red so innocent
    ...
    Can't help but wonder where and who she is."

    Seems like maybe they don't quite know either... ;)
    Maybe I'm reading too much into it... but it clicked when I looked at the lyrics today.

    we're all reading too much into it LOL!

    i have this really odd feeling though that the song was completed before the album artwork was done. :idea: ;)
    "If you love someone, set them free. If someone loves you, don't fuck up." -ev

    6/29/03 - Montreal, QC 10/1/04 - Reading, PA
    10/3/05 - Philadelphia, PA 5/12/06 - Albany, NY
    6/27/08 - Hartford, CT (FRONT ROW CENTER!)
    8/2/08 - (ev) Boston, MA 6/9/09 - (ev) Albany, NY
    8/21/09 - Toronto, ON 5/10/10 - Buffalo, NY
  • Posts: 1,443
    kenobi77 wrote:
    show previous quotes

    we're all reading too much into it LOL!

    i have this really odd feeling though that the song was completed before the album artwork was done. :idea: ;)

    So maybe "Jerome Turner" brought the lyrics with when he collaborated with Tom Tomorrow on the concept.. :)
    This IS fun.
    PJ: St. Paul 6.16.2003, St. Paul 6.26.2006, St. Paul 6.27.2006, Hartford 6.27.2008, Mansfield 6.28.2008, Mansfield 6.30.2008, Beacon Theater 7.1.2008, Toronto 8.21.2009, Chicago 8.23.2009, Chicago 8.24.2009, Philly 10.30.2009, Philly 10.31.2009, Columbus 5.6.2010, Noblesville 5.7.2010

    EV: Los Angeles 4.12.2008, Los Angeles 4.13.2008, Nashville 6.17.2009, Nashville 6.18.2009, Memphis 6.20.2009

Welcome!

It looks like you're new here. Sign in or register to get started.
Sign In
Register

Quick Links

Categories