The Smithereens celebrate the 40th anniversary of The Who’s seminal rock opera Tommy (incidentally, one of my all time favourite albums) with a version of their own of the complete album. And what’s more, they asked cartoonist and fantasy painter William Stout to do the artwork. And a great work he did, using the iconic layout of the 1950’s EC horror comics to evoke the angst and the tense atmosphere of the album.
Stout has a history with The Who projects, as he previously also provided the artwork for two bootleg double albums in the early seventies. For The Smithereens, this isn’t the first comic-related project either : for a previous cover projects, B-sides the Beatles, they asked Jack Davis to do the cover artwork (after the break).
