The ten: Naked cover stars | OMM

Plenty of album sleeves boast acres of naked flesh, but only a few brave artists have stripped off themselves, blushes Luke Bainbridge

The idea to replicate Manet's Le déjeuner sur l'herbe for the cover of Bow Wow Wow's first album proper, with 14-year-old singer Annabella Lwin, came from manager Malcolm McLaren. 'I was still at college when Malcom saw my work and liked the painterly quality of it,' recalls photographer Andy Earl . 'He came up with the idea of copying Déjeuner on Saturday and we shot it on Monday. I drove round Surrey looking for locations in my old landrover and found this spot at Priory Park, near Rygate. Annabella didn't know about the idea until she turned up and Malcolm showed her the original painting. She said: "What, I've got to take my clothes off ?" Malcolm said: "Well, you're not going to let the band down, are you?". I had no idea she was only 14.' The image above is a previously unpublished shot from the shoot. As they all finished, a primary school outing traipsed past, glimpsing slightly more nature than their teachers intended. When Lwin's mother found out what had happened, she reported McLaren to the police, who confiscated most of the negatives, putting the kibosh on the sleeve plans. But Lwin's mother later changed her mind and the image was finally used for a 1982 EP.

2 - John & Yoko Two Virgins

Recorded the night Lennon and Ono consummated their relationship, Unfinished Music, No 1: Two Virgins was almost unlistenable. EMI refused it a release so it came out on the Who's label. In a paper bag. Not the 'bagism' that John and Yoko later promoted.

3 - Man Revelation

Swansea may not have been at the epicentre of the Summer of Love, but Man let it all hang out on the cover of their debut album in January 1969. Lead single 'Erotica' was a hit in Europe, but banned in the UK for simulating the sound of an orgasm.

4 - The Slits Cut

For the cover of their important debut, the hugely influential first ladies of punk donned nothing but loincloths and rolled around in mud. 'If feminists were against it, that's probably proof we weren't feminists,' singer Ari Up told OMM 25 years later.

5 - Red Hot Chili Peppers Abbey Road EP

Paul McCartney went barefoot on the cover of the Beatles' Abbey Road, but the Chili Peppers took it a little further for their spoof. 'Cocks in socks' was regular stage attire for the band in 1988. Guitarist Hillel Slovak died of a heroin overdose later that year.

6- Prince Lovesexy

Released after Prince recalled The Black Album, declaring that record to be 'immoral'. Some shops took offence at the image of the singer (or perhaps just at the suggestive flower) and refused to stock it, or censored the sleeve themselves.

7 - Janet Jackson Damita Jo

Not her first cover to feature a flash of flesh, but Damita Jo was released during the fallout from Jackson's 'wardrobe malfunction' during her performance with Justin Timberlake at the Superbowl in 2004, outraging middle America.

8 - Liz Phair Liz Phair

The Phair naked lady had already bared all for the 'all fur coat no knickers' sleeve of her 1993 debut Exile in Guyville, and 10 years on she decided to prove she still had what it takes, physically if not musically, for her eponymous 2003 album.

9 - Marilyn Manson Mechanical Animals

Manson had already appeared naked on 1996's Antichrist Superstar, but it took this image two years later to earn him a ban from several retail chains. Marilyn shocked no one when he later married the burlesque artist Dita von Teese.

10 - Manic Street Preachers Generation Terrorists

Richey Edwards's tattoo actually read 'Useless Generation' but it was retouched for the band's first LP cover. The missing guitarist had previously carved '4 Real' into the same arm with a razor blade.

ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7tbTEoKyaqpSerq96wqikaKeSqLKzwsSrZqilnWTBqbGQaWasrJ%2BnxnB8i2VocG1mbIV5eI9pZaGsnaE%3D