Funny jazz album covers by MAD magazine’s Don Martin

11.28.2016
01:11 pm
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Jazzville in Percussion

Anyone who has so much as glanced at an issue of MAD magazine from its heyday three or four decades ago will be familiar with the distinctive imagery of Don Martin; he was one of the magazine’s defining graphic artists, alongside Sergio Aragones, Antonio Prohias, Jack Davis, and Al Jaffee.

Martin worked at MAD for from 1956 to 1987, contributing many dozens of utterly distinctive cartoons. He was identified closely enough with the publication to be habitually referred to as “Mad’s Maddest Artist.” Martin’s stock in trade was what might be considered static slapstick. His characters invariably featured well-nigh cylindrical skulls, outsized schnozzes, and hinged feet, such that a character’s toes might creep over a sidewalk curb.

Don Martin other main trademark was a genius for exaggerated onomatopoeia, as this page helpfully demonstrates. “SHKLIZZORTCH,” “NNYEEOWNNT,” “CRUGAZUNCH,” and “FPFWORPFT” were just a few of the elaborate sound effects he invented for his crazy scenarios. (It’s said that his license plate read “SHTOINK.”)

At some point early in his career, Martin did a series of album covers, five percussion-based albums assembled by Pierre Du Jardin that fit tidily in the original Space Age bachelor pad -type music that Harry Crane from Mad Men might have favored. The covers were squarely in the style Martin had established at MAD, poking fun at the middle-American dorky white male who cannot achieve any level of “exotic” status no matter how much hepcat jazz he listens to. Most of the albums signal this “worldly” flavor with keywords like “Latin,” “South of the Border,” or “Internationale.”

Nobody seems to know what year these came out, but this auction house guesses 1960, which seems reasonable to me. Based on the artwork alone, it seems clear that Martin executed these covers well after establishing his signature style at MAD—indeed, it’s hard to look at these and not conclude that they must be official MAD releases (which they were not).

One reason we can surmise the relatively late timing for this set of five albums is that it was not Martin’s first foray into jazz album cover design. In 1956 he did several album covers for Prestige for noted jazz artists such as Miles Davis and Sonny Stitt, and the style is completely different—they’re not funny (they’re actually a bit grim), you’d never look at them and say “Oh there’s a Don Martin drawing.” If anything they seem vaguely aligned with a flat, Kafkaesque, and/or “sick” style of drawing of that era that might include Saul Steinberg, Basil Wolverton, or Virgil Partch. I’ve included images of those covers as well.

Percussion with a Latin Twist

South of the Border in Percussionland

Cha Cha Cha for Normal People (Percussion Of Course)

Percussion Internationale

And here are five of his Prestige covers, in a completely different style:

Miles Davis and Horns

Sonny Stitt / Bud Powell / J.J. Johnson

Stan Getz, The Brothers

The Art Farmer Septet

J.J. Johnson / Kai Winding / Benny Green, Trombone By Three

Here’s South of the Border in Percussionland for your listening pleasure: