Glen Wexler is a preeminent album cover artist and photographer who has worked with many well-known musicians and rock bands, including Van Halen, Michael Jackson, Steve Miller Band, Rush, KISS, Yes, Black Sabbath, ZZ Top, Slaughter, the Black Crowes, Bob Weir, Boston, Kansas, Chaka Kahn, Herbie Hancock, Whitesnake, Peter Frampton, and Chick Corea. With more than 300 great album covers in his portfolio, Wexler’s work has been presented at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Wexler’s work often has a mysterious and surrealistic feel to it. Many of his works use circus sideshows images to help create this effect. The work of Wexler on Slaughter’s “Stick It To Ya” and “Stick it Live” record album covers are perfect illustration of this influence. Both album covers have knife-throwing themes with other circus images in the background. On Van Halen’s “Balance” album cover, Wexler has placed a set of Siamese twins on a seesaw, ironically making it completely out of balance. More recently in the video, “No Money, No Love”, directed by Wexler for the rock group Heaven and Earth, we see a number of sideshow images, including a clown on slits, a dwarf, a magician, a fire performer and a man with an abnormally long, serpent tongue. These images are used to create a sense of weirdness or absurdity within a realistic context, or as Wexler refers to them “improbable realities”.

Slaughter – “Stick it Live” record album cover