Meet the Iconic Figures on the Cover of The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band

June 1 will mark the 50th anniver­sary of the release of The Bea­t­les’ Sgt. Pep­per’s Lone­ly Hearts Club Band, an album con­sid­ered rev­o­lu­tion­ary in every respect. Every­thing from the music itself, down to the album’s cov­er design, broke new ground. To com­mem­o­rate the upcom­ing anniver­sary, the BBC has start­ed to release a series of videos intro­duc­ing you to the 60+ fig­ures who appeared in the cutout card­board col­lage that graced the album’s icon­ic cov­er. (See a map­ping of the fig­ures here.)

Some of the fig­ures are endur­ing legends–Carl Jung, Mar­i­lyn Mon­roe and James Joyce. Oth­ers (e.g., Tom­my Han­d­ley, Bob­by Breen and Tom Mix) have fad­ed into obscu­ri­ty.

Up top, watch the video fea­tur­ing Bob Dylan. No stranger, right? Down below, see the video on Aubrey Beard­s­ley, the Eng­lish artist who cre­at­ed strik­ing illus­tra­tions for works by Edgar Allan Poe and Oscar Wilde, both also fea­tured in the col­lage.

At the bot­tom, see a clip on pio­neer­ing elec­tron­ic com­pos­er Karl­heinz Stock­hausen. The BBC will be adding yet more videos here.

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Relat­ed Con­tent:

How The Bea­t­les’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lone­ly Hearts Club Band Changed Album Cov­er Design For­ev­er

Oscar Wilde’s Play Salome Illus­trat­ed by Aubrey Beard­s­ley in a Strik­ing Mod­ern Aes­thet­ic (1894)

Pio­neer­ing Elec­tron­ic Com­pos­er Karl­heinz Stock­hausen Presents “Four Cri­te­ria of Elec­tron­ic Music” & Oth­er Lec­tures in Eng­lish (1972)