Hey everyone, PushingUpRoses here and welcome to a very strange video. I recently moved and as such,
had to sort through some of my records and find them a new place to live. The majority
of my collection was my Dad’s, and I inherited it after his passing as we shared a deep love
of music together. His favorite artist was Neil Diamond. (Bah bah bah). Considered one of the
most prolific and talented songwriters of his lifetime, Neil Diamond is known for his unique
storytelling. His discography includes songs like Knackelflurg, and Porcupine Pie. (reaction).
Even more absurd than his songs are his album covers; when you see them all in succession
it’s WILD, so today I will be reviewing and ranking Neil Diamond Album covers.
These are straight from my Dad’s collection so I will only be talking about the ones I have,
otherwise we would truly be here forever, looking at a million different headshots of this man.
Recently, I’ve been thinking about Dad and wanting to find some way to connect with him,
and riffing on these silly records is just what I needed.
Let’s start with Tap Root Manuscript from 1970. This one looks relatively
normal until you turn it around and see Neil Diamond is STALKING you.
The Spice must flow. What’s really great about this is that my Dad used to write what year the
albums charted on the billboard. He wrote it here and it was obviously too dark to read,
so he wrote it again in the lightest part of the cover, his face. Good job Dad. 10/10.
This is Stones from 1971,
in case it wasn’t obvious. Ooo, another one that charted, thanks Dad!!
I look at this one and I think, life is like a box of chocolates, you’ll never know if you
get stones. You see, what you don’t know is that it was originally called Stoned,
but nobody greenlit that so they were like okay STONES. I can’t help but look at this fake window
and think you could just jump through it to some slide that maybe you race a penguin in.
Kinda boring, 2.5/10
Moods! Neil Diamond? More like FEEL Diamond
This is clearly right before he got eaten by the leather jacket,
serving grandmother’s table cloth realness. He’s lookin’ real upset that someone dressed
him like this. It’s definitely puttin’ me in some kind of mood, but not a good one. 4/10.
Ohhhh this one, a classic. Hey girl, You wanna be my sweet Caroline, or my Cracklin Rosie? Hang
on just let me unzip this Neil Diamond costume. Other names for this album include: Hehe!, Help,
I glued my hand to my head! and, Girl, you’ll be a woman soon. …don’t like that. I love that there’s
a sticker for venture on this one, remember Venture? RIP, gone too soon. I am also very
impressed by the WIDTH of Neil Diamond’s hair. This side is almost precisely one half of his
face. You know how there’s this weird standard of beauty that says we are attracted to symmetry?
There should be a unit of measurement for how wide your hair is compared to the size of your face.
Wait a second. What is happening here. Why does his shoulder look dislocated??
This leather jacket is DIGGING into him or something. This is what I feel his bones
look like right now. (plink) So… would you swipe right? Primitive indeed, 2/10.
As you can see, this is the hair prequel to Primitive. We start with this side part,
and end on THIS side part. On the way to the sky? More like On the Way to CLOWN
hair, Obviously, the bigger the hair, the closer to go, which is close to the sky. Let me just
take a quick gander at the track list. Love Burns, Save me, Yesterday’s songs,
Guitar Heaven …IS THIS ALBUM ABOUT DYING? Points for being weirdly dark, 5/10.
Okay. *laughs* Look, I realize that we can go very dirty with this one, but let’s not be obvious.
We’re better than that. Perhaps he is playing air saxophone. Or holding a large piece of bread, or
trying to play the guitar with his mouth. Perhaps he just caught a football or is playing the harp.
Maybe he’s shocked as he reads the receipt for these 400 beads. Or holding a copy of
his hit album primitive, OR MANY copies. The possibilities are endless with this image and
even though it is clearly the worst and I have no idea who greenlit this I am
giving it a 10/10 because of entertainment value, otherwise I would give it a solid 1.
I like this. Lady, Oh!!!! 8/10.
Don’t be distracted by the shininess of this album cover,
this image is portraying pure destruction. See, this isn’t a microphone, it’s a blow
dart; huge godzilla Neil Diamond is about to take this city DOWN 7/10.
Here we have pensive Neil Diamond doing his best Jim Morrison impression.
Let’s take a quick look at the track list. (name a few) Reggae Strut. Ah yes,
nothing quite says Reggae like this. This album cover is surprisingly boring and it
took me too long to figure out this was a microphone. Uninspired, 3/10.
Apparently there was a film based on the novella Jonathan Livingston Seagull,
I did not know that and have never heard of any of this shit.
But if you’re wondering where the seagull is… he’s right there.
Oh my god, He is HOLDING the sunglasses he is wearing from the Serenade album!
Obviously he went to the beach to take a small poop, then went back to record Reggae Strut!
When you open the album, you get this.
Two Neil Diamonds. If you are offended by chest hair, don’t worry, look over here.
Album has a bird on it, so 9/10.
The more I look at this picture, the most baffling it is. He is clearly being
eaten alive by an abnormally large leather jacket. Look at it!! Look how fucking huge
it is. I am not even sure if this is a photoshop, it looks like someone found a
giant leather jacket on the goddamn ground, then photoshopped Neil’s face into it. Save meeeeeeee.
Honestly, the price tag says it all. 4/10.
Welcome to Night Gallery
Ahh, Pensive in Sepia. Someone really went nuts with the sharpen tool here. I’m glad that this
album includes Neil Diamond, but to be fair it’s tough to compete with Miss Babs, which I assume is
why her name is listed above his on his own record. There is a lot of negative space in
this picture so I like to look at it as though Neil Diamond is just wearing the album cover,
like all this white is part of some weird avant guard outfit and all you can see is his face. 7/10
Welp, the jacket got me.
Wow, I am impressed. This is a legitimately good photo of Neil Diamond that doesn’t look creepy.
Even though it looks like someone’s mom took this photo and got their finger in the way,
he is finally NOT directly looking into the camera. Also, I have an admission.
I like the song Heartlight. Turn on your Heart Light, let it shine wherever you go… 10/10
This is probably the best album I have in my collection; it is a compilation of some of Neil
Diamond’s greatest hits, but what’s really neat is that the album cover is a connect
the dots portrait of the man himself. I am showing the version without the lines,
and here’s what my Dad did. Upon initial examination I thought this looked fine,
but after some close scrutiny, realized he clearly messed up and that is why his
nostril is doing a loop-di-loop and why he has a unibrow. He is an abomination,
he begs for death. (high in the sky) Come on Dad, I can do better than that! (eldritch horror)
This concludes my Neil Diamond Album Cover Review video, I hope you enjoyed it and
found these things as bonkers as I do. Even though I mostly joke in this video,
I really do have a connection with my Dad regarding music, and when I hear Neil Diamond
on the radio or see one of his records somewhere, I think about him… (my Dad,
not Neil) and I just feel really happy. Thank you all for watching this and if you have any
other thoughts, riffs, or even suggestions on other musicians you’d like me to ridicule,
please leave a comment. Until next time… turn on your heartlight. (record scratch)
All of the Neil Diamond Jokes!!
WAIT, I almost forgot. In the spirit of Dad jokes, I would like to add a little bonus to this video.
The best Twitter thread of all time. Rapid fire Neil Diamond puns, let’s go!
What if Neil Diamond starred in a critically panned 90s superhero film?
Steel Diamond!
What if Neil Diamond took the place of Justin Timberlake?
Biel Diamond!
What if Neil Diamond owned a thrift store?
Deal Diamond!
What if Neil Diamond were a Sith?
KNEEL DIAMOND? What if Neil Diamond married Heidi Klum?
SEAL DIAMOND - now that’s crazy
What if Neil Diamond was in Get Out?
PEELE DIAMOND?
What if Neil Diamond was a jeweler?
REAL DIAMOND
What if Neil Diamond has to cool down slowly after being under extreme heat?
ANNEAL DIAMOND!
What if Neil Diamond was in a legal comedy with Calista Flockheart?
Ally McBeal Diamond!
Basketball? Shaquille O’Neal Diamond!
What if Neil Diamond were in Deliverance?
SQUEAL DIAMOND - wow, dark
What if Neil Diamond was a delicate cookie on Master Chef? TUILE DIAMOND
What if Neil Diamond was a baby cow?
VEAL DIAMOND
What if Neil Diamond was in the Fast and the Furious?
WHEEL DIAMOND
And my personal favorite:
What if Neil Diamond had been in Pink Floyd?
SHINE ON YOU CRAZY NEIL DIAMOND.
I am so glad we got those puns out of our system. Bye!
Hey everyone, thanks again for watching my video where I rank Neil Diamond album
covers. If you want more content from me, I have a lot on offer on this very channel,
but first I want to shamelessly plug my patreon because I need money to
live. If you want to support the channel in a monetary way, consider joining my campaign,
otherwise please consider leaving a comment, engagement helps a lot.
If you want to see more from me, here are a few suggestions: On the right I have a
short but sweet game review I did on Stray, featuring a very adorable orange tabby cat.
On the left I have the last installment of my flagship series, That Time on Murder, She Wrote,
featuring a murder. Thank you so much again, and as always, I will see you in the next one.