Who is on the cover of Hole album ‘Live Through This’?
Grunge is one of the most understated genres in the world. There is little that can achieve as much emotional diversity as grunge does.
The sound which stemmed from the Seattle music scene takes rock and essentially breaks its heart. The guitars are slowed down slightly, as they drone more than you would expect on other songs, while the lyrics pack a punch harder than other songs could only ever dream of doing. It’s a great style of music to listen to, and while its time in the mainstream burned bright and fast, the classics from that period are still considered classics to this day.
When you discuss the greatest grunge albums ever made, there is scope for debate, but there are some names which will no doubt appear on every fan’s shortlist. These include the likes of Pearl Jam’s exciting Ten, Nirvana’s thrashing In Utero, and, of course, Hole’s boundary-ushing Live Through This.
On this record Courtney Love and Co managed to deliver an album which stayed true to the grunge sound that people had come to love but that also introduced new aspects of the genre. A lot of these aspects came in the form of different themes that the band were touching upon. As previously mentioned, grunge had the potential to be a real emotional style of music, and Love took advantage of this.
Throughout the album, she tackles a wide range of subjects that most bands might have been too wary to go near – feminism, violence against women, motherhood, postpartum depression, self-doubt, and beauty, to name a few. Each song stands strong on its own, perfectly crafted to be appreciated in isolation. But when heard together, they don’t feel like a random collection – instead, the cohesion lifts each track, creating something even greater than the sum of its parts.
The tone of the record is bang on in that iconic album cover – a prom queen caught right in the middle of a full-blown meltdown. Her makeup’s smudged, the smile looks forced, and even the way she’s clutching the bouquet feels awkward. It’s a striking, properly memorable image. Shot by Ellen Von Unwerth, it somehow manages to bottle the entire spirit of the album – all without her even hearing a single track.
“The album was still in the making, but I was a big fan of Kurt Cobain and was sure that his girls would produce something equally cool,” said Von Unwerth, “Besides, I go with the flow. I heard the music afterwards and loved it.”
Von Unwerth’s photography really captures the image perfectly, but it begs the question: Who is the distressed prom queen on the cover?
So, who is on the cover of Hole’s ‘Live Through This’?
The woman on the cover of Hole’s iconic album is the model Leilani Bishop. She elevates the look of the album a great deal, as she manages to pull off the look of distress incredibly well.
There is so much carried in her smile that you could hazard a guess at the thoughts going on behind those mascara-smudged eyes. When discussing the thought behind the look, photographer Von Unwerth said that both her and Courtney Love were inspired by a classic horror film.
“Courtney Love called me,” she recalled. “We were on the phone for one hour. I didn’t say much but listened, and Courtney had the idea of re-enacting the scene of the [1976] movie Carrie, which I loved, too […] I just met her the night before the shoot wearing her famous schoolgirl dress. We had some drinks and connected instantly.”
The album itself is anything but horrible, as this grunge classic continues to be a champion of the genre.
