Bob Dylan, Knocked Out Loaded, and the Daughters of Doom
In June of 2014 master Bob Dylan researcher Scott Warmuth posted the cover of the January 1939 issue of a pulp magazine, “Spicy-Adventure Stories,” to his Facebook page without comment. To Dylanologists the image of a firecracker señorita about to crown a bandito with an earthenware jug needed no explanation. It was the heretofore unknown source for the album cover art of Dylan’s 1986 album, Knocked Out Loaded.
Although the Knocked Out Loaded cover was attributed to a Charles Sappington, Sappington had been careful to distance himself from its creation in a 2009 interview with “The Houston Chronicle.”
Q: Did you create the image for the album cover? Or just the design?
A: I created the package. However, the deal was at the time … I promised them I wouldn’t talk about it. There was a reason, and it was legal. They had some legal problems with that cover. I suspect enough time has passed, but I have to stick to my word unless I get approval from the Dylan camp. What I can say is that Bob Dylan supplied the original image and then we distorted it from there.
