After a 20 year career built through a relationship with a major label and fans, Counting Crows now want to continue their legacy directly with you, no more middle man!
Be a part of Counting Crows' future by designing the album package that leads the campaign for the new face of what it means to be free of a major label, and making independent decisions.
This is a collection of cover songs entitled Under the Covers Underwater Sunshine. Just as the Crows are interpreting songs written by others, you have the opportunity to be a part of this truly unique album by visually interpreting the Crows.   Be inspired by the style of Counting Crows' past album artwork and capture the essence of the trendsetting band.
Inspiration for the album art should come from the overall feel of the Crows' music, the songs posted here, and the concept behind this album.   Use the provided template to submit a cover design. The winning designer will work with Counting Crows' creative director to develop the rest of the album layout.
Counting Crows' new album will be released March 27th, 2012.

Click here for details and your chance to enter.

Good luck!

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UPDATE:

I'M CHANGING THE TITLE!!!!!

I can't help it. I've always liked "Under The Covers" but lately it keeps striking me as a little meh. Also, there are about 100 other albums called "Under The Covers".

I'm going to name the album after the website we never quite finished building because they're both kinda meant do the same thing: shed a little light on some cool stuff we love that you might not otherwise see.

So...from now on, this record is called "Underwater Sunshine". Alternately, there's a longer version of the title which you're also free to use : "Underwater Sunshine (or What We Did On Our Summer Vacation)".

It's up to you (I like the longer one better but it seems a lot to burden you with).

I should tell you a little about the record. Brian Deck, who produced "Sunday Mornings" and is mixing this record, says a lot of bands ask him about working with us and he always tells them how deeply we all love, and are still fascinated by, music. It's true. We're lost in our music and we're obsessed with everyone else's. He thought this was a fitting record to make because it's a real expression of that. You may or may not know most of these songs - some of them you almost certainly won't have heard - so you might wonder why we chose them. We work in a music business whose pop culture celebrates "business" but a lot of the best music doesn't necessarily do the best business. It's still great music. Truthfully, it's not even really about business. There's so much great music made every day. It's inevitable that most of it gets missed. The songs on "Underwater Sunshine" come from old bands and young, they stretch from the early 60's to earlier this year, and they were both recorded for major labels and, some cases, just for a few friends to hear. Either way, they're all great songs and hopefully they'll be heard by a few more people now.

It wasn't an intentional theme but it did sort of fall out that a lot of the songs on this record aren't well-known. It wasn't something we did on purpose but, like I said, there's just a lot of great music made every day and there's no way for anyone to hear all of it. I wonder if most people realize that independent music is truly flourishing today. Aided by the support of blogs and the relative ease of modern recording, bands are making great records, touring, and - most importantly - surviving...all without major label contracts.

Anyway, I know you wonder why we didn't just write our own record. Well...mostly because we just wanted to do THIS one. We live in an era of songwriting these days but (I hate saying this) songwriting isn't all there is to music. Sometimes it's great to play someone else's music and try to make it your own. Or just because it's fun.

(shrug)

Anyway, it's our first independent release and it seemed a good time for it so we took a week in April and another week & a half in June and we recorded all these songs. These are a list of tunes likely to be on the record and the bands who originally recorded them just to give you an idea. Don't use them in your art. Be inspired by anything you want but NO FUCKING BIRDS. Please.

"Jumping Jesus" by Sordid Humor
"Start Again" by Teenage Fanclub
"All My Failures" by Dawes
"Meet On The Ledge" by Fairport Convention
"Like Teenage Gravity" by Kasey Anderson & The Honkies
"Ballad of El Goodo" by Big Star
"Coming Around" by Travis
"Four White Stallions" by Tender Mercies
"You Ain't Goin' Nowhere" by Bob Dylan (originally recorded by The Byrds)
"Untitled (Love Song)" by The Romany Rye
"Ooh La La" by The Faces
"Hospital" By Coby Brown
"Return of the Grievous Angel" by Gram Parsons
"Mercy" by Tender Mercies
"Amie" by Pure Prairie League