"As if a '70s time-capsule blasted off into space and you're watching it through a holographic filter."

Adam Lambert's description of his new album, the cover design of which is getting a big reaction:

Lyndsey Parker loves it:

Now, I adore this cover's absolutely fabulous retro vibe. (It looks so much like a beauty shot snapped by Andy Warhol in some glitter-dusted private party room at Studio 54, I can almost imagine Bianca Jagger riding a white horse in the background; what's not to like?)

Others are less enthusiastic. Ian Spaceman:

What do you get when you mix together My Little Pony, Ziggy Stardust, a cheesy 80s school picture, the Purple Rain font, and Microsoft Publisher? The new Adam Lambert album cover, that's what. This is artistically indefensible and, I suspect, commercially suicidal.

I'm not sure what "absolutely fabulous retro vibe" feels like to people who didn't live through the 70s when they were really happening. I've been through much of Andy Warhol's visual work and I've read his various scribblings — "Diaries," "Philosophy" — but nothing about that Lambert cover reminds me of Andy Warhol. I thought more of David Bowie, but browsing through old Bowie album covers — after looking at Lambert's — they all looked damned subtle and artful to me. Compare: