Is Chris Brown's new album cover an artistic tribute or lazy pastiche?

Chris Brown's new album BROWN has sparked a lot of debate, and not just because of its 27 tracks. Break Rules Only When Necessary (the title is an acronym as well as the singer-songwriter's surname) is also causing controversy due to the album cover art, which alludes to pop and R&B classics of the past.

If you think that 'not so casually reclining on one elbow' pose looks familiar, it's not just because of David Brent in the office. It was used on a host of covers in the 1980s, including Michael Jackson's Thriller, Luther Vandross's Give Me the Reason, Teddy Pendergrass’s It’s Time for Love and the Lionel Richie single You Are.

Is Chris Brown's resurrection of the classic '80s lean a respectful homage or an egotistical and lazy pastiche?

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On social media, people were quick to point out the familiarity of the BROWN album art, which shows the R&B star reclining in a tan suit and fedora. The photo has been edited to achieve a soft bloom effect where the lighting hits Brown's hat from behind, heightening the comparisons to Michael Jackson's Thriller cover from 1982.

For some, the similarities suggest Brown is trying to equate himself with the greats of the past, which has led to accusations of self-aggrandisement. “He wanna be a Michael son sooo bad,” one person writes on X. Others see it as mimicry bordering on parody, which could be seen as ridiculing the founding fathers of the genre.

Others are people are mocking the imagery for being derivative or looking like the kind of “AI-generated soul covers” found on YouTube. One person calls it “boring” and “lowest vibrational art", while others fail to see a link between today's R&B and that of the '80s.

Nostalgia is everywhere these days, and Chris Brown's twelfth studio album is hardly the first to reference cover art from the past. Cover art references do often tend towards parody, like The Clash's pastiche of Elvis Presley's debut for London Calling, Frank Zappa's clone of Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club for We're Only in It for the Money of Gorillaz take on The Beatles Let it Be, although Eminem intended his cover for Kamikaze to be a homage to the Beastie Boys' Licensed to Ill.