Behind the Racy Cover of Herb Alpert’s ‘Whipped Cream & Other Delights’

Those sultry, come hither eyes, the suggestive fingertip to the tongue, that mountain of whipped topping – it all makes one wonder: What does a woman covered in piles of whipped cream have to do with smooth jazz? The answer: Everything.

Herb Alpert’s 1965 album, Whipped Cream & Other Delights, caused quite a stir upon its release, not because of the music that crackled and popped from its inky, black vinyl, but because of its now iconic cover.

“My first reaction was, ‘Holy shit, man. Too racy,’” the artist told Billboard, recalling the moment he was first shown the concept for the album’s cover. “Obviously now it would hardly register, but at the time I thought, ‘Wow, that’s a little much.’ And I didn’t know, quite frankly, whether it reflected the album — the music I was doing at the time. But we decided to go with it. Obviously, that was fortuitous.”  

The album – credited to the acclaimed trumpeter alongside his Tijuana Brass – would mark the Alpert’s breakout. The project was home to now-standards like the title track and “Lollipops and Roses,” but it would also be the vehicle for one of music’s most iconic images.

Under the Covers

The brainchild of A&M Records’ art director, Peter Whorf, the cover of Whipped Cream & Other Delights features a woman – model Dolores Erickson – scantily clad wearing nothing but the record’s title sweet treat and serving looks that easily cloud the mind. Finger to mouth, she’s an enticing sight against the album’s sickly green background.

Erickson herself looks sickeningly sticky until one ingenious fact is revealed. She’s actually covered in shaving cream. She revealed to the Seattle Times years later that the actual dessert topping melted quickly under the bright lights, so a substitute was needed. Another fact was hidden under the heaps of cream – Erickson was three months pregnant with her son at the time of the cover shoot.

This was not Erickson’s first shoot for an album cover – she had previously been the face of Nat King Cole’s The Touch of Your Lips, the Sandpipers’ Guantanamera, and others. It was also not her strangest modeling job by far.

“It wasn’t unusual for me,” she told Billboard of the whole affair. “I’d worked on a catamaran in the middle of a storm for a cigarette commercial. This was just another job. Peter [Whorf] always told me to make love to the camera. We just had a lovely time.”

Photo Credit: Dewey Nicks