The Captain in Mojave desert by Anton Corbijn 💫

 

Possibly the most widely seen photo of Don Van Vliet, from the 1980 Mojave desert shoot with Anton Corbijn. Anton commented on this photo in 1993: 'When I met Beefheart on an NME assignment in September 1980, I didn’t know much about him at all. I met him at the County Museum of Art in LA and suggested photographing him in the desert, where he’d just come from. He said yes rather reluctantly, and we drove for two-and-a-half hours. It helped that I could pronounce his name properly. Once we’d found the spot to do the pictures, he took off his hat for one shot only and then put it back on, saying, "My wife’s not gonna like this".'