The cover artwork was designed by artist Peter Saville, using a data plot of signals from a radio pulsar, saying "I was convinced that it was just sexier in black" since it represented a signal from space -- a ridgeline plot of radio emissions given out by a rotating neutron star, discovered in 1967 by a student at Cambridge. Designer Raf Simons later used it as a collab signature for an apparel line. Rarely does a cover so perfectly represent (in this case, almost total binary starkness) the music within. Yes I have a t-shirt of this. :)
