Michael Sumner is the proud proprietor of what should be essentially the most weird assortment of vinyl information within the land. Over the years, this DJ and file salesman has scoured car-boot gross sales, charity shops and second-hand file retailers from Malaysia to Mozambique, from California to Kazakhstan – all searching for the weirdest and wackiest album and single covers he can discover.

The most horrendous of them now characteristic in his new guide, 101 Terrible Record Sleeves. They embrace images of ventriloquists’ dolls, a guitar-wielding robotic, boxers within the bathe, frankfurter sausages on the Moon, a cowboy on a rocking-horse, and a dwarf who as soon as acted as an Oompa-Loompa in Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory.

Sumner’s uncommon passion is a consequence of his day job, which entails looking down high quality second-hand vinyl information he then sells at a store in Ventnor, on the Isle of Wight.

During his rummaging, he recurrently comes throughout file sleeves adorned with pictures which might be hilarious, impolite, in shockingly unhealthy style, or simply downright bizarre.

“If ever I found one that was particularly amusing, I’d buy it, just for a bit of fun,” says this 48-year-old from Shanklin, on the Isle of Wight. “A few of my friends were doing a similar thing, and we found ourselves comparing who had the naffest record sleeves. Then I noticed my collection of bad sleeves was growing.”

Five years in the past, Sumner moved briefly to Eastern Europe, a area he discovered to be a wealthy supply of “naff record sleeves”.

“Particularly Serbia, for some reason,” he provides. “Don’t ask me why.” 12-inch and 7-inch sleeves from the Seventies – earlier than political correctness had taken maintain – offered him with huge amusement, too.

In his guide, a number of musicians from that period have fortunately pictured semi-naked fashions in suggestive poses on the quilt.

“It makes you realise how society and our values have changed,” Sumner explains. “What is acceptable is always moving, always shifting.” He factors out how, in 20 years’ time, even a few of the covers of modern-day information and CDs will look preposterous.

Some of the information he unearthed throughout his travels had been in such unhealthy style he felt he wasn’t capable of embrace them in his guide. On one album recorded by rockers Status Quo, for instance, the picture appeared to glorify home violence. While sure of the demise metallic information he discovered featured deeply misogynistic footage.

The homeowners of the retailers and market stalls Summer visited struggled to know why he plumped straight for the tacky stuff.

“In Dresden, in Germany, I went to this old boy’s shop, and he was proudly showing me his Led Zeppelin and Jimi Hendrix records,” he remembers. “I said, ‘That’s very nice, but can you show me where your rubbish ones are?’ I was there for hours and pulled out loads of great sleeves. He was baffled as to why I was buying all this junk.

“Then I realised I had to walk across the city to the bus station. So I took all the discs out of their sleeves and gave them back to him. He was even more baffled then.

“I want to send him a copy of my book so he doesn’t think I’m this crazy Englishman.”

With so many horrible information to select from, Sumner struggles to pinpoint his very worst of all. When push involves shove, although, he opts for a 1981 German satirical album, referred to as Leberkäs’ Hawaii, which options satirist Gerhard Polt’s head atop pineapple slices, liver and a few wilted lettuce.

Sumner says: “Among all the others, it really is the most bizarre of all.”