If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears is the debut album by the Mamas and the Papas, released in 1966. In 2003, it was ranked number 127 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time, with its rank rising to number 112 in the 2012 revision. The stereo mix of the album is included in its entirety on All the Leaves are Brown, a 2-CD retrospective compilation of the band's first four albums and various singles, as well as on The Mamas & the Papas Complete Anthology, a 4-CD box set collection released in the UK. The mono mix of the album was remastered and reissued on vinyl by Sundazed Records in 2010, and on CD the following year.
No. 1: The original cover features the group in a bathroom, sitting in a bathtub with a toilet in the corner. These were pulled from stores after the toilet was declared indecent; they have since become valuable in the collector's market with one copy selling at auction for $300.
No. 2: Most of the toilet bowl is covered with a scroll listing the presence of "California Dreamin'" on the album
No. 3: Two additional songs from the album are shown on the scroll: "Monday, Monday" and "I Call Your Name"
No. 4: Same as No. 3 but with a Gold Record Award blurb added to the left of the group
No. 5: Black cover with closely cropped shot of the group removed any hint that the picture was taken in a bathroom
The album received a positive retrospective review in Rolling Stone, where critic Rob Sheffield remarked "The Mamas and the Papas celebrated all the sin and sleaze of Sixties L.A. with folksy harmonies, acoustic guitars and songs that told inquiring minds way more than they wanted to know. And on their January 1966 debut, If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears, they somehow made it all sound groovy." He described the album as a dark look at L.A. culture that sounds accessible and optimistic thanks in large part to Lou Adler's production. Bruce Eder wrote for AllMusic that the album "embraced folk-rock, pop/rock, pop, and soul, and also reflected the kind of care that acts like the Beatles were putting into their records at the time." He added that it had a stronger polish than The Mamas and the Papas' other albums, in part because it predated the personal conflicts which tainted their later works. The album was included in Robert Dimery's 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.
