Album artwork either black or gray w/ music note

I had the same problem. I just went to iTunes and found the specific albums that were black on my iPod. I then clicked (right clicked) on a song from that album, went to "Get Info" then went to the "Album Art" section of that. There should be a picture of the album art there. I then deleted it. I did the same for every song in the album, until the picture next to where it says the album was the little gray thing with a music note on it (or whatever it looks like). Then I just clicked on "Advanced", then "Get Album Artwork". The album art should now be once again applied to the songs that you just deleted it from. Now resynch your iPod and the album art should appear. If the black space is still there, just repeat the steps again, once again going into iTunes and deleting the album art. For me, I had to do this a few times for one album in particular. You can also upload your own picture for the album art, rather than clicking "Advanced" and "Get Album Artwork". I had to do that for one album that continued to have a black space.

Hobbitluvr,
I have the newest version of itunes, and if you do, I think I'll be able to help you. When you have your itunes open, go to the "view" tab at the top left hand corner and select "as cover flow" This should give you a screen where the coverflow is the top part of your screen, and there is your library at the bottom. It may seem like you have your album covers in, but they aren't. if you double click a song in your library, and the album cover shows up in the coverflow AND the bottom left hand corner, that mean that when you sync your ipod the cover will show up. BUT if the album cover only shows up on the coverflow but now on the bottom left hand corner, well that's where your problem is. Most of my songs are from cd's, so i just google the album cover in google images, then drag the missing cover into the bottom left hand corner. This should solve your problems.

Alrighty, ive been looking for this help for a while too. I have just one question to possibly make it easier - where does itunes store the album art pictures??? I have looked through my directory and cant find it...??

Cheers
smokey

If you have uploaded the songs off of a CD, the iPod will do that. iTunes is not familiar with that CD album display/artwork. I have the same thing on mine, but I eventually figured it out. If you buy songs from iTunes, the album's artwork will appear.