Recently in Graphic Design Category

Last week, Cleveland Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert was publicly ridiculed for using the Comic Sans font in an angry letter to player LeBron James. The letter was posted on the team's website after James announced that he is leaving the team. Gilbert's ridiculous font choice was instantly a trending topic on Twitter and become a hot topic on blogs across the Internet.

It has been quite a long time since I have seen Comic Sans used on an album cover. However, I often see other fonts that have become cliche from overuse or have been reviled by graphic designers for their lack of artistic merit. There are just some fonts that should not be used unless it is intended to be ironic. The recent cover for the album Brothers by The Black Keys (above right) is an excellent example of an ironic cover. It uses a version of the overly common font Cooper Black for a generic look.

Recently, I saw that the font Copperplate Gothic was used for the cover of David Archuleta's forthcoming single, Something 'Bout Love (below). Copperplate Gothic is certainly not as despised as Comic Sans. However, it is a font that has been used for countless rock and heavy metal album covers. It has a kind of horror movie look to it, especially when modified to include crosses and other symbols. It definitely doesn't work on a David Archuleta cover.

Perhaps the art director who approved Copperplate Gothic for Archuleta's cover should have gone the ironic route instead and used Comic Sans and Cooper Black. At least that would have been cute and creative.

In 1962, legendary pop artist Andy Warhol caused quite a stir in the art world with Campbell's Soup Cans, thirty-two canvases each featuring a painting of a Campbell's Soup can (right). Each painting represents a diffferent variety of Campbell's Soup.

I saw Campbell's Soup Cans in the 1980s at an Andy Warhol exhibit in Los Angeles. Like most of Warhol's work, the scale was surprising. The canvases take up a huge amount of wall space. It can be seen on permanent exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. The paintings at MoMa are arranged in the order they were introduced to the public by Campbell's.

Campbell's Soup Cans was one of the first major pieces that uses a branded product label as fine art. It led to an entire series of Campbell's Soup can paintings by Warhol. There have been dozens of parodies and tributes of the work over the past 48 years.

I do not know how many album covers have been based on Campbell's Soup Cans. Two recent exampes is Soup by The Beautiful South and The Housemartins and Dog Food by Mondo Generator.

A version of the collaboration by The Beautiful South and The Housemartins actually came in a soup can. I have seen an alternate cover that looked more like a copy of the Warhol painting. I assume it was changed due to copyright issues.

The Mondo Generator cover more closely resembles the Warhol original. I think it stands up better as a parody of Warhol rather than an imitation.

The Beautiful South and The Housemartins - Soup (2008)

Mondo Generator - Dog Food (2010)

Posted by: zeefritz

When I first saw the album cover for the forthcoming Christina Aguilera album, Bionic (right), I took an instant dislike to it. Now that I have seen the original photograph on which the cover is based, I hate it even more.

So, I opened the photo up in Photoshop and started messing around with it to see if I could come up with an album cover that conveys the "bionic" theme without making Aguilera look like a robot zombie that has had half of its face removed. The Rocky Horror mouth that the artist pasted on her doesn't even resemble Aguilera's.

I also dislike the horror movie blood streams that have been applied to the typography. The typography is also very weak and not proportioned well on the image.

I decided to apply some futuristic tattoos to Aguilera's face. I wanted the effect to be subtle, yet convey the idea that she is perhaps part machine. I think that the result is a nice start. The tattoos need quite a bit more detail and 3D effects, but I think this is a major improvement.

I think what I would like to end up with is something that is similar to what H.R. Giger did for Debbie Harry (right), just not as morbid and creepy. I haven't found just the right font yet either. I think a custom font would be nice for a major artist like Aguilera. (I'll be updating the image as I work on it.)

I'm known for being somewhat of a "font geek" in my circle of very geeky friends. I am usually the one people call when they need to identify a certain font on an album cover. Often, I am able to help. In other cases, I can't. That's because many fonts used on album covers are custom fonts that have been created especially for the artist. It may be similar to an existing font. It could also be unique.

However, there are many recording artists that use a common font. I have listed a few of them below, along with the name of the font.

Weezer - Century Gothic

Oasis - Arial Black Italic

Glee - Avant Garde Medium

Yazoo - Broadway

Coldplay - Albertus MT

The Clash - Stencil

Do you have a favorite album cover font? If so, let me know about it by leaving a comment. I may share in an upcoming article.

 

• http://www.amazon.com/Mischievous-Art-Jim-Flora/dp/1560976004/

Here is a short clip of street artist Mr. Brainwash discussing the album covers that he created for Madonna’s recent retrospective collection Celebration. I wrote previously that the cover for the standard version of the album fails due to the cliché Andy Warhol-style blue eyeshadow and red lipstick that the artist applied to her face.

Mr. Brainwash also says that he feels his album cover is better than the 1962 Andy Warhol portrait (right) that inspired it. Obviously, Mr. Brainwash doesn’t understand that Warhol applied the garrish makeup and yellow color to Marilyn’s face as a form of social commentary. It was an insult to her beautiful face to cover it with harsh colors, masking the real person beneath the artificial image.

After Monroe’s suicide in August 1962, Warhol used a 1953 publicity shot of the actress by photographer Gene Korman to create his silkscreen portrait of her. It was a shocking image at the time. No one had ever seen the face of Marilyn Monroe reduced to pop art in this way. Warhol’s portrait was timely and extremely morbid.

For Mr. Brainwash to copy this important work of art and claim that his imitation is better than the original is ridiculous. It shows a lack of understandering of the artist he is imitating. Perhaps if he’d created his album cover shortly after Madonna’s death it would have a similar impact and an irony worth consideration. However, it would still be an imitation of Andy Warhol.

The nominees for the 52nd Annual Grammy Awards were announced yesterday. The three categories that are of most interest to album art aficionados are those for Best Recording Package, Best Boxed Or Special Limited Edition Package, and Album of the Year.

Here are the nominees for Best Recording Package and Album of the Year for recordings released during the eligibility year October 1, 2008 through August 31, 2009:

Best Recording Package

Spinal Tap - Back From The Dead
Brian Porizek, Art Director

David Byrne & Brian Eno - Everything That Happens Will Happen Today
Stefan Sagmeister, Art Director

Neko Case - Middle Cyclone
Neko Case & Judge, Art Directors

Splitting Adam - Splitting Adam
Jeff Harrison, Art Director

Various Artists - Tathagata
Szu Wei Cheng & Hui Chen Huang, Art Directors

The Spinal Tap CD packaging features an “action figure stage show” that can be assembled from an insert in the jewel case. I wrote about it a few months ago. I am not surprised it was nominated. The David Byrne and Brian Eno CD also has a very cool design. From photos that I have seen, the Tathagata CD features what appears to be handmade paper.

My favorite for the win in this category is Splitting Adam’s self titled album. It features an amazing 3D hologram as demonstrated in the video below.

Album of the Year

Beyoncé - I Am… Sasha Fierce

The Black Eyed Peas - The E.N.D.

Lady Gaga - The Fame

Dave Matthews Band - Big Whiskey And The Groogrux King

Taylor Swift - Fearless

Of course, album art won’t be a consideration in selection of the Album of the Year. However, the winner and the nominees will influence the design of album covers for years to come. Art directors tend to look at successful and critically acclaimed albums for inspiration. I really do not have a favorite among the nominated albums as far as album art goes. They are all fairly average.

Taschen Books has recently published Alex Steinweiss, The Inventor of the Modern Album Cover, an amazing 422-page collectors’ volume that illustrates the career of the graphic designer who is credited for the invention of the album cover.

I recently read through the entire book online and it is wonderfully done. It has brilliant full-color images of Steinweiss work, including typography, logo design, album covers, movie posters and more. Steinweiss’ career spanned over three decades and the book gives us an excellent look at how his work remained distinctive and influential throughout the years.

Authors Steven Heller and Kevin Reagan have created a book the will be of interest to both graphic design professionals and anyone interested in learning about the early history of the album cover and graphic design in American advertising.

The signed limited edition is limited to 1,500 copies comes in a slipcase. At $500, the limited edition is priced out of reach for most of us. Hopefully, it will be made available to the masses as a standard edition in the near future.

One of my favorite covers of 2009 is for Susan Boyle’s forthcoming album I Dreamed A Dream (right). The album will be released on Monday and it has broken all online presales records.

Fans were delighted when the cover was revealed several weeks ago. There had been speculation that the image for the cover would be a Scotland landscape, similar to the image that was used in the artist’s official website.

Instead, the album features a beautiful black and white portrait of Boyle. Her head is cradled in her hands and she has a sparkling and almost mischievous expression on her face.

I recently came across the color version of the portrait used on the album cover and decided to see what the album cover would have looked like in color rather than black and white. I really like the result. I’ve posted my creation below as a mock up for a deluxe edition of I Dreamed A Dream. I hope that if a deluxe version of the album is released that the record label will consider doing something like this.

I believe this image is just as beautiful in color. The photograph was originally taken by Hugh Stewart for the September 2009 issue of Harper’s Bazaar. This is an excellent example of why using a talented photographer is an important part of album cover design.   

When I read Adam Lambert recent tweet that defends his new album cover as “campy”, I immediately thought of the most recent album cover that I have seen that displays a true sense of gay camp. The cover for the deluxe edtion of Rufus Wainwright’s Millwaukee At Last shows the artist in a bathrobe and putting on a huge diamond earring. Wainwright is also wearing a bit of eyeliner.

The album uses a retro font that adds to the campiness. The concept is simple. The photograph shows Wainwright’s personality and sense of humor. The image of a vain diva playing at a venue in the American Midwest is a joke that anyone can get in an instant.

Recently, photographer Matthew Rolston took a wonderful campy photograph of Adam Lambert for Rolling Stone. Lambert even uses this image as the background of his Twitter homepage. I took that image and applied fonts that are similar to those used on the Rufus Wainwright album. I think the result is an album cover that has much more impact and suits Lambert’s image.

Now, THIS is a campy album cover. I think it works because it is based on the work of a talented photographer and is not overworked. The background is not busy and distracting. It also works with the title of the album. “For Your Entertainment” envokes an image of an artist performing live on stage.

My advice to Adam Lambert is to seek out a talented photographer and art director for your next album cover. Do not try to come up with a cover that screams at the viewer. Your voice already does that.

After I wrote a review of Allison Iraheta’s new album cover (right) this morning, I started thinking about what makes the difference between an average cover that is simply designed to sell the album and those memorable album covers that make a lasting impact. The cover for Iraheta’s Just Like You doesn’t really say much. It features an attractive portrait of the artist, but it doesn’t tell us anything interesting about her — other than the fact that she has brightly colored hair.

If you’re a fan of American Idol, you watched Allison grow as a performer during the competion. She matured from a timid young girl who had difficulty speaking her mind into a confident star. Why isn’t that story conveyed by her album cover?

Below is a mock up of a concept that I came up with for Iraheta’s album cover. It shows her standing in what could be a backyard or neighborhood playground anywhere in the world. Standing in front of a tire swing is a small girl with a frightened look on her face. This child is “just like you” or just like anyone who has ever been small enough to be afraid to jump in that swing and head for the sky.

A talented photographer could do much to improve a concept like this. It would result in a cover for a debut album that Iraheta could be proud of for the rest of her career. I think this kind of image would be inspirational to Iraheta’s young fans who view her as a peer who has already achieved fame and success.

This concept shows a contrast between the edgy pop star that Iraheta has become and the child that she used to be. It is something that will contrbute to her image and be valued by fans years from today. There are dozens of album covers that portray female artists as sexy vixens. There are very few that are smart and sexy at the same time.

It took me about an hour to come up with a concept for this album cover. That demonstrates the small amount of effort that must have gone into creating the final cover for Just Like You. The record label just slapped something together without considering the artist’s image or her future. That is very typical and should serve as a lesson to young artists who are just starting out in the business. Ask for concepts that you can live with for the rest of your career. Your album art will help define you.

Here is an interesting video about the creation of the cover for Snoop Dogg’s forthcoming album Malice N Wonderland by Estevan Oriel and Mister Cartoon.

Apparently, recycling old album art has become a trend. A few weeks ago, I ran across an album cover that featured a collage that was basically a Madonna album cover with first aid tape applied to it. This second example is a bit more sophisicated.

The cover of the upcoming album from Indie rock band Smith Westerns features a collage by artist Jason Matthew Lee. The collage uses a very popular album as the background. I am not sure if the other images are album covers. They could very well be.

This album will be released on July 7 and has not yet been added to the AAX gallery. I listened to a few sample tracks on the band’s MySpace page. They sound okay, but I don’t think I’ll buy even a single track to add the 600 x 600 art to the gallery. Check them out if you get a chance. If you get the album art, please upload it. It is notable for the reuse of a an iconic cover.

If you’re in any way interested in creative CD packaging design, you must watch this video that demonstrates the “action figure stage show” that is included with the new Spinal Tap album, Back From The Dead.

American Rock band The Used released the cover for their upcoming album Artwork today with the following announcement on their website.

Artwork For Artwork

Want to see the cover for the new album? Head over to  http://theused.buzznet.com/ to check it out now!

Get it? The album is called Artwork and they are releasing the artwork for the album. That is so clever (yes, I’m being sarcastic). Personally, I think the cover is pretty darn hidious. I don’t mean the subject matter, either. The artwork for Artwork is over saturated and looks like someone rubbed it down with a sheet of sandpaper. It is very poorly executed. I will let the social critics comment about the drug-related image (although I am squeemish about needles).