Blu Peter: Widescreen & Digital 1999, UK
The Velvet Underground: Andy Warhol 1967, USA, Silkscreen Print
The Designers Republic (tDR) is a graphic design studio, established in 1986, known for its “anti-establishment aesthetics.” Its album designs appear to celebrate consumerism and mimic the uniformity of corporate branding (e.g. Coca-Cola). In 1999, advances in tools of the trade like Adobe Photoshop allowed firms like tDR to produce covers with precisely manipulated images.
This 1967 album cover is notable for featuring an Andy Warhol silkscreen print. It has since become one of the most critically acclaimed rock albums in history, appearing at number thirteen on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the “500 Greatest Albums of All Time.” The image has become iconic due to the album’s success and the lasting popularity of Andy Warhol.
This cover is a prime example of digital montage where identically sized images of calculators form a pattern of excessive repetition. The overall minimal aesthetic pays homage to web economy with a plain title centered over the digitized background.
When it was reissued as a compact disc in 1996, the silkscreen banana print remains the cover image. Given the visibility of the interior of the cases, the image of a peeled banana is incorporated beneath the CD.
Queen: The Miracle 1989, USA
Green Day: American Idiot 2004, USA
This cover utilized then cutting-edge image-manipulation technology to combine photographs of the four band members’ faces into a singular morphed image. The cover resonates with their decision to dispense with individual credits and simply present their music as the product of Queen the entity. The back cover went a step further with a seamless regiment of the bands’ eyes.
This was Green Day’s seventh studio album. The cover art and title reflects the politically tumultuous year of its 2004 release. The band’s name is displayed in white while the album title American Idiot is displayed in red. The centerpiece is a white hand holding a grenade in the shape of a heart, with blood dripping down the hand.
Courtesy of React Records
Courtesy of Capitol Records
As an omnipresent trend, musician portraits are experiencing a renewed status with the present iTunes age of tiny digital icons. This design remains very recognizable despite the downsizing, which is true of most portrait-style album covers.
Web Economy
The idea that the Internet promotes the excessive distribution of duplicate images. These images lose inherent value as the products of millions of pixels in this abstract, intangible realm.
Courtesy of Verve Records
Courtesy of Reprise Records
Throughout the last half-century, many bands have promoted peace and protested war, nuclear weapons, and political leaders via both their music and album art. However, barely legible on a 1-inch digital icon, message-filled imagery is nearly extinct.
Evolution
This design translates from large 12-inch record album scale to 1-inch digital icon scale and remains recognizable despite the downsizing.
George Hardie: The Dark Side of the Moon 1973, UK
Roger Dean: Tales from Topographic Oceans 1973, USA, Watercolor
This was the eighth studio album by English progressive rock group Pink Floyd displaying Hardie’s iconic dispersive prism on the cover. Richard Wright instructed them to come up with something “smarter, neater—more classy”. The prism represents three elements: the band’s stage lighting, the album lyrics, and Wright’s request for a “simple and bold” design.
Since the beginning of the record industry, musicians have often felt visual art enhanced the music on their records, and have partnered with professional artists to create a holistic album experience—both visual and musical.
Courtesy of Tower Records
In 2003, VH1 declared this the fourth-greatest album cover of all time, and in 2009, listeners of the UK radio station Planet Rock voted the packaging the greatest album cover of all time, proving that a minimal design can be very effective.
Courtesy of Atlantic Records
Artwork for Yes’s Tales from Topographic Oceans (design and illustration) was done by Roger Dean. Dean designed many of the group’s album covers, forming a continuing story in pictures. He also created the iconic Yes logo. This album has often ranked on lists for “Best Albums of All Time.”
The Doors: LA Woman 1971, USA
David Juniper: Led Zeppelin II 2004, USA
This was the last album recorded by The Doors. Shortly after its release, Jim Morrison, the lead singer, tragically passed away. Although the cover art is simple, it provides a very powerful picture of the band. Given the impact of Jim Morrison’s death, his portrait on the cover of this album helped bolster sales for the record.
This was Led Zeppelin’s second album, and it follows a long tradition of visual references to politics and history. David Juniper was the art director, and the cover’s picture was taken from a historical photo from World War I. The original was of the German air corps-made famous by the Red Baron.
Courtesy of Elektra Records
Courtesy of Reprise Records
The original black and white photo was tinted, and the faces of the men in the division were replaced with the band members’. Within the clouds, the words “Led Zeppelin II” reference a picture of a zeppelin in the opposite corner.
Records Today
The vinyl record disappeared from the mainstream in 1991. Then, in 2008 they appeared to have regained popularity with nearly 2.9 million units shipped (the most in any year since 1998).
Remix
A remix is an alternative version of a song, made from an original version. This term is also used for any alterations of media other than song such as album art. Free file sharing via the web has enabled DJs to recycle old music into new creations (e.g. Girl Talk, now playing).
“The image represents a visual reference for the music that is permanent. When I think back to my favorite albums, the artwork is the first thing that flashes in my mind. The classic albums were an event, a cultural identifier.” Beck Hansen, musician
“What was once stiff cardboard, specified in different finishes, embossed and die-cut, will now be flimsy paper stuffed into a plastic box… not surprisingly, the impact of the original was lost.” Stefan Sagmeister, graphic designer
“In a couple of years they (compact discs) will seem as outdated as vinyl now: MP3 is here to stay and the combined computer/TV/music center in every household a real possibility.” Stefan Sagmeister, graphic designer
The Digital Age When record albums first became affordable to the masses, their art became visible in store windows, on posters in bedrooms and on T-shirts. The musicians on the covers were idolized and gazed at by adoring fans, and many of the striking images on album covers defined entire generations. Music and the art that represents it have acted as powerful mediums in our popular culture, catalysts for fashion trends, inspiration for young artists and budding political activists, and ultimately, the covers have become iconic for people all over the world. There was a time when art spoke volumes about the album it was representing; however, 12-inch record albums are not the norm anymore as we have entered the digital age. Much of the hand-rendered quality of the artwork on records released in the 1950’s-1980’s is barely recognizable in the transformation to the 1-inch x1-inch digital icon. The details are lost and so is the impact of album art design on pop culture today. As the physical product of the record album dies out, record shops are closing and iTunes gathers more and more customers every day. For people downloading music illegally and sharing burned CDs with their friends, album art is nonexistent; it is like the web’s “404 ERROR FILE NOT FOUND” message.
RECORD: An Evolution of Album Art Music is universal, both culturally and among generations, and the album art has played an influential role in free expression. This exhibition takes a look at the evolution of album art from 1960-2010 and highlights the relationship between technological advancements and formatting. From record albums to compact discs (CDs) to digital files (MP3s), the progressive downsizing of the original 12-inch cardboard record sleeve results in a mere 1-inch by 1-inch digital icon. The three panels explore the changes in imagery from the large-scale to the minute, from the expressively detailed and tactile to the flat and pixilated. One must ask, is album art obsolete— what will follow the digital icon? The exhibition will explore four major categories of album art: covers making political statements or historical references, artistic covers, covers emphasizing musician portraiture and minimalist covers. Various albums are highlighted with additional information in reference to each category. The location key indentifies these in red on the right-hand side of each label. Definitions: From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Vinyl Record = an analog sound storage medium consisting of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove (the rotational playing speed is denoted in r.p.m.)
Compact Disc = an optical disc used to store digital data (the readable surface of a Compact Disc includes a spiral track wound tightly enough to cause light to diffract into a full visible spectrum)
MP3 = a patented digital audio encoding format using a form of lossy data compression algorithm (a 128 kbit/s setting will result in a file that is about 11 times smaller than the CD)
MP EG 1800
94 Emile Berliner’s United States Gramophone Company begins selling single-sided 7-inch discs
1900
03 12-inch records now for sale commercially. The 10-inch record is standard, holding 3 min of music on each side
39 Vinyl was first tried out as a 78 rpm material, mailed as a cigarette radio commercial to stations
82 In 1978, Sony demonstrates an optical digital audio disc similar to the Compact Disc introduced in 1982
94 The German Fraunhofer Society releases the first software MP3 encoder called l3enc
95 With the 1st real-time software MP3 player Winplay3, people are able to encode and play MP3 files on their PCs
2000
01 Apple launches the first iPod, a 5, 10 GB portable media player. The 5 GB can hold up to 1,000 songs
09 Apple launches the iPod Family. Over 260,000,000 worldwide have sold as of April, 2010