The Music Edition.
Contents 1
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Jay-Z, Ice T, NOFX, MGMT, MJ, JK, Karen O, Run DMC, R.E.M, JMJ, U2, LCD, 2PAC, INXS, UB40, Do-Re-Mi
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It’s all just text without no melody. Coz it just don’t bounce without typography.
spangly leotard, hold its name up in lights and shimmy for all the coin it’s worth.
Eventually... EVERYBODY SINGS.
At the end of the day no matter how ‘indie’ or ‘alternative’ a group may deem themselves to be, they still share that pesky (global) problem with us typographers aka “BILLS” and to that end, eventually, EVERYBODY SINGS.
For Twenty Ten’s FFI we’ve worked typography into paying homage to that thing that sounds better with you, that thing that makes the sound of the city disappear, ABBA thanked us for it, the Village People warned us we couldn’t stop it and remember what it did to the bourgoise and the rebels? Queue: MUSIC. Recent history shows us that music can no longer play alone as this commercial planet we inhabit enforces its monetary obsessed laws upon all that dare to create and this most certainly includes musos. Every musical group aims to get ‘signed’, the better signed groups proffer slick logos, these groups are sponsored by product, gigs are sponsored by alco-brands, and gig attendees will inevitably share a visually co-ordinated aesthetic. For just as we select our trainers, our haircuts, our leisure activities and our linguo, we also use our choice of music to further define to the visual world exactly who our external selves want to be. Therefore music is really left with no choice but to pull on a
The four musical streams we have chosen to work from are Structure, Interpretation, Covers and Harmony – each of which can also be related to typography. The four relative teams each created two inspired pieces of typography with accompanying text. Music and typography are a complementary marriage of opposites. Where kerning turns, a yearning note burns. Where plain lowercase fills visual space, its heavy weight shows a depth of bass. Where a typeface e x t e n d s , a song starts to slow, and when text layers up we feel its echo. 2010’s FFI group now ask you to sit back and listen to our visual offerings trusting in the hope that what copy cannot express alone, typography will bring to life with deafening resonance.
I Always Think of Ferdinand
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A New Graff-thetic
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Harm
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Legibility is for Chumps
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What Would Maria Do?
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The lyricist [has] to compete with the modern day pop star.
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FERDINAND CAN’T HELP YOU FIGHT A DOUBLE-D, AUTO-TUNED PENGUIN I had an argument with a colleague the other weekend about the lyricist having to compete with the modern day pop star for playtime on the airwaves.
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My argument was that pop stars such as Lady Gaga or KE$HA are a manufactured and engineered sound with very little consideration for lyrical imagination aiming only to achieve sales through shaping and crafting the most catchy hooks. However the lyricists, John Lennon, Ben Gibbard and Leonard Cohen etc, are the rare-breed who consider not only the shape of their spoken word but the imaginative conception that it inspires within an individual’s mind as well.
Jocelyn Nguyen, It All Starts With a Beat.
/ STRUCTURE
/ STRUCTURE
Every time I have one of these arguments I always think of Ferdinand. I have also found myself having the same argument with her in relation to the contrasting nature of the overly commercial Publisher and the Typographer. It had the same recipe; an overly commercial publisher will attempt to generate profitability for themselves and their author by producing a text that relies solely upon the strength of the words. There is very little consideration for its form other than that which minimises cost. Contrastingly the Typographer will not only consider the imaginative conception that the written word evokes, but will also consider its form and the impact that it will have on the way in which the concept is received and interpreted by the reader. Every time I have one of these arguments I always think of Ferdinand. Ferdinand de Saussure was a linguist born late in 1857 in Geneva, Switzerland. He lived his life both lecturing and studying languages, Latin,
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Greek and Sanskrit that are considered to be the foundation of numerous modern day dialects. He died two years after the completion of his third offering of his Course of General Linguistics at the University of Geneva and it wasn’t until his work was published by two of his old students three years after his death that his theories in linguistics were recognised; theories that later saw him become one of the founding philosophers who stimulated the development of Structuralism. The central notion of Ferdinand de Saussure’s theories were principally involved with the analysis of language within a formal structure that when applied to any dialect would highlight linguistic signs which he titled the Signifier and the Signified. The idea was that the Signifier described the shape of the word or its sound pattern and the Signified was used to describe the mental conception that is formed in response to the word. If I was to say ‘a tame, domesticated lion’ you might think
immediately of a completely smitten, playful lion and that is the very foundation of his analysis; he looked at the sound of the word and subsequent conception in a person’s conscious. My argument seemed to slide perfectly into the theory of de Saussure. Her argument however, no matter the context, is that they are now successful, earning enormous amounts of money and do not have to work ‘early on a Sunday morning like us’. And as I unpack the last box of penguin classics, tapping my foot to another catchy hook by some double D, auto-tuned princess, I realise that I can’t help but agree. Oh well, it was worth a try.
LEFT: Yerevan Dilanchian, All is full of Love.
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MORRISON’S END. I had reached the end much too early, Not late for once but still not on time. We were so close but so far in this frame of mind. You were on the highway into the sunset, I cruised in the slow. Less enjoyment, less pain, Still had an open and powdery brain. Junk up then collapse, That was your thing. It did such a good job of relieving your sting, In the smack you were wrapped The more restless you napped, Was that how you watched me die? Through a numb face And a near closed eye? You pulled the belt for me, And told me I'd drown, I was already more than coming down. Further derailing my life, Thinking Nirvana was close. Pretty springtime, natural energy, So many arms to make me a dose. Your dead flowers brought genius Of a million degrees, Mind spilled into music When we were just fusin'. I'd dumped and snorted only hours ago, It was then that you offered, You needn't have bothered, I had premonitions I'd be feeling abhorred.
Your dead flowers brought genius... Mind spilled into music.
Joanna Frank, The End.
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/ APPROPRIATION
There is more history to graffiti than kids scribbling on walls.
THE CRIME OF GRAFFITI APPROPRIATION “Snap necks at the central stations Young kids making cops run like mental patients Don't they know that graffiti can’t be stopped Writers unlike rappers can't go pop So they stay underground till the day graff is legalized Civil eyes look upon us as evil guys”
ABOVE: Natalie Schwarz The Bronx.
— Looptroop’s ‘Ambush In The Night’
As a summation of society, advertising sucks the soul out of subcultures such as hip hop as they appropriate the work or actions for the masses, in order to sell a product while completely ignoring what has caused the mindset, act, or the art produced. For example, various advertisements for vehicles feature graffiti inspired type and animation seen initially on the streets of L.A and New York and featured as video in the graffiti documentary Wild Style (1983). The four elements of hip hop culture are seen in the video, including MCing (including vocals like rap or beat boxing), break dancing, DJ’ing and graffiti. The combination of these elements makes up a lifestyle, somewhere to fit in outside the square, and most importantly, various avenues of self expression. The lyrics above explain the graffiti experience of hip hop
and the inseparable relationship between not only MC’ing and graffiti, but in the song the DJ’s beat is present and together, they provide music to break dance to. Clearly, there is more history to graffiti than kids scribbling on walls. The differences between the work produced on the streets and those seen in adverts are beyond comprehension unless one has experienced painting the streets. The first and foremost is the reasoning behind the creation of such work: advertisers attempt to use graffiti style to sell a product, while graffiti artists (or ‘writers’) actively painting the streets can be doing it for a variety of reasons, including the exact opposite — an act against the law and what is deemed against the law and what is deemed ‘right’ by general
society, for the adrenaline rush, “fame, artistic expression, power and rebellion” (Brewer, 188). Writers may go through months or years of drawing and painting practice to produce something original in preparation of a ‘piece’ (a three or more colour work, usually type based which may include characters). From there, buying or stealing paint, knowing where and when to paint streets, tracksides or trains, the fear and adrenaline of a police chase, improvisation, quick talking and quick thinking are all parts of graffiti that those appropriating it for different reasons miss out on. The fact that someone could create a graffiti style artwork on their computer in a sterile office, on thousands of dollars worth of software and computer equipment, insert it into the background of an advertisement and
have it printed billboard size and pasted into the community is hardly artwork nor interesting to many if not all involved in the real deal. Without knowledge or understanding of the history and surrounding elements, its meaning is not only lost but gradually crushed as it enters the mainstream. Complaints will arise if trains or walls are coloured, however, no one seems to mind an advertiser’s poor and demeaning appropriation. “A child sometimes is a product of his environment and sometimes a child’s environement is a product of him.” — Mark Gonzales ISSUE 2 / 10
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Techno
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TYPE THAT SINGS
Legibility isn’t the main element I’m attracted to within typography.
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It doesn’t necessarily pop out at you, it sits in the back of your head and you wonder... “Hang on a minute...that’s... messing with me!” Oh, yes indeed. The great thing about either the making of harmony or the execution of anti-harmony is that it evokes a certain emotion, a manufactured emotion; for the good of controversy or just plain allowing oneself to adhere to the overall sensual experience the type is conveying through its characters. Legibility isn’t the main element I’m attracted to within typography, although creating a font that is legible is an art form in itself and a rather difficult skill to master. In my world typography as illustration is where it’s at because ‘everything else has been done before’.
Serif
LeighAnna Webb, Anti-Harmony.
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/ HARMONY
LEFT: Brian Sulaiman Harmony Equalizer.
Until your eyes and ears bleed from the insatiable curiosities...
Experimental typography plays with letter forms for what they are. Balance between arranged type has the ability to create perfect harmony between each negative and positive space generated by each shape. The beauty of its puzzle-like formations enhances its visual capacity to a much higher level, as opposed to something that can be read and possibly forgotten. A viewer won’t usually remember if something is legible due to the typeface — or is that the global description of good legible type? Something so easy to read and unobtrusive that it’s forgotten? All I know is people are more inclined to remember what excites and moves them and for me that is type as image. I want to draw attention to the message via the words rather than let it sink away into the
background never to be contemplated or dreamt about. I want to subject people to sleepless nights, tossing and turning, ever wondering “But, how... that ‘H’... how did they... why did they..?” the unanswered questions of technicalities eating away at you for days, if not weeks. Distressful you say? Inhumane? It sure is. Harmony in type can be perceived in many ways, but essentially, just as in music, it is an important element regardless of its differences in medium and sensual experiences. It draws you in and keeps you wanting more, until your eyes and ears bleed from the insatiable curiosities while the sounds and visuals speak to you personally from origins so epic as to move your soul and forever remain a part of your being.
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NEW YORK HYMN The sun screams loud as it dusty’s in, the dusty louvres let him in. If only they had kept at bay that hymn that to this very day can paint me black, lure me away, force my heart to yesterday. I can’t resist that fist, but then, nor could you — and now again: I am five and you are ten.
Paint me black, lure me away, force my heart to yesterday.
A can of coke as evidence, your nobly meek confession. An eternal moment’s sweet silence, then we, are taught, a lesson. We kneel before our brutal hymn and sing in shame until Amen. Outside the maid finds coke cans missing: I took five and you took ten. Blinking hard I return to now with calm and dread I dial somehow. She knows before I’ve even dared, her babies fatally unpaired. Your bruises hidden in sparkled snow, the New York blizzard your final show. I laugh out loud, my clever big bro!
Belinda O’Brien, New York I Love you.
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/ INTERPRETATION
RIGHT: Josh Climpson, Cosmogramma.
We need an alternate option... music is the answer.
COSMOGRAMMA Whenever I find myself in a bind I ask myself what would Maria do? (I refer of course to that wondrous beast of a phenomenon that is Maria Von Trapp – the completely lovable antagonist from my number one favourite film of all time, The Sound of Music.) The answer to the aforementioned question is naturally always: the right damn thing. So, on that willowy windswept mountain how did Madame choose (very successfully) to teach her seven young charges to carry a tune? Here’s a hint: “Let’s start from the very beginning a very good place to start… when you read you begin with ABC, when you sing you begin with DO RE MI!” You guessed it… she SANG!
Sadly in modern Aussie classrooms my (okay Maria’s) rather progressive idea is shot down as complete bovine excrement which is quite unfortunate when the status quo is examined. In our so-called ‘modern’ world students are still using the same system dinosaurs used way back even before the Whopper was invented! And that system is of course T.E.X.T (time-consuming, exacerbating, Xeroxed trash) books. Text based learning is fine if you harbour a billion extra blood vessels running through THAT side of the brain but spare an exam mark for us creative folk! We ain’t wired like you funny accountant people and this renders us disadvantaged in the
classroom. We need an alternate option and I reckon music is the answer. Try and follow me here ‘K? Let’s use COSMOGRAMMA as a sample. Even just a half hearted listen (and lemme tell with this FlyLo ain’t no half nuthin’ coz boy commands complete ‘tensh yo) leaves you with lessons in history (Alice Coltrane and Jazz), religion (world religion and spirituality via the cosmos), music (how to count beats real easy) and pop culture (an A-Z of Nintendo generational hits) – and that’s just the bare basics. To compliment the vocal lesson we add some visuals to pump up a rounded day of learning.
For example, the sample shown teaches us about the first ever printing block: a curled up hand, dipped in dye and pressed down to form the mark we now know as paisley. YOU DIDN’T KNOW THAT? Hesitate not class-dunce! Ditch the T.E.X.T books and sign up for my S.O.B, School of Beats, coz we are outta the dark ages and seriously off the book!
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The ffi Team EDITORS Tanya Johannesen Alex Bloom Rebecca Nekho Adrian Moore STYLE TEAM Yerevan Dilanchian Jocelyn Nguyen Hollie Tinworth Katherine Roman-Miller TYPOGRAPHY Natalie Schwarz Natalie Lysaught Joanna Frank Rachel Wong WEB DESIGN LeighAnna Webb Brian Sulaiman Arlene Yuwono PROMOTIONS Angela McKay Josh Climpson Belinda O’Brien Emma Hutley SPECIAL THANKS Adrian Moore Rebecca Nekho Wing Lau
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