Album artwork –
What is all the fuss?
Here is question that I would to have answered. When have you ever bought an album based on the front? My answer based on my own opinion is never. Surely you buy your music based on the concept that you actually bloody like it, or is that just a stupid statement. Whenever a new album comes out from highly anticipated artist, there is always criticism about the album artwork. If that is something that you are concerned about then is it not the age old statement of do not judge a book by its cover?
There are a few numbers of artists who have recently come under scrutiny for the uninspired album cover, or the lack of so to say. Even the album covers that people delve further into so see if it means something more than they are being told. Nine tines out of ten though there is nothing else behind it, other than they liked the look and it seemed a fitting cover. So why all the controversy then? Could it be that the album is that amazing, they need something to pick at (it is not often you find an album that is track for track stupendous)? Or is it that people want to delve into the minds of the artist further? The answer is probably none of these. In this day an age people enjoy picking the tiniest fault with anything. This is the job a critic is it not. Yes we are here to praise the product, but also we need to find fault also. Nothing is ever absolutely perfect in life so it won’t be in music.
One of the controversial album covers that brought a lot of media attention to it was that of Hard-Fi second album “once upon a time in the west”. This caused many tongues wagging as the outer sleeve of the album was designed as colour it in your self kind of project. Now this was just the outer sleeve, the inner case actually had how the cover should look, which again brought criticism towards it. It was thought that design was not original and very uninspiring. Again you’re not going to go into a record store and refuse to buy the album on principle that its album artwork is not up to scratch. So why is there big problem with it? It is how the musician wanted it, how they wanted it to be seen so shouldn’t we just accept it.
More recently the Arctic Monkeys have come under fire for simply having their name on the cover. Again there were cries of why have they done this? But I found that it stood out more in the shop. You don’t have to try and search for the small text to see if it is the band you are wanting. It is simple it helps you save time and effort in the long run. “Suck it and see” is not the first album of the Monkeys to come under scrutiny. If you remember the debut then you will remember that concerns were raised with the image of a guy smoking on the cover. It was said that they were promoting that smoking is acceptable. But that image has stuck in your mind has it not. Soon as you see that image then you know what album it is and what band it is.
So the concept of having a simple image or no image actually does work, you just don’t realise it, you are more concerned with why they haven’t put any thought into it, when in reality they have. What they set out to achieve has worked. They have got you interested in the album, and you are now probably thinking I will buy it just to see if it is actually any good. In my opinion it doesn’t matter what is on the outside it is the content on the inside, that grabs my attention. So keep that in mind when you are listening or reading something about a bands artwork.
