For my album cover I want it to touch upon various issues such as equality, mental health or violence as I feel as though some of the best album covers have a message behind it. I like the style Alex Williamson has with the silhouette of a person whilst several different messages are within it, certain words being more visible than others allowing the message to be very clear; transgender. That is quite a rough subject as there may be many people who identify as transgender and many who support them, there are still people who are extremely against the idea of it.
Another one of his pieces is based around America and some of the issues it faces, such as what appears to be unborn children in the top right corner which could symbolise the controversial topic; abortion, something that a large percentage of people are against. There have been numerous cases of groups of people rioting outside of abortion clinics and, in some extreme cases, shootings.
Just above the flag appears to be the famous ‘human evolution’ picture going from an ape to a man. However it almost looks like the people are walking towards a factory, which could be a symbolisation of work or even pollution.
Banksy is known for the messages within his artwork, for example the piece above is a pair of soldiers covering up a peace sign. This could indicate that although the world claims they want peace, some people will try their best to destroy it.
This piece is a symbolisation of the more recent issue going on in the UK; immigration, something that sparked fury within some citizens claiming immigrants should not be allowed to come into the country as they do not belong, the sign reading “keep off our worms” could be an altered version of a common phrase used nowadays “they steal our jobs” as many people strongly believe that immigrants are stealing jobs from them.
A style of album I really like is Grandson’s “modern tragedy vol 1”, it is a simplistic design with just black and white but it holds such a powerful message, just like the songs on the album.
The child holding a gun represents the school shooting over in the USA- the eagle in his opposite hand symbolising the US. This album talks about not just the problem with the unstable gun law, but the wars going on around the world.
Some of his artwork for his singles and album, are similar to Alex Williamson with the the image of someone or something iconic and using the doodle style, for example his two pieces for the songs ‘overdose’ which tackles drug use and the struggles of being an addict and his song ‘war’ which evidently talks about wars. The use of Donald Trump, another controversial topic and crossing out his eyes shows his views on him as there are many different opinions on Donald Trump.
His songs always have an angry feel to them, showing just how passionate he is about the topics he talks about, whether it be from personal experience or just his views.
Another song of his “thoughts and prayers” is once again talking about the growing gun violence in America, due to the bullets helping to form the flag.
I like Grandson’s style as it not only tackles serious topics, his lyrics have such meaning and depth behind them. He uses such creative styles to get his message across to people, whilst also keeping his own unique style; the crosses.
I’m thinking of doing a similar style to Grandson as a lot of his artwork has a border where he usually has the title and his name with a picture in the centre. I want to experiment on photoshop with double exposure similar to Alex Williamson and then try incorporate Grandson’s style too.
There’s a few things I want the album to symbolise as they are things I feel quite passionate about, such as:
- Mental health
- Equal rights
There are so many, but I feel as though the two listed above are the one’s I am most passionate about therefore it will be easy for me to add a lot of detail to it and really delve deep into research.
Originally I wanted a very cartoon styled album; lots of colours, different symbols merged together with a big, bold title.
This is a great example of what I meant, there is so much going on that anyone can pick different parts out and analyse it, but like most things, everyone has their own interpretation of the cover.
I also looked at MIKA and his albums as the majority of his albums are very colourful and jam packed with different messages and images within the cover, which is what I was thinking of. Then I looked at Coldplay and their ‘Hymn For The Weekend’ single cover. Another band I looked at was Blur as it had a very simplistic design yet it has a nice colour theme; vibrant.
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