Grave Mistake Records put together a very respectable record for Big Eyes' second Lp. i love all these staged photographs that make up the majority of this layout! my favorite image is definitely the cover image, which was beautifully composed and printed in full color with lots of warm tones. there is great sense of balance and symmetry in this image, you can tell that the photographer took a lot of care in setting up this scene for the shoot. really glad that they chose to brand the poly record bags with a sticker instead of trying to force the typography into the shot somehow....
these jackets were professionally full-color offset printed and glued. on the back cover they chose to use a different shot from the same Seattle Union Train Station location as the cover image, this time in black and white with the contrast blown out. as much as i would have personally liked to have seen this shot in color as well, i suppose this style of photography lends itself better with having to work with typography in a composition...
inside, you will find printed dust sleeves with your vinyl. on the main image side, there is another black and white image from the same shoot which is very high contrast but not quite as blown out as the back panel. this is a bit of a pet peeve for me... pick a style and stick with it!
on the backside of the printed dust sleeve is a nice and clean dust sleeve. the half tone logo on the diagonal was a nice touch, something about this feels very legit 80's record layout to me, and that's always a good thing...
really nice job on the A and B label art as well! the A side has an interesting pattern along the right side of the label and the information running down the left side. it creates a subtle tie-back to the front cover shot and the mosaic train station tiles. the only thing that would have made it even better would would be if they used warmer tones like the front color image instead of blue on silver....
on the B side there is another image from the photo shoot...
there is also a HUGE poster insert included in this package as well! black and white band shot printed on the one side, great use of type on the guitar cases. that "BIG" type reminds me of the Big Boys logo, which is most likely a happy accident...
on the back side, a full color and super abstract band shot, which reminds me of something that Tenement would have done in one of their layouts. i love how shadowed all of their features are by all the tiny lights that are within the frame...
Paul! As always, thanks a million for writing about one of my releases, I am always excited to see when you choose to talk about them on the blog and I definitely appreciate both the complements AND the criticisms as well! I take a lot of pride (for better or worse) in my layouts and how my releases look (even when I don't do the art) and am always trying to make them as good as can be and learn from mistakes.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, let me nerd out for a second and talk about the original idea the band and I had. You suggested "pick a style and stick with it" however the array styles were completely intentional to go along with the theme of the record, which is a play on the title, "Almost Famous." The back full contrast symbolized a band in it's rawest form, gearing up to obviously "go somewhere" so to speak. The insert, a little less contrasted, showing a transition ... then the full color cover - three punk kids hanging out in a fancy train station (where they clearly don't belong) now waiting to head to a new destination, wherever that may be. Obviously it's a bit tongue in cheek, however at the risk of compromising an aesthetic consistency, I felt that a completely full color layout, or a complete black and white contrasted layout (like we did for the "Back from the Moon" single) would have not done the idea and overall theme we were going for justice. The poster, a similar concept. We actually debated using the b/w photo on the poster as the cover, but opted for the full color photo because of this. Obviously, I have no formal art training so I'm sort of talking out of my ass here, maybe aesthetically that is a big "no-no," or maybe I could have pulled off my attempt in a much "clearer" way ... but those are my reasons and I'm sticking to them!
*Compliments not complements ... it's been a long day
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