Chris Coco - Feel Free Live Good

Artwork/packaging by Anthony Burrill in collaboration with No Days Off.

Rolling Stones - Sticky Fingers

Text version as part of Astrid Stavro's 'Iconic Albums' series plus the provocative Warhol version and a nice bit of classic music/design ephemera.

Various - Bugged Out Classics by Zip

Designed by Zip and featured at http://www.zipdesign.co.uk, I really like the aesthetic created for this compilation from the techno-oriented Bugged Out club night. The designers claim this is "lo-fi tech" and it's that use of ASCII art that links it closely with the music. Being a 'classics' collection, it is yesterday's forward-thinking machine music and is ultimately restricted by the technology of its era. The artwork seems to heighten that concept of retro-futurism.

Unkle - Where Did The Night Fall by Ben Drury

Ltd. edition packaging for Unkle's fifth album Where Did The Night Fall designed by Ben Drury. I'm probably being a bit pedantic by wondering where the question mark is but, aside from that, I like the previously assumed incongruous fusion of the luxe metallic finish and erotic-themed photography with a font that appears informed by graffiti/tagging. It balances it out nicely so that it doesn't become too much of one particular thing: with sensual imagery coupled with hard-edged qualities plus 'street' elements that are restrained enough to remain sophisticated.

Portishead - Third by Marc Bessant

Originally documented at: Sleevage.com


Designer Marc Bessant:

“After the ten year gap from the last record I knew the only visual which had stuck in the public eye had been the ‘P’ character, it was an established brand which I wanted to not only reintroduce but reinforce. We were keen to avoid anything ‘conceptual’, no puns or noir imagery, that was all dead to us, I wanted to present a box, which simply holds the music, with the least amount of information on it which would ultimately say everything – essential minimalism – which I felt captured the Eastern Bloc coldness of some of the music I was hearing in the studio.”

Michael Hernan logotypes

A designer whose work within music includes identities for labels including Classic and Giant45, Michael Hernan also came up with the two pictured logotypes. The first is for the mighty Bush label and the latter for the third in Dave Clarke's 'Red' trilogy which was issued via Deconstruction [his 'Red 1' and 'Red 2' were released by Bush].

In both cases, the projects were driven by a typographical identity with little in the way of other imagery. Additionally, these were visually alligned with a series of releases to further that collectability.

Work by Non-Format

There's already a picture of Non-Format's Red Snapper artwork on the Hard Format post but, looking through their portfolio, there are so many perfectly realised music projects. The sort of stuff that would make it worth trekking to the shops for.

Warp20 box set

I mentioned the supposed ubiquity of particular designers to releases by specific labels earlier when noting what Vaughan Oliver is to 4AD and Peter Saville is to Factory. Last year's Warp20 artwork is a bit of an anomaly as it wasn't created by the intrinsically linked Ian Anderson of The Designers Republic. Instead YES did a very fine job of packaging a selection of must-have material from the seminal Warp Records. Everything from those esoteric images to the splashes of purple to the often subtle introduction of text is in keeping with representations throughout the label's 20 year history. [The inclusion of 'locked grooves' on the vinyl also has personal appeal as it is about using a format for its potential capabilities rather than just being a nod to sentimentality.]

While these editions sold out quickly, the mobius band-based photographic work (by Dan Holdsworth) has since been released as four collectible prints in an edition of 100. Price £65 each or £250 for the set. Music not included.

Pop Matters by Nikolay Saveliev

Viral-Promotional Record Sleeves, 2007

Vinyl record sleeves with 2-sided insert featuring faux-academic material on pop music and the state of the record industry, seeded with promotional material for indie radio stations. Sponsored by Brown Student Radio. Snuck onto used and new record store shelves. 140 copies in total. More at www.nikolaysaveliev.com

Gig posters by Telegramme

More examples of the effort that is being put into devising eye-catching gig posters. These are by the formerly Cornwall and Bristol but now London-based duo that operates as Telegramme. [Other exponents of quality gig posters that I should reference quickly are Sonnenzimmer's Nick Butcher and Nadine Nakanishi plus the very influential Jay Ryan. There are also hundreds of lesser known practitioners featured at www.gigposters.com]

I particularly like the way that Telegramme have managed to focus on location for their Arctic Monkeys series: taking design inspiration from where the gig is set to take place. Although, for me, the colour use and addition of intricate pattern does recount some of Shepard Fairey's output. Style-wise, I'm more attracted by the Mum piece that boasts the kind of tesselated structure that has also drawn me to some of the work by Siggi Eggertsson and Andy Gilmore.

The Visual Mixtape by Noa Emberson

As seen on Emberson's site (www.joystain.com) but given decent coverage on, my new favourite blog, Forgotten Hopes.

This is a self-initiated project where Emberson creates posters for his favourite albums. The series consists of 25 individual pieces and I really like the way that they work as a set. They are are also very information heavy yet still manage to be really beautiful. However, I can't see their pastoral aesthetic working for more obviously "urban" genres. Unless, of course, its to play off those opposites.