BOMBAY BICYCLE CLUB - FLAWS
DIGIPAK AND ADVERT ANALYSIS
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Digipak Outside
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Digipak Inside
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This is the band's second album and is very different to their debut. Their first album was conventional indie rock whereas this one is more of the folk genre and is entirely acoustic. This style of music is suggested by the digipak and advert design. The colour scheme is very neutral, light blues and peachy skin tones. There is no photography used, the images are all paintings, painted by the band's bass guitarist Ed Nash, again suggesting the folk genre. The layout is very simplistic with images on the front and left hand side of the inside, the rest is just a painted surface which, if you look closely has paint brush bristles on. There is little post-production used on the design besides the text. The font of the text is again minimalistic, just a simple san serif type and it is only ever in either black or white. When looking at the mise en scene of the digipak the only parts that can be noted are the choice of images. Both are paintings of humans, the front cover's main image, also the one that features on the album's advert, is simply of a girl. she doesn't look particularly grabbing or happy illustrating the mood of the cd. The inside image is of someone’s legs kneeling, this is a strange image to have, I think both painting s suggest the human, down to earth nature of the music. The back of the digipak includes information such as websites, record company logo and details and a bar code. The advert has used the digipak's main image and has the band's name in large letters then the album name and release date in bold. It includes a quote which is praise from a popular and regarded radio dj. The advert also includes the band's website and record label logos. I noticed that there is actually a spelling mistake on the advert - it gives details of their newly released single 'Ivy and God' which should actually read 'Ivy and Gold'. It is basically adapted from the digipak and I like how the theme has been continued giving it an easy to identify image.
HURTS - HAPPINESS
DIGIPAK AND ADVERT ANALYSIS
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Advert |
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Digipak Inside
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Hurts are a British synthpop/electropop, their debut Happiness was released this year, 2010. By genre they are pop but tend to be more Indie as they are not particularly mainstream, they have a very unique look that is continued throughout their music, digipak and advert. They wear suits of minimalistic colours and lead singer, Theo Hutchcraft always has his hair slicked back in an 80s style. The digipak is entirely grey, black or white without a speck of colour, making it seem very classic and simplistic. It gives it a sleek finish that links to their music. The cover is a photograph of the duo, the cover has a symmetrical look. Although Theo's, on the left, hands are shown in the picture which I think is a subtle suggestion that he is the lead singer. I think some post-production has been used on the images to increase the contrast and shadows of the images to give it a darker look. The fonts used throughout the digipak are plain and kept in the monochrome colour scheme. The back of the case has a simply set out song list, a bar code, record company logos, some legal information and a website. On the back of the CD booklet are the words 'Lento Doloroso' which is Spanish for slow and painful - literally meaning Hurts! The advert I found continues the theme created by the digipak, it has taken the main image from the digipak and has kept the sleek symmetrical style. It has included a quote from popular Indie magazine NME, this opinion from a magazine that will be read by targeted listeners is a good idea for a advert. It then has the release date, order details and website. Again simplicity is the key and it's minimalism gives it an edge amongst other adverts.
YEASAYER - ODD BLOOD
DIGIPAK ANALYSIS
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Yeasayer is a very different band to the ones I have analysed above and this is shown through the design of the digipak. Their genre is defined as 'experimental rock' on Wikipedia but i would prefer to describe it as alternative pop as they are quite dancy songs that are synthesised giving it the experimental description. The digipak is extremely brightly coloured and heavily post-produced. It has a futuristic look and many of the images used are computerised all this reflects the style of music. The cover is a computerised image that on closer inspection can be revealed as the three band member's faces morphed together to look like a sort of statue. The band and album names are then over the image in a shiny transparent lettering. The back cover an extremely strange image of a face without features although it has two speakers for eyes. It contains the song list, bar code, record label logos and a website. The inside of the digipak is made up of two pockets the left contains the CD booklet and the right the disc, this is quite an unusual way of storing the contents but works well. The font used on the digipak is interesting, it looks symbolic but suits the overall theme of the digipak.
This video is by The Drums it is entirely performance based with very little storyline. Basically its a band getting ready for a gig at a youth social group. At the end the children rebel and start throwing the furniture and decorations on the wall outside.
They start in a back alley inbetween some buildings then they arrive at the 'Youth Social Group' centre, they prepare and then start to perform here with no crowd apart from one boy, then all the children, they seem to be all boys, come inside to watch the performance. They also have clips when they're on the roof of a building performing and when the band are around a table where it looks like a studio. This range of locations don't all seem to be linked. There don't seem to be in costumes for the band, they are wearing normal casual clothes. The Drums are well known for being a very trendy band. But they do seem to have an 80s look to them and this is also reflected in the locations and the lead singer's dancing. This suggest a theme of looking back to a by gone era - the 80s. The kids in the video seem to be dressed as though they are older, for example the boy with a funky haircut is wearing a leather jacket and dark sunglasses. I think this suggests the children want to be in a band like The Drums and they aspire to be like them. The band have come back to their home roots and tell the children not to give up their dreams but to go on 'forever and ever'. Lead singer, Jonathan Pierce, does his usual unique dancing throughout the video as he would in a live performance. The rest of the band simply play their instruments throughout but sometimes whilst moving as they follow the lead singer who is centered upon by the camera, this shows that the band has most of its focus on the lead singer. The colour of the video seems slightly sepia and old looking demonstrating the retro sound of the band's music. The band themselves wear quite bright clothes. The style is mainly quite cheerful but is very centred on the band's performance and look.
