OUGD603 - Secret 7 - choosing song and Initial Ideas

The first point of call is to decide which song I am to produce album art for. After looking into each of the songs I noticed that they were all autobiographical and had deeper meanings associated with the songs lyrics. I felt This could be translated into my album artwork. The work could focus on the song's deeper meaning and be shown using a single image or illustration. Out of the 7 songs I felt the three that stood out most for me were songs by Jimi Hendrix, The Manic Street Preachers and The Clash. The song are each from a different era of rock and roll and focus on the subject of mental health and depression. These were also the songs I looked most into however, out of the three The Clash's I'm not down worked best as the culture behind the punk era would be more interesting to explore and could be easily translated into appropriate imagery. 

I came up with 9 initial sketched ideas and kept in mind my brief considerations. I tried to vary my responses in concept and medium so I can bring 3 completely different responses to the critique. These initial ideas can be seen below.

1. After looking into punk culture and symbols I got a better understanding of the relevance of anarchy and the political philosophy during the punk era. Using the die cut hole that is often seen in record sleeves, a hand drawn anarchy 'A' would overlap the circle and connect well to the band.

2. My second idea uses collage of photographs. These will be taken around London (as I will be visiting in the next few days) and show arrows around the city. I will position these so the all point down relating to the song's title.

3. This idea will be one of the only ideas that will produced using programs I am familiar using on my Macbook such as illustrator and photoshop. It portrays how Joe Strummer, the lyricist was depressed from late 1978 when he broke up with his partner to early 1979. This served as the inspiration for the song.

4. This record sleeve was inspired by the punk zines popular during the time of the clash. I will complement the experimental ideas with my own illustrative style. The illustrations I include will be based on the ideas behind the song, its lyrics and related imagery from the punk era.

5. Taking quotes from Punk icons such as the members of The Clash and lyrics from the song, handwritten text will be written all over the record sleeve leaving a white space in the centre of the cover, similar to idea 1. If I am to produce this cover, I must experiment with the colour of the text and the background.

6. Similar to idea 4, illustrations would be used to make this cover more interesting. These would be placed on the songs audio/visual imagery.

7. The fist will be the primary imagery in this idea linking back to the punk anarchist ideals however the cover will also show a punk rocker being punch. This should be shown in various imager such as illustration or collage. I should also include details on the rockers sleeve, referring back to Strummers description in the song when he was beaten by a gang.

9. This idea refers to various parts of the song and punk ideals. I would produce a caution sign that says Don't Run, as Strummer describes when he was beaten and stood up for himself instead of running away. Below this, I should look at changing the word anarchy to something more ambiguous et appropriate for the song. This sign should photographed in film, linking back to the era the band were most popular.

Out of the 9 ideas I have produced I must reduce these down to 3 which will help to develop my ideas further. These 3 developed ideas will then be brought to a critique to help me decide on a final outcome.

As decided in the initial brief blog, I will choose an idea that will make me experiment with mediums I am less familiar with. My response will also be ambiguous and appropriate for the punk rock era. Because of this, I have decided to develop the 2nd, 4th and 9th ideas. I will bring these to a critique tomorrow to help me decided which record sleeve to progress with for my final outcome.