Brave and stark – Eminem’s new album artwork
This is the first of what I hope will be lots of future thoughts on design landing on my blog. The inspiration is the cover of Eminem's new album, Recovery, which is breaking the hip-hop trend for busy album covers and complicated fonts to deliver a sparse, clean and challenging piece of artwork.
The theme of the album is roughly that of Eminem's fall from artistic grace after delivering a double set of stinkers in the guise of his last two albums. Not only is Recovery being billed as a return to form but the stark imagery on the front cover is extraordinarily striking for a rap album.
The lettering on 'recovery' manages to slip in a nice cross symbol in the 'O'; no doubt referencing both the health care connotations of the symbol and it's visual resemblance to the prescription (and non-prescription) pills that have blighted the rapper's health. We're also treated to the trademark backwards 'E'; a nice touch that doesn't at all detract from the powerful symbolism in the 'O'.
However, the massive amount of space smack bang in the middle of the cover is perhaps the most arresting feature of the artwork. The vanishing road of course embodies all the cliches of the 'long road to nowhere' / 'the road a man must walk alone' etc. but it doesn't stop it being any less powerful, especially considering there aren't many rappers who's egos could take a shot of the back of their head being used as their only presence on their own album cover.
Advertising wants you to lie to your girlfriend
The Argentinian beer manufacturer Andes has taken it upon itself to remedy a problem as old as alcohol itself. Both personal experience and lazy pop psychology tells us that men go out drinking less after they get a girlfriend because their better halves don't approve of their man's drunken excesses.
To bring this fledgling demographic of men back into the pub (and, more importantly, to get their brand talked about by potential customers) Andes have created a sound proof cubicle that can be filled with a variety of non-pub background sounds. This means you can call your (quite rightly) distrustful girlfriend and lie convincingly that you are in the office despite the fact that you're slurring all your words and may or may not have dropped a kebab down the front of your shirt.
Basically, it's not going to fool anyone but it is a cool brand awareness campaign.
The ad for it below is (apparently) in Spanish but you get the idea.
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About
Tom Hubbard-Green is the E-marketing Executive at Alzheimer's Society and a freelance technology journalist.
His articles have been published in a variety of magazines and industry publications including Figaro Digital, O2 Venue magazine and City magazine.
