This album cover is for Major Lazer's "guns don't kill people lazers do" abum released in 2009. I chose to look at this album as the Artist's songs are within the same genre of music as my chosen band, Major lazer is within the new elecronic sound and dance music genres, so the target audience for this album cover would be the same.
In addition, Major lazer uses animation as a brand, using this within his music videos and any other ways of promotion. For one of my ideas for my band, I was thinking of using stop motion animation.
This album cover uses an Andy Warhol style artwork to express the ideas behind the music.
The main character is easily identified on right hand side of the cover, due to the size of the character compared to the other figures within the picture. From the image of the main character, it is clear that he is a strong, muscular army character which is also backed up by the name "Major" as it could relate to his status within the army. Wearing shoulder pads, a amunition belt, hat, sun glasses his seriousness and "hero" status is made, due to the hero figure created by action films like "Terminator". The lightening bolts in the sky look as though they are coming out of the Major, which could be understood as how the character got his name "Major Lazer".
The entire cover is really quite agressive, uncovering the political issue of War. As the main character is walking into the scramble of people and objects in the bottom left hand corner it seems that he is coming to fight against the evil ideas of war that are apparent on the left hand side in the form of a skull, full moon and bats, with the lazer gun pointing at them. The bright colours and clear sky that is seen coming from behind Major Lazer shows us that he is bringing goodness with him.
The picture seems to be cut diagonally from bottom left to top right, uncovering the top corner as the evil and the bottom as a happy and joyful atmosphere, where the characters are dancing, listening to music and laying in beach scenes. The Lazers in the bottom left corner, seem to be coming from the dancing area and pointing towards the evil, becoming a symbol and metaphor for the sounds coming from "Major Lazer's" music. The zombie in the bottom right has a shocked and scared facial expression showing his terror of Major Lazer whilst running away from him. Showing that he is winning the battle between good and evil.
Althought dealing with political issues, the evil side is not portrayed as certain people, instead have been replaced with the original idea of evil. Creating a much more comical take on important issues. The animation also creates a much more layed back and less sinical approach to the views being expressed in the image.
The only words used on the cover is the name of the artist. The title of the album "guns don't kill people lazers do" is not actually present on the cover. I think that this is due to wanting to create a bold title that focuses on the image rather than text. As the cover is like a comic book, more writing would take more of the effect of the image away.
The font used for the title is a bold, stong sans serif, with a slight shadow, creating the idea that the writing os 3D and stands out. Using capital lettering, the name jumps out at the audience creating the feeling of it being shouted and loud that could be a comparison to the type of music being promoted. By using yellow as the colour for the text, it shows that Major Lazer is a good character, as yellow is a metaphor of good and happiness. Being placed at the top of the image, it is like the title found on a comic book, and I think that this is the effect the image wants to create. The font also does a very good job of capturing the attention of the audience when stacked in a shop.
Overall, the imagery chosen for the album cover is very successful in portraying the artist and genre of music. The animation works really well with the issues that are being shown and it is very eye catching and bold, allowing the target audience to pick it out.
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