Research - Arctic Monkeys - AM Digipak Analysis

Arctic Monkeys - AM

Front

This album cover is one of the more minimalistic of the Arctic Monkeys' artwork, and album artwork in general, potentially suggesting the sudden turn in direction in their music and overall style. The slick design of the sound wave references the clear focus on music alone, rather than an image that is carried alongside the music. This message is equally reflected in the album's leading single's music video 'Do I Wanna Know?' which appears to follow no narrative and focuses more on the stylistic aspect of minimalistic art with black backgrounds contrasted with bright lines, particularly colored white, to convey the new sleek image of the band. Additionally, the conceptual design of the cover holds a very striking look to the album and thus allows the audience to associate the cover with the band, despite the band's name not being featured on the sleeve, based on the branding of the band. This therefore leaves a strong effect on the audience in that it creates a strong symbol in which they can associate the band with. This cover inspired me because of its minimalistic design which I would like to carry over into my design; primarily because I wish to include a logo, most likely the lemon, that Stone Roses fans can instantly identify the band with

Back - (Bottom Left Image)

The reverse side of the digipak is equally minimalistic as the front of the album sleeve; the same two monochrome tone is used on the back. The text includes the band's name, notably on the back rather than the front, and the various song titles split by a thick white line to suggest the continuation of the sound wave from the front, stylistically  designed to indicate the end of Side A and the end of Side B on the record. The band's name being printed on the back is a theme previously used on the Arctic Monkeys' 'Suck it and See'.

 

 
 
 Inside Cover

The inside cover features a professionally shot band group photo. Not only does this convey the slick image of the band, and thus creates a stylistic link to the artwork, but also can potentially work as a callback to the 60s/70s in which band group photos on, or within, albums were commonplace in the rock genre. This allows the audience to gain a sense of personality from the band and thus allows them to create a visual relationship with the band. The monochrome color scheme of the band photo itself also creates a link to the rest of the album cover design, thus allowing a sense of synergy in the band's branding in that almost all the promotional material involved with this album followed the same minimalistic color palette; ranging from advertisements, music videos and band shoots.



A still from the 'Do I Wanna Know?' music video

The single cover for 'Do I Wanna Know?'

Tour poster for the 'AM' tour