Research; Ska Covers

The first Ska album I decided to analyse, when researching into how I should do my album cover was 'The Sound of Ska'. I decided to analyse this album because it is an compilation album and therefore had to create an overall images for all of Ska. Just by looking at the album you can tell that black and white is a clear convention. I personally like the way that they use the checkers on the album as it is just at the side, therefore not dominating the album but still something that you notice and will remember from the album, which they have followed on to the back cover with the line of checkers used to divide the songs and the institutional information. However this album is quite boring and has nothing that draws you to it as it is only black and white, therefore I would like my cover to be colourful to go against the conventions, but still to include conventions like the checker idea.

Re Do Of Cover Plan

I decided to change my cover plan as i felt it didn't link in with my music video or magazine ad enough and also wouldn't appeal to my target audience, so i drew upon the ideas that i had used on my magazine ad, making the cover more colourful and bright.

Inside Cover Plan

Inside Plan

Front Cover Plan

Record Label Choice

For my ancillary tasks i had to look into a record label for my band and for this i decided to choose Island Record label as it has artists like VV Brown on it, who i feel is a mordern day style of the Ska genre. I also decided to choose this label because the types of other artists on there appeal to the same target audience that i am aiming for such as the Sugababes, Justin Bieber and Rihanna.

Cover Research -- Jay Z

During lesson we textually analysed Jay Z's most recent album cover 'The Blueprint 3' (shown on the left). We also looked at his previous album covers, to look at how his career focus changed, with his picture being in the for front or him being the main focus, to his most recent one, where he took it back to him being about the music, and how

music is a form of art.

Looking into his album covers we saw how is the centre of attention, as that is how new artists start out, were the record label decides everything, were they used Jay Z's genre of Hip Hop and the Thug look, and close ups of him.

The close ups and Thuggish look makes to audience feel intimidated by him, but as Jay Z became more successful in his music career he came to have more say in the what he did and made it more about the music than him shown in the first picture of his most recent album cover.

Jay Z over time has become more noticed for his music than him, and has become a producer in his own right for himself and other artists. he has also collaborated with artists outside of his genre like; Linkin Park, showing that any genre can produce great music together as it is about the music and not the artist them self. Using Jay Z as a influence I want my band cover image to be more about the music, the artist is creating.