One of the highly anticipated new music albums for 2010 will feature Clay Aiken. The multi-platinum recording star recently left RCA and signed with Decca/Universal. Decca has the reputation of working with outstanding musicians and emphasizing the music as the most important part of the recording process.
Information about the new album has been scarce. Most of the “facts” about the recording have been passed along through unreliable tweets, facebook pages and speculation.
In October, Clay said that the album would be out in the first part of 2010.
Because of the secrecy surrounding this album, the general public has no idea where Clay is in the steps of putting the album together. I would like to think that the team is working on the album cover.
The first impression of a CD is generally based on its cover. The cover design acts like the cover of a magazine. It is always the first thing a buyer observes. For that reason, the cover and packaging of a CD is an integral part of the CD process.
Visual arts mesh well with music and many album covers have become a marketing tool. There are certain album covers that we recognize immediately……..Everyone remembers the cover of “The Beatles Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, or perhaps Pink Floyd’s “The Dark Side of the Moon.” These two album’s artwork has become memorable almost on its own.
Alex Steinweiss invented the album cover as we know it, and created a new graphic art form. Steinweiss won a scholarship to Parsons School of Design and at the age of 23, he became the first art director at Columbia Records.
In 1940, he pitched an idea: Why not replace the standard plain brown wrapper with an eye-catching illustration? The company took a chance, and within months its record sales increased by over 800 per cent.
His covers for Columbia combining bold typography with modern, elegant illustrations took the industry by storm and revolutionized the way records were sold.
In 1950, Steinweiss started a 20+ year association with Decca recordings.
Steinweiss
Over three decades, Steinweiss made thousands of original artworks for classical, jazz, and popular record covers for Columbia, Decca, London, and Everest; as well as logos, labels, advertising material, even his own typeface, the Steinweiss Scrawl.
He launched the golden age of album cover design and influenced generations of designers to follow.
As photography started taking over album design, Steinweiss slowly began to take on less and less work. He felt out of his comfort zone and felt that photography “cheapened the medium.”
Steinweiss now resides in Sarasota, Florida and at 92 still holds exhibitions of his artwork.
Of his work on the albums, Steinweiss said:
“I love music so much, and I had such ambition. I wanted people to look at the artwork and hear the music”
What do you think? Will Clay’s album cover be unique? Will it have special artwork on the cover or will it be made up of photography that makes a splash? Whatever it is, I hope we see it soon.
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