Album Covers

As part of one of our ancillary tasks, we have to produce an album cover for our music video production. Therefore, to make a start on album covers I thought it would be productive and constructive if I were to take three album covers from my music genre and analyse them. By doing this I will gain inspiration for the album cover I am hoping to produce as I am hoping to develop an album cover which will directly catch the attention of all audiences. The album covers I decided to analyse is Pink’s album ‘Funhouse’, Katy Perry’s album ‘One Of The Boys’ and lastly, the artist I am following – Avril Lavigne’s ‘The Best Damn Thing’.

Here are the analysis's I have made of the following album covers...

As Avril Lavigne is the artist I am following throughout my project, I have decided to compare her most recent album to one of her older ones. Firstly, here is an analysis of her album cover for the front of the album and the back also.

Comparing Avril Lavigne’s album ‘The Best Damn Thing’ to her first album ‘Let Go’, there is a difference in the use of generic album cover conventions. For example, Avril Lavigne’s name on the front of the album cover does not stand out against the name of the album. This could possibly be challenging the album cover conventions compared to ‘The Best Damn Thing’ as usually the artist’s name would be somewhat striking compared to the album name to immediately catch the attention of the audience when placed on a shelf next to a number of albums.

A similarity between both album covers in which Avril Lavigne has proposed is that she appears to relatively still have the same style of a punk/rock girl due to the colour scheme of her outfits. However, her use of fashion in more recent years tends to become more colourful but only slightly as she tends to where the colour white more often. This could possibly be illustrating that as time goes on she is growing up and becoming more of a woman who sees the world through a more clear perspective. Whereas on the album cover ‘Let Go’ she is wearing all black which could hold connotations of someone who is mischievous and gets into trouble? So, the slight colour change could be demonstrating the process of her maturing.

The background of the album ‘Let Go’ is blurred and gives the audience a sense of dizziness. This could possibly be a way of demonstrating the feeling of being drunk or possibly on drugs. Avril Lavigne’s sense of fashion and public image would link to the background and the audience would associate this with people of the same stereotype.

‘The Best Damn Thing’ does not particularly challenge the conventions as much as what ‘Let Go’ does because her older album does not necessarily appear to be an album cover at all as the artists name is not striking in any way, there is not the name of any well known songs which has the chance of catching the audiences eye and there is not the use of bold colours which are prominent. Whereas her most recent album ‘The Best Damn Thing’, commit more so to the generic album cover conventions due to the striking image of Avril Lavigne, her name is noticeable next to the album’s name and the album would generally stand out to the audience’s attention when placed on a shelf compared to her older one.