The proposal
“How does the cover art of the symphonic metal album Bye Bye beautiful by Nightwish and the Goth rock album Dark Light by H.I.M portray the emotional feel of the albums main songs compared to a group of the opposite genre?”
At first I thought that album covers were just there to make the band seem cool, and in my opinion modern albums do just that, but what I want to look at is the few remaining album covers and songs that actually tell a story. Being a very musically orientated person (I play guitar, drums, bass and keyboard) music has played a massive role in my life. In my opinion music can inspire you or break you, make you happy or make you sad, different songs make you feel in different moods and therefore change the way you work. So how do they transfer the entire albums emotion, into a visual aid?
The two Bands I have chosen to look at is Nightwish’s Bye Bye beautiful (from the genre of symphonic metal) and H.I.M’s Dark Light (from the genre of Love Metal/Goth Rock) I haven’t just chosen these because they are two of my favourite bands, but because these are the albums I know most well.
in my own opinion Modern music has no emotion in it, no storyline, there all about “Shorty’s fire burning on the dance floor” (for you and me, this line means “my girl is currently on fire while dancing” )
In my chosen music, there is definite storylines, from beginning to end the albums for me are bursting with pure, heartfelt emotion (bearing in mind that is my own opinion, which with this essay I am hoping to prove, but to do this, I am going to disregarde all hatred I have towards modern music)
. choosing to incorporate a music theme into this essay is a big help to me because I am currently looking at two pathways. One of them is doing illustration for Bands, Gigs, music venues etc, so this essay and all the research that goes into it will greatly help me in understanding the world of music design that I desire to go into.
Although I am very opinionated at this point I will of course not be prejudice in my analysis of the covers, I am going to concentrate heavily on the message/image the cover is trying to represent, Included in my research will also be the groups The Wanted and JLS. This will give me a comparison to make, 2 completely different forms of music.
For the album section of the research:
1. Listen to the 2 main songs on each album
2. Look at and explain the album covers and artwork
3. Read the inserts and lyrics of the song
4. Find any gig/album Posters
5. Research the relevant history of the band
6. http://www.nuclearblast.de/en/ (the record label of Nightwish )
7. http://www.nightwish.com/en/ (nightwish official)
8. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ville_Valo (the only thing I could find on Hims history)
9. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-ZMagJy208&safety_mode=true&persist_safety_mode=1&safe=active (Lyrics and music for Bye Bye beautiful)
10. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F437idxb_ns&safety_mode=true&persist_safety_mode=1&safe=active (Dark Light Lyrics and Music)
For the Design process section of the research:
1. The art of the club flyer (Craig MCcarthy, WSA library)
2. Marketing designs and ideas WSA library)
3. 100 best album covers (Salford library)
4. Best gig posters of the 21st century (Salford library)
5. Chris Worsley (Former workfriend who now works in music industry)
Action plan:
December 13th – December 20th: The first week of this project will consist of getting to know the songs as much as I can, constantly listening to them, and trying to understand the emotions of the 2 songs, I will look deeper into the lyrics and try to define a definite storyline to the songs.
December 20th – January 3rd: This time will consist of gathering the necessary information of the albums, all of the above mentioned resources will start to come together. A small survey will be carried out on my peers, showing them the songs and asking how they feel, and what they think the songs is about.
January 3rd – January 10th: This week I will start to put all of the information I have found on my 2 chosen bands onto a form of mind map, linking relevant emotions and lyrics.
January 10th – January 21st: This is the point were I start to gather all the resources needed for the design process portion of the essay, in these weeks I will go to WSA library, Salford library and Wigan library, I will also talk to Chris Worsley (possibly meeting up in Manchester) for some extra help/tips.
January 21st – January 28th: At this point, I should be starting to research more deeply into the design process of making album covers, making notes of the important parts, and basically learning how to make an album cover.
January 28th – February 12th: Again, I will make a large mind map at this point, only this time about the design process, how its done, and what decisions are made to determine what sort of graphic feel is on the cover
February 12th – February 19th: Everything should start to fall into place at the moment, I will put the 2 mind maps I have created together, making one large mind map, this will help me to link emotions to design, and vice versa.
February 19th – February 26th: Make a start on the essay, a first draft would be great at this point.
February 26th – March 4th: If draft is done, get feedback from lee/dave and make relevant changes.
March 4th – onwards: Any last minute changes and referencing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DU-hsF-g8B4 (Bye Bye Beautifull Song + Lyrics) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F437idxb_ns (Dark Light song + lyrics)
http://nightwish.com/en/article/6 (The letter to Tarja)
http://himlyricss.blogspot.com/2011/04/him-dark-light-lyrics-meaning.html (Dark Light meaning)
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The Jls and Wanted covers have no emotion, no feeling, no meaning, nothing of the sort wereas the ramones cover with basically the same principle does, In the time this was released this was considered rebellious and out of normallity.
There was a time when album art was done by the design greats, but not anymore.
There was a time when album art was done by the design greats, but not anymore.
