DIGIPACK ANALYSIS

I N D I E R O C K G E N R E

KINGS OF

LEON

Only By

The Night

The CD digipack designed for Kings of Leon’s album has some

very artistic vision induced into it, specifically the symbolic

eagle which is on both the front and back of the cover. This

eagles is also merged with the bands faces. This gives a clear

representation of their regional background as all members

are from the USA. This allows the band to market towards

Americans heavily and make big sales in the USA as well as

showing the world their pride of being an American rock band

using the symbolic eagle cover.

The colours of this album are very greenish with black fades

which I think are directly linking to the album name of “Only

by the Night”. This shows a sort of night vision view of the art

which is further supported by the crosshairs on the front

cover and next to the album name on the side of the Digipack.

This strongly supports that to utilise these colours the

producers used a night vision camera. This also informs the

audience that the album has certain tracks that incorporates

events that happen at night such as “Sex on Fire” and “Use

Somebody” which has panning shots of an American city at

night. This shows that Kings of Leon may have drawn

inspiration for the album artwork from their ventures into

different nightlife aspects.

However another interpretation of the eagle could be drawn upon

negatively, specifically by the back cover which shows us the eagle

with a large crosshair which seems to imply a gun is pointing at its

head which could be showing us messages suggesting of back

stabbing as the eagle is targeted from behind and generally the

back cover shows a much grittier and darker look which suggests

negative messages in comparison to the front which is smooth and

a lot lighter which portrays a more positive image.

The text used for this Digipack is similar to computer coding from the

font choice. This comes across as smaller writing and I portray this

as clever. The band clearly want to market their album with artistic

work as opposed to an album full of text. This shows they are

trying to sell their image to the masses which a wider range of

people can recognise.

The main think to notice for the placement of the artwork and

computer coding text is that they are both separated greatly from

each other and easily distinguished making it a lot easier to look at

and appeal to a wide range of people.

I believe this collaboration and placement could

inspire me to create a similar Digipack for my

music video

THE 1975

The 1975

Self-Titled

Album

For the Digipack there is not much that can be said. It has low

key lighting, which anchors the idea of Indie Rock as it is

stereotypical to the genre. The white light that outlines the

speakers also anchor the idea of the indie rock genre as it

is stereotypical for artists of this genre t be focused on their

music shown by the musical equipment of speakers. As

most videos of this genre include a performance element , it

is another way for the band to portray to their fans its all

about the sound.

As well as this on the front cover, highlighting the bands name

emphasises exactly who they are without getting in your

face. Its a simple yet effective way of composing a Digipack

to appeal to wide audiences. Its very interesting in the fact

that there are no band members on the front or back of the

covers, juxtaposing the amount of times they are composed

in the music video. This creates not only an enigma to the

new listener but also anchors ideologies about those who

create indie rock and how they want to present themselves

Another thing that is interesting between the two print

pieces of text is that they’re symmetrical in the colour

scheme, font style and the background image. By

doing this it creates a trademark for the band and gets

them noticed worldwide, as people will see this colour

scheme and instantly relate to the 1975.

The fact the colour scheme is black and white is also

significant as it again anchors the ideas of indie rock

as it is conventional within the genre as it connotes a

sense of isolation and being on the outer edge

translating to being different which of course what

“indie” means,

ARCTIC MONKEYS

Whatever

people say I am, that’s

exactly what I’m not

Whatever people say I am, that’s exactly what I’m not was the debut album for

Arctic Monkeys released in 2006. As a debut album it needed to make a

good impression of what the band were exactly trying to accomplish. The

strange name comes from a novel the singer (Alex Turner) was reading at

the time called Saturday night and Sunday Morning. The songs are very

much about going out on the town and the feeling of this, therefore this

informs the listener . This title stereotypes these indie people and so the

album can make them feel more involved.

The man on the front cover, not actually a band member, portrays how the

Arctic Monkeys see themselves. They see themselves as the working class.

They have done this to imply that fame has not gone over their head, and

they aren’t a stereotypical boy band. Also to define their target audience

which is predominantly more working class people. They also touch upon

real issue in their songs such as politics, bar rules and women.

The man on the cover , with a standard haircut, smoking and casual clothes

also supports their target audience of the working class and cuts across to

the listener that the album includes them making them feel like the band

cares about them. People are more likely to listen to a band if they feel that

the band cares about them.

The colour scheme of this Digipack is black and white which is stereotypical to

indie rock bands. It also symbolises darkness and depression unlike typical

boy bands which promote brighter colours. This also gives the potential

listener an insight into what the songs are about. A boy band may sing about

love but Arctic Monkeys sing about heartbreak and being kicked out of

nightclubs. The colour also represents the Arctic Monkey’s “down to earth”