Conventions of a digipack

For the first of our ancillary texts we have decided to construct a digipack. The modern digipack is a variation on the traditional plastic CD case for album, it usually consists of a folding cardboard sheet with a certain number of flaps and storage compartments. The CD either stored on a plastic back or a carboard sleave which is very similar to the classic carboard sleaving for vinyl. Not all of the images included in my research are from digipacks, but represent the way that album art is presented in general.

For a description of some types of digipack see: http://www.mediaheaven.co.uk/digipak.htm (hyperlink option broken)

The digipack (or traditional CD case) is just as important promotional tool for the artist as a music video or any other form of advertising. The artwork needs to be able to stand out from the crowd, while at the same time it has to relate to the music or artist. From looking at a range of album covers and digipacks I have managed to piece together a set of common conventions which are present, these are by no means definitive but seem to represent this form of media text.

•Genre Characteristics
•Artwork reflecting the main themes of the album or artist
•Images of the artist (or their iconography)
•Intertextual references
•A consistent design aesthetic
•Information about the product

There is obviously a great detail of variety in the application of these conventions, this is essential to allow an album to stand out from the crowd. For most texts one convention or a combination of few will provide a unique selling point.

1. Genre characteristics

From the moment you look at an album you should be able to get some indication of the genre of the text, this allows the fragmented audience in a postmodern culture to select music of their choice. One example would be the cover for Amon Amarth’s “Twilight Of The Thunder God”, the mythogical seeming imagary of a warrior fighting a dragon is very conventional of the heavy metal genre.



Another album which shows aspects of its genre is Jack Johnson’s “In between dreams” the plain background along with the simple silhouette of a man with an acoustic guitar, shows the relaxed nature of the music. This is fairly typical of the acoustic/singer songwriter genre:



2. Artwork reflecting the central motives present in the album or the artists work

A lot of the time the artwork on a digipack will be closely related to the title of the album, which is often intrinsically linked to the musical content of the album. This gives the audience an idea of what the main themes of the album are likely to be, or alternatively a statement about what it sounds like. One example would be the album cover for Flobots "Fight With Tools". The images of the American flag reflect the highly political nature of this text.



One band which has clearly made use of consistant set of motives throughout their career is Chlidren Of Bodom. All of their album covers contain an image of the grim reaper who is often standing next to a lake. This references the Lake Bodom Murders which was the event inspiring the bands name.





The art on a digipack is often used as a way to create a text which is consistent overall, for example the album artwork for Sylosis’ “Conclusion Of An Age” depicts a massive tree with skyscraper like buildings around it being swept away by a tidal wave. This fits in particularly well with the titles of tracks on the album such as “Swallow The World” or “Last Remaining Light” in addition to suiting the fairly “apocalyptic” soundscape of the album.



3. Images of the artist (or their iconography)

The artwork on a digipack serves as a promotion for the artist in addition to the album concerned. Therefore it is frequent for the artwork to include images of the artist or something which is unique to them such as a symbol or a certain font. The cover of Michael Jackson’s Number Ones album centres the attention on Michael Jackson himself in one of his most characteristic poses:



Quite often an image of an artist is not appropriate for the front cover of an album since it detracts from the main themes of a text. However it is still necessary to show the identity of the artist responsible for the text. This is usually done by including the artists name in their own font or their symbol. This can be done in a subtle way or in a way which draws alot of attention to the artist. Metallica's "Master Of Puppets" is a good example of this.



If the artist does appear on the front cover of an album or digipack the image is often altered or incorporated into some larger picture. This way the artist can be promoted in conjunction with the themes on the album. Additionally this approach is often more aesthetically pleasing. For example see Four Year Strong’s “Enemy Of The World” or Blur’s “Best Of”.




4. Intertextual references

In many cases the best way to tell the audience what a text is all about is to make references to other texts. This is usually done in a very subtle way or in a directly obvious way, and it is likely that anything between these could be cause for legal disputes of some variety. An obvious example of this is Weezer’s most recent album “Hurley”, the album cover contains a close-up picture of the character Hurley (played by Jorge Garcia) from the US drama lost.



We can also see where an artist has almost blatantly imitated a past album cover in that of Five Finger Death Punch’s “The Way The Fist” which is not dissimilar to that of Guns ‘n’ Roses “Appetite For Destruction”. I am not sure if this was intentional, but there are definite similarities between the two covers. The fact that they are both albums which could be considered as being within the hard rock/ metal genre suggests this is more likely to be a pastiche than a cheap imititation.




5. A consistent design aesthetic

Out of the all the actual digipacks I have analysed I have not found any which contain major deviations from a set colour scheme. This helps the digipack to seem more like one thing rather than a collection of unrelated article about the album.this can be seen on the inside cover of Rise Against's "Appeal To Reason".



6. Information about the product

The track list for an album is traditionally found on the back, however the introduction of the cardboard digipack has allowed some artists more flexibility, for example Nine Inch Nail’s “With Teeth” has the track names on the inside cover.

Most albums also contain a lyric booklet which usually includes production credits in addition to the lyrics and information about the band. Other pieces of essential information include the barcode and copyright details; these are typically in small font at the bottom or in a corner somewhere since they do not really add anything to the digipack in an artistic sense.

It is not uncommon for stickers to be placed on the front of albums containing reviews, ratings or mentioning one of the singles the album contains, these serve as a promotion offering yet another reason for a member of the audience to purchase the text.