CD Designs

Alright, just a quick disclaimer that t But considering I So whether I'm discussing things They're just kind of an unusual relic of when CDs were more popular. They'd often only have a couple songs on them. Bright Eyes did it. A bunch of other bands did there were really a ton of these t So I'm going to start off by showing some really basic things T I'm always horrified to try to pronounce bands like this, but it's mu- Mu- There, now you can joke about how horribly I pronounce the band's name. But sometimes the cases were just different colors No text anywhere on the back or on the inside. It's just a simple blue cover with kind of t Another common t So this Sigurros alb And they were still releasing vinyl, so t And sometimes bands would do things They actually did it even better on another CD. Take it easy where you couldn't see anyt So the red translucent plastic actually disguised the red printing on the cover, w You had to actually take it apart to see what was printed on the back, but it's the same visual effect. Lou Reed for a set the Twilight Reeling actually kind of did the opposite. So you look at the cover and He sees blue lines emanating from And then as you slide it in, the blue lines kind of reverse and disappear. And So it essentially reverses the visual effect from what the bright eye CD was trying to accomplish. RICO actually released a ton of CDs with t And then there were lots of releases The traditional CD was in there. There were some postcards in it. It's just kind of a slightly different presentation for the CD. Not And a lot of musicians and bands released CDs that were in the format of a book. T And then there were a lot of other releases that were kind of So the book would give you a lot of information. So it's kind of nice because the CDs actually look Sigurros again did somet It looks It's just a front and a back and then the CD kind of crammed inside here. Nice visuals, but not necessarily a book. Bart Hopkins did one for the Gravicords release where there was just tons of information that you could read through as you listened to these bizarre experimental type pieces. But it was a book that actually had a lot of information in it. Other musicians and in fact there are so many I could show these forever, but musicians There's almost all pictorial, lots of drawings and photographs and some text, but less a literal book T Muom also did another one, S This is probably the most book- It certainly had a lot of visuals But the interesting thing about this is it really looked But it looked Nice visual and nice old antique book structure to it. And then you slid the cover on top and it just really felt It was a really nice release for t 4AD was such a great label. They had so many great designs that they put out with a lot of releases. T Once again, visuals, photographs, etc. But it also had textured sleeves, these embossed sleeves so as you ran your finger over it, you could actually feel the page. It had a much more tactile quality to it because of the embossment. And the embossment was kind of t So just another gorgeous 4AD release. Lots of great visuals. Lots of nice extra touches. A negative land. It's all in your head. Did a release recently with a couple CDs, one in the front, X1 and X2 in the back that was actually put into a Bible. Literally just a Bible. I kind of scanned through here. I couldn't find text that had actually been changed. I actually thought it would have been really interesting to But there was there was apparently a Koran version. I don't have the Koran. But definitely a book. Muggison had a lot of interesting releases. T But what was more interesting was t So the book inside was hand stitched with thread to hold that book in place. And the idea of using other materials in addition to either the plastic jewel case or the traditional cardboard cover was kind of nice. And that handmade touch of stitc So if we start t Mike Barron's had an EP where supposedly all of these flannel pieces of fabric were That he was touring these songs. W I don't know if it, in reality they really were the s But I Discanesia. I had a little fabric sleeve one of their releases. It's got t I don't actually pull that out. I can kind of pop the CD out from the back. So I don't have to damage it. It's got t Jeff McClennan turned me on to t I'm trying to find t I don't actually own t But it has a kind of a hemp type cover with t But I t It was a letter pressed handmade fabric pouch. It had a little bit of resin incense and t It just has these beeswax. It's just an interesting little package with lots of additional materials used on it. And there's another band, Mies on a Beam. I'm not sure I'm pronouncing that correctly either, but they had a release called Crochet, w T Really completely different. That's going the extra mile when you name an alb That's how you should do it. And there's a lot of these fur covered ones, t It was called, had a furry sleeve and the jewel case would slide and fit inside that fur sleeve. Black Moth Super Rainbow for their release. Eating us did the same t Really nice soft fur sleeve. Synthetic fur, of course t In a nice little zipper pouch. So you slide the zipper, it reveals the CD, you pull the CD out and voila. I actually have the original release on vinyl, t I show it in some other videos, but it's a nice alb I dig t And then of course the flaming lips famously did one of these fur sleeves. It's a much stiffer fur, more So embryonic sits inside this fur cover and it's more So you slide the CDs out of the birth canal and it's a pretty effective package. It's got multiple discs in here. After Clang did one for Springer, t I guess if I would have gotten it originally it would have been nice, but it's a nice similar concept, a w I'm not really showing tapes very often, but I might as well show there are some other great releases that use different materials as well and these CDs from t It's just a various artist collection of lounge-y songs, but packaging itself is what's really cool here. It's kind of this Vegas Baby one has a green felt, so it's kind of like a billiard table or something like that, but it has a working roulette wheel on it, so you spin it around, you hold it at different angles and the little bb, the ball spins around and you can bet on n It's a really cool disc. Kid Koala has the 12-bit blues that I showed in another video, so I'm not going to talk about it too long here, but the CD has the same concept that the vinyl does, where you assemble t Dale Hayward was nice enough to give me permission to use It's a great little animation here to show how t Sometimes we'll show that again really quick. Pinebender did they had a whole bunch of different pages in here so you could do multiple designs. It's just kind of an interesting release because years later Beck actually did somet With his release, the cover looked a lot You would actually peel off each of these stickers and then place them where you wanted on the cover. And then they did the same they collected people's versions of the cover so everybody could customize it themselves and then shared the different covers online. So a little different than the Pinebender because you didn't have to worry about whether you could draw or not. You could just place the stickers in and everybody could make a cool cover. You could get lots of weird variations just using the stickers and maybe a little hand drawn elements as well if you wanted. Examples of what some people did. Spiritualized had t Whereas you held the CD in the light at different directions, it looked It's the face is actually pressed down into the case, but it looks It's a pretty cool optical illusion. Slow motions did a really simple one. It's just a die cut sleeve. You pull the photograph out. This is a hand n I guess this is n But the part of the photo that's revealed through the die cut changes the cover so everybody's got a slightly different cover because of what's inside. Mune did another one here. They always got somet Depending on w If you get bored of one cover, you just switch it to a different one. So that's kind of fun. Pete Rowe did this as probably a bunch of musicians and artists have done similar things, of course, but it's But the idea is all of these different portions of the sleeve fold down and interlock with each other to hold the CD in place. Really the thing that probably makes this the coolest is the fact that if you pull the CD up and unfold everything and then spin it around, it actually is It is a little marigou round with all the little horses on the side. So that worked great with the title of the alb Here's another one. T Muggison again had another release there's a little booklet inside. The CD, of course, sits right down inside here, but it's a nice little folding sleeve. They're much more sop These die-cut sleeves that fold out are kind of interesting. Of Montreal, a skeletal lamping release is a good example of it. You kind of unfold each of these different parts and each time you unfold somet It's kind of the artwork in t Another band that did somet Again you fold it out and each time you fold it there's an extra little piece. Not quite as sop The artwork's really nice. It holds the booklet and the CD inside and of course folds back into a nice little square when you're done with it, but it's a nice effect on t Bright eyes again, fevers and mirrors, Saddle Creek Records This one it's There's a little Mylar square in here that's very reflective, so it acts a lot That just stays inside the booklet. So when the booklet's in the case you're looking at yourself as you're looking at the artwork. I should also mention that if you're ever in Omaha, Nebraska and go to the Saddle Creek Records store, the original artwork for a lot of the Saddle Creek releases is hanging on the wall, w So this alb It's just kind of cool that they've created an art gallery of sorts by putting the original artwork up on their walls. Loftus did a nice little CD. Let's get this nice screen printing on the black paper, but kind of like that infamous DeRudi col So the idea is as you slide the CD in and out of your collection it ruins the CDs on either side of the cover. So again, very much like that DeRudi col I'm going to show one more here, I guess the alb It's a really nice package to hold with that copper. It's got a unique Polaroid inside, I believe Bob Moll took the photos, I can't remember now, but the unique images are on the inside. I t