LIT - Alternative Blogzine

There are several reasons why a fan of music to have a disc in its materiality, rather than refer to a folder of MP3 Cold: The best audio quality, the desire to reward the artist with the price of purchase and of course the cover. Puòessere considered it a business card in which a careful choice of color images and graphics to attract our attention on the shelves of a shop or simply to suggest the content and themes of a new LP.
This article will highlight the history and the creative path that led to the creation of cover art from some of the most important works of the alternative scene of the 80s and 90s.

The theme funerario not necessarily want to highlight aspects macabre, but prefers the more genuine and twilight melancholy, he found space on the covers several times post-punk and new wave. L'art cover di Closer, per il suo gusto funebre, destò al momento dell'uscita dell'album molte critiche legate alla recente scomparsa del frontman della band Ian Curtin. Peter Saville , che assieme Martyn Atkins, curò la grafica della copertina, si difese ammettendo che la scelta dell'immagine incriminata era antecedente al suicidio di Curtis e pertanto in alcun modo ad essa legata. One of the most famous is the cover of Closer (Factory Records 1980) of Joy Division. The cover art of Closer, his taste for the funeral, aroused at the time of the album a lot of criticism related to the recent death of frontman of the band Ian Curtin. Peter Saville, who together Martyn Atkins, supervised the design of the cover, defended itself by accepting that the choice of the accused was before the suicide of Curtis, and therefore in no way linked to it. Returning to the photo, it was taken by Bernard Pierre Wolff and depicts the theme of the deposition of the tomb of the family Appiani, in the Monumental Cemetery of Staglieno (Genoa), created by the sculptors and Onorato Toso Demetrio Paernio.
That deposition, however, was not the only image of Staglieno chosen by Ian Curtis for the work of Joy Division: The Angel on the cover of the single Love Will Tears Us Apart comes from well-known cemetery of Genoa and carry the signature of the above Onorato Toso .
scelsero uno scorcio di un illustre cimitero monumentale. In addition to the Joy Division Dead Can Dance for the Within The Real Of A Dying Sun (4AD - 1987) chose a glimpse of a famous cemetery monuments. Here the choice fell on the grave of Francoise Raspail located in the beautiful Parisian cemetery Pere Lachaise. The imposing holy field, located in the east of the capital and founded in the nineteenth century, is renowned not only for the large size (it is one of the biggest in the world) by virtue of representing the last home of characters such as Jim Morrison, Maria Callas, Marcel Proust, Chopin, Edith Piaf, Rossini, to name a few. As for Raspail, Paris political revolutionary of the period, the theme that permeates the prison's tomb is due to long periods of imprisonment by scontati.

. Then there is those who chose to use images or photographs are not made for the occasion as he shot in black and white that makes frontcover from the best known of the work of the Bauhaus, In the Flat Field (4AD 1980), was produced by photographer Duane Michal (Pennsylvania 1932).
Michal is a singer in the estimated omoerotica photo. Indeed, he has the merit of having been able for the first time to stress through this type of photography (diffused from the middle of the nineteenth century), rather than the physical desire for the same sex, to the spiritual and emotional sphere of homosexual .
In addition to In The Flat Field must be included among the most important commissions received by Michal entrusted by the Government of Mexico for the Olympic Games of 1968 and in 1970 became the subject of an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, and the set the cover of the Synchronicity Police in 1983.
Another example of image 'borrowed' the painting is' Rose 'by Henri Fantin-Latour used for graphics Power, Corruption and Lies (Factory Records - 1983) of the New Order. Even after this work is the above zampino of Saville (Manchester 1955), which was precisely how to work with Joy Division and New Order in that chart as the tip of Factory Records.
As already realized from the above so far as underground and independent of the 80ies it was not rare to find strong associations between artistic graphics a particular group-label and a team of graphic designers or trust.

. E 'il caso della 23 Envelope, Graphic partnership that worked to a very fruitful with 4AD for the release of groups like Cocteau Twins, Dead Can Dance and This Mortal Coil. Behind the moniker 23 Envelope hide the chart Vaughan Oliver and photographer / filmmaker Nigel Grierson, acquaintances until the time of school and joined a professional for 4AD from 1983 to 1988. The agreement between the two gave birth to a style, drawn by the soft and ethereal, is made colors and dreamy atmosphere. The life of the 23 official Envelope ended in 1988 with the posting of Grierson. Vaughan then joined to a new partner Chris Bigg and converted the project name in V23.

, ed i Cure . But the strongest link between designers and bands, is that established between the Parched Art, the studio founded by graphic ask Thompson and Andy Vella, and the Cure. Launched officially in 1982, when he moved them to London, the Parched Art has put his signature on most of the album covers and merchandise Journal of Hospice. The activity of the PA work for Smith & Co took in all the records from 1981 to 1992 with the exception of Pornography (1982) and collection of Japanese Whispers (1983), therefore we speak of all the discs between Faith (1981) and Wish (1992). , la foto per il cofanetto Join the Dots (2004) ed il promo Blu Top Head Kiss (2006) contenente tre singoli provenienti da Blue Sunshine dei The Glove e tre singoli rispettivamente da The Top, The Head On The Door e Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me dei Cure. As for the following works to 1993, the year of the second departure of Thompson from the band, are to list the album Wild Mood Swings (1996) the cover for the collection Galore (1997), the picture box for Join the Dots (2004) and the promo Blue Top Head Kiss (2006) containing three individuals from the Blue Sunshine The Glove and three individuals respectively from The Top, The Head On The Door and Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me the Cure.
A unique style that of Parched Art, by drawings, paintings and photographs have always managed to embody every mood of the labors of the Cure.
Although the production of this study is completed, the career of the two continuing members individually.
Ask again in the Cure, took care of the graphics (based on his own tattoos) for a model of guitar that bears his name produced in 2007 by Schecter Guitars.
As for Andy from four years teaches graphic design at Middlesex University and is still in graphics editing to cover other groups (among which the mogway) and photosession both in the fashion of music, with commissions that obviously could not cover the Cure!