Creating a Track-list

The tracklist for the new album 'Electric Blue' is featured on the back cover of the digipak, as well as each of the two CD's in the digipak. The tracks on the tracklist were carefully selected, as I determined which song titles suited the genre and style of the artist 'Maverick'. Below is a list of the tracks that are featured within the 'Electric Blue' digipak, including the original artists:

Disc 1
1. Music is my Radar - Blur 
2. Around The Bend - The Asteroids Galaxy Tour 
3. Don't Fight It, Feel It - Primal Scream 
4. Losing My Edge - Lcd Soundsystem
5. Democratic Circus - Talking Heads 
6. Paranoid Android - Radiohead
7. Thought I was a Spaceman - Blur
8. My Little Japanese Cigarette - Spoon
9. Fake Plastic Trees - Radiohead 
10. Cherry Blossom Girl - Air 

Disc 2 
11. Electric Feel - MGMT
12. Blind - Talking Heads
13. Delta Bay - Empire of the Sun 

Disc 2 will also feature and promote the music video for 'Music is my Radar', which has been filmed and edited by myself and Alfie Adams. This will be one of the main factors that sell my digipak, as it will be made exclusive to the physically copy of the album. 

Below I have included some of the music videos for the tracks that I have chosen for my track-list. 

Magazine Advert Research and Analysis

As well as the digipak that I will be creating for my ancillary texts, I will also be creating an advertisement on photoshop for a magazine which will advertise the digipak and the artist which I have created. As with any advertisement, my magazine advert will sell the digipak to my target audience, encouraging them to purchase the product which I have created. 

The conventions of a magazine advert promoting a digipak include the artist's name, name of track(s), release date, record label, and information regarding where customers can purchase the digipak. Though, the advertisement must also contain visual links to the digipak, continuing the same artistic style, which is initially created within the music and music video. 

The magazine advert above is for MGMT's album 'Kids'. I particularly like this magazine advert as it looks similar as to the kind of product which I would like to create for 'Electric Blue'. I think that the style and ideology that this magazine advertisement reflects would be similar to that of my product, which is why I have chosen to include this as a piece of inspiration for when I come to construct my final magazine advertisement. 

During a photo-shoot that we did for the ancillary texts, I did attempt to get some photos that could be used to recreate this magazine advertisement for MGMT. However, I wasn't happy with how the photos turned out, especially the framing, which ended up being quite wrong. As a result of this, I did not continue to recreate this magazine advertisement, and instead decided to make a more conventional, though original magazine advertisement for my digipak. 

The magazine advert above is for the Gorillaz ablum Danger Days. The main image that is features predominantly on advert is closely linked to the artistic style of the digipak and album artwork. In fact, this particular artistic style is extremely iconic to Gorillaz in general, as they have used it in a variety of music videos, official artwork, merchandise and promotional material. The main image immediately grabs the audience's attention, because not only is it so iconic to the band, but it is also the only part of the advert which isn't black and white. A black and white colour scheme is of course something which is commonly used with any alternative artists, as it fits the ideology of the target audience and just generally looks effective. 

The name of the album and artist is featured at the top of the of the magazine advert, as is conventional with a magazine advert for an album. The font used fits the overall representation of the digipak, and correctly associates the artwork with the artist. The release date of the album is also clearly placed beneath the main image, in a much larger/bolder font than the rest of the text. This is because it is the most important aspect of the magazine advert to the customer, who is obviously a fan of the artist and therefore would want to purchase the product.

As for the rest of the magazine advert, there is a rather great deal of text, which is all useful information that relates to the artist, album and record label. In fact, the Parlophone record label is also featured at the very bottom of the page, next to the Gorillaz logo and website. Although the text-based information is prominent in this magazine advert, it is certainly out shadowed by the artistic influence of the music and the artist themselves. 

'Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not' and 'AM' - A Digipak Analysis

The front cover and back of the digipak for Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not shows Chris McClure, a friend of the band Arctic Monkeys smoking a cigarette on the front cover. This synergises throughout the digipak, including the disc which is designed to look like the inside of an ashtray, with a pile of burnt out cigarettes. This theme is very simplistic, and the minimalism of it really works greatly for what this band represent and how they will connect with the ideology of the audience, which is particularly significant when you think how this was Arctic Monkeys debut album. Also, the fact that this was the band's debut album and the overall theme of the album is cigarettes does reflect what the band are about. The dullness of the greyscale back/white colour scheme symbolizes a common theme within the indie rock genre, which had a great impact at the time, and is still used to this day. I think the reason for why this kind of minimalism of a digipak works is that it really reflects how the audience think, as perhaps if the art was much more extravagant then it could take away from what is really important, the music. 

In more mainstream music, the emphasis is much more on the persona of the artistic. This often relates to commercial exhibitionist type music videos, which Sven E Carlson suggests the music video attempts to represent the artist as a brand rather than an artist. Though, this does not appear to be the case with this digipak, and to my knowledge the only music video which could be argued to represent factors of commercial exhibitionism would be 'I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor'. However, in more recent years 'Arctic Monkeys' have become much more mainstream, particularly with the release of their newest album 'AM', and because of this, many people would argue that their music is more about their persona than it was, which may be why many of their newer videos feature themselves, like 'Arabella' and ' R U MINE'. 

The digipak above for the band's newest album 'AM' that the band that it does feature a very similar minimalist theme, though with a more modern looking black/white colour scheme. The theme of this digipak is very simplistic, especially with the front cover which is also the same as the disc, and just features one very minimal piece of artwork, with no text at all that would conventionally relate to the name of the artist of album. Although, the most significant difference which is present on this digipak, is the band who are present on the inside of the digipak. This was not the case with the first digipak, which might say a lot about the music and how ideolgies could have changed over the last seven years. In the newer digipak, the band are shown smartly dressed on the inside of the digipak, though on the older digipak, a man is shown smoking a cigarette, the common theme of the digipak. 

I think that this not only says a lot about this particular band, but how music and interpretation within society has changed in the last decade. A brilliant example of how this is so, is that when 'Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not' was released on 23rd January 2006, the smoking ban was not yet in effect, as this was introduced on 1st July 2007. The smoking ban in England made it illegal to smoke in ANY workplace or social public places, which would have had a very significant impact on social culture that perhaps Arctic Monkeys first album represented. 

Although I have gone into deep analysis of the representation these two Arctic Monkey's albums in this post, it is also important to recognise the more basic conventions which relate to a digipak, even if these particular digipaks could be regarded as unconventional in one way or another. Both front covers of the digipak's feature some iconic artwork which is now very recognisable as an Arctic Monkeys album, even if 'AM' does not say so at all in text. The same goes for the back of both digipaks, though 'AM' is about as simplistic as it can get, it does still feature the band's name and album name also, as 'AM' is just an acronym for 'Arctic Monkeys' and therefore this is a self-titled album. I think that this is a rather clever idea for the digipak, as the front cover is lacking of the artist's name, and customers will always take a look at the tracklist on the back of a digipak, so then they will see the artist's name. There is also a tracklist on the back of the digipak, as well as a barcode and the band's independent record label, Domino Records. Finally, the inside of each of the two digipaks do feature extra information and artwork relating to the overall theme, as do the discs. 

Conventions of an Album Digipak

A digipak is a style of CD or DVD packaging that became popular in the early 2000s, commonly used with music artist's albums. The design of the digipak is generally made of paper which is reinforced by a plastic casing, often with folding spine which they open up like a book. They are designed to fold into a square shape like any CD casing, though they can fold a number of ways, rather than the more conventional and simpler CD cases. A good digipak is always one that is iconic, meaning that it will be recognised, even years after its initial release. 

The front of the digipak will contain artwork which will promote the artist, usually with a central image of the artist(s) or some other design or model which fans will be able to associate with artist, as this is what customers see when they are on the shelves in a store. The front of a digipak should be as eye-catching as possible, and reflect the genre of music and ideology that fans of that artist will be interested in.  The name of the album and artist will also be conventionally placed on the front cover of an album digipak, the exception being with some more alternative music, which may not include the album or artist name on the front. One example of this is the album cover for 'Dreamland' by Wild Belle, though this cover still works as it features Natalie Bergman, the lead singer on the cover, so fans of the artist will still recognise the album. 

The back of a digipak will most likely contain a tracklist, so that customers can see what they are buying in terms of the music on the CD. There will be more artwork on the back of a digipak, again reflecting the genre and ideology of the music on the album. The back of the digipak may also include the artist/album names, as well as conventional things like the barcode and record label. 

Inside the digipak you will firstly see the actual CD, which fits inside a plastic CD disc holder, like any form of disc based media. Though, a lot of these plastic holders in digipaks are different from other disc based media forms, as it is often transparent plastic, as they have more artwork behind the disc. The disc itself will also be incorporated with some form of artwork which will fit in with the style of the digipak. There may also be some extra information about the artist or album inside the digipak, though some artists will go with style over substance, depending on the genre which they represent. 

Digipak Template

This is a template for a digipak that I found on the Wyke College Moodle page. The template reflects a basic structure of a digipak, like the one that I will be creating for my music video.