Thursday-Short-Thoughts: Do we appreciate album artwork anymore?

Hey folks. A little bit of a short one for mid-week today …

< The excitement of getting a vinyl or CD wouldn’t just be for the song within the sleeve or case, right? >

While your ears are satisfied, what plays on your eyes – and your mind – as you listen?

Falling in admiration for your favourite artist that little bit more is so important, especially via a another creative medium such as photography, illustration and graphic design. It is a way of getting a visual feel of an artist opposed to the sound alone. But have we lost this in modern times? Yes, we can see a small, pixeled thumbnail of the album art via our phones on Spotify but it simply doesn’t cut the same shapes. Spotify has an average of 172 million premium subscribers…

… That’s a potential 172 million less people holding a physical piece of album artwork in their hands. Experiencing the music how it is meant to be experienced and maybe, just maybe … buying tour tickets along the way?

As an avid vinyl collector myself, I love nothing more than sitting down with a new pristine vinyl, scanning through the vinyl sleeve dimensions and vivid imaginations getting to know the artist, and their musical mindset, that little bit more: their mural to a lifelong possessive journal of being a musician.

4 responses to “Thursday-Short-Thoughts: Do we appreciate album artwork anymore?”

Crandew

Jan 27, 2022 at 10:00 pm

I think most overlook the artwork completely now, unfortunately. It went away when CDs first hit the market, but I also still have vinyl and listen as often as possible.

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1. manvmusic
  
  Jan 28, 2022 at 8:36 pm
  
  Yeah, luckily – vinyl has made a startling comeback into today’s industry which more and more consumers looking for those physical copies – that come with all the juicy sleeve extras that you just don’t get with streaming.
  
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Andrew

Jan 28, 2022 at 2:24 pm

This guy does. When I buy a CD, I put it in my database. I then try to add as much of the artwork as I can, in the highest resolution I can get. After I put the disc in the boombox, I go over the artwork. I also want to read the lyrics to the songs.

The music is still the most important thing. Artwork is important, even if some bands cheap out on it now (stupid digipaks). To me, it’s part of the package.

To answer your question, I think that most people under the age of, I’m guessing 25, aren’t even looking for artwork. I don’t even know if they’re aware the artwork even exists for a song, or an album. I’m generalizing, but I could be way off here. I hope I am. Perhaps older folks, including people from my generation and above, have given up on the artwork. I sure hope not, but it’s entirely possible.

This is the real question people should ask themselves – Is the artwork still relevant?

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1. manvmusic
  
  Jan 28, 2022 at 8:44 pm
  
  Oh absolutely, I do believe that artwork is relevant still to this day. It creates the musical journey, completes the missing pieces of the mind of a musician sometimes and gives beautiful context to the music itself. I always seek out the artwork out on new music, whatever draws me in to something new is mostly down to the expressive artwork.
  
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