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In today's Independent on Sunday legendary album cover designer Peter Saville has pronounced that album art is dead.
Saville is famous for the iconic artwork of New Order and Joy Division who he worked with extensively, he has also designed album covers for Pulp, Suede and Roxy Music.
“We have a social disaster on our hands,” he said, speaking from his studio this weekend, “The things that pop music was there to do for us have all been done... there's nothing to rail against now.
“When I was 15, in the North-west of England ... the record cover was like a picture window to another world. Seeing an Andy Warhol illustration on a Velvet Underground album was a revelation ... It was the art of our generation ... true pop art.”
But is Saville really only speaking for his generation? After all most 15 year olds in the North-west of England today won't be aware that they're missing out on Andy Warhol's artwork, as it's available to view in the mass media and on t-shirts in Afflecks Palace. The rate at which most 15 year olds in 2008 are consuming images in the media is beyond anything Saville would have dreamed of as a teenager in Manchester.
Is the artwork of bands to be consumed elsewhere, rather than packaged around a 12 inch disc of black plastic? Will classic album artwork of the future be all the surrounding marketing of an LP, its TV advert, its website, its promo videos?
Or will the 5cm squared artwork included on your iPod when you view the album details of your favourite tune be all there is left, a postage stamp size footnote of music history?
For now, album artwork is still alive and well. To prove my point, here's 10 album covers from this year that manage to encapsulate the sound of an album with imagery. Check 'em out and if you don't agree or you want to suggest something better then leave a comment.
Sebastien Grainger & The Mountains... Next 
Sunday 07/09/08 Massive Attack, Santogold @ Becks Fusions 2008, Castlefield Arena, Manchester
Santogold, Massive Attack, The Presets @ Beck's Fusions 2008.jpg)
Santogold - 'Lights Out'.jpg)
Tuesday 03/06/08 Santogold @ The Scala, London
May Day 2010: The 20 Greatest Protest Songs 
Temper Trap Triumph At London's Shepherds Bush Empire - PHOTOS
Fyfe Dangerfield Thrills Fans At Intimate London Concert
- I dont see why the death of the CD should be seen as the death of album artwork as well. I think the Santogold cover shows perfectly how good artwork still exists in 2008. And whats wrong if it only appears in a square inch display on an iPod? It’s still there. It’s still good to look at. Embrace the future.
- The artwork appears all over the place anyway, not just on your ipod. Peter is from the age of touch and smell.
- The artwork had to be nothing less then austonishing 20 years ago, when there wasn’t such a thing as digital promotion. Artwork made a big part of a record’’s marketing, and so, maybe, the influx of great art could be explained. My favorite from 2008 is Viva la Viva by Coldplay and Nude with Boots from the Melvins (totally badass cover!)
- I reckon it still has to be astonishing, but there’s always been really lazy album art. Anything with the artist just posing, logo and album title is boring.
- Hi. Yeah. Don’t know what your creds. as an art critic are, but that’’s not a renaissance" painting. try again.
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