Photo: Press
Musicians are increasingly looking towards unique ways of drawing attention to their new releases as opposed to just putting it out there plainly. No one quite has the ingenious imagination of Tim Burgess and co, though (with their trusty sidekick Ian Read on layout and design).
To celebrate the release of their forthcoming single ‘Plastic Machinery’ (feat. Johnny Marr), which Gigwise can exclusively reveal is out on 26 May on 7" wax, they've revealed something very special. They’ve put out some their 41 singles to date, one EP and the forthcoming 7" as app icons, revolutionising the way that fans can consume music – no one has done this before.
This idea follows on from their representation of songs on a Periodic Table, the classic book covers for world book day, and The London Underground Map, which Peter Doherty called “the greatest piece of band merch ever made.”
What makes their latest piece brilliant the cryptic nods about the tracks. These include the mention of bombing submarines in the lyrics to 'Then', the chart positions shown in red on the top 19 singles, and the actual postcode of 1990 single 'Sproston Green'. Others are more straightforward yet still great. Grab the app screens as photos and look at them full size on your phone.
'Plastic Machinery', which is represented as an app below, is taken from The Charlatans' forthcoming album, Different Days. The record features guest appearances from New Order's Gillian and Stephen, crime writing superstar Ian Rankin, comedy actor and writer Sharon Horgan as well as Anton Newcombe, Factory Floor's Nik Coid and Kurt Wagner from Lambchop. We cannot wait to hear the results.
N.B If you like the idea of creating your own apps for your favourite songs of all time then send over some designs to applications@gigwise.com and we will feature the best ones.
