01/21/2008
VISUAL NOTES: Asobi Seksu = Playful Sex and Poppy Palettes
Many of the proverbial "Great Designers" of our time have had their careers launched by fantastic record sleeve and CD design. While these pieces are featured in countless delicious, glossy art books, we should also acknowledge that, at the core, the image on the outside is designed to support the music housed within.
So get set to rejoice over this great marriage of art and music on NYC J-poppers Asobi Seksu's album sleeves...
The artist responsible is Sean McCabe, a one-man creative machine behind Wider-Than-Pictures design. McCabe's designs for Asobi Seksu's Citrus (Gigantic Records 2006), Holiday EP, and recent 7" for "Stay Awake", have got me all excited, visually stimulated, and downright lusting for these albums to have and to hold (and listen to, of course)!
McCabe's treatment of the title text reads as fresh and slightly abstract, but has a tinge of throwback to mid 60's avant garde character styles. The bubblegum pop palettes and sugary patterns quite perfectly complement the bouncing, swirling Blonde Redhead-esque jams of Brooklyn-based Asobi Seksu (Japanese translation: "playful sex").
Even cooler, McCabe does all of this work out of his apartment, including the photography.
Since 2008 is still young, I'll share "New Years", my favorite track off of Citrus. I strongly advise that you purchase the vinyl, and let it rest proudly on the coffee table along with those sleek design books.
VISUAL NOTES is brought to you by Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction - a clothing company that hires innovative, contemporary artists to design exceptional and wearable pieces that combat the troubling possibility of artwork losing its presence and power in our image-saturated society.
MP3
Download 'Asobi Seksu - New Years'3:02 | 5.80MB
Posted by Robin on 01/21/2008 9:24 AM in Indie-Pop, Visual Notes
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