Analysing a CD Cover

 This is the CD cover for the Indie singer Eliza Doolittle’s single ‘Pack Up’; the video to which I analysed earlier.

  There is no one image on the cover, but many different abstract objects and eccentric items crammed together almost as a background to the words ‘ELIZA DOOLITTLE PACK UP’. The text is written in a thick blocky font, so there is more room for more images, and so it stands out against the black background. I think black was chosen as the background because within the letters, the colours used are only bright and sunny, with no black used at all, therefore the words would stand out more, and not blend into the black.

   The images and items that make up the words are the ‘sliced’ up version of the image cluster used on Eliza Doolittle’s website homepage. This is done as a promotional technique; designed to draw you to her homepage and the other linked items such as the CD cover.

   The CD cover is quite effective as it is very eye catching and would certainly stand out on a shelf amongst other music CDs, because of the bright colours which stand out anyway against the background. There are no main colours used on this cover, because it uses all bright happy colours; red, yellow, orange, green, pink etc.

   The image relates to the single, because it gives you a preconception of what the song will be like- up-beat and cheerful, which it is. The bright colours relate to the setting where the video is shot (Jamaica) where vibrancy and colourfulness is a part of everyday life. The colours and images make you believe that the song is going to be light and inoffensive, which would be correct.

   I think this CD cover is different from other artists in Eliza Doolittle’s genre because although it states only her name and the title of the song, the words are made abstract by the images and objects which are crammed inside the letters, making it stand out from other, simpler CD covers from Indie artists, which are usually just an image of the singer/band themselves.