For Neck Deeps 2017 album ‘The Peace and The Panic’, they went for a comic style for advertisement, merchandise and more. However I will specifically be looking at the vinyl record packaging for the album and how they used this style to create a narrative. The album consists of 11 songs which each are accompanied with a black and white illustration in relation to the albums concept, as well as illustration style. By combining all of these into the gatefold of the record packaging, it lets the consumer see a story within the album thats not just the songs themselves.
The user is able to follow the narrative that is shown in the cover or imagine their own over the time span of the album and match it up to each songs message. This adds a further aspect of depth to the record and further involves the user. As the American novelist Jean Hanff Korelitz explains “People need a narrative, and if there isn’t one on offer, they make one up”(Korelitz, 2013). This is especially useful if a band decides to create a full concept album which follows a specific theme in order to tell a singular story. Illustrations detailing scenes are interpreted like story boards in which the user will read through as if it’s a comic book and be able to gather a narrative. Edward Tufte states, “We come to appreciate how the underlying designs bring about and enable the joy growing from the comprehension of complexity, from finding pattern and form amidst commotion”(Tufte, 1990). This applies to Neck Deeps gatefold graphic as we are able to construe theories and understand the artists illustrations in comparison to the related song.
Tufte, E (1990) Envisioning Information, P. 115
Sanidad, A. (2013). Denying the Obvious: PW Talks with Jean Hanff Korelitz. [online] PublishersWeekly.com. Available at: https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/authors/interviews/article/59527-denying-the-obvious-pw-talks-with-jean-hanff-korelitz.html [Accessed 4 Nov. 2021].
