Research Task - Imagery Analyis

The nature of the imagery surrounding the album art used for rock bands such as Biffy Clyro is often sort of controversial and questionable and has many separate possible meanings attached, making the art ambiguous, and, most importantly, something different. Rebellious in nature, the difference in the album art style is similar to how the music is separate from the music commonly featured in the charts and that is why these bands are successful in what they do - the audience wants something different from their music and the outer-worldly album art is the first indication of this to them - and the bands deliver in this respect. 

Above is a strangely presented image which features rather implied destruction and violence but is different in that it doesn't feature gore or obvious violence featured in some album art for the more heavy metal bands, which is what makes the album art - and thus the artist - different. The image implies that people should expect to hear something different and this is what people get.

Coincidentally, the art featured above is similarly hard to approach like the previous album art and is abstract in its style, further promoting a sense that people should expect new and challenging music to listen to from the artist. Both album arts are surprisingly minimalist in design and do not have excessive feature of the artist's name or album name - meaning that the albums probably hope to be recognised for their art and visual portrayal rather than their headings. In short, the art intends to make you think just like music does, which is a neat representation to make of your band in album art. 

Further album art may consist of less abstract imagery but instead imagery that is independent in its aim and has no real editing or manipulation involved in its creation. This is simple but still manages not to imply that the band is simplistic in their aim and music. The reason this approach is fresh and appealing is because modern music nowadays is often overwhelmingly processed and tuned and this methodology doesn't really lend itself to or appreciate talented artists that make music with minimal fuss and simply play their instruments!

Common among posters and images featuring band members (commonly medium shot pictures) is the feature of large headings and text that promote the band. In this image, it is difficult to determine the roles of the band members and it is probably intended that there's no apparent hierarchy in the picture (as made evident by the fact that none of them are stood slightly in front of others, all wearing the same colour shirt, etc) to make each band member equal and to portray them as a band/group and not as separate people.