ACL 2023 - The Year’s Best Album Covers

A Closer Listen

How important are album covers?  While no one has the time to listen to all the new music being released, everyone has time to look through the covers.  In the old days, they would be on display at a music store; today they are listed in grids on digital websites.  As thousands of albums are released each week, artists and labels need an edge.  Though one can’t judge an album by the cover, art is an invitation to listen; if the art is intriguing, the music may be as well.  These ten covers caught our eye in 2023, and we found that the music was worthy of review, which means their art worked.  Congratulations to all the artists involved!

We hope you enjoy our selection of The Year’s Best Album Covers!

Arrowounds ~ In the Octopus Pond (Lost Tribe Sound) Collage, Layout and Design by R. Keane We had our eye on this one from the moment it was announced.  Ryan Keane’s Lost Tribe Sound label has been a staple on our site since its inception, winning many packaging awards; this year our attention turned to its covers.  Arrowounds’ entire Therianthrope Series is worth note, part of the larger series Maps to Where the Poison Grows.  Keane’s art promises deep mystery, and the album delivers with a psychedelic story split into parts, each a Lovecraftian nightmare.  

From R. Keane: I’ve always been a bit of a scavenger when it comes to creating artwork. I had originally created a collage piece based on the title from Arrowounds, pulling from photographs, textures, and debris I had collected over the years.  It was a good cover, and we were happy with it.  Then generative AI came to my attention in August of 2022.  I immediately began prompting some of the most bizarre octopus renders one could imagine. Knowing the use of AI is controversial, thinking of the many talented artists who have contributed to Lost Tribe Sound covers over the years, I approached releasing this imagery cautiously. What you see with the ‘In the Octopus Pond’ cover is heavily collaged from multiple renders, additional textures, filter enhancements, along with digital drawing and painting to fill in the gaps.  There’s obviously been a ton of AI artwork everywhere over the last year and half, but I never wanted this to feel recognizable as such. It felt important to make it my own, to show that AI can be used respectfully, and still add quality to the creative whole. To use it as a tool but never the whole enchilada… clean it up, dirty it down, collage with it, and be honest about how it was created. Arrowounds visceral titling and storyline made cobbling together the artwork for this four album series one of the most fascinating concept builds of my life.  He and I are forever bonded from the experience.

From Arrowounds: A confluence of psychic events. A transference of vibrational creativity as a gateway to myths unknown. We crawled through cave and crevice to reach a mysterious point of origin, the abyss stared back and gifted us grand illusions. There is no divide between creation, sound, and visualization. I will feel forever in debt to the universe for guiding these works forward, and for Ryan believing in and latching on to my weird worlds and breathing life into them.

Original Review

Brueder Selke ~ Belka & Strelka (Oscarson) Illustration by Lala Vaganova Design by Brueder Selke Who could resist this charming image of space dogs Belka and Strelka, “the dogs who lived?”  Their faces are so trusting and noble, it’s a wonder they were shot into space.  Vaganova’s warm image is an invitation to a warm album, recorded before an appreciative audience.  A Book Edition is also available, with the cover art inside.  Every aspect of the release was clearly thought out, and the attention to detail makes every participant a winner.

Overture from Sebastian, Daniel and Lala:

In their work, the brothers Sebastian & Daniel Selke bring together divergent dynamic styles with their childhood memories from the time of the Wende in East Berlin. Further, they search out comparable historical events and reflect their complex interrelationships musically. Throughout, encounter and exchange with like-minded friends and artist colleagues remain a firm pillar of their work.

And so they entrusted the illustrator Lala Vaganova with the creation of a double portrait of the legendary cosmonaut dogs Belka and Strelka, whom Lala through her fine style imbues with a sense both profound and fun.

Lala Vaganova:

Brueder Selke found me through mutual friends in Moscow and asked me to draw Belka and Strelka album cover. 

I grew up in the USSR, so the space conquest will be always relevant and sensitive subject for me. As the duo come from East Berlin, I think, astronaut dogs were one of the most vivid impressions of their childhood too. So this theme turned out to be pretty easy and natural to explore. 

Felt pens are one of my favorites tools since few years, and I considered it, combined with poster style, to be the most appropriated technique for this purpose. 

I’m very glad that our feelings matched and the cover became a natural extension of amazing music by Sebastian and Daniel.

Brueder Selke:

For the first time we decided to use two extraordinary animals as our motif. The existing photos and images in their one-dimensionality fell short of our sympathy with the vagabonds Belka and Strelka. Then we stumbled upon the work of Lala and asked her for her own version.

Our feelings and ideas overlapped with her extraordinarily fine feel for colour and shape. The final picture really impressed us: each element, from the background to the tiny planets and spaceship, was available as a separate layer so that we could freely manipulate them in our own graphics programme.

We thought about which elements we wanted to keep and concentrated particularly on the two protagonists. We purposely drew them together because we see Belka and Strelka, just like our own longstanding duo, as one, as a unity that particularly today can be both anchor and drive.

Original Review

Cicada ~ Seeking the Sources of Streams (flau) The album cover is a reflection of its genesis, as a hike in the Central Mountain Range, seeking the sources of streams, became a gorgeous ensemble release.  The accompanying video cemented the association.  This image appears to move as it is studied, a celebration of color and flow, perfectly timed with the season in which it was released.

From Cicada:

Seeking the Sources of Streams documented a long journey exploring the valleys deep in the mountains. It diminished the borders of the mountains and opened up the awareness of the elements in mountains through the rain, ridgeline, cirques, and giant trees. The mountains in this album are not merely locations but everything we experienced within.

We collaborated with woodcut print artist Muran on the album cover. This marks our first time releasing an album cover in this art form. Muran used a technique called “reduction printmaking” which means using only one plate for engraving and printing multiple times. The process was irreversible and the number of copies is limited. Inspired by the two pieces “Remains of Ancient Trees” and “Seeking the Sources of Streams,” Muran created an abstract and intricate space with streams, fallen trees, and grass owls. The visual is like a hazy recall after a long journey in the mountains, corresponding to the instant scenes depicted in the music.

Original Review

Dronal ~ Whilst We Fall (Supple9) Cover Design:  Supple9 How best to illustrate the climate crisis in a succinct, understandable manner?  The cover image borrows its striations from a NASA graph illustrating global temperature anomalies from 1880 to 2022.  In like manner, the album addresses the environmental crisis through field recording and drone, offering a warning that may one day become an elegy.

From Dronal:

I so often design my own cover art – as it’s such an intrinsic part of the creative work as a whole. “Whilst We Fall” had been written with a very specific message in mind, and I knew that I wanted the cover to reflect this. Initially I started drafting designs using striated lines extrapolated from contrasting photos I had taken – pictures of nature set against man-made industrial or abandoned spaces.

As I experimented with these striations, it reminded me of a graph which showed global temperature changes. This graphic had obviously had a strong impact on me, and once the thought was in my head I spent quite some time trying to find the original source – eventually discovering it on the NASA Earth Observatory website (https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/world-of-change/global-temperatures).

I spent quite a long time experimenting with how to incorporate the graphic in a subtle yet impactful way – but once I had recreated all of the lines and colour tones, I noticed how compelling it was simply rotated 90 degrees clockwise. It looked like a beautiful sky at sunset, but yet held this innate message – an endless fall into deep red.

As with my own music, I like to try and give an organic feel to even the most synthetic of creations, hence there are various distortions layered on top through multiple renderings and visual effects. Similarly I love to play with elements which only reveal themselves on repeated listening or viewing – in this case a photo blended into the design of two smoke stacks belching forth yet more unneeded pollution and distorting the striated lines further.

I cannot create something without it somehow reflecting aspects of me or my external influences, and there is nothing more pressing or impactful in my mind than the climate crisis we face. Whilst I can try to change my personal impact on our planet, perhaps I can also contribute to a growing cultural story which says this has to stop and motivates more people to demand the action that will drive positive change.

Original Review

Gareth Broke ~ Conversations (1631 Recordings) Artwork by Anna Salzmann, Garreth Broke, David Wenngren and Midjourney An A.I. collaborated on the music, and an A.I. also collaborated on the art.  So whom do we give the award to?  Such conversations are only likely to increase in upcoming years.  For all the talk of A.I. being a threat to civilization, it’s nice to know that the newcomers are also capable of creating great art.  Will the next civilization be more creative than warlike?  We can only hope.

From Garreth:

In the Conversations EP I had musical dialogues with unusual partners—a non-musician, a houseplant, and an AI. Continuing this process for the cover art was a logical extension of the concept, and it proved to be a lot of fun.

I asked the MidJourney image AI to combine a piece of original art by my artist partner Anna Salzmann with another image of a robot playing the piano that was created with MidJourney by 1631 Recordings label boss David Wenngren. MidJourney creates four responses to your prompt and then gives you the option to vary them. Anna and I reviewed its responses, culling the ones that were ugly, bizarre or boring, selecting the ones that had a weird beauty. The ideal image drew our eye but looked like something a human would never create.

People understandably have very mixed feelings about AI, ranging from “it’ll solve all our problems!” to “it’ll destroy us all!” Creative people in particular are concerned about its impact on our ability to earn a living from our work. I don’t disagree. But I also think we don’t know yet, and I think making decisions based on fear of the unknown is a bad idea. Maybe that makes me foolish. Only time will tell.

When Richard Allen wrote to me to ask for this bit of text, he also asked me to ask the AI what it thought. MidJourney can only generate images, so I asked it to imagine “how would an AI react to winning an award?” This is its response, which speaks for itself.

From the A.I.:

Original Review

Hanna Svirska ~ Yangola (Standard Deviation) Artwork by Sana Shahmuradova Hanna Svirska, Sana Shahmuradova and the Standard Deviation label are all based in Kyiv, and their art has endured through bombings and blackouts, frustrations and fears.  This full team has designed a beautiful release that sings of what it means to make art in a time of war.  The folkish cover art connects to the music’s theme: an angel of spring waits to return, promising a spiritual revival and dancing in the streets.

Original Review

From Hanna: I like all of Sana’s artwork but this one seemed to be the best for the EP cover. I’m really happy she agreed to give us this work. It became a beautiful and perfect addition for the EP’s atmosphere.

Jessica Pavone ~ Clamor (Out of Your Head Records) Artwork + Design by TJ Huff Rife with color, movement and symbolism, TJ Huff’s cover art for Clamor draws on concepts of “women’s work,” incorporating the bloomers that are part of Pavone’s presentation.  The image suggests freedom, while the improvisational music follows suit, an alternative to the restrictions placed upon women across the globe.  Also worth note: the unique, hand-poured vinyl (5 copies!) from Wax Mage Records.  Everyone had fun with this one, and it shows.

From TJ Huff:

The Out Of Your Head aesthetic has been slowly taking shape over the last 30 or so releases. Each time we work with a new artist, their identity gets thrown into the mix in a beautiful way and we come out with an even more evolved and defined look. I always love listening to the songs while I craft the visual housing for the release, and Jessica’s music was a great vehicle for this creativity. Our most successful covers come to fruition when the artist has some conceptual arc to the album, and Jessica supplied me with some great building blocks from which to build. From secret Chinese languages, to 17th century Korean seesaws, and 19th century changes in dress/identity, the album is all about women and their successful ability to thwart obstructions. It is an empowering concept choc-full of imagery and I used reference material from each of the aforementioned struggles to develop a single scene that incorporates them all in the OOYH palette of bright colors and wonky illustrations. I think the music powerfully and artistically emulates overcoming these female hindrances of yesteryear in a contemporary setting, and I aimed to do something similar with the visual art… I’m glad you enjoyed!

Original Review

Katherine Kyu Hyeon Lim ~ Starling Album artwork by Nikki Pet The cover art, a take on Escher’s Ascending and Descending, is enhanced by splashes of red and a pair of staring eyes.  The composer’s love of “geometric patterns and humorous satire” is brought to fruition, and the album is as playful as the cover.  Partially composed, partially improvised, the music heads in sudden directions that make sense once they arrive.

From Nikki Pet: When Katherine and I worked together in the past, it was usually a musical capacity, mostly in chamber music ensembles with Katherine on the violin and me on the clarinet. Even though the creation of this album cover swapped me into the role of visual artist, the design process worked similarly to our rehearsals—trading drafts back and forth, sharing ideas, iterating and “rehearsing” the visual output.

I had made several different options, and we were sorting through elements that we liked and disliked, when (mostly as a joke) I sent Katherine a new design: I took one of the contenders and slapped on a pair of eyes, animating it into a GIF with waving eyelashes. We had a good chuckle, amused. But then, we looked at it some more. It looked back at us. “Hold on,” we thought. As you can see, the rest is history.

Original Review

Kirin McElwain ~ Viriditas Cover art: Jessye McDowell, Future Sets (After Ruysch) (detail) McDowell writes, “This work continues my artistic exploration of cultural narratives surrounding technology, combining art historical references and new forms of making to create a sense of the familiar made strange.”  The same principle holds true for McElwain’s music, which alternates between modern composition and drone.  Viriditas is translated greening or greenness; the act of creativity is also one of spirituality, as demonstrated on this debut release.

From Jessye: I’ve never designed album art before, and when Kirin invited me to collaborate I was honored. Both our practices are interested in artmaking traditions, how they shape new forms and are themselves transformed by technology. It’s a kind of recontextualization of historical antecedents within emerging aesthetics, to draw connections between past, present, and future definitions of form. And both her album and my image are shaped by female predecessors: Kirin’s title comes from German mystic, composer, and natural historian Hidegard of Bingen. My image is based on a painting by Rachel Ruysch, one of the very few recognized women painters of the Dutch Golden Age. Creating the album art was essentially also a process of re-framing; I created a number of detail images from larger-scale works, and Kirin selected her favorites.

From Kirin: I first encountered Jessye’s work in 2018 when I attended their Future Sets show at Hunter College. I remember viewing “After Ruysch” and being completely taken with the stunningly beautiful colors and images as well as the eeriness of the textures and lighting. When I was finishing the music for Viriditas and thinking about the artwork, Jessye’s work immediately came to mind. Both our practices are interested in classical traditions and reimagining them through technology. For me, it’s western classical musical traditions and synthesis, whereas Jessye uses still life painting techniques and 3D modeling in the Future Sets series. The results can be both recognizably “beautiful” as well as unsettling or even disorienting; this is the best way I can describe what the process of making this music felt like, as well the experience that I hope for the listener to have as well. We decided on using a detail from “After Ruysch” for the practical reasons of the cassette format.

Original Review

Odalie ~ Puissante Vulnérabilité (Mesh) Artwork by Alma Alta The cover art (as well as the artwork for the preceding singles) addresses the theme of powerful vulnerability.  When one’s public face is removed, what lies beneath?  The model stares back at her own reflection in the water, a further symbol of Odalie’s deep dive.  The lingering question: is she putting flowers in, or taking them away?  Alma Alta’s image is an invitation to the music, and the music is an invitation to the imagination.

From Alma:

The creation process began a long time before the release of the album. Odalie made me listen to the first versions of her new tracks, and as always it was a blast for me as I was moved by the raw emotions and the delicacy reflected in these tracks.

She had already written about the concept she wanted to explore on this album: to speak about vulnerability. In our society, it’s often pictured as a sign of weakness; we tend to hide from people around us behind a mask of fake strength and a poker face. Yet we were aware of the risk of mental health issues and burnout that this kind of posture can cause, especially when trying to build an art career. I agreed on the message she wanted to convey with the album: to picture this sensitivity in a positive way, to encourage to nurture and assume it in broad daylight, and to learn to pick in these emotions resilience and inspiration.

I especially liked this conclusion because it matches my personal convictions and is the basis of the sincerity I always try to cultivate in my art.

The ideas for the four figurative yet metaphorical images that I suggested came very quickly after that. I’ve worked with Odalie to create her cover art since her debut EP, so the global art direction was already known by the both of us, and there was a lot of trust in each other ideas by this time.

I knew I wanted the character to be alone in these dark waters, to bring intimacy and symbolise an inner space. I also liked the idea of playing with the reflection as a mirror you can’t escape from. Flowers are prominent in my work. They combine beauty, inspiration and fragility, so it was an obvious choice for me to symbolize our vulnerability this way. 

I love to draw, but I opted for a collage technique by photoshop for a more sober aesthetic that focuses more on the message than the stylisation. 

The nudity meant for me the idea of a person facing herself that cannot hide behind any kind of artifice. Yet we knew it would represent a challenge to make this intelligible and not to fall in any sexualised representation of the feminine body, as we don’t want to add to the general male gaze. This led to the choice of the model (the same person as for the previous album) as her delicate physical aspect made it easier for me to seek for a representation that could be beautiful without recalling the usual imagery on women we wanted to avoid.

Original Review

Richard Allen