Art Designers???

[poorlol]

Does anyone know who designed their old 7" covers, tour posters, ad bills, etc? I love that style of just a big stark photo with minmal, legible text in the corners. Kinda reminds me of The Smiths' artwork too.

[japanesebaby]

a very interesting topic!
i've never seen any comprehensive list of the designers, would be great if we had it.

what comes to cover art, there are some bits of info to be found on daren butler's discography book. unfortunately the book lists these details rather randomly and not for every release. not sure which covers you specifically meant, but here're some details for pre-84 releases:


killing ar arab 7"  - sleeve design by chris parry and bill smith

boys don't cry 7" & jumping someone else's train 7" - sleeve design by bill smith.

cult hero 7" - butler: "the design for the sleeve was an idea of robert smith's from an old howlin' wolf LP"

(i'm not too familiar with howlin' wolf LPs myself so anybody know which one?)

primary 7" - looks like porl/parched art obviously

charlotte sometimes 7" - a blurred photo of mary poole taken by robert in some castle in scotland

happily ever after 2LP (USA only) - design by ben kelly

pornography - design by ben kelly/ben kelly with the cure

let's go to bed 7" - butler: "the sleeve was not a parched art design" (who designed it then? i don't know.)

the walk 7" - design by parched art


sometimes the band might have worked together with the designers, although it's not always stated.
+ for at least some of the international pressings with different cover art, the sleeve design was sometimes done by the local record company. for instnace at least some japanese releases have cover art that was put together by VAP (their record label in japan).

about tour posters/other art, i'd love to know more too.

does anyone have more information about the abovementioned desginers bill smith and/or ben kelly? :

[japanesebaby]

by the way, i always found this interesting:

although the sleeve of 'pornography' was desgined by by ben kelly with the cure, porl thompson also created  sleeve for the album which depicted naked anumals falling from the sy, covering up parts of their bodies with their arms and paws. it was not finished in time to be used as the sleeve.
a massive version of this design was painted by porl thompson in luminous paint and used as a back drop during the pornography tour.

i wonder if anyone has a copy of that design/ a photo from the tour where the backdrop could be seen more or less clearly?

[Descent]

Bill Smith was simply the art director at Polydor at the time. The major record companies always have a graphic design department in the house.

He was responsible for the early Cure covers (KAA, BDC, Jumping Someone Else's Train, Three Imaginary Boys LP, Boys Don't Cry LP) as well as ads from that time. He also did the Seventeen Seconds cover based on an idea from Robert Smith. He probably created the first THE CURE logo which is really great and emblematic I think (they used it until 1982).

You can read a short interview :
http://www.arkade.com/content/Features/Bill+Smith+Album+Cover+Design

Ben Kelly. I don't know who that is. Probably not that interior designer with the same name. (?)

Let's Go To Bed is a typical "record company cover". Probably somebody from the Polydor's art departm made that one. Parched Art refused to design it as they didn't like the song.

[japanesebaby]

thanks for the interview link.

Ben Kelly. I don't know who that is. Probably not that interior designer with the same name. (?)

i suppose ben kelly the interior designer is the guy responsible for the look of factory's famous hacienda:

http://www.cerysmaticfactory.info/ben_kelly.html

Parched Art refused to design it as they didn't like the song.

haha they must have always paid porl some extra since he also didn't refuse to play that song live later on .

[Descent]

haha they must have always paid porl some extra since he also didn't refuse to play that song live later on .

Maybe he was allowed to play some weird stuff during the soundchecks as a compromise.  And eventually, after playing it 200 times, the song grew on everybody. But it's kind of an over-played track and it wasn't very successful at the time. Hummmm.

[wish-man]

Great topic! Thanks for opening it! Will try to find out something from my sources