Album Cover conventions

Typical conventions that an album cover has includes
- A close up or mid shot of the artist in a provocative and visually enticing pose. Costume and makeup is reflective of the genre for example a rock band would have a grungy aesthetic, with a dark colour scheme to reflect the mysterious and anti authority rebel ideologies. Juxtaposing this would be a pop artist, which would traditional include bright playfully colours to echo the optimistic, feel good nature of the music.

- Name of the artist are clearly seen on the front, in a type face that coincides with the genre

- Conventionally the name of the album reflects the overall ideologies of the album and what messages the artist is trying to convey about society, music and the media to their audience. More challenging artist such as Lady Gaga named her album 'the fame monster' to encourage the audience to question their perception of the capitalist society they live in and the celebrity obsessed life one may lead today. However less boundary breaking artists with a more mainstream image, Such as Cheryl Coles album '3 Words' reefers to love, relationship and men, extremely stereotypical for the pop genre.

-Genre and lifestyle demographics can clearly be distinguish through not only the photography style of the album artwork but also what symbols they use to signify this , such as record label symbols to convey they are part of large established corporation, and may indicate to the consumer their mainstream music, and that they brand as a whole echoes this also.

Album covers and artwork are extremely important as even through the sales of tangible albums are decreasing, the artwork for the covers are still being used through downloading websites such as itunes or amazon and continue to be a important part in marketing a artist and signifying the theme, beliefs and ideas behind a album and the artist.