Michael Jackson - Album Art

Michael Jacksons Album covers through the Years

This was Michael Jackson's first album cover, in the late 70's. Michael Jackson was typically a soul and disco artist at this time and the album cover reflects this, wearing a suit with a bow tie, and a big diva afro in front of a brick wall, is somewhat groovy, reflecting the boogie aspect to his music.

 Michael Jackson's Thriller cover, the biggest selling album of all time! Michael jackson was well established after his last album, and this album in the early 80's reflects that, his pose is relaxed as though there is mo competition and he clear looks like the is on top of his game, most importantly the album doesn't look 'naff'. notice how light is entering through the left, this is a artistic device that promotes the artwork to look more pleasing as in the western world, we read from left to right and this is imprinted into everything we look at, if it were the other way around it would cause a discomfort to look at. Also note that michael jackson touches the top of the frame and falls into a triangle, another artistic device, the rule of three, it makes everything more pleasing to look at. the album name is also written in  Michaels handwriting to make it look like a signature making people want it as it feeling like it is personal to you, he has signed it for you, of course this isn't fact, but it makes you feel this.

This album cover is important to the Michael Jackson movement, as perviously music was disco, soul and blues, a new genre was taking stage, rap and hip hop, Michael would need to compete with this to attract an even larger audience, Michael believed there was always room for improvement even if his pervious was the greatest selling album of all time. Michael needed to match the 'tough' image rappers gave and this cover does so and well it does. The chains, studs and zips all over Michaels outfit match that punk, bad look, the fact that he is wearing all black whereas before he wore white shows the development in appearance, white is a pure and innocent and black being its binary opposite gives the opposite impression, an negative figure. the white background against the black title and outfit is also every harsh to look at, the is no blend between the two colours, its incredibly sharp and forces the viewer to almost turn away from it, the white makes the black sit forward. Also the red 'bad' red is a colour that has high volume and sits forward against black and white, this makes the 'bad' draw the viewers eye, and the fact that it is in a spray painted font makes it advocate that it is bad and the colour red is closely associated with danger. Finally Jacksons pose makes you feel he has attitude, ultimately the whole album cover consists of attitude and breaking convention, Michael did compete and for many modern day artists this album was their inspiration.

Here are the Michael Jacksons other album covers