Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say ...

Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not.

Immediately our attention is drawn to the image of a man smoking a cigarette on the front cover of the Arctic Monkey's album. The image appears very relaxed, suggesting the photography was not of much professionalism. It is likely that the band chose this imagery to use as a depiction of themselves; highlighting that they are more than likely working class people, and not constructed by fame and fortune. The cover uses black and grey colours, perhaps reflecting the darkness and deepness of the band's music. The colour choice also fits with the genre of the band's music, as dark colours are often associated with indie/rock. The Arctic Monkey's logo is written in a serif font and placed in the top left hand corner in a white box. This makes it the first thing seen in the audience's line of vision, and the white colour contrasts the darkness of the cover. Unusually, the album title is not featured on the front cover, however the simplicity of the design cleverly suggests that the Arctic Monkey's want the audience to focus solely on the imagery and the depictions created from it.

Showing continuity throughout, the disk uses dark colours just like the front cover. It shows no text, only an image of used cigarettes to fill the entire circumference of the disk. The band have used the shape of the disk to their advantage, as they have created an image that looks like an ash tray. The imagery of used cigarettes is associated with the man on the front cover; again showing continuity. This suggests an addiction, and again creates the portrayal that the band want their target audience to think of them as none other than every day working class people; allowing Personal Relationships to be created according to the Uses and Gratifications theory. The idea of addiction could also be associated with the Arctic Monkey's addiction to music, or the idea that they want their target audience to feel their addiction. I like the simplicity of the digipak as a whole particularly the disk, as the simplicity cleverly creates deeper depictions through focusing on imagery.

The back cover again uses only dark colours, showing the band want the same mood portrayed throughout every aspect of their digipak. The same image of the man on the front cover is used, however this time making no direct eye contact. Instead he appears to be in a more relaxed posed, rubbing his eyes connoting stress or tiredness. This could be a representation of the time and hard work that the Arctic Monkey's have put into their album, and again they are representing themselves as every day people, creating realism. The track list is written in a very basic serif font, showing disorganisation through poor grammar and punctuation; no capital letters, no track numbers. The simplicity of the text suggests again that the band want the main focus to be the imagery on the digipak. The barcode and record label information is featured in the bottom right hand corner and blends in well with the colour scheme of the rest of the cover, ensuring the audience's attention is not drawn away from the imagery.