Touchable Sound: A Collection of 7-inch Records from the USA

Soundscreen’s recent book, Touchable Sound: A Collection of 7-inch Records from the USA, is a celebration of nearly 25 years of labor intensive 7-inch record packaging and design. Curated by Brian Roettinger, Mike Treff, and Diego Hadis, it features over 300 records and 600 bands, with an introduction from the always insightful Henry H. Owings, and essay contributions from Simple Machine’s founder Kristin Thomson, Amphetamine Reptile founder Tom Hazelmyer, Three One G founder Justin Pearson, and many more.

Amazon link: Touchable Sound

Autechre - EPS 1991 - 2002

Autechre
EPS 1991 - 2002
(Warp)

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This 47 track collection brings together material from Autechre's EP releases (now mostly out of print) from between 1991 - 2002 years. Including:

Cavity Job (1991 - First Autechre release from before they signed to Warp and not available on CD before)
Basscad EP (1994)
Anti EP (1995)
Garbage (1995)
Anvil Vapre (1995)
Peel Session (Transmitted 1995, released 1999)
Envane (1997)
Cichlisuite (1997)
EP7 (1999)
Peel Session 2 (Transmitted 1999, released 2001)
Gantz_Graf (2002)

All versions come with 3 High Quality Videos:
Second Bad Vilbel (Chris Cunningham)
Gantz_Graf (Alexander Rutterford)
Basscadet (Jess Scott Hunter)
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AVAILABLE NOW

320 MP3 and Video

WAV and Video
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PRE-ORDER NOW -
5x Deluxe CD Boxset
Designed by The Designers Republic

CD version comes with WAV and 320 MP3 Downloads and Video


CD SHIPPED & RELEASED 11TH APRIL 2011


Amazon Link: EPs 1991 - 2002

Sleeping Beauty Ballet Suite sleeve by unknown designer

Link: Re:collection

Archiving Australian graphic design artefacts, Re:Collection posted this World Record Club sleeve from the 1960s. Unfortunately there is no designer credit so it's impossible to determine who devised this graceful suggestion of movement.

Various Production work by David Bray

Link: David Bray
Link: Thee Soft Verge
Link: Various Production

David Bray has been a longtime collaborator with the enigmatic Various Production. Initially he gained attention for his quirky illustration style but some of his recent sleeves have employed more photographic elements. Still, they are just as compelling.

For The Record #2: Nitzan Hermon

Link: Nitzan
Link: Edit by Edit
Link: Fine Art Recordings
Link: Sebastian Onufszak

Already involved in some very inventive music packaging through his Fine Art label, Designer Nitzan Hermon recently received a massive amount of internet love due to his coordination of a stunning series of music genre-themed screenprints. After the dedication he's demonstrated for that point where music and art collide, I was keen to know what his favourite sleeve was.

Almost an impossible task, Nitzan agreed to pick just one of the sleeves he has been impressed by: the RGB solution for Michael Fakesch's Exchange - as prescribed by Polish-German illustrator, designer and art director Sebastian Onufszak.

Radio Slave - 'No Sleep Part Six' by Red Design

Link: Red Design

Brighton's Red Design just unveiled its new website. That's probably reason enough to post the great sleeve that the studio created for Rekids' Radio Slave.

Harald Grosskopf - Synthesist special edition

Link: Boomkat

Finally touching down in a deluxe metallic reverse-bound jacket, this long-awaited reissue of Harald Grosskopf's influential solo debut from 1980 is finally here, complete with a 60-minute bonus CD including re-workings from James Ferraro, Oneohtrix Point Never, JD Twitch, CFCF, Stellar Om Source, Arp, Blondes and much more.

Having long been touted by connoisseurs as one of the great "lost" electronic albums of the early-80's 'Synthesist' was created as the New Age of the '80s was dawning and the titans of Krautrock had largely left their best work behind them. Harald had worked with the very best of them, playing drums on seminal albums by Klaus Schulze, the notorious Cosmic Jokers, Ashra, and Tarot before he retreated to the West German countryside with a MiniMoog and Revox Reel-to-Reel in 1979 to create his personal opus.

The album feels like a symbiosis of two eras, the proggy excesses of the '70s reigned in by percussively pulsing arpeggiations which would signal Techno on the horizon, especially on the jaw-dropping '1847 Earth' and the joyfully funky ecstasy of 'Transcendental Overdrive'.

His legacy is faithfully handled on the remixes, the best of which appear in CFCF's dreamy remake of 'B. Aldrian', JD Twitch's emphatically NRGetic mix of 'Emphasis', the wormhole experience of OPN's 'Trauma' and James Ferraro's slyly charming interpretation of 'Transcendental Overdrive Zone' under the Keyhole Voyeur alias, retitled 'Wishmaster'.

Photography by Detlef Maugsch.
Original artwork by Siegfried Kottler.
Liner note translation by Mike Burns.
Art direction by Kevin O'Neill.

Punks Jump Up - 'Block Head' by Michael Willis

Link: Other Scenes

Michael Willis of Other Scenes has seemingly taken inspiration from the title of, Punks Jump Up's latest Kitsune release, 'Block Head' and created artwork linked closely to Ian Dury & The Blockheads.

This 'mask' artwork obviously owes a huge debt to Barney Bubbles including a typographic style that's suggestive of the one devised for the influential Stiff Records.

If you like that, get Paul Gorman's great book on Barnely Bubbles in its fairly new-ish 2010 edition: Reasons to be Cheerful

Gavin Lucas on rubbish box sets

Link: Creative Review

Ellen Allien - Dust Remixes by Pfadfinderei

In general, designers appear to have a bit of a problem with the generic CD jewel case: it's possibly the Comic Sans of music packaging. That may be why I like this fairly simple and unabashed BPitch Control release by Florian Sebald of Pfadfinderei: the Berlin collective that created a lot of artwork for the label [including that striking Modeselektor 'monkey' logo].