'Cargaa 1 EP' by HelloMe

Link: HelloMe 
Link: Warp 

The first of three Cargaa EPs that represents emerging Lisbon talent is released by Warp next week. Available as as a 12" and download, artwork comes courtesy of Berlin's HelloMe: furthering - as the bottom images suggest - the palette and clean aesthetic of their refresh of Warp's website. Although this time, coupling that Designers Republic 2.0 style with some more expressively daubed detailing.

Michael and Mattis - 'Hoes Before Bros' artwork by Cordova-Canillas

Link: Cordova-Canillas
Link: Hivern Discs

Debut Michael and Mattis EP for the Hivern label comes with a sleeve art directed by Barcelona's Cordova-Canillas. A great project in its own right but even more impressive when you see how this artwork for the NewYork/Oslo duo is within the context of a broad yet cohesive portfolio that also includes some great editorial, digital and photography work.

Luke Vibert's Nuggets Vol. 3 by Non-Format

Link: Non-Format
Link: Lo Recordings

Boasting rare oddities from the Bruton Music label, Luke Vibert's third journey through the archives of lost synth-heavy library music is graced with some well crafted artwork from Non-Format.

Now up on their updated website (alongside their rightly lauded design for Black Devil Disco Club's Black Moon White Sun album), Kjell Ekhorn and Jon Forss have offered up the depiction of a curious object that simultaneously feels both modern and antique. The diagonals of its cryptic markings are carried through on the release's text with track titles and credits dropped into a multi-directional grid that similarly plays with another dichotomy: that of order and chaos.

 

U2 - 'Ordinary Love' artwork by Oliver Jeffers

Link: Oliver Jeffers
Link: Record Store Day

It's probably not since Michael Cina's work for Matthew Dear that a sleeve with a painted portrait has been featured here. And this one, by Ireland's Oliver Jeffers, already had me overcoming my own indifference to U2 when it was released last week as a limited 10" vinyl pressing for Record Store Day. A song featured in the film Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom, it suddenly has more resonance given the passing of its iconic subject.

Debukas - I Am Machinery by Richard Robinson

Link: Richard Robinson
Link: Debukas
Link: 2020Vision

Available now is the Debukas album I Am Machinery on 2020 Vision. As already featured in full on the wonderful Collate, it incorporates a great custom typeface by the masterful Richard Robinson (that seemingly follows on rather nicely from his contemporary stencil-based re-design for Dummy).

For The Record #6: Kate Moross

Link: Kate Moross
Link: Studio Moross
Link: Stiff Records
Link: Design Manchester 13
Link: Paul Gorman's Reasons to be Cheerful book


Ahead of her talk at Design Manchester 13 tomorrow (alongside Malcolm Garrett, Peter Saville and Mark Farrow, no less), Kate Moross selects the Kandinsky-inspired 1977 work by Barney Bubbles for The Damned's Music For Pleasure as her personal favourite sleeve.

"I didn't know what it was when I first found it but I loved it immediately," she says. "Some people will obviously know about Barney Bubbles but I still don't think he's had the recognition that he deserves. Not when you consider the amount of great work he did.

"I've got to know Bubbles' biographer Paul Gorman and he's said that he sees some of him in me. Not necessarily in terms of our styles... but it's a huge compliment."

Kate Moross' own book, Make Your Own Luck, is published by Prestel April 2014.

Manchester Confidential also has a feature on Design Manchester 13.

Various Artists - Interpretations on F.C. Judd by Optigram

Link: Optigram
Link: Public Information

Coming after last year's 35 track F.C. Judd collection, Electronics Without Tears, the Public Information label has invited Chris Carter, Perc, Pye Corner Audio, Holly Herndon, Mordant Music and more to reconfigure selected sounds from his extensive archive. Optigram has, in turn, delivered slick monochrome artwork to house crisp white vinyl. Limited edition with 500 copies worldwide plus substantially less exclusive/sexy digital versions.

Objekt/Cosmin TRG - 'Shuttered/Auster' by Give Up Art and Shaun Bloodworth

Link: Give Up Art
Link: Shaun Bloodworth
Link: The Green Series
Link: Bleep.com

The second in the Bleep.com co-curated Green Series is another highly collectable split release. Again boasting a die-cut, embossed and hand-stamped outer sleeve (with internal photography by Shaun Bloodworth), this one features music from the Berlin-based Objekt and Romania's Cosmin TRG (whose second album will be out in April via 50 Weapons).

The run of deluxe packages - complete with signed colour art prints - is already spoken for. The (still beautiful) standard version can currently be pre-ordered. Be quick though. Only 500 copies worldwide and released next week.

The Draughtsman - '1694 EP' artwork by Alex Egan

Link: Alex Egan

Renaissance man or control freak? Whatever, Alex Egan's release as The Draughtsman comes complete with artwork by the producer. Of course, Egan is more than adept at producing tasty music-oriented design with his output gracing labels including Phantasy Sound. However the polymath's double (green) vinyl offering is particularly special.

Evidently a homage to Peter Greenaway's The Draughtman's Contract, its depiction of ordered nature plays against some more haphazard type. With remixes from Roman Flügel, Cosmo Vitelli and Tim Paris, it's available to purchase from Phonica.

Dinos Chapman - Luftbobler design by FUEL

Link: Fuel Design
Link: The Vinyl Factory 

Limited Edition details:

• Four plate copper etching by Dinos Chapman, hand coloured on 300gsm Somerset Velvet soft white paper
• Five colour screen printed artwork across four panels of cloth-bound bespoke board
• Two 180-gram heavyweight hand etched records, containing the album's 13 tracks, pressed on the EMI 1400 in Hayes, Middlesex
• Limited to 300 copies worldwide, each hand signed and numbered by the artist
• One in every 10 copies contains an exclusive bonus track, pressed on an additional one-sided 12"
• Mastered for vinyl by Noel Summerville at 3345 Mastering
• Music written and produced by Dinos Chapman
• Original etching by Dinos Chapman
• Design by FUEL

One in every 10 copies also contains an additional one-sided 12" vinyl pressing of an exclusive bonus track, which will never be subsequently released on any format.

This limited edition is available to pre-order now. The Vinyl Factory will release 'Luftbobler' on gatefold vinyl, CD and digital formats on 25 February 2013. An accompanying, site-specific audio-visual installation will take place at The Vinyl Factory in Soho, London from 28 February to 3 March 2013.

Pricing:

• The first 100 copies of this edition will be priced at £200
• The next 100 copies of this edition will be priced at £250
• The last 100 copies of this edition will be priced at £300

DJ Rashad - 'Rollin' artwork by Optigram

Link: Optigram 
Link: Alex Trochut
Link: Hyperdub

Another sleeve from Manuel Sepulveda of Optigram for the Hyperdub label. This time it's a visualisation for an upcoming four track EP by DJ Rashad: a name synonymous with Chicago's footwork sound. Not that this is completely new territory for Sepulveda (he previously designed an album cover for, scene stalwart, Traxman on Planet Mu) but it is representative of Hyperdub's continued diversification.

This one sees the designer creating the sort of dark textures that typified Ikonika's 2010 album while also making use of a bold typeface created by Alex Trochut.

Getz/Andy Pain & Z Connection - 'The Wicker Man/Dive Ruv' artwork by Pyramid Studio

Link: Pyramid Studio

12" artwork for, Russian label, Interactive Music by Pyramid Studio's João Miguel Chaves. Nice.

'Dalston Fried Chicken' from MarkJames_Works and Unbox Industries

Link: Mark James_Works
Link: Unbox Industries

Inspired by hazy late night visits to fast food outlets, Dalston is six inches of finger lickin’ fried chicken presented in vinyl. Delivered in a hand screen printed box, and limited to 200 pieces. 

DFC also comes with a deep fried orange 7” single featuring a brand new track, 'Chicken Rhythm' by Gareth Goddard, (Cherrystones)

Also available will be a limited edition screen print and T-shirt. 

 

Autechre - Exai by The Designers Republic

Link: The Designers Republic
Link: Autechre
Link: Warp

Exai is the 11th album from Rob Brown and Sean Booth
Released March 2013

17 tracks - 2 hours 32 seconds

- Deluxe Vinyl Edition
- Compact Disc
- High Quality Download

Made in The Designers Republic™ 


Deluxe Vinyl Edition

• 4 x heavyweight 180gram vinyl, each disc packed in its own printed inner sleeve.
• Housed in a rigid slipcase wrapped in Cairn Eco Kraft stock with clear foil block to front.
• Includes Download code redeemable at Bleep.com

CD Edition

• 2 x cd, each packed in its own printed cd wallet.
• Housed in a CD slipcase made from Cairn Eco Kraft stock with clear foil block to front.

Included free with all Vinyl & CD orders on Bleep.com

• Your choice of 16bit / 44.1kHz or 24bit / 44.1kHz WAV version of the album
• Plus a 320kbps LAME encoded MP3 version of the album for your portable player

• These digital versions will be available to download direct from Bleep.com on day of release

Preordering now.

Karenn/The Analogue Cops - 'Studio 3/OCPLX1' by Give Up Art and Shaun Bloodworth

Link: Give Up Art
Link: Shaun Bloodworth
Link: The Green Series
Link: Bleep.com

Following up 2009's North/South/East/West project, Bleep.com has again collaborated with the formidable team of, design company, Give Up Art and, photographer, Shaun Bloodworth. Again fusing artwork and music, 'The Green Series' has made its pre-order debut with a split techno-oriented single from Karenn (a.k.a. producers Pariah and Blawan) and The Analogue Cops (Marieu and Lucretio).

The standard version for this release is already pretty special - with its die-cut sleeve, embossing and hand-stamped details - yet there is additionally a numbered deluxe edition that additionally comes with two high quality art prints signed by Bloodworth. Both versions include MP3 versions that will be delivered on, release date, 19th November. Neither are going to be around for long: the pressing is limited to 100 copies of the deluxe vinyl available and a further 500 of the standard version.