The digipak for Alt-J's album "An Awesome Wave" has an abstract front cover image that sets it apart from other albums and stimulates interest. Like the band Arctic Monkeys, the front cover does not include the band's name, intriguing audiences to learn more. The minimalist design reflects indie music conventions of not emphasizing the band's image. The back cover lists tracks in varying boldness and alignment, making them slightly harder to read than standard designs. The CD disc matches the back cover's color scheme and emphasizes the track listing around the edge.

1. Digipak Research
Alt-J
An Awesome Wave
25th May 2012

3. ‘An Awesome Wave’ by At J has an abstract image on the front that
sets it apart from other digipaks. This image allows the audience to
make their own assumptions as to why there is a creative image on the
front also it stimulates interest as it is different from most. Similar to
AM, An Awesome Wave does not feature the bands name on the front
cover which intrigues a wider audience to look at the album, this is a
convention of albums from the indie genre.
The minimalistic concept is also a convention of the indie genre and
is used on this album. As the band have also chosen not to have
themselves on the front of the album this also reflects the genre that
they belong to as they may feel they want the audience to buy the
album simply for the music not for who the band are, subverting
Dyer’s ‘Star Image’ theory.
The back cover traditionally has the track names on, these are in bold
and their colour scheme is also brought into the text. It has a barcode
which is a convention of any album no matter the genre, as well as the
music production company’s logo. I think the back cover is interesting
as it is different from most as the tracks are not lined up and centered
like most also the boldness of each track name differs. Although this is
interesting I find the titles slightly harder to read than most albums
and it looks a bit busy and not very clear.

5. The CD disc for ‘An Awesome Wave’ follows the minimalistic theme
and matches the back cover as it has the same colour scheme. The
track list follows the edge of the CD which emphasises the track list to
the audience.
How has this helped?
This has helped me to discover how indie bands take risks and
experiment with their digipaks, they also use artistic, innovative
designs to make them stand out from other albums. It also showed me
that the band’s image is not necessary for the digipak.