The Flaming Gnomes cover - still my personal favourite!
One of the big attractions for many vinyl fans is often quoted as being the tactile nature of the album sleeve – something you can read (without a magnifying aid) while you listen to the music, and sometimes a thing worthy of a place on the wall in its own right.
Fruits De Mer started out issuing singles and EPs, before releasing a single album (and a cassette!), and then a few double albums. There was even talk of a triple album where Head Music was concerned, but that was eventually abandoned as over-ambitious.
Greg Curvey's Roqueting Through Space cover...
... and the bit in the middle.
Having personally arrived at the FdM party somewhat unfashionably late (around ‘Roqueting’ if I recall correctly), I am missing a few of the early releases and am therefore in the dark about those covers. Of those that I do have some stick out as firm favourites, namely Head Music, Sorrow’s Children and Roqueting Through Space among the albums, and The Flaming Gnomes and Krautrock Sensation from the singles.
With the latest releases and the spectacular album art that adorns them, I started thinking about the process that results in the sleeves that protect our precious vinyl and at the same time inform us about the artists and any number of technical details. I decided to ask Fruit De Mer’s Keith Jones a few questions to see what goes into the sleeve design…
SG It’s fairly obvious to me that there is a constant effort to maintain and improve the excellent quality of the music on offer in terms of the artists, the songs, the production and even the quality of the vinyl pressings. Faced with keeping on top of that, how important is the sleeve art and the quality of the final product in that regard?
KJ The music always comes first – always will – but part of attraction of vinyl is that you can put a package together – including colour vinyl, gatefold LP sleeves, inserts, whatever – while a CD is pretty utilitarian and a download is, well….
SG I believe that the (musical) artists approach you with a willingness to be involved in a project; how does the commissioning for sleeve art generally take place, especially with some of the more ambitious projects? Do you approach the artists, are they recommended, or do they present themselves to you?
KJ Quite often, a musician wants to be heavily involved in the artwork, they are designers themselves. That invariably works really well as they are as committed as me to the ‘complete package’. At least one or two musician on each compilation to-date have been designers, so there’s no shortage of design ideas!
SG Once an artist is engaged, how much input do you have in the design? In the case of something like Head Music or Sorrow’s Children where there is a substantial amount of additional text, who generally sources that text and compiles the final version?
KJ Very little design input on ‘Sorrow’s Children’, which is designed by Frank Suchomel, who happens to be a musician in one of the bands with a track on ‘Head Music’ – it’s like an extended family!
As for text, I approached The Pretty Things’ manager Mark St. John via Mike Stax from Ugly Things, and he arranged for Phil May and Dick Taylor to get my list of questions, which they kindly responded to – and named the album ‘Sorrow’s Children’ in the process! Jimmy from Extra happens to be a proof-reader, so he gave both ‘sorrow’ and ‘Head’ sleeves the once-over (that extended family again!).
The ‘Head Music’ sleeve is rather different – the cover design is something I put together myself a long time ago for a possible 7″ single (lifted from a copyright-free image), but the music side of the project just grew and grew, so I extended the design from there – getting inspiration from one or two 70s Brain compilations along the way. Ulrich Klatte, who wrote the sleeve notes, is an FdM fan, so he was happy to get involved.
SG How much cost is involved in the production of a full-colour gatefold sleeve like, say, Sorrow’s Children?
KJ A full-colour gatefold sleeve is maybe a third of the total cost of a single album – although it also adds to the dreaded postage costs.
SG Most of the singles, if not all, come in fold-over sleeves. Do you ever see singles being presented in card sleeves or would that add too big an overhead to production costs?
KJ As it happens, I’m moving to professionally-printed card sleeves this year – as I’m now typically pressing up 700-800 copies instead of 500-600, the numbers just about work out (breaking even is always the target) and I’ve got to admit that all that copying, trimming, folding, inserting is pretty time-consuming, especially as I’m lining up four 7″ singles for simultaneous release in early June!
SG Not exactly sleeve related this one, but still look ‘n’ feel based – you must have used up most of the regular colours where the vinyl is concerned by now, so where next, or do you simply start over? Will there ever be a Fruits De Mer splatter vinyl or two-colour disc?
KJ Record Industry, who press all the FdM releases, are very professional and offer a good range of colours, but they don’t get into two-tone or really wild designs. With 12″ records, mixing colours is a bit like mixing oil-paints – you can get really interesting swirling/splatter effects. With 7″ singles, it’s more like mixing watercolours – you can end up with a sludgy mess if you’re not careful (two different processes apparently – it’s all beyond me).
SG Finally on the topic of the colour of the vinyl, I saw that a couple of the Vibravoid singles (What Colour is Pink and Krautrock Sensation, both on purple vinyl limited to 10 pressings) went for ‘Fruits De Mer money’ on ebay recently (£260 each). Who decides on the runs in terms of which colour and how many, or is that somewhat random? For instance, I have a Roqueting 7″ on red vinyl with a plain white label that I believe resulted from a short run on the regular pressing.
KJ Until 2011, we were getting records pressed in the US, where the colour mixes were a bit ‘haphazard’ at times – the main-runs were what we asked for but at the start or end of a run some odd colours would creep in – so these ‘rare’ colours were unplanned – and there are probably quite a few odd ones out there that I’ve never seen. Record Industry are pretty slick – with tight controls – if it’s not what you asked for, you don’t get it! They also charge for colour changes, so too many changes gets expensive – two, maybe three colour versions of any future release is my plan at the moment.
The ‘Roqueting’ white label red vinyl 7″s were as result of a panic call to Record Industry – we were swamped with orders and had 40 spare copies of the album, but no 7″ singles to go with them…”quick, press another 40 – any colour you like”- was the measured request from us!
SG Finally, are there any sleeves that you are especially proud of or rank among your personal favourites? Indeed, are there any that you have designed yourself?
KJ Well, I am a bit pleased that The Pretty Things 7″ single that will be released in June was put together by me, but it’s a typesetting job rather than a ‘piece of art’. I’m O.K. at finding copyright-free images as adapting them – ‘Wicker Man’, ‘Keep Off The Grass’ and Nick Nicely’s new 7″, for example, but ‘The Flaming Gnomes’, ‘Roqueting’ and ‘Sorrow’s Children’ are my favourite sleeves – and they’re nothing to do with me!
Many thanks to Keith for indulging me with his words and pictures for these ‘Sleeve’ posts – I’ll stop bothering him for a bit now!
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