“The Cure” by The Cure

Digipak Deconstruction

The Album

“The Cure” is the twelfth studio album by English alternative rock band The Cure.

It was released in 2004 by Geffen Records This is a youtube link for the full album :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M6qdCmGlNww&list=PL03196A396437AD93

The Front Cover : Typography The typography used on the front of the album is seemingly written by a child in

black crayon. The black used for the album title and the smudged, wobbly writing connotes that this was not done by a happy child. This implies that the album has a dark underlying message and could possibly relate to the childhoods of the songwriters. The writing takes up the whole of the width of the page and is quite bold in order for it to stand out.

The name of the band which is the same as the name of the album has been written in a smaller version of the same font in red, which connotes blood and anger.

The Front Cover : Imagery The front cover of the digipak is an imitation of a child’s drawing, done in

different coloured pencils on a white lined paper background. The main image is a stick person drawn in black with red demon like eyes, which connotes that it is evil or angry. The stick person is holding its hand up to the sky suggesting that it is more important and powerful than the other ‘people’ drawn on the page and that it has control over them.

The Front Cover : Imagery The other pictures drawn on the front include a monster like line

drawing holding on to a heart with wings and a smiling clown holding onto a small sad person. These images could be a connotation of power and how society is controlled by certain people and how privacy is invaded by government. This relates to one of the bands album songs “Us or Them” with the lyrics “Get your fucking world out my head” which is a portrayal of their political views.

The Inside Covers

The inside cover is a plain white background with multi coloured crayon scribbles all over it. This is again continuing the childish theme of the entire digipak with the messy drawing and bright colours.

The Back Cover : Typography The typography used in the song list on the back cover is a typewriter font. The

words do not fit in with the lines, again continuing the messy, childlike theme.

The song list is located on the right hand side of the back cover. The images appear to overpower the writing as it is done in a small, black font, so as it is quite simple it does not draw attention to itself.

The Back Cover : Imagery The images on the back are a continuation of those on the front. There is a ghost in

the bottom left corner which is a childish representation of evilness and fear. There is also a larger drawing of a stereotypical native American and several other smaller drawings of stick people.

As opposed to these images portraying political control, they could also be interpreted to connote equality. There is a large variety of different people represented through child drawn stick people and rather than controlling and ruling over each other, they could also be holding hands and working in unison.

The Spine

The spine of the album shows the band name, album name and the name of the record label.

The CDs

There are two CDs included in the digipak, one album CD and one bonus CD titled “Making The Cure”.

The CDs have purple backgrounds which look like they have been messily painted on, again by a child. The title of the album is done in the same typography as that on the front of the digipak but this time in purple and pink which seems more light hearted and positive.

The Booklet : Cover

The front and back covers are identical to the ones on the digipak, but if we open them up we can see that it makes a single image.

The Booklet : Interior

Inside the booklet are more drawings that seem to have been done by a child. There is one of a princess or a queen wearing a crown which could connote a powerful person, and one of some people in a boat. This image is primarily in red and black which suggests a dark, evil message.

There is also a drawing portraying lots of ghostly faces in the sky over a woman who looks like she is crying. There is a shape in the background that looks like a volcano pouring out lava which could be another reason why the woman is crying.

The Booklet : Interior

Like most booklets that are included in digipaks, this also contains the lyrics to the album songs. The lyrics are written in the same typography as the song list are on colourful backgrounds with drawings on. This keeps continuity with the rest of the album.

Although the typography and background is inkeeping with the album, it could also make it difficult for the lyrics to be read as they are in a small font on a busy background.