Research into CD covers of the R&B

Genre By Chris bell

Purpose of CD Covers To Protect the CD from getting Damaged

For the artist to advertise their music product

To denote the artists personal style

To Include tracklists

Trey Songz-Ready

The album cover is of a mid shot of Trey looking right at the viewer, this is used to show the viewer his muscle and body art. Additionally this gives the viewer an aspect of voyeurism as it could be said that he is shown so that ‘men want to be him and women want him’.

The lighting from above is used to define his body and enhance his muscular tone, this seems to have been done to show his athleticism and creates a connection between the audience who may aspire to look like Trey.

Bashy

Bashy’s main target audience are teenagers, this cover art appeals to teens as Bashy is sat on a Mozilla Firefox logo which is a widely used web surfing application amongst teenagers who are known for spending too much time on the internet. The title of the album is the web address of Bashy’s official website which is an advertisement technique used to engage the audience and get them following the latest news and songs posted on the webpage.

Britney SpearsIt is made clear that Britney Spears is meant to be the center of attention in the artwork by use of the border around the center mid-shot of Britney which connotes her innocence and ‘Barbie girl’ image. The name of the star seems

to be of higher importance than the actual album name as Britney Spears dominates the album cover by stretching the whole width of the album whereas the viewers attention is not brought to the actual album name. This may have been used as a marketing technique so Britney spears fans know straight away that this is her album.

Kelly Rowland

A Mid shot is used of the star to include both Kelly’s facial expression whilst also getting her body in the shot to present her in a voyeuristic manner which seems to be a convention of R&B album covers.

Kelly's appearance is coded for strong visual and erotic impact and thus can be said to connote ‘to-be-looked-at-ness’, this supports Laura Mulvey’s male gaze theory

Overall Points to consider

Most R&B album covers make use of:

A mid-shot of the star

Present the artist in a voyeuristic manner

Use simple colour schemes & monochrome themes

Different font used for the Artists name and the name of the album

A simplistic design

Portrait album covers are mostly used by R&B solo artists