Analysis of a magazine advert by an artist in our genre: "XX" and "Coexist"

These two magazine adverts are for two albums by The XX, their debut album The XX (right advertisement) and their sophomore, Coexist. They both share very similar album artwork with nothing more notable than a large X in the middle of the cover, although the colour scheme is completely reversed for Coexist when compared to the first album.

Both the album cover and magazine advertisement for The XX have a monochrome colour scheme, which shows how the bands minimalistic style isn't just limited to the simplistic, hushed tones of their music. As this is a poster which was designed for their debut album, it gives a bold and distinct style which they then embellished for their second album. The large white X dominates the poster, with the only other part of it that breaks up the black background being the bands/album name underneath it.

Coexist has a magazine advertisement which is made up of a plain white background, and adheres to a simple aesthetic, which suits the uncomplicated, laid back feel of the music. As aforementioned, the focal point of the poster is the large X, which appears to be coloured in the same way which oil looks when the sun is shining on it. As this poster is for an album which came out three years after their debut, the large X has become iconography which many will immediately associate with the XX, which is why it is a good marketing tool to keep this as the focal point of the album cover. Beneath this focal point, there is the bands name and the album title, both of which are in the same font. This helps to keep the poster simplistic as it doesn't overload the brain of the person who is looking at it.

Interestingly, neither of the album covers contains any information such as a release date or website for the band, which shows that they believe that the design alone will contain enough artistic merit in order to interest potential fans into further research. Both of the posters are almost identical to each other, which gives the band a recognisable theme, and suggests that there is also lot of continuity between their albums in terms of musical styles. There is no picture of the band featured on either advertisement, which I believe is a good change from the norm, as it allows the potential buyer to focus on the artistry of the band rather than their image. I plan on taking a lot of inspiration from the minimalistic feel of this magazine advertisement when designing my own one.