Features

Nolan & Wakeman — Jabberwocky

The Art Corner was a series of articles by graphic artist Mattias Norén, who was part of the DPRP team and designed the layout we had at the time. In this series, Mattias reviewed the artwork of albums. The series started in January 1999 and ran for about 18 months.

The original introduction of the series is included below and will tell you what it was all about. This category no longer runs, so information about submitting an album for review has been removed, but we're keeping the archived articles as a separate series in the Features category.

Check out Mattias Norén's company website: ProgArt!

Dear visitor of The Art Corner!

Some people say that it's just the inside that counts, but I'm actually one of those men that cares much about the outside as well! :-)

The Art Corner only concentrates on the outside. What I think about the inside, the music, I'll keep for myself in this case.

Each album has been given 1 to 5 points in seven different categories.

  • Design / Composition: Is the idea and layout good?
  • Technical skill: Is the artist good at what he is doing?
  • Connection to the music: Is the artwork inspired by the music, album title and the lyrics? Does it feel good to look at the cover at the same time you listening to the music?
  • Logotype: How good is the design of the logotype?
  • Typography: How good is the typography? (cover and backcover)
  • Booklet: How good is the typography, artwork, layout and paper quality?
  • Disc: How good is the typography, artwork, layout on the disc?

Mattias Norén

Clive Nolan & Adam Wakeman — Jabberwocky (Verglas Music - VGCD014, 1999)

Design

Artwork by Rodney Matthews

Design and layout by Matt Goodluck

Scores

category score
Design and composition
Technical skill
Connection to the music
Logotype
Typography
Booklet
Disc

Score: 3.7

Comments

Everybody who knows me knows that Rodney Matthews is my big idol. His skill to paint fantasy images is outstanding. I can look at his images time after time and still find new details everytime. In this cover he has captured the story in a brilliant way as usual.

The cover itself is actually only the lower half of this image. In the middle of the booklet you can see the full picture with all the trees in the background.

Jabberwocky, © Rodney Matthews.

The rest of the booklet and the backside is not of the same quality. Details from the cover has been scaled up and looks unsharp. Not very professional, if you ask me. Photos of all the musicians and singers have been included, which is very good, but I think Goodluck could have done more with that page. For example, take a look in the booklet of Ayreon's Into The Electric Castle and you will see a huge difference in artistic skill.

Jabberwocky will probably not end up as the best package of the year, but it definitly have a big chance to win the title "Cover of the Year".

Features