We were delighted that within our first year of business we were nominated for a Print Award for the spectacular sleeve for Rubella Ballet's Danger of Death album
Yes... I know "awards mean nothing", in the words contained in the movie School of Rock... "Sex Pistols never won anything", but there's something very gratifying about being nominated, as a young company, for a project that is pretty special and is the first ever record sleeve to be nominated for an award at the Print Awards in its 40 year existence. The album in question is Rubella Ballet's "Danger of Death". Rubella ballet are an oxymoron... while they were the forerunners of a genre known as Death Rock, a dark gothic type of punk / rock that the likes of Christian Death, the Southern Death Cult or the Sex Gang Children may have occupied, and their background was the stark black and white world of Anarcho Punk, Rubella Ballet were disarmingly colourful. Prone to performing under a black light with clothes, hair, makeup and instruments all painted in UV sensitive paints and ,materials, they stood out among the rest... and continue to do so to this day.
Being supplied with a free hand and nothing more than some artwork for the front and back cover, we firstly colour coordinated the vinyl to match the pink on the cover, we then matt laminated the sleeve and added a spot varnish to highlight the name and the batman image. However, behind this we also added an invisible UV sensitive ink that would only show up under a black light....
Why, you may ask, would we do this given that there was no way anyone would know it was there???
Simple.... we would know it was there, and so would the band!
Its a great record and a great design and something we are particularly proud of being involved with.
We didn't win the award, but it was very interesting to sit at an awards ceremony in full black tie watching as the 30 foot screen displayed a DIY artists record cover alongside corporate brochures for banks and FMCG's