Break Me Down
The Pond
artwork – graphic design
Break Me Down is an italian alternative metal band with female singer.
I was asked to work on this project directly from the band, which was about to release their first full-length “The Pond” and they need to have the artwork and all the graphics of the phisical copy of it, so after a few drafts of the front cover and brainstorming, they chose me for the whole graphic aspect of this album.
The cover artwork
After the initial brainstorming with the members of this band, we selected the element water as main presence of the whole project and since the main thread of all the songs was about people diseases about mental problems, discrimination and community, I selected a picture from their last photo shooting, as the front cover image, editing it by turning the mirror into a liquid mirror with a distorted reflection of the model in it, together with the name of the album, to signify the distorted vision of many people about common diseases such as mental and phisical disability, ratial discriminations, abuses, etc.
The color grading of the artwork, as the whole booklet and back cover, is a mix of deep blue and aqua, with an average of corroded noise, to give the feeling of dirty water.
The disc
Since the main topic of the artwork was about water, I opted for a clean, minimalistic water drop that fitted perfectly the round shape of the disc, creating a nice geometry.
The booklet
The booklet has basically 2 song lyrics for each page, except for the first page wich shows the band’s line-up, the second last with the credits of this project (sound studios, management, photographers, etc) and the last one which lists all the thanks from each band member.
The line-up page show the same scene of the front cover, but it has the musicians in the mirror instead of the model.
Each standard page lists 2 songs with vertical titles to separate one from the other (image below), to optimize space in just 4 printed sheets.
