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Button badge goodness: Public Image Ltd [Part 1]

Friday, February 14th, 2020

Who could tire of the humble button badge? A staple adornment of the era, these badges in Part 1 all hail from 1980/81, when I first took to the charms of Public Image Ltd. ‘Flowers of Romance’ the focus of the first few, pretty sure these are likely to be ‘Better Badges’ designs, though couldn’t say for sure – anyone?

^ Public Image Ltd – Flowers of Romance button badge from 1981 – design 1

^ Public Image Ltd – Flowers of Romance button badge from 1981 – design 2

^ Public Image Ltd – Flowers of Romance button badge from 1981 – design 3

^ Public Image Ltd – Paris au Printemps button badge from 1980/81

^ Public Image Ltd – Death Disco button badge, bought 1981

^ Public Image Ltd – PiL button badge, bought 1981

^ Public Image Ltd – PiL button badge

Posted in Design crazy, Memorabilia, Small objects of desire | 2 Comments »

Side by side: New Order – ‘Ceremony’ 2019 12” reissues and 1981 originals

Saturday, December 28th, 2019

Rounding off 2019, time to look back to earlier in the year and also 1981, with New Order’s ‘Ceremony’ re-issues and originals (at least the UK 12” ones anyway).

^ New Order – Ceremony – 2019 UK 12 inch version 1 re-issue front sleeve design.

Accompanying the super deluxe box set re-issue of the ‘Movement’ album, the bands first four 12” single releases were re-pressed and issued afresh in March 2019 to support it. Let’s not get into the whole debate on whether this was a rather odd way of going about things, given that the super deluxe box set did not include any of the recordings from these 12” singles… Ho hum. And when I say the first four… well, two of these are versions of the one song, ‘Ceremony’, of course. (more…)

Posted in Design crazy, Factory, Side by side, Versions, versions | No Comments »

Button badge goodness: More Siouxsie and the Banshees

Saturday, December 14th, 2019

Once again, 8 years on from the last such helping, further new wave button badge goodness to tide over the festive season… this time around, in true ghosts of Christmas past fashion, some more vintage goodies from Siouxsie and the Banshees’ imperial period of 1981-82. And as before, these are from back in the day, not later reprints.

^ Siouxsie and the Banshees ‘A Kiss In The Dreamhouse’ era badge

(more…)

Posted in Design crazy, Memorabilia, Small objects of desire | No Comments »

Joy Division – ‘Unknown Pleasures’ UK CD (Factory FACD10, 1986)

Monday, October 28th, 2019

Sometimes it is enough just to celebrate something for what it is without needing to explore any obscure variations. With this post, I focus on the first time Joy Division’s wonderful ‘Unknown Pleasures’ made an appearance on CD and where Factory attempted to overcome the tyranny of the ’80s CD jewel case and somehow tap into the spirit of the original sleeve design.

For starters, the ‘car carry case’ – a miniaturised revision of the original sleeve design. Shorn of any need to include the tracklisting on the reverse, it kept things minimal. The tracklisting was provided only on one of the jewel case inserts. Yes, in addition to the carry case, the CD jewel case comes with not one but two inserts. Both of which come printed on similar ‘textured’ card stock to that used on the original album sleeve and the car carry case this time round. I hope that the photos help to capture the textured card stock so you can see for yourself.

One odd thing about it though – at some point in the design process, it looks like the photograph from one side of the inner sleeve has gone awol from this redesign – the originally uncredited photo, ‘Hand Through a Doorway‘ by Ralph Gibson.

^ Joy Division ‘Unknown Pleasures’ original UK CD car carry case – front.

(more…)

Posted in Design crazy, Factory, Small objects of desire, Versions, versions | No Comments »

Skids – ‘Fields’ UK 7″ and 12″ (Virgin VS401 and VS401-12, 1981)

Saturday, September 28th, 2019

When first released in the summer of 1981, ‘Fields’ was quite a challenging release for Skids fans to get used to and it never really gained the success the new vision that the remaining band members, Richard Jobson and Russell Webb, had in mind for the band. The departure of Stewart Adamson was obvious, his familiar sonic hallmark missing from the A side, replaced by a somewhat more twangy guitar and a more pastoral scene fashioned from acoustic guitar, flute, traditional drums and layered, choral vocals. In retrospect it is not nearly the radical departure it was made out to be, though much of the subsequent ‘Joy’ album certainly would be.