Music scenes

Ten scenes, and the graphic rules each one used to say who the night was for.

A music flyer has one job before it has any other: tell the right person that this is for them, and tell everybody else that it is not. That is why these styles are so specific. The typeface, the paper size and the amount of information on the sheet all encode a scene, and a reader who belongs to it can read that in half a second from across a record shop.

Flyers printed for one night

4

Four club traditions. Small, cheap, printed in a hurry, and handed to you outside somewhere else.

Rave and Acid Graphics: Neon on black, a smiley, warped type and every effect the software had.

Rave and Acid Graphics

Neon on black, a smiley, warped type and every effect the software had.

$Drum and Bass Flyer: Early 3D renders and fractals, chrome type, and a much darker palette than the rave next door.$

Drum and Bass Flyer

Early 3D renders and fractals, chrome type, and a much darker palette than the rave next door.

Reggae Sound System Flyer: Red gold and green, a lion, and every sound system named in a different typeface.

Reggae Sound System Flyer

Red gold and green, a lion, and every sound system named in a different typeface.

80s NYC Hip Hop Flyer: Hand-drawn symmetrical borders, airbrushed display lettering, and a full bill in black and white.

80s NYC Hip Hop Flyer

Hand-drawn symmetrical borders, airbrushed display lettering, and a full bill in black and white.

Labels and bills

4

Two record labels that designed everything the same way, and two poster formats that had to carry a whole lineup.

Factory Records: Almost no information, borrowed classical or industrial imagery, and a catalogue number.

Factory Records

Almost no information, borrowed classical or industrial imagery, and a catalogue number.

4AD Records: A photograph of something unidentifiable, layered and soft, with type dissolved into it.

A photograph of something unidentifiable, layered and soft, with type dissolved into it.

Festival Indie Lineup: One central graphic, then the whole bill stacked underneath in strict size order.

Festival Indie Lineup

One central graphic, then the whole bill stacked underneath in strict size order.

Heavy Metal Concert Poster

One airbrushed apocalypse, a spiked blackletter logo, and everything in shades of black.

Scene graphics beyond the stage

2

Two places a music scene's graphics ended up: on a cinema hoarding and on the underside of a board.

Blaxploitation Movie Poster: A painted hero in a dynamic pose, hot funk colours, and a tagline in chunky 70s type.

Blaxploitation Movie Poster

A painted hero in a dynamic pose, hot funk colours, and a tagline in chunky 70s type.

Skateboard Graphics

A cartoon or a logo pushed to the edge of taste, screened flat on a coloured ground.

Make one of them

Copy a prompt into an image model and pay for that one run. No subscription.

Open an image model

Other style groups

Graphic design movementsEighteen movements, and the wording that gets the look of each one.18 design movements Art movements as postersTwenty-one movements, each written as a poster the movement might have printed.21 art movements Print and reproduction looksEleven printing processes, and the wording that gets what each one does to ink.11 print processes Handmade and folkNine ways to make a poster that looks like a person made it, not a studio.9 handmade looks Place and eraFourteen national and period styles, each with the rules that made it local.14 regional styles Propaganda and protestSeven political traditions, and the visual rules each one used to move people.7 political traditions Screen and digitalTen looks that came from a screen, and the wording that gets each one.10 digital looks

Cinematic techniquesShooting a video rather than printing a poster? The same reference, for the camera.

Because the flyer is a filter. It has to tell the right person that the night is for them and everybody else that it is not, and the typeface and the palette do that faster than any wording could.