WTF Records Zine Debuts
I quietly debuted the very first issue of WTF Records Zine on Etsy last week, and am hard at work on the next edition, trying to get it ready in time for sale at Capricon 32 in Wheeling, Illinois. I’m setting up the Turntabling booth at Capricon 32 and three other horror/sci-fi conventions in Feb/March 2012. The full list of appearances is at my vinyl blog Turntabling, and the zines will be on sale at the booth at all shows while supplies last. WTF Records is a zine about bad album covers, vinyl collecting, strange and wonderful record albums that
Zines Everywhere!
Been busier than I can even begin to relate–editing video game scripts freelance (I don’t write ‘em, I just edit them for content, accuracy in technical details and such), selling vinyl on eBay, and writing a brand new zine about all things vinyl-related. The new title is called TURNTABLING, and should be ready just in time for a set of conventions I’ll be running a table at in the next three months. More on that later or you can go to my vinyl blog Turntabling.net to get the down-low on all that. My current zine title, Penguin F@cker, has been
New Zine Project Released: Penguin F@cker Issue 1 Out Now
I haven’t published a zine in AGES, and suddenly I find myself with three at once in varying stages of completion. This one, which became available for sale today, is PENGUIN F@CKER Issue #1. It’s more or less a personal zine, full of insane observations about work, the format wars (vinyl vs. digital), suicidal bicyclers, and more than one aside about penguins. PENGUIN F@CKER is a completely irreverent bundle of pages complete with twisted, wrong artwork and quite a lot of snark for better or worse. This is actually more than probably the TAMER of the material I’m working on,
Zines in the Works
Been hard at work on two new zines sure to delight, bewilder and amuse. One is completely done by hand–an insane stream-of-consciousness undertaking which is basically an experiment to see how far I could take such a blasphemy before it runs out of steam. “Deranged Nonsense” as a working title isn’t bad at all, and is pretty much in keeping with the laws regarding truth in advertising. The other one is much less stream of consciousness and more personal–pages of musings and observation about zines themselves, cultural ephemera, digital versus analog formats and much more. Look for the first edition
Zine Publishers Wanted
by Joe Wallace I’m starting a new project on Twitter to help promote my self-publishing and zine printing work, and I’m looking for other zine publishers who would like to have their work promoted as well. Basically those involved would have their new projects for sale in places like Etsy, Bonanza and other online shops posted on Twitter to spread the word about what’s out there for sale, who’s doing it, and what’s new. Naturally a project like this needs some promotion, so anyone interested in getting their work published on the Twitter account would be doing a great service
Mutations
I’ve been involved with a LOT of DIY media, independent culture, self-publishing and other artistic stuff over the years. And lately I’ve had a bit of a renaissance with all that and I find myself doing a lot more than just album covers, photography, silkscreening, etc. So it was high time this site got more active and with a broader focus than just my album cover work. I’m back in self-publishing, I’m silkscreening like crazy and my work is basically sort of exploding. The site will be changing and growing soon to incorporate all this stuff. Album covers are still
Bad Album Cover Art
When I find truly awful examples of bad album cover art, I post them over at my vinyl blog Turntabling. The WTF bad album covers gallery is crammed with all sorts of hideous examples of truly awful album cover artwork. Consider these cautionary tales of what NOT to do with your album cover. If the guiding principle of album cover art is to sell the music on your new record, a bit more thought going into the design of that cover is probably for the best.
Album Cover Design: The First Impression Factor
I’m naturally biased when it comes to good and bad album covers. In my mind, when it comes to album cover design, the first priority is to promote the music on the record somehow–whether that’s by giving some visual clues as to what the album’s all about, establishing a concept, or promoting the band’s identity. The graphics on the cover should give the casual record store shopper or iTunes downloader some idea of what they’re getting–especially people who have never heard your record before. This atrocious album cover does score some points in a few areas when it comes to
I am Joe Wallace. I Design Album Covers
Thanks for visiting. As this is my first blog post here, a little introduction: I’ve been designing album covers, zines, blogs and creating artwork for a very long time. For an equally long time I never gave myself much credit for being an artist per se, but I realized at some point that I truly love creating album covers. Hence all this. Click on “continue reading” at the bottom of this post for the full story. Or you can check out a few samples of my work to the right.