4AD.
In the 1980’s and 90’s, no self-respecting music fan of the indie persuasion could be found without at least one CD from UK record label 4AD. The label’s music catalog holds some fantastic, acclaimed music which profoundly shaped my musical leanings.
Graphic artist Vaughn Oliver gave the label’s releases a distinct style that is often imitated but never quite duplicated. His covers for Lush, The Pixies, Throwing Muses, The Breeders and more rank among my favorite album covers.
So imagine my delight upon stumbling across Fedge’s 4AD – The First 20 Years, a 20-year retrospective of 4AD albums. As far as I can tell, it is quite an accurate catalogue of Oliver’s work over that time period. This is a great collection of album art! A few of my favorites, from my musical stash:
The Breeders – Last Splash
Belly – King
The Pixies – Doolittle
Lush – Spooky
Check them all out here, and enjoy!
Comments
Luke Dorny » 16 June 2008 #
Thank you very much for the link!
This is amazingly cool. 4AD encapsulated the cover art of all of the bands i was gaga about in my high school years, and come to find out that Vaughn was the dude behind the canvas. What an inspiration.
Doolittle, DCD, Cocteau, and omg Bauhaus. Formative.
Also, there are tons of covers that flash me back, but I also ended up picking out an album to reminisce to: The Wolfgang Press—Everything Is Beautiful: A Retrospective 1983-95
Will also search for the book featured here at the end of 1994 
Jared Christensen » 17 June 2008 #
There’s that book, This Rimy River: Vaughn Oliver and Graphic Works 1988-94 by Vaughan Oliver and Vaughan Oliver: Visceral Pleasures by Rick Poynor. I’ve been meaning to pick them both up for a while now.
Amazon carries both of them.
