The Internet was the recipient of one of the worst jigs when we all assumed Kendrick Lamar’s third studio album would be available for our streaming pleasures last week. After getting our feelings hurt, we dried our tears and K.Dot soothed us all by releasing the album cover and tracklist for Damn.
The aggressive photo features the title in bold red laters with Mr. Duckworth looking for a lack of better words, spaced out and a bit sinister. The graphic designer behind the image Vlad Sepetov took to Twitter Wednesday night (April 12) to explain how it all came together and addresses the claims it’s not as powerful as K.Dot’s To Pimp A Butterfly album art.
already seeing a lot of discussion about the cover. and i’m really excited about it. it’s interesting to see people talk about “bad” design.
— Vlad Sepetov (@VSepetov) April 11, 2017
but i’m incredibly proud of this cover. i sort of bucked a lot of what my teachers taught me. i wanted to make something loud and abrasive.
— Vlad Sepetov (@VSepetov) April 11, 2017
and maybe some won’t see that, but i’m glad that dave and dot saw the value in making something that didn’t fit the mold.
— Vlad Sepetov (@VSepetov) April 11, 2017
just given the bare bones we fleshed something out that has a lot of people talking. it’s not uber political like tpab but it has energy imo
— Vlad Sepetov (@VSepetov) April 11, 2017
FYI I didn’t create Kendrick DAMN. cover, the little homies did. For those taking my tweets out of context, I helped the vision that’s all.
— Vlad Sepetov (@VSepetov) April 13, 2017
So there you have it folks. Now that there’s some perspective on the album art how do you feel about it? Sound off in the comments.