The MP3 Decade
2000-2009. Album sales collapse; covers persist as ringtones, social-media avatars, and Spotify thumbnails. Stripes, Strokes, Arcade Fire, Kanye, Daft Punk's helmets.
Part of Album Cover
18 moments in this segment.
- — Radiohead — Kid A. · Year: 2000 · Designer: Stanley Donwood · Thom Yorke Painted snow-covered mountain landscape rendered in Donwood's "red" palette. Released without a single, in a year when the music industry assumed nobody bought albums anymore.
- — Kid A. · 00:04:45
- — Daft Punk — Discovery. · Year: 2001 · Designer: Daft Punk Gold-plated robot heads — the moment Thomas and Guy-Manuel adopted the helmet-as-permanent-public-identity.
- — Daft Punk - Discovery (Full Album). ) · 01:00:29
- — The White Stripes — White Blood Cells. · Year: 2001 · Designer: Jack White · photo by Patrick Pantano Jack and Meg in white shirts on a red field with falling "cells". The Stripes' commitment to the red-white-black palette as a complete brand system.
- — The Strokes — Is This It. · Year: 2001 · Designer: Colin Lane Photograph of a woman's hip and gloved hand. The UK cover was censored to a particle-collider image — both covers are now collected.
- — The Strokes - Is This It (Lyrics) [HQ]. ] · 00:02:31
- — Interpol — Turn On the Bright Lights. · Year: 2002 · Designer: Slang · photo by Marina Chavez Red-on-black band-name typography against a black square. Definitive post-punk-revival design language.
- — Outkast — Speakerboxxx/The Love Below. · Year: 2003 · Designer: James Goodman · Antwan A. Patton · André Benjamin Two-sleeves-in-one double-album with separate Big Boi and André 3000 covers. Designed so you could file it on either side of the alphabet.
- — She Lives in My Lap. · 00:04:27
- — Kanye West — The College Dropout. · Year: 2004 · Designer: Kanye West · Morning Breath A bear in a varsity sweater alone on bleachers. West's "Dropout Bear" mascot debuts here and recurs through Late Registration and Graduation.
- — Never Let Me Down. Provided to YouTube by Universal Music Group Never Let Me Down · Kanye West · JAŸ-Z · J. Ivy
- — Kanye West — Graduation. · Year: 2007 · Designer: Takashi Murakami Takashi Murakami's Dropout Bear in graduation cap and gown against a CMYK-pixelated explosion. The first major collaboration of a contemporary artist with a hip-hop release.
- — Graduation Day. · 00:01:22
- — Radiohead — In Rainbows. · Year: 2007 · Designer: Stanley Donwood · Thom Yorke Donwood used a graffiti-removal solvent on woodblock prints, mixed it with wax, scanned the result. The pay-what-you-want album with a cover made in the kitchen.
- — Radiohead - In Rainbows From the Basement (April 2008). ) · 01:03:10
- — Interpol - Lights. · 00:05:16
- — The White Stripes' White Blood Cells (In 3 Minutes). ) · 00:03:14
