You guys were all living together in the same house, correct? So I put a little piece of orange up in the corner, partly because it needed something distinctive, and partly to match the color with Madonna.ĭescribe what the environment of working at Stones Throw was like at the time. I saw the two pictures side by side and laughed at it like it was some rap version of Beauty & the Beast. I hoped this picture of this guy with a metal mask would do the same to some other 5-year-old somewhere.Īnother thing – just sort of a little inside joke of mine – was that the black and white photo reminded me in some way of the first Madonna album cover, just her in black and white – it said “MADONNA” and the “O” was orange. I use to check out that big red screaming face on the King Crimson album in my dad’s vinyl when I was a little kid and it really shook me – I was actually scared looking through his vinyl.
I was thinking of the cover for King Crimson’s In the Court of the Crimson King when I was working on this photo that I zeroed in on. We shot them at our house, where the album was being recorded. Doom and Madlib can be elusive with photos, so this was a score. I don’t remember if we had a shoot planned or if he showed up on the right day. I mean, who the hell goes around with a metal mask, what’s his story?Įric Coleman came over with camera and film and just went to it one day. Specifically I was thinking of a picture of this man, who happened to wear a mask for some reason, as opposed to “a picture of a mask.” I don’t know if the distinction would occur to anyone else, but to me it was a big deal. So, I really wanted to get a shot of him on the cover, just to make a definitive Doom cover. Hip-hop heads knew he wore a mask, that he’d been in KMD a decade earlier, but he really was a mystery. Jeff Jank: Back then, 2003, Doom didn’t really have public image. What was the original inspiration for the Madvillainy album cover and how did the concept evolve? We recently caught up with the man to discuss the making of the LP and its cover – a process which entailed bartering, bong hits, a bomb shelter, and opportunities to perhaps frighten small children. Buoyed by a striking image by photographer Eric Coleman, Jeff’s album cover design for Madlib and kindred enigmatic spirit MF Doom’s classic inaugural collab, Madvillain’s Madvillany, is an essential example of one that actually beautifully bridges both categories. The longtime Art Director at the revered Stones Throw Records, Jank – via his wonderful album and single sleeve art for the likes of Madlib (and his myriad of incarnations, including Quasimoto and Yesterdays New Quintet), J Dilla, Dudley Perkins, et al – has exhibited as much a talent for creatively paying homage to vintage record designs as forging indelibly original ones. You could quite accurately declare, as folks frequently do, that designer Jeff Jank has been instrumental in expanding the expressive range of how indie hip-hop is visually represented.
Madvillainy album Offline#
Archived from the Ego Trip’s which went offline at some point. Interview by Brent Rollins, published December 11, 2011.
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