CD Analysis - Midnight Sun

BEAST are a well  known Korean boy band, they were back in 2009 and are under Cube Entertainment. Their debut was in late 2009 with their first mini album called "Beast is the B2ST". The group have six members - Yoon Doo-joon, Jang Hyung-seung, Yong Jun-hyung, Yang Y-seob, Lee Gi-kwang and Son Song-woon.

This B2ST album is very unique and fresh. The album doesn’t have the boys on the front which will intrigue the fans to buy it for the photo book.

The simple design is that B2ST have chosen differentiates itself from the norm which is sometimes rare in Kpop albums. The matte black chosen for the background reflects upon the title of the Album “Midnight Sun” and the use of gold represents the shining sun. What I like most about the album cover is the 3D artwork which is hardly seen on western albums which makes this album very eye catching and different. The small “B2ST”

logo/name placed in the top middle of the album signifies that the fans don’t need to see the artists name to recognize the album as the boy group has already grabbed their attention even before the release of the album and they’re at the peak of their popularity. By using gold and black as the two main colors makes the album look very elegant. By having the large “B2UTY” mask that the center of the album it makes the fans instantly recognize the album and the fact that it’s gold makes it tempting to buy. The way the eye cut on the mask has been done makes it look like the album is looking directly at the buyer. The mode of address used here connotes that the person is hiding their inner “B2UTY” from everyone else.

This is the inside of the album as you can see the photo book is located on the left, usually for western albums that’s where the lyrics book would be. The inside of the album introduces new colours and steers clear from the gold but instead a mixture of blue, green, yellow an a red. These colours represents each of the boys in the group. The small gold writing act as a border but it’s actually the song list. The inventive use of sharp lines makes the CD look 3D and makes it appear to both genders. The photo book contains lyrics at the very back translated which has 3 languages, the first one is Romanised English, Japanese and traditional Korean Hangeul. This is so that the bands international popularity can increase by targeting western fans especially in America and the UK as their fan bases have increased from a few hundreds to thousands in add. The logo on the middle of the photo book is also very interesting as it spells out “Midnight Sun” and is in a shape of a sun. The surrounding shapes may connote a galaxy and the fact that the sun is in the middle could suggest that it’s the mist significant on the page.

This is the back of the album, it's kept simple but there's a slight change as it doesn't contain the song list. This is because the song list of this album had been pre-released 2 weeks before the release of the hard copy. Cube Entertainment created a medley for the songs on their website for the fans to see. However this adds more of a mystery for the fans as they're expecting the unexpected. The fact that Beast have chosen not to put their songs on the back is very different and unusual. 

Overall, I have gathered that the back of the CD album should be simple and easy to read. The front should be unique which would attract the audience and to also have a good colour scheme. I should not over do it with metallic colours or it'll look too polished and fans do not like that. The use of matte black is also very trendy right now so I could use it as current fans like it on the other hand I shouldn't as I want my CD to look different and have it's own style.