Factory Records Style vs New Wave
ファクトリー・レコーズ / ニュー・ウェーブ
Factory Records Style comes from Music Graphics and New Wave from Counterculture. Both are read here as style. They are reached for with some of the same intent, which is where they get confused.
Factory Records Style
At the Manchester label Saville made sleeves that refuse to explain the music. Borrowed industrial color charts, classical paintings and waveform diagrams turned post-punk's intelligent void into a style.
New Wave
Keeps punk's freedom while re-editing color and grid with urban polish.
| Factory Records Style | New Wave | |
|---|---|---|
| Era | 1978–1992 | 1970s–1980s |
| Family | Music Graphics | Counterculture |
| Kind | Style | Style |
| Cues | Refusal to explain / Borrowed imagery from other fields / Restrained typography / Catalogue numbers as institution | Irregular grid / Dots / High chroma / Rotated type |
| Best used for | Music or exhibition promotion that withholds explanation and leaves only resonance · Making numbering and specification itself the way a brand speaks | Editorial heat for culture media · Adding surprise to serious content |
| Type | Set small at the edge so neither title nor artist takes the stage | Mix condensed, geometric and vertical setting |
| Composition | One unrelated plate at the center with the surround left silent | Shift the grid; hold several angles at once |
| Material | Industrial color charts and special finishes borrowed, the print spec treated as work | Yellow, red, blue, dots, thin rules |
| Caution | An unrelated plate chosen without necessity reads as mere suggestiveness and leaves the listener with nothing to remember. | Don't multiply small decorations. Choose one starring deviation. |