This channel is severely underrated. Amazing insight and stories. I also love hearing about your creation process too. You truly made some of the best album artwork in the 90s which complemented the music so well.
@@Microdot After Be Here Now the covers of Oasis albums were getting worse.Except for Dig Out Your Soul i loved that cover.But the Covers always seem to fit with the music.There was always something British about it.I Love Be Here Now and i also liked the sleeve.I liked all the sleeves that you made Brian.
Life is about being lucky in the right circumstances ... but like Brian you need to put yourself out there ... great channel and amazing artwork /photography mate. You must be so proud of your back catalogue. To me the cover artwork is as important as the music
Brian, this is absolutely brilliant, huge thanks for starting to cover Verve's covers! I absolutely can't wait to see the breakdowns for ASIH (full documentary length on that one, please!), Superstar, Gravity Grave, Slide Away, Blue, Voyager 1, No Come Down, Verve EP, etc.! Hugely appreciate hearing about your creative process. I'd also like to hear more about your relationship with the music at the time, which tracks really stuck with you, etc. To me, you're to Verve as Stanley Donwood is to Radiohead... totally integral to the music.
I band who I was playing with at the time and still am now 3 men gone mad, supported Verve at St Helens Citadel 13/7/1991.Verve were incredible I remember this song on the night and Simon saying at the soundcheck Virgin were very interested..i followed their career ever since ...great band, pity they couldn't stay together...great video Brian!
even finished the video with 'see you in the next one', which is the final song on the verve's first album! Looking forward to more Verve stuff. You've got a new subscriber.
Thank goodness you ran out of milk! Seems like divine destiny for you two guys to reunite, it's so rock and roll I love it! Thanks again your sleeve work and design work is fantastic!
Did you get a reason why you didn't do Fourth? Oasis should have stuck with Microdot in the 00s. Maybe it all fits though, classic Oasis had the classic artwork.
Fantastic art work, really creative and original. The landscapes and objects are so fun to look at. My favourite art piece is the burning car for a storm in heaven
It's amazing to finally know all the curiosities behind all these album covers. Thank you for explaining your work because it is all wonderful. Especially for me the ones from The Verve are jewels. For a fan of the group who also works in the audiovisual and graphic design world, it means a lot. Someday I will go to Microdot to meet you!🤩🔝
Class Brian, proper seat of your pants stuff in those early days. Love to hear about the chance meetings with Richard and the naivety going into that first meeting at Virgin, brilliant!
Fantastic video, Brian! Thanks for this. Can’t wait to see what other Verve videos you release in the future. As a fellow Wiganer, it’s brilliant to see these local areas used for the first shoot of my favourite band. Even Richard’s old flat, I had no idea that was where it was! I’ve gone past that about 5000 times whilst attending High School and it was right next to it the whole time. The Verve is forever and your photography is an important part of that legacy 📸
So glad to finally hear about the verve! To be honest, I always enjoyed their sleeves more than the oasis ones; the verve sleeves were just trippier. Both bands sleeves were always great and it was so fun to go over them and find all the hidden stuff! What an exciting time! I live in the states and so it was really unusual for someone like me to be collecting singles in the 90s. They were hard as hell to find in the states! I’ll never forget when I walked into Manifest records on spring break in 1997 and found ALL of verve’s singles on sale. I flipped out and bought them all! The thirteen minute version of she’s a superstar?! Amazeballs.
PS: I just put the Microdot sticker that came w my Be Here Now shirt, on my car. Be Here Now came out on my 18th bday in 1997: 8-21-97. I also have the verve Music Saves shirt. Microdot rules!
These are fantastic videos! Very interesting, and informative. I would love to see more videos about the Verve's albums covers. Urban Hymns is one of the best albums of the 90's. Don't know how they didn't have at least 4 hits from that album, and become huge?
Brian - quick question. How did you decide what font to use for the band name? It changed several times over singles and albums until the Urban Hymns era
I changed the log several times until the Urban Hymns era, that was inspired by the Canadian band 'Rush' who in the 70s had a different logo for every album they released - kind of anti marketing.
@@Microdot I used to love drawing them on my school bag in tipex and silver marker pen. Thing the gravity Grace font was my favourite although the Slide Away one was very cool (and difficult to draw!)
I've been waiting for you to do The Verve, Bri. As a kid, album covers were so important and the more detail to pour over the better. There's only you who really got that Sgt Pepper/Peter Blake idea and how important a packed album cover is, especially to a teenager, even though obviously you could only do them where they fitted. Love from an old Pemps acquaintance.
Brian, designers (like all creatives) invariably reflect the times they're creating art in through their creations. I would say the Microdot archetypal design always says "1990s" when you look at it, and I don't mean that in a bad way. But like all art, its very of the time period it was made, just like the sleeves from the 60s were, and the colour palettes used in the 1970s for interior design and the like, and dictated a lot by what's going on around the creators and what they consciously and subconsciously assimilate and then use in the process. So with all that said, was there a point in the Microdot history, maybe in the late 90s or whatever, where you ever thought "we need to completely change tack here, or else we risk saying the same thing over and over again and being left behind"? And given that you obviously have certain sensibilities and things you like to see in designs, how hard is it to change that mindset, bin all the design cues that you like, and go in a totally different direction?
Brilliant watch. Keep them coming Brian! Always look forward to your videos and the back stories behind the sleeve design. You and your partner are always very welcoming every time I visit the Microdot boutique too. Top man.
Brilliant video Brian. I must say it was meant to be for you and Richard to meet. First at the party and then running into him at 6 in the morning whilst getting a pint of milk? C'mon you know. It's also quite fitting that the first sleeve you worked on for The Verve was All In The Mind because your ideas, your brilliant ideas, are all in your mind. And that visual presentation? Brilliant!
Another great video Brian. I'm hoping you might do a video about the CD cover for Whatever by Oasis. I always wondered if the picture of the sky was originally meant for Underneath The Sky or something.
Brilliant stuff Brian. I got this on 12 inch when it came out and just poured over the art work as you did back then. The images seemed to fit the 3 songs perfectly, especially ‘One Way To Go’. I’d just seen them live and they became the perfect band for my teenage years overnight. Your sleeves were a massive part of that. Can’t wait for more Verve videos.
thanks Brian, been waiting for the Verve videos. I've been a massive Verve fan since day one, those records and artwork feel like storyboards of my late teens and twenties. thanks for sharing the stories behind the work. see you in the next one 😉
Great channel, really enjoying seeing all this stuff and hearing the stories. Brian I think deserves more accolades and recognition for his work over the years, truly a legend of the industry, he is to these iconic 90’s bands what Saville was to Joy Division.
