Band + Brand

Band + Brand is a project dedicated to assisting members of the DIY music community in creating a visual identity for their bands. With an introduction on the history of album art and band merchandise, the book serves as a guide on how to approach the creation of a band’s brand. Interviews of bands and designers were conducted and showcased within this project to highlight their experiences working with one another to show the process behind translating sound into visuals.

A series of zines titled “The Name Game” was also created to tell the stories behind band names. The first step to any kind of branding usually falls within the name, so the zines are collections of fun and revealing stories by bands from across the country.

The website is an interactive platform that will exist beyond the thesis show, as the focus of this project is to ultimately be a resource for the DIY music community. While it has an interactive section where one can read the book and zines, it also has a resource tab that lists all the different places a band can create their merch. Simultaneously, the blog at the moment has two main discussion series: The Merch Table, where bands can submit their merch stations at shows and show what kind of designs they have, and Artist of the Week, which will highlight an artist of any medium who has worked on branding a band or who has designed merchandise/album art.