Analysis of MGMT and Girls Aloud's Album Cover

Firstly, I think that straight away MGMT's album cover is individual, and slightly different from other albums that I see from the shelves of HMV. The main reason for this being the way that MGMT are dressed, representing an image that males can consume a constructive identity from music. The album cover itself is simple, with a mise en scene of what is obviously sea water, and a not over stated album title which is only outlines in white, and lays clearly in the middle of the cover so it catches an audiences attention.

The two men's dress sense is clearly making a statement to it's target audience that they intend to stand out from a crowed, and not typically be like everyone else. In particular, the man on the right who is wearing face paint and numerous items of bright and colourful clothing round his neck and body. This makes him appear bright and confident to a primary audience, and furthermore, the other member of MGMT is wearing a colourful scarf tied round his neck, which is made to stand out against his half naked body. His red shorts worn on his lower half connote boldness and danger, which make him appear also confident and quite "cooky."

Overall, the way that MGMT are dress, suggest to an audience that there music is intended for people who wish to also be slightly individual, and don't depend on the charts to tell them which bands to listen to.

Secondly, the Girl's Aloud album cover represent a completely different image compared to MGMT's. For example, each female member is dressed up in mini, colourful yet "girly" dresses, and none of them contain an individual look about them. In contrast with MGMT, who obviously stand out as unique. Therefore Girl's Aloud are representing an image that all females are girly and like to dress up in glamorous dress wear; not in anything "wacky" or different. Each member is also wearing high heels, which promotes that type of look to a female audience. Although, even if you weren't familiar with the band Girl's Aloud, if you looked at there numerous album covers, you would straight away guess that there genre and type of music would be very "pop" and cheesy. (A genre which already doesn't connote individuality.)

Finally, what's interesting about these two album covers is that MGMT which is the more individual album cover of the two, is a male dominated band, where-as Girl's Aloud is obviously a female dominated band, with an obvious mass market of young teens. Therefore, this suggests that males are perhaps expected to have both a taste for individual and alternative identities, whilst still are accepted into the mainstream genres of music. However, females are only accepted into the mainstream genre if they live up to female stereotypes, such as exposing there gender in a sexual way to flaunt there bodies in order to gain attention, thus them taking on homogenised identity. Hence resulting in an obvious difference in how males and genders are perceived differently by audiences.