"Global Village Coffeehouse" aesthetics: C/D?

Chagall seems like an influence here too, in addition to haring

Also idk if this was linked yet. Good analysis of why these looks might be coming back

this shit is what gives me righteous fury

I typed a thread a while ago on how the obsession w/ graphic design aesthetics of the 80's and 90's among young designers today is a cry of rebellion against... THIS https://t.co/JBZSvz3z7g

— 〽️ax krieger's big mood (@MaxKriegerVG) February 14, 2018

Wait, so Jesus Jones and I BOTH think the Vampire Weekend cover is reminiscent of Jesus Jones aesthetic but there's no actual Jesus Jones album cover that looks anything like it? Weird.

Sorry here is the for real og thread

I theorize that the rise in popularity of all sorts of pre-2008 visual designs, from "vaporwave" to synthwave to anime futurefunk to memphis milano to "global village coffeehouse" to y2k to "mcbling", is a cry of rebellion against the modern state of consumer graphic design

— 〽️ax krieger's big mood (@MaxKriegerVG) December 28, 2017

See also:

Just found out the wonderful @ScienceMuseum logo designed by @johnsonbanks has been replaced with a simple typeface. From Burberry to Yves Saint Laurent, brands are doing this and IMO it's a shame and a copout. So, coining a #portmanteau for this: brand + brand+ blah = #blahnd. pic.twitter.com/yAy9Jwg5tT

— Irene Hoffman (@ihoffman) March 7, 2019

Yeah this shit is wild.

Part of me likes this trend to sans serif, user focused Appleworld—it’s kind of like, the final and unexpected triumph of Modernism. But the context is wrong. For the Bauhaus, Le Corbusier, these kinds of people, there was a utopian dimension to modernism, even a Marxist dimension, which is totally lacking here. They’re not trying to shake off the dead weight of the past, they’re cutting corners. It’s fast food.

i don’t know, who cares? design looks this way because this is what design looks like in 2019, we don’t always need to ascribe moral qualities to aesthetics

Hegel says it means something

I'm confused, have y'all heard of vaporwave?

Oh sorry lol

oh no our poor brands

I linked to it on the VW thread, but for the sake of this thread, here is where the Global Village Coffeehouse aesthetic is laid out:
https://www.are.na/blog/the-global-village-coffeehouse-aesthetic

Also, from the same site, a glorious gallery of examples:
https://www.are.na/evan-collins-1522646491/global-village-coffeehouse

Good place to find this aesthetic: early 1990s issues of Utne Reader pic.twitter.com/VyuoHlr1VQ

— John M. Cunningham (@jmcunning) March 9, 2019

Trϵϵship go home ur drunk

This is supposed to be a safe space to care about aesthetics

Never stop, treeship

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/8f/Thebeloved_conscience.jpg

bingo

"Einstein Bros. Bagels-core"

https://i.pinimg.com/236x/23/2c/e0/232ce01d321617e8ed80486d10c5378b--bagel-music-to.jpg " class="noborder">

https://theblacksheeponline.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/einsteinbrosweirdwallartjpeg.jpg " class="noborder">

oops

https://theblacksheeponline.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/einsteinbrosweirdwallartjpeg.jpg
https://i.pinimg.com/236x/23/2c/e0/232ce01d321617e8ed80486d10c5378b--bagel-music-to.jpg

https://img.discogs.com/cjAHW381umqRh0tiRoJTMpqaVOM=/fit-in/300x300/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(40)/discogs-images/R-189069-1336110266.jpeg.jpg

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/71KZA7EJEBL._SX360_BO1,204,203,200_.gif

It feels SO familiar... yet I can't find the cover it reminds me of !

― AlXTC from Paris, Monday, March 11, 2019 9:37 AM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I was just about to say "oh of course it looks like..." but all the LPs I'm looking at aren't it. It's a big LP from the early 90s, and I've seen it many times before.

― mfktz (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Monday, March 11, 2019 10:15 AM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

ILX's collective intelligence will find the answer to this frustrating quest !

― AlXTC from Paris, Monday, March 11, 2019 10:19 AM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Also, you guys are definitely right. If it's what I'm thinking of, the design was a big departure from other album covers the artist had released. The Soho Goddess album that Willl linked to is close but not quite it.

Its really bugging me so I've been on a deep dive through early 90's album covers. Candidate #2 = 'Let Them Eat Bingo' by Beats International: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f5/LetThemEatBingo.jpg

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f5/LetThemEatBingo.jpg
apologies, img embed fail

! That's a good one. I had been thinking that whatever it is, it might be on the dance/electronic spectrum too.

yeah definitely ! for me there's got a be a geometric and electronic element in the visual mix.
Not juste the global village coffeehouse aspect.

https://t2.genius.com/unsafe/220x220/https%3A%2F%2Fimages.genius.com%2F2b6008c0dccf6288ce4e4bb4a6d56d79.600x600x1.jpg

perhaps it's something to do with early 90s web design rather than a particular album cover?

(sorry for the typos...)

https://www.variaworld.nl/fotogroot/0006645000_voorzijde.jpg

I had considered Beats International too, but that's not what I'm thinking of. We'll get this!

I linked to it on the VW thread, but for the sake of this thread, here is where the Global Village Coffeehouse aesthetic is laid out:
https://www.are.na/blog/the-global-village-coffeehouse-aesthetic

Also, from the same site, a glorious gallery of examples:
https://www.are.na/evan-collins-1522646491/global-village-coffeehouse

― jaymc, Monday, March 11, 2019 7:56 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

seems to me that global village coffeehouse aesthetic is very much not what this vampire weekend cover is going for

as in no hand drawing, too minimal, not very natural or earthy looking, no wavy lines, etc.

Yeah, there's something different going on there for sure.

The thing about the cover I'm thinking of re Vampire Weekend, is that I don't actually know the group very well. However, I'm familiar with the cover because someone on ilx mentioned it, like "remember when _______ came out with that weird album cover? What a mistake!" or something.

Font is wrong, but...

http://img.clipartlook.com/http-www-teacherfiles-com-clipart-earth-day-earth-day-25-jpg-earth-day-clip-art-250_250.jpg

maybe the VW cover looks familiar bc... it is a blue and white earth on a white background and this image has been everywhere for a long time. sorry i am being kind of a dick

also deep forest these guys were on this trip for sure

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_Forest_(Deep_Forest_album)#/media/File:DeepForestDeepForest.jpg

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f0/DeepForestDeepForest.jpg

the little logo seems congruent, not sure about the rest of it

this was their whole vibe!

Deep Forest is the first studio album by the musical group Deep Forest, consisting of French duo Eric Mouquet and Michel Sanchez. The album mixes New Age electronics with UNESCO field recordings of music from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Solomon Islands, Burundi, Tibesti, and the Sahel. Deep Forest was nominated for the Grammy Award as Best World Music Album in 1994. For Sanchez and Mouquet, the most important purpose of the album was to express their own fascination with the Efe people, and open the world's ears to the exquisite sound of a quickly vanishing culture. As Mouquet noted, "It's not very often you can hear a Pygmy singing on the radio."

Yeah I think some of these are getting pretty far afield from what's essentially a clipart globe w/words wrapping around it (tho I agree it's prob. gesturing toward the era in question)

The white album cover thing is definitely of the time though

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/98/Seal-Seal%281994%29.jpg

http://jamiroquai.com/upload/jam_new/albums/album-cover-1.jpg

xp. ok yah very on brand.

strikes me that the java logo is a bit this

The white album cover thing is definitely of the time though

It's a shame The Beatles never thought of it.

seems to me that global village coffeehouse aesthetic is very much not what this vampire weekend cover is going for

― ( ͡☉ ͜ʖ ͡☉) (jim in vancouver), Tuesday, March 12, 2019 11:22 AM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I agree. Someone mentioned Global Village Coffeehouse in a Hipinion thread about the Vampire Weekend album, but I don't think it was in reference to the cover, more just the general ~vibe~ that the band seems to be currently interested in.

The discussion of GVC in the Vampire Weekend FOTB thread was prompted by this Jordan S. post:

idk the visual aesthetic they're referencing in this stuff is pretty obvious to me... i guess ezra & i are roughly the same age and prob grew up around a lot of the same ppl (upper middle class suburban jews) but ironic riffing on the iconography of boomer hippies-turned-settled down adults and their kids (life is good brand clothes, tevas, fonts on the first wave of organic products, environmentalism, jam bands etc) is pretty in the sweet spot of the kind of social milieu this band has always occupied itself with

I was hoping this thread would be more about GVC and less about the VW cover!

Yeah. This whole aesthetics captured a certain middle aged contentment, still clinging to a vaguely progressive mindset. So boomers in their 50s basically.

From the gallery:

https://d2w9rnfcy7mm78.cloudfront.net/2365279/large_139ea3eea71eb5497d36ec66fb814677.jpg?1530161891

lol

I'm very into that gallery

i almost completely forgot those monitors with speakers mounted to the sides existed.

This brings back memories of the first PC my father brought home, a Packard Bell with teal accents and monitor speakers.

yeah it brings back good memories for me. there's something inherently friendly about the big serif fonts with loopy capital letters. i loooved those huge cut scene diagrams. and lol i almost completely forgot those monitors with speakers mounted to the sides existed.

― dream mummy (map), Sunday, April 19, 2026 4:29 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

agree

Things like the 'Hatris' (don't know what that is) or the 'collage of separate colourful things but with Smart Font' with lots of white space would have felt, to me, like 'this _looks_ somewhat fun but there's something boring/grown-up/educational about it. I need to find out if it's fun or not!'

Hatris was a Tetris sequel - but with hats!

seems so obvious now!