Digipak Analysis of Wiley

Wiley - The ascent

I have chosen to analyse the digipak of Wiley's The ascent album.

A digipack is an original version of a cd covering and album package. A digipack usually conforms of a gatefold (book style) from cardboard and or plastic. With trays or sleeves holding the CD and the attachments inside in their place. Digipacks were among the first to be used by major record companies. Digipacks are usually used as special editions of the record or albums as the packaging is more resistant to scratching and damage. Digipacks can also be used for DVD's.

Conventionally Digipacks contain images all over portraying the trademarks of the artist and represent the theme of the album such as here, Wiley released this album The ascent where the image on the front of the pack is of himself looking away from the camera in a dramatic pose portraying his deep thought, representing the deep lyrics in some of the songs on the album. This also suggests he has something to hide, or a lack in confidence. Most grime album covers involve the artist looking directly at the camera to increase fear factor.
By looking at the album cover it is rather difficult to see what genre it is conveying, although   there is one way you can tell it is Grime is by the use of a gold chain to represent wealth.

The colour scheme on this digipak is fairly dark, with the exception of a t-shirt and text. On the front and back, it has white text, so it can stand out from the dark, black background.
How Wiley is represented on this album cover he would want to convey a grime stereotype, due to the choice of clothing and name of the album. A waste coat is not a typical choice of clothing for grime artists, so Wiley definitely wants to stand out from the crowd.
As like Wiley’s clothing, the font doesn’t convey grime too. Also like the clothing, it shows sophistication. This could mean that Wiley is trying to change his style and move away from the grime stereotype.
The audience of Wiley would still be the normal young, grime demographic males. Although, by proving sophistication, Wiley could raise his target audience. Some of his bigger tracks have also become quite popular with the mainstream media audience. 
The image oh himself is extremely large compared to other aspects of the digipak such as the small writing on the back and the medium size title on the front. This suggests that the artist is the most important.