box vox

Back in the Boxes

Packaging for two products, each called “Back in the Box”

1. Back in the Box™ by Classic Games Company was a packing puzzle in which 17 tetrahedra of various sizes are fit back into a cube-shaped box.

Despite rectangular box inside, the shape of the package is more exotic. Appears to be rectangular box with one corner truncated to make a triangular top flap. A rare example of polyhedral puzzle packaging reflecting its unusually shaped contents, the truncated corner simulates the shape of the tetrahedrons inside. (Photos, on right and above, left are from Baxter Web Puzzles)

2. “Back in the Box” the 1994 seven-song "David Byrne" CD: design and photography by Deborah Norcross.

I like the blurry photo of the little box, and of course I want to know, what did it once contain that we are now meant to imagine going back in the box?

Note: track one is parenthetically entitled, “Vox in the Box mix” 

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Immortal Water

Finally got a chance to design some more music packaging—a cross-referential CD package with an Ouzo-style bottle label for Annabouboula’s long awaited 3rd album, Immortal Water.

The Greek expression “annabouboula” means a confusing noise that aouses passion. We present to you a collection of Greek songs, some old and some new, that convey our confusion and our passion. Our confusion is an ingredient of our identities: Greeks of the Diaspora dreaming of the Greece of a recent past that no longer exists (if indeed it ever existed), as we confront the Greece of the present. Our passion is the main ingredient of Immortal Water, a life-giving potion that flows from the soul and is a distillation of all the varied music we love. We all imagine ourselves, and this is the modern Greek music of our imaginations.

Annabouboula, the band, is the preeminent Greek-American trio consisting of producer/anthropologist Chris Lawrence, guitarist George Barba Yiorgi¹, and singer, Anna Paidoussi.

The title track of the new album is based on Marika Papagika’s 1928 recording of a traditional karsilamas 9/8 folk tune of Greek Asia Minor...

“From your sweet eyes, aman aman, immortal water does run; And I asked you for a little bit, aman aman, and to drink you gave me none”

Aidhinikos Horos (The Magic Fountain of Your Eyes)

Tears, fountains, Ouzo, shipwrecks, mermaids... clearly, there are deeper meanings for “Immortal Water” than are dreamt of in my philosophy, but from my limited, mono-cultural perspective, I just really like the idea of “bottled tears” as Annabouboula’s new consumer product.

What they did was take a traditional belly dance and rembetiko music (smokey Greek blues) and electrify them, adding a funky rhythm and a wild psychedelic undertow to these dark and moody songs of passion and heartbreak.

Wikipedia entry on Annabouboula

And the music? The swooping keyboard riff—(a descending glissando, I think it’s called)—in the very first song (Hello Sailor) worked on me like a (psychedelic) undertow and carried me happily out to sea for the duration. (Hear for yourself!)

(Footnoted Digressions, after the fold...)

Opening Bottle Credits

Back in May, box vox featured some packaging-related opening title sequences. Here are two more—each including an electric guitar soundtrack and a multitude of bottles.

The one below (via: Watch The Titles) is for “Kill Your Friends,” Kris Clarkin’s proposed film adaption of John Niven’s book of the same name:

Haven’t read the book, but I gather that the story’s protagonist is an indie music A&R man who becomes a serial killer:

Stelfox freely indulges in an unending orgy of self-gratification. But the industry is changing fast and the hits are drying up, and the only way he’s going to salvage his sagging career is by taking the idea of “cutthroat” to murderous new levels.

Harper Collins

The bottles here signify excess & moral turpitude, setting the scene for the “unending orgy of self-gratification” mentioned above—or the packaging aftermath of such. The music is by Richard Lightman, whose name appears in the credits (apporopriately enough) on an album cover.

The second opening title sequence (with another multitude of bottles), is actually the one that that I saw first: HBO’s Boardwalk Empire. Here the bottles are a reference to prohibition & bootlegging in Atlantic City—(the bailiwick of this TV series)—as well as implying a certain message-in-a-bottle thing...

Initially, I was irritated by the anachronistic electric guitar music of this intro. Was there no music from the period that might have signaled “Nucky” Thompson’s inner psyche just as effectively?  But now that I know it’s a song by The Brian Jonestown Massacre, I’m suddenly willing to cut them some slack because I do dig it.

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Expiration Date

Have hardly touched the guitar since my much-ballyhooed landfill gig last September. The WXPR radio appearance —(video above, from Rich Russo’s Anything, Anything)— was part of the big promotional juggernaut.

Of course, “juggernauts” are supposed to be unstoppable, and stopping was the very first thing I did after the landfill gig was over. Just could not multi-task to the degree necessary to maintain any momentum. (Musically speaking: a rest.)

There was, however, some very nice feedback that I meant to eventually follow up on. Maybe the time is now.

1. I was so honored to have Marijke Rijsberman of Interfacility attend. On her blog, The Landfill Diaries, she posted her review of my musical efforts—as well as some funny commentary about a few of the products that we’ve designed packaging for. (i.e.: “... spangles for underage females.”)
   
2. Artists, Tattfoo & Enze Tan also attended and wrote about it: here.
3. Covering the Staten Island landfill beat, was Staten Island Advance reporter, Jamie Lee whose story was entitled, A concert stage rises atop the landfill.
4. Photographer, Andrew Gardner came and took some great photos which he posted to his Flickr site.
5. And the the Freshkills Park folks who did so much work to make such an event even possible, also posted a “recap” about my performance—(on their capped garbage mound)—here.

Because there was limited seating on the bus, only a finite number of people could attend that day, but everyone who did went home with a free and uniquely packaged copy of “Songs About Packaging.”

There are still some of those left. My mom bought one. Why not you?

(Song lyrics, after the fold...)

Sardine Can Compressor

The Celmo “Sardine Can” Compressor...

(And the paperboard carton that it comes in, after the fold...)

All the Young Dudes Original Album Cover Art

“Dude ’72” photo by Mick Rock (Camden Town, Summer 1972)

For obvious reasons I really like Mick Rock’s photo of this English boy, outside with his cardboard guitar. (I'm guessing the kayak must have been for Regent’s Canal since I don’t see any other bodies of water on a map of Camden Town.)

We went to the opening of Mick Rock’s Glam! show on Staten Island a couple weeks ago. This photo was there.

The original cover photo for Mott The Hoople’s classic Bowie-produced album “All The Young Dudes” ... Why it wasn’t used I can’t remember, nor can Ian Hunter, must have been a chemical shift.

Mick Rock
Glam! An Eyewitness Account

A chemical shift or just a really bad executive/creative decision? The album cover that they ultimately went with—(with a 1940s-style illustration of some English public school chaps in suits)—was so crummy by comparison, it was embarrassing. (I don’t even want to stink up the blog by showing it; you can go here to see it, if you want.)

In my second year at college, I remember going to a Providence record store to buy that album and just cringing when my girlfriend at the time held it up and, from across the store, called out, “Randy, here’s Mott the Hoople!”

I think I might have held my head a little bit higher, if the English boy with the cardboard guitar had been on that album cover instead.

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Guitar with Packaging Skin

Originally the idea was that I’d be singing songs about packaging & playing a cigar box guitar on top of the landfill. I had even found an El Producto cigar box on eBay that I thought particularly suitable —(conflating stringed instruments: harp & guitar)—and I planned on commissioning my guitar-builder friend, Ted Crocker to turn this cigar box into a 6-string guitar for me. Unfortunately, The budget would not stretch far enough for that. So I decided instead to just give the Edison Volt a sort of packaging skin. (See: package as skin)

The skin in this case: a corrugated Tropicana shipping case. At first I was thinking of using something more pop and super-graphic. (like an economy size Tide box) But then it occurred to me that that sort of iconic branding could easily overshadow the whole enterprise, making it seem like an event sponsored by that brand. The upside down shipping carton seemed like a way around that, and it happened to coordinate with the brown kraft labels of the DIY CD packaging.

Although box vox had very little to say about last year’s Tropicana branding brouhaha, I could not resist referencing it now in my own small way. (The new orange-shaped cap serves as my tone control knob.)

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Package-Shaped Transistor Radios

Marlboro & Uniflow radios from Michael Jack’s Transistor Radios Flickr Photostream; PET Evaporated Milk & Folgers Coffee radios from Gasoline Alley Antiques; the others from eBay

I was on the radio last night. I got to sing two packaging songs on Rich Russo’s Anything, Anything on NY station, WRXP. (“Expiration Date” & “This Landfill is Your Landfill”)

We’ve featured a couple package-shaped transistor radios in the past—(here & here)—but now seemed like a good time for a bigger roundup of these advertising radios.

(Another packaging/radio after-thought, after the jump...)

Tub Packaging

Realizing that I needed a more apropos publicity photo for the upcoming S.A.P. landfill event than the “ye olde” fake-tintype photo I’d been using—(with the Edison Volt guitar, which, while owing a certain debt to cigar box guitars, does not really say “PACKAGING!” in any meaningful way)—I sought a better way to package present myself.

What was needed, I figured, was a photo combining me, a guitar and a whole lot of packaging. After searching the house and failing to turn up any bucket seats or butterfly chairs capable of fully containing me and my groceries, it suddenly dawned on me: the bathtub! Here was not only a practical solution to a logistical problem, but also—(since I care about such things)—an image fraught with artistic precedent. The cover of The Who Sell Out, for example, included packaging, performer and bathtub. (The Mamas and the Papas also come to mind, although: no packaging.)

But after first touting the CD packaging and now the press photo, maybe it's time I reveal a little product...

Here’s a sound clip of the first of 4 “feature tracks” on the Songs About Packaging CD:

The Prettiest Package: This song really started with the title and was sort of named after Bowie’s “The Prettiest Star.” (By no means, my favorite track from Aladdin Sane, but ever since I heard it used in the opening soundtrack of the film, Kinky Boots—I hear it differently now.) But I digress. Aside from the title, there’s nothing Bowie-esque about “The Prettiest Package”. (It has nothing to do with Trans Cans and everything to do with Packaging Drag.)

Note: The sound file above is just an excerpt of the song. There are other full-length mp3 files available here, but I’m just trying to maintain a little artificial scarcity for these 4 new songs. (And as mentioned before: the entire CD will be distributed for free to all who attend the free landfill performance on Sept. 26th.)

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

S.A.P. CD Packaging

Finally coming in the home stretch of the “Songs About Packaging” project. Recording is now all done and packaging is almost done. I went with DIY packaging with re-purposed materials from my own personal recycling bin. Ties into the whole “Litter Rock” gestalt of the project and dovetails nicely with the limitations of my budget.

I expect to have enough of them assembled in time to distribute them for free at the landfill gig. (If you’re going to be in NY area on Saturday, Sept. 26th and would like to attend, follow this link for more info.)

CD label and side sticker are ink-jet printed on kraft paper. The white UPC is a separate label. I got my bona-fide UPC number via CD Baby. (Since I don’t expect to be putting out enough products to justify paying the $760 fee to GS1 for my own “company prefix number” any time soon.) I figure I might as well stick with these labor-intensive, DIY handmade covers for the foreseeable future. If S.A.P. ever threatens to go platinum or anything, I’ll re-evaluate at that time...

Lyric booklet is that kind of 8-page booklet that you can make from a single sheet of letter-sized paper. (Another ridiculously labor-intensive part of the project.)

(One more “product shot” after the fold...)

Amp Can

In preparation for my “Songs about Packaging” September performance (on top of Fresh Kills Landfill) I’ve been looking into battery-powered amps. Although the landfill is a good source of methane (and is already heating 22,000 homes a day here on Staten Island)—there is no place to “plug in” on top of a capped garbage mound. So, rather than go acoustic, I’m thinking a Fender “AmpCan” might be the appropriate choice. An amplifier designed to resemble a can of house paint—(packaged in a cardboard carton).

It seems to be a discontinued product, although it’s still featured on Fender’s Australian web site. I got mine on eBay. Like a lot of music products, the graphics are sort of lame. Embossed-label typography in the manner of a punk fanzine. Radial Japanese-rising-sun-style bursts. And silhouettes. Can’t decide which silhouette I should be identifying with: the guitar rocker or the skater guy? (The rechargeable battery in this thing is heavy in the way that a car battery is heavy, so I can’t really see it as a great thing to skate-board with—unless your were doing some tricks requiring extreme ballast.) Not sure yet if I am OK with the tone. Further experimentation is needed to see whether this amp will serve on top of the landfill.

Still, it’s got 2 channels: one for vocals—one for guitar, and it’s shaped like a paint can!

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Tobacco Packaging & Air Guitar

I don’t know what it is about tobacco packaging and guitars but they are somehow connected. Probably it all started in the 1800s with cigar box guitars. (Subject discussed on box vox: here)

As the roll-over image above will show you, the match pack on the left contains Dunlop guitar picks, and the reused Camel cigarette pack on the right is a mini guitar amp from Smokey Amps. Both were gifts. (Thank you, Ray. Thank you, Tim.)

(See 1 more way that guitars and tobacco may be connected, after the fold...)

Packaging and eBay Airplay

Yesterday someone emailed me this link to a current ebay auction. End time: 1/18/09 (Any records I have ever made—all 2 of them—have long since been consigned to similar cutout bins, real and virtual.)

If memory serves, this 1981 DIY single may be the first package I ever designed. All the writing on the sleeve sort of mars the layout, but it just goes to show how you can’t control what happens to your packaging once the product is sold. But, hey, at least this one didn’t end up in a land fill. Yet. (An unmarred view of this cover may be seen here.)

Seems to have once belonged to radio station WRUC in Schenectady, New York. I love the John, Paulo and George thing, although I guess that makes me Ringo—(and completely omits my brother Ken Ludacer, David Hanson, and Kenia who are also credited on the back of this sleeve!)  I’m flattered that—(for the sake of a sale)—the seller has gone to the trouble of making and posting an mp3 file of the entire 3 song EP... enabling me, for the time being at least, to share it with you here. (Since you won’t be hearing it on WRUC any time soon.)

Update: Ebay item number 360122471097 had two bidders and sold for $6.50 (+ $4.00 shipping). Sadly the mp3 file appears to have disappeared.

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Songs about Packaging at Fresh Kills Park

Photo(s) by Debby Davis

I got a grant! A COAHSI Premier grant. My project? Well, back in March I entitled a post “Songs about Packaging” and—(like leachate in a landfill)—the idea percolated for a while and then mutated into this publicly-funded performance project:

Ludacer will write and record a series of new songs about packaging, culminating in a solo performance atop a capped garbage mound at Fresh Kills.

Yes, that right. With the support of COAHSI and the New York City Parks Department, I'll be singing my tunes on top of what was formerly the world’s largest landfill. Serenading, in effect, the decades of discarded packaging buried beneath. (See: Land Fill Ice Cream)

The performance is set for Saturday, September 26, 2009. Eventually, Fresh Kills Park will be New York City’s largest new parks expansion since the 1890s, but since it is not yet open to the public, this performance can only be attended by those who sign up for it via the NYC Parks Department website. Transportation to the location will be provided by the same bus(es) that they use for their regular tours of the Fresh Kills site. (Note: they don’t post their 2009 tour schedule until Spring.)

I hate to let box vox lie fallow, but I will need to shift my meager creative energies towards writing some new songs, practicing them, recording them, etc.

This is why I’m seeking volunteers to try and keep box vox going. I’m going to be posting less often, but—if can find enough like-minded, obsessive-compulsive packaging-bloggers...(contact me!)—then maybe box vox can take on a life of its own.

(More photos, after the fold....)

Existential Marginalia

(See the wide screen version here.)

My older son (Robert Ludacer*) recently graduated from SCAD with a BFA in animation. I'd been after him for a long time to make a “€œmusic video”€ of one of my songs, and he finally did!

Marginal Existence tells the story of his parents’ threadbare, but happy times in the early 1980s on the lower east side—€”Allen Street, to be precise. I love how he’s envisioned the place, based entirely on his recollections of our descriptions. Stories & anecdotes that we’€™ve probably told him too many times are cataloged here into a sort of storybook mythology...

• the time I had the dog off the leash and—€”alarmed by the noise of the gate coming down—€”he bit the owner of the liquor store as he has closing up. (Thank you for not suing!)

• Debby making her casts of pig heads (purchased at the butcher on Stanton Street)

• her coming out of our front door and spooking Keith Haring, doing graffiti on the other side of the door (Note the eyeglasses.)

• the burglar (who we actually interrupted trying to break into the liquor store and who left behind a hammer that we still use today)

What has any of this to do with packaging? Well, you can be pretty sure there was packaging in our kitchen and in our fridge. (Jolly Time pop corn and Brown Cow yogurt, come to mind.) And check out those bottles downstairs in the liquor store...

And about those fireworks at the end: I remember after one particularly incendiary holiday (4th of July or something) taking our very nervous dog on a walk with the street completely awash in red paper from exploded Black Cat firecrackers.

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

*Check out his most recent animation here.

 

Art by way of the Ferry

Lots going on on Staten Island this weekend and next. Art by the Ferry stands to pretty much take over St. George—(the neighborhood on Staten Island, closest to the ferry)—with exhibitions in ad hoc gallery spaces and music performances, both indoors and out.

One particularly excellent show will include Tom Bogaert, Debby Davis (partner at Beach Packaging Design), Steve Foust, and Tom Ronse. Missing this show would be like, uh... missing the boat?

My own little adjunct performance will be held at an entirely different location—(but within walking distance)—on Saturday morning (tomorrow, June 14), across from the Staten Island Farmer’s Market.

(“X” marks the spot after the jump...)

Songs about Packaging?

Okay, maybe not all my songs are about packaging, but these two songs are: “Expiration Date” & “Pop Top Ring”—and packaging does figure into the lyrics of quite a few others... (Here’s a link to my music site.)

Maybe these two activities (music and packaging design) do not have to be as separate as I've been thinking. Maybe we can be like Sybil and reintegrate our various, separate selves. What do you think?

“Expiration Date” is ©2006 Randy Ludacer. “Pop Top Ring” ©2007 Josh Weisberg & Randy Ludacer.

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

Staten Island’s Little Miss Big Mouth Show

Photo from the Save Staten Island web site

Upcoming real world event... On Saturday, February 9th at 8 pm, Sara Valentine’s Little Miss Big Mouth Show, this edition entitled, “Staten Island: Alive in Wonderland (A Love Letter to New York City’s Forgotten Borough)” is to be held at the College of Staten Island's Center for the Arts. (Full program information may be found at any one of the 3 links above.)

Personal favorites in the show’s line-up include Trish and Christoph, musical duo who take the “go local” ethos to its logical musical conclusion. All of their songs are about life in their neighborhood on the north shore of this island we call “Staten.” Christoph can also be counted on for a concept-driven slide show with hilariously oblique commentary.

In addition to this, there will also be variety of performances and other stuff happening on “the Midway.” (A sort of sideshow-appetizer in  advance of the main event.)

It is on “the Midway” that I (writer of this blog) will be debuting the Edison Volt for the first time! I’ll only be performing 3 songs, however, so if you live terribly far away and were thinking of taking a transatlantic flight in order to hear me sing & play the Volt, you might want to consider postponing that trip until March...

Edison Volt

One thing I've come to realize, is that you’ll never have enough time to do everything that you might get it into your head to try and do—but some of the stuff might just be do-able...

About a year ago I decided that I would no longer content myself with a guitar “off the rack.” Instead, I would start a new project for which I was remarkably unqualified: to design and build my own guitar.

Although I had always thought of myself as a mid-century modern sort of guy, for some reason I wanted this guitar to look like it was made at the turn of the century. I think maybe I acquired this fetish for dark wood and tarnished brass from living in (and attempting to restore) an old house. I wanted my guitar to be like that—modern and electrified, but vaguely Victorian. Like a collaboration between Thomas Edison and Les Paul.

Very soon in the process I realized that I was not equipped with the tools or the know-how to pull this off. I would need help. Back in April of 2007 I found a guitar builder online who had guitars on his web site—a lot of which had features that I had actually written down in my initial wish list: exposed pickups that looked like transformers, knobs and switches on the top (rather than the front), brass corner protectors (which I ultimately decided against). This guitar builder was Ted Crocker, about whom I've written before on the box vox. It was he who ultimately constructed this guitar for me. (Although I did handle the carpentry on the headstock myself...)

For the past 10 months any amount of musical spare time I might have had, has instead been devoted making “actual size” guitar mechanicals in Illustrator and trolling eBay for brass guitar parts.

One neighbor, who works for DiMarzio here on Staten Island, helped me find a source for brass plating.

I designed & built a mechanical “string damper” since I love the “palm mute” sound but do not seem be a good enough guitar player to achieve it via the traditional technique. (The blue material is a scrubby pad.)

Along the way I encountered some sub-cultures I was not aware of going into this.

Relic-ing
Many years ago I used to work at Christie’s auction house where I learned about the importance of patina and provenance in the valuation of antiques. But on eBay there are enterprising artisans who will happily charge you a premium for gear they’ve scuffed up for you. (Sort of like pre-washed denim, I suppose.) I’m ambivalent about relic-ing. I know my guitar would be more important if Thomas Edison had really made it, but—like plenty of other good stuff—it’s inherently fake. And I’m OK with that.

Steampunk
Likewise, I had no idea about Steampunk—that there were all these busy people making stuff look as if it were made 100 years ago. (Among my favorites of this sort of thing is Mike Yager’s spectacles .) The downside of this trend is that too much of it looks like fanciful props for a science fiction movie. (Too many decorative brass gears that don’t really turn anything.) Still, I love the idea that there’s a groundswell movement of new people appreciating how cool old stuff is, ’cause I’m thinking, “hey, I’m old...”

Oh yeah, Ted insisted that we give the thing a name, hence: Edison Volt. Now the Volt is finished and I’m pretty jazzed about it. It sounds really good and I’ve officially reclaimed my musical spare time. (Anyone out there with special guitar needs should just go ahead and contact Ted directly.)

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design 

Package Hacking

Altoids tin thumb piano from yapruder/RP Collier’s Flickr site

It’s a wonderful thing when a product package is so iconic and so beloved that it spawns an entire subculture of cottage industry and energetic hobbyists. Altoids seems to be in such a position. While Radio Shack is gradually phasing out its trays of diodes and transistors, abandoning their original customer base of electronic hobbyists, Altoids has somehow taken its place. By now, most of us have seen Altoids tins used in everything from housings for flash drives to iPod chargers, but really that’s just the tip of the iceberg. The list of things that people have thought of to make out of Altoids tins has gotten ridiculously long. So many people are recycling Altoid tins in such a variety of ways that one wonders how many of these tins ever find their way to a conventional recycling center.

Why has this happened? Partly it’s just the luck and mystery of whatever it is that makes certain products successful. Partly, I think, it’s because this sort of durable, permanent-seeming package is tremendously appealing and hard to throw away.

(More package hacking after the jump)