I’m pretty sure I was only brought in for this feature because I can usually be counted on for a good rant about things that don’t matter very much to many people. Like off-tempo clapping, Fergie, and the absolute unholy terror that is bad typography. And although I would like to spend a little time pwning Fergie (whom our fatally-flawed editor is known to appreciate) that last gripe is what I’m actually here to address.

Basically, if your music is supposed to glorify God and represent His kingdom, your album art doesn’t get a free pass to suck.

I am no stranger to poor art direction, having worked for a number of clients who can’t quite lose the words, “Is there room for another American flag?” from their design-related vocabulary, and a few who seriously refuse to believe that red, blue and yellow don’t work all that well together (Yes, they are primary colors. No, that doesn’t mean they automatically match).

But until Glory Revealed: The Word of God in Worship, I tell the truth—I’d never seen a cover comprised of finger-painted clip-art quilt squares (made… of wood?) coordinated by the colorblind and surrounded by what appears to be toothpaste:

It’s not that I don’t get what they were attempting – folksy, homemade, communal, unpretentious – but when I think of God’s glory, I think of something a tad more refined and a lot less Oregon Trail.

As far as graphics go, we’ve got a busy, fight-for-your-eye mishmash straight out of the Church Bulletin Builder’s “Miscellaneous/Spiritual” clip-art archives: two leaves, a dove, a purple plant or mollusk of some sort, a Bible, a dove and three crosses on a hill far away.

Back when I was attempting to give the art director credit for some sort of logical progression, I’d concluded that the tree on the lower left was intended to be Moses’ burning bush, ‘cause of the yellow, the red, and the lack of any other explanation. Then I noticed that the tree appears to be levitating directly over the ocean and alongside the moon, which, to my knowledge, was not part of the story, unless there was a Safety-First! element to the miracle of which I’m unaware.

[“…and then, Timmy, Moses traveled into space where he found a bush on fire because it was too close to the sun, and this is why God made sunscreen…”. ]

While the crosses are a nice, simple element, the rest of the graphics, notwithstanding the purple plant/ shell/mollusk/hermit crab, are predictable, overwhelming, and not a little tired. Yes, I realize the tag is “The WORD of GOD in WORSHIP,” but there is really no need to show us an open bible to verify that we KNOW what THE word OF God LOOKS like.

Also, the pointless use of all-caps? Does not lend a project depth of field or texture. Lazy designers, take heed. I realize that we’re trying to stress ALL NEW here, but my eye absolutely gets lost in all of the brown and the list and the band names and the CAPITALS of EVERYTHING. Plus, the typography, in general, is abysmal. I’ve seen the “Glory Revealed” font before, and it was spelling “Psalty’s Funtastic Praise Songs,” or something of the sort, aand that was forgivable, because I was eight and Psalty is, was, and will forever be awesome.

The Psalty font is entirely inappropriate here, where the use of something slightly more refined and less reminiscent of my arch-font-enemy, “Curlz,” might have lent the entire cover credibility. Picture this: Lose the quilt squares, lose the toothpaste and the levitating bushes, keep the brown wood background behind Glory Revealed and spread it over the entire album. Grab a nice sans serif in chocolate brown, keep everything light and minimal, and the entire album – which, by all accounts, appears to be a nice little worship compilation – would have been twice as aesthetically pleasing, and exponentially more saleable.

So what have we learned? First, leave Psalty to the kids, and keep the bushes off the ocean. And second, Christian music’s biggest artistic problem – the inability to cut the crap and keep it simple – is likely not just limited to the music.

Jennifer Carden is a copy editor and graphic design consultant for The CCM Patrol.
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Previously in Fug the Cover: We brought down Lifehouse for their staged angst and pseudo-grungy graphics.
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Standing Disclaimer: We give grateful credit to the girls at Go Fug Yourself for the title of this section, a phrase that they coined.