Exit Through The Trap Door
Design Diaries: Early album cover art I designed for Gucci Mane.
In 1998, I visited Atlanta and designed a cover for MC Breed. He was working with Mel, who eventually started Big Cat Records with Cat. I moved to Atlanta in 2002 and did dozens of projects for Big Cat, but in 2005 they brought in a new kind of artist. I sat down with him and we discussed his upcoming album. As I shook his hand he said, “Waddup DVS! (pointed to me) “Damn man you worked with Prince!?”. “You the Graphic Mane” (then pointed back to himself) “and I’m the Gucci Mane!”. Unseen to me at the time, this was going to be a major influence on what was to become “Trap Music”. He had some real energy going for him unlike the majority of quiet, timid artists I came across everyday. One time I had lunch with him and he was so excited about a pair of $700 gator skin sneakers he just got… yep. I met Reggie Anderson, the photographer at Big Cat’s office, and we did a photoshoot at a private jet hanger for Gucci. It’s funny because out of the hundreds of photos we took that day, the one I chose for the cover wasn’t from the photo shoot at all. Reggie had shot a candid image of him talking on his cell phone in between takes. It wasn’t even in great focus but I didn’t care. It just felt so natural, so I masked him out and removed the private jet in the background then added an image of a fucked up crack house (or should I say “Trap House” — which was the name of the album). I designed the cover for his first hit single “So Icey” featuring Young Jeezy which exploded into the mainstream radio almost instantly. I went on to do a lot of work for Gucci and Big Cat; a total of 5 Gucci albums, singles, compilations, posters, vinyls etc. I sometimes did photo shoots myself and one day at the studio Gucci had on a blue fur coat. I shot him just smoking a joint and talking, and the photos came out DOPE! I still wonder what happened to those photos.
I think back to that first day in contrast to what he went on to do, like him being a pioneer for Trap Music and appearing on songs and videos with artists like Britney Spears and Mariah Carey. Having a big role in the film Spring Breakers with James Franco, that shits a trip! As I finish writing this I’m watching Gucci’s interview on The Daily Show with Trevor Noah about his new autobiography and how his life changed has me feeling so happy for him.
I’ll be doing more posts about my ATL days. Looking back on my time in Atlanta, doing work for many independent labels and working with so many young artists was a trip. I remember doing a photoshoot in a back yard with 3 Pit Bulls and someone pointing a gun directly into my camera not knowing if it was loaded or not. Not quite the same as some of the Netflix marketing campaign shoots I go to now, lol. Some office environments back then weren’t so corporate, it’s business as usual seeing automatic machine guns just laying around. Oh ATL :-)
Side note:
I recently dug through a box in my closet and found some old work that brought back a lot of memories. Some of the album covers were from 2 Chainz, KRS One, Akon, Rocko, Rasheeda, Diamond, Paris Hilton and the artist Prince with whom I was lucky enough to be mentored by for a couple years. I plan on writing about some of those experiences over the next couple months and posting on Medium and my IG @davidmadeit
