The Rolling Stones ‘Beggars Banquet’ 50th Anniversary Creative Direction

To promote the 50th anniversary reissue of The Rolling Stones 1968 LP ‘Beggars Banquet’, Yes Please were commissioned by ABKCO Music to create a series of posters, print ads, web banners and lyric videos.

The main direction we were given was to reference the LP’s original sleeve art in some way. This actually gave us two options because the memorable gatefold sleeve art which features a graffiti covered bathroom wall was rejected by the Stones’ U.S. and U.K. labels on the grounds that it was ‘offensive’. A compromise was reached and the offending sleeve was wrapped in a plain sleeve adorned with an elaborate script typeface reminiscent of a wedding invite.

We considered using the white ‘replacement’ sleeve but it just didn’t feel in the spirit of the original record. The intended sleeve was the now legendary ‘toilet wall’ and this was the artwork we chose to use. The notorious bathroom was photographed by Barry Feinstein at a Porsche dealership in LA and was defaced by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards with drawings and slogans.

In keeping with the graffiti aesthetic, we chose a rough handwritten typeface and sourced a range of paint splatters, daubs and strokes. When animating the lyric videos we used these paint splashes and strokes to emphasise beats and key words. To differentiate between the feel of each track on the LP, we mixed up the camera moves and editing as well as adding bespoke ‘scrawled’ graffiti style drawings. In this way we created a new visual identity for the campaign that was still in keeping with the original sleeve art.

The Rolling Stones ‘Sympathy For The Devil’ lyric video

Poster campaign featuring lyrics from the Rolling Stones ‘Street Fighting Man

The poster campaign featured lyrics from ‘Street Fighting Man’ to be read from left to right “Coz this sleepy London town is just no place for a Street Fighting Man” followed by the box set information. This sequence of posters proved very eye catching in situ.

We also created full page print adverts for music magazines and a range of web advertising including banners for Spotify, Youtube and Facebook. Working across many mediums, we created a unified campaign that was instantly recognisable and true to the original artwork.