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Yusuf – Tell ‘Em I’m Gone

The new Yusuf (formerly Cat Stevens) CD is out and available. The cover is pictured above.

Wanna see the original cover I drew for this CD? Here it is:

Sony/Legacy preferred to use a photo of Yusuf instead of art. Yusuf convinced them, however, to use my cover for a limited 12″ vinyl edition of the album.

I originally planned for the cover to be a wraparound and designed it that way. Here’s that full cover:

This image is the centerspread to the CD booklet (although it’s printed in black & white in the booklet, not color as it is here). The image shown here is the un-cropped version, by the way.

I share full design credit with Yusuf and his talented son Yoriyos (who connected me with his dad). They were very hands-on, making the creation of this cover a very collaborative experience. They were great — very kind and respectful, as well as being very clear in communicating their vision. Thank you guys, for being so much fun to work with!

I also drew an illustration for each song. I may show those on this site at a later date.