Custom logo design

Here are three logos which I have designed recently, Clarinbridge Arts Festival, rock-band Kindred and The Miami Showband

Remember, during a boring class in school, you would doodle the logo of your favourite band on the back cover of 'Peig' or 'Paradise Lost'? They all had a specific way of writing their name, whether it be a backwards letter (ABBA), an arrow (The Who), a lightning flash (AC/DC) or something else equally distinctive. Here are some classic logo-designs - I have credited the artist when known.


Thin Lizzy's jagged edge logo was designed by Jim Fitzpatrick. The Corrs' early celtic-style logo was dropped, probably because it was too difficult to draw. Enya's logo even has a font named after it!


The distinctive 'S' helped the KISS logo (by Ace Frehley) to stand out while Chicago used their logo on all of their 16 album covers. The 'Yes' logo by Roger Dean is widely-regarded as one of the best band-logos ever.


Brian Pike's logo for The Who was brilliant in its simplicity and even non-artistic fans could copy it. Electric Light Orchestra's is a bit ostentatious and The Rolling Stones 'tongue' by John Pasche is one of the few that doesn't use the band-name. I feel that the Donwood/Yorke design for Radiohead is unimaginative.


The 'ransom-note' font was ideal for the anarchic Sex Pistols (by Jamie Reid) while the almost-illiterate-style lettering allegedly brought Korn many new fans. The Travelling Wilburys based their logo on a circus-poster while the Dead Kennedys' logo by Winston Smith, in my opinion ranks with Yes and The Who as one of the very best.


It's de rigueur for a metal band to have a distinctive logo, probably because their sales of t-shirts and merchandise is bigger than most other bands put together. The jagged 'M' and 'A' make the Metallica logo. The font used in Iron Maiden's logo has a distinctive 'O' while the bolt of lightning made AC/DC's logo (by Gerard Huerta).


Back in the 'Swingin' '60s', many bands had logos or used distinctive lettering in the band-name. One letter, 'T', distinguished The Beatles name while The Byrds' was all flowery and hippyish but yet, easy enough to draw. The Beach Boys' logo never really caught on though it's a nice design.


The 'm' distinguished The Jam's logo while T-shirt sales were clearly in mind when Guns 'n' Roses colourful logo was designed - it had to look good on black! Emerson, Lake & Palmer used a catchy 'ELP' design by H.R. Griger. Madness' logo by Bubbles makes clever use of the letter 'M'.


Once again, easily-read, easy-to-copy, distinctive lettering carries these three logos.


Though their music is poles apart, Nine Inch Nails and Abba's logos are very similar. ABBA's stands out because of its simplicity and brilliance. First of all their designer took the first letters of each member, then seeing that they formed a palindrome, turned the second 'B' backwards so that the name looked like a mirror-image. Artist Trent Reznor adopted a similar approach for Nine Inch Nails with his backwards 'N'. Along with The Rolling Stones, The Grateful Dead's logo by Bob Thomas was one of the few band-logos which didn't include the band's name.


The Eagles' logo is artistic but fails because it's not easy to read. Cher adopted a gothic-style font for her name. Bjork's logo is symmetrical and a feature is the positioning of the three dots.


Wings and symmetry are common to these four logos. Wings could hardly have used anything else! Former band-member Ray Tabano is the artist who created Aerosmith's logo. Two bands used initials as their band-names may have had too many letters - Creedence Clearwater Revival (definitely!) and Van Halen.

S P E C I A L O F F E R U N T I L 1 M A R C H 2 0 0 9 !

I will design a logo for your band for the rock-bottom price of 25 euro and . . . if you don't like it or decide not to use it, you pay me NOTHING! How's that?

All logos used with the best intentions. If you wish to have your logo removed from this page, please let me know by email and I will take it down immediately (all except my own of course!)