LOS ANGELES _ The album sleeve for David Bowie's "Blackstar" earned its designer, Jonathan Barnbrook, a Grammy in the recording package category. Shortly thereafter, "Blackstar's" producers and engineers _ Bowie, Tom Elmhirst, Kevin Killen, Tony Visconti and Joe LaPort _ earned the award for engineered album, non-classical.
That latter award marks not only the first musical Grammy award for Bowie's acclaimed album but his career. (He previously won in a video category and a Lifetime Achievement Honor.)
Barnbrook's design features a cut-out star on an all-black sleeve, hidden images that only reveal themselves when held to the light and at least a few secrets that have yet to be cracked.
Said Barnbrook in receiving his award of Bowie: "He had this very rare quality of getting people to produce their best work, but doing it in a way that was wonderful, charming, a great, great enjoyable ride, and I want to thank him for that."
He added of contemporary pop music: "I've seen how important what musicians do for people is. It's there when you're born, it's there when you get married, it's there when you die at your funeral. So we should celebrate that, absolutely."
Also nominated were Parquet Courts' album "Human Performance," for which singer, guitarist and artist Andrew Savage created a matte-finished gatefold sleeve and a multicolored 12-page booklet with lyrics and art.
Artist Eric Timothy Carlson was nominated for experimental folk artist Bon Iver's "22, A Million." The gatefold sleeve features curious symbology, invented letters and odd scribbles.
Designer Ciarra Pardo and pop star Rihanna got nominated for the deluxe CD edition of Rihanna's "Anti." With embossed cover art created by Israeli artist Roy Nachum, the three-panel sleeve features a poem written in Braille, a booklet with artful photos of Rihanna and a fold-out poster of Nachum's work.
And Sarah and Shauna Dodds, who won last year, were nominated for "Sunset Motel" by Reckless Kelly, which transformed lyrical themes into illustrations, building a narrative and creating visual cues that suggested the heyday of Route 66.
