What a macabre bag. Imagine the Peter and Jane books of our childhood; now imagine what the Ladybird illustrator would have drawn if he’d been on acid. The bag from The Twilight Sad‘s merchandise collection reminds me of Martin McDonagh’s play, The Pillowman. In this, the Pillowman is styled as a kindly Father Christmas character that helps children (who will otherwise have deeply traumatic lives) pre-emptively kill themselves. It employs the same absurdist humour as this lovely bag which shows a son with a cloth mask about to smother his sleeping mother, with an inset of a mystery hand pouring a bottle of poison. It’s a series of confusing cartoon events that would have Jonathan Creek baffled for at least twenty minutes about who is to blame and who is the real victim in this two-dimensional world. But this is not just a generic piece of merchandise aiming to make money with as little creative effort as possible, in fact it doesn’t directly advertise the band at all. There’s no huge slogan distracting the eye from the unnerving image (taken from the Fourteen Autumns And Fifteen Winters LP artwork). This style of artwork has become a recurring theme for the Glaswegian band, as there are a series of these images available on t-shirts, screen prints, and previous EPs, all of which complement their passionate anthems. You can be sure you won’t be mugged with this subversively vicious image hanging from your shoulder.
The Twilight Sad and other Fat-Cat merchandise available here
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