The front cover of Anne Waldman’s Fast Speaking Woman & Other Chants, part of City Lights’ Pocket Poets series, with text set in Yagi Link Double.

Photo by Sheyla Baykal

Poke Pachi (Time Trap, Pocket Pachinko) ft. Marvin and Grotesque No. 9

TOMY Pocketmate is a series of mechanical games made for the pocket. They were produced by TOMY Japan between 1975 and 1984, before the success of electronic games such as Game & Watch by Nintendo.

More than 70 games were published worldwide, under different names and appearances. They were known as Pocketmates in Japan, as Pocket Games in the US, and as Pocketeers in the UK.

Lopetz of Büro Destruct is currently designing and editing a book about these toys. In case you are interested in the publication, please get in touch with him. And head over to Flickr to see his little collection of the most cleverly designed Pocketmates.

Shown here is a selection of games with interesting typography. Many of the display typefaces were available from Letraset. The Tomy Pocketmate name and the labels like “Start”, “Goal” etc. are typically in all-caps Futura.

Space Athletic (Moon Shot) ft. Data 70

Catch a Caterpillar ft. Yagi Link Double and ITC Avant Garde Gothic. The top line appears to use Yagi Link Double’s inline.

Galaxian (Star Shooter) ft. Microgramma and Futura Display, with a customized N

Moon Target (Splash Down, Magnet Target) ft. Data 70

Space Invasion (Pocket Vader, Space Invader) ft. Filmotype Quiet and some unidentified Helvetica-like substance

Marbel Catch (Secret Passage, Drop ’n’ Catch) ft. a customized Pump

Election (Time Machine) ft. Data 70

Golf Game ft. outlined Pretorian with a custom M and a mirrored A

Dice Up ft. Davida

Target Game (Target Range) ft. chromatic Profil. The numerals are from an unidentified source.

Frog Fight ft. all-caps Flash and an unidentified Japanese typeface

Hamburger Catch (Burger Catch) ft. numerals from Brush Script. The title is lettering.

AM America was a morning news program by the American Broadcasting Company (ABC). Launched in January 1975, it lasted only ten months on the air. This promo clip was already mentioned in the post focusing on the program’s logo in Yagi Link Double. Here we’ll take a closer look at the other animated type in this spot, as it pretty much sums up the various trends in 1970s display typography in the United States.

The promo opens up with the name of host Bill Beutel, sliding in from both sides, in caps from the bold and informal Blippo Black, a geometric sans in the vein of Burko, Harry or Bauhaus Geometric. The typeface chosen for the name of co-host Stephanie Edwards – the only woman featured – is Ringlet, an 1880s design with curls, and one of the various Victorian faces that saw a revival in the 1960s and 1970s, in pink. Washington correspondent and news anchor Peter Jennings is represented by a wall of caps in a no-nonsense condensed grot, probably Helvetica schmalhalbfett. “News” gets the (then) futuristic MICR-style face Moore Computer. In further roles: Two staples from ITC; ITC Avant Garde Gothic Bold for Robert Trout and ITC Serif Gothic for Sam Ervin, both in all caps, and the inevitable Bookman Swash with its artificially obliqued and boldened letterforms for John Lindsay. The multicolored “Entertainment” uses an all-caps/unicase face made of dots, available from Photo-Lettering as Dellacroce Marquee B.

See the animated version on YouTube.

Source: www.youtube.com License: All Rights Reserved.

Yagi Link Double is the typeface chosen for the logo of AM America. From Wikipedia:

AM America was a morning news program produced by ABC in an attempt to compete with the highly rated Today on NBC. Premiering on January 6, 1975, the show never found an audience against Today or the CBS combo of the CBS Morning News and Captain Kangaroo. Lasting just under ten months, its final installment aired on October 31.

A promo clip featured an animated version of the logo, with the interlinked letterforms from the neon-like typeface gradually building up from three starting points. The A is a custom barless version (like an upside-down V) that flows into the typeface’s alternate M. “ERICA” likewise is made of glyphs that allow for linked pairs. Once the two parts in blue and in red are complete and the former is scaled down to match the size of the latter, the wordmark is perfected by a red star inside the A. Yagi Link Double was also used for the studio graphics, including the date display.

License: All Rights Reserved.

License: All Rights Reserved.

License: All Rights Reserved.

License: All Rights Reserved.

License: All Rights Reserved.

License: All Rights Reserved.

License: All Rights Reserved.

License: All Rights Reserved.

License: All Rights Reserved.

Source: www.youtube.com The Museum of Classic Chicago Television. License: All Rights Reserved.

AM America closed circuit test, 1974.

Source: www.youtube.com License: All Rights Reserved.

AM America on Friday, April 25, 1975, with Monthy Python as guests in the studio.

Source: www.youtube.com License: All Rights Reserved.

Source: www.youtube.com License: All Rights Reserved.

Source: www.flickr.com Uploaded to Flickr by Studio Z-7 Archives. License: All Rights Reserved.

Ad in the Minneapolis-St. Paul edition of TV Guide, January 1975, using ITC Souvenir.

Source: tvguidegal.blogspot.com License: All Rights Reserved.

Cover of the TV Prevue by the Chicago Sun-Times for February 23 to March 1, 1975. “TV prevue” is in Eurostile Bold Extended.

Mach 1 is an album released by the U.S. Air Force Recruiting Service in 1983. The title of this not-for-sale record featuring a price tag is set in Yagi Link Double, and the name of the band in Data 70. Both typefaces were available from Letraset. The cover was designed by William S. Brownlee, with art by Armando M. Montoya.

[More info on Discogs]

See also my Yagi Link Double list on Discogs for 14 other records featuring this typeface.

According to Discogs, “Xenon appears to be a group of musicians and producers coordinated by Marzio Dance, who was the DJ at Xenon, a Florence (Firenze) discothèque.”

The cover design for their 1985 Italo-Disco single “Xenon Opera” is credited to Dino Marsan
and Virna Comini. In the foreground, we get to to see mask-wearing cyborgs in yellow lab coats, operating screens and keyboards, one of them wielding a futuristic soldering rod.

The letterforms are made from a continuous line, with circular terminals, echoing the electric circuit in the background of the airbrush art. There are several typefaces from the 1970s that come close, like Eggomania, Neo Script, Tangui, to name but a few. In fact, the lettering apparently was made by taking Yagi Link Double and using exclusively its inline. All glyphs can be found back in the typeface design by Teruoki Yagi, including the linking N, the open P, and, most strikingly, the single-stroke X.

[More info at Discogs]

Posted by Buro Destruct as #1039 in their Fonts from the Flea Market collection on Flickr.

The back cover is set in all-caps ITC Avant Garde Gothic (with alternates) for the track titles and Futura for the credits.

Source: www.jozefsquare.com jozefSquare. License: All Rights Reserved.

Czechoslovak poster for Stunts, also released as The Deadly Game and known in Czech as Povolání kaskadér (“Occupation: stuntman”), an American thriller directed by Mark L. Lester, starring Robert Forster and Fiona Lewis.

The illustration of a stuntman on fire is executed in only three colors, and acquires an almost impressionist quality. It’s the work of Czech painter, graphic artist, and musician Jan Antonín Pacák (1941–2007). For the typography, he used a formula that was popular in Czechoslovak poster design: an attention-grabbing display typeface found in catalogs by Western manufacturers like Letraset, Mecanorma or ITC – here Yagi Link Double – with added monolinear diacritical marks, paired with a straightforward typeface for the smaller bits, here Maršův Grotesk, a domestic design that sits somewhere between Futura and Gill Sans.

Source: www.vinterior.co Vinterior. License: All Rights Reserved.

Detail showing Yagi Link Double’s D, redrawn and filled with red.

Source: www.vinterior.co Vinterior. License: All Rights Reserved.

Лабораторная работа (“Laboratory work”) is the name of the joint improv concert of СОЮЗ & Интурист that will take place in Studio 42 in Minsk, Belarus. The name comes from the idea of making a live event in the form of a musical laboratory (e.g. BBC Radiophonic Workshop) focused more on creating sounds and textures.

The titles are set up in the original Gemini and Yagi Link Double typefaces with some self-made Cyrillic glyphs with the accompanying Univers text. There are two variations of the crop-and-repeat technique utilized on the poster. The digital version was printed and scanned in order to get the right texture.

Yagi Link Double in use with some of its alternates to form joined-up letters, on the cover of Para-Transit: Neglected Options for Urban Mobility. From the book abstract:

Increasing concern over pollution, congestion, and fuel consumption accompanying the use of the private auto in urban areas, together with greater emphasis on needs of those without access to autos, has led to major efforts to upgrade scheduled bus and rapid rail transit service in the U.S. cities. Other forms of transportation which are available to the public and use the streets and highways of urban areas, referred to as “para-transit,” are now under consideration as transportation alternatives. This study was designed to review the experience to date with para-transit services, to access their potential for servicing urban transportation demand, and to design an RD&D program as needed to identify and demonstrate innovations in the provisions of para-transit services which would be beneficial. Services studies were grouped into 3 categories: (1) “hire and drive” – daily car rentals and forms of short-term car rentals that have been proposed including Minicar and Public Automobile System; (2) “hail or phone”-taxi, dial-a-ride, jitney and related services; and (3) pre-arrange ride-sharing – forms of car pool, van pool, and subscription bus services. Four major applications of para-transit services are identified. Chapters include comparative study of para-transit modes, innovations in para-transit regulations and case studies. A para-transit bibliography is furnished. Tables and figures complement the text. A summary of this report is “Para-Transit: A Summary Assessment of Experience and Potential.”

The summary uses the same cover design with repeating lines in yellow, green, and red, here against a light background.

From the collections of Northwestern University’s Transportation Library.

Cover of a 1977 reissue of a synth-pop album by Belgian composer Dan Lacksman, originally released in 1974 under the Electronic System moniker as Tchip.Tchip (Vol. 3).

The album title uses a modified graphic version of Yagi Link Double, or maybe Yagi Link Light. This piece of typeface-derived lettering is integrated into the contour of a butterfly, simulating two red neon tubes with some highlights.

“Electronic Butterflies Play Instrumental-Hits” appears to be set in tightly spaced L&C Hairline with alternates. PLINC’s Futura Fineline would come close, too, apart from the full-round counter in a. “Including Tchip Tchip” features outlined Stencil (ATF) set on an angle.

[More info on Discogs]

The letter S is adapted to follow the path along the butterfly’s left wing, followed by a modified K made to connect on the top of the caps height. The Y is modeled after the third alternate (but with smaller top), then the second alternate of L with a very short horizontal in order to reduce the space to the following A (fourth alternate, but wider), and finally a modified version of the second B without joining the path.

Yagi Link Double in use on the cover of a disco/funk single. The artist’s name is shown with the line gap filled in white color, probably inspired by the way the typeface was presented in a Letraset catalog from 1975.

This seems to be the only record by David Keat, released by Hansa International in 1977. The track names show tightly spaced caps from Gill Kayo. The record label’s name is set in Braintrust, which was a mechanically condensed copy of Westminster carried by German phototypesetting studio Fürst.

[More info on Discogs]

Yagi Link Double with automatic ligatures, an interlinear connection, and a hyper-extended G for the cover of a best-of compilation by Dutch rock band Golden Earring, including their hit “Radar Love”.

[More info on Discogs]

Paperback cover.

Yagi Link Double in use for the first U.S. edition of Australian Science Fiction, issued by Academy Chicago Publishers in 1984, both in hardback and paperback, with cover art by Cynthia Breusch (b. 1959). Edited by Van Ikin (b. 1951), this anthology was first published by University of Queensland Press in 1982.

While the uncredited designer used Yagi with appropriately tight letterspacing resulting in linked up pairs for ST, RA, and CT, this setting is not as sophisticated as the Charlie Christian album cover posted by Stephen. The glyph set offered alternates that would have enabled instant ligatures for AN, EN, or ED, too.

[More info on ISFDB]

Book jacket (front).

Book jacket (back).

Source: www.flickr.com Uploaded to Flickr by Stephen Coles and tagged with “yagilinkdouble”. License: CC BY-NC-SA.

The illustration and design for this Elec Records release is credited to “K. Abe” (Katsuji Abe) who created hundreds of Japanese record sleeves (primarily as a photographer) from the 1960s to the 1990s. As soon as I saw this in the bin at Contact Records in Oakland I knew I had to have it — for the music, yes, but mostly for the cover.

License: All Rights Reserved.

Album cover detail with type isolated from the background.

Source: www.flickr.com Photo: Stephen Coles. License: All Rights Reserved.

Yagi Link Double in Homage to the Alphabet.

Abe’s use of Yagi Link Double is the most skillful I’ve seen yet. Most designers failed to take advantage of the many alternate forms Teruoki Yagi offered to achieve an occasionally connected string of letters. Or, they would simply set the type too loosely.

Yagi Link Double, one of the more popular members of a large family of semi-related styles, was available as phototype and dry transfer lettering, but any version must have been extremely difficult to apply properly. That’s why Abe’s implementation is even more admirable — it’s as seamless as the typeface would allow, with a two-tone (orange/brown) effect to boot.

Last year, I presented a weirdly specific talk about the relationship between fonts and neon signs, and Yagi Link Double was one of the examples that I included as a less successful emulation of glass tubing. If I had known this record cover back then I surely would have included it.

“Omar Rayo en la Segunda Bienal Americana de Artes Graficas / Museo La Terulia / Cali Colombia, Octubre 1973.” Stripes (1973) is paired with Pump Bold (1970), which is used without i dots.

Omar Rayo (1928–2010) was an abstract art painter from Colombia whose geometric Op Art works have been exhibited multiple times at Museo La Tertulia and at Museo Rayo in Cali. The two museums collaborated on a retrospective exhibition with paintings from both collections. Each time a catalogue was printed it featured a different typeface arrangement, mostly with geometric display typefaces. Both museums even made an special exhibition in 1977 called Los Rayos del Museo Rayo y los Rayos del Museo La Tertulia.

Some exhibition catalogues like the one for La constante geometría from 1972 had original lettering, but most of the covers and posters are early examples of instant lettering typefaces in use, with very original typesettings. Unfortunately I couldn’t find any information about the designer of these printed materials.

Another exhibition from 1985 called Rayo Serie Raya Blanca Raya Negra shows Stripes in use. In Spanish, Omar’s family name Rayo could be translated to “ray”, but when used in feminine form, Raya means “stripe”. In this case, it transtales to: Rayo White Stripe and Black Stripe Series.

Joc Line (1973).

Stop (1971) and caps from an unidentified wide grotesk (similar to Akzidenz-Grotesk or Venus breit) for Omar Rayo at the Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo.

Sans-serif caps from what appears to be a predigital cut of Helvetica, cropped and repeated.

Traffic (1973).

This piece of lettering appears to be modeled after Pacella Graphic Biform or Bailey.

Deutsch Black (1966).

These letterforms that look like folded paper strips are either custom drawn or from an unidentified typeface.

Compacta Bold Outline (1965) on an angle, with a circle punched out and rotated.

Eurostile neretto largo (1962), caught in a grid.

ITC Ronda Bold (1970), with a crop-and-repeat treatment and a custom interlinear ligature.

Good Vibrations (1973).

Yagi Link Double (1968).

Baby Teeth (c. 1966).

Hot Dog (1975). While most of the other typefaces were carried by Letraset, Hot Dog was exclusive to their competitor Mecanorma.

These caps look like they’re from Moore Computer (1968). The Y isn’t a match, though – it might be an alternate, or a modification.

This ladder-like arrangement appears to use custom drawn letterforms.

Poster for Rayo Serie Raya Blanca Raya Negra (1985), featuring Stripes and Helvetica. The Museo Rayo logo at the bottom left is based on ITC Avant Garde Gothic, while the text at the right is set in caps from Wexford.

Poster for La Constante Geometria (1972), ft. more ITC Ronda and Univers Ultra Condensed or similar. The big “OMAR RAYO” is probaby custom. For similar extracompressed digital fonts, see Radiator or Fit Skyline.

This catalog was issued by Letraset, the British manufacturer of dry-transfer lettering sheets and other graphic means, in 1975. The front and back cover show fifteen examples for how to use their display faces. Each typeface is presented in a different setting alongside illustration that complements the letter style.

The example for Broadway (first image, top left) features a frame made from elements of the Stripes typeface. In 1977, this device was referenced in a cover design for an album with music by Bing Crosby, see the post contributed by Pampa Type.

Another example of note is Buster (first image, bottom left) which employs the text buildup technique as sometimes seen in concrete poetry. Stripes also appears on the back cover (bottom right), with hyper-extended glyphs. Both Stripes and Buster were desiged by Tony Wenman and are Letraset originals. Many of the other faces were either licensed from contemporary manufacturers of phototype, like ITC Pioneer by ITC, Pluto by Face Photosetting, or Yagi Link Double by FotoStar/Facsimile Fonts; or were adaptations of metal typefaces. The Letraset logo uses tightly spaced Helvetica.

Photos courtesy of Peter Smith – thanks a bunch!

A double feature of biline faces, Yagi Link Double and Oxford, for Vans and the Truckin’ Life, published by Harry N. Abrams in 1977. Text by Terry Cook, photographs by Jim Williams. Edited and with a foreword by Mark Gabor.

With its winding double line, Yagi Link Double references the road, obviously. The caps-only face is used for the title page, for drop caps, page numbers, and the opening pages to the two main parts. Christine Lord’s lowercase-only Oxford was chosen for chapter headings. The two similar typefaces are paired for the title on the interactive cover, which features a die-cut window and a fold-out flap. Both originated at phototype manufacturers, Yagi at FotoStar/Facsimile Fonts in 1968 and Oxford at Face Photosetting in 1970, and were later adopted by Letraset for dry-transfer lettering.

Nai Chang provided the book design. Born in 1933 in Shanghai, China, he came to New York in 1939. “After taking evening art classes at Cooper Union, he found work as a designer at Harry N. Abrams, a prominent publisher of art books, and remained at that company from 1965 to 1981 as art director and, eventually, vice president.” [obituary] Chang died on January 17, 2019.

From Goodreads:

This book is a fascinating look at the Van Movement that sprang up with the first hippies in early Volkswagen Transporters, and then spread to other auto enthusiasts like some muscle car guys, and also included some outdoor types. There are photos and descriptions of the vans themselves (trucks, as they were called by vanners in the know), from the beginning up to that time and including all major makes. […]

Half-title and flap.

Title page. That’s a lot of Yagi! Note the use of some of its many alternates, e.g. for T or A.

The contents page has a heading in Oxford with a hyper-extended middle line. The text typeface is Helvetica.

Drop cap in Yagi Link Double.

Page number and opening page in Yagi Link Double.

Techno Top is the fourth volume in Chris Forsyth’s ongoing Solar Live series of high quality live releases, and was just released via Bandcamp.

Darryl Norsen designed the digital album artwork. I admire Darryl’s work and am especially fond of the way he digs up predigital typefaces that have fallen into oblivion, and skillfully casts them for his creations. While this cover obviously revels in a 1960s/1970s aesthetic, it does so from an informed, contemporary perspective, and brings together several elements (compare e.g. the bichromatic type on a Sweet single and the photo of Medicine Head) for a concentrated best-of.

Darryl comments on the design:

Chris and I have now worked together for several years and we both suckers for bootleg and free jazz vinyl artwork. Techno Top obviously nods heavily to both of those with the blown out band member faces that leave much to your imagination within their shapes. The choice of using Shotgun Loaded and Yagi Link Double was intentional: Shotgun adds the weight to Chris’ name so you see his name first. Yagi Link is a direct line to the song title as I felt like we needed that kind of modern linear font that says ‘Yeah I am electronic music!’ (though Chris is very much a rock ’n’ roller). The smaller type is all done in Futura Medium and Bold – I have a thing for Futura in that it pairs pretty well with any other 1960s or 1970s typeface.

Front.

Oddly enough, this 1979 Australian release has nothing to do with Wendy Carlos’s famous Switched-On Bach or Sy Mann’s Switched On Santa. The previous were both late 1960s explorations of the relatively new synthesizer technologies pioneered by Robert Moog. The 21 songs listed are done in a more 1970s disco style, mostly instrumental with a variety of instruments. There’s no artist name listed. Maybe my all time favorite Christmas cover, nonetheless!

Back.

Spanish release for “Blockbuster!” / “Need a Lot of Lovin' (Necesito mucho Cariño)” by The Sweet. Track titles rendered in a bi-color treatment of Yagi Link Double, using a scaled-down U in “BLOCKBuSTER”.

The title track was released as a single record in a handful of other countries. Sometimes the title was spelled differently: “Block Buster” (Germany 1972), “Block Buster !” (United Kingdom 1973), “Blockbuster” (USA 1974).