“Popalp” is a piece of 1970s Swiss pop oddity produced by Michel Neuville and performed by Hermann Studer and his ensemble of alphorn players. The cover for the French release on the Seabird label depicts the Alps, but avoids the stereotypical choice of Helvetica and instead features Marianna. The balloon-like face by Samoan New Zealand designer Joseph Churchward was available in France from Hollenstein Phototypo.

[More info on Discogs]

Published by Gyldendal in 1972, Hare, hvorhen? (“Rabbit, where to?”) is the Norwegian edition of John Updike’s 1971 novel Rabbit Redux. It’s the follow-up to Rabbit, Run (1960), known in Norwegian as Hare, hopp!

The cover design by Peter Haars brings together two display faces from 1969 which both carry first names starting with M: while the multiline Michel is named after its designer, Michel Waxmann, the inflated Marianna by Joseph Churchward got its name from one of the designer’s daughters. The author’s name is in ITC Pioneer.

French sleeve for Yoko Ono’s first single from her second studio album Fly, released in 1971 by Pathé Marconi Records under license from Apple Records.

Written and sung by Ono, the A-side was recorded with John Lennon on piano and organ and Klaus Voormann on acoustic guitar and bass.

From Wikipedia:

Ono biographers Nell Beram and Carolyn Boriss-Krimsky described the song’s theme as the way the public defined Ono solely as ex-Beatle John Lennon’s wife and did not recognize her as an artist in her own right. Beram and Boriss-Krimsky felt that the lack of promotion her records including Fly received was a reflection of this theme, since her record company did not believe that the public would be interested in Ono’s solo work Ben Urish and Ken Bielen described the song’s theme similarly, stating that it is an “ironic ballad” that it sounds like a love song, but the lyrics describe Ono’s anxiety about losing her identity.

Premier Lightline is a Letraset original, and the first typeface to be released in their Letragraphica range. Smoke and Churchward Marianna were available in France from Hollenstein at the time, see them listed in a 1971 catalog.

[More info on Discogs]

Fonts from the Flea Market #1320

The chubby forms of Churchward Marianna make Star Wars look a lot less martial and dangerous. This audiobook with original music by John Williams was narrated by Dominique Paturel (1931–2022), who is best known as the French dubbing voice of Larry Hagman (as J.R. Ewing in Dallas) and Michael Caine. The 7″ record comes with a 24-page color booklet. It was released by Buena Vista Records in Canada in 1979 or 1980. Shown here is a slightly later French pressing.

[More info on Discogs]

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Just like the recently featured Begriffe-Lotto, Wir sammeln Pilze (“We gather mushrooms”) is a game issued around 1981 by VEB Plasticart Annaberg-Buchholz, produced in their Werk 4 in Karl-Marx-Stadt, the Saxon city nowadays known again as Chemnitz.

And just like Begriffe-Lotto with its mix of Cut-In and Thannhaeuser-Schrift, this board game illustrates the gamut of typographic options in East Germany at the time: body copy was to a large extent still set manually, with metal type dating back several decades, to be printed in letterpress.

Designers in the GDR strived for a greater palette. For display purposes, they found interesting contemporary faces in the offerings of the NSW, the “non-socialist economic area”, read: the capitalist West. In this case, it’s Marianna by Samoan New Zealand designer Joseph Churchward. The chubby face with forms evocative of curving mushroom heads (see also Bravado) was available from West German company Berthold Fototype and also from French press type manufacturer Mecanorma.

The insert with the rules of the game features a headline in Aktuell, created by Walther Schnippering and released by Schriftguss before the war, in 1935. The text face is the slightly younger Primus-Antiqua. Made in-house at VEB Typoart, apparently as a socialist clone of Excelsior (Linotype, 1931), it was first cast in 1950.

CW. License: All Rights Reserved.

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Fonts from the Flea Market #1274

Joseph Churchward designed the bubblegum face Marianna in 1969. In 1971, French Letraset competitor Mecanorma adopted it for dry transfer lettering. In the same year, it was used on the sleeve for the song “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Our Love”, in all caps with a gradient fill.

[More info on Discogs]

Das Giraffenbuch, 1973.

Born in Argentina in 1932, Guillermo Mordillo was one of the most widely published cartoonists of the 1970s. In 1969, he was awarded the Silver Medal at the V International Biennale of humorous designs at Tolentino, and in 1977 he won Best Cartoonist of the year at the Salon International de l’Humour in Montreal. In the years between, the Insel Verlag in Germany published two paperbacks with cartoons featuring giraffes. The cover typography uses the Shadow Italic style of Churchward Marianna. Joseph Churchward’s obese letterforms are a perfect fit for Mordillo’s chunky, bulbous-nosed characters. I only wish Marianna would have been spaced tighter. It looks better with touching letters.

Mordillo passed away on 30 June 2019.

Das Giraffenbuch 2, 1974.

Source: abbasite.com License: All Rights Reserved.

Ring Ring by Björn Benny & Agnetha Frida, released on 26 March 1973 on Polar Records, Sweden. The cover was designed by Peter Wiking, with photography by Bengt H. Malmqvist and a tightly spaced version of Gill Sans Extra Bold with enlarged dots. The ampersand appears to be a custom addition.

Ring Ring was ABBA’s first album, released in 1973. I will share the fonts used for this album and the related singles. In this early period the band didn’t identify as ABBA yet. Instead, the covers spell out the names of the four members: Björn & Benny with Agnetha & Anni-Frid. In many cases, the women’s names are given as “Anna & Fri(e)da”. “Björn” often has to do without a trema on the o.

“People Need Love” (1972) was the first ever single released by ABBA. The “Ring Ring” single was released worldwide. “Nina, Pretty Ballerina” was only released in France and Austria. That single gained a #8 in the Austrian charts.

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

Released on 1 June 1972, “People Need Love” (Sweden) was the first ever single by ABBA. Fonts in use: Annonce / Aurora-Grotesk V and Helvetica.

Source: www.45cat.com Scan: Meandi74 / 45cat. License: All Rights Reserved.

French pressing of “People Need Love” on Disques Vogue, featuring Neil Bold and Akzidenz-Grotesk.

Source: hitparade.ch License: All Rights Reserved.

German release of “People Need Love” on Polydor. The fonts in use are Churchward Marianna and Helvetica Inserat.

License: All Rights Reserved.

The sleeve of the Danish version of “Ring Ring” by Polar combines Stencil and Compacta.

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

In Sweden, the “Ring Ring” single was packaged in Polar’s generic typographic sleeve featuring Sans Serif Shaded.

Source: www.flickr.com Scan: Horst Adomeit. License: All Rights Reserved.

French pressing of “Ring Ring” on Disques Vogue. Fonts in use: Annonce / Aurora-Grotesk V and Frankonia, in all caps.

License: All Rights Reserved.

The Dutch sleeve for “Ring Ring” (Polydor) pairs the descenderless Broadway with caps from Futura Display. Note the “surprised frog” Ö with affixed dots in “Björn”.

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

German release on Polydor. “Ring Ring” is in ITC Pioneer, the rest in the equally squarish Diamante.

Source: shop.totallyvinyl.com Totally Vinyl (edited). License: All Rights Reserved.

Spanish version by Carnaby. The typeface is Pluto with a two-color fill.

License: All Rights Reserved.

“Nina, Pretty Ballerina” as released in France by Vogue. The font in use is Windsor Elongated.

License: All Rights Reserved.

The Austrian version of “Nina, Pretty Ballerina” (Polydor) features Normande Italic and Filmotype Flyer.

Is there anybody going to listen to my story / All about the girl who came to stay?

Joseph Churchward named his Marianna typeface after one of his daughters:

It’s a plumpy typeface, and when Marianna was a little girl, she was a plumpy girl, so I called it Marianna.

[More info on Discogs]

1975 hit single by pop band Ferrari from Heusden, The Netherlands.

Many sources show this sleeve variation with Beton Extra Bold used for the title. Was this the original design that got replaced because it accidentally says “Boogie Woogie” instead of “Woogie Boogie”?

The album title was originally to be December Fourth according to a September 1970 article in Melody Maker magazine, but for some reason this was dropped and Volume Two was chosen.

This 7″ single was the German release of Al Martino’s 1975 rendition of the Domenico Modugno song "Volare."

DIN A1 concert poster for Neil Young, 1982, Deutschlandhalle, Berlin.