website comparison

http://www.rush.com/v4.html



http://www.pearljam.com/



I chose to use two of my favorite rock bands' URLs as examples. First of all the band "Rush" has a nice site that uses extremely creative graphics. For example, as soon as you select your bandwidth, numbers flash in the middle of the screen and countdown seemingly at random, arrows fly through the air and a snake crawls across the road in tribute to their latest CD "Snakes and Arrows". Simultaneously, the music of the first song from their new CD cranks out and you experience bit of a jolt. I found the site to have great artwork throughout as you navigate from the different menu items such as tour dates, news, etc. Text alignment looks good and the photos of the band members are quite interesting and well placed. Rush has a thirty-year reputation of being an intelligent and hard rocking trio of master musicians and their site has a mysterious quality to it, which like the band, has been part of their very loyal fan appeal. One complaint is that the text is fairly small and a bit of a strain to read.



"Pearl Jam", has not quite as visually pleasing a web page, but does include some interesting artwork. It is very similar to the Rush site with its well organized placement of menu items and related text alignment. However, the text is a bit small. The unusual artwork is thought provoking and as with everything Pearl Jam, it is on the abstract side. That fits well with this band as they strive to be mavericks and tend to write unusual yet powerful music and lyrics. Like Rush, Pearl Jam are also master musicians who push themselves harder than most bands. The site would benefit from more photos of the band, and I would like to see some humorous antidotes describing the band members' road and studio experiences. Finally, unlike Rush the PJ site does not launch into an opening theme song to set the mood for the viewer.