What kind of music is ideal for cover artwork? I think it’s that which has a cyclic form and describes a moment like a frozen still. Something that at the same time brings up a stream of associations and comes along in distinct colours. If these requirements are met, the cover art can ideally be that frozen still for me. Whether it is the same for someone else is something I do not know. In fact, I may even create an image of something that would look differently to the listener if the cover did not exist. Concerning Kurt Nimmo, the person behind Fosel, the cover art for The Difference Engine perfectly match the music.

The draft for the cover was the result of my messing around with several photos using different kinds of overlay strategies. At some point, the original characteristics were lost and patches of light were left. There is an accidental similarity to Futurism, but this is the result of the patches influencing each other’s appearance. The glowing blue reminds me of Cherenkov radiation, which is emitted when particles exceed the speed of light for a medium. Also, to stretch the associations with space and relativity even further, the front image may be interpreted as a black hole with a bright accretion disc spiraling along the event horizon. The idea to arrange the album title in a circle around the centre disc, however, was inspired from an old Captain Beefheart cover. In the end it eventually became what I consider one of the best works as Synflict attracting a lot of attention.