When Kendrick Lamar unveiled the cover art for his new album DAMN., the initial reaction was, shall we say, a bit mixed. Thanks to Kendrick’s downcast expression and the big red Times New Roman font, the artwork has already been memed into oblivion, and now one of the graphic designers behind the cover, frequent TDE collaborator Vlad Sepetov, has taken to Twitter to explain his intentions:

but i'm incredibly proud of this cover. i sort of bucked a lot of what my teachers taught me. i wanted to make something loud and abrasive.

— Vlad Sepetov (@VSepetov) April 11, 2017

and maybe some won't see that, but i'm glad that dave and dot saw the value in making something that didn't fit the mold.

— Vlad Sepetov (@VSepetov) April 11, 2017

just given the bare bones we fleshed something out that has a lot of people talking. it's not uber political like tpab but it has energy imo

— Vlad Sepetov (@VSepetov) April 11, 2017

@NickyChulo we wanted to make the pa logo part of the design not an afterthought. why make it small? let's make it huge and embrace it. DAMN.

— Vlad Sepetov (@VSepetov) April 11, 2017

Don't like my tweets taken out of context.

Saying one person made the "artwork" is a disservice to everyone who worked on it.

— Vlad Sepetov (@VSepetov) April 12, 2017

See that? That’s being humble.

DAMN. by Kendrick Lamar. pic.twitter.com/ucQcg0PuzG

— Kendrick Lamar (@kendricklamar) April 11, 2017