Eddie Floyd – Soul Street album art
Soul Street is an album by R&B and soul singer and songwriter Eddie Floyd (b. 1937), released in 1974 on Stax Records. The sleeve design is by the record company’s internal design studio, The Stax Organization. Ellis H. Chappell provided the marvelous street scene illustration, complete with shop signs of current and previous businesses in various lettering styles as well as details such as protest graffiti.
The cover typography is set in Swinger. This funky heavyweight comes in two styles, Swinger and Swinger Shadow, both of which can be seen here. The designer of Swinger is Ray Cruz.
Born August 31, 1943, in Ponce, Puerto Rico, Cruz graduated from New York City’s High School of Art and Design and honed his skills working in several of the city’s lettering studios, including Techni-Process (1963), Headliners (1964, under John N. Schaedler), and, following two years of army service, at the newly formed John N. Schaedler, Inc. There, he helped Schaedler design Loose New Roman and was soon appointed studio director. Tempor Medium and Bold from 1968 were “his first independently designed alphabet styles”. Fat Albert and Swinger followed around 1970. Cruz described the latter as the “sign of the times – anti-war fervor mixed with sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll”.
In 1977, he founded Cruz & Slowik Associates, together with Janet Slowik. There, he drew numerous wordmarks and logotypes, as well as custom typefaces including for Camel and the United States Postal Service. From 1999 to 2005, Cruz served as type director at the Young & Rubicam advertising agency. In addition, he was a passionate teacher, working as adjunct professor at Parsons School of Design, FIT, Kean University’s Robert Busch School of Design, County College of Morris, and Marywood College.
In total, Cruz designed more than fifty typeface styles. He revived some of his early works himself and released them in digital form through his own foundry, Cruz Fonts, including Swinger.
Ramon “Ray” Cruz died on March 26, 2025, at the age of 81. Rest in peace.
Credits and track list on the back cover are set in a light weight of ITC Avant Garde Gothic.
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Here’s a detail of a specimen page for Cruz Tempor, from a catalog by Schaedler.
And a slightly later portrait of Ray Cruz, from The Lettering Studio. A Design Portfolio, published by John N. Schaedler, Inc. in 1970. Cruz is shown as one of the studio’s “four lettering-designers”, alongside John N. Schaedler, Joel Kaden, and Taro Yamashita: