Here’s a test for you. Scan these images and decide which one represents purchasing a ticket. To make it all scientific, have a disinterested friend stand over you and time things. (Have him or her wear a lab jacket for full test cubicle effect. And a pair of thick–lensed specs.)

Now test using the website. Swap positions (and costumes) with your scientific mate. Get them to perform the following tasks: find the programme, find out about the venue, find out who the sponsors are (I guess this is of interest occasionally). Ask them to speak about the task and note how easy they find the experience.

I’m willing to bet that this isn’t the easiest set of tasks in the world and that the experience isn’t particularly enjoyable. Probably because the icons suggest the following:

The HD Live site has used something called mystery meat navigation. Although it was rampant a few years back, you still see it occasionally. I guess designers prefer the look of images over text, or just want to try something different occasionally. It is a gorgeous looking site, by the way:

And the answer to the question? It’d be easy to say never but that would be wrong: sometimes we might want to experiment, sometimes it’s appropriate to sacrifice usability for prettiness (on “creative”, artistic sites, for example), or sometimes it might just work. But textual lables are really the simplest way to do navigation menus as they take no time to interpret; why not use them?