Blue Moon Blog

My pal, Mark Flora, for whom I’ve done album illustrations, and who played guitar and more for the most recent Bedbugs trailer, has assembled a new band, The Holy Rocka Rollaz! Over this past weekend, the band was out and about at a local car show, spreading the word and passing out CD samplers, which featured my art on the cover, in total Ratfink/Dragster mode.

The band provided me tons of good photo reference for the vibe and likenesses. There’s still some tweaking and finessing I’ll do on the art, as well as the type treatment, but this was good to go for their purposes early on as Mark and his gang lay the groundwork to set up gigs. The Holy Rocka Rollaz are a band that loves and pays tribute to early American rock ‘n’ roll, probably playing car shows, gigs events and even weddings by the Fall.

For your curiosity, I’m including here my initial and only sketch/pencil, done digitally, directly on the screen/computer. I printed it in blue and inked with a brush, scanning and coloring in Photoshop. I’ll post updates about the band here at the blog, as well as the updated art when it’s completed.

Last year this time I wrote a comprehensive post of my Christmas favorites. Adding to the list this year are a couple books:

Auggie Wren’s Christmas Story by Paul Auster is a short and simple little ditty, and quietly moving. The book is a nice package with a cool cover and illustrations inside, but a tad pricey at $15, so I’d try picking up a used copy, or read it for free online at the link above.

Larry Marder’s Beanworld just last week made its first appearance in print in more than a decade with a full color holiday special. For long-time fans, this book will whet the appetite ’til Beanworld makes a big return in 2009 with two big books: the first reprinting early material; the second of all new stuff! For new readers, it will serve as a great intro, as this Beanworld review makes clear. I ordered several copies to give as gifts, but have not yet read it. I’ll post an update here later.

I’ve added some songs to my iTunes Christmas playlist, but my favorite is a new song by Florapop, Watchin’ it Snow, which can you can listen to at the new Florapop MySpace page. This is just the first taste of a planned Christmas album for next year. Mark Flora and I are already planning the art for it, which I’ve done for previous albums, like Sunshine Saturday.

Happy Christmas!

Mark and Lisa Flora are a talented husband-and-wife Minneapolis musical duo whom I’ve known since 2000. After reading about their CD release in a local newspaper, I listened to some of their audio samples at their web site, ordered a CD, and the rest is history. Mark and I struck up a friendship, at first exchanging emails, and I’ve since illustrated a couple of their albums.

The first, Sunshine Saturday is sometimes mistaken at first glance for a kids album, but that impression can be forgiven due to Mark’s vision for the Saturday morning cartoon/cereal box style I used. Though the music certainly is bright pop, it’s actually a full fledged, fun-for-all-ages festival in anticipation of the birth of their first daughter, McCartney. Featuring catchy melodies, layered harmonies and sprightly arrangements, this album evokes Brian Wilson’s Pet Sounds and Lindsey Buckingham at his best, while still all its own.

Once we had our visual and thematic hook, images sprang forth, as I reminisced on my own Saturday morning fun and early love of The Archies. I remember cutting out Archies records from the back of cereal boxes that could actually be played on a phonograph! The art for the CD itself is a recreation of those cardboard 45s. For the art behind the CD, I envisioned staring into the bowl of sunshine pictured on the front cover, stars and hearts and flowers flying from the bowl.

For the back of the CD case and the rest of the CD package, we threw in as many references of those wonderful Saturdays as we had room for and could think of. For Mark, that meant Evel Knievel, Jaws and Godzilla. For me it also meant cartoons, funny pages and comic strips, Johnny Bench and the Big Red Machine and playing softball for hours with my brother.

You can listen to audio samples and purchase the full CD package for your own self at the superb independent music site, CD Baby. I especially like For You Two (one of my favorite all-time songs), the toe-tapping instrumental, Doot Doo, bouncy You’re My Baby, and check out the more melancholy Once Upon a Saturday and Turn to You. It’s not all sugar, sugar.

For their next album, an enhanced Japanese re-release of that self same self-titled 1999 CD I’d ordered way back when, Mark asked for a superhero/Kiss look, which was fine with me, since I’ve always loved comics, and Kiss was my first rock concert. I employed a similar layout and structure to Sunshine Saturday for this next CD package, this time with a sweet-sounding pop super-siren, Elton John glasses and flame-spouting guitars.

After something of a hiatus, Mark’s feeling the musical itch again, and we’re already planning the next two CD projects, which I’ll be drawing and Mark and Lisa will be recording. Should be fun!