Legendary punk rocker outfit Blanks 77, pogo-ing their way into your heart, by way of your ear-holes. Elyria's own Antiseptic, some band The Reserves, Cleveland's Six Six Sick, and Milwaukee's Number 9 Hard are all opening to throw down a big ridiculous night of ridonkulous punk frolicking. This is a Now That's Class show of Classiest of dimensions!
I'm actually really proud of this poster. Which, maybe that's saying too much; maybe that's revealing a little more about the nature of my relationship to my work than I would typically like to reveal. Maybe it's just that I feel like I nailed this motherfucker to the floor. That I think I actually really stabbed the beating heart of what this genre of bands is all about. How weird and confrontational, and physically humorous this type of music, and by extension, show, could possibly end up being.
That being said, this is how it was done:
Here's the rough draft, pencil version. Actually, I think it's the third or fourth version. The brainstorm that ended up being the blueprint for this masterpiece. It's a guy in a creepy Clown Mask! Ha! Yes, the mask is most definitely, heavily influenced by what is easily my favorite youtube video of ALL TIME.
YES, KIDS! BEYONCÉ CLOWN!
This video completely destroys me! There's so much about this 38 seconds that I love. It makes me laugh, like, verge-of-tears-if-not-full-on-crying levels of laughter, every time I watch it.
Firstly, what the fuck is up with that creepy ass clown mask?!? Clearly it's based on Pennywise, the evil clown from Stephen King's IT, but seriously- Where did this poor girl get that thing?? Aside from the fact that it's hysterically funny, what would posses a person to put that thing on and dance around to Beyoncé? OR, do that and TAKE VIDEO OF IT??
Secondly, I wonder if Beyoncé has seen this shit. How do you think she feels about it??? I'd like to think that if I were Beyoncé, I would be super stoked on this and hire that girl to put on her creepy clown mask and smash her head into TVs at all my shows! Maybe I'd have an entire crew of dancing IT-Mask wearing dancers with that exact build straight up blasting TVs with their noggins!
I wonder if Gwen Stefani was jealous of this video. Nobody put on a creepy ass clown mask and brained themselves on a TV while dancing to Hollaback Girl. That we know of. I bet there's just a gaggle of Divas that saw this and are seething with envy.
What the hell is even on that TV?? A Purina commercial, with kittens running around. Kittens. I bet there were Purina execs shitting their pants over this video. What show do you think they were watching? Do you think there's somebody off camera watching that TV that wasn't part of making a Clown Mask Beyoncé video shenanigans? Just like, Uncle Dude, or whoever, trying to ignore this absurd bullshit the zany kids were up to- until one of them cracked their clown enveloped dome into his TV?
It occurred to me to include the cream pie for two reasons.
One: I recently re-listened to the podcast Sound of Young America Live in Chicago from 2007, which was the very first time I heard some stand-up comedy by the hilarious Hannibal Buress. He did a bit about how he felt about an ex-girlfriend in the context of Slapstick Comedy. It's a good episode but Hannibal begins right about the 25 minute mark.
Two: I needed something for that other hand, and I wanted it to be something comical and ridiculous. I think punk rockers seriously need to laugh at themselves some more. Seriously. Punks aren't really that funny.
Years ago, I was at a 9 Shocks Terror show at the old Grog Shop where a box of cream pies was released upon the unsuspecting crowd of punkers and hardcore enthusiasts. I'm not entirely certain how well it went over, at that point I think I had lost interest in watching and migrated over to the bar area... anyway, cream pies.
I always thought it would be awesome to get a couple different outfits out of taking multiple types of camouflage patterned articles of clothing and cutting them into sections and then grafting them onto each other. At the very least it would be a great clown suit. A militant clown. I bet this has already been done.
I knew I wanted to keep the background super duper sloppy and a big giant mess. I knew this piece needed to keep the focus on the character. I like drawing like this... loose and crusty, just brush strokes and splatter. Still, I knew I wanted to represent something that would be great for a militant clown to go buckwild at. A big box store like Target, with their vast expanse of empty parking lot seemed like a good idea.
I went in and colored the hell out of the line art, which adds to making the focus of the jam the character in the foreground. I think I actually did this after I had colored the background on a separate layer.
So, yeah, I added the colors to the background first. I knew I wanted it to be hot, filled with warm colors, like a muggy burning landscape. I dunno, there's something about a hot background that works well. I decided to keep the character mostly cool colors, contrasting with the setting.
So, there ya have it, I guess. The final before adding the text. Like I said, I'm pretty proud of this piece. It's totally ridiculous, but I don't think that takes away from the level of craft and effort to keep it relevant. If anything, it enhances those aspects of this poster. I took this concept as seriously as I did any other piece I've done this summer. I think it paid off.
I admit, I boned it and laid out the band's name wrong with the first shot at this. Can't win 'em all! I just had to redraw it. No big deal.
BEYONCÉ CLOWN!
This was taken outside The Root Cafe in Lakewood, one of my favorite coffee spots to haunt these days. It's actually where I am right now as I type this. I love seeing this poster out in public. So fun.
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