Gross Anatomy: High on Fire poster

2012/12/282015/02/08 Doktor Ross SewageLeave a comment

Back in August / September, Yob was coming through town. I love Yob. They were playing on my birthday and I wanted to do a poster for them. I talked with the band and they were down. A week before the event, after just starting the inks, it was pointed out to me the promoter already had a poster. Shit. I didn’t talk to the promoter. I cancelled my job and enjoyed the show anyway. A month later, my friends at Secret Serpents offered me a spot in their High on Fire tour series. Well, why fucking let that art go to waste? I requested the date for the end of the world, December 21, 2012. This is what came of it.

Like all posters I’ve worked on, I don’t make a cent… unless I sell my own copies. This is the topsy turvy economy of the gig poster world. 35 of these bad boys went down to Santa Ana, gratis, for the band to sell. My copies are on sale on my website now. The process to get from there to here took longer than expected, but I was pleased with the results.

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Choice Cuts: Building a Lazer-saw

2012/12/212015/01/31 Doktor Ross Sewage

After taking a beating for the last four or five years, Killbot wasn’t looking so hot. Getting smooshed into a trailer night after night didn’t help. While on the last tour, we talked about a making a new one. Maestro Sean McGrath took the lead on this one and cobbled together a leaner, more aggressive looking, and tougher version of the costume. When he wants to write a blog detailing how he did that, he’s welcome to. In the meantime, I threw in the LEDs and lit the bitch up, and that’s what I’m gonna talk about here.

The previous Killbot had lighting done to its head. I detailed that in a previous entry last year. When I finally saw the lazer-saw that Sean had built, my mind started whirling with ideas. Originally, he’d planned to have electroluminescent wire wrapped around it. He tried that for one show, but it wouldn’t illuminate very well. I tried working with it, and I’ve decided I hate EL wire. It’s definitely not bright enough for a lit stage and it’s a bitch to work with. I wanted to go another route.

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STD Greeting Cards: You need these!

2012/12/072014/06/24 Doktor Ross SewageLeave a comment

My fiancee and I have been mulling about on a project for some time now. Probably, like, a year. Touring and stuff often gets in the way of fun stuff like this. Finally, however, I was able to make some time. It is here I am for the first time displaying our first ever joint artistic effort; STD greeting cards.

I’ve gone and screen printed four different cards, all featuring just the most adorable little animal I could draw. These are going to be sold as a set of four, bundled up all cute, and just in time for the holidays! What makes these so special, besides my amazing art and a wonderful four color screen printing job? The messages inside… each one has a different message declaring from the sender to the sendee an APOLOGY for whatever SEXUALLY TRANSMITTED DISEASE you might have given them. You had to know the idea was gonna get sick at some point, right?

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Gross Anatomy: Melvins Lite Poster

2012/09/072015/01/28 Doktor Ross Sewage1 Comment

Freak Puke is the debut album from Melvins Lite, a more recent power trio incarnation of the Melvins. It features old stalwarts King Buzzo and Dale Crover joining with legendary bassist Trevor Dunn. They’re as “Lite” as a joke about 9/11; it’s every bit as heavy as any version of the Melvins. They are touring to promote Freak Puke, but this time, the tour is an event of Guinness sized magnitude. 51 shows in 51 days, every state in the union plus Washington D.C. This will be a record. I was pleased as punch to be included in the tour poster series from Secret Serpents. Yesterday, they played the second gig in Seattle, Washington. I commemorated the event with this piece of Sewage-style snarkiness.

I was a bit apprehensive at first, being handed the tour poster duties for Seattle. Being that this was such a geographically consequential tour, I wanted to do something to reflect the area they were playing. I couldn’t abide by putting the Space Needle in the art, but I couldn’t think of anything more unequivocally recognizable about the Emerald City. I set about looking for inspiration.

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Gorenography: visiting the Slave Pit, Inc.

2012/05/112015/02/08 Doktor Ross SewageLeave a comment

After being entranced for so many years by some of my favorite space mutants, it could be considered sacrilege to see the men behind the curtain. Ah, fuck it. I’d been on tour with these folks for some time. I’d smelled their poos and farts. There was no more disillusionment to be had. The day after our tour ended, we headed to Richmond, VA (not Antarctica) over to see the real headquarters of GWAR: the Slave Pit.

It was an unassuming enough building from the outside. It looked like an little old office or shop of some sort. Now, it is a little fucking shop of horrors full of gorenography!

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Gross Anatomy: Impaled poster

2012/02/172014/06/24 Doktor Ross Sewage3 Comments

What kismet… As Sean and I display our art all month at Eli’s Mile High Club, we were booked to play a show with Impaled at the same venue. Well, if I’m displaying a mess of gig posters I’ve printed, I’d be quite the fool to not make one for this show.

Like a letter from Iwo Jima… well, a really crass letter. I’ve been thinking about hacking away at the iconic photo of the flag raising at Iwo Jima for some time. This seemed a good opportunity to do it. I’m not 100% happy with this poster, because, as usual, I was rushed. Still, I think I managed to use a few interesting techniques during the process of drawing and printing it that it’s worth sharing.

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Booking the Dead 2: I’ve Been Framed

2012/02/102015/02/08 Doktor Ross SewageLeave a comment

To get ready for the group art show we’re having all February at Eli’s Mile High Club, I had to frame a grip of posters I’d done. There’s three ways to do this:
1. Take it into a place and have them framed by a wage slave. That has the benefit of making one feel like part of the elite that drives around in a Prius.
2. Look around salvage stores and just throw that shit into any frame that it kind of fits into. Now one is sticking it to those fucking elitists who drive around in a Prius.
3. Do it yourself.

I like art under glass. I like it with a nice, cut mat. I like it uniform. I like to have my cake and eat it as cheaply as fucking possible… aka a doughnut. Look how nice that poster looks framed properly. It doesn’t look anything like the poster that didn’t sell at all at the show, or that I was told I should be killed for having designed. Now, it’s not a mockery, it’s corpse-fucking ART. And it ain’t that hard to do it yourself.

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Booking the Dead art show: Hang ’em high

2012/02/032015/02/08 Doktor Ross Sewage2 Comments

Chris Oxford, an old friend and guitarist for Depressor, contacted me and Sean McGrath about doing an art show at a local bar. I’d wanted to do an art show with Sean for some time. What gallery would have our gorenography? Chris got the date together for a February art show at Eli’s Mile High Club and that was the kick in the pants we needed.

Eli’s Mile High Club has become a beacon for crusties, punks, and metal heads looking to get their drink on in North Oakland. They have a show space and a wall for displaying art. Last night we took all our framed pieces (and some unframed) to Eli’s. Amidst the din of barking dogs on ropes and metal from the DJ booth, we got to work.

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