Swing Low, Sweet Ventricule

Getting back into the swing of things. Taking risks with my sharpie. 

I've been wanting to put more in my posts in terms of writing. Rather than just presenting new drawings, I was thinking of writing short stories to accompany my drawings. As if I have the time. As if my posts aren't few and far between as it is. But I'll take the challenge, as long as it's a creative endeavour.

No accompanying story this time around. We'll see how terrible I am at writing when the next post comes along.

The Wheel in the Sky...

My band Luther Higgs is playing a show soon. We don't play as much as we used to, but we don't have any reason to play more than we do. I booked a show for Boston band InAeona's Montreal tour stop. We're playing with them along with sludge/post-metal Montrealers Rhino. Booking shows gives me an excuse to draw the poster. No doubt I'd post the finished product here, along with the "original," pre-photoshopped sketch. 

I figured, for an more experimental/ambient rock/metal line-up, I'd go for some kind of fractal-type, trippy design. Also somewhat influenced by looking head on at a turbofan engine. Well, not actually.

Come to the show. It will probably be the last of the year. See poster below for details.

Tree Maker

An old sketch I decided to ink. Getting back into the groove of this whole "drawing" business. Not doing as much as I want to. Now that I have something to procrastinate, I'll have something to draw.

This is not a deliberate environmental protest drawing. 

Squalor Bloody Squalor

Been up to a whole lot of nothing. Just this angry piece of nothingness, frustration, boredom, solitude, and insomnia. I should always doodle on un-lined paper - it would save me from too much photoshopping.

PAGAN!

This took way too long to do. And it still looks empty. I'll get back to it when I get some ideas.

Seven

Finally something to show for the complete and utter absence of any progress/activity from my band Luther Higgs. Below are the final artwork as well as the scribbles for the artwork for the 3 song demo we've just put out. Below is also the link to the bandcamp with a free download of it.

lutherhiggs.bandcamp.com

On the Road Again

Weekend-road-tripped with @BenCardilli to Kingston and Toronto. We stayed at friend's places and woke up hours (HOURS) before everyone else. Knowing full-well this might happen, I packed pens and paper. So I decided to learn how to draw. These are my memories.

Thanks to the kind-hearted friends who put us up (and put up with us). 

Dead Branch

My band Luther Higgs was contacted by Dead Ranch to play a show on their Montreal tour date, but they never confirmed. The only "confirmation" I got was seeing a Facebook event of this show created by the bar we're playing at (times like these...). The event photo was a blurry/motion picture of us, so I decided to take it upon myself to make a poster for it.

I'm not crazy about how the skull turned out, and I have no eye for making appealing posters. It is what it is.

Luther Higgs is playing with Winnipeg's Dead Ranch and Montreal's DevydeaD this Thursday @ Piranha Bar. It'll be heavy, me thinks. See poster/Facebook event for details below.

ABBAcadavre

There was something in the air that night...

Sycophantastic

 

Album art for Ben Cardilli's new EP Sycophantastic. A fun little project. My first foray into colouring. A rush job, but I am happy about how it turned out.

(Shameless Plug):
See it in all it's physical glory, free with a purchase of a $10 ticket for a Ben Cardilli Band performance. Sunday May 27th, 2012 @ Underworld, 9PM. Tickets available from the band members. We'll deliver.
facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/349723035087428

Use Your Illusion (number 2)

So, I'm not mature.

You know when you draw moustaches on people's faces on posters, or give celebrities makeup with a blue, red and black ball point pen? Or maybe you've heard about http://teenagemutantninjanoses.tumblr.com. Well my brother and I draw naked squatters shitting on cars, open fields, and people's heads. I drew this, framed it  and gave it to my brother for his birthday. He hasn't hung it up on his wall yet.

It's even better when we draw a little prairie dog peeking its head out.

Life Or Something Like it

In the midst of my not-so-happiness, I got the idea for this drawing and slowly hacked away at it. One of my only drawings that look complete. My eraser was used minimally, and I threw caution to the wind for this one, not caring too much about making lines straight or being consistent in the patterns. I also played with background colours, which I don't like in the least bit here, but I threw it on here anyways. I prefer black and white, though some kind of colour scheme would work well with this...

I do realize any words about my drawings are a bit sophomoric. I apologize for that.

Thanks for reading/looking.

The Mighty Owl

Sweet dreams.

Sketches of... (my sweetheart the drunk...)

The lack of March updates can ultimately be attributed to laziness. I am making it up by with this blog, full of non-sequitur doodles on crumpled looseleaf pages I had drawn this past month (or so). I'm listening to Meshuggah's new album Koloss as I write this - what's up with the over-compression in some of the songs?



"Catch 34"
What I thought would turn out to be an infinite tube became three tapeworm-like creatures oriented in such a way that it reminded me of Meshuggah's "Catch 33" album cover, hence the title. (Excuse the run-on.)



"Ernie fishing for the biggest catfish in Plaquemine County"
At the height of my desire to draw a catfish, I saw (coincidentally) the episode of "River Monsters" called "Killer Catfish." Incidentally, I had recently watched the Sesame Street sketch where Bert and Ernie go fishing.



"Clique"
This is pretty self-explanatory. Excuse the typo.



"Cookie"
What can I say? The dude loves cookies.



"Grover attains enlightenment; Oscar looks on"
Grover does yoga, but you'd never know it. The sign of a true enlightened one.



"kooKIeSS"
Card-carrying member of the KISS Army.



"Hair & He-Man"
Practicing hair-drawing. On the left, the back of a girl's head in class. On the right, well, He-Man.

Wet Ink

 

Skin & Bones

Wet ink...

I've been into drawing teeth and the human skeleton as of late. Here's a drawing consisting of both.
It took me a great deal of courage-building to trace over the original pencil sketch with a sharpie for fear of ruining it. You can see the shakiness of my hand, but I think it turned out okay.

I have a few drawings backlogged and waiting to be finished, then inked. Here's to procrastinating doing schoolwork.

Staff Head

Here's a random drawing. Reminiscent of the Tenacious D's Pick of Destiny, or perhaps the head of Skeletor's staff.

If I may toot my own horn (no pun intended) for a moment, I would like to draw (no pun intended) your attention to the detail (second picture). I am quite pleased (... impressed) with the texture and effect to which I gave the underside of the horns. I am very new at this whole drawing thing, (or, to use a pro-wrestling term, "green"), so please forgive my unwarranted conceit.

My Heart is in Your Hands

I made a quick sketch of this in the margins of my notes to keep me from dozing off in class.  My friend looked at it, turned to me and said "I hope you don't kill anyone."

I have been meaning to colour in the "shading"/"shadows" (whatever you want to call it) but never got around to doing it. I had moved on to other things.

This is my first heart I've drawn. I think it's pretty decent for a first attempt. I should experiment with heart-drawing more.

Pot Pourri

As you may notice by some of my doodles, I am terrible with proportions and symmetry. I have a shaky drawing hand. I take way more time on drawings than they should actually take. But, I like doing it.

Also, I don't know how to finish pictures. Bear with me.

Rough Sketches

The tentacles were drawn in October 2011. I find myself drawing tentacles often for some odd reason. This weird attraction to drawing tentacles can also be found in the album art I created for the Luther Higgs' "Monologue" EP. I kind of wish I had put more effort into the album cover. I admit it is a little weak but we were desperate to get the EP out at the time.

The skull was drawn on October 13th, 2011 during Ashtray Heart's set at Katacombes. I have never been successful at drawing a skull with attitude. This is another attempt. I supposed it was partly inspired by the atmosphere of the venue and the music. It seems I was going for a modified Bret "The Hitman"Hart logo.

New Beginnings...

The idea of starting a blog to house my "art," for a lack of a better term, - be it drawings, poetry, music, whatever - has been lingering in the back of my head for sometime.   My chosen academic path and poor time management skills have left me little time to cultivate my creative side.  And so by starting this blog, it is my hope that I will devote more of my time to this end.

I have no formal background or training in art or music, which is apparent in the clumsiness in my various projects.  Many of my drawings arise from doodles drawn out of the sheer boredom of sitting through lectures in school. Many of the drawings I will be posting here may very well be those doodles.  Some are inspired by half-conscious visions in the moments before falling asleep.  Most are just rip offs from real artists.

I will try to post new drawings, random songs I've recorded etc. as frequently as possible and not let this blog fall by the wayside.

Thanks for checking this out.

Chris