PLEASE NOTE: I do NOT have any extra copies of these posters! And I will ABSOLUTELY NOT give anyone a high-res file so they can print their own! Your best bet is eBay, but hardcore Weezer fans paid $500 (each!) for these posters, so you are probably not going to find them.
There's no way for me to know what the rest of my illustration career will hold, but I DO know that this year I got to draw the two coolest illustrations I will probably ever get to do. Yes, as the title of this post says, I got to draw two posters for my all-time favorite band,
WEEZER.
This summer,
I got to go backstage at a Weezer concert in Vermont, which was easily one of the coolest nights of my life (the above link is a 3,000 word summary of the show). After years of correspondence, I got to finally meet Karl Koch that night, who runs their website, documents and archives all kinds of information about the band, and in general, keeps the Weezer world turning.
Well, a few weeks after the show, I got an email from Karl, asking if I would like to design two posters for Weezer's upcoming "Memories" tour. The idea for the tour is that Weezer plays two nights in each city, and on the first night they play a bunch of hits and then close by playing the ENTIRE Blue Album from start to finish. Then the next night they do the same thing but play ALL of Pinkerton. So NOT ONLY did they want me to do some illustrations for my favorite band, but they wanted me to focus on my two favorite albums of theirs. This was a dream assignment, if ever there was one.
For the tour, Weezer is partnering with
I Love All Access to offer these amazing VIP packages, which (for $500 a ticket!) include a meet and greet with the band, front row seats and some exclusive merchandise, including my posters! Since most of you probably can't afford those rates, here are some .JPEGs for you to enjoy instead (click to make bigger).
The deadline for this project was pretty tight, so Karl suggested I start with some other illustrations I had been making for Weezer (more on that later!) and put them in a grid - one illustration for each song. If you don't know every word to every song on these albums, I'm afraid most of these will go over your head, but I was assuming that people who are paying $500 for a ticket will get the inside jokes!
Initially the posters were in full color, but then Karl suggested I limit the palette, which I did, based on the cover art of each album (I also carefully matched all of the lettering from both albums). Then as a last step, Karl showed the posters to Rivers for final approval. Rivers asked us to hide a secret message in the posters, which I did. Needless to say, it was SUPER cool to have his input!!!
For payment, I received some money, but MORE IMPORTANTLY, tickets to the New York stop of the Memories tour! Claire and I are heading down to the city on Thursday and this weekend we are going to ROCK OUT, old school Weezer style!
