Do your parties always fail?

Try putting Grouplove on at the next one. It’ll help.

Also, you may need new friends and/or personality.

PS. Never Trust a Happy Song album art is by Grouplove singer Hannah Hooper.

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Illustration by Troy DeShano

This year new music sharing will alternate with music-based illustration.

My 9-yr-old daughter has really been into The Beatles lately, and on the rare occasion that she takes a break from The Muppets soundtrack you’ll hear the Fab Four ringing from her iPod.

I thought it was pretty cool the other day when she had a friend sleepover and I could hear “Love Me Do” coming from her room and wondered how many sleepovers over the past 50 years have had that song in the background.

So in honor of her and her always classy tastes, here’s the first in what will hopefully be many Beatles-inspired illustrations from our house.

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Which is nice.

The subtle newness can be attributed on some level by the fact that it was produced  by Bon Iver and…

I suppose I don’t need to write anything else. She’s awesome.

Also. My giddiness hearing this new album was coming was cranked up a big notch when I saw the totally rad great lakes album art by Darren Booth!

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Totally obsessed with Delay Trees right now.

Kind of like Sigur Ros only more accessible (the songs are much shorter for one thing) and it is catchy and upbeat (but not too upbeat) and has these little wonderful moments of really intense energy.

I feel like I could recommend this to just about anybody.

While I’m wondering how some kid from Helsinki can write songs about everyday things, love, life and the apocalypse in a way that a kid from Michigan can appreciate, I noticed the band bio on their website:

In his early twenties, Rami started to write songs about the growing pressures of adulthood, unemployment, ending friendships and the long Finnish winters.

Ok.. That makes sense then…

Which makes me wonder… is art style, genre, medium or even tempo determined on some level by personal experiences? Even if Rami and I live on opposite ends of the Earth, but have long winters in common are we more likely to create things to which one another can relate? or feel inspired by or connected to?

Or just enjoy?

So many great things about this record. I love the opening to my favorite song on the record – the apocalyptic “Summer 2012″ — speak to me in tongues or through fire alarms.

That’s a winner right there.

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Rather than publishing my annual boring list of music that I like and think everyone else should (but probably doesn’t), this year I’ve just set up a Spotify playlist of my favorite albums from 2011. So you can just listen & decide for yourself.

A few times I’ve caught myself saying how 2010 was such a huge amazing year for new music and this year had a few gems, but nothing life-changing. (a justifiable statement considering 2010 provided classics from Sufjan, Arcade Fire and a Kanye West opus)

Maybe I was distracted by the fact that my by-far favorite album to listen to this year actually was released late December 2010.

But as I was throwing this playlist together I’m realizing I was wrong. (see list below for obvious reasons why)

In fact, even in the past couple weeks I’ve discovered new stuff that I didn’t even know existed that is totally making me double-take.

So spend your afternoon listening and let me know what you dig.

PLUS: There’s so much great stuff out there… check out other lists like IGIF and NPR

So listen along and enjoy some great tunes and let me know if you’ve been obsessed with that I missed! (i.e. The Antlers, Atlas Sound, Caveman, Wilco?)

Strong Odors: Favorite Albums 2011

• M83: Hurry Up We’re Dreaming
• Radiohead: The King of Limbs
• St. Vincent: Stronge Mercy
• The Joy Formidable: The Big Roar
• Feist: Metals
• tUnE-yArDs: W H O K I L L
• Wye Oak: civilian
• Beastie Boys: Hot Sauce Committee Part Two
• Jay-Z + Kanye West: Watch the Throne
• Cymbals Eat Guitars: Lenses Alien
• Raphael Saadiq: Stone Rollin’
• J Mascis: Several Shades of Why
• Ringo Deathstarr: Colour Trip
• R.E.M.: Collapse Into Now
• The Roots: Undun
• Delay Trees: Delay Trees (Totally obsessed right now)
• Fleet Foxes: Helplessness Blues
• Bon Iver: Bon Iver

Strong Odors on Spotify

Strong Odors: Music-inspired Art Prints

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Design by Jim LePage

Abaout a year ago I interviewed and featured Jim LePage and his Word Designs project – his unique and modern illustrated poster series of the 66 books of the Bible. Since then we’ve become pretty great friends (what’s the “guy love” equivalent of online dating?)

Today he posted the very last of his series of 91 total prints.

Revelation

Please take time to see the entire series on his site and if you do not own one of these for your home (or the entire set for your church) then today is a great day to remedy that problem. Check the Revelation post to see how to take advantage of a sale going on right now – or how to win a free print of your own.

Proud of you Jim for sticking to it man.

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Glitschka Studios logo by Von Glitschka

At first glace Von Glitchka’s work might not seem so special… but (though this is a bit hard to explain) that is exactly what makes him such a master. Great design should after all, be “invisible.”

Over the past 8-9 years thanks to the courage and generosity required for him to share his wisdom with the rest of us he has become the ultimate resource and hero of vector designers everywhere.

Where he most amazes me personally (besides the sheer volume of work he manages to accomplish) is his logo design in particular.

Designing a good logo seems to be one of those design projects that laymen consider must be the easiest. I mean, look at the most recognizable marks out there — Target, GM, Chevrolet, IBM, Apple, Etc — all you need is a circle or a couple initials and you’re gold, right?

So small (or sometimes big) businesses everywhere recruit their design-school cousins or craigslist trolls to create a quick “logo.”

But you have to wonder, if it is so easy, why to most businesses have identities that look awful?

Because dude. It’s not easy. It’s one of the most difficult processes in the design world.

I’ve worked across a variety of creative mediums – motion graphics, film, advertising, illustration, corporate, print, publishing and even fine art – and I’d take any one of those categories well before “logo design” if I ever end up on graphic design Jeopardy.

So Von’s been published all over the place, manages like 10 websites, has written a handful of books (cannonized in the design community) and garnished a pile of awards for illustration and design… all that pales in comparison (as far as I’m concerned) that he can take a call today from one company among a million others just like it and create a single, timeless yet totally unique mark just for them.

And then do it again tomorrow.

Amazing.

Oh yeah, he’s a pretty dang cool guy too. Follow him on Twitter.

Tell us one of your favorite odors.

Vanilla bean scraped from the pod.

What is it about that particular smell?

It’s fresh, clean and completely unadulterated in it’s natural form.

What experience makes you feel alive?

Traveling and experiencing new cultures and environments.

What fears do you have?

Corporations that control and produce the software I use to create my art will become less flexible in allowing the user to control how they choose to work and instead insist that the user work the way they prefer you to work.

Other than that I try not to fear stuff. If something starts to wig me out I just give it to God and ask for Him to give me peace about it. Life is too short to let fear reign.

What have you learned about yourself over the past year?

We can’t depend on any form of authority or government to facilitate our livelihood, or sustain our happiness, or equip our potential. It’s on us, you have to motivate yourself and grow, learn, fail, and succeed. Can’t blame anyone else, you have to take responsibility for your own actions and inaction. I think leadership at all levels could learn from that too.

Are you working on anything cool right now?

I’m developing some branding for a new beer and distillery so that will be a lot of fun moving forward too as we do labels, bottles, packaging etc.

Do you find your creative work a spiritual experience? In what way?

My faith shapes my world view and my world view tends to influence my thinking and thus my design in various ways.

What tunes have you been hooked on lately?

I’ve been listening to a lot of 80′s hits lately. Stuff I use to listen too in art school. Huey Lewis and the News, Journey etc. I really like crooners too though like Frank Sinatra so I listen to those a lot too.

[NOTE: Check out (one of my favorite 90s girls) Petra Haden's a capella "Don't Stop Believin'" cover in the Strong Odors Spotify playlist.]

WIN!! Your very own copy of Von Gitschka’s Flourish.Banner.Frame

Von Glitschka has graciously offered up a copy of his book Flourish.Banner.Frame and you could win it!

This amazing resource contains 600 vector ornaments on DVD along with several real-life inspirational examples of use by top designers.

[UPDATE: Congratulations to Minneapolis designer Brandon Harrison for winning the giveaway!]

More Von Glitchka

Glitchka Studios on Facebook

@Vonster on Twitter

Von Glitschka on Google+

 vonglitschka.com

drawsigner.com

illustrationclass.com

and be sure to snag this Glitschka poster to benefit non-profit organization Charity:Water

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Sometime last year I had just a hint of an idea that involved taking my designs and photographing them to give it a little dimensional feel. I think the idea came when I was maxing out my photoshop skills to make client photos respectable for their print pieces. I come up with about a dozen new ideas each day though, so this one like most others came and went and was buried in my mental rolltop where all the clutter is stored.

Around that same time Ward Jenkins posted a few photos on Facebook of one of his favorite artists – Tom Allen.

I got pretty dang excited right off the bat, because Tom had already been doing something similar to that one particular vision for years now… only better.

At first glance Tom’s work—cutting up and photographing old paperbacks and pulp fiction—seems like one of those mediums we creative types discover and follow immediately with a forehead-slapping “why didn’t I do that??”

But when you really take the time to see what he does exactly.. you realize that you’re not really upset he beat you to the idea, but rather incredibly stoked because he does it so well any of the rest of our attempts to do the same would have seemed a parody in comparison.

When I then discovered Tom is a fellow Michigander I got especially excited though. I absolutely flip whenever I find other individuals in Michigan doing incredibly creative things because I believe that this is the spirit that’s going to bring Michigan up out of the ashes.

What I love most about Tom’s work isn’t that it’s just so lovely and the images he uses are so wonderfully kitschy, but rather the fact that he’s using source material that is so utterly common and familiar.

How many times have I walked past the stack of 10¢ paperbacks at my local library or huge hoards of them at estate sales and never even batted an eye? Yet somehow Tom saw the beauty in these vintage illustrations and had the creative vision to bring them back to life.

It’s the very thing that we hope is about to happen in our Great Lakes State.

Tell us one of your favorite odors.

Lilacs

What is it about that particular smell?

The slightest whiff catapults me back to my childhood. Why? I’m not sure. Perhaps it’s because my mom would always cut and place huge bouquets of them in the house.

Other favorites: School paste, A&D Ointment, the original scent of Jergen’s lotion and balsam needles. Yeah, I’m a freak!

My least favorite smell: roses
My grandma died when I was 10 and that smell reminds me of the three days I spent in the funeral home. One sniff and I become depressed immediately.

What experience makes you feel alive?

Backpacking. I trekked 31 miles across Isle Royale with a friend a few years ago and felt free and unshackled from the rigors and stress of daily life.

What fears do you have?

Having my career tank. That and open water at night.

What have you learned about yourself over the past year?

That as much as I enjoy helping people out when they ask, that I am just one person and can only do so much. That said, I’ve learned that saying, “No” isn’t a bad thing.

Are you working on anything cool right now?

A 16-print commission for a hospital (that’s all I can say right now) and widgets for a major website launch (again, I have to be tightlipped). I’m also teaching a one-week photography workshop at Penland School of Crafts (NC) the first week in November. This will be my 5th time there. It’s a place of pure magic.

Do you find your creative work a spiritual experience? In what way?

No. However, it does give me free license to make personal commentary about perceived stereotypes while injecting humor at the same time.

I’m a lover of myth and I’ve found, over the years, that I revisit the story of Sirens again-and-again. It’s the whole notion being rendered weak in the presence of beautiful sound that fascinates me.

What tunes have you been hooked on lately?

Hmmm. That’s tough-especially since I just signed on to Spotify. Now everything is at my fingertips-literally: type in an artist and listen.

However, I will say that I usually turn to more melancholy music in the fall. I’ve been listening to Cocteau Twins quite a bit along with This Mortal Coil. My favorite track, hands down, is from IT’LL END IN TEARS — a cover of Tim Buckley’s SONG TO THE SIREN. Elizabeth Fraser (Cocteau Twins) has the most enchanting voice. She is my siren.

Lisa Gerrard and Explosions in the Sky are also in heavy rotation.

More Thomas Allen

Become Tom’s friend on Facebook. (but only if you enjoy a regular dose of cynicism re: Michigan’s sorry government leaders)

Visit his website

Thomas Allen at the G. Gibson Gallery and Foley Gallery

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Both lyrically & sonically reminiscent of early Smashing Pumpkins (only without Billy Corgan’s voice) — Cymbals Eat Guitars manage to channel a number of different but familiar sounds while somehow maintaining their very own.

I love how they get creative with rhythms without falling into “experimental” category and have the guts to tread dangerously close to the “emo” cliff without falling into that dark, sad abyss.

Pretty much anything actually contemporary that sounds like 1991 I’m going to be freak out about.

I can totally see myself cranking this all day and then crashing on the couch for some Twin Peaks.

Oh wait. That’s what I’ve done every day this week…

I even learned something from Lenses Alien – I’d never heard of the Tunguska explosion. Pretty interesting stuff. Subscribe to the Strong Odors playlist on Spotify to listen along with me.

Another Tunguska

I emerged as if through a narrowed eye
into lashes of white sun from your apartment
and pollen clouds held absent sound
in gutted buildings we pray bridges and causeways
curl fast again like slap bracelets
and the skyline resets to a bare, hushed wilderness

I worship the day of the invisible wave
then a stream of revenants surged outward
like prominences from the sun
1927 an explosion
another Tunguska

and at once I was flat on my back
my skateboard rolled on down the hill
the congregating deer stood stock still
in the corridor of manicured lawns

remember you and I would get so high
we’d pass out with our shoes on
first light through leaves

this was back when my smoke would juke
and stutter in the highway crossbreeze

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