My friends in the band Swingset Showdown recently funded their debut album “Short Bus Ruckus” with Kickstarter, and hooked up with me to do the album art. These are the cats who made my theme song, so how could I refuse?
Swingset Showdown’s stuff is boisterous, tongue-in-cheek music that has more intricacy than it should, considering its juvenile nature. I wanted to capture that, so a major inspiration came from Jack Davis. His album covers had an overstimulating, to0-much-going-on quality to them that made their entertainment value last beyond the first glance.
Another concept I love for this sorta thing is doing flat compositions, where you’re almost looking at the scene like it’s a trompe l’oeil. Rockwell did this a bunch. The nice thing is that, since you commit to a flat perspective, you can focus on the silhouette and flow of a picture rather than whether your perspective math is correct.
After several such roadside scenes were used to make the album art, I turned them into a long landscape, and used that to make a polar panorama.
And then when you pull the CD back… (Explosion made in Blender, because I have no soul.)
I had a lot of fun working with them, and the album turned out great. Come see them get down at their CD release party on Saturday, Dec. 15th at the High Dive!
P.S. No Seabug in January, as I’ll be on baby hiatus.
P.P.S Jack Davis & Norman Rockwell copyright blah blah blah.