x~ray vision

What Can X~Ray Do For You?

2010-08-03T04:42:00.000-07:00

If you're in a band or run a label, preferably making/releasing the kind of music I dig, examples include: Black Lips, Tuff Bananas, Boys Club, Busy Signals, The Flakes, Feelers, Black Time, Romance Novels etc etc. And you would like me to design a sleeve for you then get in touch. I opperate on a 'I design the sleeve, you supply me with copies of the finished record, and any other loot you think my work and talents are worth' rate. So it's FREE you jerks!!!! See below for the current crop of happy customers.

Holiday Snap Makes Blacktime Cover

2009-08-13T01:08:00.001-07:00

Telephone Explosion have put out this 12" split featuring the U.K's Blacktime and West Coast dooder Ty Segall. Sleeve wise the Blacktime side had the theme of a shit British holiday, which works in stark contrast to Ty's sun kissed surfer riding those crazy white horses. The photo I used is culled from my dad who took this snap of me and my brother, I'm the one wearing the anorak and flares. This was taken on the 11th April 1976, so there. Punk!

Sweet Music

2009-06-23T08:33:00.001-07:00

So you don't hear from a Wisconsinite for over a year then two come along at once, first the Gut Reactions, then The Sugar Stems! OK, I've got to admit that this is my fave piece of work I've done in a long while. Firstly I actually used a pencil to draw it, secondly it's FUN! Thirdly it's Jon E (ex Catholic Boys and all round power pal and tour buddy) and Drew (ex Leghounds!) And of course, last but not least, the band have been turned into a set of teeth that are having some serious fun, even with tooth decay. Great hooks abound in this fine release, available from Bachelor Records.

Gut Reactions~Bored

2009-05-19T14:31:00.001-07:00

Jake (formerly of The Surf Ninjas) has a new-ish band, The Gut Reactions, who are hoicking up some fine punk rock 'n' roll splurge. I kindly got asked to do the front. So I photographed a rubbery alien that I'd picked up at a car boot sale a couple of years back. I liked it because it has a giant brain, a brain filled with BOREDOM! Sleeve done, this will be out on the Bachelor Records label.

Nobunny's Oral Fixation 7"

2008-11-21T01:14:00.000-08:00

Nobunny is about to release a fur ball single for Douchemaster Records! Not heard it but Nobunny was specific in what he wanted regards the sleeve, it involved a mouth, braces, sucking a popsicle or lollipop. My bad drawing skills came to the fore here, which is fine because I only had a few hours to get this all done and dusted!

Teenage Rejects Sleeve Idea

2008-10-10T03:43:00.000-07:00

This concept dates back from early 2005 and I've just found it on an old USB memory stick, there was an idea mooted for an LP release of the Rejects unreleased and singles material. Would've been great if this happened, this idea was composed of photo's used from the band's Alien Snatch 7" sleeve, there was no official title for this and the band had long split and mutated into the mighty moronic Catholic Boys! Just thought I'd share this historical artefact with y'all!

Kids Party Gets Monster Crazy

2008-09-09T07:26:00.000-07:00

This was a nice fun job! My daughter hit the big three back in July, so what better way to celebrate than a pink monster party! I created four cardboard monsters, Godzilla, Wolfman and two one eyed pink people eaters. One of them had a wide open mouth so the kids could dip in and get some sweets. Who says you have to go down the Barbie/Disney route, get making stuff, make it fun, make it different. Your kids will think you're crazy but one day they might realise that Mum and Dad made that little bit of extra effort in creating something unique!

Caution Hangs

2008-08-08T06:27:00.000-07:00

Here's a pic of Black Time gang leader, Lemmy Caution, proudly displaying the limited edition (only one in existence) framed X~Ray Vision art print. Certainly brightens up the room.

Black Time Release Double Negative

2008-07-02T01:00:00.000-07:00

This is Black Time's third, yep third LP and their second on In The Red. X~R~V had the pleasure of working on the jacket with lots of input and prodding from the enigmatic Lemmy Caution.

I wouldn't necessarily call Double Negative an out and out concept album, but there is a lunar theme that seems to run through this. I've had the pleasure of immersing myself in this LP and I can state that this effort is by far thee best yet! There are moments of lucidity on the LP, this is then shattered by a caterwaul clank of a jarred lunar rhythm.

Late 60's/early 70's electronica sleeves were an inspiration in the creation of this design, especially groups such as White Noise and Silver Apples, heavy use of photocopiers and the Life Science book Man And Space also proved invaluable. Fonts were chosen and rejected. The 'star' background behind the moon was created by rolling ink onto acetate, then back lighting it and photographing it in a black box.

The back had to work in stark contrast to the calmness of the front. There is a ton of bumph, info and ramblings shoehorned onto the back, much in the vein of a lot of 60's LP's, that means you Loog Oldham!

From the left over bits of photocopied spacemen etc, I created the promo poster shown above.

The sleeve is two colour offset litho, print black and silver.
(Poster Artwork © X~Ray Vision. No reproduction without prior consent)

Hair! Blood!

2008-06-30T00:59:00.000-07:00

Another Hair release, another X~Ray sleeve. The title cut finds the boys in a melancholic mood, with lines about 'spilling blood in the wrong place...' The artwork ties in with the album look.

Print stats, four colour offset litho onto coated stock.

Blank Its Reject X~Ray's Vision

2008-03-14T02:15:00.000-07:00

After a couple of stabs at producing something for the upcoming Blank Its release on Sweet Rot Records X~Ray vision had to concede defeat as we just couldn't bring the ideas of the band to fruition.

The brief for this, as described by Justin from the band is thus:
"And if we could do some version of orange and green
and black with a little white. Or not. Maybe that
could be a color combo. We're pretty into making
'BLANK ITS' kind of big and seperating the two words
or making them seperate. Can't think of enough ideas
to keep people from thinking. About BLANKETS. Some
other ideas that we use alot are blocking out people's
eyes so they are unidentifiable. And then there's the
theme of the three of us.

Then there's the songs. 'Windows Are Dirty' is kind
pissy about how people are always trying to make you
get up and do stuff. I know I need to do stuff. I know
when I want to do it. Heaven forbid I do what I want
to do. When I do it. The title is a visual about
someone telling you to go outside, you know that you
should, but you don't wanna. So as they are telling
you, you're closing the blinds and (picture yourself)
as you're looking through the blinds you can see that
the window is thick with mildew (because you didn't
get up to clean them either) and you can't see outside
anyway. What's the point of closing the....

Anywho, 'Divorce' is about when you're a kid and your
parents are splitting apart. And they are kind of
kiddy. And everything is kind of a blur. All you see
is constant rage. All they see is hurt feelings. The
whole time you're wondering why you didn't see this
coming. Or maybe you did. Who knows? Now you're just
sitting in the back of the car.

That's about as much info as I can fill you in on and
on. Maybe the song topics could be used for a cover
idea. "

The more colourful sleeve was rejected on the grounds of being 'too goofy.'

Hey, you win some, you lose some.

Pink Reason hit Brit Shit Mag!

2008-01-30T07:41:00.000-08:00

The NME, Britain's lame music weekly, features an article on some bands that regular readers of Terminal Boredom and VOT will be familiar with! Click on image to get an enlarged view of the article!

Ho Distro Get New Logo!

2007-12-21T06:59:00.000-08:00

The UK is often starved and neglected when it comes to top quality, prime punk and rock 'n' roll platters. Fortunately for us residents of this fair isle, Ho Distro can plug the gap in this market. Ho Distro are there for all your quality audio indecency needs, so use 'em! Oh and they've taken up a new snazzy logo too! And one more thing they are good on price!

The Impulse Int'l Get Go!

2007-12-06T03:35:00.000-08:00

New Jersey power poppers, The Impulse Int'l, release double A dide on Derranged Records and housed in a suitable X~Ray sleeve to boot!

I thought I'd keep this sleeve quite simple, but I addded texture and offset colour craziness. I hand drew the girl and I liked the combination between the loose drawing and the use of band photo's. Thanks to Adam for hooking me up with the photo's.

The Hair Turning Japanese

2007-11-14T03:50:00.000-08:00

These Leeds based youngsters have gone and recorded a full length CD! X~Ray Vision worked closely with Neil Clark, the bands keyboard player, to create this photomotage. I pushed for a colour scheme that included a silver litho, this enhances the shiny, disco element of the music. I guess you could say The Hair are West Yorkshire's answer to The Rapture, what with funk filled bass lines, jerky guitar spits and the odd clonk of a cowbell.

This is a Japanese only release on the Kurofune Records label. More info can be found on the bands website.

The Japanese have gone all out on the marketing, with in store displays in Tower Records! I guess this is my most polished and fancy shmancy work to date!

Manhattan Love Suicides Whip Out 3"

2007-11-07T08:14:00.000-08:00

The MLS are busy at it again, this time releasing a three track 3" CD on the Cloudberry Records label, purveyors of the sound of jangly guitars and based in sunny Miami, Florida. Sounds lovely.

For this little project I enlisted the help of Kimberley Scott, she provided the initial illustration of the gun toting girl. I 'scuzzed' up the overall design with elements of ink rolled texture, comic book dots and the like.

Makeouts Get Singled Out

2007-10-02T04:40:00.000-07:00

Swedish punk trio The Makeouts are due to release their second seven inch platter on Radio Obligato records.

Featuring the songs 'Street Tonight' and 'Still Love You,' I was asked to produce a cover to fit in with a raw 50's/60's flavour, with a scuzzed up look. The couples I chose seem to fit with each song title. A heavy use of an old black and white copier helped make this look all messed up. Thanks Jakob for using X~Ray Vision.

Iekk! Sounds To Release Lover!

2007-10-02T00:47:00.000-07:00

Iekk! Sounds from Spain are about to put out this seven inch by Rich Crook's Lover! When I was contacted to work on this Mr Crook had a specific idea in mind for the sleeve, in his words "would you consider the artwork for one of the covers being a woman or small girl alone in the woods looking very scared with evil eyes in the bushes staring at her as if they want to kill her."

The black and white version will be for the limited edition single, the skull represents that something very nasty has happened in those deep, dark woods. Gulp!

Pretty scary stuff, I illustrated the background and gave it a moonlit glow, my friend Lucy Shaw provided illustrations of the gnarled leafless trees. The victorians provided the etchings. To date this is the most illustrated sleeve I've done and hopefully it has brought the nightmarish visions of Lover! to life!

Forbidden Tigers LP and CD Art

2007-10-01T08:17:00.000-07:00

So here's the latest sleeve to come out of the busy X~Ray workshop. This one came via Dead Beat Records. The cover was started by someone else and featured the band on a plain yellow background, Tom at Dead Beat thought it looked too plain, I agreed and decided that some photocopied and much enlarged Letraset electronic symbols would help 'magnetic' this up a bit.

From originaly just being approached to adjust the front, this project turned into full LP and CD jacket, along with labels and on body CD print. I kinda like the way this turned out. The band let me get on with it and me and Tom traded a ton of e-mails until we both got the result you see here now! The Buzzcocks proved an inspiration for the hand lettered type on the front!

You can find out more about the Grand Island, Nebraskan Forbidden Tigers here.

Demon's Claws/Coathangers Flyer

2007-09-05T02:55:00.000-07:00

This flyer was created for the upcoming tour of the Demons Claws and Atlanta's all girl punk rock group the Coathangers. This job was orchastrated through Robs House Records. Who will be soon releasing the Coathangers debut LP!
Check out their myspace page for tour details plus record release info, they've put out plenty o' good swag!

I wanted this flyer to look kind of scary, the screaming mouth comes c/o the movie Suspiria, Dario Argento's 1977 horror meistervürk! Other elements include a spooky looking forest ( a reference to the 'back woods' element to describe the music of the demon's claws.) Yikes!

Print spec for this will be black on either a bright yellow or pink stock.

Manitowoc's Surf Ninjas Are Go!

2007-08-02T00:54:00.000-07:00

New teen sensations, The Surf Ninjas, roll out their debut release on the Trickknee Productions label. Allthough this high school band have now split up, they've managed to scrape some recordings together thanks to none other than Brad X!

The brief for this sleeve was to create something colourfull that referenced all kindsa junk these kids dug. I kept getting e-mails from the singer, Jake, saying stuff like "...oh and Jim wants a robot on it." And "...Jared wants a rocket somewhere on the sleeve." And finaly "can you add a pizza on the sleeve somewhere." So this is the final result. Everything but the kitchen sink on this.

I think this will be due out in the next two to three months?!

The Hair Get X-Rayed!

2007-08-01T03:41:00.000-07:00

Here's a fun and quick little job for indie-dance-rock urchins The Hair. This project was a to supply a stencil for this limited release on the Louder Than Bombs records.
Each sleeve was hand sprayed by the band using various stencil designs. Two colours.

My contribution keys into the rave ethos, hand(s) aloft with an electric, pill induced charge shooting up the main vein! Yeah I'm talking nonsense. Find out more about the band here!

Manhattan Love Suicide Sleeve

2007-07-30T08:30:00.000-07:00

Just finished this sleeve for the MLS. Print spec for this is a metalic silver litho on white board. The main image of Ms Welch with firearm was supplied by the band. They wanted a messed up look.

For more info on the band you can check squirrel records who have put out numerous punk slop 'n' roll records. The majority of those sleeves are created by my fair hand.

Sweet Rot Records

2007-04-24T00:26:00.000-07:00

Yes! Another Catholic Boys sleeve, this time sans band pics. The 'boys didn't want their ugly mugs on this one, so instead I've opted for a nightmarish victorian collage. The title for this piece is 'The Brain Activity Monitoring Center.'

Print spec for this is single colour on an off white textured paper. Nice!
Sweet Rot Records are based in Vancouver and have released a couple of scorchers c/o The Pets and Cheap Time!

2007-02-08T00:54:00.000-08:00

Here's two more Catholic Boys sleeves, those Wisconsin weiner smokers have been very busy boys since splitting up!
You can find out more at their MySpace page, ain't got a clue how to link yet.
Both these releases will be out on the Trick Knee label, run by the enigmatic Todd Trickknee. On a technical note both these jobs are two colour only, and I've specified illuminous inks, that's if the printing budget allows.