omg! meet me where i am.

i love doing design work and photography for bands – mostly because i live and breathe music, but also because there’s a freedom from convention that you don’t always get when doing that kind of work for other clients.   the band that i have done the most work with over the past year and half is ryan paul and the ardent.  ryan and i were instant bff’s when we met – but when he first started asking me to maybe design some stuff for his band, it was a disaster.  i came up with a poster with no direction or input from him, and he thought it was too pretty.  too fancy.  or something.  he wanted it mucky, gritty, weird.  bits and pieces of things, randomness.  swirly.  chaotic.  i think he even said avant garde but i pretended he didn’t say that.    we talked through it more and i figured it out and we made a website and a whole lot of handbills, and he even did the old school thing of running copies of a 4-up at kinko’s and handing them out wherever he went.

i set up his website so that he could take more control of updating it on his own, and shortly after he started working on some of his own handbills and banner ads – timidly and jokingly at first, swearing he couldn’t do it and sending me this ridiculous thing:

but when i just made fun of him, he made this, which is awesome (photo by alexandra k):

this morning he sent me a link, with only a comment saying that his favorite part was at 2:35.  it’s a video on you tube, and it’s for one of my favorite songs on La Vita Nuova, the album he released with his band this last summer.  i asked if his roommate made it, because his roommate makes videos and stuff.  he said “i made it.  really. me.”  and i was so proud!  and impressed.  and i want to share the video, and ask you to to listen to this great song.  enjoy!