SWAMP MUSIC

A piece for the new Oxford American Music Issue. Cleveland Crochet and the Hill-Billy Ramblers. 50's era cajun garage-billy rock and roll. Real swamp music. At first, I was trying to get these guys all in the jaws of a giant croc, but then I thought it would be great to have a band on a Croc/Swamp tour boat. Thanks to Oskar for picking out the orange.
These guys have like two songs but  Sugar Bee was a major regional hit and even cracked the Billboard top 100.

As usual for these kind of assignments, except for some weirdo-obsessive music blogs there are hardly any photographs or other evidence these guys existed. These are the two reference photos I had to work with.

Early promo shot of the band.

The bandleader, Cleveland Crochet.

I'm honestly not usually a fan of Cajun or Zydeco music, the insistent oompah beat grates on me after a while. But this early stuff when rock and country and R & B were a little less defined is very interesting. Think a white Little Richard backed with a lap steel, fiddle and an accordion and you got yourself some Hill Billy Rambling jam.

IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE ONE

New album cover I finished last month for Cultures of Soul. This is an amazing underground, Atlanta disco record by Tommy Stewart. Can't wait to get my copy of this on wax.

I've done a few covers for these guys now and funnily enough a pattern is starting to emerge, last time it was Ancient Astronauts, this time the book of Genesis re-thought, lots of interesting myths and theories with a disco back beat.

Here are the labels I designed for this 2 record set.

I will be doing a giveaway or two when these couple records come out, so stay tuned. And apologies to people who won posters on the last giveaway, they are finally going out this week. Promise!

ANCIENT ASTRONAUTS

I've been on the road a bit lately with the PA One Book tour and I'm posting most of those adventures over at the Stop Snoring, Bernard! blog. But I did manage to make this album cover for Cultures of Soul Records that will be out soon.

It's a collection of some left field underground Boston based disco from Evan's Pyramid.

Andre Evans is basically the man behind the group and he is interested in Ancient Astronauts theory. Which is pretty interesting stuff, you can read more of it on Wikipedia here.

If you like your disco underground, dirt and cosmic you will dig this comp. When I get a couple copies on wax I will be giving one away so stay tuned.

LOVE-A-RAMA

This is a piece for Oxford American Magazine. Leon Bass is a Rockabilly performer who had a couple hits in the 60's and is from Alabama. He stopped performing in the 70's and worked a factory job.
In the late 90's producers from Hollywood contacted him about using one of his songs in a movie and with the renewed interest in his work, he began to perform again.
This is one of his more famous tunes.