Wherever I may go with this whole tattooing thing, I owe any and all success to Sue at East River Tattoo for taking me in and apprenticing me. She’s become one of my absolute favorite people in this world and has taught me pretty much everything i know about tattooing. so, thank you Sue.

With that being said, I’ve just been hired at Lucky Wolf Tattoo in bushwick, and I’m absolutely, absolutely thrilled to be working right now. its been a really rough year in general, and I’ve pretty much done nothin’ but work, work more, and then not sleep and work even more, but its really exciting to see it finally paying off.

Homage to Jean Toutin part II

9×12″ princeton liner brushes on Arches watercolor paper. liner brushes are a whooooole new process, but its a pretty necessary skill. this is a remake of Jean Toutin’s 17th century blackwork print done as a painting.

Six Pack Hustle

quick commission for a friend of mine for an upcoming race. still looking for a beer sponsor. get in touch if you’ve got any leads! danbones@danbones.com

new piece i’ve been working on for …quite a while now. i’m really happy with the end result though. i’m pitching this as the cover artwork for the Revolta/Concussion split 7″ that’s currently in the works.

the image is initially based of of my own irrational fears; amputation and wasps. from there, it deals with the sting of disloyalty and subsequently being rendered useless (armless). if i may be so candid, a lotta people that are very important to me have been royally screwing me over lately. so i draw stuff about it. enjoy.

also, Concussion’s “Dried Blood” EP is off getting mastered right now, but we’ve posted the mixed tracks up online at http://myspace.com/concussionbk. give it a listen ‘n come see us rock out ‘n stuff.

this was the first time i’ve done a piece like this and only used one piece of paper instead of 50 sheets of tracing paper or graph paper. usually i’ll just composite everything in photoshop, but i just sorta went for it here. i borrowed pretty heavily from Durer, Gorey, and pretty blatantly reused imagery from a piece i did last year, but i think i finally made something in this style i’ve been going for that isn’t too cartoony.

also, there’s a piece that goes with this i wanna have done this week, and hopefully both are gonna be used as album artwork for the EP my band Concussion just recorded.

I started this piece while we were up in Mass. recording at Dead Air Studios and the image came together pretty organically with the music. I’m really pleased with how it came out in general, but overall i’m just really happy to be drawing again.

More on recording later!

my tattoo work is comin’ along. thanks so much to my friends for being so supportive! hopefully i’ll have more to post soon. In the meantime, my band Concussion is playing at Union Pool Feb. 20th with Misery Index, Magrudergrind and our friends Mutant Supremacy, playing at Europa on the 23rd with Acrassicauda, and then recording in March at Dead Air Studios in MA. rock ‘n roll ‘n stuff.

Well, its been a little over a year since, and I have my full rig set up and I’ve been steadily working on grapefruit, pigskin, and willing friends alike, as well as moonlighting as shop assistant at my friend Nate’s new tattoo shop, Thicker Than Water.

I can’t say i’m any closer to being the actual adult i aspire to be, but damn it, I’m gonna be a tattoo artist one of these days. Here’s what I’ve gotten done in the past few weeks. Click the pictures for larger images.

this ain’t the first time, neither. what am i gonna do with you, blog? how do i explain what i been up to? let’s start from the top:

i’m now in two bands and easily spend half my week playing music, I got hired as an animator for a small project in May for Ride5 Media group in Hoboken, NJ, and have since completed my first professional animation project for “The Edge with Jake Sasseville”, i got the HELL out of new york and went to Berlin and Prague for a week, i started getting into block printing and have since pulled some sweet looking prints, and about fiiiive hundred other things that are keeping me as busy as ever.

i’ll start with music, that’s easiest.

Haunted Castle has been playing shows like nuts. we’re getting louder, angrier, better at playing our instruments, and finally coming into our own as a legit thrash band.

i’ll elaborate on everything else later. I’ve been drawing every day still, and i have some rad stuff in the works for the future. sorry i ain’t been updatin’ you, blog. but you’ll live. more fun stuff to come.

-bones

Haunted Castle is playing a Burlesque Show.

We played a house party with Japanther.

And we’ve got new artwork in progress.

In other news, I got a postcard in the mail from Dave Kloc, who is an amazing illustrator in LA. He and I are doing an art trade, and this is what i got from him.

I’d post up my end of the bargain, but I’m a terrible person and haven’t mailed it yet. it came out pretty rad though. Hopefully its worth the wait.

Also, I’m an animator now! I’ve been hired by a company called Ride5 Media in Hoboken to be their animator on a project they’ve got in the works. I started last week, and I’ve been doing a ton of character design and workin’ fairly furiously over in NJ. They’re treating me super well, and I should have some awesome work to add to my demo reel down the road…

So, I’ve got a few commissions i desperately need to finish up in the near future, new artwork i’ve been crankin’ out pretty regularly I’ll post soon, new Haunted Castle shows in the near future, and I’m goin’ to Berlin in June! I’m goin’ to visit my friend Kat for a week, draw a ton of stuff, drink a ton of beer and I’m even gonna Czech out Prague while i’m there. …sorry.
Kat rules, and I’m pretty thrilled to get the helllll outta new york for a hot minute.

ok. more soon.