Whose creative work do you really admire?
Off the top of my head, I’ll say Chris Ware. He’s a cartoonist, graphic novelist, writer, genius … I’ve been a fan of his since he first started. Watching him reinvent the genre in real time as I was following his career was pretty exciting. His style is so distinct. I mean, even his commercial work is impossible to mistake for anyone else’s.
When I was starting to be a fan of his, I was stuck in an advertising job. Your typical soul-crushing-corporate-drone-type situation. I got inspired by what he was doing. I’m sure that was part of what drove me to branch out and start doing rock posters.
Your illustrative style has inspired a lot of designers. Where are you on imitation as a form of flattery?
It’s a good question. I mostly hear that from other people, rather than recognize it myself. It might be a personal blind spot.
The thing is, you want to inspire people with the work you do. Have you heard of Methane Studios? When I saw their work, I said, “I want to do that.” When I started out, I was super-careful to look at Methane and try to catch myself. I love them so much, but our styles were so similar, and I was paranoid people would say, “Oh, he’s just ripping those guys off.”
But I think you’re right. As I transitioned out of doing a lot of poster work, I started to notice more stuff that looked similar to mine. It’s part of the reason why I got out of doing them, because the competition had gotten fierce. There are tons of people doing posters now, versus even 10-15 years ago. It was easier then to get jobs and sell posters.
What’s an artistic medium you haven’t worked in much, but you’d like to?
I’d like to write more. Previously, whenever I had ambitions to do any book-related work, I always figured I was just going to be the illustrator and this was going to be somebody else’s work. More of a team effort kind of thing.
When I started working on the Dragon Brush storybook app with Small Planet, the experience opened my eyes. Like, “Wait a second, the writing portion of this is actually hugely fun and fulfilling on its own.”
The children’s book I released a couple months ago reinforced that. I look forward to the writing process now, as opposed to before, when I thought it wasn’t even something I could do.
What inspired you to write and illustrate Does Frankenstein Get Hungry?
There was a series on Showtime called Penny Dreadful. It was a post-modern take on the classic Universal monster stories with Dracula, Frankenstein, the werewolf, etc. Game of Thrones had become a huge hit, so studios were flooding cable TV with a lot of violence, boobs, and epic storylines.
Anyway, in Penny Dreadful, Frankenstein has a job. He goes to work at a wax museum or something. It wasn’t a terrible show, but it could get silly. You’re watching vampires and mummies going around town terrifying people, then all of a sudden they’re getting up in the morning to go to work.
So, I thought, “Hold on, would Frankenstein need to eat?” Where does that end? How far can you take a storyline in making Frankenstein a regular guy?
What’s a favorite wall decoration in your home?
One of my favorite things is a framed Mad Magazine from April 1974. It’s just a blue background, the yellow Mad Magazine logo, and then the only thing on the cover is a middle finger. And it says, “The World’s Number One Ecch Magazine.” E-C-C-H spelled out like a disgusted sound.
It embodies the whole publication. If you were trying to tell aliens what Mad Magazine was all about, all you’d have to do is show them that cover.
If you could choose one comic book character to reboot, who would it be?
Mike Mignola’s Hellboy is one of my favorite characters of all time. Hellboy reached the end of its story in a very natural way, but I would love it if he went back and started the whole thing over with fresh eyes.
That kind of thing happens constantly with the mainstream characters. Big publishers do it to excess, unfortunately, tearing down the mythology of Superman or Spider-Man and immediately rebuilding it.
I enjoy reading and looking at Mignola’s artwork so much. He’s right up there with Chris Ware as far as doing stuff with the medium that just wasn’t done before.
What are you listening to right now?
Let me see what’s playing on Spotify … oh, The Idles. They’re sort of a raunchy – wait, I don’t want to say raunchy – they’re really just a bunch of hairy dudes. Their songs are almost embarrassingly earnest, but exactly the kind of stuff I want to listen to right now.
One I’ve been listening to a lot is called Danny Nedelko. It’s sort of a pro-immigration song from a UK perspective. The video is amazing. It’s this guy running around London posing with different immigrants and hugging people. As I said, very earnest! But the video combined with the song … it’s awesome. I’ve probably watched it a couple dozen times just to lift my spirits.
How did you fall in with The National?
I went to the University of Cincinnati, and there was one of those typical semi-decent restaurants right off campus. When your parents come to visit? This is the place you take them to for breakfast.
I started there as a dishwasher, then became a cook. I went into the dish room one day, and there was a guy back there just completely out-of-his-mind busy. I stopped to help him because I knew what that was like. The guy was Matt Berninger (lead singer of The National). We kept in touch through the years. Yeah, he’s probably one of my oldest and bestest friends.
What’s it like doing live readings of your book?
I’ve been doing readings at various bookstores in Brooklyn and Manhattan, and it’s the first time I’ve had live feedback to my work. Reading out loud to people really shows you the truth about what you’ve made. I can see which pages get laughs, which don’t. Reading it by yourself is a completely different experience.
When I got my advance copy of Does Frankenstein Get Hungry? in the mail, I couldn’t even look at it. I didn’t look at it for a month, because after I’m done working on something for so long, I need to get away from it. All I can see are the flaws, know what I mean?
Doing these readings made me fall in love with it again. I thought, “Shit, this is actually good and people like it!” It’s a kind of validation that you didn’t waste your year on something that’s crap.
