00:00 - AJ (Guest)
How's that that is?
00:01 - Aaron (Host)
fucking perfect.
00:03 - AJ (Guest)
Awesome. I'm not the best at this Zoom stuff, so bear with me here.
00:08 - Aaron (Host)
AJ, you look fucking crystal clear. You sound great.
00:13 - Mel (Host)
Yeah, and you have a cool background.
00:14 - Aaron (Host)
You are good, excellent.
00:15 - AJ (Guest)
I was going to ask should I blur it? I got a lot of crap going on here in the studio. We do too.
00:21 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, us too. I'm Aaron AJ.
00:27 - AJ (Guest)
I'm Aaron as well, aaron so yeah, aaron, john, I am not an aaron, I'm mel uh nice nice to meet you good, do you ever go by aaron, or always aj? You know it's really funny. Uh uh. Half of the time I go by aaron, of the time I go by Aaron, half of the time I go by AJ, and it kind of tells me whether you knew me before the posters or not.
00:50 - Mel (Host)
OK, that makes sense yeah.
00:52 - AJ (Guest)
So somehow, when the poster thing started, I switched to AJ, for whatever reason, I can't even tell you why. And yeah, it's all my old friends and family and whatnot it's. It's pretty much strictly Aaron, but poster folks, aj Got it.
01:10 - Mel (Host)
Well, can you talk about when that started, about how long ago that was?
01:14 - AJ (Guest)
Oh, I can give you the whole history. Please do.
01:17 - Aaron (Host)
That's why we want you on Okay cool and the long version if you will.
01:22 - AJ (Guest)
Sure, sure, happy to. I mean, it goes all the way back to seeing the Grateful Dead for the first time in 1992. I was a huge Deadhead, went to art school in 93, spent my entire freshman year going to see as many Dead shows as I possibly could, to the point where my parents almost ripped me out of art school because of it. And, yeah, things went on and started going to fish shows and my wife is a huge fish fan and I can well let me reverse.
01:58
I was a printmaking major in art school, so I was very familiar with the printmaking process and and, but more on the fine art side of things like the galleries and that kind of thing, um, it was going to see fish in albany in 1999 that I walked up to the merch table and saw jim pollock print and was like, oh my god, that's like a real linoleum block print. I was very familiar with linoleum block prints, okay, and that's when it like clicked, oh my god, maybe I can combine these two things and actually like do something with it. At the time I was just trying to get to the next show, you know. So, as we all do, yeah, I, I started making lot art and was going around fish shows selling stuff in parking lots, and one thing kind of led to another Is that is that stuff still floating around out there.
02:53
What's that? The old lot?
02:55 - Aaron (Host)
stuff.
02:56 - AJ (Guest)
Oh sure Sure.
02:57 - Aaron (Host)
It's out there.
02:58 - Mel (Host)
Yeah, to see some of that stuff, you know how do you get into the linoleum, like that seems so specific, like how?
03:07 - AJ (Guest)
Yeah, so, like I said, I was a printmaking major in art school. This was back in the mid 90s or so and I was. I was taught linoleum. I dabbled in it in one of my classes there, but it really wasn't my forte. That wasn't my focus. My focus was lithography, which is a completely different process. But lithography requires a lot of equipment, a lot of chemicals. You need a full-blown print shop set up to do lithos and it's not made for mass production. It takes I mean God, I can run hundreds of lino block prints in the time it takes to do one litho, oh shit um.
03:50
So after I graduated and was a starving artist, um I I still wanted to keep working and I was trying to figure out a way to get some sort of printing press into the basement of the condo we were living in at the time. And I went to my old art school, talked to one of my mentors and he was like, oh well, why don't you do linoleum? And I was like, yeah, you know I can, but I really can't. And he's like, oh, I know this guy with a printing press in his garage in pieces that he's trying to sell the art school, but we really don't need it. He'll probably sell it to you cheap. And he did.
04:26
I bought my first Vanderkoek printing press, which is what I use pretty much exclusively for the linoleum stuff. It was 500 bucks. Like I said, it was in pieces. It cost me just as much to move the thing into my basement. And then I spent the next couple of months putting it back together, which was a task unto itself. Um, but yeah, that that's kind of how I fell into linoleum. It wasn't even really a choice on my end, it just sort of happened. It came to you. I don't know.
04:58
That's kind of the story of my life things just come I wish I could tell you this was some big plan that I had to, you know, get into the dead world and all this stuff. It wasn't. It was just me following what the universe was kind of telling me to do. It's I still. I still sort of do that, to be honest same thing with no simple road, man uh yeah, yeah, this is the best way to live.
05:22 - Mel (Host)
This was no like I wasn't sitting somewhere one day and was like I know what I'm gonna do come on, yeah, well, I mean, is it similar with your art, like when you're gonna draw something or whatever? Like, do you know it all, what's like? Do you see it visually before it comes out, or are you just kind of like going with the flow and then it happens?
05:46 - AJ (Guest)
A little bit of both. Ok, if that makes sense. It's the, the gig poster stuff. I really do have to kind of sit down and chew on it a little bit before you know, kind of waiting for the muse or inspirado or whatever you want to call it. Um, sometimes it happens right away. Those are the best ones. Um, sometimes it happens right away and I sit down to the drawing table and start working and I realized real quick that ain't going to work. The concepts, for me, are by far the hardest part. It it's, uh, it's coming up with a cool concept, something sort of a little different or whatever, engaging, whether it has to do with the venue or the city or the town, or sometimes bands themselves have. I mean, the Dead has ridiculous iconography that goes back decades and decades. But yeah, for me the concept is the the hardest and uh, the rest is is just kind of, I don't know, making it I, I do, I do art, I'm an artist too.
06:56 - Aaron (Host)
I went to art as well, um, and I got to agree with you that the uh, the concept part is absolutely the most difficult part. Like, once the concept is in place, then I can execute and it's not a problem. But getting to that place is super tough, man, and do you have like a something that you do to open yourself to the muse, to kind of, yeah, when you, when you get that uh process?
07:29 - AJ (Guest)
creative block, right, the creative block, which is a real, real thing. Um, yeah, my go-to used to be taking the dogs for a walk. Um, yeah, we're, we're in between the dogs at the moment, but, um, I think, just, yeah, when it really gets bad and when I find myself like trying to force something, that's kind of the worst feeling in the world for me. Um, I, I do, I gotta get away. I, I just I'll leave the, whether it's go for a walk or, you know, go do something else or whatever.
08:09
Lately I got into meditation a couple of years ago. I find that incredibly helpful for everything, not just the art, physical stuff. Like I've never been a real like workout, physical kind of guy, but I got a Peloton a couple of years ago and refused to let it just sit there. So I've been trying to stay at that and I find that super helpful. I mean it just it clears your brain. I mean, if you're, if you're on a freaking bike or doing whatever or working out and struggling, like you're not thinking about art anymore, you're really not. You're not thinking about anything else except, oh, my God, I have five more minutes of whatever You're in the moment and that's.
08:53
I think that's part of the. I mean, obviously it doesn't work every single time, but I think, just getting out of your own head, that's when the muse can kind of slip in and and give you a little little treat. Um, but yeah, I I wish there was some like okay, all I have to do is these three simple steps and I'm gonna have the next concept. It ain't like that, no, and it can happen. It can come from anywhere, it can happen anytime. It can be sitting watching tv with my wife. It can be like I said I used to go take my dogs for walks on the river and I would. I would have my best ideas while I was out there.
09:31 - Aaron (Host)
Where, where are you?
09:33 - AJ (Guest)
I'm in Connecticut. I'm in West Hartford, connecticut. Oh, okay, cool, where are you guys?
09:36 - Aaron (Host)
We're in Portland, Oregon.
09:38 - AJ (Guest)
Oh nice, I've never been to Portland. I need to come on, man.
09:41 - Mel (Host)
Oh my gosh, you'll get yeah.
09:43 - AJ (Guest)
That's a new show. That last corner of the country I haven't seen yet. I need to get out there, yeah.
09:49 - Mel (Host)
You'll definitely be inspired. Here, for sure.
09:51 - AJ (Guest)
Oh, I can only imagine, yeah.
09:57 - Aaron (Host)
Hang on a second Hold on my camera's. Lost its goddamn mind. Hold on there you go there, you go, there you go. You know the concept part of the whole thing is huge and I think one of the things that like, at least with your art, that made me a fan of what you do, is the complexity of some of the pieces. It's not just you didn't just open up, procreate and do the thing like, but look, mad respect for that I'm not shitting on that at all.
10:28 - AJ (Guest)
I, I struggle all the time I'm so jealous of my digital friends.
10:32 - Mel (Host)
I really am and from a non-artist perspective.
10:35 - Aaron (Host)
Like anything, a pencil drawing is dope you know what I mean like, but like with the stuff that you do, when I look it I can't even tell what the medium was. Do you know what I'm saying? Like there's so many different things, like the one you did recently with all the gold foil and the gems, and like oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's my new love, like what. Talk to me a little bit about that man. Like doing a piece like that, there's so much to it and there's so much room for error I would be terrified to do some shit like that man.
11:19 - AJ (Guest)
So I'll give you a little history. What you're talking about is egg tempera, which is a an ancient media. I mean, it goes back to medieval times. When you think of, uh, the high italian renaissance, okay, that's like tempera work. It's um, like botticelli and, you know, frangelico and stuff like that. Um, it's a beautiful, beautiful medium. It is insanely tedious and insanely, it takes forever to do paintings. It it's just, it's inherent to the medium itself.
11:59
Um, my mentor back in art school, fred wessel, is an absolute master at egg tempera. He was a lithography professor there. He took me under his wing, highly influenced by the Italian Renaissance, has done workshops in Italy for the past 30 years or so. When I was in my junior year, I actually went to Italy with him, fell in love with the media myself, um, but it doesn't lend itself to commercial work. Um, you know you can't do gig posters in egg temperate. Um, I'm working on my next piece right now and I've literally spent the past two and a half days working on a little section this big and it's nowhere you're done, and that's just how the the medium goes. Um, but, yeah, it's, it's uh, it's nothing more than egg, yolk, water and ground pigments and that's it. Yeah, it's super, super, super old school it is. You talk about digital versus analog. It doesn't get any more analog than this. I mean, I literally make the panels that I paint on. You make the gesso, you make the panels, you everything, everything.
13:17 - Mel (Host)
So for you, is it the process of it that you love so much, Like what is? It about that medium specifically love so much Like.
13:26 - AJ (Guest)
What is it about that medium specifically? It's the process, it's the meditation of it. You cannot be distracted, you cannot. I can't be answering emails while I'm painting. I can't be doing anything else because it's all about the touch. As they say, your paint has to be just right, with just the right consistency. Dressing of your brush meaning how much paint is actually on your brush has to be just right in order for the medium to work. So I think, subconsciously, I like it because I really can't do anything else while I'm painting. Everything else, like usually when I'm drawing, I'm working off monitors, so I have my email right there. Things are going bing, bong, all of it. I'm, I'm always being distracted and that's fine. I I've learned to work with that. With the linoleum medium, with egg temper, I have to shut the world off and I find the older that I get, the more I'm like happy to do that.
14:25 - Mel (Host)
It's like art within art, because you're creating a piece but, like the artistry of how you're creating, it is just as important as the end result.
14:35 - AJ (Guest)
It is very, very technical. It's probably one of the most technical painting mediums that I'm aware of. I've never tried oils, believe it or not, so I can't speak to that, but yeah, it's a beautiful medium. It's not something you hear about a lot in the art world anymore, contemporary wise I mean. I don't know if you're familiar with Andrew Wyeth. He worked a lot in egg tempera. There's a handful of people out there still working in the mediums, but it's just, it's beautiful. It's um, yeah, there's something about it that, if you see, saw the, the gold gilding with the, the gems and everything in it. It's uh, if you see it in person, photos don't do it justice, as you can see that with most art you know, um, but especially with egg tempera it's.
15:25
It's all about layering color and really thin, diluted, they liken it to stained glass. So when you're looking at an egg tempera painting, you're really looking through hundreds and hundreds of thin layers of color that all kind of work together and create this just beautiful image.
15:45 - Mel (Host)
It's like the most psychedelic when done, right when done, right, yeah, when done right, yeah I just wonder about the layering, because you layer with your um linoleum blocks, right, like how. I mean, clearly it's got to be just your, your brain too, but how? But how do you know? How do you? How do you not mess up? Or maybe you do, and we just don't know, because there's a little bit of that, um.
16:12 - AJ (Guest)
so, I mean, that was one of the things I did learn back in art school, being a printmaking major was reduction prints. And, um, I started doing reduction prints because it's easier to carve the plates, believe it or not. For those that aren't familiar with the printmaking turns basically linoleum block prints. It's a giant sheet of linoleum, or however big you want your image to be, and you're carving away that linoleum to create a printing surface that you can then ink up and pull a print off of the. The best way to think of it. We all made the potato stamps back in like elementary school, right? Yeah, it's that, but on steroids, right? So in order for you to have multiple colors, you have to multiple plates. So most of my prints are somewhere in the seven color range. To carve seven full size, 18 by 24 plates would take forever, right? What you can do are what are called reduction prints. So I'll take that one sheet of linoleum we good yeah we're good, it's just okay.
17:24
Oh, you're trying to okay there we go um that one sheet of linoleum, I'll carve away everything. I want to stay white, the color of the paper right. Print your lightest color. So let's say yellow. Okay, go back to that same plate. Carve away everything. I want to stay yellow. Print your next color on top of that first yellow, which is usually like an orange. You got to stay in your color families because you are layering inks and they do show through. Print your orange. Carve away your orange. Print your red. Carve away the red. Print your.
18:02
Usually for me it's mauve, right, um, and there's a reason for that. The white base of the mauve is very opaque and it works as trapping so you can kind of clean up areas, um, but basically you're whittling away this one plate between each color until you're left with your darkest color, usually black. Now what that means is I only have to carve away the one color that I plan on printing next or that I just printed, yeah, as opposed to carving away an entire plate. That's what I was thinking. What golf means is that I'm destroying the plate as I go along.
18:35 - Mel (Host)
Yes.
18:35 - AJ (Guest)
There is no going back. They nickname it suicide prints, because there's no way to go back and print more. I have to be very clear about that with my clients because that has bitten us in the butt a couple of times. Oh really.
18:51 - Mel (Host)
Okay.
18:53 - AJ (Guest)
Well, you know, I mean, they're not printmakers, they're not artists, they don't understand the whole. And, let's face it, my process is very different than most others in this industry. And yeah, yeah, I got to be very upfront, very upfront that, hey, you give me the addition size, that's it, there's no changing once I start carving okay, so this may be a silly question, but when you start carving, do you have like a penciled out version of what you're gonna?
19:21 - Aaron (Host)
okay, so you've. You've like given the concept to whomever and they've given you the green light.
19:27 - AJ (Guest)
Yeah, my, my general workflow. Um, you know, get hired for a gig, I'll, I'll work up a very rough pencil sketch. You know to size, because that's just how I work. But I'll, I'll work up a pencil sketch, proof of concept. Figure out the text, you know all of that stuff. I'll send that to management or whoever, basically saying like this is the concept, be on board. Next step I take it to color, which means I will redraw the image but then go full color with pastel pencils and charcoal. And the reason I use pastel pencils and charcoal is because I need that chalkiness to it, because I will then take that drawing and literally run that drawing through my printing press onto the sheet of linoleum. Oh, okay, chalk transfers the image onto the linoleum. I spray it with some spray fixative so it stays there. So not only does it show me where the colors are, it reverses that image for me, because the plate itself is a reverse of the image you want to finish. So when I'm carving text and things like that, I'm carving it in reverse, backwards.
20:46 - Mel (Host)
Yeah, that's a whole other your brain is amazing, that's like patting your belly and your head honestly, I'm so used to it.
20:57 - AJ (Guest)
At this point it's just second nature now, but yeah so what do you do with that final what's up?
21:05 - Mel (Host)
what do you do with that what's up? What do you do with that final carved out block of linoleum? Yeah, Um, sometimes I sell them collectors like them.
21:15 - AJ (Guest)
Um, sometimes, I mean, I have stacks and stacks and stacks of plates in my studio, um, but yeah, yeah, some are more interesting than others. Um, a lot, lot of the times, especially on the fine art type things, they're so carved away by the end you can't even recognize what.
21:32 - Aaron (Host)
What to begin with but you know, you know, what I'm curious about aj is like okay, we're here now and and you're making all this incredible stuff, and but there was a time when you were Aaron and Aaron decided to go to art school, right? What what made you want to go to art school, man?
21:54 - AJ (Guest)
I've been drawn since I was a little kid. Were you the doodler? Oh my God. Yes, I couldn't pay attention to any class. All my notebooks were filled with doodles. But even before that, I mean I my mom still has a Spider-Man drawing I did for show and tell in kindergarten. Um, so I I mean it goes back way way far for me and and I give my parents all the credit in the world because they were so supportive in in my artistic endeavors Um, even when they did threaten to pull me out of art school because of the Grateful Dead.
22:28
But it happens, it happens, it happens. But yeah, I've always been drawing. I've always been that kid back in school that was always in the art room doing whatever it just there was no question for me. It never even crossed my mind to do anything other than art. I did a lot of other things in order to you know, live.
22:58 - Mel (Host)
But yeah, yeah, so what about now? Do you ever think like, oh, I'd like to do this. Or are you like dang I know, like you know what you're here for, cause it seems that way? Oh yeah, no, I'd like to do this. Or are you like dang I know, like you know what you're here for, because it seems that way, oh, yeah, no, I know my purpose, I, I, I.
23:13 - AJ (Guest)
Art is always going to be part of my life, whether it's you know my profession or not. Yeah, but I also have a lot of hobbies, so I keep myself very busy Often too busy, I find, but yeah.
23:31 - Aaron (Host)
So I mean of course I understand and probably most of the folks that are listening understand. But just curious, like for you, man, what was the thing at that dead show? What got you?
23:46 - AJ (Guest)
Well, I say, my first dead show was 92, giant stadium. Okay, I didn't actually. I didn't actually see the dead. My first two shows. I got kicked out of my first two shows. What? Yeah, yeah, I mean this was back in high school.
24:01
We were stupid kids, you know, um, but I went to that giant stadium show, uh, with a few few of my buddies, didn't even know what I was getting into. The whole parking lot blew my mind, um, everything blew my mind at that point. But, uh, I don't know if you were around at shows back then, but the thing to do back then was jump over. If you weren't on the floor, you would jump over the wall and, um, get on the floor. Yep. So me and all my buddies, we were up in the nosebleeds in giant stadium. We couldn't even. We're like let's go. Okay, I was the sacrificial lamb that got thrown in a head and like, dragged out. Whatever, it's fine, I had a blast in the parking lot, anyways. Then the next show was MSG in like 93. And I mean, I don't know how much money it is. I was in a different mind space at the time Of course.
24:56
And, for whatever reason, lit up a bowl, like in that, didn't even realize there was a security guard like right in front of us. What are you doing, man? I also got escorted out, um, but yeah, everything about the scene, I mean it's for back in the 90s, I don't know man, I had never experienced anything like that, where you could literally go into a parking lot full of people, giant stadium, you know, and essentially feel like you could walk up to anyone and give them a hug. Yes, that's what kind of sealed the deal for me. Like it was just everyone was so welcoming and so inviting and so non-judgmental. I was always that black sheep, you know, uh, weird art kid back in school. So, like you know, I was friends with everyone but like never fit the dead scene was just like, oh my god, this is my place I I so much like yes to all of that, so all these years later being able to do art for, like some of the most important dead related stuff, man, is that some kind of like you know?
26:12 - Mel (Host)
nod at yourself, your inner self.
26:15 - AJ (Guest)
You're kidding Absolutely. What the fuck, gale? It still blows my mind.
26:20 - Mel (Host)
It's ridiculous, because you just talk about it like normal. But that's a fucking big deal. You're, like you know in your teens, doing some crazy shit on lot. Now you're in your shop making these gorgeous prints.
26:32 - AJ (Guest)
The thing was, I wasn't even in my teens. I was. I was in my 30s when I was up in the lots. Yeah, this wasn't until you know the lot stuff didn't really happen. I started doing the fan art, fish stuff okay in the early 2000s.
26:50
So I think, like 2001, trey did like a solo tour and that was the first time. That was like all right, I'm gonna try to like make something, and I did. I I actually snuck back into my old art school print shop and at night and like ran it on one of their etching presses which if my old professors knew that, they would have killed me. Um, but whatever, uh, total renegade, you know, yeah, but, um, yeah, so I, I did that and they, they sold like crazy and that's what kind of turned me on to it. And then fish, you know, did the the breakup thing? Yeah, um, so I was like, okay, you know, I had a full-time job at that point I was working at a university, um it basically in fundraising. Um, I was like, okay, that's cool, we'll figure out something else. And then, uh, it was when they came back in 2009 that things really really took off for me how did that happen?
27:44 - Aaron (Host)
aj like was when you're looking back, can you see the steps that that kind of yeah, yeah?
27:50 - AJ (Guest)
to a certain extent, I was very lucky. This is when you know, really the internet was, was kind of it was before facebook, it was before I don't even know if myspace was around at that point. It was like yahoo message groups, yeah, yeah well, messenger and like stuff like that. And there was this one website uh, terry weedox fish posters something, something that became like a go-to for any. I was collecting posters. I forgot that whole thing. I was collecting posters before I was even making okay. So my wife cara and I we were running to shows. This was collecting posters before I was even making them. So my wife Kara and I we were running to shows. This was back before. Like it was guaranteed that every show had a poster too. So you would go in not knowing if there was a poster or not and like every once in a while I was like yes, there's a poster, and like people would go nuts and buy them all. And then that became like the secondary market and all that. But, um, so, coinciding with me starting to do the like fan art things, the internet was taking off and the next thing was this website called fish posterscom, um, which was sort of the the hub for all the the poster collectors, uh, obviously in the fish world, but it branched out from the fish world and made a lot of connections there. Just it was literal, like directly to the consumer collector. Um, and you know the scene, like people are just cool, like they're really cool, people are diehard heads, like whether it's grateful dead fish, whatever, um, and I just made a lot of friends there, you know. So I sold a lot of, like I say I was in the lots and I was. I sold more stuff on the internet than anything.
29:37
Yeah, so between the internet and then, you know, actually going to the lots and like shoving my posters in people's faces, because my work is very different. It is very analog. It is not digital, it's. You know, if you see one of my linoleum pieces, if you hold it in your hands, you can see the texture of it, you can see the vibrancy of the inks, you can smell the inks. People used to always comment on the smell of my prints because I used oil-based inks, so they would have a certain smell to them. Um, so it was always my uh intention to get it like the physical work in front of as many faces as I possibly could, um, and to educate people on what is actually going into the work, because people don't, you know. You say reduction, linoleum print what?
30:35 - Mel (Host)
Exactly, exactly, but you can tell that it's different, though you really can, even if you don't know what the difference is. You know, like it looks like fine art and not to say that other posters don't look like they're, you know, professional and gorgeous and we've got a ton of them, but like it looks specific, it looks like it's been through a process.
30:58 - AJ (Guest)
Yeah, I've had people say my prints look more like paintings than prints. Um yeah, and that that comes back to like that fine art training I had back in art school. I always treated my posters as prints, as fine art prints. So, even going back to those days, it was always, you know, cotton rag paper with a deckled edge on the bottom. And to this day, like I just did a goose print you know, a couple of weeks ago for for forest hills and bottleneck gallery down in Brooklyn mailed out all of my prints and they're getting all these questions back Like, hey, I got this print, but there's something really wrong with the bottom of it. It looks like it was torn or chewed up by a dog. It's like no, that's a deckled edge, it's from the paper making process. It's actually a sign of very high quality.
31:48 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, Don't, don't put that in the frame Like you want you want that in there.
31:53 - AJ (Guest)
Oh, I've had people cut off the edges because they thought it was a mistake.
31:56 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, yeah, yeah so do you have recollection of like the first licensed legit dead and grateful dead, whatever print?
32:09 - AJ (Guest)
yeah, you want to go yeah man okay.
32:12
So, like I said, I used to take my dogs, uh, for walks all the time the farmington river out here in simsbury, connecticut, absolutely stunningly beautiful, um. So I was walking my dogs out there and I made, like I said, I made a lot of friends and lots there was. There was sort of like a core crew of us that we're always doing the fan art stuff and shakedown and whatnot, and one of my good friends was doing a lot of the graphic design for Headcount, ok, ok. And she I don't know if she called me or shot me an email or whatever, but was like, hey, we're headcounts doing this thing with Bobby Weir and the national and it's called the bridge session.
32:55
I think this was back in like 2012. Yeah, do you want to do the print for it? I was like, hell, yeah, I want to do the print for it. That's awesome. So I think it was billed as this you know, east meets west kind of thing, bobby, being west coast, national east coast. So I came up with this idea of you know those, um, binocular things, that at all the landmarks that you put the border, oh yeah so it was one of those.
33:21
But on on the left side was the golden gate bridge, on the right side was the, the brooklyn bridge, right, yeah, um, so I, I did my rough concept, sent it off, and I think it was bobby's manager at the time. Um came back and was like oh well, the, the binocular thing almost looks like a steal your face. Why don't you just make it into a steely? I thought that was off limits, like I'm so used to, like the lot scene where, like, you have to be real careful, you can't, don't use this, don't use that, don't. You know? And I always tried to play it by the rules. I always, you know, I never wanted to. So I was like awesome, I get to do a Steely. And that became my first official steal your face. I would be shitting my pants became my first official steal your face and that piece got my foot in the door.
34:09
Um, the next thing I knew it was further at the time right, uh, I, I got the call hey, do you want to submit some art for for further tour? And did a handful of things for further, and then phil and friends got in touch and I started doing stuff for phil and uh, the next thing you know is the gd50 back in 2015, and I was just sitting there chomping at the bit like, oh my god, I hope I get, oh my god, I hope I get. And then I get this email like hey, do you want to submit for a triptych for for three pieces?
34:44 - Aaron (Host)
yeah, yeah that must be like a dream come true as far as like it was so cool.
34:51 - AJ (Guest)
It was so cool to actually be able to put like grateful dead on something I can actually put a 13 point bolt on this oh yeah, the whole nine yards and and and that piece is what really sort of took things to the next level for me. Just, you know, having your work in front of I don't know how many people, millions, soldier field there, but yeah, I mean it was 75 000 but then after that you know what I mean.
35:19 - Mel (Host)
Like since then, like people know you but don't know who you are. You know what I mean.
35:24 - AJ (Guest)
Like they'll see your art and might not know which is fine. No, it's crazy, I'm not gonna lie, it's crazy. Uh to to see your work, you know, up behind the band and places like hollywood bowl or city field or you know it's, it's, it's pretty nuts so where's the trippiest place you've ever seen your art Trippiest place, yeah. Oh, that's a good question.
35:57 - Mel (Host)
I don't know. Well, that makes sense. I mean, you don't know everywhere that it's turning. You know where people, yeah, yeah. I mean, I don't know you don't know that's good, fine, you don't know, Uh yeah, Let me chew on that one Well that's all right. Aaron had to run to the bathroom, so we're we're good.
36:16 - AJ (Guest)
Oh no, yeah, trippiest, place Um well, you know, just maybe somewhere where you feel like venues and things like that. You know what I mean. Like I've been in the coaster world so often, it's like, well no, they're at the merch table.
36:29 - Mel (Host)
Okay, well, just like, maybe somewhere where you go in and you don't expect to see it, you know like something that's sort of like caught me off guard or um, you know it's, it's always.
36:42 - AJ (Guest)
It's more wild to me to see like photos of people's spaces yeah, that have, like, one of my prints behind them.
36:51
Like I know, um, oh god, it was someone from widespread, that it was a shot of of them practicing or something I forget whose practice space it was, but there was one of my prints behind them and I was like, oh, that's super cool. Or like I I I had the opportunity to actually meet bobby weir, uh, a year or so ago and, um, I gave him one of my fine art prints and, um, the the next thing I know, a mutual friend sends a picture of him in his tour bus and he has it literally taped up in the wall. I don't know if it's still there, but at the time it was taped up on the wall of his tour bus and that blew my mind.
37:36 - Mel (Host)
Yeah, someone's looking at that all the time.
37:42 - Aaron (Host)
Oh, you know, there's a few artists that I directly associate with the iconography of the Grateful Dead, Like Stanley Mouse Rick.
37:54 - Mel (Host)
Griffin Mike.
37:56 - Aaron (Host)
Dubois and you man Like it's a thing, it's a. Thing now man and and I, I think like you're in art school and you're doing the thing, go to shows and then all this happens, like do you look back on everything and and see where everything is, and just like are you in awe of the thing yes, yeah, yes, I am.
38:26 - AJ (Guest)
But I will say, when you're living it day to day, it's it, you can take it for granted. Sometimes, and I do have to step back and, you know, do like the sort of pinch yourself sort of thing and like, remember, like I am so fortunate, I am so lucky to be able to do what I do, and when I'm having those creative block days or whatever, the painting's not going well or the concept's not coming, that's when I have to kind of like step back and be like, okay, you're very, very fortunate to even be in this position, to have this issue. So you know, it's that whole attitude thing and like it's sometimes it's hard to to hang on to that gratitude, but, um, it is mind blowing man.
39:14 - Aaron (Host)
It's the same thing with doing this, Like you know, when you're in the midst of the day to day of it and like I'm trying to schedule stuff, we have to reschedule somebody or whatever. We have to reschedule John Medesky for next week, or whatever. And I'm like, oh God, we, we have to reschedule John Medesky for next week, or whatever. And I'm all frustrated and these guys are like what's your fucking problem? And whatever.
39:33 - Mel (Host)
Well, because I think sometimes when you go so far in your craft and you said it a moment ago like you've been doing it, so it's it's not a big deal every day, but it is, but it is a big deal every day. But you can't live like that, because then you get hung up on yourself, you know.
39:50 - AJ (Guest)
Yeah, and that's the other thing. Like I try to stay as humble as possible and I know that one stupid move in this whole house of cards can come falling down on me, especially these days, man.
40:02
That's honestly how I kind of look at it. Like I feel like this whole thing is a dream and it's all just gonna go away someday. Um, maybe not the healthiest way to look at things, but it keeps me sort of um pushing, if that makes sense. Like, um, I never want to like rest on my laurels, kind of thing. Yeah, man, yeah, and I get bored too. So, like I, I I always want to do something different or try to push things, or you know, it's um, yeah, yeah you're busting your ass in that shop, though, man, like that's no joke it's um yes, yes, yes I am, and we getting like we're getting the cherry picked sweet moments from you through Instagram, facebook.
40:52
Oh God, you know what I mean.
40:53 - Aaron (Host)
We're not seeing the 2am oh shit moment or whatever that's happening. People think like oh yeah, your poster art is. It must be so great and it is. But I'm sure that there's moments that are like, god damn man.
41:08 - AJ (Guest)
We've. We've had our handful of challenges here in the studio. For sure, for the longest time it was myself and my printer, kate Lennon, who also went to the same art school as me. For the past eight years or so she's been really the one sort of at the helm of the press, been really the one sort of at the helm of the press. So when we were running the insanely large you know 1500 print editions for Denning Company, that were these seven color linoleum block prints. This medium is not meant for that sort of production. It's just not. It's so physically intensive because, like I said, every color of every print is a separate run through that press. So you're talking those numbers, I mean you're up into the tens of thousands of cycles of a printing press and you're physically working that press, you're moving your print racks all over the studio. It's physically demanding. So yeah, kate has since left the studio so I'm solo. Now she's off to grad school, which is awesome for her Shout out Kate Not so awesome for me.
42:25
But I've been sort of shifting things anyways. You've seen it with Deading Company for the past couple of years. The numbers for them have just become unobtainable with the linoleum medium. So I've shifted my work more towards what are called chiclés, which is basically a fine art archival inkjet print Very common in the fine art world.
42:51
But what that allows me to do is, instead of you know, the linoleum style, where everything has to be like hard edges and one color or another. There's no gradients, there's no shading. It allows me to do things like you can kind of see in the corner there that's a piece morning dew in a colored pencil. It allows me to work in infinite colors and have infinite shading and really sort of work the way I used to back in art school, right. So for the past few years with dead and company, yeah, everything's sort of shifted to more um, color pencil medium as far as the original drawings and then g clay for the prints, because it allows me to run 10 000 and not it's, which is still a lot of work just packing 10 000 yeah, that's a lot of paper, man it's a lot of work, um, but it's.
43:51
It's much more achievable and obtainable than the linoleum was. So we're only still around. You know, it's just even now that it's just me here, uh, running the presses like I'm telling bands like I, I can't do more than 200. That's just my limit. Outside of that, we can farm it out to be silk screened, or we can do G clay here I'm working my processes to accommodate what I can and can't do. Let's face it, I'm not getting younger either, and the physicality of it is. It's just impossible to do those giant runs with not only them anymore.
44:32 - Aaron (Host)
Well, how cool to be in a position to be able to dictate how it's going to be done. And I don't.
44:38 - AJ (Guest)
I don't know if I'd call it dictate, well suggest, lightly suggest. It's usually a conversation.
44:46 - Mel (Host)
Well, and you literally had to change up your medium because of your demand. That's pretty incredible, Like we love what you're doing.
44:55 - AJ (Guest)
You know, I wish I could say that. It was some master plan that I had, but it was more like the universe just telling me hey, listen, I personally, as an artist, wanted to go more that direction anyways. So it kind of worked out for all of us and, yeah, okay.
45:13 - Mel (Host)
What do you think or what do you have to say about like luck? How does that work into your you know, I don't know in your life, into how you do you feel like you've been lucky, there's? Definitely oh for sure feel like you've been lucky.
45:30 - AJ (Guest)
There's definitely, oh for sure, you know what I mean. There's an aspect of luck, there's no question. I would love to say it's, it's all and it is hard work, it is talent, it is putting in the time, it is putting in the effort. Obviously, nothing's going to happen if you don't do those things. Yeah. But it is also taking advantage of opportunities when they present themselves. And I'm a little bit more exclusive now in what I say yes to. I'm trying very hard. Back when I was starting, I would do anything and everything that would possibly grow my audience or put my art in front of people's faces. I didn't care what it was, I didn't care if three people were going to see it, I'd do it. I was just, I was very motivated to get the work in front of eyeballs. And you know, is that luck? I don't know, is it do think there's. There's an aspect of luck involved in everything, but I think it's.
46:33 - Mel (Host)
It's also important to see these opportunities when they do present themselves and capitalize right well, I just say that because you know, luck and magic are kind of like those types of things that we will say but what, what is it really? You know what I mean. If I knew we wouldn't be sitting here. But but it's a part of your.
46:53 - AJ (Guest)
So for me, like the luck, I was very lucky that headcount thought of me when it came to that bridge session. You know, I was very lucky that when GD 50 did come around cause I didn't I wasn't guaranteed to get a slot in that by any means I was very lucky to get that call. But then being able to, like, really not be a deer in the headlights when you're presented with a project like that and really, you know, take it on and put, put everything into it, which I did, I I was solo at that point too. Um, so, running those prints it was don't quote me on, this was a while ago, I think it was like 1200 prints for each night, so 1200 times three times seven colors for each one. So let's do the math on that.
47:51
Um, I mean, and me solo running all of those prints, I mean that edition literally almost killed me, um, both physically and mentally. Like I didn't go to to fairly well because, like I mentally couldn't handle it at the time. It's, uh, yeah, very stressful, very um demanding, but awesome and you delivered.
48:18 - Aaron (Host)
Oh so great, you did the thing so very, very grateful for it, you know, okay, so I I'm curious about this. Like for me, my first show was in 89. I toured 90, 91, did tattoos in the lot and whatever. And then you know, years later, the Grateful Dead was the only music I would listen to.
48:48
Like everything else was it didn't hit the same music I would listen to. Everything else was it didn't hit the same. It wasn't right, it just didn't do the thing. I think maybe Phish kind of crept in there a little bit. There wasn't the wider jam world like there is now. We didn't have the gooses and billy strings and all the things. Um, what's your opinion on the scene as it, how it's grown and and where we're at now?
49:18 - AJ (Guest)
I think it's fantastic. I think it's great, um, you know, I, I, I think the dead laid the the groundwork for everything that we're seeing now. I mean, like you said, it was they're the granddaddies, right. And then fish came around and they kind of went off on their own on scene, but still very similar. And then you know, seeing dead in company come back and I remember it that the back in what was it? 2015 was their first tour. Yeah, uh, thinking like, oh, that's, that's an interesting mix up. That'll be cool to see. I didn't think it was gonna last, I didn't think it was gonna be a continued, I thought it was like a one-off tour kind of thing, right, um, and to see it explode into what it became, uh, to where, you know, selling out stadiums, which is crazy it's wild, it's, it's a trip.
50:18 - Aaron (Host)
I saw a, a post I think it was our friend tune, who's also an artist maybe it wasn't, I don't know, but he's younger, I think he's in his early to mid 20s and the post was saying, like you know, there's all this talk and argument about like, does John Mayer fit? Should he be here? It should dead and company keep going all this stuff. And they were, like you know, for people like me of my age group, dead and company is the grateful dead for us so there's, no, there's not even a conversation.
50:56
That thing that you guys were getting back when jerry was around. We're getting that same thing right now with dead and company. It's created our family. It's given us our opportunities to get our art out into the world. It's you know, we're making money because of it, all the things. And I think that's a one, it's a testimony to the strength of the foundation of the thing that they built. You know, the Grateful Dead proper built that they built you know the grateful dead, proper built, but also the necessity for something like that now.
51:35
Because because those those younger cats that are getting into the thing now wouldn't be getting into if they didn't need it. It's believe it if you need it, you know what I mean I saw that same post post and it warmed my heart.
51:48 - AJ (Guest)
It really did. You know, because they listen, man, I, I'm a diehard deadhead, I'm a diehard fish head. I I've seen fish 250 plus times. We're going to moat in this week. We're going to see him both nights. You know I love them both. This week we're gonna see in both nights. You know I love them both. The fish scene, while it has its similarities, is not what the dead scene is. It's just not. It's uh, um, I, I don't, I'm not gonna talk down nor should it be, you know, but they are different animals.
52:25
They are um. And to see that continuing to this day for people you know, half our age or whatever, um, I think it's just fantastic.
52:37 - Mel (Host)
It's nothing but love, right you know, and all the dialogue is from the older people. You know, these younger people are not trying to be like well, it's not what it used to be. No, it's fresh for them and it's great. And, like, the old people are the ones that are putting these Well, john Mayer, and like, no matter what happens out there, there's, there's someone that's going to be, you know, critical of it.
53:18 - AJ (Guest)
But yeah, like you said, I mean Jerry's gone. He's been gone for a long time now and as much as I still love the man I mean I'm surrounded by drawings of him right now that I've done and I've been lucky enough to do for the Garcia estate. John Mayer can rip man, the guy can play guitar, I don't care what you say and dude Bobby's still up there doing his thing and it's just a beautiful thing to see it and, like Mickey and you know it's, it's awesome.
53:47 - Aaron (Host)
Brother, I'm 52 and there's there's some days where, when I wake up in the morning, I'm sure I'm dying. I'm sure, I'm sure that this is it today I can say the same thing, man coffee. It's fucking iffy most days to be 80 years old and get up there with his fucking kettlebells and stuff Right Doing his workouts Like my God.
54:11 - AJ (Guest)
Never mind kettle Phil's. What 84? 85? Now, I mean my God.
54:15 - Aaron (Host)
And he's still like schooling younger cats.
54:18 - Mel (Host)
Yeah.
54:18 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah.
54:19 - AJ (Guest)
Absolute warriors.
54:22 - Aaron (Host)
So you're going to see Fish this weekend? Yeah, what's one song you want to see?
54:29 - AJ (Guest)
yeah oh god, oh, I used to chase so many songs. I I don't anymore. I I I'll be honest, I kind of I I haven't even heard a lot of the new fish stuff, so I'm kind of interested to hear, like, some of the new. I know the new album just came out and all that, so I'm interested to hear some of the new stuff. Um, I don't know, I'm just gonna be happy to see him again.
54:52 - Mel (Host)
It's been, it's been a while so what were some of your old jams that you were waiting on?
54:57 - AJ (Guest)
oh god, I loved all the the old weird stuff. Like for the longest time I was chasing harpooh to the point where, like I didn't hear it and they broke up.
55:08 - Aaron (Host)
I'm like, oh fuck I'm never gonna fucking harpo now the same thing with the the grateful dead.
55:13 - AJ (Guest)
I never heard a terrapin, I never heard a scarlet fire, I never heard a dark star. Oh, I mean, I only got to like 30, 40 shows or something like that, but anyways, um, so yeah, harpo was a big one for me for the longest time and then they came back and I caught like two or three of them at this point, so it's like awesome uh, I don't, I, I can't even think off that. Uh, what's this? The new one? I really like, I like mercury.
55:37 - Mel (Host)
Oh yeah, it's really good, that'll be sweet um did you get to see the sphere at all um any of the shows at this time?
55:44 - AJ (Guest)
I have not gone out to the sphere for fish or the dead. Yeah, I'm okay with Vegas. It's not my favorite place in the world.
55:54 - Mel (Host)
You know we moved eight years ago. We're from Vegas, so we understand. Okay, no offense, no, no, we got to get the fuck out of there.
55:59
Man, leave me, I get it you know, vegas is great for a lot of things and when we went back to the sphere to see them I had, I had a really new appreciation for vegas. I never hated it. I raised my kids there. I hated it. I, you know, I grew up there. I'm not from there, but I grew up there and so it's. It's cool for a lot of things, but it is not cool long term and it is not cool for everything. And you know, a weekend to see fish or the dead, yay, thumbs up A lifetime to be in that kind of environment, it's fucking hard.
56:34 - Aaron (Host)
It's a hard place to be. I couldn't stand Vegas. When we went back we did the four-day run of fish and when we got home I was like, wow, I really appreciate our hometown now. And Mel was like, wow, I really appreciate our hometown now mel was like what I was like. Yeah man, I could have walked down into that lobby in my underwear at three o'clock in the morning smoking a cigarette, and they would have been like sir can you?
56:57
just go back to your room, it would have been no big deal you could do whatever you want there, basically oh and you're good to go.
57:03 - Mel (Host)
Yeah, it's the service industry, you know. So they're ready to give you and let you do whatever you want within reason hospitality yeah, I love it.
57:12 - AJ (Guest)
You know what you said last time I was there was uh, when did fish play halloween 2014?
57:17 - Aaron (Host)
it was at a thrilling, chilling oh yeah, that was 14 with the um haunted house stuff yeah.
57:25 - AJ (Guest)
So, cara, my wife and I I we were in San Francisco. I think they played in San, it was a Berkeley or something, I don't remember. We were in San Francisco oh, I think it was for the Trips Festival, the poster event that goes on out there Went out for that, went to Yosemite for like four days and just were in this blissful national park park, yosemite. I'd never seen it before, it was just absolutely nature's wonder. And then we drive to Vegas, which is about the most opposite you can get of that, and everything's just plastic and cigarettes and I just I was like fish is awesome, but I'm not coming back here what you said about chasing songs like.
58:10 - Aaron (Host)
I've got a couple that I'd like to see, but I always say I don't give a shit if they play happy birthday for four hours.
58:16 - AJ (Guest)
I'm just stoked even fish I mean they're still going at see it, still and having fun up there and like it's awesome I have a very unpopular opinion about fish and where they are now I I think that they are the best they've ever been right now, I think.
58:41 - Aaron (Host)
I think what we're getting with that band is them operating on a way higher frequency than they ever were operating on before. They're you know Trey's sober. We're getting like clear shit through them. The energy that comes through them is this, like fire hose of joy.
59:00 - Mel (Host)
Well, and it's 40 years of experience to boot, you know, and that 40 years of playing with the same people, so not just experience on your instrument and your music, but like as a couple and you know, at not a couple but, as, yeah, as a quartet. Like you know, from being married, the longer you're married you've got this secret language. You can look at your wife and not say nothing and she like goes get the car keys. You know what I mean.
59:25
Like there's something right so when you do that musically, like there is something, and especially with the crowd, the crowd also, they're another additive, they're waiting for these things, it's, it's something that is probably the coolest thing I've ever witnessed and as much as I love, you know, the mango song and lizards and all goofy fish yum and whatever, much as I love that, that's what initially drew me to them.
59:56 - Aaron (Host)
The new album, I think, is like, lyrically, the best I've heard as far as like leveling up frequency wise maturity maturity it's, it's there's some deep shit in there, man, and and like very uh profound for the world that we're living in right now. It's a real reflection of the time that we're in and this, let's be real, this we're it. Shit's weird, sure for sure shit is funky man um, things are interesting, for sure yeah, it's gonna gonna be a cool end of the year. Let's just see as much music as possible.
01:00:37 - Mel (Host)
So, aj, I have a question with all, with all the cool stuff that you've done, what other cool stuff do you want to do? That's a great question.
01:00:47 - AJ (Guest)
That is a good question. So I've the past couple of years I've been making a real effort to balance my time between the like gig poster, client work and my own sort of fine art passion projects, my own sort of fine art passion projects, and I feel like I'm finally at this, this point where you know it's it's been like a pendulum for me. You know, like prior to COVID it was like all gig posters all the time, and then COVID hit and like all the gigs went away and I was like, oh well, what the fuck am I supposed to do? To do? Like all I could do is dive into my own work, which I did, and you know I used to feel bad saying it, but I had my best year ever.
01:01:34
That year and that sort of taught me something, or at least showed me something, gave me a little more artistic confidence, I guess, which is something I definitely struggle with. But you know, 2021, things came back. I felt like I had a good balance between the two and then, like over the next couple of years, with Dead Company ramping up the way they did, especially 2023, that final tour everything kind of shifted back to primarily gig posters. This year, like the sphere is more or less wrapped up for me at this point from the artistic side and I sort of told myself, like the rest of the year, I'm just going to do my own stuff, and I've been saying no to a lot of things.
01:02:23 - Mel (Host)
That's a powerful word, that's a really powerful word.
01:02:26 - AJ (Guest)
No, that's something that I'm learning, and it's taken me a long time to have the confidence to say no, it's true, because I remember when we first started to change in no Simple Road.
01:02:40 - Mel (Host)
We weren't always interviewing musicians. It started out very humbly we're interviewing each other, our friends, you know, know local people that we think are interesting. And then when we started to interview musicians, then we just started to do everything. We're going all these festivals, all these concerts, doing anything and everything almost died and it was so fucking exhausting, dude like I never looked as haggard as I look during those times. I mean to myself, you know what I mean energetically to myself.
01:03:09 - AJ (Guest)
You know what I mean.
01:03:10 - Mel (Host)
Energetically, you I can you know like you can look the same on the outside, but it's how you see yourself and like I really had to be. Like Aaron dude, we cannot say like no more, you know, cause unfortunately you're not catching our third person Apple.
01:03:24
third person apple he's here, he's, he's out at a concert he's at that farewell festival um, but like we all collect and they're in their 50s I'm in my 40s, like I'm like I feel like I'm in my 60s. Now what are you doing? And it really I know I understand why you want, like you said, you want to get your, your art out into as many eyes as possible. You want people to see what you're capable of or what you're doing, and so I understood it. But like the actual doing of it is going to kill us, and so when we started to pull back and on purpose, because we needed to, it kind of changed things for us. It made us see things with different, especially me.
01:04:06
I mean, I can't speak for everybody but like not saying yes to everything yeah, it made it what we did accept that much more special and it felt like we could pour more of ourself and more energy, because we were depleted in energy going into all of these things. And it just made it better and and it made me realize the value of no. You know, sometimes you just got to say no and it doesn't have to be like because dot, dot dot, it can just be like no thanks.
01:04:36 - Aaron (Host)
I can't right now Not interested.
01:04:40 - Mel (Host)
Yeah.
01:04:41 - AJ (Guest)
It's hard to refill the well when you're just constantly depleting yourself. Yeah, yeah, I get it. Like I said, I didn't. There was a time where I just didn't want to miss any opportunities, and I think that's when you're in that, when you're starting out, when you're hungry, as they say, it's important to do that. You've got to hustle. It's all about the hustle, right? I mean, yeah, nothing's handed to you here. You got to hustle, and whether that's slinging stuff in the lots or, you know, like you said, hitting as many festivals as you can, or whatever it's, it's uh, it's important when you can do it, um, but you do reach a point where it starts to bite you in the ass a little bit and when the work starts to suffer because of it, that's when you really got to prioritize yourself a little bit more. And it's hard, it's difficult.
01:05:40 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, you feel like you have this responsibility to yourself and the thing, and my God, they're asking us to do it and how dare I say no with I'm so grateful for the opportunity and all that shit, and then you have to go. Is this healthy for me at this point?
01:05:58 - AJ (Guest)
you wind up overextending yeah and that.
01:06:00 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, that's been the story of my life well you know what, over and over, over and over and over and over.
01:06:10 - Mel (Host)
Congratulations for being in the place that you are Like seriously, where you can actually say you know what. That was my last for the year. I'm focusing on my own stuff and that's going to bring me light and energy. Like that's dope man.
01:06:25 - AJ (Guest)
Yeah, exactly, you know, at 48 years old. That's great. I say that now, but you know, I'll probably have some gig poster come out in November.
01:06:36 - Mel (Host)
We're allowed to change our minds. Shoot.
01:06:39 - AJ (Guest)
Listen. If the right opportunity presents itself, I'll obviously, but for right now I'm really just focused on my own fine art. But for right now I'm really just focused on my own fine art. I have I post an open studio event here in my studio in West Hartford, connecticut, once a year. It's kind of like a Willy Wonka thing where, like, I open up the doors and let everyone come in and see, you know, the printing presses and where everything happens my drawing room. I have a vast collection of natural history type stuff, as you can see behind me. Um, so I'm really really primarily focused on that for this year, which I think is going to be november 16th. There's your exclusive cool. So, yeah, that's that's my plan for the rest of the year at this point is, uh, focused on that.
01:07:29 - Aaron (Host)
And then we'll see where it goes. Where can if people want to see like your stuff, where can they go to find out more?
01:07:36 - AJ (Guest)
Like physically or virtually.
01:07:38 - Aaron (Host)
Both yeah.
01:07:41 - AJ (Guest)
My website, obviously, massdaystudioscom. I need to do some updating with the more recent work, but I have a whole archive going back to the early 2000s of all kinds of stuff up there. Bottleneck Gallery is my main go to gallery for sales and whatnot. They're great down in Brooklyn. I've been working with them for many, many years If you want to actually see. Like I said said, my studio is not really open to the public, so yeah, november 16th, like right, yeah, november 16th.
01:08:15
All are welcome. Um, I mean, right now I actually have a few pieces hanging in a fine art show in weathersfield, connecticut, here at the historical society, which is pretty cool. Um, so if you're local to connecticut, you can hop over to weathersfield and see a few pieces hanging. Um, but otherwise, yeah right on man I.
01:08:33 - Mel (Host)
I hope that is it the capricorn um yeah, capricorn's hanging, I just have to say that's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.
01:08:40
Like truly what aaron showed me, like hey, we're gonna have aj on the show and he pulls up this piece of yours and it's, there's something. There's a feeling that I get when I saw it, you know, like it's feels so special and magical and like just beautiful, and like like when you look at a sunset, when you look at a gorgeous redwoods, like it's like a breathtaking thing. You know, and I just I wanted to share that with you because you know there's always there's art that's beautiful and great, but this was really something. I don't know what you pulled out of yourself to get that, but it was amazing and I just want to say thank you for sharing that with the world.
01:09:22 - AJ (Guest)
Thank you so much. I've truly fallen in love with the. I call them my, my skeletal icons and, um, you know, it started out. Back in 2019, I did a show out in san francisco where I did uh, the seasons right.
01:09:38
I feel like every every fine artist winds up doing like a season set eventually. So I did a series of four, you know the fall, winter, winter, spring, summer. They were not egg temper, they were. They were colored pencil at the time, but it sort of it created this, this icon imagery for me, which I've been pursuing now with the Zodiac series. So Capricorn was the third in the series. I'm working on Libra right now. There's your other exclusive.
01:10:10 - Mel (Host)
That's mine, mine too, so yeah, this is a very personal one for me.
01:10:15 - AJ (Guest)
Right on, it's half Zodiac, half self-portrait, sort of thing.
01:10:23 - Mel (Host)
Oh, my gosh. I'm excited about this one.
01:10:26 - AJ (Guest)
Yeah, yeah, it, literally right before we hopped on. I've been painting all morning on it. So there's something about just the format, it, it, it hearkens all the way back to the Italian Renaissance and sort of my roots in that sort of work, but also like it keeps coming back to, I don't know, the Jimi Hendrix quote of music is my religion. Yeah, like I'm not a big religious guy, I'm, I, I'm spiritual, like I'm not. You know, I'm not Catholic, I'm not anything. Yeah, um, but there is something to that.
01:11:01
Like music is my religion and like going to dead shows back in the day was a religious experience. I don't care what you say, what, whether you were on anything or not, and you can't go to these concerts and and not have some sort of I don't know feeling, you know, for lack of a better word. So trying to pull that into a visual context in some way shape or form, I don't know, it's trying to speak to that higher level a little bit. Yeah, man, whether it resonates with people or not, I don't know, but this part of the art I like to say it's almost a little selfish.
01:11:50 - Aaron (Host)
Rick Rubin even in that book he's like you know, the art should be for the artist. Yeah, and then if everybody if people like it, cool, whatever.
01:11:58 - Mel (Host)
But because aren't you a spectator as well? Do you know what I mean? Like you're making this, but you're also seeing it, so it should please you the same way you're hoping to please somebody else.
01:12:13 - AJ (Guest)
Right, right, and that's the thing, especially with these egg tempera paintings. I mean, I've been working on this Lieber piece already for well over a month, you know, from initial drawings through the actual gold gilding and now the painting. So I have to be absolutely in love with these images because I'm going to spend at least three to four months of my life slaving over this thing. So if I'm not into it and I have pieces that I've gotten pretty far on and kind of fell out of love with them and they just linger, sometimes they come back, sometimes they don't. I've had drawings sitting in drawers for years to come back and maybe I reworked them a little, maybe I don't, maybe I just fall back in love with it. But yeah, it becomes a very, very personal thing and you have to kind of throw out that. What are people gonna think? Because if you're thinking that, especially with the fine art, like you're down the wrong path, yeah, you've you're, you're not doing it right.
01:13:17 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, it's not, and I think don't worry about what people are gonna.
01:13:21 - AJ (Guest)
And that that's where I that's the part of me that always thinks this is just a big house of cards that's gonna fall down. But it is what it is and I have to just have confidence. And you know it's uh.
01:13:32 - Aaron (Host)
Do the thing well, you know you try you do your best right you've been doing your best for a long time I think, that I can say that safely yeah, I, I really, really hope that we get a chance to kick it in person sometime, man yeah, for sure, for sure.
01:13:47 - AJ (Guest)
If you're ever up on the east coast, hit me up for sure.
01:13:49 - Aaron (Host)
And if you decide you ever want to visit portland. Man, you gotta, you gotta spot. Oh yeah, with us nice, nice. Yeah, I'll hit you up, all right man, thanks for hanging out with us this morning.
01:13:58 - AJ (Guest)
Such a pleasure thank you this is awesome.
01:14:02 - Mel (Host)
Thank you, guys have a great afternoon. Man, you too take care oh, you know I I love artists first of all, I know this has nothing to do with anything, but it does. I love libras. There's me too there's a certain sweetness that can, without you knowing that that's what it is. There's something about being a libra because it's like you know the care. It's really like you can feel how much he cares about what he's doing.
01:14:40 - Aaron (Host)
He wouldn't be going through all the stuff that he goes through to create the art that he creates if he didn't care and I think that's true with almost all artists you care about the thing.
01:14:52 - Mel (Host)
Well, and there's a compulsion, You're compelled to do this.
01:14:56 - Aaron (Host)
I mean he said it at the beginning like there was never anything else. Every notebook I had was filled with doodles.
01:15:03 - Mel (Host)
And you know like this is what always amazes me on anybody who shares their art Musicians, artists like AJ the fact that they want other people to see it like something in you wants somebody to listen to that song that you made, or something in you wants to share that.
01:15:23 - Aaron (Host)
I think if you're doing it from the right place, because you're creating the art for yourself, right, you're doing it because you want to make something that gets you off, and then once that thing does that for you, it it come at least it should, I think, maybe come from that place. That's like this thing got me off. I want to share it with everybody. I want them to feel dope too. I think a lot of art maybe today is, uh, shared from the place of I want to be cool, everybody look at me. But when it's shared from the place of like this did the thing for me, I want you to feel it too. That's when you get magic. You know what I'm saying. It makes sense.
01:16:10 - Mel (Host)
I guess, yeah, I'm really not an artist in that way and I've never really cared to share my stuff and that's why I'm always so fascinated when people are so confident about themselves to share their like heart there. They're putting so much attention and, like he said, he's been doing this for like months already. Right, and like if I worked on something for months, I don't know if I want to share it or not.
01:16:38 - Aaron (Host)
I don't like I work on like but if it, if, if it, when it was completed, like you were like oh wow, look at that.
01:16:47 - Mel (Host)
But again it goes back to confidence and like I don't know, like, why do people want to give a shit about what I'm doing? Like it's I that I always think, that I always think that is. And in regards to a medium, in regards to a medium, you know, I mean I.
01:17:02 - Aaron (Host)
I can honestly say like at the beginning of doing no simple road, my focus was on the finished product and what people would think of it.
01:17:12
Right, and somewhere along the way I it was the same with playing guitar it was I always would stop because I wasn't good enough, because I wanted other people to think I was good so it wasn't necessarily for yourself, yeah, and then at some point, I mean both things turned inward and it was like no, this thing is for me and it's exciting, and so like, with this, with doing no simple road, I'm having the conversation I want to have with the person I think is interesting. You, me, apple, we do the thing together and I'm not even thinking about like I wonder what people are going to think about this conversation. I'm like that was dope, I'm going to share it.
01:17:58 - Mel (Host)
But now okay, but you've got over the hump of should I share it or shouldn't I share it. I'm always, like I said, flabbergasted that somebody will create something and immediately want to share it Like that, in itself, to me, is like a huge confidence.
01:18:20 - Aaron (Host)
That's a magnanimous heart. When it's coming from a pure place, that's like, like I said, that's pure.
01:18:25 - Mel (Host)
No, it's not about purity or not purity period. I'm just sharing something that like look at this, like I want you to hear that.
01:18:33 - AJ (Guest)
That right, that's what I'm saying.
01:18:36 - Mel (Host)
It's not about. It doesn't have to be spiritual or the coolest thing or the worst thing I'm talking about just the fact that other people yes period.
01:18:45
You want other eyes or other ears on your medium. That to me is incredible Cause I don't feel that way. I hide all of my things I do like nobody knows. I have some really dope stuff that I just and I'm not saying this to like for people to like be like Mel you should share. No, this is how my brain is. I got you, it's just how it like it to me. His artistry is also in the fact that he shares his art. That's true with all artists, I know.
01:19:14
It's like doing this you know, no Simple Road. I still haven't gotten over that part.
01:19:22 - Aaron (Host)
Well, I mean, think about the collage you made for Adam and like that's art, which we're going to mail out today, straight up, that's art, it's one of the coolest things I've ever seen you make. And I even said to you that day I was like how does it feel to be an artist? And you're like, well, I've been one for a long.
01:19:39 - Mel (Host)
Well, okay, but even okay, I'm glad you brought that a perfect example. I do think it's beautiful, I definitely put a lot of love into it, but like I don't care to show anybody that I want adam to have it, I'm not like, oh, let's make prints and I'll make birthday cards of this or what, like, what you could, which I, and that's what my client, um susan she's always like melanie, you need to print these. You cannot just give these, these. You're giving away art and you know, and I'm like, I know this person deserves it. I don't like I I guess I just never, because I've never seen myself as that. Whether I am or not, it doesn't matter, I'm not. That's not the debate. It's always been like a private thing let me ask you a question.
01:20:27 - Aaron (Host)
if we worked in the garden together, outside, and we planted daisies right and they sprouted and these beautiful daisies popped up in the garden, would you would you want to share them with your friends be like, oh, I'm gonna bring brooke a daisy, I'm gonna give brie and tiff a daisy you would yeah, absolutely there wouldn't be like I don't want anybody to see this daisy. I don't give a shit if anybody ever sees it. Wait a minute, wait a minute.
01:20:58 - Mel (Host)
It's not that black and white, it's not like I don't want, it's not that way.
01:21:02 - Aaron (Host)
If somebody happens to see a collage or something and like it, cool, I'm not putting up a gallery of all of my art and people seeing like, hey guys, look at this one, you wouldn't, you wouldn't, take the flowers that were grown and put them on our table.
01:21:16 - Mel (Host)
Exactly, absolutely for myself to enjoy when I go in and out of the house. I want to see my flowers whatever. I hear what you're saying. I really do I guess there's maybe there's like a small fraction of you know myself where, yeah, you, you can see it and it's fine, but it's, it's never something that I I never have felt compelled to be like.
01:21:41 - Aaron (Host)
I need people to see this I get it, you know, and I I am super grateful to people like aj that me too. Let it fly, because it inspires me. I'm not saying the way that I am is the way.
01:21:53 - Mel (Host)
No, no, I am definitely not saying that please share your art, please share your writing, please share your music. I am not. I have my own hang-ups. Okay, everybody, this is about me and my own weirdness.
01:22:06 - Aaron (Host)
I'm I I think we're on.
01:22:08 - Mel (Host)
We're on this show to share people's amazing art, so I I understand the need and the necessity for it. I'm just so enamored that people think of their art that much to share it.
01:22:23 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, that's what so that's where I'm coming from. So then we're sharing sharers.
01:22:28 - Mel (Host)
We're sharing sharers. Yeah, yeah, pretty cool. I'm okay with that. I'm okay to share aj's dope art. I think that that's amazing.
01:22:36 - Aaron (Host)
I love that I have news for you. News flash doing a podcast is also art yes, I am aware of that you are one third of the artistry. That goes into creating no simple road, two times a week, 52 weeks a year. So you're an artist and you share it all the fucking time well, it's because it's not me by myself, yeah whatever, I love you um everybody. I I hope that you enjoyed that.
01:23:06 - Mel (Host)
Yeah, thank you, aaron, for sharing yourself, your history, your stories. You're an incredible guy and I can't wait to see that Libra.
01:23:17 - Aaron (Host)
Yeah, man, everybody, we will be back. What? Day is it? We'll be back on Monday with another edition of the no Simple Road Weekly Rewind. If you're new to no Simple Road, that is just mel apple and I hanging out talking about stuff, stuff, yeah, could be aliens could be soil samples could be about our family vacation could be about our dog?
01:23:41
no it, it's just us hanging out and uh, yeah, until then, take care of each other. Smile as a stranger. Safety third hyd. And when you're out at a festival and it's day two and you go back to your tent at the end of the night, have like a thing of wet wipes there that you can clean your feet with before you get in the sleeping bag or on the air mattress, because nobody wants Wookfoot in their sleeping bag. That shit smells funky.
01:24:10
Sometimes people do do, sometimes you do sometimes don't marry too high yeah, but if you got a second, get some get some wet wipes, hook them puppies up, because you'll thank me in the morning. Love y'all, we'll see you next week, peace peace out.