Next up in our series of artist interviews we caught up with Australian designer Jamers. With his bright and lively style, Jamers is finding bands and clothing companies lining up to use his artistic talents. With a giant client list, including massive acts like All Time low, Paramore, The Academy is and Cobra Starship, the man from down under doesn't have to much spare time these days. Still TFS managed to catch up with James who was happy to answer everything we asked him.TFS - Hi James, thanks for doing this interview. Firstly tell us a bit about yourself and what made you get into drawing and creating artwork, and or what or who inspired you to first pick up a pencil and draw?
Jamers - No problem!
I’m an Australian Designer/Illustrator, and I enjoy drawing weird cartoons for some cool bands. Although not all of my work is cartoon related, its what I’m best known for, and what I enjoy creating most. Besides what I do for a job, I now live super close to the beach and am loving that, I have an identical twin brother who rules, I love pop punk tunes and spend most of my days watching cartoons and horror movies whilst I’m sketching up new ideas.
As for the name Jamers, there’s no real cool story behind it. My friends just kept spelling it wrong, hitting the ‘r’ key by accident when typing things to me online, so I changed my name to that on MySpace. Soon after everyone contacting me about work started calling me Jamers, so I went with it, it seemed fun and a little bit different. I get the impression now that a lot of people think it’s my actual name, as I get called Jamers both on emails and in person, its pretty funny.
In terms of getting into drawing, as far as I can remember I have always been into drawing, inspired mainly from my Grandfather’s great interest and talent in art and sign writing, as well as my love for drawing cartoons and creatures, probably inspired by growing up loving cartoons like Rocko’s Modern Life and Aaahhh Real Monsters. My mum tells me back when I was around 10 asking if I could draw cartoons as a real job. haha.
Then going into university I had virtually stopped drawing, focusing on graphic design for magazines and websites etc... However, I was finding this rather monotonous and boring, and as I began going to local punk and hardcore shows I saw some local dudes designing things for those bands, and thought it would be cool to do the same thing. And here I am now drawing cartoons and things for bands I love. So kids, drawing pictures in class can be a good thing!
TFS - You’ve worked with some really cool bands and clothing companies, who has been your favorite to work with and who has challenged you the most?Jamers - I really enjoy designing for bands I listen to, both local and international ones. A Day To Remember was one of the first bigger bands I worked for within the heavier music scene, and my friends and I love them. I remember being so excited to tell my friends that I had done a shirt for the band, and how stoked I was seeing people walking around wearing the shirt. So in terms of excitement and getting my work out there, that is definitely one of the best.
As well as that, I did a super fun stage banner design for All Time Low, which actually ended up being the one used during the live set on their DVD (not that I knew that until a friend told me haha). So having a huge 20-foot banner that was covered in swear words that only showed up when the UV lights were on was one of the coolest and funniest projects I have ever worked on.
As far as challenging work, I think CD artwork definitely takes a bit more thought and planning, trying to convey the music and lyrics through the artwork. At the start of the year I worked on illustrations for pop punkers I Call Fives’ ‘Bad Advice’ EP, and I spent quite a bit of time coming up with some illustrations that I thought were a good representation of the music. The project ended up coming together really well, so it was worth the effort.
TFS - How did you go about building a reputation that has led you to working with bands and clothing companies?
Jamers - I mentioned previously that whilst I was at university I began designing some shirts and gig posters for local punk and hardcore bands. After I had done this for a while and had put together a small portfolio, I decided that I wanted to try and push myself and should see if I could land some bigger clients. So I began emailing a few record labels trying to see if I could get anyone interested in hiring me to do some work.
Luckily, Craig from Rise Records liked my stuff and decided to get me to do up some designs for some bands on his label. Working with some bands there, and then showing off that work on networking sites like MySpace and Emptees, as well as emailing examples of this work to other labels, I was able to gain interest in my work from all sorts of people wanting me to do work for them.
From there it has basically been the same process, trying to constantly improve my work as well as ensuring my work is out there for people to see, and emailing companies and record labels that I want to work for.
TFS - Would you say you have your own style of design? And how did you go about building your own style and making sure it is different to the other artists out there? With there being so many other artists online how important is it that you stand out?
Jamers - I would like to think that I have my own style of design, people tend to be able to recognize my work when they see it, so I would say that I do. I definitely try to put my own spin on things, especially through my cartoon creatures, whether it be through wacky features, bright and bold color choices, drawing in some weird patterns or whatever else.
I think my color choices are one of the main things that make my work stand out, because I do get a lot of compliments on my color choices, as well as people asking the inspiration for them. I usually can’t answer that question about inspiration, because I generally have one basic color scheme I work with until I have almost finished the design. But once I get to that stage, I begin alternating colours again, and again, and again till I find a scheme I am happy with. It’s not luck, just a lot of experimenting till I am happy with it. Haha.
As for the actual drawing of my work and building my own style, I don’t think it was something I consciously did, or something that happened over night. I have been drawing for as long as I can remember, and my work now is simply a natural progression of that. Transforming from wanting to draw my favorite characters from cartoons on television, to creating my own characters with weird features and doing stupid things.
TFS - What type of things do you take influence from when creating artwork? Do you take influence from other current or past artists?
Jamers - To start with, I generally check out the music from bands I work with, as well as looking at their current merchandise, website etc… to get an idea of the band and what kind of style they represent themselves and their music with.
As I said before, cartoons I grew up watching, especially the zany characters from Nick shows like Rocko’s Modern Life, Rugrats, Aaahhh Real Monsters etc… and they definitely have an influence on the work I create now. As well as that I draw some influence from old surf/skater type illustrators like Jim Phillips, Ed Roth and Reg Mombassa.
In terms of contemporary artists, I am always impressed and inspired to work harder when I see the work of some of my peers in the merch design world like Ben Lande, Craig Robson, NVasion, Kyle Crawford, Michael Shantz, and the dudes at the Black Axe who are always putting out amazing work that I want on my body.
TFS - Have you got any exciting projects on just now or coming up that you can talk about?
Jamers - I’m generally always waiting to show off a bit of work, but aside from a few shirts that haven’t been released yet there’s not really anything too crazy that I can think of, or talk about unfortunately.
However, I have done a few fun ideas for Woe, Is Me over the past few weeks though, so keep an eye out for a zombie Katy Perry design from them, as well as a few others I did. I definitely enjoyed drawing that one up, combining my love of zombies and the uber hot Katy Perry haha.
TFS - What advice would you give to anyone wanting to start out as an artist?
Jamers - Definitely try to keep having fun with your work, and don’t be afraid to contact people you want to work for, a friendly email never hurt anyone! I started out just wanting to design things for friend’s bands and local bands that I loved, and then worked my way through to designing for bigger bands. I just enjoyed drawing things for bands I liked, as well as putting in some hard work and some persistence I worked my way up. I would recommend that people starting out should do the same.
Whilst you should always try to output a professional standard of work, don’t get too disappointed when you don’t start out working for huge bands. Enjoy the ride as you improve your work and appreciate each new band that wants to represent themselves with your work, because that is a big compliment!
TFS - Finally what music are you listening to right now and what music should we be looking out for this year?
Jamers - Lately I have been jamming a lot of the Descendents because I am going to see them on the weekend. They have never toured Australia before, so I am so amped to see them play!
I have also been listening to Gogol Bordello, The Wonder Years, New Found Glory, Black Flag, Cool Kids, A Day To Remember, and a bunch of local Australian bands like Word Up, Break Even, Skyway and Mary Jane Kelly. And I’m not too ashamed to lose some street cred when I admit I have been digging the new Taylor Swift record, it has had a few plays on my iPod. Haha.
As for releases next year, I am not really on top of what’s coming out next year, to be honest I only know that All Time Low’s new album comes out January because I have been working on a couple of shirts for them. And I’m sure everyone knows that the new Blink 182 record is supposed to be coming out next year, and that has me me super excited.
Also my rad friends in a new band called ‘Burn Down Hollywood’ are putting out their first release next year, and I should be doing some work for them for that. So I’m excited for them to put out some new tunes as well as following them around when they start touring.
Thanks for the interview, and thank you to everyone who took the time to read about me!
