Even though this is my new home on the range, I believe in putting others first. I never forget the people who have helped me in my career and those I've had the honor of collaborating with on various projects.
First up is my Buddy Hal Lifson.
No, I didn't design his website, but definitely pay Hal a visit and browse around, maybe buy some custom coin holders! One of Hal's little side-gigs is representing the Quikoin company. Remember these?
Above is a design I did around 5 years ago to get Hal going with his first order. I still have a few laying around for $5 ea. E-mail me if ya want one.Hal was managing Nancy Sinatra when I first met him at Rodney Bingenheimer's table at Cantor's in the year 2000. We started talking. Hal told me he dug the "Brian on the Sunset Strip" poster that I'd done for the Roxy gig that year.
He asked if I would I like to do one for Nancy's upcoming gig with Eric Burdon (below)
It turned out Hal & I had a lot in common; he was raised in Encino, and I went to Jr. High & High School there at Cal Prep...actually across the street from Hal's childhood home.
We soon became close friends. The '66 book was actually born one Sunday evening while walking through the Disneyland parking lot (Hal, myself and his beautiful wife Brigitte) Hal just blurted out "Ya know buddy, I was looking through my stuff at home this week and everything I worship has "copyright 1966" written on it!" About a week after that, Hal ran into his childhood friend Jeff Stern. It just so happened that Jeff had recently acquired a book publishing company called Bonus Books. Hal told him about our idea, and voila...project 1966 began to take shape. I designed the cover of the book (with my own special nod to Wham-O in the design of Hal's name) and I scanned many of the images in there (the clean ones of course!) If you're a 60's art fanatic, especially if you happen to have born in Southern California like I was, Hal's book is a must own. When was the last time you saw that amazing diamond shaped KCOP logo?!
I had a blast finding and scanning the images for this project. One memory that stood out, was I won a '66 LIFE magazine on good ol' E-Bay. The seller was out in Ohio...and to my Twilight Zone surprise, when I finally got the mag in the mail, I read the address label and I couldn't believe it...the address was exactly across the street from where I was working on the book...in Toluca Lake, California. So I took it over the neighbor's home and knocked on the door...no, it wasn't from their family's old subscription, but from the Doctor that they had bought the home from in 1967. He passed away shortly after they bought it, and said they'd just been talking about him the day before I came over!Supernatural? Perhaps.
Baloney? Perhaps not!
Speaking of The Monkees...stay tuned for shameless promotion of pals part two: Andrew Sandoval.
