A Burning Designer

A couple old cartoons I did years ago turned up on Facebook. These were of the band "August" that I was doing lighting for back in the early 80's. As a road crew member, I had drawn 5 cartoons in 5 years starting in 1979 to be used to market the band.

August rocked the Boston area and the tumbling Marshall cabinets behind them were to illustrate the band's power.

The members changed a bit over the years. Guitarist Dave Amato shown in these first two cartoons moved on after the 1980 cartoon above and now plays for REO Speedwagon. The band was carrying on as a trio in the 1981 cartoon below. I gave drummer Louie Santoro a couple of "morning star" clubs to pound his drums with.

The late great bassist Jamie Pease is in all 5 cartoons as well as front-man guitarist Jimmy D'angelo.

Jimmy D is a living legend in the Boston area and in the 1982 cartoon they had picked up guitarist Scott Hanley.

The 1983 cartoon shows Jeff Houck on guitar and Dave Balcom on drums. Jimmy and Dave are still together in a band.

That same year, I had my first published cartoon in an international magazine. It was a cartoon for Elliot Easton of The Cars who had been writing a column for Guitar World magazine. It showed Elliot playing chess with his guitar. These early published pieces led me to realize how much fun it would be to make a living doing art and cartoons.

The energy of these musician friends was so inspirational to me and I love them for that. There were wild times, lots of laughing and, yes, hefty doses of debauchery, but there was also creativity, risk-taking and the thrill that came from the anticipation of potentially reaching success, wealth and fame.

Here's a watercolor drawing of Jimmy D'angelo from around 1980 that I may have gone a little over the top with. But to his credit Jimmy has a great sense of humor and still has it framed on his wall. Jimmy D is still the quintessential rocker.

I think I even found the photos of Jimmy that I used as reference. Keep on rockin', JD!