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British illustrator Drew Millward is one of the best poster artists on the planet, which is why he gets to work with many of the biggest bands in the world. His work is extremely colorful, whimsical, fun and dark all at the same time. More comfortable home with his family than out working the circuit, this conversation was an exciting (and rare) opportunity to sit and chat with one of the most influential and distinct visual-voices creating art for the music industry today. He talks about his start in art, process, working with Phish and they’re very engaged fans, designing skateboards, beer labels, and more. Drew is hilarious and full of insight and useable advice, if making incredibly eye-catching posters is something you aspire to do more of, then this episode is for you.

Follow along with the SHOW NOTES (below) for images of the projects and people discussed on the show. Be sure to enter our contest (details at the bottom of the SHOW NOTES and at the 50 min point of the episode).

SHOW NOTES:

1:00

2:30

www.drewmillward.com

Drew’s Instagram page

4:00

www.lukedrozd.com

www.instagram.com/lukedrozd/

4:20 – Drew and Luke Drozd ran Birdwar Records, their indie label

4:45 – Jud had two little record labels with friends. Kansas Khan Records with his buddy Mike Rizkalla in the mid-90s; and Dependent Music, an indie collective started by Brian Borcherdt in high school. Brian ran it for years and then Jud and our podcast’s beat-master Loel Campbell worked on the project with Brian for many more years until it all ended in 2008.

A few records Dependent Music released:

A newspaper ad from one of the 200 concerts Jud and Krista promoted in St. John’s:
(Jud hand drew every poster in this era)

6:30 – Gigposters.com was a site created by Clayton Hayes to showcase his collection of posters and quickly became the main global source and meeting spot for posters artists from all corners of the planet. For many years it was the central hub of all things to do with this business. Then one day without notice it went away. We miss it. R.I.P. GigPosters.com

7:45 – We found these photos of Jay and his wife Diana at their art exhibit at the Richard Goodall Gallery in Manchester (2007). Quite possibly the exhibit where Jay and Drew met.

9:20

9:45 – This ‘Swearing at Motorists’ poster is one of Drew’s earliest band posters.

10:00 – Mitch Putnam – of PostersandToys.com, OMGposters, and Mondo fame

PostersandToys.com first launched in 2006. It is a curated collection of art prints, movie and concert posters by many of the top artists in the world. OMG Posters is the Instagram account for Posters & Toys, and Mondo is a massive organization that license the rights to make special edition movie posters and other limited edition projects. Like they

Examples of limited edition screen print posters Drew Millward has designed for Mondo.

10:50

11:30

14:25

Examples of a couple record covers Drew Millward designed.

14:35 – The Weakerthans are a popular indie band from Winnipeg, Canada. Their singer, John K Samson, use to also play in the punk band Propagandhi. Fans of one also usually love the other. John’s solo records are also INCREDIBLE!!!

18:25 – Drew drawing digitally on his Wacom tablet

18:50

21:37 – Jud’s girlfriend Krista is an amazing pattern designer and graphic artist. Her wallpaper line is quite popular. Check out here work here — www.kristapower.com

28:00 – CMYK is the name given to the ‘four colour printing process’ – this is how colour photos and other full colour images are printed on old school printing presses. The image would be separated into four colours — Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black. Then layered together they make your image look like it has infinite colours.

A moire pattern is created when printing using the CMYK format. Essentially the layered images create small circular patterns – in magazines and books that use high resolution printing you can barely notice the moire patterns, but for screen printing your dots are much bigger and the resolution much smaller — so the moire pattern stands out much more.

30:10 – Jud’s favourite screen printers that will print jobs for you if you’re really nice to them:

Kid Icarus, Toronto

The Cardboardbox Project, Montreal

And his Absolute FAV – Midnight Oil, Halifax

30:30 – Drew loves to have Prints of Thieves (Leeds, UK) print his UK work (including his art prints) and then gets Half and Half (Boise, Idaho) to print his designs for North American clients.

A couple photos from Prints of Thieves:

33:40

34:55 – Print Mafia is an old poster design shop by Connie Collingsworth and Jim H Madison

Examples of a couple Print Mafia posters

Drew also mentioned being a fan of Mark Pedini – he’s from Rhode Island.

38:30 – A selection of Drew’s art prints (no client, he made these for himself)

39:30 – A couple examples of Kevin Tong posters. Kevin is an incredible American poster artist.

40:00 – The Drew Struzan doc Jud mentions:

40:30 – Drew has been working with other industries, not just music.

45:30 – Skateboards designed by Drew Millward

45:50 – Skateboards Jud designed for his skateboard company Atlantic Aire

48:00 – Thanks for coming on the show, Drew!!!!

50:00

www.drewmillward.com

Drew’s Instagram page

50:20 – WIN THIS STUNNING DREW MILLWARD PRINT!
Drew has agreed to come back on to answer a listener question or two and everyone who writes in will be entered in the draw to win one of these limited edition screen prints!!! Email your question or just write in to tell him how much you love him, at artdesignmusicpodcast@gmail.com. Winner will be announced on Episode 11 (Dec 13, 2021).