Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Wondercon Signings, New Prints, and BLOOD-RAIN!

Been zoning out to the sound of the jet-lagged bags under my eyes inflating and deflating like heartbeats as I prepare for both WonderCon in SF this weekend (see below) as well as a HUGE new video release tomorrow!

Meanwhile, we just put up 5 new Ltd. Giclee prints on the Zerofriends store, including a good mix of styles & art that I have done over the last year or so. Check out a couple of group yearbook photos here and click on either of them to go see what's new in the Prints section of the ZF online store:)


Wow...this lethargy is making me way less witty than normal. And yes that sound you just heard was the sound of me patting myself on the back for my normal wittiness followed by a punch for being so lame right now. But oh well...









Direct link to the print section:
http://zerofriends.com/store/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=28



Now, WONDERCON, which is being held at the MOSCONE CENTER in San Fran this Friday, Sat & Sunday:
Zerofriends will have a booth set up in San Francisco this weekend (Friday, Sat, Sun) at WONDERCON.
I will be signing BOTH Saturday & Sunday, and possibly floating around like a tired Tinkerbell looking at awesomely nerdy stuff on Friday, so come by and say hi:)

Here is the signing schedule, which, in addition to myself, includes signings with SKINNER & Camilla d'Errico!!!!



ZEROFRIENDS
BOOTH #1125

Signing Schedule:

Saturday, April 3:
12:00 - 2:00: ALEX PARDEE
2:00 - 3:00: CAMILLA D'ERRICO
3:00 - 4:00: SKINNER


Sunday, April 4:
1:00-2:00: ALEX PARDEE
2:00-3:00: SKINNER


In addition to the Zerofriends booth, I will probably be hanging around the booth of 2 of my favorite artists & Zerofriends collaborators, Jon Wayshak (Scrapbook Manifesto) and Dave Corriea (Play With Knives) who will be located in the Small Press section at Booth #SP44, which I highly suggest you go see some of these guys' original art that is there. You will be blown away.

And to celebrate my excitement that Camilla & Skinner will be signing at the ZF Booth, check out this amazing animated video from SKINNER:





Oh yah, and since Wondercon is going on over Easter weekend...Happy Easter 'n shit.

NY In a Rectangle

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

3 Amigos, 3 New Shirts

Just flew back from NY and boy are my arms....still flabby.

I'm jumping right back into the game and I'll be signing/hanging at Wondercon in San Fran this weekend, full of more secrets than Jesse James, but more on that in a couple days. As for now, I am proud to give you....

3 BRAND NEW SHIRTS FROM 3 AMAZING ARTISTS: SKINNER, Camilla d'Errico, & Greg "CRAOLA" Simkins:
Click on any one to view or purchase:










And remember that the ZEROFRIENDS RETAIL STORE OPEN UNTIL APRIL 30!

ZeroFriends NYC
437 E. 9th St.
New York, NY 10009

Word!!!

VANNEN x ALEX PARDEE Watch NOW Available




The Vannen x ZF Watch release & signing in New York went amazing. Thank you to everyone who came out and hung with us. I really appreciate and love the support.





There are still a small handful of watches available for purchase NOW on Zerofriends.com Click the top image to purchase!
Or, here is a direct link:

http://zerofriends.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=33&products_id=274


Thanks again!

Thursday, March 25, 2010

Enter the ZF Retail Store via Moviefilms




Since I am stepping on a plane to go back to NY in 14 minutes to go hang at the Zerofriends Store, I wanted to share with you this cool little video that our buddy CW made documenting us putting the store together last month leading up to the opening reception, which was amazing.
hope you like:)

Come visit me this Saturday!


Watch Release in NYC, Grand Invincible, & other BIG THINGS!

Photobucket

Due to the high quantity of BIG THINGS (see above for photo representation) that Zerofriends & I are involved with this week, I'll subtract the usual boring banter and just cut to the chase.


1. ALEX PARDEE x ZEROFRIENDS x VANNEN Super Limited Wristwatch & Print release & signing will be taking place THIS Saturday, March 27, at the Zerofriends NYC Retail Store in Manhattan from 1-4 PM.
Official info below the photo:

Photobucket

Saturday, March 27th at 11am ZeroFriends and Vannen Watches bring you a new limited edition Alex Pardee wristwatch available only at the ZeroFriends boutique in NYC. Only 40 of these watches exist in the entire world and come in never before seen packaging that's signed, numbered and customized with splatters and magic by Alex. No two pieces of packaging are the same! Plus as an extra bonus - each watch also comes with a limited edition, 11" x 17" signed and numbered secret (see below for secret revealed) print. And for those of you not in the NYC area - and if the watch doesn't sell out - you can find it online Monday, March 29th only at http://www.zerofriends.com. The cost of the watch will be $125.00

ZeroFriends NYC
437 E. 9th St.
New York, NY 10009

Now here are 2 pics that were not released until now:

Photobucket

The packaging, individually hand-splattered by my…well…hand, i guess.

And…

Photobucket
The secret print that will be included when you purchase the watch. It's a blue variant of my "Escaped Conviction" piece, only it's limited to only 40 prints, and is a little smaller than the previous editions (it measures 17" x 11"). The only way you can get this is to buy the limited watch.





2. Zerofriends has also just released something that we are very proud of. As you may or may not know, and may or may not care, I was raised in the late 80's and early 90's in the Bay Area, and I grew up on classic Hip Hop like Gangstarr, Kool G Rap, Too Short, NWA, The Click, Public Enemy, Souls of Mischief, Geto Boys, Tribe, Wu-Tang, etc. In addition, I have consistently followed the Bay Area hip hop scene since I was in high school, from the birth of mob music to the insanity of the hyphy scene. Amongst the madness, there were also more sample-oriented and funk-inspired groups like the Hieroglyphics, Living Legends, & Gurp City. One of my favorite groups to come out of the bay in recent years is "GRAND INVINCIBLE", consisting of Luke Sick (from Sacred Hoop/Gurp City) & DJ Eons (from Bay Area Grindcore legendary band SPAZZ). They have always just had such a well-constructed, old school-inspired way of producing genuine music that I have loved them for years.
With that being said, it was really cool about a year ago when we all linked up and talked about working together. And now, after a long time coming, Zerofriends has just released our first album, Grand Invincible's new album "COLD HAND IN THE DICE GAME" (with cover art by the amazing Eric Kneeland)!



Grand Invincible “Cold Hand In The Dice Game”
Second full length album of grimey hip hop from the duo of Luke Sick (Sacred Hoop) and DJ Eons One (Spazz). 13 tracks to furthering the GI movement, based on the philosophy that hip-hop as an art form was best served under the technological limitations of the late-80s and early-90s and that the best hip hop records were made using records. Featuring all original artwork by Eric Kneeland inspired by 60’s horror comic books.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO SNIPPETS AND PURCHASE:)

Direct link to check it out:
http://zerofriends.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_music_info&cPath=30&products_id=268

We also have the CD available in a really rad limited art package that has hand a screenprinted poster, a 12" record, stickers, and more:



Here is their newest video, directed by F/22, for the song "The Way We Revolt", harking back to the MASS APPEAL days for sure. Love it.






3. (Lastly) THIS GUY!!!!




SEE YOU SATURDAY!

Sunday, March 21, 2010

"Hey! WATCH!!!!!"

"Dude, watch this!"
"Watch what?"
"THIS!"
"Huh?"
"Just…..WATCH!!"





Terrible intros aside, I do have something for you to "watch".
Designer watch company VANNEN WATCHES & ZEROFRIENDS teamed up with me and my irritable, bloated stomach (might be the illegal whale meat I just got force fed) to release an Ultra-Limited edition wristwatch designed and splattered by me:)

The watch, inspired by my "Escaped Conviction" piece, will be available on a first come first serve basis only at the Zerofriends retail store in New York next saturday. And I will be there in person for the release and a signing next Saturday, March 27th, from 1-4 PM. Hope you like it:)

Check the official press release below from the good dudes at VANNEN:





Next Saturday, March 27th at 11am ZeroFriends and Vannen Watches bring you a new limited edition Alex Pardee wristwatch available only at the ZeroFriends boutique in NYC. Only 40 of these watches exist in the entire world and come in never before seen packaging that's signed, numbered and customized with splatters and magic by Alex. No two pieces of packaging are the same! Plus as an extra bonus - each watch also comes with a limited edition, signed and numbered secret print. And for those of you not in the NYC area - and if the watch doesn't sell out - you can find it online Monday, March 29th only at http://www.zerofriends.com.

ZeroFriends NYC
437 E. 9th St.
New York, NY 10009

Tuesday, March 16, 2010

BLOODBATH CONTEST WINNERS!

Thank you to everyone who participated in the Zerofriends "BLOODBATH" Remix contest that has been going on for a few weeks. I hope you at least had fun playing around with some messy-but-clean-and-slow footage:)
Look for a new video and a new contest coming soon!

Until then, here is the $250 GRAND PRIZE WINNING VIDEO by FOREST242!




And the runner up winners with the most views are:


1. DigestedChild / Steven Payco
2. katefosh
3. iamsecksy

Once again, thank you all. It was fun watching all of the remixes:)

Word.

Friday, March 12, 2010

Seattle Cancellation

Hello friends.
Due to a family emergency, I will be unable to attend the Emerald City Comic Con this weekend in Seattle. I was scheduled to be signing on Saturday, March 13 from 1-3 at the Zerofriends booth. Unfortunately, I will NOT be there. I apologize for the inconvenience.
Thank you in advance for your understanding and continued support.
Thank you.
Alex

Monday, March 8, 2010

Weekend Update Without Dennis Miller (but with Me Instead)

Dear everyone,
If our beautiful relationship is to stay intact, there are a few things I think you should know about this weekend…

First…




I'm not sure if God vomited a specific pattern of golden bile atop the clouds along the path in the sky through northern California and Oregon, but hopefully He did, and hopefully those clouds are illuminating GOLD so I can follow those sons of bitches up to the Emerald City to hang with the Wizard and look at some comic books. It's been a while since I have had the pleasure of going to a comic convention and saying hi to this guy:



But that's exactly what I'm doing…kind of:)
This upcoming Saturday, I am taking a quick and whimsy plane ride up to Seattle to get some coffee, try to read some poetry with Kurt Cobain's ghost, and visit the EMERALD CITY COMIC CON.

I will be appearing/signing/meeting you beautiful souls on Saturday, March 13, from 1-3 at the Zerofriends Booth (#909) at the convention. I won't be there Sunday, as I have to get back to California and tend my beet farm with Dwight Schrute who is in town this weekend, but Zerofriends will have a booth there with all of our regular fun stuff. And since we always like to have at least one new release at each show, and since I don't have the power to "release the Krakken" like I want to, we are going to be releasing a new limited print of my recent painting, "The Zookeper's Secret".

Here is the info on the con, my magical appearance, and the print release:

What: EMERALD CITY COMICON
Where: Washington State Convention Center, SEATTLE, WA
When: March 13-14
Why: Because comics still rule. Not comics like Dane Cook. Real ones. Like Batman 'n shit.
What part 2: I will be signing at the Zerofriends booth #909 on Saturday, March 13th from 1-3.
What part 3: Zerofriends, on top of having a ton of other products, will be releasing this dandy new limited edition print, "The Zookeeper's Secret":




"The Zookeeper's Secret"
By Alex Pardee
Limited Edition of 100

22" x 17" Printed with archival inks on Velvet Cotton Rag.
Signed & numbered by Alex Pardee
$45.00


A little detail of the duckface:




And here is the story of "The Zookeeper's Secret":

There isn’t a zoo within 100 miles of my house, but somehow, my neighbor, a middle-aged, Warcraft-obsessed hermit named Lyle, insists he’s a zookeeper, yet I’ve never seen him leave his house for longer than an hour. When I confront him about this, he just laughs and tells me a mundane story about how a snake got into the Koala cage, or how a kid pretended to be a monkey and threw his own shit all over the gift shop floor. But his favorite stories always revolve around this secret animal that he, along with the zoo scientists, are studying profusely until they have enough info to reveal it to the world. Some kind of underwater rabbit that can breathe both on land and while submerged. He calls it a Swimbit, but he says that’s just a “code word”. Lately there’s been a problem with the Swimbit. It seems that a sore on its torso has actually grown and morphed into a visible parasite, complete with arms, legs, and “the devil in its eyes”. The parasite is clearly sucking the creatures blood, Lyle told me, mixing it with its own, and spitting the plasma back into the Swimbit’s bloodstream. Lyle said he tried to remove the parasite but failed. The swimbit is dying, but you couldn’t tell from the look on his face. Lyle says it has less than a week to live. But the parasite, on the other hand, might end up destroying the world.



Now, secondly….

Along the same coast (that may or may not break off into the Pacific Ocean within a few years according to THIS GUY), I will have a piece in the Mo'Nique-sized HI-FRUCTOSE MAGAZINE'S 5th ANNIVERSARY ART SHOW! Too many rad artists to name so I suggest you just follow a DIFFERENT golden brick road down to LA and go check this out:



Info: 5th Anniversary of Hi-Fructose Magazine
Saturday, March 13th, At CoproGallery
Bergamot Station
2525 Michigan Ave. T5
Santa Monica, CA


Here is the piece that I did for it. It's a 3 parter, documenting my 3rd favorite (not so famous) mythical beast, the UNIRKEY:



Detail of the main painting:



Concept sketch from the first time I saw a Unirkey:




And finally, the little-known story of the Unirkey (which also comes framed with the other 2 pieces):

"If the X-men were real, my Grandfather's Great-Great Uncle Randy would certainly be a part of the team. Instead of being a cool super mutant though, he's just kind of a...well...mutant. He suffers from a disease that allows him to age, but doesn't allow him to die. At all. He looks kinda like how the guy at the end of Indiana Jones looks when he chooses poorly, except for like, he's alive. And awesome. I don't see Uncle Randy much anymore as he seems to like going to Egypt a lot since he says he fits in there better and gets to play funny pranks on tourists where he lays down in sarcophaguses and then jumps up and scares people. He's hilarious. 

One of my favorite stories that Uncle Randy used to recite to me when I was little was about his third favorite mystical creature, the Unirkey. He said that in 1621, the Pilgrims begged the Heavens for a turkey big enough for the 53 of them to feast upon to celebrate their harvest. To their disbelief, a 240 pound wild turkey fell from the sky right onto the serving platter on the middle of the giant dinner table.
"GET IT!" yelled the head pilgrim. But the turkey was too quick. It clawed its way off of the table and soon had a band of hungry pilgrims chasing it into a small patch of forest. Little did anyone know, a once-in-a-lifetime event was happening in the forest at that very moment: A 6-eyed Unicorn who lived behind the rainbows was bathing in a waterfall in plain sight. The unicorn sensed the fear in the giant turkey from the sky, and acted accordingly. The unicorn exploded out of the waterfall, ducked his neck down, swooped up the turkey, flung him onto his own back, and galloped straight through the band of Pilgrims, piercing almost all of them with it's majestic horn. After the Unicorn bolted into the sunset, no one heard from, saw, or mentioned that incident again. Until years later, in the middle of the same patch of forest, on Thanksgiving, behind the waterfall, someone saw something. It was giant. It resembled a turkey...but with six eyes...and a breathtaking horn. And it seemed to be....glowing. When the man approached the magical beast it had vanished. More sightings were reported behind waterfalls all over the world over the years, all occurring on Thanksgiving. Rumor has it that the giant turkey and the unicorn were quite smitten with each other, and that this mystical Unirkey is their love-child. But what does it want? And where will it strike (a pose) next? No one knows, but if I were you, I would pay close attention to any form of flowing water on Thanksgiving, as you might be in for a surprise."

So yah…umm, that was a lot to take in. Sorry. Don't worry, I'll have more tomorrow. For serious. Goodnight.
PS. My puppy just pissed on my couch. Damn. Damn. Damn. Gross.

My Buddy

Ran into my old buddy Marlon Wayans over the weekend at the beach, where he was excited to show me his new money clip. I approve whole-heartedly.


Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Judgement Day's Stringmetal is the new Awesome

Quickly...look at this now, and witness A) how live painting should be done in a process of creating and destroying, B) how ALBUM COVER design should be created in unison to the music it's representing, and C) how bay area experimental string-metal band JUDGEMENT DAY is the new awesome. I mean, violins & cellos creating eye-melting metal riffs? Sign me up. Check out this rad video of the creation of Judgement Day's new album and then check them out over on their site HERE and get them to play at your funeral. It will be worth dying for.




And of course, one of my favorite Judgement Day videos of all time, the infamous VIOLIN HERO video. So rad.
Fuck your guitar.

word.

Monday, March 1, 2010

The Evolution of a Logo

6 years ago I was first contacted to become the art director for The Used. One of the first things we collaborated on was a new logo for them. After bouncing a ton of ideas back and forth like a 5 person game of art-pong, we decided on a good direction and their new logo was born. This one:




As many of you have seen this before, this has been a staple icon for The Used for over 5 years, and I couldn't be more proud to have something that I designed represent them so steadily for that long. Now grab your rotary phone, call up Ol' Crazy Doc Brown, scoop up your Valterra skateboard, jump in your Delorian and set the date to March 1, 2010.
Last week I got the chance to catch up with the guys, and we all agreed that so many things have changed in all of us over the course of those 5 years, that it was time for a little remodeling. More specifically, in the Heart Department. Once again, we played creative ping-pong for a few days and then, just like old times, decided on a good direction and I went off and ran naked through a field of sketching. And the final result is a nice little rebirth of the old logo. So here it is, my new updated logo for The Used:




And for an evolution of the old and the new, here they are holding hands:



And lastly part 1, a little detail:


And lastly part 2, the original really rough concept sketch:


Word.

Oh, and it looks like you can already buy a shirt with this new logo on it ONLINE AT THE USED'S MERCH STORE!