La Costa Perdida

Friendlies, the new Camper Van Beethoven record is out today, and it is, indeed, a goody goody. The package design and illustrations were done by yours truly. You can stream the whole thing here, and you can buy yourself a copy here. I recommend getting a "hard copy" of the CD, since that will give you the full sensory experience of owning the record (as opposed to having these little pop gems lost in the "shuffle" of your playlists).

Go ahead, treat yourself. Buy the CD from your local music purveyor, wait for it to arrive, pour yourself a frosty beverage, put the CD on, find a comfortable place to sit and listen, and relax. Listen to each track carefully, noting your physical reaction to each song. You might get distracted. That's ok. Sit back down, and listen to the next track. And so on. See? Feels good, right?

Do you know Camper's older musics? You might start with Popular Songs of Great Enduring Strength and Beauty. This is a good collection. If you like that one, you're ready for Cigarettes and Carrot Juice, a box set of their early records. Key Lime Pie is another favorite. Listen, it's all great. Trust me.

You'll find me at The Rickshaw Stop on February 16.

xm

september 2012

Friendlies: so much is going on. So. Much. Is. Going. On.

First, there's this: Mac @ ARCH Art Supplies asked me to design a poster for Papergirl SF, a "a community art project that distributes submitted art pieces by bicycle, freely and at random, to people in the streets of San Francisco, American paperboy style".

Here's a lovely little video of the poster getting printed. These posters will be distributed free this Friday night at the DeYoung Museum.

Making of the Michael Wertz Papergirl SF Poster from Papergirl SF on Vimeo.

I'm working on the new Camper Van Beethoven album packaging right now. The record is called La Costa Perdida. Have I heard the record? Yes, and it's their best record since Key Lime Pie. I can't wait for you guys to hear it. In the meantime, here's "Camper Van Beethoven" and "La Costa Perdida" in Hebrew:

כמפר ון בטהובן camper van beethoven

לה כוסתה פרדיטה la costa perdida

Here's this year's Campout poster. It'll be available on my site after the Campout.

camput_2012

This summer I worked with my friends Babs & Steve at Hard Boiled Industries to make an e-Book version of Dog Dreams. Get it on iTunes! You can have me read the book to you and say the word "hurtling" 100 times in a row. Fun! The post below (the video of me at the SFCB being goofy-looking) is included as part of the e-Book, so you can watch me pretend to make prints on the Vandercook again and again!

What else. Oh, it was a lovely, lovely summer. Spent the 4th of July weekend with our good friends Earl & Samuel in Port Costa. Stayed at this beautiful old hotel : these spots (without strip malls) are hard to come by in the Bay Area. Did the yearly family trip to Tahoe (this was our 24th year ; we've somehow managed not to kill one another), and prepared for my teaching gig at CCA. I'm teaching Digital Tools to 20 students in the Illustration department. There's only been one class thus far, but so far, so good.

OH MAN. Also! In the "Cool Stuff I get in the Mail" department: Chris Rathman sent me a Plastic Bead version of the Space Bear from this year's Campout Poster! Behold!

space_BEAR

Thank you so much Chris!

xm

Dog Dreams opening at Book Shop Santa Cruz!

Friendlies, we're getting the band back together again - again - for a singing and book signing at Bookshop Santa Cruz. This is one of my very favorite bookstores, and we're excited and grateful that they want to host and event with us. We have a long history with the town of Santa Cruz, and Bookshop is one of the best things about Santa Cruz. We always go there when we visit. Usually we go to Zachary's to fuel up, then down to Bookshop. It's a thing we do.

So come on down, check out the surf, grab a book. Come say hi!

WHAT: Dog Dreams singing/signing at BSSC WHERE: Bookshop Santa Cruz, 1520 Pacific Avenue, Santa Cruz, CA WHEN: January 19, 2012, 7:30 pm.

Some video has emerged from the Dog Dreams opening at the Oakland Museum: here it is. It's super goofy.

OH MY GOSH I ALMOST FORGOT AND THERE'S THIS! SUPER CUTE! (t/y Carolee)

xm

camper van beethoven

hi there ladies, had a very quick (and very refreshing) one day trip to santa cruz - saw camper van beethoven play at this place called the attic. CVB is my/our favorite band from "back when" - though it's odd to say it like that, since they put out a great record two or so years ago. the crowd is a tad older, but the band is still super tight & the songs sound as fresh and weird as they ever did.

there's a delicious rumor going 'round that a certain michael wertz and a certain jonathan segel may be collaborating on the design and imagery for his next compact disc release. stay tuned.

here's a fil-mm of camper playing a couple of my favorite songs:

xm