Challenger Deep
When Challenger Deep, an instrumental “prog” band, approached me to collaborate with them on illustrations related to their new album, they were looking not just for a one off work, but for a partnership lasting nearly a year. To market the band’s second studio album, Point of No Return (cover illustrated by Jeramy Muxworthy), they decided to release five singles from the LP, each with its own thematic illustration.
Scavanger
The first single off of Point of No Return, Scavanger, was a stylistic departure from the band’s typical sound, featuring aggressive riffs, blast beats and hard driving bass. One of the guitarists in the band, the primary write of this song, shared that while writing this song he kept returning to this image of a Golden Jackal, fighting for survival. Taking that idea, I decided I would represent a plausible scene interpreted through the same lens as the art from their past albums and singles. Set along the shores of South Africa, a fierce Golden Jackal defends its decaying meal from a massive Cape Vulture. In the near distance, monstrous tentacles of an unknown creature creep into view.
The Cruelty of Fangs
The Cruelty of Fangs isn’t quite a break up song but the inspiration behind it was seated in the duality of romance. Rather than default on a cliche like “roses have thorns,” the guitarist and I decided to keep the monster theme alive and speak more directly to the song title by imbuing a cluster of bright blooms with hyena teeth. Since this was such a surreal image, I felt it would benefited from a stark presentation of being isolated on a blank, black ground.
Zero to Midnight
Zero to Midnight was one of the most epically racing tracks off of the LP and the band had a special request for the single cover. Very specifically, they wanted a recurring hammerhead shark character from their first album (originally illustrated by Taylor Adams) riding a squid like rocket into space. When I first sketched ideas for this illustration I chose to revisit certain cultural tropes involving the act of riding, like Major Kong riding a nuclear bomb, bad-ass gang members riding on motorcycles and or course, cowboys. Ultimately we universally loved the space cowboy version of this scenario, giving the cows-monaut a neo-steampunk squid rocket.
Once the single, and this illustration, was released to the general public, I collaborated with Walker Carney to animate our hammerhead hero the band’s social media content.
Shimmer
On an album of intense rock, Shimmer is a sweet song with an edge. The visual inspiration I was given for this song was the Mother Brain, an enemy character from Nintendo’s classic video game, Metroid. I decided to take a slightly more naturalistic take, combining a monster like the Mother Brain with a moon jellyfish, including a humanlike brain and a tangles network of nerves.
Highly Dubious
Highly Dubious was the final single the band shared before Point of No Return was released. Reaching back to the themes from their first album and the deep sea allusions in their name and branding, this single cover explores the dangers of the deep. Here, a deep sea diver inspects a glowing object in the blackened depths only to have the light’s source lurking below.
