It's been busy here at IC, to say the least, and we haven't been updating the blog as often as we'd like. To make up for lost time, here are a handful of new albums we've been working on over the past 6 months. Enjoy.

WovenWar I've been friends with these guys ever since we toured together in 2010, but never had the chance to work with them on a design level. I couldn't be more pleased with how smoothly everything went. We knew we wanted a cover image that centered around an icon, and the WW mark is something that came to mind instantly after our first conversation. As always, I loved working in simple black and white. Each image is comprised of abstract painted shapes to convey a ink-blot/rorschach vibe. Pre-order the physical package here.

Tedashii Below Paradise Taking a page from the late, great Storm Thorgerson book of "doing it for real," we ventured out into the high desert of Southern California in early 2014 to create this album cover. Caleb Kuhl did a killer job on the photos, Neil Visel was particularly handy with the forklift, and I put too much lighter fluid on the car and we had to call the fire department. Apparently they saw the smoke from a neighboring county. Oops. Grab the physical album here.

Propaganda Crimson Cord Our pal Prop gave us free reign on his (amazing) new album - we wanted the packaging concept to feel as organic and layered as his music. What may look like paint drips and splatters are (mostly) images of his iconic dreadlocks. Our goal was to blend his soul into the art as much as possible - which was inspired by the album title and album concept. Grab the physical album here.

Memphis May Fire Unconditional The guys in MMF came to me with this concept, which I thought was great - that of the bond between father and child. Since my dad happened to be coming to town around this time, I thought it would be a great opportunity to photograph his arm for this cover... and I was able to talk one of my brother's children into giving us a "hand" as well. Grab the physical album here.

The Atlas Moth The Old Believer I’ve always enjoyed creating imagery that is “more than meets the eye.” I also love concepts that allow for some real hands-on interaction. Ideas like this have kept music packaging exciting for me through the years. When The Atlas Moth came to me with a concept that would change the cover image when wet, I thought there was no way we'd get the necessary approval to make it happen. Thanks to the folks at Profound Lore, who, in rare fashion, believe in going the extra mile in the name of artistic endeavor, this amazing idea is something you can now hold (and drench) for yourself. Above are both "before" and "after" versions of the cover. Grab the physical album here.

Lecrae Anomaly One of our favorite clients, Lecrae (and his label - Reach Records), asked us to work on the follow-up to his last album Gravity, which we had the pleasure of working on in 2012. We enlisted the help of our friends at Shinbone Creative to create Crae's likeness in 3D wireframe (spot gloss varnish!) form for the cover. The physical packaging will def. be worth checking out. Pre-order that here.

Killer Be Killed Working with an entire band of metal visionaries isn't something I get to do every day. Needless to say, I jumped at the chance. The aesthetic that we really bonded over, and seemed fitting for this project, was that of crusty, gritty, photocopied punk. The real fringe - Discharge, Man Is The Bastard, Doom, Crass, etc. It was a blast getting to work in a style that I love, for awesome guys that totally get it. Grab the physical album here.

Grieves Winter & The Wolves Another album cover that's more than meets the eye. We worked with Grieves to create something really special for 2011's Together/Apart, and we knew we wanted to do something amazing for this record as well. The actual cover (top image here) features a die cut hole right in the center, where a standing Grieves shows through. When the cover is opened, we see that he's surrounded by wolves. Careful out there, buddy. Grab the physical album here.

Insense De:Evolution I had the pleasure of touring with these guys in Europe during the spring of 2012. We spoke a bit on the road about working together for the artwork on their new record, and I'm stoked that we were able to make it happen. Not to worry - no babies were harmed in the making of this cover. Grab the physical album here.

Over the years, Number One Gun has been a source of creative exploration for us. They've always been great at essentially giving us free-reign, which has allowed us the room to create some work that we're really proud of (thanks, Jeff). For this, their newest digital-only release, This Is All We Know, we created a scene made to look like a page cut from a special Twilight Zone Edition of a 1960s Life Magazine. We started with a pre-printed image and added a mysterious mirrored box, nestled into the setting.

Here's a look at the album cover we created with long-time friend Aaron Sprinkle, for his newest release, Water & Guns. The Album itself is phenomenal, and Aaron, as usual, gave us his unyielding trust to create something with no boundaries but our own imagination. Water & Guns speaks of (among many other things) Aaron's recent move across the country, and his long journey to complete this record. Our idea was to represent two polarizing landscapes using abstract shapes. In this case, all pre-printed materials from vintage magazines. Buy this record.

We had the great privilege and honor of speaking at LEGO's internal Design Camp last week - a day away from the office for the creative team in beautiful Enfield, Connecticut. Scott Decoteau, along with the talented and generous crew at LEGO, were gracious hosts during our time in New England. Highlights of the trip included the LEGO HQ tour (wow), dangerously delicious indian food, bowling and sharing sentimental stories about the infamous drawstring denim LEGO bag.

To commemorate our talk, we decided to make some things. One of them being a poster of us creating our new mark out of 4,236 bricks - flown in from all over the world. After 2 hot days, 1 broken mallet (don't ask), 6 iced coffees and 3 blisters, the mosaic came to life. Extra special thanks to LEGO for supplying the baseplates.

Unfortunately these posters and prints are not for sale, but who knows - we may throw some in future IC poster orders ...

Here's our album cover for the one, the only Andy Mineo. Heroes For Sale arrives on April 16th. To be continued...

Here's our cover for Lecrae's much-anticipated new album Gravity. We've been fans of what Reach Records has been doing for years  - so we're pretty excited to be part of this record. And Church Clothes has been on repeat in the studio since it dropped.

Check out the cover we just wrapped up for Sold State newcomers The Overseer.

Well, The Spit Swap has come and gone. The 2-night stint with yours truly in Portland and Mr. Draplin laying it down in Seattle was one for the record books. Portland, I can't thank you enough for cruising out to The Ace to watch me sweat it out up there as I attempted to tell our scattered story. It was a fun night of sharing great conversations with real folks. I had a blast. And Portland - your art, design and illustration community is one to be envied. Hats off to you nice people ... Massive high-fives to Eric Hillerns for the hospitality and for dreaming this baby up. Seriously. Aaron Draplin (and family!) for the obvious reasons. The man has talent in about a zillion areas, including the English language. But you guys knew that.

And of course The Ace Hotel, Lloyd Winter, Duane King, 52 Limited, Always With Honor, Portland AIGA, Fort Port ... the list goes on. Thanks to everyone who helped out, brought beer, food, tweeted, you name it. THANK YOU!

A few rad shots of the night, courtesy of long-time broseph Mr. Arges:

We stopped by the mighty W+K to visit one helluva guy Lloyd Winter and to apparently have our socks knocked off by the sheer awesomeness in that building. Wow.

"Yup, that's a bear"

Before the gig started, we stopped by Instrument's new spot to see our buds and visit the infamous teepees. Incredible space. Incredible talent.

J.D. and Vince giving us the tour ...

"Is this thing on?"

We meet at last ...

Tyler and Elsa from Always With Honor with a touching and funny introduction ... thanks again, guys.

Zac strong-arming folks into buying paper and sticky things ...

"It's just a theory" ... Duane, Josh and a few others hear me out regarding my thoughts on relativity.

--

Anyways, it was a rad night. Thanks again, Portland.

We'll have 100 of these 3-color silk-screened posters for sale at our Spit Swap gig this Wednesday. Printed by the fine folks at Seizure Palace right there in PDX. Oh, and we've seen Draplin's poster. Get ready, Washingtonians.

It's 100% official and tickets are now available. Draplin and I will be riding the rails and corrupting each other's respective cities October 19th & 20th.

Something awesome is unraveling. IC vs. DDC. Portland and Seattle. October 19th and 20th.

Our buddy Josh surprised us with a nice little gift last Saturday in San Diego. Killer engraving by Garrett Patz.

Last year, our buddy Josh Higgins asked if we'd cruise down to his city sometime to tell our story and flash some .jpg's on a big screen. We happily agreed, so here we are. We're excited to bring our dog and pony show to the beautiful city of San Diego on April 2nd. We'll be speaking at the legendary Casbah club, but what we're most excited about is The Black Heart Procession will be joining us to shut down the evening. Oh, and a little bonus for you early birds: The first 200 folks through the door get an 18" x 24" silk-screened poster, namely the one you see above. Tickets are $10 advance/$12 day of show and you can purchase them here.

Check out your local newsstands now for the new issue of Revolver Magazine, featuring Zakk Wylde. We did the photo-illustration work for the cover and the feature, which meant many hours of cutting out little demon people to create the elaborate scenes. The cover image itself pays homage to recently deceased Frank Frazetta's classic artwork.

Check out our new post over at Headbangers Blog, in which we explain the process of creating imagery for the April, 2009 issue of Revolver magazine, featuring metal heavyweights Lamb Of God. Feel the wrath!

Here is a cover that we did for a documentary about The Doors, titled "When You're Strange." Unfortunately this cover was rejected when it turned out that the band just "wanted a band photo" instead. We thought we'd show it to you anyway, as we're rather fond of it.

Here's the cover for Demon Hunter's new "Live In Nashville" record. For this album cover we wanted to execute our "demon skull" logo (which graces every DH cover) in a new and unique way. If you focus on the black negative space, you'll see it. Album available January 27th!

Just finishing up the artwork for new Solid State band, The Ascendicate. This is actually a band that I sought out and recently helped sign to the label. I'm very excited for the release of this record. The above image is the final cover (sans sticker, which displays the band name, album title).

Here's a glimpse at some imagery that we're working on for the new record by Becoming The Archetype, titled "Dichotomy." The theme of the album is loosely based on C.S. Lewis' "The Hideous Strength," wherein Lewis writes of the dichotomy between man and machine. Brutal! Oh, and the album slays. Buy it November 25th!