The music ones

Elvis

I'll start with the Elvis section. I went through a period of drawing Elvis quite a lot. I was reading Peter Guralnik's two volume biography of his life and I guess that motivated me. I'm not a massive Elvis fan - I can see him objectively for what he was - which was incredibly talented, flawed and exploited. I was still really getting used to the Wacom stylus at this point too.

(above) is from the later years when he'd gone back to performing and was splitting a lot of time between Vegas, Hawaii and Memphis.

(right) is based on an early image of Elvis - well, post army, but during his movie days.

 (above) is a rough one from a still of the 'Comeback Special' (which was 1968 I think) and to the right is a later Vegas period but it's tiny and it pixellates really easily!

Jimmy Hendrix

I play the guitar (badly) and I think that anyone who has ever tried will only sit in awe of Jimmy Hendrix. For me he was massively underrated for his musical contribution though. There's no doubt that he is one the greatest guitarists of any generation - but I think his musical talent was much greater than a single instrument and the great tragedy was that we never heard his full contribution as a producer and writer.

Incredible facts about Hendrix include the fact that he wasn't playing fifteen years before he died. In addition he was only famous four years before his death. Despite all this, look at the mark that he left on music.

Anyway, this was one of the very first pictures I drew when I got my stylus setup.

 Jimmy Page

This is my drawing of Jimmy Page. I love Led Zepplin, and for me Jimmy Page is the focal point of the band. This was my first experiment with drawing onto a black background and adding light and colour to define the shape of the image. It came out 'ok'.

 

John Lennon

This is the first  example of me showing a drawing of someone I really don't like. I'm an avid reader of biographies and I've read a lot by and about the Beatles and numerous figures in the music industry at that time. Everything that I had read about Lennon portrays a pretty horrible human being - despite his popular image as a leader of the peace and love movement.

This is a copy of a painting that someone else did and it's a graduation from the Jimmy Page image - starting with the pink water coloured background and over laying with heavier darker pop art style that looks like a screen print. Despite the fact that it's Lennon, this is one of my favourites and I'm really happy with how it came out.

Johnny Cash

Two images of the man in black here. I am a massive Johnny Cash fan. His stripped down style and his dour gritty subjects really get me.

As with Elvis I recently enjoyed a superb biography of Cash - written by Robert Hilburn - quite unflinching. 

I was reasonably happy with how both of these came out although the mono one (right) came out a bit like the Irish actor Colm Meaney!

The picture below tends to show the struggles that I have with drawing hair.

The Rolling Stones

A friend recently asked whether I preferred The Beatles of The Stones. I said that I prefer the early Stones and the late Beatles. Some pretty good fence sitting there.

When it comes to The Stones I'm a Keith Richards fan. For me he is the musical heart and soul of the group. I'm not deliberately running Mick down here - he's irreplaceable - but Keith Richards is the mojo for me.

So (below) I did a Keith Richards and it's bit post-impressionist, kind of Van Gogh (he says modestly lol). It's a very recent drawing and I was quite happy with it.

Usually I'm a bit of a coward when it comes to colour and particularly putting heavy dark shading on a picture. So my stuff can be a bit pale and it lacks contrast at times.That's something I'd like to improve certainly. Anyway quite happy with Keith.

Mick (below) is also done in the style of oils, and it was a bit rushed really. Never have been happy with his neck, but I suppose he'd recognisable so that's something.

Peter Green

The Green God. The man is a pure genius and I'm drawn to his tragic relationship with that genius. I'd love to research how genius really affects people. For me, in so many cases, it's like putting a huge engine in a little car - the rest of the vehicle (brakes, shocks, chassis etc) - just can't cope and eventually it just blows up. The fact is (at least for me) Peter Green was just the most gifted blues guitarist of his generation. I'd draw Paul Kossoff into the conversation here too.

Still the picture below, on black, came out ok - but I'll always be unhappy with his right hand (any pointers anyone?)

For now, that's probably my musicians, although I'll probably draw more soon.