Music To Your Eyes
An Interview with Jason Munn
The music industry is changing. Some of the change is good (resurgence in vinyl). Some is considered bad (New Kids on the Block are touring this summer). One change that most can agree with is the increasing popularity of the concert poster.
Thanks in part to a new breed of poster designer with their independent sprit and iconic imagery the concert poster is filling concert venues (and museums) across the country. One of the artists leading the pack of new designers is Jason Munn, founder of The Small Stakes.
TDS: You have done some amazing posters for some equally amazing bands. How did you get started?
MUNN: I started out a while I was in school. Anytime I had a choice of subject matter for a design project I would most likely do something revolved around music, whether it was an album package, poster, or an illustration project. I also did some flyers, t-shirt designs and album packages for friends of mine in bands while I was in school. After graduating I worked in a couple different design studios, but still did some work for friend’s bands on the side.
After doing this for a couple of years I moved to Oakland with intentions of getting a job at a design studio, but that didn’t happen too easily, so I was mostly doing part time stints at studios, ad agencies and a screen printing shop. After living here a couple months some friends of mine started booking shows in the basement of a church in Berkeley and they asked me to make a poster for each show—typically one or two a month.
This is really where things started for me—it was mostly local bands playing the venue along with some touring bands. The venue only lasted a year unfortunately, but I met a lot of bands through this venue and I continued to work with some of them.
TDS: Your company name, The Small Stakes, is taken from a Spoon song with the same title. The song is about taking risks and chances. Why did you choose this name for your shop?
MUNN: I remember at one point I had a few posters and other jobs to do, but at the same time I was spending a lot of my time looking for a permanent job at a studio. I just got to a point where I wanted to spend my time doing what was in front of me and to see where that led and not worry so much about looking for a full time job.
During that time I was listening to the Spoon album Kill The Moonlight—Small Stakes is on it—that song really stuck in my head and seemed a bit fitting.
TDS: What risks did you take opening The Small Stakes? Would you do anything differently?
MUNN: I don’t think I really saw it as a risk since I never had any kind of a business plan to begin with, I just wanted to do the kind of work I imagined myself doing and didn’t think too much beyond that. Also at the time we had four people living in a two-bedroom apartment and my rent was only $275 a month. The pressure started to pile up for me when I moved into a studio apartment on my own and the rent was three times that—I was real nervous about that one.
I don’t know that I’d do anything too differently. Things have continued to grow, but at the same time it’s still just me so I can concentrate on the work I want to focus on.
TDS: How does one know when a risk should be taken versus a safer route (through life)?
MUNN: I’m not exactly sure, but safe is not typically that rewarding. I think it is really somewhat personal and revolves around your responsibilities. I didn’t have a family to support when I decided to start working on my own, so my situation was rather simple for the most part.
TDS: Your posters are highly conceptual. You must constantly be taking in new ideas and thoughts from a multitude of sources. How do you draw inspiration and how do you go about creating a poster?
MUNN: The process always begins with the band or the main subject matter if it’s a non-music related poster. I’m typically doing a lot of sketching and thinking of images that reflect something about the band or subject matter. I sketch a lot of literal interpretations, with some sort of twist so the image isn’t too literal. Once I have an idea or sketch that I think will work I go on to mock up the idea to really see if it will work. If after the mock up I still feel it will work I continue with a final. I’ve got two tables in the room I work in, one for sketching and one with the computer and I typically am going back and forth between the two all day.
TDS: How has your creative process evolved over the years?
MUNN: The most significant change has been that most of my work over the first couple years was using a lot of found imagery and collages of images to get my ideas across. I’ve drawn most of my recent work while still often using a similar idea of combining images to get new meaning.
TDS: Your work is primarily for bands, are there any challenges to working with other creatives?
MUNN: Yes, of course, but things overall have been pretty smooth. There is a lot of creative freedom with the posters, but at the same time the client/band has the final say. I don’t often get much of a creative brief if any before starting a poster. Once while working on a poster for Josh Ritter his management mentioned Josh would like some reference to Idaho on the poster. This made me a little nervous because all I could think of at first was potatoes—sorry Idaho. After looking at the shape of Idaho and tying it into the shape of a grand piano things really began to work for me and in the end I was pretty happy with that poster. I most likely wouldn’t have gone in that direction if it wasn’t for Josh mentioning he wanted some reference to Idaho.
TDS: I am sure you love all of the posters you have designed but, if forced to pick, which would be your favorite?
MUNN: Well, there’s actually quite a few I’m not overly happy with. The couple posters I have done for The Books are a couple of my favorites. I think they are both pretty good introductions to the band and I like the fact that they both relate to each other.
TDS: There seems to be a bit of resurgence in the popularity of concert posters. Why do you think this is?
MUNN: There are a few possible reasons, but the biggest is probably because many people are getting music digitally. I think the visual aspect of bands is not there when you are buying music online, so bands begin to look to other avenues to tie themselves to visuals and this begins to happen with posters, t-shirts and also the resurgence in vinyl which is happening right now.
TDS: Is there anything upcoming for you that we should be on the look out for?
MUNN: I did some t-shirt designs for Patagonia that were just released this spring and there will be some new ones out in the fall too—all having to deal with environmental issues. Also I just finished a project for Insound designing a series of t-shirts and posters for 20 different bands. I am pretty excited about how they turned out.
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