“Lambe-lambe,” “snipe,” “cartel,” whatever you might call them, many cities throughout the world have an indigenous poster industry. Unlike the normal glossy and four color process poster you see nowadays for shows and venues, the ones we’re talking about are usually letter press, quite cheap, and more than likely, overlooked by the Live Nations and the Golden Voices of the world. But for what we were looking for, it was perfect.

In Los Angeles, when we need a poster, the company we turn to is Colby Posters. Established in 1946, Colby Posters does poster work for political electioneering, as well as Salsa, Cumbia, and Reggae shows. The big pop and rock shows don’t use Colby anymore, but back in the day they did. Their day-glo hand-lettered snipes are part of the visual lexicon of our city.

For Timeless, as with many of our shows going back to Keepintime, we wanted to have that authentic feel to our promotions. The sense that someone spent time on setting letters, running screenings, and actually going around stapling posters to telephone poles, etc. It wasn’t enough to have these shows exist just online or on flyers.

The poster for Suite for Ma Dukes is a special one. Our friend and graphic designer Stephen Serrato did an amazing job incorporating some of Miguel Atwood-Ferguson’s actual music notation into the format. The poster designs became the template we turned to when it came time to design the whole box set.

In this short, an extra on the DVD, we had Todd Mazer go to the Colby plant and film the posters being made. Eric Coleman brought the posters to Ma Dukes when she arrived in LA for the concert to unveil them to her for the first time. It’s a simple exercise in classic design, classic workmanship, and old school sentiment.

Turn it up.

via VTECH + Mochilla