Interview: Canadian Sign Painter John Lennig of Big Top Sign Arts

Sean and John talk coffee, sign painting, the vinyl years, world travel and paint brush choices.

More info on John Lennig: ⁠http://www.bigtopsignarts.com/

Transcription:

Coming to you from Starr Studios in Denison, Texas, this is Coffee with a Signpainter, a weekly podcast hosted by sign painter, Sean Starr, that consists of interviews with other sign painters and some of the customers and characters Sean comes across while running his studio. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to Coffee with a Signpainter. Kind of, feeling a little rejuvenated. I, last week's episode, the the changes episode, I think I was sorting through some things, and I think that's a good thing to do.

But, I wanted to give a shout out to Chris DeBell. He, he reached out to me and we started talking, after that episode and he kind of, gave me a boost and a pep talk that was much needed. And I appreciate that a lot. We also got a lot of really nice comments, from that episode. So it's good.

It's good. I, I got a little discouraged, you know, just, the time constraints of trying to do this combined with a little bit of, criticism, you know, so whatever Back on track. Here we are. Got another episode. I'm gonna be talking to, John Lennig today who, for those of you aware of John, he's up in British Columbia and he's been painting signs for, I believe fifty years.

And he's just an incredible guy. He's not only an incredible artist, but he's just one of those people that, well, you'll see when when I talk to him, you'll you'll see he's just a really neat person and, very insightful, thoughtful person. But you know, all of this has, has led me in, in the last week through kind of a, a series of, thoughts and ideas and things about the show and things about, you know, where to go from here. And, I don't know. Maybe that's why I did the changes episode.

I must have intuitively known I was going through some changes, but, I don't know. Something struck me this morning that, I I wanna I wanna put out there. I wanna see, like, how many others feel this way is there's kind of this I think artists, they look at the world around them, they see that they're different, and they kinda wanna create a bubble for themselves. That's been my experience. That's what I've observed with others, working in the artistic field.

And it's kind of, I don't know. It's kind of a weird thought. It just, you know, it struck me the other day when I was working on a, storefront on Main Street here in our little town of just, this this entire process of doing this podcast and social media and everything else, is kind of this constant struggle to maintain the bubble. And yet share what you do. But it's it's kind of a weird deal because, I don't I don't want too many people in that bubble.

I mean, as as excited I as I am that this show has been embraced and and shared so much, I kinda I kinda wanna keep it limited to where it's just us, you know? I I like knowing that there are like minded people out there, listening to the show and they interact and they they send messages and post things on on Instagram and tag us. And and that's cool because I I look at those and even the ones that I don't know, I look at those and I'm like, okay, that's cool. I've never met this person. I've never talked to them, but yeah, we're on the same page.

You know, I could probably hang out with them. So that's kind of the, I don't know. It's the double edged sword. I mean, the accessibility is there with something like a podcast to, to get out there and share it, but I kind of want to keep it. I kinda wanna keep it small scale, you know, keep out everybody else.

But I I guess that's not reasonable. Probably doesn't work that way, but, you know, I'm just curious to see if any of any of you else feel that way. So we're gonna be, talking to John Lennick today. John's a buddy of mine. We've, I think we'll end up covering this, but I I think it was probably 2009 that, he came down to San Francisco when we had our studio there and spent some time with my wife and I and, taught us some invaluable things about gold leafing and, you know, we had a a really good visit.

And then later, I invited John down with some others, when they were shooting the sign painter movie. We had a little letterhead meet in my studio in Big Bear, California. And, so kinda kinda neat to be able to interview one of my, one of my heroes of the trade, not only of the trade, but just as a, just as a really neat human being. Or any anyone that that has gotten to know John will testify that, he's a neat guy. So, without further ado, let's, let's talk to my buddy, John.

So how are you, John? I'm good. I, to go to sleep last night, although I don't oh, yeah. No medical talk. Anyway, I, I, at different times I would, okay, well go to sleep and I would kind of go through the little script.

Woke up this morning and, man, I got thirty three years ago. I'm gonna have to speed this thing up. So I just wrote some really cryptic little notes here, and you know how there's a story to everything. But, I think I've got it down there where I can see. Yeah.

I picked up a brush. I painted, but that is still doing it. Alright. So, we we talked yesterday on the phone, and you you were giving me a little bit of crap about my changes episode because it was kind of a down rush. I was just yeah.

I I was heard you, you know, towards the end of it, and you were you were kinda like, yeah. This is the way it goes. And and then that's exactly the way it goes. Yeah. You know, and I I I made a commitment to myself when I started this thing to do you know, to be real and, you know, kinda just take people on my weekly journey, as it were.

So I don't know. I I don't I don't feel bad about putting something like that out there, but, I I listened to it again yesterday after we talked. I was like, yeah. It was kinda mopey, but, yeah, whatever. It was too many years listening to Mercy, maybe.

Well, and it might do some people, you know, like, like, yeah. You know, I feel that way too. I'm I'm I'm not the only one, you know? Yeah. Yeah.

That's what I And that's, because sometimes you can feel that when I Okay, John. You can't be eating celery or doing whatever you're doing because that's, making Oh, is it coming through? Noise. Yeah. So Yeah.

Yeah. You need to hold off on breakfast for now. There's a whole story on that and me and my crunching I'm supposed to eat soft foods apparently. I see. So you're sneaking it.

Well, no, I mean because I make so much noise. I think my head is a sound box or something. Eating salad, I sound like a cow in a field. But there is a double espresso here, bulldog beans, highly recommended by the guy, not by me. I'll go back to Continental Coffee, Lamophilia.

They don't even have it on the board. You just ask for it. La familia. And they say, mhmm. And then you get the beats.

The inside scoop. Mhmm. Alright. Well, I I just got a couple bags of the sign painters blend that just arrived this morning, so I was able to replenish my supply. So that made me happy.

I wonder if, it could get across the border or maybe I have to have it sent to Blaine. Well, I I spoke with Chris DeBell yesterday as well, and, he told me that they're working on getting some up there. So Ah. He's only about an hour from you. So I'm sure he could get you the hookups.

Well, if he's working through Phillips, they've got all sorts of Yeah. I believe that's the plan is for for them to start stocking some. So that would be really cool. Yeah. So promoted here.

Yeah. Mhmm. Yeah. Good deal. So, let let's give people a little background on, John Lennon.

Mhmm. When did you start painting Signs? It was a long time ago. It was a long let's see. Now, when when was the big flood?

Let me think. 1963, I signed up at San Diego City College for a commercial art class. I graduated from high school that June, so in the Fall because I'd always liked art classes. I always did art classes, you know, the heavy ones, art and launch and those things. And, the class was full.

So they said, Well, take this sign, ping, and show card lettering class. You know, the the commercial art will spin out. You can just, you know, move over. Lettering's part of commercial art anyway. Hey, John.

John, let me interrupt you real quick. Try try to not, like, lean in and lean back because it Okay. Makes you really loud and then really quiet. Sorry. No.

No. I get active. Okay. I'll, here. Here.

Here's what I'll do. If you need a reminder, instead of interrupting you audio wise, I'll just put that up there. Put on, and where what am I seeing? Oh, you're seeing it? It says sit still.

No? You don't see it? I don't see anything. Electroshock might work. Okay.

Well, I could I could hook up the electro pounce to to zap you through the through the microphone. Okay. I'm sorry. No. No.

No. That's, I mean, this is this is back when I wasn't a DJ. I never knew these things. So, yeah, one week into just using number six, number 10, red sable, Grumbacher brush, making the vertical strokes. I guess we must have attempted some letters.

I just loved it. I and I'd never done any one sign in my life before that, you know, with a little artist bristle brush and porch paint for my dad for a property he was selling. And it was your typical measured, you know, amateur. And, so anyway, I just love this. And it was a it was a it was a seven month course or nine months, seven hours a day, five days a week, taught by a journeyman sign painter who'd gone through the whole union thing and Foster and Klieser and and he went back to school in his later years to teach, get his teaching credential.

And it was a great class, formal show card writing, learned how to use a mall stick, learned about silk screen printing, hand cut stencils. And soon I was doing my own work, on the side. And, then I took the class a year because our family was talking about moving and things were up in the air. So I thought, well, I love this. I'm going to keep doing it.

And then in the year, I took a night class from an old Gold Leaf guide, Frank Job. It was a union class that he taught and learned the proper way to, do glass gilding and how to hold everything in your two hands so you didn't have to, you know, put things on boxes and and spill things. And so at the end of that year, then that summer, we moved north, and, that's when I started working sign shops. Superior Signs in Port Coquitlam. Worked there a year and then my dad saw an ad in the paper for sign painter.

So you need to, you know, he was big on improving yourself. He struggled with his own. He never did find a thing that he loved doing. But somehow I ended up, you know, and with his strong work ethic training, it, it all worked out. So anyway, I applied for that job and I got it, bought a car to get there, a 'sixty six Volkswagen, because it was in town and, we were sort of out of town.

Two weeks, my 20 birthday, they let me go because I wasn't the hotshot sign painter that they thought they were hiring. Slow on the truck lettering, the paper stencil, silk screen, pull, everything fell off the screen. It just fell on to the they set me to work doing consecutive numbering on, I don't know, Provincial Park signs, like tiny little, you know, ten forty eight and then the next one, October. They let me go, you know, sorry about that. It was a shitty 20 birthday.

Yeah. But then, I just started going around the area, picking up work, talking to people, and, then my dad died and that was grim. My mother had young kids to raise. So we moved out to the valley out actually Chilliwack, which is just close by to Vetter where, where Dan Sawatzki is. Well, he's not actually a veteran.

He's just just a veteran. Anyway, So you started, in The United States. You went to trade school down in San Diego and then moved up to Canada. What what year did you move up to Canada? '65.

Okay. So it was just a couple years after going to trade school? Yeah. It was two years of the trade school. I never worked in a shop down there.

I I went back on one trip and I had to go work in a shop and I went and found one. It was near the old near the trade school, you know, junior college, Central Signs. I worked there for, I think, two days, made some cash, and it was like, okay, I've done it. So, yeah, then working up here So I'm out in the Valley for six months and I'm coming into town every once in a while looking for work. And then finally in sometime in late 'sixty six, early 'sixty seven maybe, got work at a sign shop, sign ads.

A guy named Jim Bosley was the foreman. He convinced the boss to hire me. He figured I was, you know, and it turns out he was Jim was leaving to go down to The States to work for down in Tri Cities. So, so anyway, we've got a new foreman and then I was working there and, worked there for a couple of years and then was told about, Oh, you've got to go out to this other shop. There's a lot more freedom out there.

And so I went out to Burnaby, worked with a Dick Robertson guy. Do you mean like creative freedom? What do you mean freedom? Yeah. Like this English guy that was work had come over and was working in different shops, And, he he worked at Cinan's a little bit.

He worked at Dick Robertson's. And he was going back to England and he said, you know, you stay here. All you're gonna do is paint real estate signs for the rest of your life. You know, you go out to, you know lots of freedom at Dix. He's he's he does all kinds of stuff.

And sure enough, that was it. You know, lettered some race cars. Dick didn't like to, you know, work all that hard all that time. So so and I did. And, there was just a whole variety.

Like, I got to make up sort of my own layouts completely. It was a real change from from the other shop, which was much more structured. Yeah. And then, then another guy nearby, he, they were busy and Dick's shop got slow, so I went over to work with them and then, then we decided we were going to Lynn and I decided we were going to Europe. And we found out if you could you could buy a car, if you stayed out of the country a year, you wouldn't pay any duty on it.

MR. And we'd run across some people with a Volkswagen van who had done that, and they bought an empty shell van new. And they made all these parts to make a camper out of it, put it in a box, shipped it over to England, went over to England, picked up the Volkswagen, put the stuff together, spent the year, brought it back, no duty. This is perfect. So I did the same thing.

A friend had an empty van I could take measurements from and, made it all up out of craze on, put it in a crate, took it down to the docks, put it on a ship. Two months later, it got to England. You know, we flew there, picked up the van, went to Brixton, when you could go to Brixton and park on the sidewalk and stayed in a little hotel and spent a week putting the van together, drove around Europe, and then came home on a ship, passenger freighter, Eugenia, back to Vancouver. So you went over to England and you put together this van, like you assembled it there? Well, not the the van.

The insides to make, like, bed, and and fold out boxes. Like a camper van type. Yeah. Yeah. And then you drove it around for a year?

MR. Yeah. We went we didn't get to Scandinavia, but, we got over to Turkey, up through Romania, Bulgaria. MR. Dude, that's amazing.

I never knew that. MR. Yeah. That was 'seventy one, March '1, and then time we got back into Vancouver, it was the April, because we we spent the winter in Morocco and, then, we met some people who were coming back on a, on a, this passenger freighter. And we were just going to put the, go up to Hamburg and put it on a Volkswagen ship and then fly home.

But, I met these people and and they had a great idea and and they were from Canada and and so the ship kept breaking down in the Mediterranean though, so that it stalled the trip for a while, but we finally got on it and, got to the East Coast, supposed to go to New York, ended up in Boston, had to drive North, pick up mail, and then, visit some old relatives in Atlantic City, and then drove down through Texas, over to San Diego to see my sister and then up to Vancouver. So so that was about a year out. Although I brought a few brushes, I've added, you know, let on Canada on my bumpers, and I lettered Proud Mary on the back of a Fins van. Awesome. When we were down in Morocco and and went to some sign shops.

I went to, I still got, Arabic, Coca Cola, Sprite, and, an orange drink Fanta in Arabic, decals because we went to their plant and they gave us all this stuff. So, yeah, back in Vancouver and, went back to work for that K and R signs and and, in Burnaby. And one guy knew another and another, and one guy, you know, had friends on Vancouver Island, and he said if you ever get to the island, look me up, because this guy, Gary Willis, ran a screenprint shop and Courtney, Courtney Cumberland Comox area. So we decided we were going to I mean, I was a hippie, right? I had long hair and a beard.

So I thought I'm a hippie, but I gotta work. You're a working hippie. One time, I was there was a point where I could have drawn some EI, and I I went to the office and I sat there a little bit and I thought, I could be out making money. Forget this. So, you went through a similar situation that I did, from talking to you about this in the past.

That period, I don't know if it was late eighties or early nineties for you. You had you had been painting signs for decades at that point, and then got started to get involved in the computerized stuff that everyone was being told we were going to starve to death if we didn't switch. So how did that go? Well, true. Everything was paint, you know, on the bench, eight hours a day or and or on-site.

And but one of my customers, good customer, was a Western Display out in Richmond. And their clients, their corporate clients, because they did trade shows, big stuff, they were all corporate, you know, deals. They had the they had the new book, so their clients wanted vinyl. So if I was going to be their supplier to Western, I needed it. So I got the Gerber 4B.

My mother, God bless her heart, she loaned me the money for it, and a few years later, I said, I'm ready to start making payments on it, and she said, Johnny, that's for you and your family. MR. Nice. I've got a painting that she's I've got it now. She passed on twelve years ago.

But I did it in grade and she said, When I saw that, I knew you were going to be an artist. And so there's that four b there at $16,000 Good gravy. MR. I used to love to look at it with a pen in it plotting and making all these little beep noises. I couldn't bear to use it for big stuff.

I would use it for some headlines. I'd still do the Bullnose Small. It took seven or eight years before I'd cut out big vinyl and stick it on a vinyl banner. I'd always paint it. MR.

And one time I got stuck, a bunch of Costco work. Instead of making a pattern, I cut vinyl. That was the end of painting on the banners. So, yeah, 'eighty six, got the 4B, and then, still painted lots, but but I was using it, and especially for all the Western stuff. And McDonald's was another good customer and used it for them a lot.

Or anybody, really. And then this and then I moved from this leased place. I bought a unit in a strata building down Burn Road here. And, I could see it from our house. I can still see the building from our back deck.

The Sprint. Well, here's a thing with a screen and a nice module that auto layout. Looking back, I got a bunch of old sign crafts that, well, I've got the whole collection downstairs, but a guy gave me a batch at Puyallup a few weeks ago, and I'm passing them on to some people I'm mentoring and passed a few on. But I'm reading through them all those promises in there. The one, not anagraph, but techno arts.

It was out of Seattle. It melted. It had a melter that was built and leave the this rough edge on the vinyl. I I worked at a trim line. Remember those places that did a lot of pinstriping and all that on on new cars?

And that's what they had. That was one of the exposures to vinyl cutting that I had gotten across, and I was just it was horrible. For those of you who don't know what it is, like John was saying, it doesn't cut with a blade. It's this little bright red hot tip that melted the vinyl, and all of the edges were, like, crusty, and it was gross. But I think those machines were ridiculously expensive too.

I I think everything was because it was new and, you know, probably cost. You know, they weren't into big production and and people wanted it and, so, yeah, got the Sprint. I think we kept the four beat. I'm sure it did. And then a few years later, the, the Graphics Advantage came out.

And that was a big change. So why don't why don't you explain from your vantage point? You know, you you had this this immediate passionate love for hand painting, you know, that got you hooked. So I think that's something to to maybe put in context is, you know, a lot of a lot of these younger guys, I think, are gonna ask the question, well, why in the world would you start adopting this other stuff? I mean, I know for myself, it was I had bills to pay and a family to support and all of that.

And, you know, when when it got down to it, there was, there was such a shift in the customer's mind that paint was now hack work and that this new vinyl computerized stuff was the only way to go. I mean, is that what you experienced up there? Yeah. And and the fact that if on vehicles, you know, to lease vehicle, you can peel it off, you don't have to repaint the truck. When I in later years, before I sold brushstrokes in February, if I'd mentioned paint, I remember people, you know, making the statement, oh, well, that would be cheaper, wouldn't it?

They just somehow it would be cheaper if you paint it because otherwise you're using that really expensive equipment. Mhmm. But, Which then made your labor completely disposable and your years of craftsmanship and everything else was expendable. And anybody I mean, you know how it went with the franchise shops and people buy one, have it in their basement. Anybody's making signs, You know, signs with quotes on them.

Right. They're they're material with with letters on them. With words on them. Yes. Yeah, words and letters.

And like it showed in the movie, they're flapping in the wind, you know, they're hammered left to right margins. And the general public doesn't know the difference. As far as, you know, did I how did I feel about it, well, it was gradual. I think towards the end, there was like we used to do the Okanagan Spring breweries, trucks, all hand painted. My friend Dalgraw, he'd come down from, from his place up in, up in Lytton, and, we'd paint away.

And then Sleeman Breweries bought them out. That was the end. Then it was giant digital print on the sides of the trucks. MR. And that happened with a couple of about three different people I did trucks for.

That was sort of in the later 90s. And yeah, just kept kept, you know, doing it. I remember buying the letterhead the fonts, all the ones, like sort of Mike Stevens MR. Ones, and realizing, you know, this isn't special anymore, because you see it everywhere. And, and since then, you know, no matter where I travel, there's always this s with a loop, you know, the s and the c.

I mean, that's not special anymore. You can paint it, hand paint it, but anyway, but I bought those because I used some of those those fonts. And and one day I mean, a few times I'm I'm doing it with a nod, you know, and you're grabbing and pulling, and I and I and I had this thought, You should be using a brush. You know? And I enjoyed, you know, hand lettering it and scanning it.

Mhmm. And then cutting some vinyl for for whatever reason. But, yeah, it, and and it was getting to the point where, you know, a big digital printer was was really needed. It was by late 90s, early 2000s, you know, it was that was the thing that Mike bought when he bought the shop for me. He bought a big printer.

Because that was that was next, you know. I mean, there was the only thing I could have done is just shut the shop down and just, you know, rent out part of it and just use part of it and just say I'm going to do hand lettering well. My way was to divest of everything. I didn't want to run the place. I didn't want to be a manager.

And it was either be a manager or there was a lot of reasons. It was I'm really glad I made them. I can't believe it. This December will be fifteen years. Fifteen years ago.

That you walked away from that? Yeah. That I sold the building, the business, everything. And, But see, I I think what you're you're saying is, kind of the core, issue with the whole transition is what what entered the the market was a bunch of managers. And, you know, as people that had the bankroll to buy this expensive equipment and buy rolls and rolls and rolls of all this different colored vinyl, And there was it was just this really, dollars and cents approach to what had been an art form for millennia.

Mhmm. And I think that that's what turned so many of us off to it. You know, we were trying to, you know, find our place in the whole mix. But I I know with myself, I don't know what you experienced, but creativity was constantly stifled. It was considered frivolous, you know, to spend time on a design, you know, because it was all that mechanical approach of, okay, if we get out 10 banners today and, you know, five four by eight signs, then we'll make our profit margin blah blah blah.

And so, you know, they the the shops that I worked in when I got up to Seattle, started working out in the shop, you know, doing production, and then got moved into the design department, you know, which was exciting because I was like, okay. I paid my dues out there. Now I get to, you know, put some creativity together. But it was just you constantly had someone looking over your shoulder, you know, pushing you. Don't spend time on that.

Don't spend time on that. Just, you know, just pipe out the words and block letters, you know, cut it out or send it to the silk screener in the back or whatever, and we're just gonna, you know, bump these out. Is that what you experienced as well? Or well, because nobody was telling me to, you know, I was my own boss, so I could spend as much time. But truthfully, I didn't like computers.

You know, I've learned to like them because I get stuff from them now, and it's not really to I mean, kind of to do with work. I mean, my iPhone, I can do a pencil sketch, send it to somebody, you know. Mhmm. Boom, boom. It's back and I can look at Instagram.

I can, you know, look at stuff on Facebook. That aspect of computers. But as far as learning, you know, I still don't know the basic things about using a computer. I have to call in Tech Lady Lynn, you know, and she is patient to a point, but I better not be the jerk, you know, or all of a sudden tech is gone. And I got to say, at this point, you know, if it wasn't for Lynn and her, you know, going back to school when we lived on the island and and then getting teaching job and and I mean, if it was up to me to support the family in the way I ran my shop, we'd be a bunch of hungry kids and we wouldn't be, you know, living where we're living.

So, she had a big part in this and, you know, putting up with me. But, yeah, regarding computers, I didn't like them. I, you know, I would use it in the simplest way and and, you know, graphics advantage or, you know, any of those things, instead of making it sing, you know, like people who love that, they got into it. I don't know what it's like if you're in a a bigger thing where, like, you've got somebody pushing you versus you. It's your shop, and you're using it the way you wanna use it.

Yeah. See, I, you know, I I became proficient at using the design software, and that still pays off today because, like you had mentioned earlier, I do a lot of hand rendered stuff that I then scan in and and digitize and vectorize and all that good stuff. And then I'm able to make large scale patterns. I'm able to repurpose things. So that's been beneficial for me to have that background, but it the the main focus, I worked at a company called Cara Graphic in Seattle that, in the what was that?

I think it was just around 09:11, I think is what tanked them because, there was a company called Natural Grocer no, not Natural Grocers. Something grocer.com, homegrocer.com, something like that. And this company was just exploding because they were, like the online grocery delivery thing concept. Okay. Yeah.

And we had the contract to make all of the graphics for all of their trucks that were being shipped all over the country. And it was part of that whole .com bubble nonsense. And, what ended up happening is the company went under and, we had been working twenty four hour shifts. Our our business that I worked in was and they did that for months and months and months and months, doing custom screen printing on these huge decals for these trucks. And when the company went under, they owed us hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars in the comp our company went under.

Oh. So that wasn't that ended up getting sold out to somebody else, and I don't know where it went from there. But, you know, that it it was just so mechanized and so focused on production. I remember one of the things that we did is, the ICC numbers on trucks. Yeah.

And they had the contract with Freightliner trucks. And so there were months that we would spend an entire month laying out Helvetica ICC numbers for thousands of trucks. So it's thousands of different numbers and you're just sitting there basically typesetting and then sending it to vinyl cutters, and then we'd all have to go out and weed and pre mask these numbers week after week after week. It it was horrible. Very, very, very boring.

Yeah. Yeah. That's a production in a you know, yeah, I never never faced anything like that. It was, you know, so it but I did I found that when hand lettering jobs would come along, scheduling wise, I usually had to do them on weekends or in the summertime, you know, you know, after supper it's still daylight because they were busy in the shop. MR You know, had Mike worked full time and and Ken was a part time guy, I was enjoying it, but I was doing doing very little of it.

And, then when I decided, okay, I was getting more fed up, more fed up, and I wanted to I just wanted to escape. I wanted out and ended up, you know, selling to Mike. And, and I'm just going to go back. I remember talking to Linda and I went to a financial planner and she says, So what are you going to do now? I said, I'm just going to do hand lettering.

Yep, pinstriping hand lettering. I really hadn't a clue, but I had this idea that I was going to do it. And I guess I did some up until 02/2002, and then my son, who works in locations in TV and film here, he, he was early in the early in his career there, but, he mentioned it to somebody, a painter, and they said, Oh, you should go to the union. They need sign painters. So that sounded interesting.

I went down there and got on as a permit and then got enough days. I got to be a full member. And that was a just a big eye opener. The whole Vancouver's been a movie town for years and years. It still is.

It's super busy right now. It had a a down turn two years ago, but that's turned around and it's full tilt now. I think they they filmed one of my favorite shows there. That show Psych. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. That that was filmed there, I think. Yep. And I think is it Fringe? Is it an eleventh season?

I've never watched the show. A friend of mine is a, scenic artist on it and, God, he's been living on that show. Yeah, so much has been done here. And it was it was fun. I mean, I wasn't all brush, all the time.

I learned how to use a roller and a cutting brush properly. I used to hate painting in my house. Once I learned, you know, how to paint properly, or at least, you know, way, way better, it's it's another brush. You're still pushing pigment with hairs tied to a stick, And I love it. It gave me a whole new set of brushes to collect.

Nice. So, yeah, working as a sign writer and and, you know, you do put down some vinyl, you put down frosted vinyl on windows and, go to some funny places. But, you know, Matt Matt and his camaraderie, which in the shop, you know, there's two of you here. There's lots of people. So I've had a little break from the last two years, but I'm I'm back in the game now.

And and, I've got a pending job that if it comes through, it's it's basically sign writing, but it's it'll be a sort of a high profile thing. So, but I've got some big windows to do in over on Commercial Drive using Dutch metal, which I ended up buying down at McLogans, because they had it, and it was good price, and I got it. And I'm teaching, a three hour basic beginner hand lettering workshop. I've done it twice before. It's a three hour class.

I'm doing it at a place called London Fields. It's on Hastings Street in Vancouver. Okay. Basic, hand lettering. It's three hours.

It's learned in those strokes. You know, the ones I learned, vertical, horizontal, curved, I use a number I was using a number six or a number eight Langnickel brush for that, and I was getting them out of Maryland. Artist Crush I forgot the anyway, all they have now is number 12. She said there's two factories going full tilt in China. You can't get any any of the smaller sizes.

And, at any rate, I ended up talking to Chris at Mac Brush and talked about the Mac 2,179. And I have a couple of those, and I didn't like them. The magnacol for better. But then we got talking, and we're talking hairs. And, you know, guys get talking about hairs and blue squirrels.

And next thing you know, we're talking the 169, which I use and love, but I never considered it for water. I just oil, you know. And of course I never cross contaminate. We, you know, we know that. But he says, No, no, they work they work great in in water.

So I'm going out on a limb and getting, 24 number, number sixes. I've got enough Langnickels to do this week's course, this Saturday and then the eighteenth. MR. Are you providing everyone with a brush? Is that why you have someone Yeah.

They get a brush. I'm using sort of, tempera. It's not really the Showcard paint that we know and love, like Richart, but it's, from an art store, and I I put a little acrylic flow enhancer in it. Not Floetrol, but something similar. And, we don't worry about coverage.

You know, it's just how it works in the brush. It's sort of the viscosity is not too much. And, so they get a brush. I I get I go to Staples and get those 20 I don't know. 20 by 28 or 20 no.

22, 28, something like that. It's a thin, kind of like tag board. Cut those in half. I run one and three quarter inch pencil lines along them, so they work with that and, Like how we how we learn to to write cursive when they still taught cursive? PHYLLIS: yeah, same thing.

You have to have something in your hand. You've got to be making marks with it. I don't remember learning cursive. That's handwriting, isn't it? Yeah.

That in here in The United States, anyway, that's, Going all going away. Yeah. We had these worksheets with the, you know, base and top line and then the center line in the middle. It was, like, usually dashes. And then, we would just sit there and repeat the cursive letters after the teacher would draw them up on the chalkboard.

Jeez. That's, I can remember a lot of things when I was little, but I don't remember that. Well, I do remember, you know, as I've all through my sign painting, my mother always, you know, was puzzled that the fact that I can paint such a beautiful script, but my handwriting is Well, she said she said not so nice. You know? I I've got the same issue.

My, my my chicken scratch is horrible. I don't I'm I'm not really that, that good at script either with painting. I can do passable, but I never would I never really spent enough time on it to feel confident in it. It's it's, you really, appreciate different brushes when you're doing a script. You're you're the one that turned me on to probably my most used brushes, which are those Steve Kafka sets.

Oh, are are that? Those little, beige handle ones. Remember when you The little stumpy handle with the long hair? No. They're they're they're full length handles.

They're not you know, maybe they are the outliners. Oh, well, but they're are they pointed? Yeah. Somewhat. Yeah.

The this Kafka script. Now he brought out a long haired, lettering brush. So it's a weird tip. I don't care for those as much. I I haven't used those, but Chris Yona, who who goes Pf Diesel on Instagram, he's we've painted together for the last six, seven years.

He's tattooist, took up striping, then he wanted to do lettering. He's just taken off with it. He's left handed and he really likes those brushes, but I have yet I haven't even borrowed one of his to try it. The 189 Mac grays, although in the smaller sizes, they look like a brown hair, I just got some of those a little while ago. I used it.

Put it up on Instagram, these name plaques. So all those names the last batch of name plaques, I put up two pictures, the finished ones and the ones where I just did the base color for the for the word, the lettering, without highlights. All those were done with the same brush, and then, I don't know if I put that on Instagram yet, but it was a Pepsi Cola door for a full size Pepsi machine of 57. Yeah. I don't think I've seen that yet.

Raised Ladders did all the work on that with the same number four brush. Fantastic. It just, not a hair has come loose. It's just you could lay it down on the job, go for a coffee, come back. It's lettered.

You know, it's almost like that. So Well, that's an endorsement. Highly recommended, the MAC-189s. The handle is plain wood. You know, it's not Right.

And I'll get a report on those one sixty nines when they come trying them in water. Okay. Yeah. I'd like to know about that. Hey.

I I wanted to, last, interview I did was with Colt Bowden. Mhmm. His wife, chimed in towards the end. I I thought it was a really cool idea. I wanted to run this question by you.

Your most embarrassing moment as a sign painter or an embarrassing story of something that went wrong? I thought that'd be kind of a neat question. Oh, man. Excuse me a sec. I probably could have thought some up.

I'm sure there's been some. I I know one time I I got the wrong phone number on a guy's truck that I I painted in. It was still fresh, and he he caught it. And I I just said, well, you know, they don't charge that much at the phone company. I've I've heard, you know, you can get your number changed, and it's they don't charge very much at all.

And then I just didn't say anything more and just see what his reaction was. And he's kind of, oh, I don't you know, and that and so that's I'm I'm just joking. It's always fun to, you know, just go to a point and then stop. People take take you seriously. Embarrassing things, I'll think of them all afterwards because We'll mull that over.

Maybe we can Oh, well, how about embarrassing, like, oh, You're gonna make me really do some editing work. I'm gonna have leaps left and right today. Oh, poopy poopy. What do you mean you don't want that you won't accept this $1,500 glass door I've done. That was embarrassing.

Why why I've never been rejected like that before. Why did they not want it? It was not up to standard. And I I missed out. I didn't take seriously enough what I was doing.

I thought I was there was a lot of distractions. I, you know, there was a lot of side issues. Bottom line was there was two ways to do it. Afterwards, say, I can't handle this. I'm sorry.

And do whatever they're gonna do. I don't think or I'll do it again. And I thought, I can't walk away from this. And I you know, that was my dad's old work ethic kicking in. I'm sure it.

I felt it. I did it over. I said, I can't do it for two months because of everything that's going on. I did it over. But it was you know, it it was a real hit to the ego.

MR. MR. I finally figured that out. It took me a while to figure out that's what it is. That's what's given me so much pain.

You know, the details of the job, they can be corrected. Right. But, so that was, that was a wake up. But, you know, I think I learned something from it. But, yeah, general everyday embarrassments, there's there's got to be ones out.

Well, there's nothing like the phone call you get when they say, Yeah, I really like that the job is great, and you can just, like, You know, what's what's coming next? Here it comes. Here it comes. But but there's something. So, yeah, yeah, that's, well, I'll think of others, but then I'll just have to put them in the memory bank.

And, yeah, so the way things are now is I get work from referrals and through Instagram and people find you through that and then they, you know, they Google, God, even if I have everything Google, so, that's, the way the work comes in. And it's, you know, I'm at a point where I I can pick what I want to do and and turn down and I've got a great guy, Murray Gibbs, long time sign painter, airbrusher, pic, muralist, pictorial guy. I can refer jobs to him. He does big stuff, you know, because of of some, you know, physical demands that I I can't handle certain jobs. Give Murray a call.

He's a great guy. And and that's that's really important, so that you don't have to tell people no. Yeah, yeah. You know, you can refer. And then, you know, if Maurice, that's his choice, what he does with it.

And then, okay, you're going to ask me what's my advice for the new timers? Yep. Do not make up your own letter styles until you understand proper lettering and can do proper lettering. Don't make it up because it looks it can be spotted a mile away by anybody who understands lettering. And if the general public doesn't get it, well, that's just because they're called the general public and they don't get a lot of things.

I think that is an excellent point. Years ago, it was pointed out to me that all letter forms aside from script are based either off of the old block Egyptian or Roman, and everything else is a derivative of those two. But those principles are always there with the, the proportions and the structure of the letters. And I I'm seeing the same thing. I'm seeing people post things that I'm like, you haven't even learned the basics, and you're trying to create your own type style, which Yeah.

You know, most sign painters, that evolves over years of just minor adjustments to things, and then it kind of becomes your own thing, you know? Might might be the the the way it crosses over in in the capital a or something. That's kind of your little signature or whatever. Yeah. But it's not these dramatic changes to the structure of letter that people have been looking at for thousands of years.

And it's not it's not like something, innovative or, you know, this is just some creative new direction. It it's ignorance. Yeah. And it's not telling them, look, you know, we're better than you. You don't know.

No. I I when I in Puyallup, I saw this going on and and without being too pointed, I I said the same thing. Don't try to make up your own letter styles until you learn lettering. Copy a style you like. You know, something that, you know, find one, you see one in the books or wherever and I'm turning them onto Colt's zines because those are really good.

Yep. And and either trace it or eyeball it or pencil it, but copy that because that's that's the way, you know, that's that person's style. And, it's gonna be way more correct than what you're making up. I mean, there's I just saw the other day, a batch of books that were up, and one was about creative lettering and blah blah blah by by these two people. And, and the word creative, the thick stroke of the and it was like a thin and a, and a really fat stroke.

That's how the letters were. The A fat on the left, thin on the right, and the V fat on the left, as it should be. And I thought, holy, this is the blind leading the blind here. Yeah. Yeah.

I I'm seeing the same thing. It's disturbing. So that that's an excellent, It's great to be painting. It's all that, but, yeah, you know, if you were trying to learn guitar, would you just pick up a guitar and just I did. I bought a guitar, Broken Love Affair.

The guitar will fix it. So and then I thought, I'll just start picking strings, like, plink, plink, plink, and somehow some music will happen. I tried it a little bit. No matter how much I smoke, it still didn't happen. Yeah.

And and you can gonna happen. You can learn, you know, some basic chords, but if the strings are out of tune, it's never gonna sound good. At you gotta learn the basic chords, and I I didn't even wanna do that. I just thought I could plunk plunk. So love affair, I got a drawing board, a good tilt drawing board.

Now that That worked. That worked. Now that's the way to go. So Awesome. Well, that's that's great advice.

What what about your iPod? The iPod? A, I don't have one. Well, it's it's just You know what I mean? It's like saying, Do you want a Coke?

MR. Yeah. MR. Because what are you listening to? MR.

You know, I've got a huge batch of CDs downstairs from over the years. If I would only get CDs made out of my vinyl collection out in the garage, all my John Stewart records, you know, Pied Pumpkin, just all the stuff I listened to in the '70s and '80s. And and now it's it's pretty random. There's you know, I know you talk about guilty pleasures. I don't think I, I have any.

I mean, if, if I don't like it, no, there isn't anything. There's just so many, things. It depends, Like, if you were gonna sit down and paint right now when we're done talking, which you probably are going to anyway, but if you're gonna do that, what would you flip on right now? What what would you click on as your music? Well, gee, okay.

Last night, I finished off with Ray Bonneville. He is a great singer, player, a man from Texas with a big little band. MR. Ah, well, I love it. Yeah.

I've got somebody gave me a couple of those. I'd heard them, and then somebody gave me these are great. I gave you some of that when you came down, for the That was the guy. Yeah. Yeah.

I I quite enjoyed those. That was a nice guy. Yeah. So it's, you know, there's nothing right now my job has been to draw lines on those on 60 of those cards. So that was a little numbing, but but, yeah, it's it's it's hard to say.

You know, there's just there's lots of music there. There's Ray Kondo and his and his ricochets. He's he's passed on, but his music lives on. And and, you know, there was a guy that plays the jazz trombone, you know, an $8 CD buy that I got back in DC. You know, you just never know.

I'm I'm kind of a sucker for going in and That looks kind of interesting. I'll get it. Because it's used, I'm not spending a lot of money, and I might Mamas and Papas. Okay. The movie, the documentary, The Wrecking Crew.

MR. Well, I don't know what that is. It's it's called that's the name of it. It they were the session players in LA in the late '50s, '60s, '70s, '80s. By '90s they were fading because singer songwriters, they, they were playing their own music.

The musicians were playing. It wasn't just the Monkees that didn't play their own music. The associate You listened. Unbelievable. This is such a good documentary.

That and Muscle Shoals. About the I saw that, in in the mix, but I haven't watched that one on Netflix. Mhmm. Or it was almost a prime or something. MR.

Especially the Wrecking Crew. And it was just so entertaining. I mean, these musicians being interviewed. A guy, Danny Tedesco, was sort of his son made the documentary in his honour. He was a guitar player.

And so, yeah, that's we just saw that last week or a week ago down at theater. I just watched that documentary on Atari and how they, put well, there's this urban myth about them putting the ET game, which I guess was really horrible, in a landfill in New Mexico. That was pretty entertaining. Yeah. I don't know if you're familiar with that story, but No.

No. Like like, you mean put all the the the research or the No. Like millions of cartridges because the game flopped and then Oh. The Atari went under. And so there was this urban myth that they had gone out to Alamogordo, New Mexico and put these millions, I believe, cartridges in in this landfill and covered them up.

And, so that rumor has been floating around for years. And and I I won't give away, the end, but they, they do or don't find evidence that this occurred. Wow. Well, like my dad used to say, You see a lot of strange sight. Now, his father used to say, You see a lot of strange sights when you haven't got your gun.

And I thought that was his original. And then a few years ago, I read it on some something and it was it was just a saying that people said, like, you know, have a nice day or or something. It was just something that was said back in the late 1890s. Interesting. So I, I do have one thing I wanted to mention to you.

I kind of want to get your feedback. And I kind of want to encourage others to do this. I was doing some work yesterday for a new client here in this small town and she's got this little candy store and, you know, really nice lady and has gone through some, I believe, health changes in recent years. She started this little candy shop to stay afloat and is on the visual side of things as in way over her head. I thought to myself, you know, I am doing these projects for her, but, you know, this is something I did have done, previously, regularly, ever since I started doing this type of work, is to just kind of do somebody a solid once in a while.

So like I'm I'm taking this afternoon and I'm I'm painting her a little sign for interior. She's got a sign in there right now that she made out of like, poster board and marker and stuff. So I'm going to just surprise her with a little sign. And I I just kind of that whole pay it forward kind of thing of just, you know I I think that as humanity, we don't do enough nice things for each other. I doubt that completely.

That is that is great. And, you know, it's it's like when you give something to a charity auction or, you know, you can reach in your pocket for a certain amount of money, but you could give away a piece of artwork that might fetch more money. And and the bonus is that you had you enjoyed making it. So, like in this case, well, you will take your time, but you'll enjoy making it. If you were, you were, if you were going in to clean out some of her, you know, drains in the back with the, with the snake, you know, not so much fun, but it made, it would have helped her.

Right. Maybe if the drain was clogged, But this way, she gets something that helps her. You enjoy doing it. And it costs you your time, but it's a good thing. No, I kind of feel these name plaques I do.

I've got a policy. I there's no money ever involved in them, and I'm I'm coming on to 400 of them now. And I know. And if you want one, you know, I mean, not if you want one. If you want something after somebody says, Oh, can you make this for my thing, or that, or, you know, business, or even can you, you know, then, yes, then I'll give you a price on it.

But, people say, oh, I've gotta pay for it. No. You know, I've made that so that it's maybe not quite the same thing because it's not really helping. What you're doing for the candy store, that's perfect for her, you know, and and it'll help her. And, yeah, I would hear it out there, people in the world.

You'll see situations and and, you know, it's made me aware of it now. Like, you know, be all in name plaque, so they'll run across a situation where, you know, this would help and I get to paint a sign. And Yeah. And, you know, so much about our our daily existence is, you know, marketing and money and bills and all that. And, you know, some of that you just gotta do to, you know, stay alive.

We've got this ability as commercial artists to do little things like this that really make a difference in someone's day and kind of boost their spirits and helps them out with their endeavor. And it's like, you know, I don't know. I just, I think more of that should happen, you know, and I would encourage listeners, you know, hey, go down and put somebody's hour block in their door or something and just shake their hand when you're done and say, there you go. Have have at it. It's for you.

You know, it's just goodwill stuff. You know? And and I think we've we've lost a lot of that where people just don't take the time to be nice to each other like that anymore. Yeah. That neighbor helping neighbor.

I know my brother, he he he owns five properties, but if he chooses to, you know, mow, the Old Lady's Lawn, you know, over in the other neighborhood there, just because he that's his decision, you know. And and, it's that same kind of thing. You're doing something for somebody. It helps them. You've chosen to you know, how much you're going to give or do, and, it's it's good.

It's a good thing. MR. Yeah. So MR. You know, that golden rule and, you know, you get more with honey than vinegar, those are simple concepts that, you know, we complicate things an awful lot.

MR. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. MR.

So, this sounds very, you know, very, loaded, you know, not loaded to ground, but, not complicated. Yeah. And and that's, so that's what I'd like to encourage people hearing this to do. Go out and do something nice for somebody today, you know? Use use your craft and ability Mhmm.

To do something nice that'll cheer somebody up and make them feel good about being alive. My, my tenant downstairs got a brand new 2015 Hyundai, bright red, and I'm thinking I'm going out there to stripe that. Pin stripe that puppy. Yeah. She'll be so surprised when she comes out.

You might wanna double check on that It's like that sign painter, you know, the the the mythic one we heard. Oh, yeah. He drank. You know, but once his hand touched down with a brush, oh, so smooth. Yeah.

And I would tell this story, and I still like to tell it. Sign painter, I knew he'd be walking down the street with his kit. He walked by, and he he'd all of a sudden, he'd stop. There'd be this pickup truck, or it's a van, whichever I'm telling. And he'd just stop, and he'd look at it, and he'd walk around it, open his kit up.

Next thing you know, he's a letter in that truck. He doesn't even know whose it is. For real? And and then I leave it at that, and I just hope people are spreading that story, you know, because if you elaborate or say you're joking, well I see. I see.

You got me. Leave leave him hanging. Leave him telling you know, spreading the word. On on that note, I'm gonna wrap it up. You just can shut him up.

Well, thanks, Bill. This this was awesome being able to, chat with you. You know, I, I enjoy following your stuff on Instagram and seeing what you're tinkering with here and there. It's good stuff. Well, it's it's good.

I feel healed. Healed. Alright. If I could reach through and touch your forehead, I would do alright, man. Well, you enjoy your day up there, and, I'm gonna go paint a sign for somebody and give them a surprise.

That sounds, candy store sounds sweet. Very good. Talk to you later. See you. Thank you very much, John, for coming on the show.

As you can now see, if you don't already know John, John's a good guy. So really enjoyed having him on the show. And so I will, leave you with your mission this week is to go out and do something nice for somebody. You know, use your skill with paint and brush or design or whatever it is that you do to just do somebody solid. It doesn't have to be a huge thing, but, I think, I think you'll feel good about it and I know they'll feel good about it.

And, ain't nothing wrong with that. So, would like to again, thank our sponsor, Full City Rooster Coffee, for putting together the sign painters blend, which is available at their website, fullcityrooster.com. Getting lots of good feedback. People are enjoying it and, you can order your own right through their website. And, so this wraps it up.

This happens to be our longest episode thus far, but I think, it was time well spent with mister Lennig and we will talk to you guys next week. Today's episode of Coffee with a Sound Painter is brought to you by Full City Rooster Coffee Roasters in Dallas, Texas, roasting distinctive coffees from around the world. Sean drinks Full City Rooster coffee every day in the studio. You can order their coffee online at fullcityrooster.com. Thanks for listening to Coffee with a SignPainter, hosted by Sean Starr.

You can find all sorts of info about the show and sign painting, including previous episodes at our website, seanstarr.com.