The Power of the Image vol 1

Carnival Artist Profile: Bobby P

Bobby has been a friend of Carnival before it existed. He has been a constant support; from tasting our beers, sharing his time and now involvement in the development of our labels and the Carnivalization event at the Carnival Tasting Room (news on Carnivalization to come in a future blog).

Over the last six months we have worked together on four labels and there are more to come:

OK Limbo

Friend, it’s still you

We Are Diamonds

Next up is his special treatment is All Clouds Are Silver – our revolving hop series pale ale for optimists.

For today, I had a chat with Bobby about how he got into drawing and what were his influences. I have to put in a disclaimer here: I love the style and execution of all his labels. However, Bobby is quick to point out that “I am not a designer” and that things take time to develop. That is precisely why we love working together. It is always an absorbing process and an education for us at Carnival but the main thing is we love the results.

We are submerged into the wonderworld of the masters of visual realisation. Greats like Jack “King” Kirby, Peter Max, Gary Panter are to name a few, but this is tip of the iceberg.

The names of the influences was not something to just talk about off-the-cuff, a short while after talking a list arrived with the proviso that this was not definitive and “there's a lot more than that though”.

I don’t even want to attach numbers to these names as they each mean and represent something to Bobby that can’t be ranked – I’ll leave that to a discussion over a pint in the Tasting Room. 

Bobby explained that the process of creation is influenced by everything around but there are definitely three pillars to Bobby’s creative energy. In no particular order they are:

1. COMICS – “OF ALL KINDS!"

2. RECORD COVERS – and the ephemera that comes with record releases (meant to be throw away, but how many of us can throw them away. Dom found his Mr Scruff Trouser Jazz jigsaw last weekend, I still have my Stereolab yo-yo and always will have!). Not forgetting all the associated art that comes with rock’n’roll. From posters to merchandise and all the weird and wonderful in-betweens. One of Bobby’s treasured possession is a bottle of Hot Aftershave Bop (a promo item from The Fall, but this is one of many

3. ART that informs, comes from and surrounds the music-scene. Bobby is always looking at things through the lens of “that would make a great record cover” (soon to be an app on the Carnival webstore – I wish).

Next, inevitably (since this is a beer blog) to beer, what can we say?

Well one thing's for sure, there is a lot of wonderful brewery and beer art about. This is a great thing. Bobby commented, "I bought a can of beer based on the can art without knowing the beer or even the beer style. Why, one of my introductions to mixed fermentation ales was Stillwater Artisanal’s Shoegaze beer. I love the label the name and have grown to love mixed fermentation ales."

This is a phenomenon we have all known. It’s akin to seeing that record cover in the rack that calls. We trust the content is going to be as amazing as the label that represents it. That’s our job at Carnival, to create those beers.

This is definitely going to be an evolving feature as Bobby is not the only artist involved. We have had great fun and experiences developing labels with other artists and designers. More about them another time.

But for now the last words come from Bobby P in relation to the creative process and the don’t look back ethos he has “keep moving...like a shark”. Well if that ain’t a beer name that what is.

Ade Carnival 2021