Influential artistry

This is more for me than anyone who reads this, but some of you might be interested. This is a list of artists who inspire and influence me, and why/how they do so. First of all, I'd like to clarify. I get inspired to draw by music, and I get inspired to create music through pictures. So, when I say 'artists', I may be interchangeably referring to musicians or visual artists. Now that we've cleared that up, let's get on with it.

One of the artists (musicians) who inspires me to create is a man named Cloudkicker. He is a musician who records every instrument seperately, combines them, edits them, mixes them and masters them all himself to create some of the most complex and mind-blowing pieces of music I know of. The reason I think he inspires me is because his music is an auditory explanation of my style of art. He creates an ethereal, surreal and somewhat twisted world with his music, and holds your hand as he guides you through it. Every note, every beat, every tone feels like it has a reason to be there and a story to tell you. There are no words in his music, he just takes the instruments and shows you a world within them. Another hot contender for Cloudkickers throne, is the remarkable band Animals As Leaders. The combination of instrumentals, talents and random time signatures, for one reason or another, get my creative juices flowing. That's a disgusting phrase...

On the visual front, I can't skip past YouTube animator and all around weirdo David Firth. Creator of the beloved nightmare that is Salad Fingers, his art style and story telling are two things I am all about. He takes photographs of textures he likes and uses them in his videos, giving every frame its own life and history. It's not just how it looks to me, it's the philosophy behind it. Using images from the real world to create your own universe is something I very much want to do, and David Firth nails it. I would not be the man I am today were it not for this creative marvel.

I have always been a fan of album artwork, even going so far as to draw my own years ago. My band never got big enough for anyone to see it, so that's a shame. But after so long of looking at the artworks, I decided to finally look up who drew them. The answer was Swedish artist Pär Olofsson. he has drawn some truly phenomenal artworks for some of my favourite bands. His dystopian artworks of a world beyond all the hells have inspired me to create a lot of music, as well as art of my own. Looking at his artwork, you can tell he has been influenced by some of history's greatest science fiction writers, including Lovecraft, Bradbury and Geiger. Some of my favourites. There are, of course, many, many more, but instead of naming artist after artist, I thought I'd just give you a brief rundown. Old style propaganda art has always been a great source of insipration for me. The picture of the world that this style paints is one that appeals to me. A world caught in turmoil with the childlike innocence that this particular style reminds me of. If you don't agree with me about the childlike innocence part, just remember that the symbol for surviving a nuclear blast was a turtle, with the slogan 'Duck and Cover!'. For a nuclear blast. It's just something else, isn't it?