Profiile Of An Artist w/ D. Norsen Interview
Are you originally from Waltham, MA? What was your childhood like growing up?
I grew up in a small rural Western New York town called Caledonia. Literally no stop light - only a monument in the center of town that directed traffic. It is not well known by any means other than the nation’s first Fish Hatchery is located there, Teddy Roosevelt dedicated the aforementioned monument and a former classmate became a WWE wrestler. I had a pretty generic 80/90s middle class upbringing. There was not much going on culturally at all in my town but fortunately I had some friends whose older siblings and/or parents who hipped us to cool stuff. We never traveled internationally, but my parents would take us to Toronto pretty frequently and other cities up and down the eastern seaboard. Rochester was only 30 minutes away and by the time I was a teen with a driver's license I took every opportunity to go to all the record and book stores almost daily!
When did you first begin to fall in love with music/art and what was it that initially fascinated you about it?
My mother let me buy my first tape when I was 8 years old - The Rolling Stones’ Through the Past, Darkly (Big Hits Vol. 2) then I just started really accumulating them quickly at the local store which had a rack of like $2-3 classic rock stuff. Aerosmith, AC/DC… etc were all early favs and I pretty much instantly was a collector. When I was 12 I got a boom box with a cd player and it was pretty much the end of my wallet. It also coupled with hanging with some new friends who had siblings and parents who had a really eclectic taste. It was then I heard The Residents for the first time as a friend's dad had a stash of their records and he heard of playing Primus’ covers of their songs one Friday night. Staring at those records really took me to another world.
Was this relevant around your household growing up? Do you have any siblings?
My parents had a small record collection - nothing crazy. Pretty much a quintessential 70s collection with everything from Jim Croce to Black Sabbath. They didn’t discourage listening to any kind of music at all - so I had things with parental advisory labels that other friends' parents would not let them have. Which made it easy to swap things with friends to hear more stuff. I have a younger brother who isn’t an artist but, is extremely crafty with beer and has won several awards. He loves music too and we try to see concerts together whenever we can. I took him to his first concerts - Phish and Ween. As a result he is one of the few of his friends that can say he saw 1.0 era Phish haha.
What would you and your friends do for fun growing up? When and where did you see your first concert and what kind of impact did that leave on you? Who were some of your earliest influences as far as bands/artists?
The typical shenanigans. Stay up late watching MTV and SNL. Ride our bikes all across the county just because we could as our parents didn’t care what we did as long as we were home for dinner. Total latch key kid situation for sure. Lots of backyard baseball and football until we got too old and found weed and doing dumber stuff. Ha! My first real concert was Phish on 8/14/1997 which is well known as the show that Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters showed up as. It was very surreal as I was into the Dead and knew about the whole early acid scene with Kesey, so it was truly like getting indoctrinated in both worlds that night. The usual The Rolling Stones, The Beatles, AC/DC, Aerosmith then like Nirvana, Pearl Jam and other alternative grunge type bands. Little later definitely The Grateful Dead, Phish, The Residents, Morphine, Miles Davis, John Coltrane… I started working at a record store my first year of college and I had a few customers that showed me to bands beyond those worlds including CAN, John Fahey, really out there free jazz…etc. That’s when my taste took a real left turn though I still love classic rock ALOT!
You have contributed work to so many great acts; it's insane! DMB, Grateful Dead, Light In The Attic, Hot Tuna, War On Drugs, the list goes on. How do you prepare for a project whether it's an album/t-shirt/poster, etc. What are your main mediums and when did you really begin to dial in your craft and unique approach?
I work in a pretty adhoc way - I am constantly collecting stuff that I think can be ‘collaged’ together both physically and digitally. I’ll scan or photograph them then tweak/rework/etc. them in photoshop and illustrator. It is not really a logical way to work but it works for me. I have had two phases to my career - when I was younger I worked in the sneaker world as an Art Director while moonlighting design for various bands and friends. I was laid off in 2017 and I was like why the hell am I wasting my time working for companies that could care less about me? So I made a conscious effort to really become a freelancer and I already was pretty well on the path to becoming a full-time thing, but the pandemic hit and I really just put my head down and worked, worked, worked until people started to really notice I had something going on. I feel guilty sometimes admitting that the pandemic worked for me while many others struggled, but I am of the ilk I would rather be busy than bored as idle hands are the devil’s playground… etc, etc, etc.
What do you love the most about making art for folks and everyone you’ve worked with over the years? Do you have any other passions outside of music and graphic design?
I love that everyday is different. Some are really chaotic as I am chasing deadlines or an idea. While some days are mellow and I am just casually trying new things with clients who are open to my ideas. I am lucky to have a wide breadth of clients who release things from jazz to indie rock to experimental to psychedelic, or whatever. I never feel pigeon-holed by any means. For example last week I was working on a psychedelic inspired poster for a golf magazine, a 1980s funk record and merch for one of my main clients - Smithsonian Folkways. Never a dull moment! I collect a lot of counterculture ephemera, be it magazines, comix, posters, etc. I like mowing our lawn, watching documentaries and being lazy when I can, which is hard with two kids, a wife and a few animals.
Are you working on anything, or have any plans for 2023 as we enter Spring/Summer? Is there anything else you would like to further share with the readers?
There is ALOT of stuff that is going to be announced in the next months that I have been involved with since last year and early this year that I unfortunately can’t share yet but I am proud of it all. At this point I have an idea of what my summer looks like too and its pretty wild. When I was laid off I started seeing a therapist and we had an analogy for when I would discuss my fears about becoming a freelance artist. Which was about standing at the deep end of a pool. I started with my toe, then a leg, then my torso and finally a swim. Now it feels like a cannonball. Don’t be afraid to sink or swim as we are all doing it everyday with every part of our lives and you don’t know it until you try.
