Sorry for not having any new stuff lately - all of my free time off work was dedicated to working on the artwork for Luke and then i went to a load of concerts this week!

I’m back at uni as of this afternoon, but i will definitely have some new stuff up after the weekend :)

Okay so just bear with me because i’m still on a high from tonights happenings.

So for those of you who don’t know what i’m talking about, heres a bit of background: Basically, the first drawing i randomly did a month and a bit ago (which you can check out here), i posted on my facebook just for the hell of it, and ended up getting quite a response from it, most notably, Luke from Dream On Dreamer commenting on it. I ended up messaging him a thank you, because DOD are one of my favourite bands, so to have Luke like my work really meant a lot to me. Anyways, he told me he really liked my stuff, and the next day his girlfriend, Kate, added me on facebook and messaged me telling me that Luke had seen my drawing and lost his shit and shown her, and so she asked me if i would be willing to do one that she could give to him as a surprise for his birthday.

Obviously, after sitting there for a few minutes wondering if i’d just imagined what i read, i replied saying that it would be a pleasure on my behalf, because seriously, how often do you get asked to do an artwork for a member of a band you adore? So me and her messaged for the next couple of days, discussing the size the artwork was going to be, what materials, etc, and Kate was really nice and let me have a lot of freedom with the piece, so i chose to keep it black and white (it works better with my drawing style, and this artwork in particular), using paint-pen on loose canvas, and kept it at roughly an A4 size as Kate said that way it would fit perfectly in the entrance to their house.

So Kate and I had everything organized, and she was going to come down to Sydney this week and meet me to pick it up. Unfortunately when i messaged her yesterday morning asking if she’d like me to bring it to the Underoath/Dream On Dreamer show the next day, she let me know that she was too busy with work to come down to Sydney, so i’d have to meet Luke and give it to him myself. Funnily enough, i did meet Luke (and all of the DOD guys) earlier this week at Soundwave, except i wasn’t sure if he recognized me, so i kept my mouth shut so as to not let anything slip about the artwork, and i never mentioned it on here because he follows it and i didn’t want to ruin the surprise.

Anyways, tonight was the show and i’d have to meet Luke to give him the artwork as they’re headed to Melbourne now for Soundwave tomorrow, so Kate asked me if she could put me on the guest list and have Luke meet me at merch, and i said that was fine with me, but thanks to facebook being totally unreliable, my message didn’t even send! Either way, i was still good to get in as i had a ticket to the show, thanks to my awesome friend Sara, and even though we ran a tiny bit late, luckily some other bad was on first. So we were just chilling outside near merch because i wasn’t sure if i was meant to be meeting Luke before the set or what was going on, but i decided i’d somehow just find him after the guys finished their set.

Then DOD played their show, opened with one of my favourite songs (Downfall), closed with one of my favourite songs (Ambitions), played my absolute favourite (For What You Believe In), and just really a fucking amazing performance, which isn’t surprising, as they have been awesome live each time i’ve seen them. Some random sound tech dude threw me the set list also, but some girl snatched it before i could get it, so that was kind of a bummer.

So i was standing there watching them pack up their stuff, and decided i should go wait on the balcony outside, as that was where they were taking all the stuff, so it would be easier for me to catch Luke there, or at least one of the other guys and ask them if they could please get Luke to meet me. Anyways, i’m just chilling there with Sara, and chilling is probably the least accurate way to put it, because the DOD guys are just casually walking around packing their things and i didn’t want to bother them whilst they were putting things away, so i’m just standing there thinking ‘holy shit these guys are some of my idols’. So i’m getting more and more nervous by the second, i keep checking that the artwork in in the case, as if it would disappear somehow, and then thinking that Luke might not like it and just generally being a nervous idiot, i even made Sara nervous, so she had about a minute to get me to chill out, because then Luke and Marcel walked out with bags on, you could tell they had finished packing everything and were ready to go.

I just tapped Luke on the shoulder and thought to myself ‘pull yourself together you idiot’. So pretty much i just asked him if he remembered me and told him i was the girl who did the artwork on facebook, and he did, and when i said “Kate asked me if i would do a little something for you, so this is it’”, omg you should have seen his face, he was like “Seriously? This is for me?” and so i explained how Kate asked me to do the work and i was totally cool with it and i didn’t even know she hadn’t told him yet, so i asked him if she had and he said no, so pretty much that was like the ultimate surprise we managed to pull off. So then Luke asked me if he could open the case and look at it and obviously i said yes because i really wanted to see his reaction and if he liked it, and when he unrolled the artwork i got really excited and he got really excited and Sara was just like “I can’t tell who is more excited right now”, and he was like “I don’t know what to say”.

Then Luke thanked me and gave me a hug and then kind of just looked at the artwork for a few minutes and told me he was really impressed when he saw that first drawing and knew i had talent and that it was the greatest thing a fan has every given him and omg i was just like holy shit and attempted to tell him how much it meant to me for him to say that and to like my work, but really how can you put something like that into words! And he thanked me and hugged me a few more times hahah but i’m really really so happy that he likes it.

So then we just chilled out for a bit and talked about Soundwave and how touring was going and all that for a bit, and it felt like i was just talking to one of my friends because i actually managed to keep my cool and not freak out like some total spaz over the fact that i was just hanging with Luke and some of the DOD guys, who are just really all such nice guys. And he asked me if i wanted a shirt or something and i was just like “Um wow, yes please, that would be awesome” but unfortunately they had already packed away all the merch, oh and they liked the DOD shirt i was wearing, which Luke told me was designed by a tattoo artist, which is probably why i love it so much. And after all that Sara and I watched a bit of Underoath with Marcel, but then the guys had to leave to get back to Melbourne for tomorrows Soundwave. Hopefully next time they come to Sydney i can meet Kate because she’s just so sweet and i really want to thank her in person for this.

Anyways, i got a message from Kate on my way home, telling me that Luke called her and “was so friggin happy, he sounded like a 10 year old after just getting their first bike”, which made me really happy to know that he truly liked it, and she told me he said he’s going to send me a little something as a thank you, which is just really really nice of him.

So yeah, holy shit. I probably missed out on a few things but you guys get the idea! This has definitely been the greatest week of my life, with Soundwave and all the sideshows i went to, and all the awesome musicians i got to meet, but meeting Luke tonight to give him that artwork is the single greatest moment of my life. I probably sound like an idiot saying that, but it truly is.