In an age when print magazines are dropping like flies, it's nice to see someone buck the trend, especially when they do it so well. Mass Appeal resurrected itself from the dead, first online, and now with it's second new issue in print. For issue #53, Timmhotep Aku spoke with Jeff Jank about the history of the Quasimoto character, along with four pages of sketches from the albums and the infamous Quasimoto "guts."
You may not realize it, but Quasimoto is your friend. You know, the friend who trash-talked his way into a bar fight that ended with a brick bouncing off of some poor bastard's skull. The one who convinced you that rolling to a Vegas strip club on 'shrooms was a good idea. The homie your girl gives the stink eye because she knows a night on the town with him will end in either inebriation, an altercation, incarceration or all three. No matter how ill-advised hanging out with him is, you still do it. Why? Because, despite the danger, you know you'll always come away with a story to tell.
Jeff Jank has a story to tell too. He's the. Stones Throw Records art director and in-house illustrator who took Madlib's mischievous alter-ego and created the character we see today. Though Lord Quas was born on Madlib's personal
beat tapes in the mid-nineties, Quas, the "Bad Character," wasn't visually
represented until 1998's "Microphone Mathematics" single, when DJ Design
(then known as Keith Beats) drew him as one of three aardvark-like creatures
sitting in a classroom holding a mic. Jank adapted the character for the booklet in
Quasimoto's debut The Unseen and so began the visual history of the boozing,
pot-smoking, up skirt-looking, diminutive creature.
This June, Stones Throw released Yessir Whatever , a compilation of unreleased and extremely rare songs from
Ouasimoto. Accompanying the music were some
equally rare and unreleased illustrations of Lord
Ouas by Jank himself. To celebrate our favorite
imaginary friend, we spoke with Jank about his
creative process and he blessed us with some of his
early sketches and artwork. Get to know the best
west friend you'll ever have.
