Short Interview with Juan Montoya

One of my VERY favorite band t-shirts is my Torche "Meanderthal Tour" shirt. I bought it at a Torche show in Gainesville, FL in 2008 and it's been in heavy rotation ever since. I recently learned that Juan Montoya (former guitarist of Torche and current guitarist of both MonstrO and Stallone) co-designed this shirt.  He was kind enough to answer a couple of questions I had regarding this illustration and other visual projects he's working on. 

What medium did you use to design the shirt?
I used black ink on stock computer paper it was more of a doodle. Rick already had the Torche logo designed a while back, we used it on the first self titled. Once it was scanned we added blood drips on the image, to go with the AC/DC "If You Want Blood" Tribute.

What was the concept behind the design?

The shirt was a collaboration with Rick Smith (Torche's drummer). We recorded Meanderthal in late 2007 and the band talked about an album cover. Steve Brooks(Torche's vox) mentioned I should draw monsters for the cover and I said "Why don't I do monster versions of us?" So we all agreed and I started to do about twenty diffrent designs. The band loved all of them and we included them on the cover and I asked Aaron Turner from Isis to sketch out ideas for a backdrop to these creatures. He came up with the mountain idea and Robotic Empire printed a giant gatefold of the art. It was amazing to see the finished product. We also designed tee shirts from all the different drawings. The idea for that particular shirt was to make it a homage to AC/DC but warp out Bon Scott and Angus young into a Steve and I siamese mutant. It was a laugh when I showed it to the guys.

Other than being a fan of this shirt, I also extremely enjoy the illustrations you do. Could you tell me more about these psychedelic pieces?

As of late I'm playing in the band MonstrO and instrumental band Stallone. During MonstrO's tour with Clutch, Hellyeah and Kyng. I put a drawing of the band on the merch table for sale. Someone bought it and I took a pic of the image earlier and posted a photo of the fan who purchased it on our Facebook. It created a little buzz about having a different drawing in each city and seeing who would own it. When I came home from tour I started working on my technique and started selling my own images on FB and IG. I did one for a friend of her cat inside a tiny space ship traveling the galaxies and the emails started to pouring in. I've been able to support myself with these drawings. I work on original one of a kind high quality pen drawings on watercolor paper.It's a blast to do these and most people love their pets like children. It's very gratifying to give a little joy with art. I also do trippy images that are very 60/70s sci-fi influenced most of them include sexy space vixens that I make up from dreams. 

These are amazing! My personal favorite is "Kiss Cat"! 

Thank you so much! Cheers

You can see more of Juan Montoya's work at instagram.com/montoyablackmagic
Or you can check out his work at MonstrO's merch table when they go on tour with Alice in Chains in late April.

"Dita in Space"

"Dr. Skull"

"Kiss Cat"

"Stallone Album Cover" 

"Sally"