When a band emails you, big or small, and they like your style enough to ask you to design a poster for their next gig/tour, it feels pretty good. I've had the privilege of making merch for bands like Bright Eyes/Conor Oberst, David Bazan, Panic at the Disco, Rocky Votolato, The Felice Brothers, and more.
Sometimes, I get carried away and stray from my normal "you get three options to choose from" and go overboard with five or six concepts for a band to choose from. Often, it works out to my benefit with the band picking two, or one now and one later, or even "wow! let's print all five as a set for the next tour!", which really only happened once. This method, however, results in a good amount of unused designs.
What you see here are some of my favorite poster designs that have been gathering dust on the cutting room floor. The actual band names have been changed to protect the innocent.
If you know a band that might be interested in some hand-me-down designs, let me know. One band's trash could be another band's treasure!