Happy Birthday Lzzy!

One of the best things for a trading card nerd like myself making his own cards is that I get to make cards of the things that interest me.  That's very appealing seeing as not everything gets an official trading card these days.  If you've been a reader of this site for awhile you'll know that Lzzy Hale is my favorite musician.  I've written about it before, but the cliff notes are as follows; she's an ultra talented rock 'n' roll badass.

I'd done a few Lzzy Hale card singles but back in May of 2020 I did a mini-set devoted to her.  The set design is of course inspired by the look of vintage trading cards but it is my own original design that I am very proud of.  In my eyes it really has the look of a trading card set that could have been produced in the late '70s / early '80s.  

With anything that's a "favorite" of mine I never hesitate to 'right-click --> save-as' when I see an image that turns on my creativity and love for card making.  Since making that first "All Hale" set I've accumulated a folder full of rad Lzzy images.  

In honor of Elizabeth Mae Hale's 38th trip around the sun I'm busting out "All Hale Series 2", complete with a puzzle back!  

I've decided this'll be an ongoing project.  I already have a Series 3 ready to print and a Series 4 in the works.

 

All Hale

If this is your first time seeing my custom card blog you should know I'm a big fan of Lzzy Hale.  If this is not your first time reading the blog you're most likely sick of reading that I'm a big fan of Lzzy Hale -- seeing as this will be the 4th time I've done an entry about cards I've made of her.

Why I love Lzzy so much is that not only is she a badass but she's also an awesome human being.  I've said for a long time that, to me, Dave Grohl is the coolest guy in rock 'n' roll and I am of the opinion Lzzy is the female Dave Grohl in the way that she's a cool person that just so happens to be a rock star.  Any interview I've read or watched, any fan interaction I've ever read about or seen she's truly a down-to-earth class act. So there's that, which is enough, but I also love the music she and her band Halestorm make and also let's not pretend she's not easy on the eyes.

I got it in my head that I wanted to make a Lzzy Hale mini-set.  I originally wanted to make it a 9 card set to display nicely in a 9 pocket card binder sheet.  The problem was I was able to narrow down my favorite 10 Lzzy pics but couldn't leave any one of the 10 off, so... it's 10 cards.

The set isn't a direct homage to a particular vintage card set but it does get some inspiration from the 1978 Donruss Kiss set both at the top of the frame and the font used for the "Lzzy Hale" design in the lower right.  I thought that font would be fitting because to me it resembles the lettering on Lzzy's guitar strap.  I wanted to incorporate Lzzy's signature Epiphone Explorer guitar into the design so I made it a part of the frame.  I was originally going to make all of the frames the same color but as a nod to Lzzy's championing of equality I used 5 different colors and tried to coordinate them to the 10 different photos.

The card back was just something I came up with that I thought would look cool.  It's meant to resemble a rock show marquee.  I filled the marquees with a mix of facts and quotes about Lzzy and Halestorm.

Lzzy Hale (Yet Again)

Lzzy Hale is someone I only need half a reason to make  custom card of,  not even a whole reason, just half of one.  Ever since seeing her and Halestorm open for Shinedown years back, she melted my face off and has been on the list of my favorite things ever since.

1990-91 UD hockey

My half a reason this time was the picture of Lzzy holding up the custom jersey the Syracuse Crunch presented to her when she sang the National Anthem for them a couple of years ago.  It reminded my of rookie hockey card where the draftee is holding up his new team's sweater.

Some of my favorite cards I've made recently are the ones modeled after early Upper Deck designs so I wanted to do another of those.  I love the distinctive clean early UD look. 

I ended up choosing the 1990-91 Upper Deck design, UD's first hockey set.  I used the color scheme from the Toronto Maple Leaf's as it most closely resembled the Syracuse Crunch.

Lzzy, Again

I freaking love Lzzy Hale.  She's such a bad ass and Halestorm's newest album, Vicious, rocked.  She and the band make me believe that rock 'n' roll music is very much alive and well.

I made this Lzzy card and have been wanting to make another, but I wanted it to be cool and not just make one for the sake of crushing on her. 

I've been wanting to use one of the designs from the 1978 Donruss Kiss set.  But, same line of thinking, I wanted it to be cool and no just throw any old thing into the template.  I was bumping around Instagram like I do when I should be doing something productive and came across the pic I used for this card.  I thought the picture sort of hard a vintage rock look and would go great in the design and I was not disappointed. 

Lzzy is right up there at the top of custom cards I'd love to get signed.  One day, fingers crossed. 

Lzzy Hale

I got such a kick out of the Ultimate Warrior card I did using the 1991 SuperStars MusiCards design that I decided to revive the ProSet inspired design for another custom card, this time it's of my favorite rock star Lzzy Hale of Halestorm.

I've seen Halestorm a couple of times in concert and each time I was left in awe of Lzzy's performance and stage presence. The best description I could use to describe her would be a take-no-prisoners total badass. She gives me faith that actual rock 'n' roll music is still being made and should be played loud as hell.

As is with the Warrior card, the design itself is nothing all that special, but the nostalgia and instant recognizability of the Pro MusiCards that make these so cool to me.

Update: This is always really cool!