Happy New Beards!

2010 is going to be a killer year for Choonimals. We can all feel it in the air. To commemerate this momentous occasion, we all decided to grow beards. You're welcome.

Six Gallery Webisode

Our good friends in Six Gallery posted a new webisode last week. It's from a weekend of shows they played in WV. There are some Choons tucked away, see if you can spot them. Happy Holladays!

SIx Gallery Webisode 3: West Va. from Benjamin Schreiber on Vimeo.

Choonimals and Casa de La Sal

Choonimals isn't always just about drawing weird, creepy animals. A big part of our mission is to use Choons to help charities such as the Casa de la Sal orphanage in Mexico City by donating essentials like medicines and by supporting the nursing staff. Casa de la Sal houses and cares for nearly 25 children and teens living with HIV/AIDS, plus 40 more living at home but who need counseling and financial support. Choonimals made its initial donation to the orphanage in November, purchasing $500-worth (or 6,600 pesos) of essential prescription medications for the kids. By setting aside 10% of all December sales, we hope to raise enough to make a second $500 donation to the orphanage and to continue our relationship with the staff and children.

Choonimals Charity from Captured Life Productions on Vimeo.

Six Gallery Signs with Superball Music

Superball Music (home to celebrated acts Oceansize and Trail of Dead) is pleased to announce their first worldwide signing of an American artist; Columbus, Ohio's Six Gallery.Often compared to contemporaries such as Minus The Bear, Maps and Atlases, and Aereogramme, Six Gallery will be re-releasing their debut album, "Breakthroughs In Modern Art," on March 23rd. Alex is in Six Gallery(that's me), get on that!

www.myspace.com/sixgallery

There's someone I'd like you to meat vol. 4

** AVAILABLE ONLY AT SKREENED **

Batty Choon is a classic Choon we've revived from the grave.....




Batty Choon became famous for his ability to hiccup faster than any species of fruit fly. After 9/11 he joined the boy scouts, and became president of the hungry hungry hippo's fan club. Currently he enjoys mashed potato's and sewing machine repair. Batty Choon can be customized and ordered here.

BLACK FRIDAY SALE

Is going on right now! As we speak! Get over to www.Choonimals.com for some epic sales. Old school shirts are only $13, new school shirts are $15. This ends at midnight tonight, so make it happen!

Sparks The Rescue x Choonimals

Our amigos Sparks the Rescue played an EPIC show at The Basement in Columbus, OH the other night! Here's some awesome pics Phil Chester took of them rockin out in our gear...











Much, much love. Make sure to check out their new video "We Love Like Vampires" up on their myspace!

Bored on a Tuesday night.....

Got nothing to do tomorrow (Tuesday)? Well for all you Columbusians, go to the Basement to see Sparks the Rescue. These dudes rule and are friends of ours and rock Choons. Come say hi to us and them. Come strapped in some Choons and maybe I'll even buy you a beer.

There's someone I'd like you to meat vol. 3

**AVAILABLE ONLY AT SKREENED**

Crabs are our friends.



When Crab escaped from the oppressive Dingleberry regime in '94, he swore revenge on those who kept him captive for so many years. Unfortunately he was never able to reap vengeance upon his enemies as he immediately developed a $200 a day fudge round addiction, and a penchant for making hats out of newspapers. He now lives a quiet life with his grandmother in Omaha. Crab can be ordered and customized here.

Stay tuned for more Choons!

There's someone I'd like you to meat vol. 2

**AVAILABLE ONLY AT SKREENED**

Allow me introduce a great buddy of mine, Goblin Shark.



Goblin Shark obtained his bachelors degree in Socks from Funyun University. His resume claims he is fluent in both French and Metallica, although in reality he can only read French and make small talk. His prestigious degree recently landed him a job snorting pixie sticks for the Flump Corporation, who specializes in the manufacturing of butt candles. Goblin Shark can be customized and purchased here. Stay tuned for more Choons!

There's someone I'd like you to meat vol. 1

**AVAILABLE ONLY AT SKREENED**

I'm sure many of you are unfamiliar with how Choonimals get from our brains to your shirts. It is a delicate process that requires sharpies, pieces of paper, brain candy, scanners, nacho's and beer. To date there are hundreds, nay, thousands of Choonimals that have yet to see the light of day. Over the next few days, I would like to introduce you to some of these lesser known Choons, who currently can be purchased exclusively at Skreened. If you don't know what Skreened is, I suggest you go to Skreened and find out. Without further adieu, I would like to introduce you to Pony:


Pony had an unfortunate upbringing. His father was a snorkel and his mother had a terrible addiction to mouthwash. His one and only sibling, Gerald, was the founder of the Mayor McCheese fan club, and a frequent contestant on the controversial, but very popular local hit TV game show, 'Bonermouf'. After graduating high school and leaving home for good, Pony had 32 children and is dedicating the remainder of his formative years to sulking around roller-skating rinks in search of the perfect nacho. Pony can be customized and purchased here.
Stay tuned for more Choons!

I guess this is the week for Choons in Video's

I was perusing our buddy's in Sparks the Rescue's guyspace page, and noticed there was lots of Choonage going on. Have to say a big thanks to those boys! Time to return the favor. Check their tour video posted below. See if you can spot the Moby Richard.

If you havn't seen it yet.......

Captured Life Productions (ie Chris and Matt from Choons) did a video with Pro BMX athlete Terry Adams a while back. He's a pretty sick flat land dude, and they snagged some gnar vid of him shredding in a gnar gnar sevenandahalfta'pus. Oh, and Six Gallery provides the sound track on this one. It's a win win all around.

Terry Adams is Choonin from Captured Life Productions on Vimeo.

Choonimals x TOMS Shoes

The Wexner Center and the First Year Experience Office at Ohio State University teamed up to host a “Style Your Sole” event for OSU students. Style Your Sole is an event where people decorate their own canvas shoes from TOMS; in turn, TOMS donates another pair of shoes to a child in need. (The Founder and Chief Shoe Giver of TOMS, Blake Mycoskie, spoke at OSU a week before hand).

Choonimals was invited to be one of the local artists on hand to share their know-how and inspiration with the participants.

Drew scrawled tons of his own epic LOL Choons on some nice footsies, here's a few pictures from the event!



















Choonimals + TOMS Shoes = BFF4E

Commercial!!!

Hey all my friends! We will be coming out with a series of videos about why "Choonimals loves you!" Stay tuned and check the blog often!!!!

The Young Designers Market NYC

Choonimals will be selling at the Young Designers Market in NYC 11am-7pm every Sunday and sometimes Saturday (most of the time definitely probably for sure I think) SO make sure you come out and say hi and tell us tales of adventure and pick up presents for your enemies and loved ones. It's an awesome place to see thriving artists, jewelers, gypsys, and designers all in one spot. Our brand new HEARSE will be parked right out front, so if you miss it then you probably don't have a head. She's in the process of getting dressed up in the standard Choonimal fashion, so if you want a sneak peak of what's already been done, you'll have to come see for yourself. If you're lucky and beat me in rock/paper/scissors, we'll take you for spin in it.

Follow the map above to get there, just like Zelda.

Pumpk 'O Ween

So its the season for carving pumpkins, and me being a big kid that I am, I reallllly realllly realllly like to carve pumpkins, so i carved one with a Dremel tool, if yalls dont know what a Dremel is look it up. The entire prosecss was very messy and i got pumpkin juice all over me and my pants but it was worth it. So in the short and long, (chad long) of it have a happy Halloween, buy tons of shirts, and steal bunches of candy from little kids as they trickotreat, jk, but no really

Adventures of Grauff, Vol. 1: Times Square

For months, the Grauff has been acting really messed up towards us for keeping him locked up in the dining room all day and night. He demanded we take him to Times Square to meet Elmo, or else he was going to splinter us between the toes in our sleep. I said to him, "Bah! Y'all got little rat legs, you can't even walk up the stairs, let alone open up my chamber door". And then he bit me.

It wasn't easy getting him on the subway. The giraffe alarm went off, so we had to think fast. We left a trail of Cinnamon Toast Crunch for the guards to follow - right into a pit of lava. The train came rushing by and we hopped quickly aboard.


We made our way across the Brooklyn Bridge, posing and faking smiles with the Grauff for his camera.




Times Square was still miles away. We used our Magic Flute the Princess gave us after beating Level 8, and rode the back of tornado all the way to the Millennium Ball.


Time was of the essence, Grauff had to get back home by 3 to watch Maury Povich. Still, he refused to leave without meating Elmo.


Finally, we spotted the red rat behind some shrubbery. Grauff puked he was so nervous! BEST DAY EVS!


Moral of the story - you get what you want when you bite people.

To keep his mind off of eating us all in our sleep, we've been forging him a new friend (below) from the depths of the swamp. He should be parachuting on to our roof any day now, upon which is will receive a hot bath and some tomato soup with croutons.


TO BE CONTOVRE...

Choonimals 2yr Anniversary

Pictures are up from our 2yr Anniversary! Here's a few of them below, check the rest out on our fanpage!

















The event was BEYOND a success, we sold out the venue, debuted our new fall line, rocked out to the epic sounds of Josh Fitzwater and the Shambles, Six Gallery, and the best Weezer coverd band ever - The Pinkertones!

It was so good to see all the faces of our fans, friends, and family that have supported us over the years... people even showed up with Choon tattoos! It's extremely humbling to have such a supportive fan base, we really couldn't have done it without you guys! You all are the flux in our capacitor, the freon in our reverse microwave, the drool in our fangs, the lazy in our eye, the hiss in our tongues, the scales on our hearts, and the gummy in our bears.

Can't wait to show you what we have in store for the future! You'll melt like Alex Mac.

Love,
chrismattchadalexdrewjoe

NEW CHOONS NEW CHOONS!!!!!

OMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGZ!











The new Fall/Winter line is here, and it's in FULL FORCE!!!!!! We got faces, we got GORE-illa's, we got choonmeleon's on color changing shirts, we got hoodies and batty v-necks. Get over to www.Choonimals.com. Now. Go.

2 YEAR CHOONIVERSARY!!!!!!

This is tonight! Come to Ravari! Wear Choons! Actually, I'm feeling nice and generous right now....If you wear a Choonimals shirt to the show tonight, we will hook it up with $5 off of any item from the new Fall/Winter line! Don't be late, this event will reach capacity!

The Chonster is BAAACCCCKKKKK!!!!!!

For the month of October you can purchase an updated version of a Choonimals classic, The Chonster Shirt! Just head on over to www.skreened.com/choonimals and customize what shirt you would like it on. Pictured below is the Chonster on an ash white stripe mens fitted tee. After halloween, you will no longer be able to pick this up, so make sure you get on it!

Choonimals Giveaway

Want to win some free stuff? Want to win some free Choonimals stuff??? Want to win some free Choonimals stuff that no one else has????? Well then head over to
http://blog.columbusalive.com/windowshopping/
to find out how to win. Two lucky lads will win a few new shirts from our unveiled Fall/Winter line which we will debut this Friday at the Ravari Room as part of our two year Chooniversary. If you don't win em here today, you can buy em there on Friday.

Columbus Alive

Check out this great article from this weeks Columbus Alive. Many thanks to Brittney Kress!

http://columbusalive.com/live/content/features/stories/2009/10/01/ca_u_screen-choonimals.html?sid=108

The Independents Day Fest

This weekend (Saturday) we will be participating in the annual Independents Day Festival held on Gay street in downtown Columbus. We will have some super sales going on so come visit our booth and pick up some swag for ten bones! We will have what is left of our Spring/Summer 09 line avaliable, and once this stuff is gone, it ain't comin back. We got's to make room for that hot new fresh Fall/Winter '10 line that's bouts to drop on October 9th. Here are some more deets about the show this weekend:

Music on three stages by:

Gay Street Stage
12 p.m. - Andy Shaw Band
1 p.m. - Bush League All Stars
2 p.m. - Burglar
3 p.m. - Moon High
4 p.m. - Brain Double
5 p.m. - You're So Bossy
6 p.m. - Sick Thrills
7 p.m. - Church of the Red Museum
8 p.m. - The Patsys
9 p.m. - The Lindsay

Pearl Alley Stage
12:30 p.m. - LES Crew
1:30 p.m. - Shin Tower Music
2:30 p.m. - Couch Forts
3:30 p.m. - Blastronauts
4:30 p.m. - Moondrones
5:30 p.m. - Floatation Walls
6:30 p.m. - Six Gallery
7:30 p.m. - D Rob
8:30 p.m. - Tin Armor
9:30 p.m. - Karate Coyote

Lynn Alley Stage
12:15 p.m. Mono to Mono
1:15 p.m. Vug Arakus & The Stallions
2:15 p.m. Available Light Theater Company
3:15 p.m. Old Worlds
4:15 p.m. Make Ready the Fleet
5:15 p.m. Curtis Cole
6:15 p.m. Super Desserts
7:15 p.m. Maza Blaska

go to www.thisisindependent.com for further details!

Frequently Asked Questions...

Umm...WTF is a Choonimal?

Choonimals are our own brand and creation of animals/creatures/abominations from an otherwise normal animal kingdom. Every one has fangs, eyes more crooked than Don Vito, and sometimes a spiked, sparkler-looking tail. They all look rabid and ravenous, but somehow still cute enough to share a pillow with.

When did all this start?

Most of us in Choonimals grew up together. We've known each other since 5th grade, some even before that. We started drawing these things in High School to pass time in class, make each other laugh, and entice our teacher's anger. At one point, they were taped all over the classroom walls because Drew and Matt said they couldn't do their homework unless the Choons were on the wall. Their teacher said to Drew's face, "I don't like you".

Where did the name "Choonimal" come from?

Again, during High School, we all went out to lunch together. One day we were at Arby's and their was an old lady taking our order and her name was "Choon". Drew thought it was hilarious, so the next time we drew one of these animals, we called it a "Choonimal". Seriously though. That's what happened.

What's with all the Sharpie™ marker tattoos you guys give out at your events?

So after High School we discovered girls and forgot about our little creatures for almost 3 years. Then one day during a hazy daze, we found an old birthday card Matt and Drew made for Chris out of cardboard with Choonimals all over it. We nailed it to our bathroom wall as a reminder, and every so often while we were partying, we would grab markers and draw Choons on people. It started happening on the regular, and pretty much blew up at a huge outdoor festival in college. We had LINES of complete strangers waiting for us to draw Choonimals on them. The marker tattoos we do at festivals are homage to that, as are all of our actual Choonimal tattoos (the kind that don't wash off).

Why did you decide to start a clothing line?

Honestly, a clothing company was one of the last pieces of the Choonimal puzzle. When most companies decide to start a clothing line, they first pick a name, then a theme (or vice versa), and roll with it. We did it completely backwards. We already had our creation, and a name for it. A clothing company was just our way of sharing Choonimals with the rest of the world.

Who draws all the Choonimals?

We all take our turns drawing them on people at events (except Alex because one time he drew a bat and it looked like a stealth bomber so we banned him from using our markers), but all of the designs for Choonimals Clothing Co. are drawn by Chris. Every design is an original piece of artwork that transcends from his sketchbook to your shirt.

What type of material do you guys print on?

All of our clothes are printed on American Apparel™ (AA). We are very conscious about where our clothes come from, and the means by which they are made. AA is in our mind, the ONLY option for us. It's all made sweat shop free, right here in the U.S. We could be making a lot more money by printing on low quality clothing, but supporting and encouraging fair work environments is more importance to us than any dollar amount you can throw. And yea it helps that all of AA's clothing feels like kissing clouds.

Any more questions? Anyone? Anyone? Email them to chris@choonimals.com

Choonimals 2 Year Anniversary

We are finalizing all the details for our 2 year anniversary, and wanted to let you know what's going on. On October 9th, 2009 we will be celebrating with Josh Fitzwater and the Shambles, Six Gallery and The Pinkertones, a Weezer tribute band playing songs from the Pinkerton and Blue albums at the Ravari Room here in Columbus, Oh. We also will be debuting our Fall/Winter line for 09/10! This will be your first chance to get some brand new Choons before anyone else. Check the flier for more details:

Skreened

Some dudes of ours in Columbus have this fantastic site called Skreened. They make all kinds of original printed t-shirts, and are making some very limited, custom Choonimals shirts. You can go to our profile page, www.Skreened.com/choonimals and pick from one of the three designs we currently have available. You can then customize what garment you would like it on:


These are just a few of the options you would have for our batty shirt. Our designs will change every month, so don't wait too long before these go extinct.