Know Show

Scrojo has been the in-house artist for the Belly Up Tavern in Solana Beach for 25 years, but that doesn’t mean he gets to see all his favorite bands.

“No, I do not meet every single rock star that comes through here,” he says.

The Encinitas native has been living the rock-and-roll dream since he was 19. He got his start designing t-shirts for the surf industry, signing his name “Scrotum Jo.” When a printer shortened his name at the last minute, “Scrojo” was born.

“As I started getting more work, nobody knew me by my real name,” he says. “They just knew me as the Scrojo kid.”

Scrojo’s work is hard to miss. He combines bold lines and fluid curves to create evocative images. “I’ve got a lot of freedom to do whatever I want,” he says. “As long as I’m selling the show and it doesn’t piss off the band.”

In addition to the five posters he creates each month for the Belly Up, Scrojo does work for the Belly Up in Aspen, the Fillmore in San Francisco and various House of Blues outlets.

Surprisingly, he doesn’t get out much.

“I kind of have mixed feelings about all these old punk shows,” he says. “Aren’t we a little too old for this?”

-Jim Ruland