Hi, my name is Martin Defatte.
My creative endeavors have always been deeply influenced by my lifelong love of music and skateboarding and their respective subcultures.
I grew up absorbing DIY zines, Thrasher magazines and punk rock records. I was particularly fascinated by album artwork. I eventually formed a band with high school friends. After a few years, I chose to take a more “behind the scenes” role in the local hardcore punk scene, designing fliers for shows and laying-out demos for my friends’ bands. Some of those bands went on tour and got noticed, which in turn, gave me opportunity to work for a variety of indie labels.
After graduating from college with an Art degree, I turned an internship into a gig as a graphic designer at a small package design firm in my hometown. I cut my teeth developing package concepts for household names like: Windex, Edge Shave Gel, Skintimate Shave Gel and Ziploc.
Concurrent to my career as a print designer, I continued to pursue my personal studies in web design and development. After devouring the first of many books and blog articles on front end development, I knew I wanted to transition front print to web design and development as a career.
After moving to Milwaukee and a couple long stints at a few area agencies, you can now find me currently working for Jigsaw as a Front End Developer in downtown Milwaukee, WI. In an agency setting, I have worked on a range of web accounts including: Door County Visitor Bureau, American Transmission Co., ManpowerGroup, Noah’s Ark Waterpark, Hunger Task Force, Visit Milwaukee, Planned Parenthood of WI and Milwaukee Art Museum.
I currently live in the Bay View neighborhood of Milwaukee with my wife and my dog. In my spare time, two friends of mine and I run Triple Eye Industries, a boutique indie record label that releases a wide variety of music, in both genre and format.
My latest musical endeavor is beatmaker and producer for Guerrilla Ghost, an industrial noise-rap project. Prior to that, I played bass in a few different flavors of post-punk bands including Volunteer, Stock Options and 7 Seconds cover band, Red & Black. I have produced a few solo studio releases using my beatmaker moniker, Tron Jovi, to pass time during the cold Wisconsin winters. It’s a blend of my history as an electronic producer and the heavy bands I’ve played in.