inkstuds

12:25AM - Comic Diorama: Collected Comics by Grant Reynolds

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

In a comic shop the other day, I kept picking this up and putting it down. I have wanted to check out more of Grant Reynolds’ work since reading his standout pieces in the You Ain’t No Dancer anthologies. I really like the Jeremy Tinder-painted cover of this mini* and while all signs were pointing to YES, I balked a bit at the five dollar price tag. Luckily my companion gave me a bit of a bitch slap, commenting on how long it takes to make even a short comic, and how I just needed to get over my thin wallet and support the artist (and the store, and the publisher, etc.). Truly, friends, how many of us have them?

The book opens with “Legends of Chance Oxblood: A Travel Journal,” a series of illustrated sections from a the fictional lost journal of an unfortunate “adventurer-explorer.” Each page has three parts: the entry, the pictures and a small, mystery-laden item below. Between the introduction and suggestive glimpses into the life and times of Oxblood, we know that he did not come to a happy end, but perhaps a fitting one. I like the mystery imparted by his heavy use of black in this story and the pane-within-pane construction of the panels.

The second story charts the last year in the life of a fallen giant of the gas variety. Pluto, after being fired from the solar system, lives his life in a Chicago-like city, seemingly content with his earthbound life until his ancientness catches up with him. This mostly-wordless story is packed with expository details that don’t weigh the lightening quick story (one panel per month) down but only enrich it.

The “Black Forest Hymn” was the most visually arresting tale of the bunch and almost pulls off the aint-life-brutal allegory it strives for. Instead of you and me wandering, breeding and dying, we get silent humanoid creatures with a single arm instead of heads roaming in the state of nature. I liked the dangerous woodiness of the setting and the expressiveness Reynolds was able to pull from the figures, but the last two pages lacked the urgency felt in the rest of the story.

“You Are My Heart” is a nightmarish take on finding oneself cast as the sacrificial lamb, or in this story’s case “the chosen one.” I like how Reynolds uses two styles to evoke the need of the townspeople with the need of the monster. The woman to be given to the monster is torn from a dream that looks tellingly like that of her fate, but where she is a mermaid instead of wet bait—I thought using the same style to depict both was an elegant way to show the powerlessness of the unnamed woman in the face of other people’s desires.

The final story, “Where the River Meets the Sea,” returns to the format of “Legends of Chance Oxblood,” and is this time used to tell a somber tale of trading one fixation for another for the sake of other people. I found the words lyrical and the art fittingly moody—there are many storms to bear and whirlpools to avoid here. I think Reynolds captured the surreal feeling of striving to become someone else, however destructive the self you are trying to shed was.

*This mini was published by a large indie printer, but I am still going with that moniker for this book, both because of its size and content. Ok? Ok.

10:52PM - Inkstuds Mixtape Vol 16 Jason Leivian

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

Jason Leivian isn’t really a cartoonist, but he is a really great supporter of comics. His store in Portland, Floating World Comics has had lots of great events including a plethora of fundraising artshows. He also puts Diamond Comics, which is up to its 4th issue and gets better with each issue.

1.  Madlib - Anthenagin’ (?)
2.  Javelin - Tu Machina
3.  Low Motion Disco - Things Are Gonna Get Easier
4.  Double Fantasy - Heartbreaker (Rub-N-Tug edit)
5.  Prince - Strange But True
6.  Syclops - Nelson’s Back
7.  DJ Babu - Veetee
8.  Discodeine - Tema Di Gamma
9.  Irsol - Anthem
10.  Siouxsie & The Banshees - Skin
11.  Gang Gang Dance - Dust
12.  Stalker - Radios Et Announceurs
13.  Mac Dre - Too Hard For The F@#kin’ Radio
14.  Thomas Bangalter - Unplugged
15.  El Remolon - Vem Que Tem
16.  Atlas Sound - River Card
17.  LL Cool J - Two Different Worlds
18.  Moondog - Lament 1 ‘Bird’s Lament’

11:43PM - 4th Anniversary

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

Mike Myhre posted a really nice image. Thanks Mike!

3:03AM - Seth

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

Back for more 4 years later, after being my first guest ever, Seth and I seem to start right where our previous conversation left off. I am a really big admirer of Seth’s work, and this interview was very enlightening in new ways that I was not familiar with him before. Be sure to check out George Sprott, it’s pretty great.

8:39PM - Jeet Heer and Dr Paul Stanwood Discussing Genesis

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

Inkstuds regular Jeet Heer and UBC English Professor Paul Stanwood, joined me for a discussion of Robert Crumb’s adaptation of the Book of Genesis. Each of the guests bring a unique expertise to the table that really adds to an understanding of the work. Here are some more comments from Jeet in regards to the work here and here.

1:08AM - Sully

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

Sully is one of those fine hidden Canadian gems that i love coming across. Sully is doing some really great and interesting stuff in Montreal and his creative energy shines through in his book, Hipless Boy.

8:39PM - George O’Connor

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

Ball Peen Hammer illustrator, George O’Connor and I discussed his latest book and as well as his work in children’s books and his future in the world of the Olympians.

3:00AM - 4 years In and Still No Refunds Allowed

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

It’s hard to believe that I have been doing the Inkstuds Radio show for 4 years now, to the day. At first, I had no idea what I was doing, or even why I was doing this. Early shows were a painful mix of dreary dialogue and a more than sufficient amount of umms and ahhhs. When I decided to focus on doing interviews, some people asked me how long I could go without repeating guests, and obviously it has gone on a lot longer than those folks expected. While there have been some guests that have made multiple appearances on the show, I would have them on as often as they would let me talk to them, when you are talking folks like Eddie Campbell, Peter Bagge and others.

Going into this  new year of Inkstuds is very different from the past. Things have been better than ever. I have been able to interview dream guests like Jerry Moriarty, Gary Panter and Ralph Steadman, and have plans to chat with some equally exciting underground legends. I am currently in the process of archiving the old interviews with the help of a very generous transcriber. Some of those interviews are going to hopefully be in a book that I am putting together. I don’t want to say too much as it is, since it’s still a year away. There are also talks of putting together a larger art show in conjunction with the book, but once again, still too soon to say too much.

To commemorate this mild landmark, I will be posting a different Interview or Mixtape each day of the week. To top off the bonus programing, will be an interview I conducted a couple of weeks ago with Seth.

Seth was the first guest that I have ever interviewed. He was very generous with his time 4 years ago, and the same now. The Canadian identity is very important for me in respect to coverage with the show and something that I am going to make more of an attempt to be proactive with.

Thanks so much for listening and please keep support your local comickers. I am sure there is some mini-comic worth checking out at your local comic store. And if your comic store refuses to sell mini’s, then don’t shop there.

12:52AM - Nine Gallons by Susie Cagle

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

The cover of Susie Cagle’s fun autobio comic about Food Not Bombs says it all with its splash of unidentifiable goo, dash of DIY (the goo is squeezed out by an industrious silk screener) and urban debris.

The story focuses on the characters surrounding the making and distribution of food for the homeless and hungry (aka the “camping”) in San Francisco. The characters include a stressed Susie learning the ropes, Raj, the skill-less coordinator, the salt-crazy chef and a host of other volunteers and soup eaters from the community. The comic also includes a funny, nicely illustrated recipe for the titular soup that says more than all the pages in the comic put together about Cagle’s feelings on her time doling out food for San Francisco’s hungry. I wish the rest of the comic had been so focused. Instead, it feels very much like what it is, the first part of a longer story. We don’t get any background on the Susie character and only a little on her motivation for joining FnB, and when her reasons are abruptly swept aside by Raj, we don’t get to see her reaction. We don’t know anything about what she does when she’s not cooking. I want to care about Susie, but I can’t quite because I only get to see little bits of what she is like.

I wish Cagle had either stuck to her feelings about FnB, like in the excellent one-page nightmare sequence, or really explored the stories of the people eating, even if that meant going fictional. I understand that a glimpse is the most she gets of these people’s lives, a hand reaching out for a paper cup, but the comic suffers from the author’s slight characterizations.

Cagle’s cartooning is really fun to look at. Her style is a little cartoony, but detailed enough to feel realistic. I love how she draws the FnB crew’s jobs and facial expressions during a cooking session. They all seem a little grim. And the Susie character has such a great face and posture—she looks like a girl whose bike you could get hit by and not care because she’s so nice. I want to see what happens next in the world of Nine Gallons, I only hope some of the characters rise to the top of the broth.

12:23AM - Inkstuds Mixtape Vol 15 Mike Myhre

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

My good friend and awesome cartoonist, Mike Myhre pulled together a fine mix of music. Lots of good stuff to listen to and get into!

7:30PM - J Bradley Johnson

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

J Bradley Johnson has a handfull of comics out there, but if you can hunt them down, they are great. His work can be found in great anthologies like Kramers Ergot, Snake Eyes, Hotwire Comix, and Ivan Brunetti’s first Graphic Fiction anthology.

1:35PM - Unrelated

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

I was recently informed that there is a park in Queens named after a great-uncle of mine.

Here is info on the park - http://www.nycgovparks.org/parks/Q217/

and here is the location of the park on google street view - http://tiny.cc/Yn2wJ

I would be very grateful if somone in New York, could take a pic of monument, for my own curiousity, and maybe pour out some Olde English for a fallen homie.

6:23PM - Abby Denson

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

Abby Denson joined me for a chat about her book Dolltopia and the wonderful world of cupcakes. Abby will be in Vancouver on Saturday for an event at Elfsar Comics and then on Sunday, she will be doing a reading at Emily Carr

1:27PM - Whatever Happened to the World of Tomorrow review by Chris

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

I don’t particularly need to know what happened to the World of Tomorrow, but I’d be curious to know why it ended up so boring. There’s nothing in this book that shouldn’t be riveting—it’s a nostalgic look at the way we (as a culture) have viewed the future over the past 70 years or so, starting with the New York World’s Fair and proceeding up to the present. It’s chock full of really interesting commentary on the various eras and epochs as told through the eyes of a boy and his relationship with his father (as well as the the styles of the various comic books of each age), but unfortuantely the commentary just sits there, failing to connect the reader with either the material or the boy and his father.

To further confuse things, the boy ages extremely slowly, progressing from nine or ten around the start of the book, to his late teens by the end. I’d postulate that this is a metaphorical aging, representing the changes that our society has weathered in order to reach the more mature, realistic vision we have now, but if that’s the case, we are once again left behind by a concept that leaves the average reader behind. My wife, casually picking up the book and interested in the material, couldn’t figure out the metaphor in the aging and put it down, mildly frustrated. That’s not the right reaction when you’re trying to evoke nostalgia and wonder.

I’d like to like Whatever Happened to the World of Tomorrow—I’d certainly like to read the author’s conclusions and points of view in essay-form—but as a graphic novel, the pieces don’t quite mesh together and in the end one is left with the feeling that sometimes the future is better off without us making a big production of searching for it.

5:32PM - 5 Cartoonists You Should Be Reading Stuff By

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

I don’t get enoough to document everything i read, but here is some folks who’s work I always enjoy.

Will Dinski just got some props during APE, by receiving the Isotope award. He really deserves the accolades. His comics are all constructed like fine pieces of art. Not only do they look pretty, but they also read great.

Britt Wilson is a supertalented lady out of Toronto. Her comics are well crafted little slices of enjoyment. She really shines when she does her painted work. Britt is still pretty young, so I suggest you get to know her stuff now, before she is some big name fancy shmancy artist, and then you will have some weird bragging rights. I bought all of the mini’s she has listed here and love them.

Australian Pat Grant, sent me an awesome drawing of me interviewing Satan. It made me happy. He also does some great comics too. I love how comics are so international.

Dutchman, Joost Halbertsma has been producing some really interesting work that is a little on the more experimental side. I think he has some good drawing chops and hopefully you do to.

I really enjoy Jason Overby’s stuff and I think he is really developing a nice unique style. He has a nice piece in the Abstract Comics collection. His work comes from the Gary Panter school and wears it well.

12:31PM - Inkstuds Mixtape Vol 14 Steve Lafler

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

Steve Lafler brings us a fine mix of rock n’roll from his compound in Mexico.

1. Hank Williams, I’m so Lonesome I could cry
2. Iggy Pop, The Passenger
3. Wreckless Eric, Whole Wide World
4. Sam Cooke, Let the Good Times Roll
5. Grateful Dead, It’s All Over Now Baby Blue
6. Cracker, Take Me Down to the Infirmary
7. Jonathan Richman, Egyptian Reggae
8. Dwight Yoakam, Carmelita
9. The Cramps, Mule Skinner Blues
10. Dead Kennedy’s, Stars & Stripes of Corruption
11. Hasil Adkins, She Said
12. Beatles, Baby’s In Black
13. Rolling Stones, Let Me Go
14. Thelonious Monk, In Walked Bud (thanks to Austin English for that great tune)
15. Del McCoury Band, 1952 Vincent Black Lightning

12:43AM - At UBC Tomorrow

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

I totally forgot to post this sooner. I am hoping i can make it.

The University of British Columbia Rare Books and Special Collections (RBSC), the School of Library, Archival and Information Studies (SLAIS), and the Alma Mater Society (AMS) Art Gallery

cordially invite you to an informal reception for the opening of the exhibition:
DRIPPYTOWN: VANCOUVER LIFE THROUGH THE EYES OF INDEPENDENT CARTOONISTS–Selected Comics and Cartoons from UBC Rare Books and Special Collections, designed by the students of the UBC SLAIS “Visual Arts and Performing Arts Special Collections” course.

Featured Artists: Ken Boesem, Julian Lawrence, James Lloyd, Josué Menjivar, Jason Turner, Colin Upton

WHERE:
UBC School of Library, Archival and Information Studies, Suite 470, Irving K. Barber Learning Centre, 1961 East Mall, Vancouver.

WHEN:
FRIDAY, October 23, 2009, 12noon-1:30 p.m. Please R.S.V.P. (by October 22nd) to Francesca Marini at fmarini@interchange.ubc.ca

The Exhibition is Free and Open to the Public in Two Locations on the UBC Campus:

October 23, 2009-January 31, 2010
UBC Rare Books and Special Collections (RBSC)-Reading Room
Irving K. Barber Learning Centre-First Floor, 1961 East Mall, Vancouver
Opening Hours: Monday to Friday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m.; Saturday, 12 noon-5 p.m. Closed on Sundays and Holidays; special hours over Christmas Break. When accessing UBC Rare Books and Special Collections, please check bags and coats at the entrance.

October 26-November 3, 2009
Alma Mater Society Art Gallery; 238F Student Union Building (SUB); 6138 SUB Boulevard, Vancouver. Opening Hours: Monday to Friday, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Closed Saturday and Sunday.

9:46PM - Jill Thompson and Evan Dorkin

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

Jill Thompson and Evan Dorkin joined me for a lively discussion of their Beasts of Burden series. Evan and Jill are really great guests and have always have a lot to say about their work. The second issue of Beasts is probably some of Dorkin’s strongest writing, and a far step away from the Dork that we are used to.

11:50PM - Eric Nash on Manga Kamishibai

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

Manga Kamishibai from Abrams, is an interesting look at the Japanese Paper Theatre that is a kind of precurser to the development of Anime and Manga. It is a really goergous book and Eric Nash has done a fine job in documenting this unique artistic legacy.

8:39PM - R Sikoryak

Originally published at Inkstuds. You can comment here or there.

R Sikoryak’s Masterpiece Comics was one of my anticipated reads of the year, and it did not disappoint. Sikoryak is able to create a blend of classical literature mixed with the finest of styles of some of the greatest cartoonists. I have been a fan of his work for years, and am pleased as punch to have it all in one book.