Comical Animal 4

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ladee done comics

I have contributed some artefacts to the St Albans Punk and New Wave exhibition that kicks off next week, details here. Heather and I headed out there to drop the stuff off, we hadn't been back for over twenty years. Strangely, the town doesn't seem to have changed that much... By the way, if you're in South London and a lover of the vintage, check out ChiChiRaRa, her shop in East Dulwich, you won't be disappointed.


In a fit of self-indulgence and vanity, I am posting a rare thing – a not hideous current picture of me. Taken by Oliver Lambden at his birthday drinks do the other night. There.
I like it.

The following night, Monday that was, I managed to speak for a whole fifteen minutes at Ladeez Do Comics. It was a very good evening, the other speakers being my lovely and talented fellow B.A.S.T.A.R.D Sean Azzopardi, Karrie Fransman and her posse from London Print Studio presenting their impressions of Angouleme, and the cerebral John Miers explaining his experimentations with language.
My thanks to Sarah Lightman and Nicola Streeten, the Ladeez in question, whose warmth and generosity help draw out any recalcitrant participants. The after show curry was much needed and helped thaw us out, the heating at the Rag factory leaving somewhat to be desired.

Next upcoming event will be the London Small Press Expo at Goldsmiths on March 12th. Rob Jackson has kindly offered to share his table with me. And I will have a new comic.

Gin Palace

Look what arrived in the post yesterday: Gin Palace!
It looks lovely and contains an eight page story by yours truly as well as some splendid work by Rob Jackson, Dave Hughes, Ant Mercer, Jarod Rosello, Lee Johnson, and Simon M. There is more info here
You can buy it from Rob's website, or wait until the Webcomixthing in two weeks.
Also I have ordered some stickers in order to take part in this Dino Saw Us idea at the Webcomixthing, but also just for the hell of it as I have never made stickers before.

This what I hope they will look like.

I will also endeavour to have Striptacular 2 ready in time...

Gin Palace

I've been working on an eight-page contribution to Rob Jackson's forthcoming Gin Palace anthology. Here's a sneak preview of the first page. I haven't settled on the title yet.
With a lot of different projects on the go at the moment, I just have to keep plodding on, trying not to think too much about how much there is or it gets too overwhelming and I grind to a halt.

Thoughts on the Bubble

Leeds is definitely the best convention experience. Good size hall, good facilities, good attendance, and GREAT AFTERSHOW.
Drove down a carload of assorted comicsfolk to the sound of much hilarity. Richy K. ended up with a whole table while Sally Anne and I ended up with bigger space than we'd planned for, and the new tablecloth looked awesome: RESULT! Left it a bit late to check into our (very reasonable) hotel and got soaked walking back, hence the dodgy hair in the pic ( I know I look it, but I'd not had a drink yet, honest); also meant I managed to miss the panel game I was supposed to take part in (sorry, Ade).
Then the partying got under way. There was beer and pizza and burlesque sketching (Dan won the prize), and vodka and more beer and then there was DISCO! I'm not naming names but suffice to say that no one escaped the power of the turntable. As Sean so succinctly put it, now we've all broken the ice by exhibiting our moves, there's not much more we can do to shock.
Oh and I sold some comics, and badges too.
There's a proper review of the convention on downthetubes.com with a mention and a pic of yours truly.
Also more pics to be seen HERE. WARNING: may include dancing

Great Deeds Against the Dead

The prolific Rob Jackson has treated us to yet another superb comic.
Issue One of Great Deeds Against the Dead is a ghost/mystery story involving a painter, a dead wife, an eerie house and a couple of creepy looking psychic adventurers. It is wonderfully drawn – I particularly love the depiction of the storm – Rob's style is very precise and totally legible, and keeps the story going at a cracking pace. My only slight criticism would be that he crams so many frames on to each page that my failing eyesight occasionally has to strain to make out the background detail. And I'm going to have to wait a while to find out what happens next...
The second part of the book, Colonial Amusements consists of a series of outdoor scenes and landscapes, presumably of Bolton and its surroundings, rendered in the style of Jackson's travelogue epic On the Banks of the Mighty Croal. My favourite page has to be the underpass, featuring the best grafitti ever!
Once again, Rob Jackson has delighted me with a warm, gentle and brilliantly silly comic, and on the back page he even tells us why he does it. Get yourself a copy HERE, especially as he's offering FREE postage throughout August!

Check out my website, it's got new stuff on it.

Challenging concepts

More vintage Tesco taking shape:

Today I found this very complimentary review of Rob Jackson's Pasty Anthology which mentions my contribution HERE. It's American and they seem to be struggling with the very concept of Pasty but managed to enjoy the oeuvre none the less.
I am planning to go to Oxford and attend Caption this year. I only discovered yesterday that they have a brochure one can contribute to. I have until tomorrow to come up with something. And draw it. I like a challenge! Especially with a theme like AWAY WITH THE FAIRIES.

Prolific or what?

I have just received Rob Jackson's marvellous Pasty Anthology through the post.
Jam packed full of mouth wateringly hilarious material from Rob, Jim Medway, Dave Hughes and more!
And did I mention that I contributed a few pages? get yourselves a copy here, you won't be disappointed!
At this moment I have newly published work in an astonishing number of comics, namely Richy K Chandler's excellent Bunch 2, Jim Medway's Garden Funnies 2, my own Sole Searching and now the Pasty Anthology bringing it to a total of four.
Ubiquitous, moi?
At 176 I picked up Part 9 of Paul Rainey's wonderful graphic novel There's no time like the Present, which keeps up the top quality of the series' storytelling and artwork. Get yourself a copy here.
And I finally got my hands on Undertow, Ellen Lindner's masterful, and beautifully drawn tale of delinquents, drugs and redemption set in sixties Brooklyn.

When Krissie met Elvis

Finally gave Krissie her painting so now I can post it. Suffice to say she was extremely happy with it. Me too.

Having been inspired by Rob Jackson's display of Shelf Porn, I thought I would respond with a glimpse of my collection...
The turd on the bottom shelf belongs to my son. He bought it in a shop. OK?
Any more questions?

The Thing vs Schmurgencon

Saturday 28th March dawned and Richy K. and I set off for the wilds of Mile End, fortuitously hooking up with Sally Ann on the tube. We set up our wares on our very well-positioned table, next to Rob Jackson, and awaited the rush of punters. It was busier than last year, possibly due to it not being Easter weekend, with a fair amount of the traffic stopping at our table. At the end of the day, I sold all my copies of Striptacular and came away with a profit after table costs, which is a good result.
I picked up the latest Curtis and Terrorist from Oliver Lambden, Jake Harold's That Time I Went on a Trip to Berlin, Rob Jackson's Bog Wizards 2 (with board game!), Paul Rainey's No Time Like the Present part 8, Phil Spence's Reasons Why I'm Scared to Love You and Whores of Mensa 4.
All really good stuff – I will endeavour to review things more fully at some point.

We then moved on to Schmurgencon which was taking place in uncompromising fashion just down the road.
It was altogether a more intimate affair, involving a certain amount of liquid refreshment and experimental performance art. The mysterious Norwegian was nowhere to be seen, he was rumoured to have suffered some kind of accident...

Into the swim again

The last of the festivities are finally behind us. Took down the tree and decorations and did the galette des rois thang last night, and bar the stray choccies and goodies still lying around, it's back to normal at Tesco Towers.
Christmas day and New Year's eve were pretty jolly, with Granny and various extended family and friends swelling the numbers. Got some good swag – three Leonard "sexy" Cohen albums and some comics: Spiegelman's latest, a Cabu so massive I will need one of those lecterns they put the big bibles on in church to read it, Ghost World, Blankets... The only one I have read so far is Pyongyang by Guy Delisle, about a trip to North Korea. Rob Jackson does far eastern travel with more wit and self deprecation, but it's still a good read.
I seem to have acquired a Wire habit. Halfway through the second season, with three and four in the post, I'm totally obsessed with McNulty, Omar et all and have taken on board such new expressions as "mos def" and "good police".

There were some great highs in 2008 but the lows more than outweighed them. In the balance I can only hope that those experiences will send us forth better equipped to deal with what life wants to throw at us.

8 Stories by Rob Jackson

Rob Jackson's latest looks great on the outside and doesn't disappoint. As it says on the tin, there are eight stories here. The tone varies agreeably throughout; the quite poetic opening tale, written by Shonah Ingram, of the City by the Lake, and a couple of sketchbook/diary type pieces – one of South Korea, another covering a night out at a gig – are interspersed with more obviously humorous strips. All are shot through with Rob's warm, wry, self-deprecating wit.
My personal favourite, if I have to pick one, has to be the tale of adventure and horror entitled Blood and White Water as it rings quite a few bells in this house.
Rob's words and pictures complement each other beautifully. In the more linear stories, his drawings illustrate the action in a wonderfully clear fashion, while elsewhere raw jottings translate thoughts and mood.