It’s a day for reading comics for sure. And for music today: Albums from 1981 only.
| Japan: Tin Drum (1) |  |
12:48: Causeway 25-29 by CF
Oh, man, the white balance is so balanced today. That is, it’s very sunny, and the lamp I’m reading under uses a “warm” bulb, so to get kinda realistic white in the camera, the background looks like everything’s been painted totally blue… Sony should invent “dual white balance” stuff so that the foreground can have a different white balance than the background.
Causeway has been a grab bag of random stuff, but mostly not very narrative.
But in this batch we get a four part story, and it’s pretty cool. Sign up here.
12:57: How To Hold Back Tears by Jooyoung Kim (Kuš)
This is really funny.
And also kinda moving. I like it. Get it from here.
13:08: Ruse by Alex Wedderburn
I like the artwork here.
The story seems like a quite standard TV lawyer drama thing, but there’s a reason those things are popular. The storytelling here is solid, and I can totally see somebody like, say, Image publishing this in full in a couple years.
| Yukihiro Takahashi: Neuromantic |  |
13:18: Business Insider by Grayson Bear (Frog Farm)
This book is hilarious.
It’s very on the nose… but then it totally goes where you didn’t expect.
And there’s also a booklet in the book and all sorts of nice things.
13:28: Szarlotka by Jas Hice (Frog Farm)
This book is about a creepy neighbour.
The storytelling is solid, but I found the story frustrating. There’s a limit to how passive you can be.
13:37: Loops
This is a British anthology.
It’s mostly very short pieces. Some funny stuff.
*gasp* Nostalgia! Never heard of it.
| The Cure: Faith (1) |  |
13:45: Frontier by Giellaume Singelin (Magnetic Press)
Wow, what a strange hybrid style… It’s like Singelin took some extremely super-cutesy Japanese (or even Korean) comics figures and then smushed them into French comics parameters. So instead of hyperkinetic Japanese comics storytelling we get very staid French old-timey layouts, with no closeups, but populated with these munchkin characters with tiny bodies and bobble heads.
And, of course, mecha-influenced space ships.
Is there a Vaughn Bodé influence, too?
Very odd.
Every time I open a new spread, it all looks so good… until I actually read it. Seen at a distance, this looks like the best sci fi comic ever.
Everybody has exactly identical body and head shapes (men and women), and of course just dots for eyes, so Singelin is diligent in trying to keep all the character (and there’s a lot) separate by giving each one a distinctive hairdo. (And eyebrows.) It doesn’t work — I have no idea who all these people are, or indeed whether I’m supposed to know.
I gave up on this after two fifths.
| Simple Minds: Sister Feelings Call |  |
14:17: Jag kommer med stryk by Nanna Johansson (Galago)
This book is a mix of one page gags…
… and longer comics. It’s very funny.
14:53: Summit by Aby Wye
This one is excellent.
It’s a short book, but it packs a lot in — it’s Very Metaphorical Indeed, but works really well. Very sweet.
14:58: Mask 4 Mask by Ollie Kicks
This is the most coherent 24h comic ever.
And it’s very funny. Wonderful punch line.
| Simple Minds: Sons and Fascination |  |
15:03: Joe Galaxy Comix by Mattioli (Fantagraphics)
This is a collection of stuff that ran in various anthologies, I guess?
I think they used to call this stuff “anarchic”.
If you happened onto four pages of this in an anthology, you’d go “well, that was fun and pointless” and then move on. Collected like this, it’s mind deadening.
Oh, I guess Mattioli was inspired by Moebius’ Hermetic Garage? But Moebius has, like, a whole thing going on; it’s not just randomness and gross gags. And, of course, the artwork.
I found this book to be tedious — there are some gags that actually work, but they’re few and far between. I ditched it one third through.
15:32: Cold Chips by Chris King
Oh, this is very attractive… it’s got a proper mood going, too.
And it’s a very sweet little book. Class!
| Tom Tom Club: Tom Tom Club |  |
15:36: Krut: Seriemagasin
This is a curious artefact — it’s a special comics issue of a Swedish pedagogical periodical from 1989 that I found in a used comic book store the other day.
So you’d expect they’d soft-foot it and run kinda mainstream comics.
But nope, it’s got some pretty wild stuff, like this Max Andersson piece. Most of the pieces are about education and going to school, and most are pretty amusing. It’s an impressive little anthology, really.
16:00: CFBT by Cristiano Cardone and others
So this is one of those gritty Blade Runnerish types of sci fi comics…
… but… like… It’s not good.
I assumed that this was written by a teenager, so I wasn’t going to say anything, but I googled the writer (only his name is on the cover; the three illustrators are mentioned inside) and he’s an actual adult. Shocking.
Yet again, I ditched the book. Man, I’m not having much success with the longer books today…
| Tuxedomoon: Desire |  |
16:17: Zoo #3 by Anand
Oh, I’ve read these stories before in the collected edition. Duh!
But I re-read them now, and they’re still amazing — three tight, taut short stories in 44 page. Anand manages to squeeze so much into so few pages. It’s a gripping read.
16:41: Sanctuary by Lev Fielding
This seems to be printed pretty low rez? Was it drawn low rez on a tablet or something?
Anyway, it’s a very metaphorical story about… er… something. Finding your place? It’s nice.
16:55: War on Gaza by Joe Sacco (Fantagraphics)
This was serialised on the Comics Journal web site, so I’ve read these pieces before…
Yeah, it’s as good as I remembered.
And collected like this it’s even stronger.
| Kraftwerk: Computer World |  |
17:07: Worn Tuff Elbow #3 by Marc Bell
I love Bell’s line and design sense.
The story is mesmerisingly weird, as usual.
17:27: FK10,000,000 by Nell McKeon (Frog Farm)
This is printed so faintly that I first thought it was some kind of mistake…
… but it goes really well with the story, really. It’s an interestingly vague and somewhat goofy story, and I really enjoyed it.
| David Byrne: The Catherine Wheel |  |
17:45: Movie Theatre Stories #1 by Vincent Mollica
This starts off pretty normally, with four panel comics about going to the movies.
But then it turns into something quite else. It’s a fascinating book — so many different approaches; kinda obsessive.
| Depeche Mode: Speak & Spell |  |
18:14: The Devil’s Grin #6 by Alex Graham
This is an extra-long issue — 110 pages!
I don’t really remember what the plot was up to this point (even if there’s a recap in this issue), but I think things might be coming to ahead? It’s very entertaining, anyway.
18:53: Trap #2 by Matt Seneca
Hm, have I read this before?
Anyway, it’s pretty wild. Poor Chris Ware!
19:13: The End
Oops, I’ve forgotten to eat anything today, which may help explain why I feel like I’m about to plotz. So I think that’s enough comics.