Another lazy Sunday… I could turn it into a dazy Sunday? Yes. And for music… albums from 2005 only. Because.
| Kate Bush: Aerial (1) |  |
09:40: The Depressed Hunter by Moebius (Dark Horse)
Well, a “new” Moebius book doesn’t happen every day, so that’s something to celebrate. I don’t love how Dark Horse printed this on super-shiny paper, though.
Anyway, like the original Airtight Garage, this feels very improvised… but the original had something special going on. This seems more distracted and has big shifts in line quality — while some of the pages look amazing, some of them had me wondering whether they’d been finished by an assistant or something? But the pages are dated, so that you can see they’ve been done in random order over a decade (mid 90s to mid 00s), so I guess these are sketchbook pages that have been moulded into a narrative of sorts?
But that turned out to be too challenging, so Moebius takes the easy way out, and the last half of the book is a dream inside a dream sequence.
So… some wonderful artwork, and some narrative strains that are interesting, but mostly a footnote in Moebius’ work.
The last half of the book consists of notes from the translator, coupled with some sketches. Gotta pad stuff out?
Oh, right. Moebius switched to using a tablet in the middle of this — I guess that explains why later pages looked more boring and lifeless than earlier pages…
| Kate Bush: Aerial (2) |  |
10:04: Sometimes All The Time Book 1 by Tara Booth (2d cloud)
I got this from here.
This book is fantastic.
Like the Moebius book, it was apparently put together by using a whole bunch of pages done over years?
But it’s just got an amazing flow — it’s gripping, and it’s moving, and it’s gorgeous. Comic book of the year!
And it also has a bit of a magazine feel — we get some short pieces by other artists towards the end, and then a letters page (!), and an interview (!!). And this is the first in a series of books? Wonderful!
10:26: Only Once by Andrew White
I got this from here.
This is more of a straightforward family drama than anything I’ve seen from White before.
He’s still using his usual storytelling method, though — overlapping images that flow in a pleasing way.
But while beautiful, I didn’t quite connect with this one as with some of his other books. While reading this, I found myself snidely musing whether it was made as a possible pitch for Drawn & Quarterly or something — it’s that straightforward and emotionally… I think “manipulative” is not exactly the word I’m looking for, but…
| DJ Rupture: Low Income Tomorrowland |  |
10:51: Dogs on Dates by Luke Healy (Drawn & Quarterly)
Speaking of D&Q…
This has the unfortunate stench of something that’s been serialised on Instagram or something.
I.e., the vast majority of the pages are formatted like some lame sitcom joke.
I’d say there’s, like, two jokes in this entire book that actually work, so getting through this book was kind of a chore. Especially since the artwork is so hard to get excited by.
| LCD Soundsystem: LCD Soundsystem (1) |  |
11:44: The Interpretant by Lily Thu Fiero/Generoso Fierro
This is really intriguing…
I’m not at all sure what this story is about in the end, but it’s a fascinating read anyway.
11:49: Caught Lookin’ #1 by Andrew Alexander (Cram Books)
Half of this book is one long piece about, er, chess… and perhaps if you know something about chess, it would have made more sense? But I had a hard time just telling what was supposed to be going on.
I liked the rest of the book, though — especially the fictional autobio stuff. Some very funny bits in here.
| Róisín Murphy: Ruby Blue |  |
12:15: Boat Life 2 by Tsuge Tadao (Floating World Comics)
The first Boat Life volume was fascinating because of how loose and free it felt.
In this one, the author crams in a lot more characters and plot elements and things, and it feels a bit overstuffed? But still very entertaining and engrossing.
This was originally serialised in a magazine about fishing, so I have to wonder what the readership made of all this.
Unfortunately, the magazine went under, so at the end of this volume, all the various plot strands are left hanging, which is a bummer. Still, these two volumes are well worth reading.
| Gang Gang Dance: God’s Monkey |  |
13:38: Tant Wussi by Katrin Bacher/Tyto Alba ((Palabra förlag:)
I love the colouring here. (And excellent choice of paper. 😀)
Hey, nice…
| DJ Rupture: Redux |  |
Anyway, this book has a classic structure: The author of the book goes and visits an older relative, and then we get her dramatic story. And this is about a part of WWII history I haven’t heard much about before: It starts off in Mallorca, with the Fascist takeover of Spain and etc.
Unfortunately, while having a solid set-up and good artwork, the book just doesn’t manage to imbue the characters with much character, so in the end it feels like we’re just being made to learn all these names (so many names) by heart. I know, it feels churlish to say about a book with this serious a subject, but it just didn’t hold my interest. Sorry! I feel bad about not liking this book.
| Coil: The Ape Of Naples |  |
14:06: Tales from the Richy Vegas Psychoverse 5 by Richy Vegas
I finally remembered to put in a big order with Domino Comics again, and I think this is probably from that batch.
In this issue, the story of a hallucination is continuing (I think; it’s been a while since I read the previous issue).
The storytelling continues to fascinate — the circular action combined with the author watching it and commenting — it’s really kinda gripping.
14:15: Fish and Water by Gengoroh Tagame (Pantheon Books)
OK, I don’t know why I continue to buy his comics… they vary between horrifyingly repulsive and just embarassing (his two modes, depending on the audience he’s targeting) to me, but apparently I got another one.
Oh my god. This time around he’s plagiarising I mean doing a homage to What Did You Eat Yesterday?, which is a wonderful series. This is just inept.
I guess his artwork used to be pretty good, but even that’s missing now — it looks like he’s drawing on a tablet now?
OK, I’ve learned my lesson for sure this time around — I ditched this after 50 pages, and now I’m not buying any more of these for sure.
14:25: Hot Net Hotel (Paradise Systems)
The is an anthology of Chinese comics.
15 quite short pieces — I feel it might have been better to have a greater length variety? Reading it feels very choppy, especially since the approaches are so different.
Some of the pieces feel very… metaphorical…
I laughed at this one.
It’s an interesting anthology, but it doesn’t altogether gel as an anthology.
14:42: Mini Kuš #143-146
I got these from here.
It’s another solid batch…
Very varied.
Some are wistful.
And some are very funny, like this one about meeting a famous author.
14:55: Reality Enjoyer by Bones Gilmore (Desert Island)
This is a collection of illustrations…
It almost seems to be adding up to a narrative sometimes, but I guess not? Looks good, though.
15:00: God Head by Courtney Løberg (Glacier Bay Books)
What an odd book. It contains excerpts from two other books…
… and then a bunch of illustrations.
I mean, the artwork is nice, but is this book just an ad?
Very strange.
| Coil: …and the Ambulance Died In His Arms |  |
15:08: Swamp Thing #88-89 by Rick Veitch and others (DC Comics)
Well, here’s something I don’t think people expected to happen… DC finally publishing the end of Veitch’s Swamp Thing run. I haven’t actually read Veitch’s Swamp Thing comics, so it doesn’t make much sense for me to be getting these books, I guess, but what the hey.
Heh, with mock-up hype pages and all.
| Nine Horses: Snow Borne Sorrow |  |
So Swamp Thing meets Jesus, and this has astounding repercussions: We learn Etrigan’s Origin Story. Surely nothing can be more consequential.
The next issue is totally incomprehensible to me. I guess you had to read the rest of the series to get the point.
The artwork is quite nice, though. Tom Mandrake seems to be channeling Gene Colan a bit, which is never wrong.
15:27: The End
And I think that’s enough comics for today. I’m exhausted. I think I’ll go for a walk or something…
(I had forgotten what a good year 2005 was for music… just one banger of an album after another…)