Link:
Clipd Beaks – http://www.myspace.com/clipdbeaks

I’d like to think that it is no coincidence that the very day I started listening to a long-sought after copy of Lou Reed’s Metal Machine Music just happened to be the same day I started listening to Clipd Beaks’ To Realize. Not that the two releases have much in common on the surface, but it isn’t a stretch to imagine “To Realize” as the not-too-distant cousin of Metal Machine Music. In fact, I’d be willing to bet that an adventurous listener could play MMM behind the first three tracks of “To Realize” without diminishing the listening experience one bit.

The tracks mentioned above — “Strangler,” “Blood,” and “Broke Life” —  invoke images of darkness, lost puppies, abducted loved ones, and other nightmares.  Although three distinct songs, they also share a singular trajectory, slowly building to an incredibly dense and satisfying conclusion.  “Strangler” starts off sparse and ends with the secret of its many layers of drone exposed. And what beautiful layers they are!  In a time where drone machines are all the rage, Clipd Beaks manage to piece together found sounds into a wonderful tapestry that simply can’t be matched on any Black Angels release.  “Blood” picks things up a bit in terms of energy (just a bit) before punching you in the ear with “Broke Life.”  With guitars not unlike an air-raid siren announcing its beginning, layered vocals invoking an LSD-induced version of “Row Your Boat,” and a heavy bass line, “Broke Life” is an odyssey.  Just when you’ve got it figured out, a drum machine marks the 4:05 time signature and the song falls apart while coming together at the same time.  God, what a beautiful mess.  I could listen to the last 2 minutes of “Broke Life” forever.

“Visions” change the tempo and mood quite a bit, almost a bit too much.  Just as the groove starts to take hold, “Home” comes along and takes over.  Lots of horns, lots of guitars, a relentless bass line, and more horns, this is Lester Bangs back from the dead, bleating out chaos on his sax and annoying his neighbors while the drone reminds you that it’s best not to get too comfortable.  Comfort is dangerous on this album because “Atoms” is right around the corner.  Those spooky horns from “Home” are back, but not unlike the microscopic building blocks in which it is named, “Atoms” is a complex suite of layered (yes, that word again) bleeps, pangs, tinks, and a Star Destroyer plowing into your apartment.

“Atoms” enlarges to “Dust,” and track 7 expands on track 6.  A bit more psychedelic in nature than those songs that came before, the groove slows down at almost the 4 minute mark before the song ends as almost every other tune on the album does – with the master drone track revealed.  “Dust” evolves from “Atoms,” and matures into “Desert Highway Music.”  Haunting you with that reverb and ever-expanding textures, this might sound like every other “desert song” you’ve heard, but the Clipd Beaks manage to weave space sounds and other weirdness into the mix.  Imagine a time-lapse film of a cactus sprouting, flowering, withering, and ultimately dying with superimposed images of exploding stars…this is your soundtrack.

“Jamn” does just that – jam.  Maybe I’m just exhausted from the experience of the first 8 tracks, but this one left me a little underwhelmed.  There’s not a damn thing wrong with the track, but it lacks the focus of the first 8.  Yet again, it is called “Jamn,” and most jams lack focus and may have been the thematic intent all along.

“On One” clocks in at over 7 minutes and devolves into the sparsest track on the album.  That’s not to say the song is simple by any means, because it isn’t.  There’s just a lot more space in the song and not nearly as much chaos.  Feedback is the tendon that holds the vocals and drums together, with the bass line doing what its done so well throughout the album – pumping that blood that keeps the listener alive throughout the listening experience.  It ends with beautiful waves of noise and continues through to the final track “Shot on a Horse.”  The mix from “On One” to “Shot on a Horse” sounds to be virtually the same, until around the 2 minute mark.  That’s when the bass returns and introduces its new friend, the weeping violin.  Both are gone almost as soon as they arrived and the song fades away into the ether.

This is certainly the kind of music your parents will never understand, and that many of you won’t like.  For some, however, this is brilliant fucking music.

Stuart Sayger and I are part of a small fraternity of kids who all worked at Comic Carnival in Broad Ripple.  I was among the first lucky squirts who had an opportunity to spend a few days a week sorting books in the greatest comic book store in the state, and by my estimation, Stuart would have been part of the second generation of hired help.  What sets Stuart apart from the rest of us is that Stuart actually managed to break into the comic book industry and earn a living at it in the process.  Not only has Stuart contributed to an impressive body of comic book work, he’s also a noteworthy artist whose work has appeared in multiple gallery shows.  Stuart’s been a fixture in the local comic book scene for most of his life, and the following interview sheds some light on his life in comics.

Links: http://www.stuartsayger.com/

Talk a bit about what first drew you into comic books.  How old were you when you got your first comic, and what was it?  Who was responsible for getting you into comic books?

I’m one of the guys that fell in love with comics very early on and that love never let go. By the time I was 5, I was hooked. I received the 1979 price guide as a Christmas gift when I was 7 years old. I had received two earlier editions used, and I just devoured them as reference, looking at the Don Newton covered price guide and seeing the JSA for the first time. My mind swam wondering who all those characters were. Yes, I knew Hawkman, but the GA Sandman just looked freaky to me!

A 25-cent Amazing Spider-Man #156 May 1976 was my first comic book. I pretty much wanted comics because my sister was getting some of them, and I was jealous. I was nearing 4 years old when that happened. I wasn’t really a Spider Man fan…he never did much for me. Most all of my childhood was spent rejecting the entire Marvel line of characters. I fell for Batman hard. I watched re-runs of the 1966 TV show and thought that it was all straight and serious. Honestly I wanted then and still very much do these days, my heroes to talk like Adam West did.

I got Batman comics new off the racks but the book that really did me in was Detective Comics #477 May-June 1978. Man.. I love that book. It reprints the story “the House that Haunted Batman”.. written by Marv Wolfman and Len Wein, Art by Neal Adams and Dick Giordano. This story was everything that I ever wanted a Batman comic to be. I think that there is honestly no over-estimating the impact that Detective #477 had had on my interest in comics and drawing. Here’s the funny thing about that comic, before it was published I had some older Batman comics: a copy of Batman #200 and Detective Comics #403. Right away I responded to the Neal Adams covers. I was well aware that there were images of Batman that looked different than the rest. I was responding to Neal Adams’ work before it really occurred to me that actual people sat at a table and drew these things. When Detective #477 came out, it was the first time that I was exposed to a full Adams story. I was hooked and never looked back!

My father used to sell antique lighting and as a result I went to a lot of flea markets, antique malls, estate sales, etc. There were quite often comic books. I remember seeing the Dragon’s Lair ( comic dealers from ohio ) selling comics at the state fairgrounds when I was very young, at the time new comics were 40 cents. I could very often buy used comics for 10-cent or even a nickel back then. Everyone, and I mean everyone was reading Marvel. X-men were really roaring with John Byrne. Avengers were big too, but I didn’t care about those comics. I had Adams, Kaluta, and Wrightson. I recieved a rather large stack of beaten 12-cent House Of Mystery and House Of Secret comics when I was pretty young.  Those covers were so much better to me than anything marvel was putting out … DC, too!

Comics to me at this age were this giant awesome world that seemed to have no end. I remember one time my father found copies of the Steranko History Of Comics. My parents completely supported my interest in comics. They knew that they were the best way to get me interested in reading, and it worked! The deal then was that if we went to the store I could have a comic book, but I had to agree to read that comic to my mother (parents always have an angle.). So here I am, this li’l kid deep into comics – old comics. I had three price guilds.. My father took me to the then famous Indianapolis Convention Center Comic Convention. I think that I was 7 years old. Man.. I got so excited about that show that I threw up the day before we went, and I threw up again after the show. I would feel a little embarrassed about this, except that I’ve talked to a number of other fans who can recall these strong early comic memories.

What inspired you to start drawing comics and how old were you when you started?  Assuming that, like me, you started drawing at a young age, what were your earliest efforts like?
I started drawing comics right away. Well, I was at least drawing superheroes, a lot of Batman. Strangely I also really liked old Bob Kane Batman comics. My mother took me to the Comic Carnival. The shop used to have the Marvel and DC back issues separated. I went in to the shop and asked for Batman comics. They showed me the new issues on the rack. I said no i want ones that look different and held my thumbs and forefingers up to my chin to make the “squared off” look. My mom said they would know what I was looking for by doing that, and she was right! So I bought the most beaten rags of early 12-cent Batman comics and then very much drew Batman with that face. Now here is the funny thing, my Batman drawings had characters that looked like the Bob Kane comics, but otherwise all took place in the Neal Adams world. There was lots of smoke, full moons, but the bad guys all wore pin-stripped suits! I’ve got some of these still, they are crazy looking. I recall that I had a small spiral bound memo book about the size of a postcard. I filled the book with Batman drawings in 1st grade. I’ts gone now.. but I wish that I still had the drawing of the 1950’s Batmobile jumping a bridge. During this time, I was sleeping over at a friend’s house and attempted to make a full Star Wars comic. He kept wanting to add dinosaurs to the story which I knew weren’t in Star Wars, and that made me very mad. At least there weren’t any Tyrannosaurus.

What impact did working at a comic shop most of your life have on you as a person and as an artist?  How long did you work for Comic Carnival and at what ages?

I worked at Comic Carnival starting in February 1986. I was 13 years old. You know the beginning of the movie Good Fellas when the young Henry Hill wants to work at the cab stand? That’s what it felt like, well, except that instead of blowing up people’s cars I would bag comics and file all day. I typed up a li’l resume and walked in and pretty much asked for a job. The owner later told me that they really weren’t looking to hire anyone, but he thought that anyone who would show that kind of initiative should be given a shot, I worked there throughout Jr. high, high school, and during college breaks. I still help out now and again if someone is sick.. I grew up there. That store is very much a second family. Puberty was a long ways away, and I wanted in there with those comics. I remember unpacking the Dark Knight Returns fresh from the case, Crisis #12 sitting left over on the rack, I put Watchmen #1 on the rack and Elektra Assassin too. Anyone who has ever unpacked a case of Electra Assassin #1 remembers the smell of that book. It was really different than anything else.

I was very lucky to start working there just as the old way of comics was going away. DC had yet to start Superman over with a new #1. Capitol City was distributing comics along with Friendly Franks and others too. Diamond was established but was still kinda an upstart so it seemed. By working in that shop i received a full-time education in comics. Comic Carnival really specialized in old comics back then. I remember one time I did a restock, just checking the boxes in the back room versus the comics that were on the floor and putting out what ever was needed. I remember filing three copies of X-Men # 1 for — are you ready? — $30, $60, and $75 because asking $100 for an X-Men #1 was pretty hard to do as the book would have to be in fine condition. By working there I got to handle comics from all eras.

Yes I saw all the Adams that I wanted, but by being around that much of it all the time I was able to not only see, but learn to tell the difference between Adams inked by Adams on the Spectre versus Adams inked by Giordano in Detective Comics versus Adams inked by Tom Palmer. Life then was just such an education of the history of comics and the history of comic artists (and writers too, but I couldn’t pick up on as much as I was actually working and reading comics was grounds for being fired). For those of you who didn’t get to make it in to Comic Carnival in the 70’s-80’s-90’s, you really missed something. I wore dress pants, leather shoes, and a neck tie every day to work, as did all employees. Back then there was such an effort to make a comic shop look like a “real business” There is a reason why the “comic book guy” on the Simpsons TV show is so popular.

Probably the number one thing I learned at that shop was how to sell comics, how to talk to collectors and understand what they liked and what they didn’t. We really were salesmen then. Everything mattered .. Back then all the customers bought back issues on just about every visit they made to the shop. Grading mattered to collectors that had nothing to do with “investing.” It could be said that I’ve been working in the comics industry since 1986.

Much later, when graduation for college was approaching and I was interested in getting in to comics as an artist, all the things that I had learned about the industry working in that shop would be of value especially when it came to self publishing. Making a comic from scratch is one thing, but how many talented creators also have any idea how to sell the comic they make? I’d been selling comics for 15 years! I like to think that this is why Diamond came to me and expressed interest in selling Shiver In The Dark.

At what point did you start thinking that this was something you really wanted to do professionally (drawing comics, not working at CC)?

I never thought about making comics professionally. One time I said to my good friend and then co-worker, Matt Fisher, that I had a feeling I would be making at least part of my living from comics for the rest of my life. I was 18, he was 14 and God bless him and his wisdom, he said, “God, I hope not!”

You see, I never went to art school. I really wasn’t interested in it. I was more interested in illustration and I didn’t even know that you could go to school for that. In high school, “art class” was really pretty silly and most of the people who I had encountered who were “art students” were creating things that I really wasn’t interested in.

I studied journalism in college at Indiana University. Indiana has a strong journalism school and one reason for this is that they put out a substantial daily paper. I remember walking in to the paper offices and having the editors sigh and say to me “Okay freshman, what do you want to write…news, sports..etc.”… I replied that I didn’t want to write anything, but if they needed any illustrations, I’d like to be the guy. As luck would have it there was an editor in ear shot who butt in and said, “Can you make something right now?”  You see digital photography was not around yet, and they had lost some photos creating a big problem on page two. He said, “I need it in 45 minutes.” So I quickly drew a piece to his specifications. He looked at it and said, “Yeah..yeah — looks good. Can you do more for tomorrow?” So I became the go-to guy for the paper for four years. I wasn’t in art classes with week long deadlines for projects. I was taking other classes and I would come home, on top of my homework I would make spot illustrations that were due the next day. I had to learn to draw fast. I had to learn to draw things i didn’t know how to draw and wasn’t interested in drawing. I had to draw for an editor, not for myself. I had to draw for reproduction — clean-lined, black-and-white, camera-ready art. This is the path to become a comic book artist.

Once I was asked to create a color piece for a magazine cover. It printed very poorly as I made it out of pastels and it didn’t photograph well. The staff was very apologetic. One of them said if you want color over your colors, you should use photoshop. They had a copy of the file, but no one really knew how to do much with it other than resize photos. So I had to dive in and teach myself. One of the pieces that I made was entered in a national journalism contest and came in 2nd. I started thinking that maybe i could do this on a more professional capacity.”

I seem to recall your first professionally published work was for Big Bang Comics.  Is that correct?  How did that come about?  With Big Bang being more of an homage to comics of day’s past (Batman specifically), was this your big opportunity to channel the Neal Adams Batman into your work on a more overt level?

I think that my first nationally published work was indeed in Big Bang Comics. I had put together a group of Batman sample pages and brought them to the Chicago Comicon looking to get reviews or work if possible. I was familiar with the Big Bang line of comics from my time in the Comic Carnival. In the Big Bang universe there is a character named “The Knight Watchman” who seemed to be very much an homage to the Batman comics of the 1940’s. The first Knight Watchman comic was credited as being drawn by Tom King ( a nod to Batman’s creator, Bob Kane).

In this story the Knight Watchman battles a villain who is obsessed with time. The villain is about to get away when the Knight Watchman hurls a pocket watch like a morning star striking the villain in the back of the head. The Knight Watchman quips, “Time wounds all heels.” That was so silly and great. I loved that. Anyway that comic rang in my head when I stumbled upon the Big Bang booth in Chicago. Big Bang’s publisher Gary Carlson was there as were many other Big Bang contributors. I loudly opened the conversation by saying, “Hey!!!.. Where’s Tom King!??!?” Gary got a chuckle and we began to chat about their comics. I approached the conversation merely as a fan, not thinking that this could be a professional opportunity. You see this day was the very first time that I had tried to approach the comic industry for work. I really was only targeting DC comics and didn’t have Big Bang on my mind. But Gary being an opportunist spotted the portfolio under my arm and asked if I was an artist, and if so, if he could see my work. I showed him my pages and narrated the corresponding story to him as he turned the pages. It was so funny, it never occurred to me that he might be interested in my work.

Right out of the blue Gary says that he likes what he sees and that he had been wanting to do a 1970’s type Knight Watchmen story. The samples that I brought were in pencils, and Gary said that if I would ink the pages as the Knight Watchmen, and be willing to  tweak a few things to fit his Knight Watchman character, that he’d like to run the story in his comic. WOW! I was floored! I think that I had been at the convention for about an hour with most of that time being spent standing in line getting my badge and then bumbling around the convention floor trying to find my way, and already I had a bite! Gary was absolutely the first person who had seen my work at the show and he asked me to climb aboard. The funny thing was that I had driven up to the show from college with two of my friends who were trying to break in as writers. When I finally walked away from the Big Bang table I ran in to one of them and said, “I think I just got a gig…!!!” I’ll tell you this, and I mean every word, working in comics has been a blast, an absolute blast but nothing has given me quite the high and buzz as those early days of trying to get in to comics. Making sample pages and walking up to editors looking to get reviews is just electric. Going to a convention and meeting so many editors, one right after another, hoping to get a gig is like asking out 10 girls in 2 hours.  It seems that at some point it enters your head to try to break in to comics. Then you start drawing to really show off what you can do. You get a hotel for the show, rent a car to go to the show, and just really put so much of yourself in to something that you just know nothing about, just trying to make something happen. I’ve never felt so alive…EVER! There are photos of me and my two friends in the hotel room the night before the show putting stamps on self addressed stamped envelopes that we stuffed in to our sample packets. Those times mean so much to me.

Anyway.. I’m off topic. Big Bang and Gary was great for me. I inked copies of the pages so I have versions of my story as both Batman and as the Knight Watchmen. One of the things that made this time so exciting was the sheer fact that my growth curve was off the charts. The pages that I penciled weren’t nearly as strong as the finished inked pages. The more that I worked on them the more that I decided to change. This was a big deal for me. Things that I thought were good months earlier suddenly weren’t up to par. I really felt that I was getting better as an artist. Looking back and comparing the pencils to the inks I can see that I was right. It was about this time that my personal style was changing about halfway through the Knight Watchman inks I started to do a lot more expressive things with my inks. About this time I was really excited by Esteban Maroto’s art. In his work for Warren comics he’s done so many interesting things with negative space. His layouts just knocked down the panel boarders. Nothing could hold is lush page designs.

In comics I came from a background of Adams and Aparo and here was Esteban just running all over them in my head. The surface of how I draw has changed a lot since these days, but the Adams and Aparo influence is still there in the layouts. No way around it!  Once the Knight Watchman story was done Gary asked me if I wanted to do another. I of course agreed, but feeling that my interests were changing and that I had already done a 70’s DC looking book I wanted to do something else. I suggested something more like a Warren comic and he said that he personally liked the work, but didn’t think that it fit with his stable of characters and the other books they were putting out. Gary left the door open, and I’ll tell you, I would love to draw the Knight Watchmen again sometime. I’ll always have fond thoughts of him, but at the time my appatite to try new art techniques was knew no bounds. I knew that I would want to stay focused on my old style.

Your next move was to begin self-publishing Shiver in the Dark.  Did you try to get into the mainstream companies first, or was self-publishing your plan all along?

I pretty much had my sights set on DC comics. I had to go back to college, back to waiting tables and finishing up the work for Big Bang, but I wanted to “reload” for the next year’s con with new samples in evolving style. After the Knight Watchmen I produced more sample pages most aimed at DC comics. There were about 6 I did for the Shadow, 5 of the Creeper, 3 or 4 of ( get this ) The Witching Hour!!! ( I”m crazy) and 5 or so of Daredevil. I went back to Chicago the next year looking to get a review from the editors at DC. I wasn’t able to talk to ANYONE at DC the year before when I got the Knight Watchmen gig. I wanted to, but I was too late. I didn’t know how things worked at conventions. I didn’t think that there would be so many would-be artists in line for a review.  So the second year I went to Chicago to show off my goods I made sure to arrived early. Let me tell you one thing that just about crippled me that year. There were so many people who wanted to get a review from DC that an announcement was made that there would be a raffle, just to have the opportunity to be reviewed. I think that it was stated that about half of the people who came would get a review. Now here I was. I had devoted so much time for this one opportunity that might not even happen!!! But I was lucky, my number was drawn. I was going to get a review, but it was so obvious just how many people who worked very hard, who drove across the country just to have their portfolio glanced at, were going to go home with zero that day. This is why whenever someone asks me if I’ll look at their portfolio I always say yes, even if I’m busy.
So my number had been picked and I get in line for my review. I wait , I wait. And finally I’m going to be the next guy to get a review, and just then the editor gets up and leaves!!!! I’m standing there and the DC people say that another editor is coming. Finally Bob Schreck ( who had just been hired ) sits down. I’m his first guy to review of the day. Nervously I sit and unzip my GIANT portfolio. Now this is a funny thing that I want to point out. Comics are drawn on 11×17 pages in most cases. 11×17 is not a very big portfolio and if you want to work in any other industry at all you buy a bigger portfolio to house paintings, or blueprints, etc. I didn’t know these things and I show up with a full sized portfolio that won’t even fit on the table. Now let me tell you, Bob is a cool guy he said to everyone else,  “See? Size DOES MATTER!” He looked at my book and liked my work. In fact he even asked for samples and my contact info!  “I have no idea who this guy at DC is. And I don’t care. He’s a DC editor and he likes my stuff.” That was really all that I wanted that day. I remember Bob saying, “I like your work, but I don’t  h ave any jobs to offer right now, but I’d like to keep in touch. Send me your next batch of work. Maybe something will come along.” I went over to Marvel and Dark Horse and talked to editors and everyone seemed to like what they saw, but at the same time they all said the same thing, “good work, but I have no jobs to offer right now.”  I was very happy and I foolishly thought that I had made a big impression and that all I had to do was go home and wait for the phone to ring. Of course it never did. I was just young and didn’t’ know how things worked. One review is never going to be enough. Not ever. Still I got tired of people saying, ”good drawings, but no work”.

So all at once it hit me; why was I trying so hard to get in with these other companies? I really don’t need their approval to make comics. I could do it on my own! Besides, my Knight Watchmen experience told me that editors wants your assigned work to match the style of the samples, don’t do anything too creative. He  doesn’t want a lot of reinventing the wheel. This is when I decided to make Shiver in the Dark. Without naming names I also want to states that there was one editor at that convention who looked my may creeper samples which were finished inked pages. I didn’t have photocopies of the pencils used to make the finished inked pages. The editor quickly slapped my portfolio shut and pushed it back to me saying, “You are a new untried artist, and no editor is going to let you both pencil and ink your first job, since I can’t see what your work looks like as one stage separate from the other, these pages are worthless to me!”  No lie!  I walked away from that with a really bad taste in my mouth. That experience said to me that many editors were not looking at artist’s thinking, “How can I get the most out of this guy’s strengths?”, but rather, “How can I bottle neck this guy in to working the same way as everyone else” While still at the show, I decided that I wasn’t coming back with sample pages.. I was coming back with a finished comic that was mine. All mine, the way that I wanted a comic to be.

About two months before the Chicago convention I had broken up with my girl friend of about 31/2 years. I was just out of school and I said to my self, “OK, this is probably the last time that you can really do something crazy free and irresponsible. It’s my life to do what I want to do, to make comics.”

I called my parents and told them that I wanted to move back home rather than pay rent, that I wanted to publish a comic. God bless them they never asked for more explanation than that. I sat in my childhood bedroom with one revolving chair in the middle of the floor, on one side was my drafting table, the other was my computer. I made the first issue of Shiver in the Dark in an area about 6 feet wide. When I went back to Chicago the next year it wasn’t as a fan trying to break in. It was as a publisher with a table and a book. At this time I was a lot more realistic. I thought I’d sell the comics to fans, but also have a really nice presentation piece to give to the publishers. There was a decent number of people who had taken this route in to the industry by this time, but nowhere near as many as we have today. There was NO such thing as “print on demand.”  All the Shiver in the Dark comics were offset printed. To my surprise Shiver in the Dark sold really well. Fans e-mailed me asking for future issues and commissions of my own character!  I received 3 requests for commissions in the first 10 minutes of setting up at my first convention! This was all new to me, but immediately it felt right. I’ll never forget, I decided to make a free 30 second head sketch on the cover of the first issue for anyone who bought a copy. I didn’t advertise this, it was just an on the spot surprise to the fan when I handed them their copy. Saturday during the show I was quickly signing one of my books and looked up to see that there were FOUR people waiting in line to pay me for my book. I was blown away by the warm fan reaction. All the “Thanks, but no thanks” that I’d gotten from editors the year before was GONE! Recall that I had made Witching Hour sample pages the year before. When Shiver in the Dark first came out there were ZERO horror comics being published. Shiver was at least a year before the 30 Days of Night comic. People had responded to my writing, and my art, but also my taste in themes. I was lucky to be a little ahead of the curve, but it was by sheer luck, I was only producing a comic book that I wanted to make. That’s it.

From working in a comic shop I had gotten the idea that working at a major company was the only way to work in this biz. But making Shiver in the Dark was like falling in love for the first time! I really cut loose on that book, I tried so many new visual techniques on that book. I had no idea if any of it would work. I changed my art style from panel to panel, page to page. Whatever the mood of the scene called for is how I drew. It’s really easy to fall in to the trap of drawing what you think other people want, but when you work only for yourself you really get the best results. Shortly after Shiver #1 had come out I looked back at the Knight Watchman and didn’t even recognize my thought process. These were times of change.

What have you learned from the Shiver project in terms of self-publishing, but also as a comic creator?  As an artist, do you find the writing aspects of the comic more of a chore?  How far out do you have the Shiver storyline plotted?  Do you intend to keep that going as a series (honestly), and have you considered collaborating with other writers/artists for future projects?

I really really want to keep shiver going. The honest truth is that I’ve got the next 2 issues plotted out, but the book takes me so much longer to draw than anything else. I think that is because it is my baby. Nothing in my life has been as rewarding as making Shiver in the Dark. I mean that. I remember talking to Erik Larson who was looking the book over at the first Wizard LA convention. I remember him asking me if I had considered getting someone to letter the book. He pointed out some things that I could be doing better with my lettering. I told him that I had considered it, but was not very seriously. I told him that I could probably find someone who could ink the book better. And someone who could probably dialog the book better, and I was sure that someone could make better layouts. Ultimately I could get the best people in the world to work on Shiver in the Dark to the point where there wasn’t anything for me to do at all on the book. I said that Shiver in the Dark may not be the best comic in the world, but it’s the best comic in the world that I can make. I stand by this philosophy and Erik accepted it. Let me just say this…making Shiver in the Dark has taught me so much. I love writing the book, but I never set out to be a writer. That has changed a bit thanks to Shiver. I think about drawing comics differently now that I’ve done some writing. There isn’t an aspect of creating a comic that I don’t’ enjoy. Many creators say things like, “ I don’t to publish. I just want to draw,” or, “I hate having to do promotion,” I LOVE those aspects of making comics…publishing is a blast!!! I miss doing more of it. And let me tell you, it feels so great handing someone a comic you’ve made SINGLE HANDEDLY and saying, I made this from scratch. It’s mine.

I would like to collaborate a bit. Someone once asked me which writer I think I would like to work with most and I couldn’t come up with a name. And then it just hit me — Kevin O’Neil. I like Kevin’s work, but most of all I get the feeling that I could really cut loose and get expressive with my art, that I wouldn’t just be  a stiff illustrating fight sequences. I’m better illustrating if I think the text has something to say. I think that a good writer should have some sort of ax to grind in his writing. Every once in a while he really turns on his audience and attacks them. I like that.

How did the Bionicle work come about?  How did it feel to be working on the most widely distributed comic book in the US?  How was it working for a publisher who arguably knows little about the comics world?

I was asked to try out for the Bionicle job from an editor at DC who had seen my Shiver in the Dark comics… Lego was interested in rebooting the Bionicle comic and wanted something different.. Initially when I was approached about trying out for the book I thought that they were crazy to even think of me… #1..  I don’t draw in a clean style ( which is often how machines and robots are depicted) ..also.. There were no real good example of how I might draw a robot period…  I pretty much thought that trying out for the book would be a waste of time, ONLY because I was sure that my style was so different that I would never be taken seriously… When I sat down to make a bionicle sample I pretty much made a deal with myself… I thought that the only way that Bionicle could be any good is if I believe that it is good. I’ve got to produce art in a style that I like, and I agree with. So I had to figure out a way to make the characters interesting to me…  Years ago when I worked at the Comic Carnival I had a discussion with the then manager regarding who we thought was the best “war artist” in comics… he said Russ Heath ( which is a fine choice!.. I love Russ’s work).. But I countered saying that Joe Kubert was the best… The manager argued that Russ was better in that Russ was very accurate in how he drew the machines in the battle scenes. Russ would draw the correct tanks to be fighting in a certain part of the world, during a certain point of the war…. Kubert would simply draw a generic tank and put either a swastika or an american flag on it so the reader could tell who was whom..  Well, there might indeed be some truth in that argument, but I wasn’t going for it.. I quickly countered by saying that I believe that Kubert drew better looking people and better emotions, and that war was not about machines, but about people and since his people were better, he was better over all… I honestly believe that either Russ or Joe are acceptable answers, but my personal interests lie with Joe’s work. Getting the humanity was more important that the correct number of rivets on a robot became the driving force of how I drew bionicle. .. I decided that I would not draw using a ruler.. That the lines would have variety of weight, that the robots would get dirty, and dented, and that they would live in a world with a lot of dust and smoke. As much “life” as I could force in them was my goal.  When I drew the Bionicles I bent the body parts in ways that more closely matched the movements of the human body… my drawings did things that the toys just couldn’t do.  Lego liked my work, but thought that it might be a bit out there.. So they had a few test groups of kids go over my work.. I tested very high and was offered the job… Alex Bleyaert- the colorist- came along a bit later.. I colored the covers to issue #0 and #1 as well as the poster in issue #0… go back and look at those first 3 images and you’ll see my approach was very different than the rest of the series.

I’d like to hear about your life as a freelance artist.  How did you break into the trading card scene?

I landed the gig to do the DC/ Upperdeck VS cards from meeting an editor at the San Diego comic con. There was a fan who was looking at my work. He seemed to like a lot of it, but bought nothing. He was very nice and asked a lot of questions, I had no idea he was an art director at DC. He finally revealed himself and asked if I wanted to draw some cards for a Green Lantern set!  This all happened before Bionicle came along. I was there promoting Shiver in the Dark and that was it. Shiver in the Dark had been doing pretty well by this time, I was paying all of my bills as a fully time ,self employed comic book artist/ publisher of one title ( which I guess is an accomplishment itself ). But still it seemed that my career had sort of plateaued, and though I was happy with my success. It didn’t feel that good that none of the big companies had shown any interest in offering me any work, that feeling stuck with me for about 3 weeks and I really started to think more and more about what to do about it. Then the phone rang and the VS job was formally offered to me with deadlines, etc. Amazingly the VERY next day I was also approached by Wizard Magazine to draw a big piece for them.

The first VS job was really exciting. I was assigned 4 cards and I had to send them in electronically to my editor. I had made what I thought were pretty good looking images, but I wasn’t the editor, I had no idea what protocol was. For all I knew he was going to hate them all. The worst part was that all I could do was simply upload them to DC comics and wait. I uploaded them and then about 20 minutes later I received an e-mail from another DC editor stating that he had just seen the Green Lantern cards that I had tuned in and that he was working on a Batman related set, and that he wanted me to work on them too!! 20 minutes after I turned in my first DC job I was given my second! Before the first editor even approved the work that I had done!

Lately, it seems like your freelance work dominates your schedule more than anything else.  Do you find that the freelance work stands between you and an ongoing series?  Do you have any plans to return to an ongoing series, or are you content producing the stand alone art pieces?

“Lately” has been a hard concept for me. I drew Bionicle for 2 years and then, Boom, it was over. There was no slowing down. In fact there is really isn’t any “slowing down” in comics at all. You are drawing a book, then you finish it. There really is no way to cut back from 22 pages, it’s zero-to-22 in a second, and then back again. Just about the time that Bionicle was ending I was approached by the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis to do a lot of work for their year-long comic book exhibit. So now I’m taking care of a lot of little things that have been neglected before I take on the next big gig. Right now I’m producing the poster and program art for an original comic art exhibit for the university of Oregon called “Faster than a Speeding Bullet: The Art of the Super Hero!” It’s a 3 foot poster of Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman… very cool, fun stuff! But I am looking forward to having another project that’s bigger to sink my teeth into, something that I can really develop as I work on it. It’s great to be knee deep into a project really getting to know the characters and seeing the characters grow as you work on them.

For someone with only a few published comic books under his belt, you have amassed somewhat of a following both on-line, and on the convention circuit.  With somewhat of a built-in audience for your work, how is it that you aren’t doing regular series work for a publisher?
Geez! Way to put me on the spot!! I’m talking with a few editors right now, something might be happening at Wildstorm. The Children’s Museum gig really pulled me away from the “main stream” end of comics for a while. You’re right. I need to get on that!. San Diego is coming up soon, I’ll likely line something up there. Ask me again in July!

Who would win in a fight between Galactus and Batman?

See you did the wrong thing. You asked me about Batman. I love Batman, but I do not see him as he is portrayed in the movies, or really many of the comics today. For me batman is very smart, and compassionate. He has wealth and he understands that it is his wits and financial status allow him to make a difference for the good of all in ways that other people can’t. He becomes Batman because he wants to HELP, not punish. He is NOT driven by vengeance as he knows that no good comes from vengeance. I’ve always put the spin on Batman that he had something terrible happen to him ( his parents die) but that in spite of that he’s been surrounded by only good people who’ve only shown him kindness ( Leslie Tompkins ). Bruce Wayne is grateful for all that he has and wants to help those who have less. He wants to fight the crime because it NOT ruined his life, but merely taken the one thing that has kept his life from being perfect! He dresses like a bat because “criminals are a superstitious and cowardly lot.”

I like to think that Batman would first marvel at the sight of Galactus, curious and excited!  Then quickly Batman would come to the conclusion that Galactus is not evil, but merely hungry. I’d like to think that Batman would work to think of a way to quench Galactus’ hunger. to save earth and help the galactic traveler all in one! Thus your answer is. There would be no fight at all. Not what you expected from a guy that draws Batman grinding his teeth all day!

New, from Team ZapTown – the offical ZT Postcard!  Free, while supplies last, at a ZT friendly store near you!

Photo by Gary Mead, graphics by Yuri Duncan.

What can you tell us about the recording process? At times throughout the new album there are portions where it sounds like you have 20 people playing at once and evokes images of The Band’s “The Last Waltz”. Were most songs recorded in a group setting, or did you use a multi-track approach? Was this album really recorded in your living room?

The record is primarily multi-tracked. Resources were kinda limited throughout the process. However, we weren’t in the kind of multi-track situation where we could do endless takes of tracks and tweak and fiddle forever.

It felt more permanent like recording to tape feels. The time constraints surrounding us helped coerce ideas and focus that an unlimited amount of time likely wouldn’t have. I work well under pressure I found out. The album was recorded primarily in my bedroom and my living room. The drums couldn’t really fit in my room, with the exception of the drums that are on the track “Phones Don’t Feud.” We did alot of drum takes with two people on one drum kit. Alot of times, roommates would have to walk through our setup during a take to get into their rooms. You can hear dishes being washed. One vocal track I remember mixing has the bass frequencies of a band practice that occurred during the vocals takes I was doing. It was a little makeshift. Next time, I will definitely focus the sessions more. Soundproof more, etc. Without a doubt, the recording process was determined by my school schedule. The record was recorded during the first three months of my final semester in college. I’d get home from school, write and record until midnight, and mix til three or four, and repeat. Without a doubt, the highlight for me must have been during the final track I did: It was at three-thirty in the morning, one hour before my flight to New York (where I was headed to mix the record). I was recording glockenspiel tracks for “Days Drag” on my floor, in my underwear, with a drumstick, after a marathon 72 hour recording weekend that involved writing a whole song, and finalizing all the little recording issues before my trip. Also, I’m a pretty major fan of the “Last Waltz.”

I’ve read descriptions of the recording quality of the new album such as ‘poorly recorded’, ‘messy’, ‘trashcan’, etc. (all part of positive reviews), but to us it sounds like the closest thing to Pet Sounds yet. In many ways, it is the Pet Sounds album that Robert Schneider has been trying to make for years. Set the record straight – was the sound of the new album something that you planned? For example, if you had a chance to record the album all over again in the greatest studio in the universe, would we still get to hear the haunting reverb guitar sound that peppers most songs?

I had very very specific ideas in mind for how I wanted each part to fit into other parts. The record consciously has an aesthetic. This aesthetic is formed partially out of limitations of recording equipment and partially out of a conscious decision to make the record sound sonically unique. A part of me didn’t want the record to sound like someone who was trying to make a home recording sound like a studio record. I was confident that the compositions alone would prevent someone writing this off as a “home recording.” Not to digress, but it feels as if labeling something as a “home recording” has become more of a subtle excuse for songs being bad. In the back of my mind, I knew that we didn’t need this record to sound to perfect in order for it to be respected. I think artists like Ariel Pink, The Band, Arthur Russell, have all made amazing records and songs despite not recording in a studio. I just happened to be in a place where I’m not out and out committing to a lo-fi aesthetic yet not striving to sound like a faux-studio record. It’s a weird middle ground that this record falls into to.

The Pet Sounds comparison is a little overwhelming in that I feel like that record is pretty untouchable, as most people do. In fact, I don’t see alot of the Beach Boys references bands get, including my own. There’s a balancing that exists on Pet Sounds that somehow manages to sound minimal (when do you ever hear a full drum kit) but yet so expansive it almost seems like an orchestra filling the room. The perfect balance is something I’m striving for still. It’s something that wasn’t exactly achieved. You have to have alot of confidence to believe in just a few tracks being able to carry a song, versus a million things going on. This is also true for reverb. I’m a huge fan of tape-delays and icey spring reverbs, as you know from the record, yet it can be a huge crutch if you’re unsure of a how a part sounds, especially when it comes to vocals. I’m still working on that ability to cut back.

I love the songs “Dens” and “Experiencer”. In both songs the vocals become another instrument in a larger tapestry of sound and we can’t make out the lyrics. Can you tell us what they are about?

Dens and Experiencer both share thoughts that are a little more topical for me. Both kinda of deal with working and being broke. Mainly, Dens comes out of watching my parents struggle financially. Experiencer used to be called “Working” and it’s about summer jobs. Primarily, it’s about working jobs that make you feel less than your worth.

When describing to friends the sounds found on Columbus’d The Whim, I threw out Brian Wilson, Brian Jones, Syd Barrett and Ringo Starr (“Photograph” era). What inspires your music?

Brian Wilson is the one I probably try to emulate that most, like most artists do.”Surfs Up” probably determined alot of chord progressions in the record. I’m also a big fan of Brian Jones’ general insanity. However, I’ve never been a big Pink Floyd or Solo Ringo fan. During the recording, I remember listening to alot of Ram-era McCartney. I was really getting into Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy by Brian Eno at that time. Alot of the drums sounds on the record were influenced by that record, primary the Phil Collins drums on “Mother Whale Eyeless.” I really decided to make songs have the ability to use two drums because of that song. In addition to that, Odyssey and Oracle is a huge huge influence. My decision to start playing and buying organs stems from the Zombies. Anytime you hear the organ sound collaborate with guitar sounds on the album, I was likely using Odyssey and Oracle as a blueprint. Kate Bush is a constant inspiration from production to the way she writes melodies.

How important is cover art in an era when people seldom look at it?

I think actually people might look at a cover more than they’ll listen to a record. Especially with blogging and the digital age of music purchase, all you have to go on sometimes is a little thumbnail of a cover. I think there needs to be a re-emphasis on the actual product. The resurgence of vinyl releases is such a good thing. Seeing album art, especially on a gatefold record is such a perfect way to see things. But to answer the question, I think cover art is hugely, hugely influential. I have some records that look so cool, despite not sounding that good. I’ve found myself re-listening to them in an attempt to like the record just because of the art.

Also, Ben Tousley did such an amazingly beautiful fucking job on the whole album’s artistic direction.

Think about about itunes and file sharing role in song format re. the single vs the long format. Multi stage music festivals, too, seem to change the live experience, too, in that your not locked in, you can wander to the next act if you’re not turned on. I often wonder if we’ll start seeing touring festivals again. “itunes top 5 acts of the year performing their hit singles.” In that case, I’d be interested to hear what 5 other bands “holiday shores” would like to share the lineup with.

I’m pretty guilty of that attention deficit sometimes when it comes to music and shows. I skip the opening act all too often. Current bands I’d love to play with would be: Women, Dirty Projectors, Girls, Grizzly Bear and The Walkmen.

The whole American Idol/Rock Star/Guitar Hero DIY attitude of the entertainment industry could possibly be a concern to serious musicians. I saw an interview with Wynton Marsalis where he talked about the threat posed by those mediums. He argued that people’s sensitivity to actual legit musicianship is dulled over time if it’s not respected. I’d like to know how they perceive the effect of easy access to home recording and the recent surge of music as entertainment above artform on the musicianship of current hit bands.

I think they’d probably look down on it with much disdain. For most trained musicians, I feel like to an extent they are out of the loop with the whole of independent music, tho there certainly are exceptions where musicians with a classical or performance based education slip into this little realm of the music scene. However, I feel like there’s a sense in the world of commercial music, if you will, that adheres to having only the “best” gear (i.e. expensive) and fastest playingtechnique and whatnot. I think this world sees home recordings as something neat but not the real thing. There’s this sense of being defined by the studio you record in, or the mic you did vocals with, or the pedal board you have. I can’t relate to that. However, I dislike the emphasis on entertainment over artform as I would feel most classical musicians would. I guess to be clear, I’m not lumping classical musicians into the same realm as the kind of people that think brands or expensive gear is the be all and end all of music. I think trying to make show simply ‘entertaining’ would be misguided and it seems people in Wynton Marsalis’ league would probably agree.

What do you do when you’re not making music in order to make sure the rent is paid?

I’ve been unemployed for quite some time, but have recently found a job at a coffee shop. I have trouble being productive when I’m not working, so this is a good thing.

How do you see Holiday Shores evolving over the next 5 years? What would a Holiday Shores big budget studio album sound like?

I see Holiday Shores evolving into more of a band dynamic, which it already is. There will probably never be a big budget studio album ever. And if there was, it’d probably sound pretty shitty.

Be sure to check out Holiday Shores on tour on 8/24 in Bloomington, IN. Venue TBD.   Special thanks to Bill Purdy for the assist.

Back in 1973, when I was around 5 years old, my mother took me to see Santa Claus.  Seeing as this was the man with a workshop full of elves who could make anything I could think of, I asked him this:  “I want a toy haunted house and when I press a button, Sammy Terry comes out the front door.”  My mother was a bit nervous to say the least, and the Christmas was pretty good even without the toy I’d asked for.  One gift I received that year was a coffee mug with a skull face. I’m not sure if it was a conscious choice on the part of my parents, but the mug reminded me of Sammy Terry’s skull necklace. There are pictures of me holding the mug immediately after unwrapping it, and by the look on my face (somewhere between a smile and fright) I was a little hesitant about the gift.  I instructed my parents that the mug would probably be better suited to sit in a cabinet high above the refrigerator, out of my reach.  You see, this thing scared the shit out of me yet I would, on occasion, ask my parents to open the cabinet for just a moment…long enough for me to freak myself out.  This little story pretty much defines my childhood relationship with Sammy Terry.

Sammy Terry was Indiana’s “Shock Theater” host who really hit his stride in the 70s.  Looking like a cross between the scariest clown you’ve ever seen and a zombie beatnik, Sammy Terry was the skull cup I couldn’t bear to watch but also couldn’t help from trying.  For most of my early childhood years, I would beg to stay up and watch Sammy’s show regardless of the movie they were playing.  And even though my parents were really cool about letting me, the ritual always ended the same way:  me in the fetal position in an attempt to block out the voice and any glimpse of the scariest thing I’d ever seen.  It didn’t matter who was around, because I clearly recall collapsing into a ball on the floor in front of a room full of aunts, uncles, and cousins.  I’d happily watch whatever Hammer flick was on, but as soon as it looked like we were going to commercial, the sensory deprivation position was assumed.  This went on for years.  The spell was finally broken at around age 9 when my dad’s date brought her daughter over to the house and decided we were going to watch Sammy Terry.  What was I to do?  I couldn’t very well assume the fetal position in front of this girl who I thought was pretty cute and I wanted to impress, so I toughed it out and watched my very first episode of Sammy Terry from front to back.  And what a show it was too!  It was a Christmas episode and Sammy (along with George, his pet spider) was decorating a tree that would make Charlie Brown puke in disgust.  The climax of the tree trimming involved Sammy placing a glove (similar to the yellow dish washing gloves he wore on the show) atop the tree in place of an angel.  The other episode that stands out in my mind is the one where he had a “Feed the Blob” party which consisted of nothing more than Sammy taking partygoers tickets one at a time as they then jumped into the ever expanding Blob. 

Sammy was the gateway to a lifelong love of horror film, and I rarely see a skull without unconsciously thinking of Sammy’s necklace.  Back in the early 90s, I contacted the editor of Scary Monsters Magazine about running an interview with Sammy Terry.  The magazine ran an ongoing feature on the various Shock Theater hosts across the country, so this one was a no brainer.  My job at the time involved my making sales calls, so my confidence was high.  I contacted Carter’s Music (where Sammy’s alter-ego “Bob Carter” worked) and asked to speak to Mr. Carter himself.  The minute he took the phone, the baritone voice that haunted my Friday nights hit me like a scared little 5 year old and I nearly crapped myself.  Confidence shot, I sputtered out a feeble request for an interview, which was unbelievably granted.  With the appointment set, I borrowed Andrew’s tape recorder and made the phone call the following week.  He talked of his early days in live television and his sincere belief that he invented the slogan “Finger Lickin’ Good” while sampling some of the Colonel’s finest chicken during a live broadcast.  He talked for an hour and it was amazing.  Imagine my horror when I played back the cassette only to learn that the batteries in the recorder were bad and everything was recorded at half speed and was worthless.  Hell, I even converted the cassette over to reel-to-reel an attempted to manually speed things up by hand.  No luck.  I was crushed and depressed for a long time over that lost moment.  Luckily, Andrew had a chance to interview the man for the IUPUI Sagamore and I was able to feed him a few questions to help coax out some of the same stories. 

In 1998, my wife talked me into going to the State Fair.  Not wanting to go in the first place, I grumbled the whole way in.  The place was packed that day and we had to go in through the back entrance.  No sooner did we walk into the fair that a loudspeaker unexpectedly announced that WTTV 4 was having their 50th anniversary and Sammy Terry himself would be appearing on the main stage.  My mood changed from grumpy to giddy, as did my relative age drop to 5 years old again.  We waited patiently for the man to appear, and despite the hot sun beating down on us all, he eventually took the stage.  The next 15 minutes appeared to be more of Sammy’s unique free-style monologue that you typically heard during the extended breaks of his television show.  The tale he wove involved his journey down the Amazon with his trusted companion.  As they were beset upon by natives, his companion was taken hostage and eventually decapitated, with his head shrunken by the local witch doctor.  The punch line to the story was that his companion was “the first person to lose their head over Sammy Terry” (boo!).  Despite the bad joke, this was in fact the story of how Sammy came to get his skull necklace.  It wasn’t lost on me that I’d just heard the official “origin” story of the skull necklace that haunted me since my youth and manifested itself as a mug that I could only bear to look at on rare occasion.  Luckily, the Ghoul himself has a permanent place in the haunted house of my memory and I’m still waiting for Santa to come through with that gift.

It was 1995 and Andrew and I had a few issues of our local music zine “Movements” under our belt.  In issue #3, we’d had the pleasure of interviewing Vess Ruhtenberg who at the time was about to release the first CD from his new band, The United States Three.  Within the few houses surrounding Vess’ place on College Avenue, a new local music scene was thriving.  Sharing a rental with Vess was Michelle Marchesseault from the band Sardina, Paul Mayhern was recording in the house next door with bands flowing between the two houses frequently.  While Andrew and I conducted the interview in Vess’ living room I pitched the idea of putting together a poster or two for the band to help promote their upcoming shows.  Generously, Vess said “go for it” and my short stint on the periphery of the mid-90s Indianapolis/Bloomington scene began. 

Around the time I started putting together these posters, the band El Nino was recording at Mayhern’s house next door.  El Nino and United Stated Three had recorded a single together (“Same House”) and frequently played gigs on the same bill, so Vess introduced me to El Nino’s bassist and front man, Glenn Hicks.  Both bands had been signed to Flat Earth Records, who at the time was the newest local label on the block and were scooping up acts right and left.  Flat Earth frequently used The Patio in Broad Ripple as their main venue for featuring their new acts, which was great for me because I lived less than a mile from the club.  I’d seen El Nino live only once by the time I met Glenn, and that show had a big impact on me.  Their songs were more or less simply, catchy pop tunes infused with Glenn’s pleading vocals, the drums of Paul Karaffa, guitar by Michelle Benninghoff, and the master of reality himself, John Hicks.  Not to take anything away from the song writing, vocals, etc. but John Hicks was quite frankly, the shit.  John played a guitar that appeared to have been thrown into a wood chipper and bound back together with duct tape with a stalk of effect pedals hanging off of the guitar itself like a sonic tumor.  Any time John would rip into a solo the listener would be treated to a trip through space-rock with Ace Frehley and Thurston Moore as your pilots.  Hicks would reach down and slam his fist onto any of the pedals dangling from the guitar, shifting the course of the solo into even trippier territory before returning us back to the safe poppy confines of the song itself.  At least that’s how I remember things.

So, Vess introduces me to Glenn, I offer to do a poster for El Nino, and things start to roll.  At the time, I was working on an old Macintosh computer, barely understanding how Photoshop worked, and wrestling with the pen tool in Illustrator.  I’d been drawing mini comics off and on over the years, and was the creative end of Movements, but never had any real idea of what I was doing.  Fortunately for me, the image I produced for El Nino (a man with his hands on two live Tesla coils while his electric rainbow colored hair shot in all directions) went over well with the band.  They also liked the work I was doing for United States Three, and offered me a shot at doing the CD cover of their first release.  Cool.

I quickly drew up a couple of concept sketches, Glenn picked the one he liked, and I returned home to figure out how in the hell to execute the vision I’d hastily scrawled onto a scrap of paper into a professional looking CD cover.  Luckily, this one came together easily enough (not to be confused with my later effort on the Flat Earth compilation CD “Galileo Was Wrong” which turned into a total mess).  With the El Nino storm system being the obvious inspiration, I simply juxtaposed a photo of tress bending to the pressure of a hurricane, with the swirling surface of Jupiter as the backdrop.  It ended up being an effective image, but in retrospect I wish I’d have done a better job on the cover font.  For the back cover, we needed some pictures of the band.  Pretending that I knew what I was doing, I quickly arranged for a photo shoot.  Margo Patterson – an amateur photographer and drinking buddy of mine, agreed to have the band over to her house for a shoot.  The photo shoot went off without a hitch and we ended up with enough images to complete the CD and cook up some nice posters as well.  I remember the band being funny, easy going, and Paul Karaffa was just about the nicest guy you could meet.  I laid out the whole CD, including the inside CD booklet spread which featured a bizarre image of an old man that Glenn insisted be in the CD “somewhere”.  All in all, it was a good package and far more exciting than most of the local (non-Punk) releases I’d seen over the years.

The CD itself was really just “ok”.  The self-conscious production played it safe, and failed to capture the sonic essence that blew me away during the live shows.  While researching this article, I ran across this site: http://www.musicalfamilytree.org/band/el_nino  where you can download tracks from a live performance at The Second Story circa 1995.  A simple comparison between the studio version of Lipstick and the liver version does a much better job of making my point than I ever could in writing.  Glenn screams his verses nearly beyond his point of is ability to keep it all together while John injects pure LSD fury into his 6-string.  If that doesn’t sell you, try the “Warm Hands” solo on track 7 from the same live show. 

After the CD was released, I attended a few more shows, talked to John about doing some posters of just him playing that crazy guitar of his, heard about the sad passing of Paul Karaffa’s mom, and just generally enjoyed the scene.  And what a scene it was.  You have to remember that the previous “scenes” included the likes of hairbands like Why on Earth, Snakeskin Cowboy, Sweet FA, and the Why Store. And then suddenly we had bands influenced by the Velvet Underground instead of Motley Crue, playing sets full of original songs instead of endless metal covers.  And man, this new scene was given every chance those hair bands never had.  Billboard magazine ran a front page article on the exploding Bloomington music scene; with the El Nino CD cover featured on page one.  In response to the national attention, both Nuvo and the Indianapolis Star ran similar articles, with the El Nino CD cover featured on the front page of the Star.  Those were good times, but they didn’t last.  Despite the buzz, the scene fell apart almost as quickly as it began.  United States Three disbanded, El Nino replaced Paul and Michelle and recorded a second full-length release that never materialized, and Flat Earth Records all but disappeared.

Over the years I’ve occasionally Googled El Nino and the band to see if there’s anything new to learn either in terms of a reunion, an official break up, or just anyone who remembers these good times in general.  There’s not much to report.  The Musical Family Tree is a valuable resource that offers the live show I mentioned, as well as the complete Convenient Ave recordings that have otherwise never seen the light of day.  Glenn Hicks apparently toured with Lisa Germano for a bit while she was riding her brief wave of success.  About a year ago I stumbled on John Hick’s website.  It was clear that he’d moved out of state and was still writing songs.  As far as I could hear, the work Glenn was making with Germano and John’s solo material didn’t compare to the brief brilliance of El Nino.  Those were great times indeed, and I’m lucky to have witnessed just a brief portion of it from the periphery.  The tangentially happy ending to this story is that with bands like the Thin Fevers, We Are Hex, Beta Male, and many others, a new scene is rapidly forming in Indianapolis.  Here’s to this wave lasting longer than the last.

That brief description only scratches the surface of Jesse Moynihan’s ongoing weekly web comic Forming.

Jesse was kind enough to take some time from his schedule to talk to ZapTown about his epic: “Forming is my attempt to reclaim our origins from people who want it to be boring”. Elaborating, Jesse explains: “Yeah it’s just a personal peeve I have about the advancing of the Materialist religion. It’s a way of perceiving things that has proliferated through most circles of the radical and conservative Left. I don’t know if I can truly sum up all of the thoughts I have on this topic because it’s based on years of anecdotal observation and personal interactions with friends, strangers, and ghosts. I’ll just say that I believe in a Super Reality; meaning that I pretty much believe in everything. For me, this is a much more rewarding way to engage reality and I try to inject that point of view into Forming.  To propose that our planet and our lives evolved by pure chance is only one small piece of the puzzle. It certainly is true, but only a partial truth because reality is big enough to encompass infinite truths. That is the reality of the Macrocosmos. “

The Battle of the Dawn of Time.

A story of this size and scope could easily fall prey to its own complexities and heaviness. One element that Jesse uses to keep it accessible is the manner in which the characters speak to each other.“The reason I use modern vernacular is because I’m trying to put myself in these people’s shoes. I’m trying to illicit responses from them that seem real to me, so I have to make them talk like me. It’s a jump in logic that I hope readers don’t mind. My only other option is to have them talk like it’s an episode of Legend of the Seeker. And I wouldn’t be able to write that shit. Actually when dealing with this kind of mythic subject matter, it can be hard to avoid certain types of corny, fantasy dialog. I try my best but some situations demand it, especially when dealing with uncorrupted gods. In those scenes it’s kind of fun to write that way.”

(This is not how they talk in Legend of the Seeker)

Good stuff, eh? But don’t take my word for it, you can experience Forming all on your own, and for free. Yes, the origin of mankind is just a click away and is updated with new content every week in the form of wonderfully painted pages usually consisting of up of 18 panels per page, with each page taking around 15-20 hours a week to complete. “Before I began writing the series I did about 7 months of research on subjects that I wanted to include somewhere in the story. The research continues but I decided at some point I had to actually start the thing. So I’ve scripted about 30 episodes in advance and took a break from that to draw episodes. I’ve just started back up writing again to make sure I’m taking it in the right direction. I have a sketchbook of character references to keep them consistent. I use Photoshop to clean up smudges and spelling errors, but nothing more than that. I feel like Photoshop is a black hole that can swallow you if you’re not careful, so I try to keep the process primitive.”

I asked Jesse about his decision to publish Forming in web comic format, which is risky in itself with virtually no financial compensation and the challenge of standing out in a sea of otherwise mostly crappy comics: “Free web comics are pretty much what’s expected so that’s cool with me. Previous to doing this I spent two years in my room, working on a graphic novel. I realized, in that time, no one knew if I was alive or even working on comics anymore. The web gives me the freedom to instantly distribute color comics everywhere at almost no cost. And as I release my stuff from week to week, readers can be there on the journey. It’s way more connected and interactive. The plusses of web publishing heavily outweigh the minuses.”

At one point in our exchange, Jesse describes Forming as a “big sprawling octopus and I hope it will eventually sprawl out so far that I will be consumed by it!” Speaking as someone who has already been consumed by Forming, I encourage you to take the journey as well by visiting Jesse’s site as soon as possible. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a game of Incredible Blocks to play…

Samples from Forming included in this article are the sole property of Jesse Moynihan.

Kamandi is easily one of my favorite comics of all time.  In a nutshell, Kamandi lives in the future and is the last boy on Earth. He lives in a world ruined by the Great Disaster, populated by talking animals (who are often at war with other talking animals) and all manner of craziness.  His long time friend is a Mutant by the name of Ben Boxer.  Ben is a mutant because he can turn into metal.  Issue #29 is a favorite of many due to its connection to Superman (Click here for a great summary of the issue).

Below is my commentary on the issue.  If you’re familiar with the issue, this might be funny.  Otherwise, pardon the narrow scope of this geekout.  (This comic originally appeared in Shiot Crock #1, copyright Yuri Duncan 2000.  All DC characters referenced are theirs and are used in good fun):

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While at the 2008 SPACE convention, I found a great little mini called Ultimate James.  

Ultimate James is a 100 page tribute to the late, great actor Brion James (1945-1999).  Although the book would arguably not be considered a mini “comic”, the book measures in at a tiny 5 1/2 x 4 1/4 and was created by Dick Troutman and Brian Maruca.  Maruca is one half of the equation that produces the incredibly awesome Street Angel comic, and Troutman is an accomplished artist as well.  

I remember declaring myself a Brion James fan somewhere during the late 80s, right after seeing him in the incredibly awful yet highly quotable Tango & Cash.  It was during that movie that I realized I’d seen James in a TON of movies already, and that he brought something unique to everything he did.  You have to remember him as Leon in Bladerunner (“My mother?  I’ll tell you about my mother!”), or maybe as General Munro in the Fifth Element.  After appearing in over 100 films, sometimes only in a single scene, he’s become the “Where’s Waldo” of cinema, except that he’s actually cool and not Waldo. 

Ultimate James is not a comic, and despite John Moriarty’s quote on the back, it is not a critical analysis of Brion James’ work.  Ultimate James reads more like a love letter to the underappreciated actor.  Inside you will find quotes, reviews, and images from James and his movies arranged like a collage on each page.  There is even a very brief look at his TV career, and a few pages for readers to scrawl their own notes.  My favorite gag is the reoccurring “Brion James is pretty tall” pages that compare the 6′ 3″ actor to others such as Mr. T, Lee Majors, Darth Vader, and Gort the robot.

My only complaint is a lack of a bibliography that would allow me to distinguish between actual quotes from Brion James, and those possibly made up by the authors.  But, details aside – what this book does exactly right is serve as a must-needed and long overdue tribute to a great actor and a great guy.  You can order your own copy of this love letter to the afterlife here: Ultimate James