New Drawings 12/27/11 Edition

It Would Be So Nice

You'd have to be steeped in very nerdy Floyd history to appreciate this one unfortunately. The gist being that "It Would Be So Nice" was the first single released after they gave Syd Barrett the boot. Find the clip on you tube. It's worse than you could possibly imagine. These panels are outtakes from the Doomin story. There was going to be a real vomit party after the record got played but I never got around to drawing it.

File Under Future Hair

A Hole To Crawl Into

New Drawings (Evening) Dec 5 2011

More drawings from the new book I'm working on...

Monday Morning Drawings 12/5/11

Jack Davis Signing At The Strand NYC

Jack Davis, legendary illustrator and cartoonist, discussed his work and signed his new career retrospective published by Fantagraphics at the Strand this past Thursday. Gary Groth moderated a discussion with Jack that took in his military service, time at The Art Students League, working for EC Comics- in particular Tales From The Crypt and Mad in the 1950's, the differences in working with the editorial styles Harvey Kurtzman and Al Feldstein, working on Humbug/Trump/Help!/Yak Yak, and film posters, amongst other things. Looking through his new book, I was amazed at how much of his work I've seen, whether I knew it was his or not. Jack Davis is everywhere. Below are some pictures I took at the event.

The Business of the Business

More from the No Milk Today/The Happytime Friendship Village book in progress..

Dayglo Black Friday

Another drawing from the No Milk Today/The Happytime Friendship Village book in progress.

Spectres

A drawing from the follow up book to the unreleased Astronaut Blood. Book No.4 is to be called No Milk Today/The Happytime Friendship Village.

Selected Nov. 6 Drawings Part 1

Day of Days

Abstraction House Vol.2 Pg.2

Tales of Abstraction House Vol.2 Pg.1

Some brandnewness from this morning. Plenty more to follow soon.

Sinister Secrets of Abstraction House

While trying to salvage stories for the new comics magazine/collection, I came across the unfinished pages of Tales of Abstraction House. I was hoping to re-use or rewrite the existing pages, but it seems that it would be far too complicated and it would be best to just start over from scratch. And so, with that in mind, I leave you with one of the original black and white pages from the discarded version..oh well, the new stuff will be even better.

The Most Commercial Series Ever?

Memoirs of Erstwhile Kitty

Doomin' Pt.5

I sort of violate the structure I set up with the previous pages with this particular sequence, but I figured that as this is the last page of the web version, I might as well take it to the record store previously shown in the title page.

Doomin' Pt.4

Doomin' Pt.3

Doomin' Pt. 2

Doomin' Pt.1

Here's the first page of the Doomin' parody. Each panel is a different scene from Doomin' village. Each panel will then continue in the subsequent pages. Blah blah blah.

What Once Was and Whatever Shall Be..

So as you may have noticed, I borrowed the cover of the now defunct Whiskey Is The Key for Enough Astronaut Blood To Last The Winter. It works better for that type of art and story collection. It seems to sum up these last years in NYC just fine. And with Astronaut Blood being shopped around in the publishing sphere, I thought I'd go back to what once was Whiskey Is The Key and see if I can salvage anything from that. The plan is still the same, assemble a comics collection for a debut issue that should be about 100 pages long. It'll be a mix of the serious, not so serious, utterly ridiculous, bat-shit crazy, and so forth. There will be a few parodies, a Doomin' story, Thirty Seven Going on Eighty Five, a Devil Doll satire and then some of the shorter Mome pieces of mine as well as Tales of Abstraction House. I'd say the whole thing is 75% done. It just needs a name and a publisher. More on that as well.

Astronaut Blood Update 10/15/11

I haven't posted anything in a while, mostly due to my constant re-working/re-formatting/re-editing of Enough Astronaut Blood To Last The Winter. What I've been doing is going through the original 160 page version and cutting out the weaker art pieces and short stories. I then brought in over a hundred recent pieces for a new version clocking in at 262 pages. I suspect by the time it hits print it'll be at least 300, as I want it to be as up to date as possible. I also re-formatted the size from 5 x 7 to 6 x 9, which was a bummer since the other books are 5 x 7, but in the end it serves the art better. Also in the works is a seperate book which will basically serve as an appendix to Astronaut Blood and will feature drawings that didn't fit in the book, sketches, journal entries/working notes, doodles, and some of the stranger short stories. I figure I'll have that one available when I do readings or whatever. More details soonish.

Veronica Falls/Pianos/NYC Wednesday 28th 2011

A brace of singles brought me to Pianos to see Veronica Falls. The first, "Beachy Head", a reverb drenched charging tamborine rocker- doused in monk chants featuring a female lead vox that recalled Ludella Black and the Headcoatees. A couple songs come to mind for examples, "Pretend", "Gotta Get Inside That Boy's Mind" and also the Delmonas "Delmona, the Temptress of Love". Spooky stuff. I was smitten, this single was everything I've been craving in under three minutes. Then I had to wait for more. Time passed, and I found another single - "Found Love In a Graveyard" b/w "Starry Eyes". It was different, super melodic. I was now hooked. Then came the full length, and the vocal melodies really came to fore. The album sounds more like a singles collection than a long player with valleys and pockets. The pop chops exhibited throughout are considerable, the best of so many digested bands surfacing here in a successful merger. Sometimes I hear bits of Velocity Girl, Lush, or the Velvet Underground, but only traces, these aren't new wave post punk vultures, but rather the newest progression in etherial garage pop. They will eventually blow past even these descriptors as they are just getting started and as the baroque acapella at the end of "Misery" demonstrates, their ability to structure their vocals is one of their best assets. This was the perefect time to see them live. There was no wishing for any older material as they only have 14 or so songs to their name. I snapped a few pictures using a Mamiya 120 camera while enjoying the short and entrancing set.