DFC Day – Friday? Saturday?

Oh well, late but still here. Yesterday (Friday) was DFC day at Bruton mansions where the red and yellow envelope drops through the door and I have to wait until Molly gets home and rips it open, then reads it before I get my hands on it.

Issue 35. No time to break the whole thing down. But another, as always, good issue.

Cover by Wilbur Dawburn, really playing with the logo. The DFC has let it’s covers be altered more and more as it goes on, a plus point for them not being on the local newsagent’s shelves with the children’s comics I suppose. Wilbur’s strip Bodkin and the Bear is a genuinely funny one and has very quickly become a favourite as the tale of our stupid Minstrel and his all too cunning Bear moves forward.

Okay, out of time, but the othe laugh out loud moment? Fish Head Steve with this great mock ad leading into the strip, brilliant:

The Stupid Ipod A-Z Idea – update

It’s been a long time since I last mentioned anything about the Stupid Ipod A-Z idea. In fact it was in October and I’d gotten all the way to E. Well, amazingly, it’s still going on. I’m currently mid way through S and having a bloody great time.

Along the way I’ve rediscovered a love of REM and had a particularly good time in P; Pixies, Polyphonic Spree, Propaganda. Around Christmas I hit L and downloaded a load of Leonard Cohen so Molly could hear what Hallelujah should really sound like. She preferred the Buckley version, but that was okay, as long as she didn’t like the Xfactor abortion of a song.

Now we’re onto the Shamen.
I know, I know.
Get the snickering out of the way now.

I heard Something About You, from their first album Drop on Peel or somewhere in 87, making me 16ish. Drop sounds nothing like anything they did subsequently; a mix of 60s psych pop and indie tunes from a 5 piece band. But what really made me sit up and start following them was Christopher Mayhew Says; industrial dance music with extensive samples of Christopher Mayhew on his LSD trip.

A quick trip into dance culture and sampling for In Gorbechev We Trust (1989). Will Sinnott (Will Sin) was on board and it became a bit of a two man operation for the best period of their work. Phorward (1989) got even more dance orientated and EnTact (1990) was where it all went a little more overground and mainstream. Still great, just really tapping into the dance culture at exactly the right time. Of course, it also saw the partial introduction of Mr C.

Disaster followed. Will Sin drowned in 91 just as ProGen was about to become a huge hit the second time round, MrC was all over everything and success just seemed to make it all just that little bit more bland. Boss Drum (1992) was okay at the time but It’s almost unlistenable bar three or four tracks now. Ebeneezer Goode purely as stupid nostalgia, but Re-Evolution, the spoken word track from Terrence McKenna is still great. I had the best time watching them play Re-Evolution live at Glastonbury one year. I can’t remember the year, in fact I can’t remember much about the night apart from the great light and sound show. How much of that was on stage and how much in my own head – I have no idea.

I’ve not even heard anything after that. And I almost dread to do so. Maybe one day. But in their time, especially during the early years – they were great.

Jeff Smith at Toon Books

Toon Books, publishers of great early reader graphic novels has just announced details of a new book by Jeff Smith:

Out in September. Looking forward to reading it with Molly already.
(via Colleen)

PROPAGANDA Reviews: Rian Hughes – Yesterday’s Tomorrows

Yesterday’s Tomorrows

by Rian Hughes

with Grant Morrison, Raymond Chandler, Tom DeHaven, John Freeman, Chris Reynolds.

Published by Knockabout/GOSH

Here’s a challenge for you; find me a more innovative and visually dynamic and impressive comic artist in Britain today than Rian Hughes. I know I couldn’t.

Of course, the big problem with Rian is that he’s just too good for comics. He’s so in demand as a graphic designer for the wider world that more often than not, you’ll see him described as Rian Hughes; graphic designer and illustrator. Which is why his actual comics have remained uncollected until this marvellous volume.

As a master designer he’s been responsible for some amazingly diverse projects. Odds are you’ve read at least something with Rian’s design work if you’ve been around comics for the last 20 years. Whether it’s his beautiful logos, his innovative lettering fonts or cover design work he’s certainly been around. But his work in recent years has been outside of comics. (And given the money in some of this work, for a lot less toil, we can hardly point a finger of blame now can we?) And amongst the work there are some very strange projects indeed:

(Invisibles #1, my favourite cover image ever, plus a logo – both by Hughes. Various typefaces and the Geri Halliwell children’s series. Connection – Rian Hughes’ gorgeous design and illustration work.)

Yesterday’s Tomorrows is the collection that we’ve been waiting for, featuring five complete Rian Hughes illustrated stories from ‘87 to ‘93, a period that was possibly Hughes’ most prolific in comics and certainly the last time he was actively involved in comics before the lure of the wider world stole him away from us. It ends with an exhaustive section of background and additional material from the time. This is an Artist’s book, celebrating the work of one of our best.

(The art cards included with the limited edition Yesterday’s Tomorrows exclusive to FPI. And a perfect illustration of the four of the five stories in the book)

The stories are:

The Lighted Cities, written by Chris Reynolds of Mauretania Comics fame.

A short piece and the least visually impressive with a sense that it’s paying service to Reynold’s own art style of a heavier line and thick blacks. It doesn’t really suit Hughes’ artwork, it’s too small, too domestic, too enclosed a tale, something which Hughes reflects in his art.

(Visions in mustard – Rian Hughes art from The Lighted Cities, written by Chris Reynolds.)

The Science Service, written by John Freeman.

But where the Lighted Cities failed, The Science Service succeeds. Using just a single colour of delicate jade green, Hughes lets his thin, precise lines describe this retro-futuristic tale of a future of lost promise. It’s all about lost opportunities and failed dreams of a gleaming futuristic paradise. The world is crumbling and the nation is barely clinging on to past glories. The Science Service, once the pinnacle of all that was grand and great is reduced to bowing to the corporation running the new festival of Britain. But Henry Van Goyen, ex-service, now reduced to toy consultancy, has realised that all is not well and the corporation’s latest facial modification product, Imagon, is being rushed out without consequence to the dangers that caused him to abandon his research into it many years ago. Van Goyen’s quest to expose the truth, his melancholy longing for glorious times gone by where the future was bright and full of hope and his subsequent loss of this idealistic fantasy effectively mirrors that of Hughes’ next major work; Dare. Indeed, Hughes’ has said that Van Goyen is practically a prototype Dan Dare.

(Rian Hughes art from The Science Service, written by John Freeman)

Dare, written by Grant Morrison

Grant Morrison’s anti-Thatcherite bleak tale of a future gone wrong, potential wasted and hopes and dreams vanished is my favourite of the comics in Yesterday’s Tomorrows. I’m a sucker for Grant Morrison on form and with the combination of classic Morrison and Rian Hughes’ art make this the main attraction here.

(Art from Dare’s first home: Revolver Magazine #1. Older, walking with a cane perhaps, but still the gleaming poster boy of England’s dreams)

A lesser artist may felt the temptation to swamp Dare in darkness to reflect the cynicism and melancholy of a world gone wrong, but not Hughes. His Dare is a technicolour explosion to perfectly capture the sense of wonder that Dare evokes, that lost dream of a future in the stars. The colour is always there, even in the darker moments, where Hughes’ colours become subtle and muted but no less effective.

(Hughes’ colours throughout Dare are perfect, whether the bright sunshine colours of past hopes or the muted tones of this reflective scene.)

Dare is the zenith of Hughes’ retro-futurist look, it’s his most angular, cutting edge and intricately art-deco work. After this point, Hughes’ art rounded out slightly, becoming more fluid, more organic and possibly reflecting his work in the world of design and illustration. But with Dare, every page has some glorious, super sci-fi touch, whether it’s the razor shape lines of the architecture or something as simple as the art-deco designs of the household appliances. Big or small scale, nothing in Dare is overlooked by Hughes.

(Rian Hughes’ art perfection – a 50s future dream home and some of the best interior design of the retro-future)

But it’s definitely not the Dan Dare of old. This was Morrison completely deconstructing the character and using him as an iconic figure of a better past to contrast against the future of dreams destroyed and a people subjugated. This is a Colonel Dare retired and at odds with the government of the day, tired, disillusioned and seemingly powerless to effect change. It’s a true melancholic’s comic. Dare is brought back by the government of the day, whose Prime Minister is obviously intended to be Margaret Thatcher. He’s a washed out ex-hero perhaps, but Dan Dare the brand still says patriotism, individual strength and the dream of a glittering modernist future in a Britain of broken dreams, lies and corruption. His England paradise is a wrecked dream, controlled by agents on Earth and an old familiar enemy from afar. The end is as downbeat and final as you could get. Like I said, it’s not an England to be saved, more an England to be wiped clean, a blank page if you will.

Goldfish, written by Raymond Chandler and adapted by Tom DeHaven

Goldfish is an adaptation of a 1936 Phillip Marlowe short story which, thankfully, Tom De Haven produces a good adaptation, capturing the noir feel of all the best Chandler tales. At this point Hughes’ art has developed a looser line, but over this he’s using a very limited colour palette that makes every page a masterpiece of design. To convey the noir feel of the tale, Hughes uses blocks of colour to produce shadows. It’s visually breathtaking.

Really & Truly, written by Grant Morrison

Part of 2000ADs Summer Offensive in 1993 when the comic was handed over to Grant, Mark Millar and John Smith to do with as they pleased. In amongst some rather mediocre stories, Really & Truly stood out as a light, throwaway, silly and downright trippy thing, but visually it was as stunning as anything Rian put his hand to, with a looser, cartoony style and a heavier line geared to reflect the playfulness of the tale.

Like I said, you shouldn’t really be all that concerned with the writing when you go and buy Yesterday’s Tomorrows. That the five stories are all at least good is merely a bonus. It’s the artist that the book is all about. Hughes’ art is an amazing meld of European clear lines (Serge Clerc & Yves Chaland are particularly influential) and a harsh, stylised designers eye.But in Yesterday’s Tomorrows we get a chance to analyse a particular period in his artsitic develpment and see a progression from a strict, harsh angularity that reaches it’s peak in the pages of Dare to a more cartooning based rounded feel that he uses to this day. Of course, whatever style he does, I hope you’ve read enough and seen enough to realise that Hughes’ art, no matter what style he’s working in is that rarest of things in comics; original and unique. There’s no-one who does this as well as Hughes, and that we’ve seemingly lost him to the world of design is a true shame.

Just a quick look at Rian Hughes’ Device Fonts website should have you falling in love with his work. As I said at the start I genuinely believe there’s not a more innovative, visually dynamic and impressive comic artist in Britain today and I can honestly say that I’ve never seen a Rian Hughes piece that hasn’t been eye-catching and unique.

He truly is a classic of our times. And of Yesterday. And of Tomorrow.

(Just a couple of any number of Hughes’ illustration works available to look at on his website. I could have picked any of them and they’d be just as gorgeous)

After going out and buying Yesterday’s Tomorrows there are a few interviews & articles online you may wish to peruse:
The FPI blog published an exhaustive interview with Rian.
Newsarama interview about Yesterday’s Tomorrows.
Paul Gravett’s Yesterday’s Tomorrows article (actually the introduction to the book).
Typographica interview (design and fonts).
Rian Hughes Wikipedia entry.

PROPAGANDA Reviews: Little Vampire Volume 1

Little Vampire volume 1

by Joann Sfar

First Second

Little Vampire is a delightful all-ages comic that reminded me greatly of Jill Thompson’s Scary Godmother since all of the monsters and ghosts are the nice kind and I very much doubt that any child capable of reading and understanding the topics addressed would find much to be scared of and would probably find plenty to love and laugh about.

There are three short stories in Little Vampire, each is the perfect length for a good bedtime story or to let the older reader enjoy for themselves.

In the first; Little Vampire Goes To School, we meet Little Vampire himself who really just wants nothing more than to be a normal little boy and will do whatever he can to help his new-found friend Michael, whom he meets after writing in his notebook at the human school. Of course, being a Vampire he’s not able to go to school like normal children but he’s helped by his ghost and monster friends and they sneak into Michael’s school by night. But on getting to the school for the first time, an excited Little Vampire is sad to discover it’s dark and empty:

(A perfect example of the wonderful humanity and emotion Sfar wrings out of his monsterous creations.)

Of course, Little Vampire’s notes to Michael do lead to a few difficult explainations:

But after the acceptance of his friend’s nature, Michael becomes a regular feature at the monster’s house. Where we’re allowed to share, like Michael in the delightful family of Little Vampire. Sfar’s writing here is all about family and the wonder of being a child, even a Vampire one. But it’s with the inclusion of a normal child, in the shape of Michael, that serves to point out the differences between the monster’s world and ours. Although at times it’s the monster’s who show greater humanity and consideration to each other and those around them.

The second story; Little Vampire Does Kung Fu looks at Michael’s problems with the school bully. The monster’s are unsurprisingly keen on the killing, cooking and eating route (although some can do without the cooking stage). But in the end the problem is resolved far more cleverly, with the assistance of the Cat-Rabbi who resides in one of the paintings in the monster house.

The third story; Little Vampire and the Canine Defenders Club is all about Little Vampire and Michael trying hard to do the right thing when they rescue a trio of lab dogs.

Sfar is never afraid to throw more complex emotional themes into the stories as well. Self-reliance, bullying, loyalty all feature in these stories but never really intrude upon the act of telling the story, they’re underplayed and this makes the moments of quiet contemplation and realisation of the issues all the more effective.

The artwork is beautifully detailed and organic. Even the panel borders move and flow, allowing Sfar to utilise the white space on a page to great effect at times. But he keeps his characters simple, letting all readers find them appealing and sympathetic. And he’s able to combine delightful, funny and simple cartooning with great emotional detail and depth.

Little Vampire works so simply and so nicely. It’s dark & violent (but in an inventive and child friendly way), spooky and plain fun. Something slightly subversive for children that they should absolutely love. And it’s certainly not just for children, as there are plenty of great touches for us old folks as well, including some genuinely rather heartbreakingly sad moments, in the way that all really great children’s books have the ability to be.

You can read more Little Vampire at the First Second website.

Propaganda @ FPI blog – two reviews of Francesca Cassavetti

A revised post of Francesca’s The Most Natural Thing In The World collection and a review of a couple of her great mini-comics.

The Most Natural Thing In The World
Mini Comics

“As I’ve come to expect from Cassavetti, all three are lovely, gentle, well observed pieces with her open and relaxed cartooning flowing from panel to panel.”

PROPAGANDA Reviews: Global Frequency by Warren Ellis

Global Frequency

by Warren Ellis and many, many artists

There are 1001 people on the Global Frequency. Anyone you know might be with them. It’s the world’s little open secret. A fast response emergency team composed of anyone: mother, brother, friend, boss, policeman, spy, teacher, athlete, anyone at all. You’ll never know they’re part of it until the phone call comes with that unusual ring tone and they head out the door promising to explain later…

Global Frequency is the 20th Century’s clean up operation for all the rubbish that happened in the last millennium, all the secret projects, the cold war science and the insane power games.

Yes, this is the archetypal Warren Ellis comic series; fast cuts, fast paced, stacatto dialoguing, tech-happy. But it’s also one of the best TV series we’ll never see made (although reports are that it got as far as a pilot, but was never actually taken up. Shame). It’s a perfect episodic action thriller. Each issue is perfectly self contained: threat, call, response, result.

(”That weird cellphone” indeed. It rings, your life changes. Art by Steve Dillon from Global Frequency)

There’s an impressive array of artists on the books as well, including David Lloyd, Gary Leach, Steve Dillon, Glenn Fabry and Chris Spouse. So Global Frequency is equally as good on the eye as it is on the brain.

My favourite individual episode, The Run, features the art of the urban gymnast; “les parkeurs”, who can cross the snarled up morass of London quicker on foot than anything or anyone else. Over twenty two pages Warren Ellis manages to generate a tremendous sense of excitement that most writers couldn’t deliver over the course of an entire book. But of course, Ellis has given us 12 of these little thrillers, across these two books. Enjoy. You’re on the Global Frequency.

Learning Platforms and falling asleep in training sessions

I couldn’t help it. We’d done a long morning in the ICT suite on the Learning Platform. Back from lunch at the local pub who do an excellent buffet spread for us on training days so we thought we’d have the lunch out for a change. And the ICT suite is boiling hot, yet some of the trainees are moaning it’s cold and can we leave the air con off. I’ve got a throbbing headache and then my eyes start going.

I did the falling asleep in my seat thing for a few minutes until I decided I needed a break and went and looked in on the Year 1 class doing some word processing in another (cooler) room. That seemed to clear my head enough to get through the rest of the session.

The Learning Platform is still a huge thing hanging round my neck, but we’re going to try and encourage (railroad) some of the teachers to take on responsibilities for certain sections. That makes it a little easier in the long term. but short term is still the complete set up of all the architecture. And by short term I mean all of summer term at least. Because I’m determined to get the new website absolutely sorted and finished by the end of March. Seems so far away but technically it’s just 37 days away and I’ve got an awful lot to get done. But at least it’s not something ridiculously laborious and longwinded (like the Learning Platform for example).

After school it was a quick dash across to Beverley for the Orthodontist. Molly will need braces at some point but today was just a preliminary thing where he looked at her mouth for 5 minutes and told us to come back in 18 months. Strange dentist though. The actual room had four dentist’s chairs in it, all in a row with no partitions at all. We were the only people in there but I imagine when they have the place full it’s even stranger. With the harsh lights and dental apparatus around it looked like some high tech spacelab of some sort. very strange.

Tomorrow it’s back to normal at school and that’s my week done. I’ve got Friday as a work from home day again – NHBC are coming round to look at the roof and agree with us that it’s a shit job and the builder deserves shooting. Although I imagine the bloke wont quite phrase it that way…

PROPAGANDA Reviews: Back To Brooklyn

Back To Brooklyn

Story by Garth Ennis and Jimmy Palmiotti, Written by Garth Ennis, Art by Mihailo Vukelic.

Image Comics

First of all, a point of interest: There’s only one place in the entire comic where Jimmy Palmiotti’s name is ahead of Garth Ennis’ and that’s in the trademark notice. Everywhere else it’s Garth Ennis first. Look at the creator credits above: Story by Garth & Jimmy, written by Garth. Everything points to this being a Garth Ennis story. But unless I’m most mistaken, it definitely is not. Unless Garth Ennis has completely changed his style, there’s very little I recognise as his signature in the writing. Palmiotti’s afterword pretty much confirms this; it’s Palmiotti’s idea and reading the afterword there’s very little mention of Ennis’ input at all. I’ve got nothing particularly against the idea of a collaboration, I just feel that it’s more Palmiotti’s book than Ennis’ and the credits really ought to reflect this otherwise it’s merely misrepresenting the book.

However, putting that gripe aside, the actual story isn’t too bad. Bob Saetta has walked into a police station offering up everything he knows about the major crime family in Brooklyn. And he knows a lot, given that he’s the number two and his big brother Paul is the number one. No-one knows why he’s doing this, but after Paul finds out and kidnaps Bob’s wife and child, wiping out the 6 cops protecting them in the process, the chief investigator asks the important question: “Killing cops? What’s got Paul Saetta spooked enough to sign his own goddamn death warrant. What the hell does his little brother know?” And that’s the thing we just don’t know yet, but we’re told at various points that it’s something unbelievably terrible.

A deal is done and, with the cops knowing they can’t bring his family in safely, Bob negotiates himself a weekend of freedom to get his family back before turning himself in. What follows is a journey, a very bloody journey, through the crime family, recruiting allies and blowing away the men responsible for taking his family.

(Mihailo Vukelic’s art from Back To Brooklyn issue 1.)

Jimmy Palmiotti describes the artist’s work as “What struck me right away is his work looked nothing like anything I have seen in comics before … realistic renderings and yet abstract in their approach. Easy to read and clean …”

I’ll challenge that one. Realistic renderings perhaps. But to my eye that just means that the facial details look like they’ve been photoshopped onto the face shape, ending up with a flat, lifeless image. And there’s little of the abstract about these things, as each panel looks like it’s extensively photo referenced, adding to the lifeless quality of the art. I’ve seen far worse artwork, and I’ll freely admit that withing a couple of issues Vukelic’s art improves considerably but it’s never going to be anything I’m going to like.

Back To Brooklyn is done well enough, even with the problems I had with the art, and the story kept my interest through these initial couple of issues. Dialogue’s okay, plotting’s okay, but it’s no more and no less than a comic version of some run of the mill gangster revenge movie. If that’s your thing, go wild. But I ended up closing issue two and knew that the odds of me getting the final three issues of the five issue series were slim at best. I want more out of a Garth Ennis book than this. I want the crackling dialogue and plotting of the Preacher series. But it’s nowhere near that level sadly.

Of Learning Platforms, Battlestars and Lost

Battling another cold (combination of the weather, working with lots of small germ carrying children and being absolutely worn out – sleep worse than ever recently. Tonight I may be in bed before 4am; a definite improvement) so blogging has been sporadic at best. Forgive me all of the reposting of reviews. They’ve rather build up in my “to be posted” pile. I may as well fire them all off in one go.

To add to the misery of another cold, today was another one of those Learning Platform Training Days. Except this one was, if anything, even worse than the rest; as it was just a recap for the teaching staff of various schools on the stuff I did a while back. The idea was that we’d host it and put in several staff over the two days. Unfortunately it seems every other training course in the world decided to clash with these days so we had one of our teachers for half a day today and two tomorrow. The day didn’t start out well either as the trainer couldn’t log into the RM site and for a few minutes of early morning panic we thought it was our network that had gone down. Luckily we found out it was a general east Riding thing – they’d upgraded their connection overnight and thins had rather messed up.

After that it was a day of mind crushing boredom. At one point this afternoon I was nearly asleep; head doing the lolling thing so much that I had to excuse myself and head off for fresh air.

And as is the way with these things, come the end of the day I actually found myself a lot more tired than if I’d actually been at work properly all day. So tonights been a rest night. No reviews, no blogging (until now), no website work for school. Instead it was Battlestar Galactica and the repeat of the double episode opener for the new season of Lost. Now, having not watched anything of Lost since season one and the occasional accidental viewing of a couple of season finales, I thought I might have trouble getting into it and was perfectly prepared to head for bed early. Except I found a You Tube summary of the last 4 seasons in 8 minutes that did the trick and I really rather enjoyed the two hours spent watching the new season.

The summary video is here. I may continue with the rest of the series. Maybe Tuesday will become my night off. There’s a novel idea.