Box Out

These things have a way of bleeding into each other. 


It's been a fun weekend. As much as I enjoy parties, especially holiday ones with special drinks, I had just as much fun doing errands with my better half. Somehow we always get lost in Target and end up wandering around looking for something we've passed. It's like a casino in there - shiny stuff everywhere, tons of other weirdos and no clocks or visible exits. As I write this, the melted snow and ice are slowly re-freezing. I'm not looking forward to the drive tomorrow. It's nice and dark and quiet here. It makes me want to go and re-experience Outside the Box. 

Outside the Box is one of my favorite not-so-secret things on the internet. An online flash comic (wait, please stay with me for this) created by Brendan Cahill, Outside the Box is a great way to spend a quiet night. Cahill, hailing from San Francisco  created the strip/site/flashthing back in 2002, with the first run closing out in 2004. A one shot and second run followed in the ensuing years. It's not a strict re-paneling like some of Marvel's online content, or single page, three panel affairs like Penny Arcade or The Oatmeal. Box is a moving, vibrant noir tale that just has this unassuming but totally surprising edge to it. 


Telling the tale of office drone Jamie Black as he gets caught up in the world of private detectives and mobsters and the recently deceased, Box is a solid story told in an original format. It could work as a traditional format, but the way Cahill took advantage of the limited movement gives a whole added layer of context and storytelling to this mystery. Subtle tricks like shadows moving or showing characters moving through blueprints add a cinematic aspect that would otherwise be lost on a conventional comic. Through the novel medium, we see Black slowly separate from his office job as he gets pulled deeper and deeper into the mystery unfolding around him.

A nice touch on Cahill's part was the inclusion of suggested soundtracks. More than a handful have been covered here, the usual trip hop and down tempo stuff, as well as more off the beaten path artists like Two Lone Swordsmen. Throw on some of your favorite sneaking, gumshoe-esque tunes and dive in to the motion comic. It really paid off in the end. While it may be old hand in internet parlance, it still makes for a fun, gripping ride.

Vagrants Beware

Word. 

Alright, so I am a bit sheepish about the interference the other night. We're all human. To offer a make-up post on something awesome, may I suggest some light-hearted unwinding from the insanity that is the post-Black Friday shopping season? How about some intelligent and rewarding humor in the form of an online comic? Sound good? Yeah, you deserve a laugh. You deserve a look at Hark! A Vagrant! 

Drawn by Kate Beaton, Hark! A Vagrant is an online comic that plays to the high minded but never becomes as obtuse or inscrutable as, say, the New Yorker. Regular subjects include historical figures and classical literature, as well as the histories of Beaton's homeland, the fabled Canadas. It's hard to pin down exactly what she calls her sense of humor. Subjects and punch lines vary from strip to strip, but they cover everything from Nikola Tesla's frustrations with adoring female fans to Benjamin Franklin flying kites instead of signing the Declaration to Dude Watchin' with the Brontes. No matter the subject, though,Beaton approaches the comic with a human sensibility and down-to-earth language the is absurdly contradictory to the stuffy jumping off point. It's not crass (often) but more silly and sweet and irreverent. She takes unwieldy historical figures and makes them asinine buffoons or takes the stuffing out of our assumptions of antiquity. The idea for establishing time zones, for example, seems impossible to craft a joke from, yet Beaton does it with swift inanity that makes me smirk. Jane Austen's true motivations? Adorable. 

Not all is history-lesson fodder, though. Pop culture seeps through, as well. Her take on a crass and surly Wonder Woman are hilarious, as is her neurotic and concerned interpretation of Aquaman. Also hysterical and adorable - her drawings of a feral Wolverine and a look at how life is different with Brown Recluse Spider Man. My particular favorites of Beaton, though, are her interpretations of Nancy Drew cover illustrations. The expressionist humanism style on the books is distinctly post-WW II insanity, with clear artistic intentions despite the sub-par design. Using the illustrations as a jumping off point, Beaton takes inspired turns into the bizarre and disjointed world Nancy Drew must have been investigating. Her own artistic style is incredibly unique and charming, yet it almost makes the covers seem like a natural fit for inspiration. She gives similar irreverent treatment to old-timey book covers by Gorey, as well. 

Other notable comics on Hark! A Vagrant include her real-world take on Mystery Solving Teens, who, instead of solving the mystery at hand, just sulk and act like normal teenagers. It's a sublime dissection of ideal vs. reality. Also of note is her collection of strips about The Great Gatsby, which are not only incredibly funny but also nuanced and insightful views I hadn't necessarily been able to articulate about the famous story. 

I really can't say enough good things about Kate Beaton and her amazing writing and illustrations. It's intelligent. It's adorable. It's well drawn. It's a funny, fresh voice that hits a part of my funny bone that is rarely touched on. I think you should unwind and spend some time clicking through her site, or if you want to please the bookworm in your life - head over to her online store and pickup prints, shirts, mugs or collected strips. Online shopping is less stressful than any mall, we all know. Get a laugh and ditch the rat race. Read up! 

Repressed

Alright, here's the thing.


I fully intended on writing up a piece on some of the most disturbing books I read as a kid, all in the name of Spooky Month and this book themed week. I did some research, I looked some stuff up on the ol' Google. Then I started to remember why I blocked out my experiences of reading the books. Then the pictures showed me why I couldn't just post a bunch of them and wipe my hands of this. They were actually really disturbing.


If you were a kid in the last, say, 30 years who enjoyed reading, the odds are you came across Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark. When I was a child the collected Urban Legends and folk tales  were spine chilling. Now I find them to be enjoyable slices of lore that distill what unnerves us. The drawings that accompanied them were as disturbing then as they are now, to the point that just seeing pictures of them online brings me back to the discomfort and terror I felt as a child. Having read other people's recollections of their experiences and their disbelief at how the images compare with any other children's books, I am obviously just one of many who have been traumatized by this short lived series.

Written and compiled by Alvin Schwartz, the books all tell tales that are brief and to the point. There are classic Urban  Legends like the Man with the Hook Hand or the Unseen Hitchhiker in the Backseat or the Roommate who was Dead All Along. There are folktales of the uncanny and the taboo - tales of songs and chants and things to ward off evil. Again, these are not the most bone-chilling reads as an adult, more capsular versions of our horror movies. As a child - I slept more than a night or two on the floor of my parents room, feeling safe in their presence. 

The illustrations accompanying the collected writings are by Stephen Gammell, who has a long and celebrated career as an illustrator for children's books. Having over fifty books to his name, it's a bit of a wonder this series stands out the way it does in his career. Once you see them, though, it becomes a question of forgetting them rather than remembering them. The surreal and deformed, decaying figures are uncanny in the worst possible way. They are things of remarkable artistry, there is no question of that - they are so well made, though, that you can't help but shudder just a bit as you see some of the more...inspired...creations.


These books terrified me. If you think your kids can handle it, by all means let them have at them. But please, err on the side of safety. If you read them as a kid, conquer one of your old fears. Spooky Month! 

From Below

Let's lighten the load, shall we?

Yesterday's piece on The Living Dead collection was a bit grim. That is one macabre book full of dismemberment and head shots. Fun stuff if you're into it, but maybe we take a bit lighter approach today? Let's use today's Book themed Spooky Month post to take a look at one of my favorite comics. Let's take a look at Hellboy.

 Created by Mike Mignola back in the early 90s, Hellboy is something of a fighter. The long suffering but good natured demon weathered the treacherous comic industry that snuffed out many a smart book in the latter part of the decade. A surprisingly enjoyable movie was adapted from the first few volumes of the book, directed by Guillermo Del Toro and starring Ron Perlman in a perfect fit for the titular demon. On top of that, Big Red has seen enough enduring appeal and marketability to warrant a second, more ambitious motion picture adaptation while the book continues its extended run. Spin offs have been successfully launched. Animated adventures have been created to expand the universe and satisfy a demanding audience. All of this without being on one of the two major labels. The cigar chomping, trench coat sporting paranormal investigator is one hard demon to keep down.

So why the love? Why all the adoration for what could easily have been a one-shot or cameo, a character too outlandish or taboo to last?

I think it has to be the attitude. Not like Poochy, I should clarify. Despite the amazing and vivid artistry on the pages, I suspect it has to be the scripts and dialogue that make this comic such a (forgive the pun) dark horse. Created and published at a time when darker, edgier and more extreme were the rules by which the suits played, Hellboy kept it simple and accessible despite the other-worldly concept and settings. One could chalk it up to serendipitous choices in creative direction, but you get the sense within just a few pages that Mignola struck just the right balance between Lovecraftian-inspired, n fueled trappings and a 'just my luck' down to Earth sensibility for the comic. Hellboy may be dealing with Old Gods and steam-punk stormtroopers but he does it all with such a dogged good nature that you don't feel like you're reading a dour and unpleasant comic. Red's got a soft spot for kittens and cartoons, how dark can it be? 

That being said, I love everything about the Hellboy universe - from the folklore that creeps in to the mixture between slapstick and violence that (unlike many comics) has danger and consequences. Characters die. Things hurt. Baba Yaga has a house on a chicken leg. Rasputin summons Red with incantation and painfully cool devices that look right at home among the pop-art-meets-German-expressionism stylings of the comic. Subject matter that could come across as too self-serious or absurd in the wrong hands instead has an air of mystery and menace, walking that fine line between horror and jovial comedy. What many have pointed to as an unrecognized reason for the success of Ghostbusters and Shaun of the Dead is also a large part of the enduring appeal of Hellboy - that back and forth interplay between the comedy and horror. They play off of each other in such a subtle manner you forget they are separate elements. That they work together so seamlessly is a testament to the craft. 

Of course, none of this would work as well without the dynamic visuals. The characters lend themselves to such iconic depictions that it's no wonder they've made the impact they have. The bold, bright colors and heavy lines compliment the old-world themes. Fellow paranormal investigators Abe Sapien and Liz Sherman the pyrokinetic look just as impressive as Red himself. There is such an undeniably cool simplicity to the pop-art aesthetic here that place Hellboy in its own league. I can think of few other books that feature anywhere near as much architecture as this - an inspired move that aids immensely in creating vivid, almost tangible settings for outlandish happenings.

Full of things that go bump in the night, these comics are a perfect compliment to Halloween. Trade paperbacks of the first issues are easily available today. If you're not into reading a comic the movies are fantastic, loving adaptations of the source material. Not all the best comics are Marvel or DC, for those of you that don't know - Hellboy is a great place to go off the beaten path. Check it out and see for yourself. 

Against the Dark

Evening.


I won't talk too much about today and what goes through one's head when faced with the inconceivable. I arrived back at my apartment around 2pm. I went for a run (sitting in a car, even a roomy one, after coffee is unbearable) and went about making dinner and more apple crisp with my better half. Apple crisp happens every fall and is delicious, a soothing comfort food for what would unfold. Both the better half and I adore getting context on events through documentaries - today, unfortunately, weighs heavier on the self than other days. Among other footage we watched was a doc showing, in real time, civilian footage of the events ten years ago. Hearing the people's reactions and rationalizations was bad enough. The stunning silence that permeated the footage after both buildings collapsed was even more jarring. It was, in an impossibly distilled word, brutal. So a glass of wine and some fresh apple crisp are serving as a simple comfort, as well as tucking in with my better half at the end of the day.


So where do we go from here? How do we shake the unshakable? 


One simple, stupid step at a time. Personally, I find peaceful, pleasant distraction where I can. I ran today, putting so much energy and exertion into the process that I will fall asleep tonight, but I don't know when. Until that happens, I have something simple and serene to distract me - I'll make my stupid monkey brain focus on the trivial to ensure I can arrive at sleep contented and calm. I'll use the same thing I resorted to last night in the hotel when my anxieties got the best of me. It's a simple, but beautiful game for IOS devices - Contre Jour.

A game that was developed by Mokus Studios for Chillingo under the acquiring force of Electronic Arts, Contre Jour is, in essence an interactive lullaby. The game was heavily hyped following its E3 debut and I downloaded it after seeing the trailer here. Drawing inspiration from such IOS heavy hitters as Angry Birds and Cut the Rope, Contre Jour is a sweet but intricately designed puzzler that draws you in, with the help of an astoundingly gorgeous soundtrack. All you have to do is maneuver the little creature, Petite, to the glowing light. To do so, you can alter the surrounding terrain as well as utilize a variety of tools like elastic connectors and blowing fans to move Petite into place. It's the perfect mix - easy to learn, impossible to master. It's incredibly fun yet engaging and difficult enough that you persevere long into the night, edging closer to sleep all the while.

The art design for Contre Jour is just as important as that game play. The stark, contrasting environments are eye-catching and wonderfully rendered, all without being distracting. Modern indie games like Limbo have clearly been a source of dynamic influence. Big, beautiful creatures come to live with every poke and prod. It makes me feel strangely happy whenever I hear Petite giggle at being tossed around in search of the goal. The music is just as integral. A series of sublime piano pieces by David Ari Leon sweep you through the world of Contre Jour in a way that suggests you may already be dreaming. To paraphrase the company's own blurb, the line between art and game is blurred here, to create a phenomenal bit of interactive entertainment.

If you don't have an IOS device, be patient - Contre Jour hopefully is on the way. If you do, do yourself the favor of picking up this game. After a contemplative and weighty day such as this, it's a beautiful and relaxing way to round out the day. Indulge and relax. It's what keeps us human.

Pepper Shaker

Alright, fine.


Let's get weird with it, shall we? Let's get a little oddball. After yesterday's halfhearted impugning of Metallic despite my love of some of their singles, let's take a look at a band that completely lost their minds. An equally distant band who never the less had a single I still love that people don't really know about today. Although I suppose if one were to look deeper into the mythology of their careers it could be inferred that they never had proper minds to begin with. I'm speaking (with some trepidation) about the Butthole Surfers and their biggest mainstream success, 'Pepper'.

The Butthole Surfers are a band with a hell of a reputation. They are quite simply infamous for...being themselves. Established back in the early 80s, the band would make a horrifying yet captivating spectacle out of their stage shows. Outrageous outfits and bizarre costumes. Rampant and encouraged drug use. Nudity. Open flames. Prat falls and fake blood to accentuate them. Then there are the rumors about sex on stage which have yet to be confirmed. In the midst of all this the band was making avant-garde noise rock, punk rock and just straight up, weird, jammy stuff. Front man Gibby Hanes got to the point where he had a massive rack for noise effects which had little rhyme or reason, he just liked to switch things up for the sake of weird. I learned all of this after the fact, of course, but I did love their most mainstream release.

In 1996, some fifteen+ years after they got their start, the band released their album Electriclarryland. A single released from the album, 'Pepper', became a bit of a runaway hit with the alternative crowd at the time. This was of the era where Beck was still more of the 'Loser' sound than the 'Lost Cause' sound he later embraced. The music world, especially MTV, was much less nuanced and outrageous. A single like this stood out for its weird sound, the spoken/rapped sections in the verses. The plodding beat and the backwards vocal snippets. We were easily shocked, my friends. Something as pedestrian as 'Pepper' stood out as bizarre in a sea of Bush and Joan Osborn. Hey, I was young and sheltered, okay?

The song is a fantastic example of alternative music in the mid 90s. It's that mid-tempo shuffle, no bass to speak of but a simple drum loop and some fuzzy guitars. It's really a great song made of a handful of parts. Gibby intones about a list of odd characters who all die in bizarre ways. The chorus is awesomely poppy, just a single chord with Gibby singing "I don't mind the sun sometimes, the images it shows. I can smell you on my lips and smell you in my clothes. Cinnamon and sugary and softly spoken lies. You never know just how you look through other people's eyes." Other than a small guitar solo and the backwards vocal piece, that's the entire song. That's it. It's incredibly simple, another example of how producers and execs are screwing up by packing in sounds and cluttering songs with blips and bloops. This is catchy simply because it's so simple and stupid.

The Butthole Surfers are still technically around and, I would wager, just as insane. This song, as great as it is, is the rare commercial bright spot in their canon. If you love this, you probably won't like anything else they do. Still, I love it for its absurdity and du jour elements. It's a great 90s alternative track you owe it to yourself to dig up.

Burnout

Hey.


I'm burnt like a match head. 


As in completely devoid of combustive. Spent. Used up. This is not a matter of only getting to this now, but a matter of not having the mental and physical wherewithal to type something of legitimacy and significance that would warrant your attention. 


So I'm going to be honest. 


I'm taking a dive tonight, gang. I'm tucking in and hoping a decent night's rest will bring some restoration of character and will power. I sincerely apologize for the lack of mental sustenance tonight, but I promise you I have something on the horizon. Something unique and novel that I have never attempted on this site before. Something I think you'll be surprised to see, and it's pretty hefty. 


So I'm asking you to be patient. 


I appreciate that you're even reading my groveling. Trust me, it will be worth it in the end, I just need to charge the batteries desperately. In lieu of the written word, here's something to bide the time - some artwork based on my favorite television series ever, LOST. I can take no credit for any of the work, but it still blows me away. Enjoy, and hopefully I'll see you tomorrow.

Still here? Cool.


Quick sidenote about the Mellon Collie breakdown - a comment from an insightful reader completely broke it down for me in succint fashion. Rather than force you to find it in the back logs, I'll just quote the comment in it's entirety  here:


 "Corgan was writing from a prospective as a teenager here, not as a "rock star". He set out to write a concept album ("The Wall" of his generation he perhaps foolishly boasted early in the writing process), and didn't exactly end up with one, but the voice of the album is still a teenager, perhaps Billy himself (10 years ago at the time), perhaps not. That's why you get such bizarre swings of emotion...from "God is empty" to "deep in thought I forgive everyone".


See? Dude totally broke it down for me in a digestible, instantly understandable way. I was close, but pretty much off target. Funny to see why it made so much more sense as a teenager than when I'm closer to 30. 

Beach Combing

Welcome back.

Last time I wrote about the Gorillaz I barely had started doing this. Here I am, 5 months later with a bit of content under my belt. I had written, then, about their latest release, the experimental and conceptual project 'The Fall'. Really, though, all their work is experimental - it just depends how much so and in what context. I certainly did enjoy The Fall, although now with a bit of hindsight it feels spare, a bit thin in some spots. I realize this because conversely I have recently been listening to their last proper album before this, the sprawling and highly produced 'Plastic Beach'. Obviously tastes change with time, and in the months since the release of The Fall I've fallen out of love with it and back into the arms of Plastic Beach. Let's look at why that is, shall we?

As stated previously, the two albums are as far apart as can be, despite initial appearances. One stands more as an manifestation of curiosity and potential, as though Damon Albarn was asking himself "Can I do this?" while the other is a grand concept, so large and plotted out that it becomes something else, entirely, and example of creating art out of music. Along these lines, look at how the respective results play to our ears - The Fall, being entirely produced on an iPad, is fairly thin, almost deficient album by Gorillaz' standards. Plastic Beach, with its countless hours of recording, production and multiple cut tracks, is the most ambitious and grand thing they've done aside from a live tour. Albarn has even acknowledged how what was originally a small scale concept/art band has slowly grown and progressed into an entire collective of artists and musicians who all contribute in a unique but integral way. Fall is minimal, Beach is grandiose.

Regarding Plastic Beach's theme, I am absolutely enthralled with it. I can easily see how the realization of how plastic is becoming intertwined with the environment would be an affecting, long-scale concept. Albarn remarked that he had seen the way different cultures interpreted finding plastic in their beaches and landfills and who disposed of it and who reconstituted it, and the idea really impressed upon him. Honestly the idea is both fascinating and appalling, especially if you've seen any images of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a massive, growing wad of trash in the ocean that is a horrible accumulation of our un-recycled detritus. The images, let alone the concept, make my mind reel with the implications of our impact on the world. Albarn, however, had a more...skewed perspective. His take on it was that the plastic came from the earth and will therefore, one day, return to it or become integrated into the ecosystem. In a way he's right, but the fact that its disturbing the system so significantly shouldn't be ignored.

But I digress. I'm not going to lecture, but rather encourage - look into what the Garbage Patch is, and then listen to this album. Like I said, 'The Fall' is a sleek, stripped down affair, while 'Plastic Beach' is complex and dynamic. It's a grand, sprawling affair. Check out the intro/trailer for the album here. There was a series of short clips someone stitched together to make a longer form of the conceptual meta-narrative here and here. Combining the viral clips and official videos for singles, it makes a more cohesive story to the album, illustrating just how dense this project has become. The sound of the album is a bit colder and even more stylish than they normally do, but it works with the theme. The electric funk of 'Stylo', the 80s pop of 'On Melancholy Hill' or the cold bounce of 'Rhinestone Eyes' - they all sound great and are just enough of a growth of style that the album feels like a new push. Hell, just look at the list of guest musicians on this huge concept album - Lou Reed, Snoop Dogg, Bobby Womack, Mos Def, De La Soul and Mick Jones of The Clash, just to name a few.

It's funny how the passing of time can shape tastes. When it first came out I wasn't really sold on Plastic Beach. When The Fall came out I was enamored with the robotic persona of it, which I now know is really the sole voice of Damon Albarn working without his armada of colleagues. The complex and intricately designed Plastic Beach really has grown on me as I've had time to unpack the listening experience. Give it a whirl if you haven't already, I think you'll be as intrigued as I was.

Diminished Returns

Evening, all.

Once again it's Friday night and I am rushing out the door to see local artists cutting up the scene. I have grand designs of a massive, loving write up on them. In the meantime I'll offer another quick rundown of artists whose work you should take a look at. Hopefully I'll be back early enough to do a proper column but if not, we can cover our bases.

First of is the work of Philippe Ramette, hosted here. Ramette does an amazing job twisting your sense of perspective by playing with orientation and expected positioning. His shots are disorienting and serene, with work that displays common and known things like people and doors put into odd or disorienting spaces. Thoroughly impressive, deceptive stuff. I love the way he can create visual tricks of the eye.

Next up is Jim Kazanjian. His work is astounding and beautiful, almost to the point that it's difficult to put into words. His  prints and visual work is the kind of mind-bending stuff that takes your brain a few moments to properly process. I honestly feel like I lack the proper training to accurately describe what is presented. Fantastic deconstructions of the familiar interspersed with elements of the uncanny. Shoot, maybe that's close? I don't know. All I do know is that it's gorgeous and moving. Take a look.

While I can attest that both of these artists have long and successful careers, I give these simple and meager props only in the hopes that one more person can be exposed to their unreal and astonishing creations. I obviously lack the proper tools and training to do a decent breakdown on their talents, so I can only let the work speak for itself. Like I wrote above, this post will only serve as a place holder, a stop gap if you will, for a better, more loving post. Let's see where the night goes. 

Freebies

Afternoon, kids.

The snow continues to fall here in Minneapolis, seemingly with no end in sight. So it goes.

Rather than pound flesh against the keys for simple yardage in a misguided effort towards productive writing, I'll save us all the trouble and offer a shorter, more digestible article today. If nothing else it will remind me that volume is not always the requisite for quality.

One of my favorite things about the world we live in now is the wealth of absolutely free entertainment. While this could be something so simple as watching the sunset or having a friend over for dinner, I'm speaking more in the vein of free media content. I've already extolled the virtues of some of my favorite webcomics and albums that are available at no cost. Hulu is another excellent service that's totally free and even more rewarding if you sign up for membership - doing so allows you to set up queues and subscribe to shows, essentially becoming a remote version of DVR if the conditions are lining up with your viewing habits. While I could certainly drone on and on about how wonderful Hulu is, it's the idea of quality, free stuff out there on the web that I love. I'm not towing the typical line about information wanting to be free (artists should be able to eat, after all) some kind souls impart their work simply to put it out there and hope that allowing direct access will benefit their work. I adore that optimistic endeavor. Like I said, I've certainly written about the idea before and intend to do so at future points as well. Today, of course, is another such example. 

Sin Titulo is a fantastic, online and totally free comic written by Eisener Award winning author/artist Cameron Stewart. Stewart, who has done titles for Marvel, DC and Dark Horse Comics among others, has worked with heavy hitters like Ed Brubaker and Grant Morrison on their respective Catwoman and Batman & Robin, as well as critically acclaimed titles like Hellblazer and B.P.R.D. Hailing from Canada, Stewart has been a longstanding member of the comic industry. Housed online by the amazing comic site Transmission X, Sin Titulo is an ongoing comic about a man whose dreams and visions start to break into his daily life as the world he knows crumbles around him. It's a bizarre and eerie tale of uncertain realities and questioned humanity that twists and turns with every installment. Alex Mackay's grandfather passes away mysteriously and without any notice. As he sets about putting the pieces of his grandfather's passing in order things get stranger, with shadowy figures observing him and peculiar buildings that may or may not be facilitating unusual...things. To go into the details much further would either scare potential readers off or spoil perfectly good and disturbing surprises. 

What Stewart is doing here is absolutely awesome. He's an established and well respected comic artist who feels compelled to offer excellent free content despite already making a living as a professional artist. I can't tell you just how much I've enjoyed following this comic unfold, knowing that I just have to check back on the site every few days to see the latest update, like a surreal and morose soap opera via web comic. The fact that this awesome saga is entirely free to see is just an added bonus.

If you take any enjoyment at all from comics (or graphic novels, if you wanna class it up) please head on over to Transmission X and see what the have to offer, there's some amazing work on display. If you don't really read comics just give it a try or check out any of the other amazing comics they have going at the moment. It's some amazing stuff, all for free. Indulge! Enjoy! But most of all don't pass up great, free opportunities like this!

Still Sick

Alright friends and neighbors, I'm still fighting the bug. Cold medicine can only do so much for a man and I'm feeling tapped.

So what do I do whenever I'm feeling empty and rundown?

Same thing every time - I highlight some art that I love and let it speak for itself, thereby letting me rest my head and giving props to a deserving artist. Today is no exception and I want to put the spotlight on a local artist who I stumbled across this summer in Uptown.

Lolamade Monsters are the work of Laura Holewa, who had a stall at the awesome yet all-too-short Uptown Farmer's Market, located at 29th and Colfax. Quick side note if you live in Minneapolis - support this Farmer's Market next summer! It was a fantastic place to get fresh veggies and meats at great prices, locally grown, without having to head all the way downtown. Okay, back on track. Her stall was simple and straight-forward, letting her work put it's twisted and most endearing foot forward. Laura's creations are bright and vibrant little monsters made of clay, absolutely bursting with personality. Here she is on Twitter and Facebook, as well as her space site on Etsy. Check out her awesome clay monsters.

Look at these things! How can you not love them? It was fortunate for my own sake that I had no cash with me when I first found her spot at the Uptown Farmer's market or I would have spent way more than I could afford on her devious little creations. I would love to fill a whole shelf with these monsters. 


Like I said, still under the weather, so today's post is shortened. Tomorrow should be back to form. Also, I wanted to give a quick thanks to the massive influx of traffic for the write up on Analog Heart, I appreciate all the feedback on that underrated piece of music. Nice to know so many people already had the drop on it!


See you tomorrow, friends and neighbors.

Weekend Wind Down

Tonight's post brings you to another tangent of the blog I hadn't really accounted for in its inception. Having felt stymied for material in the last 48 hours, I thought I would share something I did over the holidays and stashed away on my hard drive, being unsure of what to do with it.


Instead of ranting and raving while about some secret obsession or reviewing some media I love, I thought I would use this Sunday as an opportunity to showcase something simple that amused me. Not having the usual wealth of drive and inertia to work with, I'm rounding out the weekend with some light hearted shots of shenanigans. It's a bit of nothing, really, but it's the idea  and execution that make me laugh, so here goes.


Over the holiday season I had the chance to pay a visit to my parent's home in Wisconsin, stately Mole Manor. One of my mother's long-standing Xmas traditions has been to display her Christmas Village collection, a series of ceramic structures  that show the North Pole and its denizens as they ready for the yule tide grind. One of my traditions is indulging in vodka-sodas and poking through boxes of childhood relics in search of...whimsy? I have no idea, but its fun to make my brain go "!?!?!?!" and feel that distant recognition come rolling in. When these two things come together, you have the most recent of my goofy and indulgent art projects. 


Long and short of the idea was to take a box full of Micro-Machines based on the Star Wars intellectual property and set 'em up, diorama-rama style. It's definitely juvenile and silly, but it made me laugh and got a good reaction from mon petit frere, who was also indulging with me, in another excellent holiday tradition. Last year we watched an old, worn out copy of Star Wars on VHS and we marveled at how far we had come to Blu Ray. He remarked how it looked as though George Lucas had smeared Vaseline on the screen. This year, I made my own creation in tribute to Lucas' inability to let a work of art lie untouched. I call it "North Echo Base Pole". Forgive the quality of the images, please, as they were taken on an Iphone 3gs, none of that beautiful Iphone 4 gorgeousness. Regardless, take a look!

The Dark Side of Santa's Village

Santa's Storm Troopers

Better than Tauntauns

Backing Lord Vader

Cheaper Than Elves

Multiple Vaders

Mounting A Defense

On The Front Lines

Santa's New Hope


So there you have the highlights from the Christmas Eve debauchery. Pretty tame but most standards, but I thought you might get a laugh out of it, in lieu of posting any more about material I've already written on. Tomorrow I will return to my usual form, as I've had two full days to give the internal processor a break and recharge the circuits. Stay tuned for more!

Another Late Night Post

To be perfectly blunt, I'm spent.

The well is dry tonight folks.

I have no zeal today for a long and pretentiously insightful post on something I love. As penance tomorrow will have either one long and detailed post, or another double post extravaganza. Such are the up and down thrill rides that are my weekends.

To maintain my streak of daily posting and positivity, I thought I'd throw out two really cool links to artists whose work I really dig. The first is completely in character and expected, the other is a little more esoteric but quite beautiful.

The first unabashedly geeky artist is Kodykoala (real name Donald) from El Paso, Texas. An avid gamer, he makes these amazing sculptures out of vinyls and other material, both for sale and his private collection. I'm not going to post any shots here as I don't want to take anything away from his site, but you really ought to check out his work. He does some amazing things with plastics and has a crazy good pop style that I love. I plan on aquiring something from his line once I have a place to display any art that doesn't hang on a wall. Condo dwelling forces an economical use of space - right now most horizontal areas are covered with books and keyboards, so no room for Mega Man statues. 

The second is another site for an artist whose work I am constantly thrilled and enthralled by, Jon Klassen. His site, Burst of Beaden, showcases his gorgeous and dynamic works that are available to purchase. Among his pieces are some design work he did for the movie "Coraline", based on the children's books. His style displays a deft use of minimalist shapes and distinct color/tone choices that are both jarring and engrossing. I see his work and my mind instantly kicks into high gear, both analysing it and musing over what my mind creates by interpreting his skillful absence of anything extemporaneus. It's quite moving. Head over to his site and take a look, I can't say enough about it to do it justice.

That's about all I have for tonight. Like I said, not everyday is going to be a barn burner, but it's something! Mnemosyne were fantastic last night at the Cabooze in Minneapolis, expect a write up on their excellent mix tape soon. I also have a few projects up my sleeve for storing up content to fill in on these lackluster days, but I don't want to ruin the suspense. Secrets, secrets! 

Until tomorrow, dear readers! Sleep tight.