tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18019999272002698432024-03-21T04:24:32.060+00:00Between Thought and ExpressionA blog about the music I enjoy listening to. And probably quite a lot of irrelevant waffle.Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.comBlogger242125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-50619603829127708952014-08-10T23:36:00.000+01:002014-08-10T23:38:25.649+01:00Sunday MusicAnother rainy Sunday passes and brings with it Sunday Music. I'd planned a couple more posts for this week but lack of time and a surfeit of procrastination killed them, or at least pushed them back a week. A review of comic The Fuse will show up next week. I had planned to do a My Favourite Albums post about Leonard Cohen's New Skin for the Old Ceremony but I'm thinking I might do Salutation Road by Martin Stephenson & The Daintees instead. <b><br /></b><br />
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<b>The Wind Cries Mary - The Jimi Hendrix Experience </b>One of my very favourite tracks on one of my very favourite albums. Hendrix's brilliance is pretty much universally acknowledged but I think Mitch Mitchell's genius is too often overlooked. Listen to this song and pay particular attention to how he's drumming. This is a jazz fusion song as much as a rock song and that's down to Mitchell's drumming and the way he and Hendrix feed off each other.<br />
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<b>Ghost Riders In The Sky - The Shadows (originally by Stan Jones) </b>This isn't my favourite song by The Shadows or my favourite version of this song but I needed a cover and I'd never posted a song by The Shadows before; I decided to put that wrong right.<br />
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<b>After Hours - The Velvet Underground </b>Originally this was going to be I'm Sticking With You but I'll leave that for another two weeks. After Hours seemed the perfect song to use instead. Another song with Mo Tucker's vocals but in many ways an opposite to it.<br />
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<b>Darker By The Day - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds</b> The standout track from And No More Shall We Part, a turning point album for Nick Cave, this really shows off Nick Cave's abilities as a story teller. This was the first bad Seeds album I owned and this was the first song from that album I loved.<br />
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<b>Depth Charge Ethel - Grinderman </b>Over time the Bad Seeds changed from a raw post-punk band to something much more orchestral and polished. Grinderman was formed by 4 Bad Seeds, (Nick Cave, Warren Ellis, Jim Sclavunos and Martyn P. Casey), and produced two raw rock albums that still feature Nick Cave's story telling lyrical style.<br />
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<b>Past Mistake - Tricky </b>Tricky sounding very Tricky-ish from the 2008 album Knowle West Boy, with guest vocals from Lubna. A song with roots in his earlier albums, I'll be discussing this album sometime next week.<br />
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<br />Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-70995235134888938392014-08-09T01:12:00.001+01:002014-08-09T01:12:30.860+01:00Tricky listeningAnother week and another Tricky album. This week it's 2003's Vulnerable.<br />
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The cover of Love Cats I used in last week's Sunday Music comes from this album. This is an album that I'm not a huge fan of. There's a sort of club style dance music feel to parts of the album that I'm not really a huge fan of. It's not a bad album, it's just one I have no desire to listen to again.<br />
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However there is one song from it I love, Car Crash. So instead of skipping this album and/or this week, I'll just post that song.<br />
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Car Crash by Tricky</div>
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Car Crash is the track on the album that is best suited to the vocals of Tricky and Constanza. I'm as much a fan of Tricky's gruff and raspy vocals as anyone else, but his delivery on this track is toned back, a back-up vocalist that adds depth to the sing. Costanza takes centre stage here. Her voice rises above the atmosphere of the rest of the track and is full of grace. Remember those chillout compilation albums that started gaining popularity in the early 2000's? This track is what they all aspire to be. Full of depth and texture, relaxing without ever zoning you out of the sound of the song and into a comfort zone where the track is just background music. It's laidback and vital at the same time. That's a tough feat to pull of.Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-85270834736110416252014-08-08T02:31:00.004+01:002014-08-08T18:54:30.803+01:00Comic Review - The Wicked + The Divine<br />
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The Wicked + The Divine is an ongoing creator owned comic. It is written by Kieron Gillen with art by Jamie McKelvie. Currently 2 issues have been published. It's published by Image. This is a spoiler free review.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Wicked + The Divine #1 cover by Jamie McKelvie</td></tr>
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I've spoken before about how absolutely brilliant Gillen & McKelvie's Phonogra; it should come as no surprise that I rate this highly too. And I do rate it very highly. With only two issues out it is one of three comics that vie for the title of my favourite, (The others are Alex + Ada, reviewed <a href="http://betweenthoughtandexpressionmusic.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/comics-review-alex-ada.html" target="_blank">here</a>, and Sex Criminals, to be reviewed soon).<br />
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One of the reasons I like it so much after two issues is the lack of wasted space. It's common in comics that the first issue is all set-up with a final page reveal that gets the main story started. Partly because it's serialised story telling and you want people to buy the next issue but partly because creators want to set up the world they are telling their story in. The Wicked + The Divine creates the world as it tells the story.It's set on a world that is basically our own. The concept is that every 90 years 12 gods become incarnate in already living people. Within 2 years they're all dead.<br />
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The current incarnations of the gods have all become pop stars. The story is told through the filter of Laura, a fan of the gods/popstars who wants to become one of them. The secondary main character, (so far anyway, i guess she'll become as prominent as Laura soon), is Cassandra; a critic and journalist who is sceptical that these people are gods.The comic deals with how people are idolised and elevated by society as a whole. Laura & Cassandra represent the two extremes of this. One totally buying in to the idea and the other not just dismissing it but hating that people buy in to it. Nonetheless, they are both obsessed with the truth behind the story; they're both obsessed with the gods.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Art by Jamie McKelvie</td></tr>
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As I said before, Laura wants to become one of the gods. She wants what they have. Of course a journey towards becoming that means leaving behind everything else, friends, family, college. She wants what they have but if she achieves it and becomes famous, will there be anything left of her. Will she still be Laura or another, ultimately disposable, celebrity. After all, these people are gods. But only for two years.<br />
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I mentioned this will be spoiler free so rather than talk any more about the plot I'm going to talk about what makes the book great. Firstly, the art is gorgeous. McKelvie has the knack of drawing images that even when full of movement and action are never confused or muddled. They lead the reader exactly where they need to go. Matt Wilson's colours deserve special praise too. the palette fits perfectly with the art; it's bright without ever being garish. Gillen's writing is clever but not subtle. That's not to say there's nothing to be found be re-reading or digging deeper into the story, there is, but it's a book about pop culture and how that leads to a transient immortality. It is frequently on the nose but never overbearingly asking you if you get the points it's making.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"> Art by Jamie McKelvie </td></tr>
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Gillen & McKelvie are two talented creators and their work is always worth checking out. When they're collaborating it becomes a must buy for me. The Wicked + The Divine is shaping up to be their masterpiece. You should grab the first two issues and join in.<br />
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One last thing. Being that it's a book based around popstars, and Gillen is an ex-music journalist, he's created a spotify playlist for the series <a href="https://play.spotify.com/user/missadalovelace/playlist/11LAaVMMhxPfSp4i2b6JRJ?play=true&utm_source=open.spotify.com&utm_medium=open">here.</a>Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-78631940873804397432014-08-03T15:27:00.002+01:002014-08-03T15:27:45.373+01:00Sunday MusicToday is the first sunny day we've had all week. Thankfully my neighbour's Elvis album has yet to make an appearance. Long may it continue. On with the music.<br />
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After yesterday's post on Hometowns I don't want anyone to be of the impression that it was The RAA's only album worth listening too. As proof, here's the first single from their second album Departing.<br />
<strong>The Rural Alberta Advantage - Stamp</strong><br />
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I've been meaning to feature this for a couple of weeks now. It gets stuck in my head on a pretty regular basis.<br />
<strong>Broken Bells - The Ghost Inside</strong><br />
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Another song that gets stuck in my head on a pretty regular basis.<br />
<strong>The Black Keys - Next Girl</strong><br />
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This was an easy choice. A cover by Tricky from the album that we're up to in his discography, (Vulnerable), this is a cover that's more re-imagining than straight copying. Those are the best type of covers.<strong><br /></strong><br />
<strong>Tricky - The Love Cats (originally by The Cure)</strong><br />
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I love the open, cinematic sound to this song. It sounds nothing like actual Blues music but still captures the feel of Blues.<br />
<strong>Timber Timbre - Bad Ritual</strong><br />
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REM spent 15 years making great album after great album and then Reveal came out. It wasn't bad but it was a major step down from everything else they'd done, except for 2 or 3 songs. That was followed by Around The Sun which was, again, not bad. Just average. Average in a way that makes you never want to listen to it again, possibly apart from Final Straw. It seemed that REM's time was over. It happens and two less than good albums wouldn't detract at all from their legacy but still, it wasn't how it should have ended. Thankfully REM released too more albums before they quit and they more than made up for the disappointments of Reveal and Around The Sun. This is the first track from their penultimate album Accelerate. When I heard it, I knew REM were back. <br />
<strong>REM - Living Well is the Best Revenge</strong><br />
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<br />Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-36040227964316048182014-08-03T00:25:00.000+01:002014-08-03T00:25:13.280+01:00My Favourite Albums - HometownsHometowns is the debut album from The Rural Alberta Advantage. Released in 2008 and then re-released in 2009 after the band signed with a new & bigger label.<br />
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The Rural Alberta Advantage, from here on out I'll just refer to them as The RAA, is a three piece Canadian band made up of Nils Edenloff, (guitar and vocals), Amy Cole, (backing vocals, keyboards and percussion), and Paul Banwatt (drums).<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Amy Cole, Paul Banwatt & Nils Edenloff (l-r)</td></tr>
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If you read the last installment of Sunday Music you'll have seen, and heard, Don't Haunt This Place from Hometowns. It's one of my favourite songs from the album but it's not necessarily representative of the whole album, at least musically. I'm not sure there is one song that's representative of the musical styles on the album. <br />
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The Dethbridge in Lethbridge</div>
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Lyrically however the album covers the same ground regardless of the music. The songs are about longing for something lost. A man in Toronto looking back at his past in Alberta and writing about that. So the lyrics are about things lost. Things left behind. A simpler way of life that we have when we're younger; soon enough to be replaced by the more complicated adult world. And it's a world that can never be revisited. Even if you go back to those places you've changed even if the places haven't. It's nostalgia, the remembering of things we loved that are gone. <br />
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Four Night Rider</div>
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Of course the problem with nostalgia can be that it leads to a refusal to grow up. Always looking back at the past is the easiest way to miss the present. This is not a trap that I personally feel Hometowns fall into. It's not an album about nostalgia as much as it's an album about living. Partially of this comes from the lyrics but mostly I think it comes from Paul Banwatt's drumming. All three members of the band are skilled musicians worthy of praise and the band works together in a perfectly complimentary way. All that said; Banwatt may be the best drummer around at the moment. In my opinion he's certainly vying with The Bad Plus' Dave King for the title. His drumming is always flawless, always driving the band along but never straying to far ahead. It gives the album a much needed vitality.<br />
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Luciana</div>
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Nils Edenloff's vocals do somewhat sound like Jeff Magnum's. The RAA however aren't another band trying to be the next Neutral Milk Hotel; they are just uniquely themselves and Hometowns is the perfect, (I know I've over-used that word), and expression of that. In a world where it's easier to tear things down and make snarky, pithy comments, (something I am very guilty of) this is a sincere album by a sincere band. If there is one song that perfectly sums up this album it's In The Summertime. A song about the past, dealing with the present optimistically, and looking forward to the future. Driven along by Banwatt's heartbeat drumming accomponied by Amy Cole's keyboards and finishing off the song, and the album, with her vocals.<br />
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In The Summertime</div>
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Your music collection is a much poorer place without Hometowns.Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-85936348545484639902014-08-01T01:48:00.000+01:002014-08-01T01:48:38.289+01:00Comic review - Satellite SamSatellite Sam is an ongoing creator owned comic. It is written by Matt Fraction with art by Howard Chaykin. Currently 8 issues have been published and a trade paper back collecting issues 1-5 is also available. It's published by Image. Before we go any further there will be some mild spoilers in this review.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Satellite Sam #1 cover by Howard Chaykin</td></tr>
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Matt Fraction is currently writing another creator owned book at Image, Sex Criminals. Sex Criminals is a sex comedy. I won't go into it any further now, there will be a review in the next week or two. I mention only because Satellite Sam is pretty much the polar opposite of it.<br />
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Satellite Sam is set in the early 1950's at the birth of TV. Satellite Sam is a serialised kids sci-fi TV show. In the first issue the star, and owner, of the show is found dead. In a secret apartment in which his son, the main character, finds boxes and boxes of photos of women.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Art by Howard Chaykin</td></tr>
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The comic revolves around Mike, the aforementioned son, and his attempts to find out just what happened to his dad and what all those pictures are about. Also, he replaces his dad on the Satellite Sam show, despite not being an actor. Or at least it's mostly about that. There are plenty of subplots running through the series. There's the studio owner trying to compete with the networks. The show's writer dealing with various pressures that would be too spoilerish to go into. One of the female co-stars of the show, Maria, and her relationship with her boyfriend. The director and his health. One of the crew members, Gene, trying to creative an inventive new style of TV show. Mike recruits another of the show's female co-stars to help him find out more about his dad. This co-star is also a born-again Christian and former hedonist. Her helping Mike leads to her having to confront issues from her past she thought long dealt with. To put it another way, the series is packed with plot and sub-plots.<br />
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Sometimes that works against it as they don't always seem to mesh together well. Mostly though it's a compelling look at just how messed up and inter-connected everything is. The comic has a tight, clautraphobic atmosphere. Everyone's trapped in some way. Mike is trapped in his father's shadow. The station is trapped by federal legislation. Other characters are trapped by the contrast between the lives they want to lead and the lives they have to appear to lead, again I'm trying to avoid spoilers. Maria is trapped, trying to make a career in America after leaving her life in Italy behind after the war. The picture below is her dressing for her boyfriend <i>exactly </i>how she appears on one of the posters for an old film of hers. She's trapped by the past and her heritage.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Art by Howard Chaykin</td></tr>
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Even Gene, as he tries to break new ground in his medium, is trapped by what a terrible person he can be.<br />
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Gene's struggle is really the struggle of the comic. He wants to make a TV show where the words and the story clash with each other and both need to be paid attention to. The comic is the story of people trying to make their way in the world and the art is full of tightly framed panels to show just how constricted they are. Ultimately the things they do are limited by things they can't control.<br />
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It's fair to say that the comic has too many plotlines than it can handle sometimes and it's true to say that the main character, Mike, is pretty much a forgettable main character, (to a degree that's part of the point of his character but it can make it a little too hard to care about him), but overall this comic is a well written & beautifully drawn series that weaves interesting stories that promise to pay off in an very entertaining way in the future. I think it's worth checking out.Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-48754345260173070122014-07-30T23:16:00.000+01:002014-07-30T23:16:05.766+01:00Some more Tricky musicAs promised on Sunday here are some more songs from Tricky. These all come from the 2001 album Blowback.<br />
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Excess by Tricky feat Stephanie McKay and Alanis Morissette</div>
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The aim of Blowback was to get some more radio play and commercial success than the previous albums. Excess shows this perfectly. It's poppy in a way that only Tricky can really be.</div>
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#1 Da Woman by Tricky feat John Frusciante, Flea and Josh Klinghoffer</div>
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Essentially Tricky rapping over the Wonder Woman theme while John Frusciante provides guitars and vocals, Flea plays bass and Klinghoffer drums. So, yeah. Tricky + Red Hot Chili Peppers + Wonder woman theme. I shouldn't have to tell you great that is.<br />
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Five Days by Tricky feat Cyndi Lauper</div>
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Tricky's usual vocal style is on full display here; no suprises there. What was auprise, to me at least, is just how well Cyndi Lauper's voice compliments Tricky's.</div>
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That's it for today; enjoy the great music.</div>
<br />Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-56506782777112595822014-07-28T00:23:00.000+01:002014-07-28T00:23:25.961+01:00Sunday Music<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
I know technically this is early Monday morning not Sunday but I consider that if I haven't been to bed it's not morning yet. </div>
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<strong>Rural Alberta Advantage - Don't Haunt This House </strong>From their fabulous debut album Hometowns which will be the subject of a My Favourite Albums blog in the coming week.</div>
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<strong>Radiohead - A Wolf at the Door </strong>Just a great song, from a great band, with a great video. </div>
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<strong>Dax Riders - I Was Made For Lovin' You (originally by Kiss) </strong>I don't watch a lot of TV normally. Outside of sports the only programme I regularly watch in The Simpsons, with my daughter. Kiss' original I Was made for Lovin' You was on one of the episodes last week and we've spent most of the weekend end singing it at each other. This cover is in celebration of that.<br />
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<strong>Foo Fighters - Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love (originally by Van Halen) </strong>While we're on the subject of late 70's rock...<br />
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<strong>Die Toten Hosen - Guns of Brixton (originally by The Clash) </strong>I almost posted this in my Weltmeister post but decided to save it for Sunday Music instead. It's in English.<br />
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<strong>Wash My Soul - Tricky </strong>One last track from Juxtapose before we move on with Tricky. There'll be another Tricky post during the week.<br />
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<br />Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-80999098982550213642014-07-26T23:41:00.001+01:002014-07-26T23:41:38.646+01:00Long songsI was talking to a friend the other day about long songs and I though that'd be a good idea for a blog. So here we are. Three songs over 9 minutes long. I've excluded jazz from this, because that's kind of cheating<br />
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Kissing the Beehive by Wolf Parade.<br />
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The Court of the Crimson King by
King Crimson
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Sister Ray by The Velvet Underground<br />
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That's it. I don't have a lot to say about these songs now because I'm ridiculously tired so I'm going to go to bed and read comics. Enjoy the three very different long songs and I'll see you tomorrow for Sunday Music.Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-62609738269862931082014-07-26T02:02:00.001+01:002014-07-26T02:02:32.764+01:00Comics review - Alex + AdaThis is my first comic review here. I'll be reviewing some series that are on going and others that are complete. This review is of the ongoing series <strong>Alex + Ada</strong>. There'll be some mild spoilers in the review; nothing that will inhibit your enjoyment of the story. If you don't want to read any further then let me say now; this book is great and worth your attention.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Alex + Ada issue #1 cover by Jonathan Luna<br />
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Alex + Ada is a creator owned series co-written by Jonathan Luna and Sarah Vaughn with art by Jonathan Luna. It's published by Image and currently has 7 issues released. I think, based on the way Jonathan Luna's previous works with his brother Joshua Luna, that Jonathan Luna & Sarah Vaughn plot the overall story and individual issues together and Sarah Vaughn scripts the dialogue.<br />
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Alex + Ada takes places in the very near, and recognisable, future USA. It's set in a world where technology has progressed in not too outlandish ways except, perhaps, for the prolifiration of robots. Basic robots that perform household chores and other more advanced robots that are companions, basically sex slaves. (There's no sex or nudity in this book)<br />
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Mild spoilers from this point on.<br />
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A year before the story starts AI has been banned. Robots with AI had become self aware and violence followed.<br />
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The story starts with Alex. Recently broken up with his girlfriend and drifting along going through the motions. If you've been through a break-up you'll know the state he's in. Not wallowing in grief, just recovering and trying to move on. It's his birthday and his wealthy grandmother decides to buy him, against his protestations, a Tanaka X5; the most advanced robot around. She has one, Daniel, that is her adoring sex slave and she thinks it's just the thing Alex needs to cheer him up.<br />
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Ada arrives and is completely subservient to Alex. He has no desire to have her but is unable to bring to return her.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Art by Jonathan Luna</td></tr>
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Alex comes to believe that it is possible for Ada's AI to be unblocked in such a way that she can have her own personality. Despite it being illegal he resolves to pursue this. It shouldn't be too much of a spoiler or a shock that his attempts are ultimately successful.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Art by Jonathan Luna</td></tr>
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So, that's the plot. What makes the story great is how the obvious themes are explored. Sci fi meditations on the nature of humanity, freedom and morality are pretty common but in Alex + Ada they are explored in subtle, non-preachy ways. Alex wants to do the right thing but that makes him a law-breaker; something he's obviously not comfortable with. Ada gaining full awareness puts there relationship at risk; she's gone from a servant to a friend. He can no longer command her, only try and teach her. Her new freedom comes with significant dangers; the truth must be kept secret from everyone. Ada's explorations of life and its experiences are portrayed with a childlike charm that is almost impossible not to appreciate. But it comes with a price. As Ada learns more she wants to experience more. Given that her existence is highly illegal she has so far been mostly confined to Alex's house. When she wants to go out into the wider world a whole new set of problems with present themselves. As much as Ada has learned about the world she hasn't experienced much at all. She has no idea how to interact in company. She could not pass as a human in dealings with the real world. Yet, she will need to experience the real world at some stage.<br />
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A final word on the art. Luna's work is so beautiful. He has a knack for knowing what to draw and how to draw it that comes across as realistic rather than hyper-exaggerated. Alex acts as a decent guy and this is believable because that's how he looks. His grandmother is drawn to be loving towards him and slightly eccentric. It's no surprise that the characters personalities match the way they are drawn so well, Luna is co-writer after all, but it is still worthy of praise.Again, the key word is subtle. The same is true with the colours. Everything has a beautiful muted touch to it. This is very much the not at all distant future rather than some fantastical future.<br />
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The first 5 issues of Alex + Ada are available in a collected trade paperback now 9in the US at least, the UK edition is released at the end of July) and I heartily recommend checking it out and picking up issues 6 and 7 while you're doing it. I don't think you'll regret it at all.Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-44968570225691708952014-07-24T00:10:00.001+01:002014-07-24T00:15:46.692+01:00My favourite albums - Juxtapose & listening to TrickyIf you've been reading the weekly Sunday Music posts you know that for the last few weeks I've been posting Tricky songs every week. The problem is, that's only one or two songs out of six I post on a Sunday. Here's a solution. It's moving a little too slowly for my liking. It's been a while since I've made a new entry in the My favourite album series. This is a way to kill two birds with one stone.<br />
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Today I'll be talking about Tricky's 1999 release, <b>Juxtapose</b>.<br />
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Juxtapose was released in 1999; the first album to not feature Martina Topley-Bird on vocals. It is, I think, a big step forward in Tricky's style. Maxinquaye was such an impactful album that all the albums that followed it felt like reactions to it. Not attempts to copy it or improve it necessarily. The albums that followed Maxinquaye were all good; I personally rate Pre-Millennium Tension very highly. None of them quite stepped out of the shadow that the masterpiece that is Maxinquaye cast.<br />
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Juxtapose does step away from it. It's an entirely different style of music. Maxinquaye is over the horizon and in the past.<br />
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Contradictive by Tricky</div>
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This is the sound of a more mature Tricky. No longer an artist worrying about the trip-hop label being hung on him; he decisevly moves away from mid-90's trip hop. There's an argument to be made that trip hop follows the direction Tricky sets on this album, that doesn't change the altered course Tricky lays down here.<br />
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For Real by Tricky</div>
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Some credit for the album must of course go to producers DJ Muggs & Dame Grease. DJ Muggs is Cypress Hills' DJ & producer and has worked with a lot of other bands and artists. Including, oddly enough, Simply Red and, most famously, House of Pain. Dame Grease is probably most well known for his production with DMX and Nas. There's an entirely different feel to this album than all the ones that went before and a lot of that must be down to the producers. </div>
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She Said by Tricky</div>
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All that said, this is still unmistakably a Tricky album. His vocals are still delivered with that characteristic low almost growling tone. His lyrics are down to earth and often poignant. It is a Tricky album and it is a great one.</div>
<br />Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-52318856699461438862014-07-20T16:37:00.002+01:002014-07-20T16:37:49.120+01:00Sunday MusicA neighbour of mine is playing Elvis songs, a selection of his saccharine songs that must come from an album called 'Absolutely not the best of Elvis', at a volume that is frankly un-neighbourly of them. This is the problem with summer in northern England. We're so unused to the sun that we don't know how to handle it; I suspect my neighbour is playing Elvis in an attempt to appease the angry ball of fire in the sun.<br />
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Enough of my environment, now for the music. I know I didn't post any covers last time; I've included two this week to make up for it.<br />
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<strong>The List by Defiance, Ohio </strong>Defiance, Ohio is a real place, but the band are from Cleveland, Ohio. This comes from their third album The Fear, The Fear, The Fear. In this blog's first go round I featured Defiance, Ohio a time or two. For those of you who are new to them, they are a mostly acoustic punk band. Defiance, Ohio are close to the top of my list of bands I'd love to see live.<br />
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<strong>Lump by The Presidents of The United States of America </strong>I ended up with this song stuck in my head earlier in the week and I decided that it had to go here. If nothing else to get it out of my head and into yours.<br />
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<strong>Teardrop by Brad Mehldau (originally by Massive Attack) </strong>The first cover and the latest in my slow process to turn people on to jazz. I've posted a lot of Brad Mehldau over the years and come to love his virtuoso piano playing. This is a solo cover.<br />
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<strong>Serenade for the Renegade by the
Esbjörn Svensson Trio</strong> This may be my very favourite piece of modern jazz. The song itself is brilliant but this performance of it turns it into something more than that, to use an over-used word, it makes it epic. <br />
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<strong>All My Life by Frank Turner (originally by the Foo Fighters) </strong>The second cover this week and part of my attempt to slowly turn you all on to Frank Turner. Truthfully I suspect most of you are already fans of Frank Turner: if that's the case you'll still be happy to hear this.<br />
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<strong>The Moment I Feared by Tricky </strong>From Angels with Dirty Faces. I think we need a post or two focusing on Tricky's discography rather than just having a video or two every week here. Look for at least one of those in the upcoming week and for now enjoy this.<br />
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Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-35988607822535258222014-07-20T00:54:00.002+01:002014-07-20T00:54:46.843+01:00The comics I buyThere's no shortage of people who will freely give their opinions on many different comics. Sometimes these people buy the comics they talk about and other times they get review copies. (of course there are some people who talk about comics they've never read, but that's try of pretty much any medium).<br />
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I do wonder with a lot of these people, what comics they actually pay to read. Which comics they'd continue to read if they had no review copies and only their own money to spend. I decided to post the comics that I buy. Today I'll post the comics that I buy in single issues; there are a few comics I buy only in trade and I'll post about those next week. This isn't intended to be a long review of any of these titles, just a list of what I'm buying and who is making them. Eventually I'll do a more in-depth look at all these titles in blog posts of their own.<br />
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<strong>Hawkeye</strong> by Matt Fraction (writer) and David Aja (artist) Published by Marvel.<br />
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<strong>Green Arrow</strong> by Jeff Lemire (writer) and Andrea Sorrentino (artist). Published by DC.<br />
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<strong>Superman Unchained </strong>by Daniel Snyder (writer) and Jim Lee (artist). Published by DC<br />
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<strong>Sex</strong> by Joe Casey (writer) and Piotr Kowalski (artist). Published by Image.<br />
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<strong>Mudman</strong> by Paul Grist (writer & artist). Published by Image. The last issue, #6, came out in February 2013 but Paul Grist said a couple of days ago that more will be coming; it stays on the list of ongoing comics out of hope more than anything else.<br />
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<strong>Uber</strong> by Kieron Gillen (writer) and Caanan White (artist) Published by Avatar.<br />
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<strong>Miracleman</strong> by Alan Moore (writer) and Alan Davis (artist) Published by Marvel. Alan Moore is uncredited in the book, at his own request.<br />
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<strong>Hellboy in Hell</strong> by Mike Mignola (writer and artist) Published by Dark Horse.<br />
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<strong>B.P.R.D. Hell on Earth</strong> Mike Mignola (writer), John Arcudi (writer) and Joe Querio (artist) Published by Dark Horse.<br />
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<strong>Abe Sapien</strong> by Mike Mignola (writer), Scott Allie (writer) and Sebastián Fiumara (artist) Published by Dark Horse.<br />
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<strong>Sir Edward Grey: Witchfinder</strong> by Kim Newman (co-writer), Maura McHugh (co-writer) and Tyler Crook (artist).<br />
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<strong>Baltimore</strong> by Mike Mignola (writer) and Ben Stenbeck (artist) Published by Dark Horse. The above Dark horse titles are all part of the same shared universe, Baltimore is not.<br />
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<strong>Sex Criminals</strong> by Matt Fraction (writer) and Chip Zdarsky (artist) Published by Image. Before this series launched searching for it on ebay brought up a lot of criminology text books. This comic is not about that type of sex crimes and is a comedy.<br />
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<strong>Satellite Sam</strong> by Matt Fraction (writer) and Howard Chaykin (artist) Published by Image.<br />
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<strong>Three</strong> by Kieron Gillen (writer) and Ryan Kelly (artist) Published by Image.<br />
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<strong>Saga</strong> by Brian K. Vaughan (writer) and Fiona Staples (artist) Published by Image.<br />
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<strong>Federal Bureau of Physics</strong> by Simon Oliver (writer) and Robbi Rodriguez (artist) Published by Vertigo<br />
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<strong>Velvet</strong> by Ed Brubaker (writer) and Steve Epting (artist) Published by Image<br />
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<strong>Evil Empire</strong> by Max Bemis (writer) and Ransom Getty (artist) Published by Boom.<br />
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<strong>Alex + Ada</strong> by Jonathan Luna (co-writer and artist) and Sarah Vaughn (co-writer) Published by Image<br />
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<strong>The Fuse</strong> by Antony Johnston (writer) and Justin Greenwood (artist) Published by Image.<br />
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<strong>Trees</strong> by Warren Ellis (writer) and Jason Howard (artist) Published by Image.<br />
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<strong>Shutter</strong> by Joe Keatinge (writer) and Leila Del Duca (artist) Published by Image<br />
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<strong>Transformers vs G.I. Joe</strong> by Tom Scioli (co-writer and artist) and John Barber (co-writer) Published by IDW.<br />
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<strong>The Wicked + The Divine</strong> by Kieron Gillen (writer) and Jamie McKelvie (artist) Published by Image.<br />
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(A quick note on creators. Some of these titles have had multiple artists do different issues; for this post I've just included the artist who is currently drawing the book)Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-28589328321675456122014-07-17T01:23:00.002+01:002014-07-17T01:24:16.016+01:00Weltmeister and fulfilling a promise<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
I said on Sunday that if Germany won the World Cup I'd post a particular song that my wife wanted me to post on Sunday. For a bit of background, my wife is German, I'm English and our kids are smart enough to support Germany when it comes to football and once England are eliminated I want them to win too. On Sunday night Germany did win the World Cup, their fourth, hence this post.</div>
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Germany had previously won the World Cup in 1952, 1974, as hosts, and 1990 while competing as West Germany. The 1990 World Cup happened after the fall of the Berlin Wall but before German reunification, which was officially completed on 3rd of October, 1990. (After the post-World War II split of Germany the West German team started up in 1950 and got to keep the legacy of the pre-war team. The East German team started up in 1952. They appeared in one World Cup, the 1974 tournament in West Germany. They were drawn in the same group as West Germany in the first round and beat West Germany 1-0 in the final group game to win their grooup. East Germany were knocked out in the second round while West Germany went on to win, as mentioned above. The match between the two sides was the only time they faced each other and was the only match West Germany failed to win in the whole tournament. East Germany won the Olympic football Gold medal in 1974 and I'll stop there before this turns into a too long digression about East German football).<br />
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I'd like to take a moment to recommend the film Good Bye, Lenin! set around the time of German re-unification which features the 1990 World Cup in a small but important role, without too much of the turgid football that tournament produced on display. It also has one of the best shot scenes in cinema history.<br />
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My wife has since amended her request to two songs, and I've added a third from my brother-in-law's favourite band.<br />
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The first song she requested is <b>Extrabreit's</b> cover of <b>Flieger, grüß mir die Sonne, (Flyers, Say Hello To The Sun)</b> which was released in 1990. Extrabreit were very popular in the early 1980's, coming along at the time of the Neue Deutsche Welle (New German Wave), but not really a part of it. (Neue Deutsche Welle was a movement based on British punk & new wave, although it developed away from that into something very unique. It also featured lyrics in German, something not too common in rock music in Germany at the time). The original version of the song was by <b>Hans Albers</b>, a phenomenally popular German actor in the 1930's and early 1940's, and comes from the soundtrack to the film F.P.1 antwortet nicht (Floating Platform 1 Doesn't Respond). Again, I'll stop here before I spend an hour talking about Weimer film.<br />
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The next song is <b>Die Elf vom Niederrhein (The 11 from the Lower Rhine)</b> by <b>Böhse Onkelz.</b> Niederrhein is an area of Germany and the 11 from there are Borussia Mönchengladbach, sometimes just referred to as Gladbach, team. My wife is a Gladbach fan, hence this song. Böhse Onkelz are from Frankfurt which isn't exactly close to Gladbach and there are two clubs in Frankfurt, Eintracht Frankfurt being the biggest and FSV Frankfurt playing in the second tier, so I have no idea why they are singing this song.<br />
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Lastly, this is Zehn Kleine Jägermeister (Ten Little Hunters) from Die Toten Hosen (literally The Dead Trousers. It's less literal translation is more like The Dead Beats). Die Toten Hosen are from Düsseldorf, the capital of Nordrhein-Westfalen, of which Niederrhein is a part. Die Toten Hosen are, at least as far as I'm aware, the most successful German punk band. This is their biggest hit, it came out in 1996 and reached No.1 on the German charts, they wouldn't have a second No.1 until 2012.<br />
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Although you're probably aware of Jägermeister as a drink it means 'master of hunters' and can be used to apply to gamekeepers.<br />
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<br />Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-72635359884255484302014-07-16T01:29:00.000+01:002014-07-22T00:24:25.663+01:00A guide to comics part 6 (Glossary)<u>If you only want to read one of these posts, this is the one for you.</u> I add stuff to this list quite often so it's worth checking the bottom of this list every week or so and see what's new.<br />
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Finally, here we are at the 6th and concluding post in my introductory guide to comics. It's not meant o be exhaustive, but hopefully it'll give anyone new to comics, or without a lot of knowledge about the terms that are used when talking about comics, enough information to not be lost when I post about comics. It's said that there's a comic for everyone and I think that's pretty broadly speaking true. If you've never read one, or haven't for a long time, I'm sure there's one for you.<br />
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The last post in this series is going to be a list of terms that get used in comics that I haven't covered yet but first I'll post a short recap of some of the terms that have been covered. A Cliff's Notes version of the last 5 posts if you will.<br />
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<b>Publisher </b>The company that publishes the comic.More like a record label than a book publisher these are brands in their own right.<br />
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<b>Big Two </b>Marvel & DC the two biggest comic publishing companies in America, they dominate that market.<br />
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<b>Independent </b>Smaller publishers in general but more specifically companies that are smaller than Marvel & DC but still have a significant level of availability in mainstream comic shops.<br />
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<b>Small Press </b>Small independent publishers that aren't always easy to find in shops.<br />
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<b>Direct Market</b> Collective term for comic shops rather than book shops or newsagents/newsstands that have a comic section.<br />
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<b>Company owned comic</b> A comic that is owned by the company that publishes it.<br />
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<b>Creator owned comic </b>A comic that is owned by the people who created it.<br />
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<b>Licensed comic </b>A comic that is owned by neither the creators or publishing company but a third party that license it to another company.<br />
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<b>Creators</b> Either the creative team that works on a book (the artist, writer, cartoonist inker, colourist, letterer, see <a href="http://betweenthoughtandexpressionmusic.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/a-guide-to-comics-part-2-creators.html" target="_blank">part 2</a> for more information on these terms) or the people who created the characters.<br />
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<b>Issue </b>A single issue of a comic. These generally come out monthly. They're sometimes called floppies because they are bound with a slightly thicker paper stock than the inside pages.These generally have 22+ pages, not including adverts and letters columns. Think of them as single episodes of a TV series.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Trade paperback </b>A collection of issues. 6 issues is pretty standard but the number can vary. These mostly collect a set of issues that form one story together. These are generally the comics you find in bookstores and at Amazon. Think of these as season boxsets of TV series. Often abbreviated to <b>TPB</b> or shortened to trade.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Hard Cover </b>A trade with a hard cover. Often abbreviated to <b>HC</b>.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>(Original) Graphic novel </b>Sometimes used as a collective term for comics bound like books, including trade paper backs and hard covers. Technically a graphic novel is longer comic that has never been published in single issues. To differentiate from the collective term these are sometimes called Original Graphic Novels. These are abbreviated as <b>GN</b> and <b>OGN</b> respectively.
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<b>Omnibus/Compendium</b> Trade paperbacks or hard covers with many more issues in. The Walking Dead trade paperbacks contain 6 issues, The Walking Dead compendiums collect 48 issues.<br />
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<b>Manga </b>Japanese comics. This term is sometimes used to refer to other Asian comics too and Manga styled comics in other countries also exist, for instance American Manga. Manga is usually sold, in the west, in a more standard book size height than Western comics.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Bandes Dessinées </b>Francophone comics from Europe, particularly from Belgium. I don't see this used to much by English speakers but it does pop up now and then. I've never seen this used to refer to a French Canadian comic, but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Album </b>Another term for comics from Europe, again particularly Franco-Belgian ones. Basically a trade paperback, hard cover or graphic novel. Think Tintin or Asterix comics and you've got it.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Runs </b>A series of stories by the same creators on the same comic. For instance Larry Hama's 155 issues of G.I. Joe for Marvel is his run on the book.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Arcs </b>A story told through multiple issues. Generally what is collected into a trade paperback or hard cover.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Ongoing series </b>A title that is published with no intention of it ending. For instance, Batman.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Limited series </b>A title that is published for a set number of issues that was decided before the run started. Watchmen for example was planned to be 12 issues.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Mini series </b>The most common type of limited series. Generally either 4, 6 or 8 issues in length.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Maxi series </b>A longer limited series. I can't think of any that go above 12 issues, but they may exist.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>One Shot </b>A single issue story that is only planned as one issue. Sometimes these have more pages than a regular single issue, often double length. I suppose these are just a really short limited series.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>One and done </b>An issue of an ongoing or limited series that tells a complete story in and of itself. For instance Marvel's recent UK based Revolutionary War was an 8 issue mini series with issues 2 through 7 telling one and done stories that were set up in issue one and concluded in issue 8.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Web comic </b>Easy, a comic posted on the web. They're mostly like the comic strips that appear in newspapers.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Digital comic </b>Distinct from a web comic these are comics that are available to be bought digitally through a site like comixology but aren't designed to be read on a web browser. They're the mp3 or the comics world. Some only exist digitally, others are digital versions of print comics.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Golden Age </b>The first American comics. Lasting from the late 1930's to the early 1950's. Lots of iconic superheroes, particularly DC superheroes, were created here; Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Captain America (for clarities sake Captain America is a Marvel property).<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Silver Age </b>A few years after the end of the Golden Age, this started in 1956 when DC published The Flash again with a new hero bearing the name. Lots of iconic Marvel superheroes debuted in this period; Spiderman, The Hulk, Thor, Iron Man, The X-Men, The Fantastic Four. It ended, by consensus, in 1970.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Bronze Age </b>Ran from 1970-1985. Superheroes began to deal with more 'realistic' issues like drug abuse and poverty, as well as facing off against supervillains. During this time comics were sold less and less through newsstands and more through specialty comic shops.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Modern Age </b>Started in 1985 and continues to the present day. Started with more 'grim & gritty' comics like Watchmen and Batman: The Dark Knight Returns. I really dislike this term, comics from now are much different compared to comics from the 1980's and 1990's. Some people call the current comics era post modern, but that doesn't have a lot of mainstream acceptance. One consequence of the Modern Age was comics trying to shake the idea of being for kids and over compensating massively.<b> </b>The idea of having multiple comics in the same month with the same main character really took hold in the Modern Age and is still ongoing.<b>.</b><br />
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<b>Shared Universe </b>The characters from one publisher living in the same world. For instance Superman's Metropolis and Batman's Gotham aren't separate worlds but two different cities in the same country.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Event Comics </b>Comics from a publisher that affect all or most of the shared universe. Almost always superhero stories these involve a large threat that all of the characters have to face together. Rather than Spiderman having to stop Green Goblin killing him all of the characters are affected by a world wide event. Think of The Avengers movie, and that's basically a comics event. These always promise/threaten to change everything forever but very rarely do.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Crossover </b>Two or more characters from separate universes meeting in a story. One member of the Avengers turning up in a story about another Avengers member isn't really a crossover, more a guest appearance. A member of the Avengers turning up in The Walking Dead would be a crossover. Crossovers often feature characters that aren't owned by the same company or creator.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Underground Comix </b>Started in the late 1960's and had their heyday in the mid 1970's.<b> </b>A type of small press comic that were sold in alternative book shops. Varying in size these are surprisingly difficult to define in a few words. These comics were often drug amd/or sex themed. Basically as far away from the standard superhero comics as you could get. Robert Crumb and Harvey Pekar, the subject of the film American Splendor, are two of the most prominent creators from this movement. Crumb's book Hup, from the 1980's, has recently been reissued if you want to get a feel for underground comix. My wife loves Hup but I've yet to read any of them. <b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Alternative Comics </b>The successor to Underground Comix. It overlaps with smaller independent comics quite a lot. As the name suggests, these are comics that are different to comics from DC & Marvel and company owned superhero comics in general. Probably the most famous alternative comic is Ghost World by Daniel Clowes.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Cheesecake </b>At the suggestion of my wife. Cheesecake is an art style that features women drawn in hyper-sexualised poses. This is much more common in comics than it really should be. The rarer male equivalent to this is <b>beefcake</b>. <b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Continuity </b>All the events that have happened in a shared universe. This can apply to stories that only happen in only one book but it's much more of a concern in shared universes. DC and Marvel have been publishing for 50+ years and publishing dozens of titles a month for most of that time. That leads to a lot of continuity. Making sure things fit in to continuity is a big deal for some fans, who tend to be quite vocal. <b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Retcon </b>a shortened form of retroactive continuity. This happens mostly in comics that are based around continuing stories that have long histories. A retcon involves a writer saying that something that happened in past comics either didn't happen or happened in a different way than the reader thought. An example is Bucky Barnes, Captain America's sidekick. As written originally Bucky Barnes died in an issue published in 1948, seven years after his debut. In 2005 then-Captain America writer Ed Brubaker brought Bucky back, establishing that he'd never actually died but had been captured by Soviet agents while wounded. Not all retcons concern bringing dead characters back to life; they can be used to change things from a characetrs past that a writer or editor dislikes.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Comic Death </b>the idea that in comics, no major or supporting character really stays dead. This is most prevalent in Big Two comics but it can & does happen in comics by many publishers. Some characters are essentially created to be killed, Spiderman's Uncle Ben for example, but pretty much every other character from a DC or Marvel comic can come back from the dead. Sometimes characters are resurrected by supernatural means and other times by the characetrs not being shown as dead on panel. And sometimes it was a clone/shapeshifter all along.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>Grimdark </b>a story or universe that is full of bad things happening, often in a misguided, (in my opinion at least), attempt to show that comics aren't just for kids and are full of mature stories. How mature grimdark stories actually are is of course open for discussion. DC are more often considered to publish grimdark stories; I only buy two DC books a month so I don't feel qualified to say if that's true or not.<b><br /></b><br />
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<strong>Longbox </strong>A box to hold single issues of comics in. They're a bit wider and a bit taller than a comic and much longer, hence the name. There's also a shorter version called, that's right, a <strong>shortbox</strong>.<br />
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With that I bring the guide to comics to a close. I hope you enjoyed it, learned a little something about comics and, hopefully, have a bit more desire to read some. Or at least not skip my thoughts about comics when I post them.Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-89839393586092693542014-07-15T00:21:00.000+01:002014-07-15T00:21:07.421+01:00A guide to comics part 5 (Licensed comics)In this penultimate of my by no means exhaustive guide to comics I'm going to talk about licensed comics. Originally I was planning on folding the subject into either the post about company owned comics or the one about creator owned comics, but it really didn't fit either well enough.<br />
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<strong>Licensed comics</strong> are comics that aren't owned by the company that publishes them or the creator working on the comics. The characters in the comic are owned by a third party who gives the rights to a publisher to produce these books and the publishers then hire creators to produce these books. There's a tendancy to consider licensed comics as somehow lesser than other comics and less good. This is nonsense, there have been great and terrible licensed comics, just as there have been great & terrible creator owned comics and great and terrible compnay owned comics.<br />
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Therew are a couple of different wat comics can be licensed. Sometimes this can be a big company licensing a property to a publisher, for example Hasbro & Transformers and GI Joe, it could be a character from novels being licensed by the author or his estate, for example Robert E Howard & Conan,<br />
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It can even be one comics creator allowing others to use their creation, for example Rob Liefeld created a character called Prophet in 1992. After the cancellation of the Prophet comic book it was relaunched by Chuck Dixon in 1995 before lying dormant for years until Brandon Graham relaunched it. Even though Graham's work is wildly different from Liefeld's original run, it's still a character owned by the original creator. It doesn't fir neatly in to either creator owned or company owned comics so I've included comics of these types as licensed.<br />
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The thing that makes licensed comics unique is they can have pretty big name recognition and they aren't tied to a particular publisher. For instance Transformers was licensed by Hasbro to Marvel between 1984 and 1994. Then it 2002 Dreamwave Productions, now closed, got the license until 2004. The license moved to IDW in 2005 and Transformers comics have been published there since 2006, to, especially recently, critical success.<br />
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Transformers aren't the only toy line owned by Hasbro and licensed out, the company also own G.I. Joe (and My Little Pony which I mention in passing because my daughter is such a huge fan of anything related to it and consequently I know far more about it than I ever thought possible).<br />
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G.I. Joe was also licensed to Marvel by Hasbro but they started earlier, in 1982, before ending in 1994 and 155 issues. The success of this comic was down largely to writer Larry Hama (he also drew a couple of issues) and one day in the future I'll go into some more detail about how good his work on G.I. Joe was, even though it was basically based on a line of toys.<br />
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After Marvel, and 8 issues produced by Dark Horse in 1996, the license went to Devil's Due Publishing, between 2001 & 2008. The Devil's Due series served as a sequel to Hama's work at Marvel. In 2009 the license was moved to IDW, home of the Transformers license, and the story started again with no reference to the previous comics. At least until 2010 when IDW launched G.I. Joe A Real American Hero, with Larry Hama as the writer and the series starting at issue 156. This became a sequel to the Marvel work and made the Devil's Due sequel no longer a sequel. G.I. Joe A Real American Hero is still being published by IDW and still being written by Larry Hama. Remember, this runs alongside, but is completely seperate from, IDW's other G.I. Joe comic that started in 2009.<br />
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There's also been a strange situation where Devil's Due, then license holders of G.I. Joe, published G.I. Joe vs Transformer crossover comics and Dreamwave, then license holders of Transformers, produced Transformers vs G.I. crossover comics. Luckily with IDW holding both these license now that shouldn't happen again. IDW are publishing a Transformers vs G.I. Joe series this week, in fact I got an e-mail today telling me my copy of issue 1 has been shipped, and I think it looks fantastic.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://i62.tinypic.com/vcw7c5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://i62.tinypic.com/vcw7c5.jpg" height="320" width="204" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Transformers vs G.I. Joe by Tom Scioli</td></tr>
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I think this serves as a good example of how crazy licensed comics can be sometimes. I'm not going to mention too many other things except to note that, at least in my mind, IDW, Dark Horse and Dynamite are the publishers who produce most licensed comics. <br />
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One last example of the occasional strange publication issues around licensed comics. Star Wars comics were published by Marvel between 1977 and 1987. The license moved to Dark Horse in 1991 and they continue to publish Star Wars comics. However from 2015 Star Wars comics will move back to Marvel. The reason? Marvel are owned by Disney, Disney bought Lucas Films and so now Star Wars will be published by Marvel. IT's a blow to Dark Horse, many of their best selling books are Star Wars books and they are generally well received critically too. Disney did allow some time between buying Lucas Films and pulling the license from Dark Horse and I'm confident Dark Horse has used the time to wrap up the Star Wars stories it was telling and preparing for life after the license has gone.Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-26925175220799666712014-07-13T14:49:00.001+01:002014-07-13T14:49:26.532+01:00Sunday MusicI'm posting this earlier than usual this week because I'll be watching the World Cup final this evening. I've promised my wife, who is German, that if Germany win I'll post some German songs during the week so you, hopefully, all have that to look forward to.<br />
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I've picked three songs from Merseyside bands first. Then a Bjork track that has the unfortunate distinction of being on the sound track to two less than great films, Tank Girl & Sucker Punch. NExt up is some synth-pop from the soundtrack of Drive, which is a great film and we finish withanother Tricky track, this time featuring PJ Harvey on vocals.<br />
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Dreaming of You by The Coral<br />
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Pressure Point by The Zutons<br />
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Fortune Teller by Space<br />
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Army of Me by Bjork<br />
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A Real Hero by College featuring Electric Youth<br />
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Broken Homes by Trick feat PJ Harvey<br />
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<br />Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-77011053076415132382014-07-12T23:04:00.003+01:002014-07-12T23:04:46.063+01:00A guide to comics part 4 (Creator owned comics)Last time, in part 3, I talked about company owned comics. Today I'll talk about creator owned comics. Then in part 5, in a slight change from my plan, I'll talk about licensed comics then in part 6 there'll be a general glossary of terms that you will probably run across but aren't necessarily familiar with.<br />
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<strong>Creator owned comics </strong>are, exactly as the name suggests, comics owned by the people who create them. I mentioned last time that almost all the comics Marvel & DC publish are company owned but there are some creator owned exceptions. Let's deal with these first.<br />
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Marvel have an imprint called Icon. They use this for their bigger creators to publish their creator owned comics without having to go to another publisher. Icon is pretty rarely used now and it isn't uncommon to see Marvel's bigger name creators have creator owned books published elsewhere.<br />
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DC are different. I don't think it's too contriversial to say that in the competition between Marvel & DC Marvel can be seen to be 'winning' in most regards. This certainly isn't true of their creator owned imprints. DC's imprint is called Vertigo. Vertigo was created to publish stories that were too controversial to be published under the main DC brand (at the time comics in the US were subject to an archaic censorship systems called the Comics Code Authority. To protect the children, of course). Vertigo was the place books that wouldn't get Comics Code Authority approval. Many of these early stories were still owned by DC but from the start Vertigo also published creator owned comics. Over the years Vertigo has become solely a home for creator owned comics and although the quality & number of the books published by Vertigo has waxed & waned over the years it is still going strong.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://i57.tinypic.com/efrmko.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://i57.tinypic.com/efrmko.jpg" height="183" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">FBP: Federal Bureau of Physics cover by Robbi Rodriguez, published by Vertigo.</td></tr>
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Almost all of the comics that I get are creator owned. I get 2 each month from DC & the same from Marvel, the rest are all creator owned books. In the last post I went through some of the problems of company owned comics, I don't intend to ignore the problems of creator owned comics even though I prefer them.<br />
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The problems stem in the main from the lack of copies these comics sell. There's no giant corporation backing these comics and so there's no guarantee of a survivable income from these books. A writer could be contracted to write 36 comics for Marvel in a year. As long as they produce 36 comics they'll be paid for them. If the comic they are writing is cancelled due to poor sales they'll be given another comic to write. (Of course there are other comic types, this is just an example). A creator owned comic offers none of that security. Of course, if a creator owned comic sells well then the creators can make more money than at MArvel or DC. The truth is however, most creator owned books don't sell that well. The Walking Dead sells well and regularly is a top-10 selling book. Saga is another book that sells very well. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sage cover by Fiona Staples.</td></tr>
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For the vast majority of creator owned books, even those at bigger independent publishers like Image, the sales aren't that big. Here's a quote from Kieron Gillen, co-creator and writer of Phonogram that I think sums the situation up well:<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
We've been doing "Phonogram" for over 4 years, not including the years before the first series came out. Imagine if we could have just done the comic and not had to deal with any of the shit we've had to. We'd have been up to issue 44 now. Instead, we have 13 issues. <br /><br />I feel frustrated. Enormously lucky, sure, but frustrated. We've done this wonderful thing we're crazy-proud about. But if the whole economic system was just a couple of degrees to the left, everything would have been different. I mean, j<strong>ust to give you an idea about narrow the margins are between what we are and what we could be, if we were selling 6K instead of 4K, we could have done those 44 issues. </strong>The difference between breaking even and actually being able to do it in comics is insane. It's like being kept under ice, clawing. I feel like a bonsai plant.</blockquote>
The above quote comes from an explanation about why a third series of Phonogram wouldn't be forthcoming and comes from 2010. He also mentions that the artist and co-creator Jamie McKelvie was often only earning "a couple of hundred bucks" an issue. That's not exactly a livable monthly amount. (There's a happy end to this story though. Since the end of 2010 people have figured out that Kieron Gillen & Jamie McKelvie are great comic creators and their stock in the industry has risen. So much so that a third and final series of Phonogram will come out.)<br />
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One final word on Phonogram, I know I'm wildly off topic here but bear with me. If you consider that you don't like comics and you only for my music posts and just happen to read this post then believe me, Phonogram is the perfect comic for you. You owe it to yourself to check it out, it'll be well worth your time.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Phongram by Jamie McKelvie</td></tr>
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The lack of sales, and therefore money, can lead to series being cancelled and never finished. Or the conclusion to a story being rushed and compressed into fewer issues than originally planned. It can also lead to the publishing schedule being erratic. Instead of an issue coming out every month there can be large and unexpected gaps between issues as the creators have to take on other jobs to pay the bills and work on the creator owned book when they can. An extreme example of the delayed release schedule is Age of Bronze. While most comics are published monthly Age of Bronze, a critically loved & award winning comic, has published 33 issues since it began in 1998. That's right, an average of two comics a year. The last issue was published in July 2013. It's still ongoing and, hopefully, will be finished eventually. There may only be 33 issues so far, but they are 33 great issues.<br />
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And really, that's the thing I love about creator owned comics. Age of Bronze tells the story of the Trojan War. Phonogram is about music and culture and growing up. FBP is about a world in which physics has stopped working properly and has lead to the creation of a fourth emergency service. Sage is most often described as Romeo & Juliet crossed with Star Wars. That sounds brilliant but Saga is orders of magnitude better than that.<br />
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Creator owned comics show a huge variety of stories and art styles that just don't exist in company owned comics. Characters live and die, they grow old and change. The stories are created by the people who want to tell them, not run through various levels of corporate editorial checking first. Saga is just the story Brian Vaughan & Fiona Staples want to tell, not a story that has to fit in with 50 other stories being put out by the publisher. (50 isn't an exaggeration by the way, DC & Marvel put out a tonne of books every month that are all inter-connected to one degree or another). Even when the comic book is part of a wider universe it's still under the creator's control.<br />
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Hellboy might be the best example of this. First there was just Hellboy. Then other books from the universe created with Hellboy started to be published. BPRD, Lobster Johnson & Abe Sapien among others. All these books under the control of Hellboy creator Mike Mignola, although he doesn't write them all. And all really good. Hellboy and the associated books may be my favourite creator owned comics ever. I'm not alone in that opinion of course, they're well loved by thousands of people. I do believe there's a comic for everybody and in most cases, especially people who don't consider themselves comic fans, it's a creator-owned comic.Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-84185132429162735852014-07-11T01:08:00.001+01:002014-07-12T20:31:11.972+01:00A guide to comics part 3 (company owned comics)We're a couple of days behind on these because I've been watching the World Cup semi-finals but still on track to have the guide to comics series finished by mid-week next week at the latest. This is the 3rd part of 6 eventual parts. This time I'll be talking about the differences between company owned and creator owned stories. I know that sounds less than interesting but it's one of the big things that affect how comics are written and stories told and is much more interesting than it seems. It's a long topic too, so I'll split it into two posts.<br />
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Today I'll be talking about company owned comics.<br />
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<b>Company owned comics</b> are generally speaking the best known American (and British) comics. If you remember in part 1 I talked about the Big Two, Marvel & DC. Pretty much every one of the comics Marvel & DC publish are company owned and those that aren't are published under a separate imprint that we'll get to in the next post.<br />
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Company owned comics, sometimes referred to as Corporation owned comics when talking about Marvel or DC, are pretty much exactly what they sound like. The company that publishes the comic owns the character and the story told in the comic. For example, DC own Superman. They hire creators to create Superman stories for DC. This is generally referred to a work-for-hire. There have been, and still are, legal actions to bring control of the characters back to the creators (or, especially recently, their heirs) but if I was betting I'd put my money on DC & Marvel continuing to own the characters they do.<br />
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Most of the really popular characters that DC & Marvel own are old characters. From DC's character stable Superman was first published in 1938. Batman in 1939. Robin in 1940. Green Lantern 1940, Wonder Woman 1941, Flash 1940. Lots of these characters have newer versions of them too, but they are still pretty old. For instance the first Flash, Jay Garrick, was created, as mentioned above in 1940. Barry Allen, the most famous Flash, was created in 1956. The third Flash, originally Kid Flash, was created in 1959 to be Barry Allen's sidekick before becoming the Flash after Barry Allen's death. Finally Bart Allen, Barry Allen's grandson was created in 1994 as another younger version of the Flash, this time called Impulse before eventually becoming the Flash. The point of this short diversion is DC still exists and creates comics and other media based off characters that are around 70 years old.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://i60.tinypic.com/vghchx.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://i60.tinypic.com/vghchx.jpg" height="245" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">All-Star Superman by Frank Quitely </td></tr>
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That's not to say Marvel are much different. They're a younger company but most of their well known popular characters come from a concentrated time period. Just looking at characters that non-comic fans are likely to have heard of you have Iron Man, created in 1963. Nick Fury was created in 1963, (although the version based on Samuel L Jackson that is familiar from the movies where he's played by Samuel L Jackson was created in 2001), Falcon debuted in 1969. Black Widow in 1964. Hawkeye in 1964 as well. The Fantastic Four were created in 1961 to be followed in 1962 by Hulk, Spider-Man and Thor. Wolverine is a notable later example, being created in 1974 but the X-Men themselves were created in 1963. Captain America is one of the few Marvel characters from an earlier time, he was created in 1941 for Timely Comics, who later became Marvel.<br />
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Most of Marvel's big characters were created by a small group of people and that's part of why they all come from the same time. The other part is, very few new characters of note have been created since then. The creation of most of the characters happening between 1938 and 1965 is also why so many of them are white and male.<br />
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Superhero comic fans tend to like to buy things they are familiar with and things that fit into an established and inter-connected story. DC & Marvel can provide that. DC have been publishing a Superman comic every month since 1938, and for almost all of that time more than one comic a month. Currently they publish Action Comics, The Adventures of Superman, Batman & Superman, Superman, Superman & Wonder Woman and Superman Unchained. That's 6 comics you can pick up starring Superman this month. Plus there are various Justice League comics he appears in and a Supergirl and a Superboy comic if you want them. There's a Smallville comic too. Superman isn't even the most published example, the point is if you want to read Superman comics there are lots of them for you to read and more coming out all the time.<br />
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The shared universe is another big draw with company owned comics. As mentioned above Batman & Superman and Superman & Wonder Woman comics exist to show different characters interacting together. It's more than that though. To give an example from Marvel, every character in those comics lives in the same world. You may be a teenage English girl with magic boots that give you soccer related super-powers (I'm not making this up, and it is much better than it sounds) but if a scientist in NY creates a robot that gains sentience and an Oedipus complex and can self-replicate then you can very quickly end up hiding in the British Museum protected by a magic forcefield generated by the legendary sword Excalibur. (Avengers Assemble #15AU, a genuinely great comic).<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Magic Boots Mel by Butch Guice (or maybe Tom Palmer. I thought it was Palmer but Google says otherwise)</td></tr>
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Basically the upside is things don't change, you can always get the big characters in these inter-connected worlds.<br />
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The downside is, things never change. Sometimes new characters are added, but they're almost always new versions of older characters. Creators by & large don't create unique characters for DC or Marvel, because the company rather than the creator will end up owning them. Because things never change almost everyone heroic is a white guy. The world has changed but DC & Marvel comics haven't really. And they don't because the people who buy the comics don't want them too. So the number of people buying them trends downwards but any action to change this alienates a lot of the people still buying them. It's a tough position to be in. It is partly of DC & Marvel's own making but it'd be unfair to ignore that they have tried to fix the problem. The solutions offered just haven't worked yet. Maybe one or both of them will come up with a solution that works one day. For now they stick to the safety blanket of using decade old characters and earn money for their parent companies through merchandising and films.<br />
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One final downside is, because the stories never really change the comics are almost always about characters coming across a problem and resolving it through punching. Even when really talented creators work on these books, that gets tiresome after a while. I'm not saying that stories where problems are solved by punching are bad, I am saying when that, or some other violence related solution, is the way 100+ comics a month play out then I find it has a limited shelf life.<br />
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I want to end on a positive note here because I think this post comes across as too skewed to the negative. Lots of the books that are and have been put out by DC and Marvel are great reads. Marvel's Daredevil as currently written by Mark Waid with a changing cast of artists and DC's Superman Unchained written by Scott Snyder with Jim Lee on art are both books I really enjoy. Mainly though there's Miraclenan. Written in the early to mid 80's in Britain and finally getting a wider release by Marvel now (due to ownership complications and compromises far too complicated to go into here) it is one of the very best things I have ever read, comic or not, and I look forward to it every month.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Miracleman by Joe Quesada </td></tr>
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Next time I'll talk about creator owned comics and a little about licensed comics.Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-46554349975171320402014-07-08T00:31:00.000+01:002014-07-08T00:31:02.570+01:00A guide to comics part 2 (creators)Part 2 in a 6 part series that will be over by midweek next week at the latest.<br />
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Last time I talked about publishers and how different publishers do things in different ways. There are plenty of comics readers who read stories based on which character(s) are featured in the story or which company published the story. Others choose what to read based on who the creators of the comic are and today I'm going to go a little bit into just what is meant by the term creator and what types of creators exist.<br />
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<b>The artist.</b> <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Andy Wales</td></tr>
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Exactly what you'd imagine. The artist draws the comic, mostly following a script from the writer. How detailed the script is, and how much room to interpret the script the artist has, varies from comic to comic. Pages are drawn much larger than the eventual comic page in case you're wondering.<br />
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<b>The writer.</b><br />
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Again, pretty much what you'd imagine. The writer comes up with the script, either individually or collaborating with an artist, and then the artist draws the page. The writer is not responsible for physically writing the words on the page, that's someone else's job which we'll get to later. It's worth noting that sometimes there are co-writers on a book. Often this is because a famous person wants to write a comic but has no real experience of doing so (for instance Quentin Tarantino's upcoming Django Unchained/Zorro cross-over). They may then co-write a book with an established comic book writer. In this instance it's common for one person to be credited as the plotter, ie they decide what story they want to tell, and the more experienced writer being credited as the scripter, ie they wrote the script that is passed to the artist. In the Django Unchained/Zorro crossover I mentioned before Qunetin Tarantino & Matt Wagner will co-plot the story and Wagner will script it. Generally when artist/writers work together the writer is named first. I've put the artist first just to follow alphabetical order.<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>The cartoonist.</b><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jeff Lemire<b><br /></b></td></tr>
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The cartoonist is someone who both writes and draws the same comic. This is really pretty much unheard of in modern day Big Two comics (DC & Marvel, as discussed in part 1), more common in independent comics and much more common with small press comics.<b> </b>There are people who started out as cartoonists and still produce independently published comics as cartoonists but also have a job just as a writer for one of the Big Two publishers. For example Jeff Lemire, above, does this. The reason cartoonists who do this tend to be employed as writers and not artists for DC or Marvel is it's much slower to draw a monthly comic so employing them to draw a comic or two while they write and draw one independently isn't feasible but employing them to write a title or two is.<b><br /></b><br />
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The above types of creators are the ones that influence people to buy comics based on the creator rather than the publisher or character (s). However there are other people who produce a comic and I'll quickly go through those positions here.<br />
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<b>The colourist.</b><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Elizabeth Dismang-Breitweiser</td></tr>
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As you'd imagine this person gets copies of the art and colours it<b>. </b>This sounds simple but a good colourist can make a book look great. Poor colours on the other hand can also be very noticeable. <b><br /></b><br />
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<b>The inker.</b><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Veronica Fish</td></tr>
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The person who takes the art and inks over the lines to give it more definition. Again this sounds really easy but good inking can make good art great and poor inking can make good art look poor. You can see in the picture above the difference between inked and uninked art. Inking can be done with pens or brushes.<br />
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<b>The letterer.</b><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Max West using an Ames Lettering Guide.</td></tr>
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Remember how I said above the writer doesn't actually write the words on the page? Well, the letterer does. Any words, and generally any sound affects, will be put on the page by the letterer. Lots of lettering is done by computer now but some is done by hand, as seen above. If done by hand the lettering is first done in pencil then inked over. This might be the most over-looked skill in comics. If the letters are don't properly then the comic fails on a pretty basic level.<br />
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It's not uncommon for a cartoonist to do all or some of the lettering, colouring and inking themselves and some artist double as inkers, either for their own art or another artist's.Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-9835657439247150282014-07-06T17:24:00.002+01:002014-07-06T17:24:49.198+01:00Sunday Music<br />
I had hoped to get more posts up this week but instead I have 4 or 5 partially completed posts for future use. On to the music.<strong><br /></strong><br />
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I first came across Spearmint only a couple of years ago. They are one of the rare brand of UK post-Britpop but still kid of Britpop sounding bands that are actually good. <strong>Sweeping The Nation by Spearmint</strong><br />
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Easy Star is a record label most well known for recording dubbed versions of classic albums. Each album has different musicians selected to fit the songs. The first album released was Dub Side of the Moon, followed by Radiodread (a cover of OK Computer) and these two albums are two of my very favourites. Eventually I'll get the time to listen to Easy Star's Lonely Hearts Dub Band, I'm pretty confident that'll be equally great. <strong>Time by Easy Star All-Stars</strong><br />
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This version of She's Lost Control is my favourite Joy Division recording by far. I'd talk about it more, but there's really nothing to say, just listen to it.<strong> She's Lost Control (Peel Session version) by Joy Division</strong><br />
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These two tracks are from Tricky's second album released under his name, Pre-Millennium Tension. This is a much heavier and darker album than Maxinquaye as part of a deliberate attempt to get away from the trip-hop label that he disliked.<strong>Christiansands by Tricky</strong><br />
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<strong>Tricky Kid by Tricky</strong><br />
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Finally one of my favourite songs with one of my favourite and weirdest videos.<strong> The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song by The Flaming Lips</strong><br />
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<strong><br /></strong>Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-29550288486128433032014-07-04T00:09:00.001+01:002014-07-04T12:00:27.246+01:00A guide to comics part 1 (publishers)This is going to be the first part of my guide to comics. It certainly won't be an exhaustive guide, but it should give enough information to those of my readers who don't know a lot (or anything) about comics that they don't feel I'm having conversations that exclude them.<br />
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I want to talk a little here about comics, what terms are used and what they mean. Originally I was going to post my recent comic purchases but I didn't want it to be full of terms and ideas that left non-comic fans feeling left out of the conversation. I don't want to fit the stereotype of a comic fan that shuns outsiders, I want everyone to be able to follow along with the blog if they want.<br />
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It's helpful to break comics down into where they come from. Although comics exist all over the world I'm going to be talking here about what can broadly described as American Comics, British Comics, European Comics and Manga. This post is going to be almost exclusively about American Comics. Only almost because there's a degree of cross-pollination between them all, especially American and British Comics. In this post, and the next few, I'll be talking mostly about American Comics.<br />
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I'm going to do this one subject per post otherwise this will turn into a massive info-dump and I really want to avoid that.<br />
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Today I'm going to talk about <b>Publishers. </b>American Comics are pretty much unique in entertainment in that people really care about which company is making the product. There are examples in other media, but to my mind it is much more prevalent in American Comics. Publishers are normally broken down into The Big Two, Independents ans Small Press publishers.<br />
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The Big Two are Marvel and DC and they dominate monthly comic sale to massive degree. In the last released sales figures (May 2014) 90 of the top 100 comics were published by Marvel or DC. The Walking Dead (published by Image) was in the top 10 but it was the only book not published by Marvel or DC in the top 20. Marvel & DC publish basically all of the superhero comics that non-comic readers have heard of. Marvel has The Avengers, X-Men and Spiderman among others. DC has Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and Green Lantern amongst others. Almost all Marvel and DC books take place in some sort of shared universe where the characters live. Marvel & DC also own the characters in their books rather than the people who create them. Marvel own Iron Man and hire people to create comic books featuring him.<br />
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The Independents are a group of unrelated publishers. The biggest is Image, others are Dark Horse, IDW, Dynamite, Boom, Oni Press, Valiant and Archie, along with a few more. These publishers can be very different from each other. <br />
Image for example tend to publish creator-owned books like The Walking Dead. Basically creator owned books are what you'd expect from the name, the creators of the characters own them rather than the company that publishes them. We'll talk about it more in a future post.<br />
IDW tend to publish more licensed book, for instance they've licensed the rights to publish Star Trek comics and hire people to create those comics.<br />
Dark Horse has a mix of both with some licensed titles like Conan and some creator owned books like Hellboy. <br />
Independent books tend not to be superhero books, although there are some. They also mostly don't have the same shared universe model that Marvel and DC do. Although some creations have more than one book taking place in the same universe, Dark Horse's Hellboy, B.P.R.D and Abe Sapien all exist in the same universe they don't belong to the same universe as other Dark Horse books, for example Buffy.<br />
Valiant operate in a similar way to Marvel or DC with company owned characters that live in a shared universe. They are on a much smaller scale than Marvel or DC of course. They're worth mentioning as an example that superhero comics aren't incompatible
with independent comics, just a much smaller part of independent comics than Big Two comics.<br />
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Finally small press publishers. These are exactly what they sound like. Basically, they are the smaller independent publishers that may only put out a few comics with small print runs. Self-published comics fit in here too.<br />
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Just to wrap it up, it is extremely important to some people which publisher a particular comic is from. There are plenty of people who will buy, for example, a Marvel comic just because it effects another Marvel comic they read. Some comics from the Big Two can be impossible to follow without reading other titles from time to time. It is one of the reasons I read very few Marvel & DC books.Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-66405851969898605962014-06-29T21:40:00.001+01:002014-06-29T21:41:00.195+01:00Sunday MusicIt's Sunday, you're here for the music so let's get straight into it.<br />
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Earlier this week I posted about Lazy Bird by John Coltrane and how I think it's a perfect introduction to jazz. It's a great track from a great album but it was released in 1957. Sometimes jazz can be pictured as rooted in the past. I don't want jazz to come across that way on this blog so here are a couple of tracks from <b>The Bad Plus.</b> This trio may be my favourite current jazz band. Both of these tracks are from their 2004 album <b>Give.</b><br />
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First, a live version of an original composition<b> And Here We Test Our Powers of Observation</b><br />
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and next a cover version of <b>Iron Man</b>, originally by <b>Black Sabbath</b>.<b> </b>This, in particular, is fantastic in a menacing and broody way.<b><br /></b><br />
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Our tour around <b>Tricky's</b> back catalogue continues with another two songs. This is <b>Black Steel</b>, a cover of <b>Public Enemy's Black Steel in the Hour of Chaos</b>, and is very, very different from the original. It comes from Tricky's debut Maxinquaye.<br />
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This next track is I Be The Prophet from the album Nearly God. This was released under the name Nearly God as a side project rather than under Tricky's name. Tricky is joined on this track by Martina Topley-Bird who provides vocals, just as she did on most of Maxinquaye.<br />
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<b>Gang of Four</b> are a post-punk band who had they're biggest impact in the late 70's & early 80's. Although there best known song is almost certainly Damaged Goods, a John Peel favourite, my favourite song is <b>Natural Is Not In It. </b>Here's a live version from 1979 that I think really captures the urgency that great live music can bring.<br />
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I posted <b>Frank Turner's</b> Photosynthesis a while ago. He's nowhere near as famous as he should be so there's a good chance you're not that familiar with him. Here's some of his music to start and fix that, <b>Reasons Not To Be An Idiot.</b><br />
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<br />Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-17339898312161119892014-06-27T00:53:00.002+01:002014-07-24T00:15:18.906+01:00My favourite albums - Different ClassNot long before I put this blog on hiatus, a phrase which implies a degree of planning that certainly did not exist, I had decided to do a series of posts about my favourite albums. It's still something I want to do, now I'm going to do it.<br />
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A few ground rules first:<br />
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I'll be choosing 99 albums. Obviously, this won't be a short term project.<br />
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I'm going to limit myself to three albums per band/solo artist. This is to avoid filling the list with just the discographies of my favourite bands and seek albums that I love rather than just come up with the easy answers.<br />
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I'm going to avoid Best Of albums with the exception of some older jazz and blues artists who didn't really record albums, just singles.<br />
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These albums are not in any ranked order, I'll just write about them in the order I want to.<br />
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That's it, let's move on to the first album, <b>Different Class</b> by <b>Pulp</b>.<br />
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Different Class came out in October 1995 in between 1994's His 'N' Hers and 1998's This Is Hardcore, two other albums that will eventually feature on this list. All three of those albums were nominated for the Mercury Prize and the three albums together, in my opinion at least, form a cohesive whole about changing views and experiences of life.<br />
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Back to Different Class. Even though His 'N' Hers broke Pulp through to mainstream success Different Class made them absolutely huge. As good as His 'N' Hers was, and I think it's a great album, Different Class improves significantly on it. There's a maturity to the songs. A sense that these aren't just kids anymore but reflective adults, looking backwards to the past and forward to the future as well as recognising the present. Different Class came out in the midst of Britpop, it is very much a Britpop album, but it's also much more. It's not just about the present, about modern life in 1990's Britain and when it does talk about those subjects it isn't just about the perils of the rat race or the fun to be had at parties and festivals. It has major themes of working class life and sex running through it. It is, as I've said, an album of people who have become adults and are starting to have adult worries.<br />
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Live Bed Show by Pulp</div>
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The most well known song from the album, and from Pulp's career, is of course Common People. A song that pretty perfectly sums up the album. A song about cultural tourism the song is Jarvis Cocker's definite statement, at least it seems to me, about the class system in Britain. All done in a way that is funny and never boring. It's also covered by William Shatner if you want a really weird experience.<br />
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Common People by Pulp </div>
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At the heart of it all Common People is an album about identity and belonging. It doesn't lionise or demonise the culture it's part of, it never sneers at it or tries to excuse it. It's full of sarcasm, piss taking and self-awareness It's about belonging regardless of how valuable or not the thing you belong to is. It's about creating something of your own to belong to, about not being afraid of life or living it your way. Not better or worse than the alternative ways and cultures, but truly yours.</div>
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Mis-Shapes by Pulp</div>
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Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1801999927200269843.post-21680055678155234892014-06-26T00:03:00.001+01:002014-06-26T00:03:57.993+01:00The perfect introduction to jazz?Jazz is a genre that a lot of people have preconceived ideas about. It's a genre that a lot of people are put off from trying. I am a huge fan of jazz and I wanted to talk a little bit about it. Honestly though, the world doesn't need another lecture about jazz. Instead I decided to share one of my favourite jazz songs and briefly describe why I think it's such a good introduction to jazz.<br />
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First we need a little bit of background. Jazz as a genre has been around for a little over 100 years. There's no definitive first jazz song and the start of the genre can be roughly placed as between 1890 and 1910. THe lack of surviving recordings from this time make it impossible to pin down exactly and I have no intention of going through the history of music in that time period here to try and provide a more definitive date, it's not needed for this post. All we do need for this post is a very rough timeline.<br />
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1890-1910 Musicians merge ragtime and blues together to form jazz.<br />
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Early 1930's Swing jazz develops<br />
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1943-45 Bebop jazz develops.<br />
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1948-49 Cool jazz, a 'softer' development from bebop develops, mainly on the west coast of the US.<br />
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Mid-1950's Hard bop develops in NYC.<br />
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That's pretty much as far as we need to go. Rather than describe hard bop to much I'll just say it's a more driven development of bebop than cool jazz. I think the best hard bop album, I'm not going to pretend to be an authority on it, is Blue Train by John Coltrane, who I rank as the greatest musician I've ever heard. I think the song that is the perfect introduction to hard bop is Lazy Bird from Blue Train. The band is:<br />
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John Coltrane — tenor saxophone<br />Lee Morgan — trumpet<br />Curtis Fuller — trombone<br />Kenny Drew — piano<br />Paul Chambers — bass<br />Philly Joe Jones — drums<br />
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The reason I think it's the perfect introduction, not just to hard bop but to jazz as a whole, is the way it's structured. Jazz can seem to be overwhelming at times with too much going on. Lazy Bird is far from sparse but it is never overwhelming. The solos are beautiful and contained within the song, they never wander from the rest of the band. The song starts with the full band playing and soon moves into a solo from John Coltrane. Then come Lee Morgan, (only 19 when this was recorded), on trumpet followed by Curtis Fuller on trombone. Coltrane plays another solo before Kenny Drew's piano solo progress into Paul Chambers bass playing. Chambers plays his solo with a bow but plucks the strings in the rest of the song. Philly Joe Jones, one of the great names in jazz, has a short drum solo before Coltrane leads the band to the end of the song with another sax solo. Six incredibly talented musicians playing as a cohesive band. It really is a fantastic piece of music. So that's why I think it's the perfect introduction to jazz. As to why I think you should listen to it? I think listening to jazz is an incredibly rewarding way to spend your time, it'll give you experience of music that you would never otherwise hear. It's a beautiful and expensive pool of music just waiting for you to start listening to it.<br />
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<br />Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05842221765423538133noreply@blogger.com0