Ted May Comics Junk Drawer

new Leon strip

2012-01-29T16:16:00.000-08:00

Sick cover

2011-10-22T11:33:00.000-07:00

From a post at the blog Hard to Look At.

Man alive. How could you see this comic and NOT buy it. I don't know the artist. The character design looks like something from Go Nagai.

sketch

2011-10-21T11:25:00.000-07:00

I found a really cool Jack Kirby panel from Thor and repurposed it with Beast Biplane. I just wanted to see if I could approximate that old school style of inking with a brush pen. It's sloppy but that's not the pen's fault. I was anti brush pen for a long time, but I use em here and there. I'm still kinda leery of inking a whole panel with 'em. Like maybe the ghost of Chic Stone will put a curse on me or something.

Page one

2011-10-11T18:46:00.000-07:00

Here's the first page of a story Jeff and I did for Injury 4.

Dylan Williams Will be Sadly Missed

2011-09-12T19:12:00.000-07:00

I met Dylan Williams at the SPACE comics show in Columbus, Ohio in ’02. Actually I met him the night before the show at the Laughing Ogre comics shop. We hit it off pretty much instantly and within minutes of meeting each other we were running around the shop like idiots scoffing at the reproduction quality of the Marvel Masterworks books and unearthing old issues of Speedball from the longboxes. It was a rare phone call with DW that didn’t end up in both of us referencing our copies of The Photo-Journal Guide to Comic Books: Volume One and Two.

Comics lost a great guy this past weekend when Dylan Williams passed away. Dylan published one of my books via his publishing company, Sparkplug Comicbooks, but I think of him more as just a really good friend. I was always thankful that I got to know and work with him. He was a real independent dude both in the way he wrote comics and the way he ran his company. I always very much admired his heart, generosity and dedication. Not to mention his vast knowledge of both old comics and kung fu movies. In fact, I gotta think right now he’s shoulder to shoulder with Mort Meskin rifling thru some incredible longboxes.

Dylan had been in the hospital quite a bit recently. Lots of people have suggested buying Sparkplug comics to help his family with the medical bills, and I'd like to echo that suggestion here. And I would also add the suggestion to not let time slip away from you. Thinking about Dylan being gone at such a relatively young age just made me think about what a short time we have in life. And it makes me admire the amount he was able to accomplish and the lives he touched. I know my life is much better for having known him. I’m really gonna miss him, that’s for sure.

Leon strip

2011-07-29T11:24:00.000-07:00

Baseball strip

2011-04-01T18:05:00.000-07:00

Dan Z., Kevin H. and I did a Leon Beyond baseball-themed comics feature for the RFT. It's essentially to add some levity to the subject of major league baseball's "Opening Day." You can check out the full feature here.

drawing

2011-02-18T10:24:00.000-08:00

The Astral Edge

2011-02-18T09:10:00.000-08:00

Here's that strip Jeff and I did for MRR. Posted to Issuu.

Open publication - Free publishing - More ted may

Maximum Rock and Roll

2010-12-15T09:24:00.000-08:00

Check out the latest Maximum Rock 'n' Roll mag - Punk Comics Issue. Jeff Wilson and I have a 3 page comic in there. For those of you who have enjoyed our collabs in the pages of Injury Comics, this is more of the same. Except this time, it's a blast from Jeff's punk past. Anyway, it's an awesome issue - full of great comics and articles about comics (and music of course). Well worth seeking out, sez me.

Beast Print in Shop

2010-11-19T12:35:00.000-08:00

Check out the shop for the Beast Biplane print I did with Mike Reddy a while back. Might make a nice holiday gift for someone. Or for yourself. I mean, go on, buy yourself a gift - who's going to say anything? You deserve it.

New Mardou comic in shop

2010-10-08T10:00:00.000-07:00

Mardou's got a new comic out! "Anais in Paris," is now available for purchase in our webshop. It's a biography comic about french author Anais Nin. It was originally done for the unpublished fourth issue of the anthology "Whores of Mensa," but it's now out in it's own little volume. This comic is also available at Sparkplug, the Catastrophe Shop, and (soon) Global Hobo.

You're Gonna Burn in Hell

2010-08-31T18:13:00.000-07:00

If you're in Portland, you may wanna drop by the Pony Club Gallery on Thursday night. I've got some stuff in the show "Satan is Real: images from the age of hysteria." The show's theme is like, the Eighties and back when people were freaked out about lyrics and imagery in heavy metal and movies and stuff. And backmasking. What was all that about? So the show will have a couple of unpublished comics pages (original art) from a new story that I'm working on with Jeff Wilson. What? Eighties and heavy metal? Yeah. Also on display will be an Iron Maiden scene I did for Electric Ant magazine. So yeah, if you meet the criteria (a. are in Portland; b. feel like it), swing by and check it out.

Hair of the Blog

2010-08-20T12:32:00.000-07:00

ITEM. "Hair of the Dog," the fan-favorite strip from Injury Comics #2 by Jeff Wilson and me is now posted over at What Things Do. Lemme know what you think.

Sad News

2010-06-11T13:48:00.000-07:00

Sad to report, the publisher of my book, Injury Comics has shut down. You can read Alvin's post here. Even before we started working together, I really enjoyed what Alvin was doing with the press and I feel grateful and lucky to have been a part of it. Knowing Alvin, I'm sure this won't keep him from doing more awesome work whatever that ends up being.

I've got three stories in progress for the next issue(s) of Injury (working with Jason, Mike and Jeff). I'll release that stuff in one form or another once we get it wrapped up.

This blog has moved

2010-04-30T10:27:00.001-07:00

This blog is now located at http://tedmaycomics.blogspot.com/.
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Beast hot links

2010-02-11T09:25:00.000-08:00

Remember that Beast Biplane print I was talking about? Mad Mike Reddy has 'em for sale. Details on his blog. I'll have some up for sale myself soon. If you want to get a print from me (along with your Injury Comics order or whatever), just email me and I can send you the price.
Also - if you wanna read the Beast Biplane story from Injury #3, it is online in its entirety at What Things Do. Conversely, if you read that and wanna get it in it's original pulpy format, scroll over to my online shop and order said comic.
While I'm at it, here's what's on the old Injury Comics clawing board: new autobio collab with Jeff Wilson; new Beast Biplane madness with Mike Reddy; and more Manleau with Jason Robards.

Smells Bells

2010-02-04T19:25:00.000-08:00

Here's a strip I did for this week's Riverfront Times as part of a big USS Catastrophe Leon Beyond comics feature. Click the art to read the full strip. The entire feature can be found at the Leon blog.

Movie Poster

2010-01-29T10:49:00.000-08:00

Here's an illustration I did in October of last year for the film "Old Dog, New Trick," a biopic about St. Louis musician Steve Scorfina directed by Mike Steinberg and Thomas Crone. This image was used for the poster and also serves as the DVD cover. The film tracks his life as a musician thru 60's garage bands, his time with REO Speedwagon and Pavlov's Dog and what he's up to currently. And a lot more I'm probably forgetting. So if you're interested in rock-umentaries (subset blues, garage and PROG), the history of the St. Louis music scene, or indie documentaries in general, give it a go.

Here are a couple early concept sketches:

Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival: What to Buy?

2009-11-27T16:01:00.000-08:00

Fans of Beast Biplane, this blog entry's for YOU. Mike Reddy will be at the Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival on December 4th selling copies of Injury 3 along with a wild new Beast Biplane silk-screened poster. It's a picture of Beast Biplane in combat with a modern barbarian who has snake powers and the ability to communicate with his dead brothers. Mike did the art based on a sketch from me. Anyway, you can grab one at this comic show. I don't know how much it will be but I'm sure it will be a good deal. Especially considering how many man hours went into it.
So, go to the show, buy yourself this awesome print, make sure Reddy signs it, and then go home and slap it up on your favorite wall. We'll have some available after the show. Details to follow. But if you want one, email me and I'll let you know once they become more widely available.

Sale at Buenaventura Press

2009-11-21T13:15:00.001-08:00

Everything 20% off now thru the end of November. Lotsa stuff well worth getting and now it's a little cheaper than it was before. So maybe rather than going out and getting wasted tonight, spend some of that boozin' money on a different kind of intoxicant. The comic book. Or print or whatever.

Remembrance of 3-Packs Past

2009-10-30T10:53:00.000-07:00

From my sketchbook. Sorry for the low fidelity. This was gonna be a promo for our 3-pack. Also, Injury 3 is for sale at from my shop.

Ants Invasion - Electric Ant #2

2009-10-19T17:00:00.001-07:00

Just wanted to drop some quick promotional consideration to the hot-off-press Electric Ant #2. I haven't seen it yet, but you can follow the above link to get all the particulars. I really enjoyed the first issue - a straight-up zine in this hyper age of tweeting and blogging - so I highly recommend the new one. Also, I did a chunk of art based on an old Iron Maiden video -FWAUGHH- for one of the sections, so you KNOW it's a high class affair.

Where are the Wild Things

2009-10-06T07:42:00.000-07:00

I did a strip for Vice's tribute to "Where the Wild Things Are." Lotsa great cartoonists featured there. There's a booklet of all the strips in the October issue of Vice, and a downloadable PDF on the site.

You may now purchase Injury 3 / Treehouse

2009-09-23T18:19:00.000-07:00

I just posted the latest Injury for purchase via my online shop. If you're going to SPX this weekend, you can pick one up at the Buenaventura Press table.
Also, I've got a creepy comic in the new issue of "Bart Simpson's Treehouse of Horror" which goes on sale this week. This year, it's ghouly Simpsons stories parlayed by Kramers Ergot artistes. Mine is a collab with Sammy Harkham (who also edited the book). I did the story, layouts, and color and Sammy did the finished art. I've been a big fan of Simpsons for years, and also a fan of Sammy's, so a) drawing Moe Szyslak's face over and over and b) seeing Sammy's take on the characters was great. I haven't seen much else from the book, but I'm sure it will be worth your while.

Injury 3 sneak peek

2009-08-30T17:52:00.001-07:00

I just posted a preview PDF of some pages from Injury 3. You can download the PDF by right-clicking the link, or if your browser can read PDF's, just click on it. The book should be for sale soon. I'll post again when it's available.

Injury 3 debut at Comic Con

2009-07-15T15:40:00.000-07:00

The third issue of Injury will be debuting at the San Diego Comic Con this year (look for the Buenaventura Press table), and will be available for purchase via this site or from Buenaventura Press soon thereafter (early August). I'll make mention on this blog when we start taking orders. If you'd like notification via email when it's available for purchase, just drop me a line and I'll let you know.

Injury #3 will also be available in comic shops as part of a Buenaventura comics three-pack. The pack will also include comic books from Lisa Hanawalt and Eric Haven. So, if you're one of those people that likes to have your mind blown three times in a row...head down to your local comics shop and reserve your grab bag today!

Our kid

2009-07-05T13:43:00.001-07:00

Sacha and I finally had our kid! Veronica Jean May - born this past Thursday. We were relieved she didn't wait til Saturday. I was afraid she'd have to endure a lifetime of "huh-huh, born on the forth of july" comments. We'll give her a couple of weeks to get acclimated, and then we'll sit her down with a sketchbook and some Microns and have her get busy.

Custom Fact Rally

2009-03-13T09:14:00.000-07:00

USS Catastrophe is doling out the facts! And the Beyondathon gets you a piece of the ACTION!

Show-stoppers Kevin "The Snake" Huizenga, Ted "Mongoose" May, and "Big Daddy" Dan Zettwoch are makin' it happen - on the STRIP!

High-speed fuel-injected gags! They draw - the rest is up to YOU! Only at the Beyondathon! Be there!

We finished Injury, but...

2009-03-03T16:16:00.000-08:00

The third issue of Injury is in the can. Actually, it's been wrapped up for a little while. Unfortunately, our finishing it coincided with Diamond Distributor's new profitability guidelines making the release of the new issue a little uncertain at the moment. For those of you who don't closely follow the idiosyncracies of the US comics market: basically, the 300 pound gorilla of comics distribution has stopped carrying comics that don't net them a certain level of profit. And Injury has never netted anyone anything other than pain and misfortune. WINK.
So, we'll see what happens. I'll post updates here once we get a release date. In the mean time, I at least wanted to post the cover. A cover that you probably will never see on your comic store rack next to Infinity Gauntlet: Smackdown, or Impregnable Fortress of Annihilus.
With no large scale distribution, it's not feasible for Injury to continue in its current format. It was basically engineered for the direct market. I haven't yet decided how we'll proceed. At the moment we're just back to writing new stuff. But please do keep an eye out for the third ish. It's probably the best we've done so far. I'll update this blog regarding future books. The fire of comics will continue to warm (and in some cases melt) peoples' faces. That much I can say with certainty.

May-Mardou collab

2009-03-02T10:07:00.000-08:00

Hi folks. Sorry for the lack of news of late. I've got a halfway decent excuse though. Sacha and I are getting ready to have a little girl. She's doing great so far and is due in June. So I've been kinda light on the comics work. Been painting the baby room, visiting relatives, and watching "It's Alive" to brush up on what we're in for. Comics news on the way shortly.

Dream Team

2009-02-27T14:51:00.000-08:00

Strip I did for Vice online. Click here.

Happy Xmas from Injury Comics

2008-12-23T17:45:00.000-08:00

APE

2008-10-24T13:59:00.000-07:00

YO - Mardou and I will be at APE next week.
Look for us around the Buenaventura table.
I'll be doing signings for Kramers 7.
I might bring some preview pages from Injury 3 - I dunno.

This 'n' that

2008-10-24T10:52:00.000-07:00

Kevin H. just put out a book that may be of interest to Injury fans. It's a zine of thumbnail sketches from him, me, and Dan Z. Some early injury concepts in there as well as me trying to figure out what I was gonna do for Kramers #7. A very nice little volume for those of you interested in peering into others' sketchbooks. You can get it from KH here. You can also get the compiled "Amazing Facts" strips which features some of my work in it. Anyway, it's got some great strips in it and a very nice silkscreen cover.

Also - I think this is pretty incredible news. Top Shelf to publish japanese "Ax" anthology. Onsmith showed me some of these books a few years ago. I couldn't read 'em, but they looked incredible. More translations from Japan UG is to be applauded, sez me. I'd love to see more stuff from that dude who did Bakune Young.

new Hamer strip

2008-10-24T10:45:00.000-07:00

Here's a strip I did for Vice a couple weeks ago (click the image above). I've also been doing this character in Arthur. It's fun writing quasi-political gags but I'm kinda OD'ing on politics at the moment so I may need to give it a rest soon.

Star Clipper 20th Anniversary Art Show

2008-10-03T09:13:00.000-07:00

ART SHOW AT COMIC SHOP TONIGHT. Click here for details. Jason Robards and I teamed up for an Injury-style homage to Star Clipper, St. Louis's venerable comics institution. Jason and I drew twenty portraits of amazing comics characters. Naturally, one of the characters I chose is the Creature from Krogarr (see Kirby image above). I can't post a scan of our piece 'cause we turned it in as soon as the ink dried. You'll have to go to the show to check it out, along with a lot of other cool art.

Injury nominated for Ignatz

2008-09-19T09:44:00.000-07:00

Our little comic has been nominated for "Best Series" in the Ignatz Award battle. The award will be voted on by attendees to the SPX comics show, so it's unfortunate none of our gang will be there to glad hand, kiss babies, hand out trinkets, etc. But you know - crowds tend to settle for mediocrity, so I think we've got a fair shot. For anyone planning on attending SPX, a preview of our book can be found here.

This year's ballot actually has some great nominees. My old pal Warren Craghead is up for Outstanding Artist for How To Be Everywhere. Also up for three awards is another artist I'm a big fan of: Michel Rabagliatti. Nice to see he's getting the recognition. Not to mention Gabrielle Bell, Onsmith, David King, Trevor Alixopulos and Greg Means - very cool to see such a great group.

The Credit Crunch

2008-09-15T09:44:00.000-07:00

I finally get what's going on. Analysis from Gary Lieb via the New York Times.

Comics Panel at Mizzou this Sunday

2008-09-11T09:27:00.000-07:00

Mardou and I are gonna be up in Columbia, Mo. this Sunday (Sept 14th at 2pm) sitting on a panel about "comic artists in the digital age." This is an event sponsored by Mizzou's Comic Art Collection. It's part of the celebration they're doing for Alley Oop's 75th anniversary. Other artists on the panel include Matt Kindt and Jeff Zwirek, and Frank Stack (I think). Should be fun. I just hope they don't quiz me on "Alley Oop" cause I know virtually nothing about him.
More info and other events at the official site.

Comic Books

2008-08-22T11:35:00.000-07:00

One of the hot topics that's been kicked around the blogosphere and the messageboardiverse over the last few years is the state and fate of the indie comic book, or "pamphlet" (as opposed to its currently robust sibling, the indie graphic novel). I follow what gets said as it's long been a topic of interest and it accutely pertains to my book, Injury. Here are a few unsubstantiated thoughts.

Just to clarify, by indie comic, I'm referring to books usually created by single artists working outside the superhero genre such as Tales Designed to Thrizzle, Crickets, Lucky, Uptight, etc. The superhero fans have their own set of discussions going about the fate of the comic book as it pertains to them. Some of them, horrifyingly, refer to comic books as "floppies."

I don't think the indie pamphlet comic will ever die (as is often declared/predicted) unless people stop reading and making printed books altogether. They're just too appealing and easy to make. At worst, the disbursal of these things will just maintain a state of moribund decrepitude. Short of some kind of comic-pocalypse there will always at least be self-produced minis as well as genre-defying books from the larger comics companies (just kidding!). As it stands now, it just seems like selling them in general is an uphill climb.

So why are these things still around? Any of this material can be made available in more accessible formats - paperbacks, pdfs, jpegs etc. And that's where many of the indie comics have gone, leaving the pamphlet comic book to fend for itself in mostly hostile comics shops between such titles as Immortal Iron Fist and Invincible Iron Man. The main reason for publishers to put this kind of book out is advertising. Instead of putting out nothing for 3 years, artists continue to get their work out there and stay in circulation, hopefully building anticipation for a forthcoming and more lucrative collection of work.

The thing is, we could put out a PDF or post everything to Flickr and probably get a similar result. I'm sure many of the same places would review it. You'd have the issue of people not wanting to read stuff on screen, but you already have the issue of people saying they don't like hunting for the book in comic shops (or trying and not finding it), or they don't like paying for the pamphlet, or they don't like reading things that are only 40 pages long. Not to mention the difference in price between print and electronic. So, the negative form factors almost cancel each other out.

I've almost actually convinced myself to just make pdfs. But - as far as that goes, I think the on screen reading experience is pretty crummy. I read stuff on screen like old scanned comics or scanlations, and I usually find myself just breezing through them. I've yet to see a screen that I don't mind staring at for very long. And paperbacks are great, but you have to crank out a ton of work before you can collect it all. I guess that's alright if you don't have a day job.

And there's still quite a few of these books being made. The main problem with comic books is distribution. That's where the creativity needs to be applied. It will be interesting to see how the new publisher-owned comic shops (D&Q, Fantagraphics, Picturebox) pan out. Stores like these, as well as forward-thinking traditional comic shops, are friendly markets for indie comic books. That's still a pretty thin market, though. It'd be great if there was a website that specialized in marketing these kinda books. Indie comics, minicomics, etc. I could see that working really well, but there's a lot of expense tied in with that kind of venture. It'd be a huge pain to operate and the profit margins are already razor thin. You'd pretty much have to also be selling porn or weed or right-wing propaganda like the Catastrophe Shop used to do (wink!).

On the other hand, not that long ago bookstores like Borders were pretty harsh climates for graphic novels. Now that those kinds of books are selling, you've got people coming out of the woodwork making graphic novels. The same could become true of indie comic books if next-generation comic shops drum up a market for them. I would also add though, that artists also need to push to make these things (meaning more books out there - a critical mass). And I apologize for using the term next-generation.

You hear reference to the early 90's being a golden age for indie comics, and there were indeed some great books out at the time, but I feel like the shops were much less sympathetic to those types of books than they are now. Most places I went to would dump Eightball or Dirty Plotte in a box or drawer with the porno comics. These days at least some shops and their customers seem to be open to different stuff. There's definitely more indie/arty stuff out there in general. But paper prices and the overall economy is much different now. I guess that's the main difference - I don't know.

Regarding webcomics - man, let's just not go there for now. That's a whole other RGB-soaked ball of wax.

One thing to think about, your larger book companies that are getting into comics don't seem to see any need for the "pamphlet sells the paperback" thinking. Maybe now that non-comics people are more accepting of graphic novels, there's not as much need to drum up business with the comics cognoscenti by cranking out pamphlets. Maybe when artists are producing books that connect with people in ways other than making character-based adventure stories, it's not as necessary to do the song-and-dance of pamphletizing them. Books about growing up in Iran, or loving the band Queen will find their own audiences.

One sad thing about the state of indie comic books, I feel like if they dry up as an option for artists, it hurts the art of comics in general. If these books are out of the equation as a viable way to develop your stuff, you don't have that graduated step between messing around with minicomics and doing a full blown graphic novel. As an artist, I've got much more incentive to work in 30-40 page chunks rather than to grind away at a 200 pager.

I'm not alone in wishing there were more indie comic books out there. I mean, seriously, what would you rather do, pick up a new issue of Injury, or download a PDF of it and "fan" us on Facebook? As much as I like making these books - I'll do whatever makes the most sense getting the stories and art out there. I'm hoping we never have to go straight to squarebound or digital, and at this point I don't see an immediate threat of that happening. However, just to cover our asses, watch this space for news about downloading a sick PDF of Injury #1, I guess!

Update

2008-08-20T16:16:00.000-07:00

Coupla items of interest - I was sick most of July so I never got around to doing these updates. First, the new issue of Arthur is out - that's got my ongoing strip, "Hamer" in it. You can grab it at finer seedy establishments or download it free from their site.

Also, I've got a page in the upcoming comics antho, Kramers Ergot which will debut at the APE comics show in San Francisco in November. As far as anthologies go, this promises to be the Monolith. It's bigger than any comic ever published by man and will house work from pretty much all the top names in comic art (along with myself). If comics in the 21st century was a building on fire, THIS is the book you would wanna grab on your way out. At any rate, I tried to make this the best single page I've ever done, so please watch for it from Buenaventura Press later this year.

rest in peace, Soldy

2008-08-11T16:26:00.000-07:00

Our cat Isolde, better known as Soldy, passed away Sunday. She was the best cat I've ever met and she made a lot of friends in the comics community. In fact, she was pretty much loved by everyone she met. She was super social, but had a "take no guff" attitude that was abundantly endearing in a little cat. In fact, she stared down Jason R.'s dog, who is like 50 times bigger than her. I've never seen anything like it! She was at least 18 when she went, and she died of old age, because no illness could keep her down. As crazy as it sounds, she was an inspiration, and a great friend. She died on the same day as Isaac Hayes, so let's hope Black Moses picked her up on his way to Valhalla. Soldy we'll all miss you dearly.

New Comic in Shop

2008-08-09T17:22:00.000-07:00

Just added Jeff Wilson's new comic to our web shop. This is a comic Jeff did in conjunction with punk band Cross Examination. Here's the blurb:

Crazy weed-centric comics from Jeff Worm and the Cross Exam dudes leaves no turn unstoned. Features two stories, "Necroponics" and "The Omen of Prophecy." Approved of and endorsed by the Awesome Party Squad of the USA. (Note: this comic is also available as part of a set with Cross Exam's new LP, Menace II Sobriety).

If you'd like to buy the album/comic set, you can get it from Organized Crime Records.

idle sketching

2008-06-13T13:50:00.000-07:00

Doom Dept: I get in these meetings at my work and if I have pen in hand I'll usually draw something like Dr Doom. Actually I've probably drawn like 50 Dr Dooms in the past month. This is a kinda "bring on the bad guys" take on drawing Doom and some other dudes.

Errant Pitch Dept: This is a baseball dude I sketch a lot.

In Case You Care Dept: Here's a thought on the next cover. It'll be kind of like this, but not this. But basically this.

Injury's nomination for next year's eisner

2008-06-06T13:56:00.000-07:00

Injury family member Jeff Wilson (aka as Jeff Worm) has been cranking on this wicked and gorgeous comics project for St. Louis punk band, Cross Examination. "Tales from the Keg" is a full-length comic book to be released in July with Cross Exam's first full-length LP, "Menace to Sobriety," on Organized Crime records. Some preview pages located on Jeff's myspace and more info is available on Cross Exam's. Keep your eyes peeled for this release. I guarantee it will rock you and shock you. For further reference and edification, please view the following educational film.

Hot off press: Manhole #3!!

2008-05-24T13:22:00.001-07:00

Just posted a new comic by my wife, Mardou, in our little online comic shop. It's the latest issue of Manhole featuring a cool new 40 page story. We'll post a preview soon. It's only $3 - GRAB ONE.

Jason Robards site updated

2008-05-09T11:06:00.000-07:00

Injury Comics gang member, Jason Robards, has just updated his website, It's Cool Steve. Check it out and drop him a line.

Hamer

2008-05-09T10:11:00.001-07:00

Here's my strip from the comic section of top youth culture magazine, Arthur. You can download the entire mag at their site (the comics is in section 2), or pick it up at your local record store or meth lab.

New Leon strip: Cellular Telephones

2008-05-06T19:18:00.000-07:00

Here's the latest installment of the Amazing Facts strip. Injury 2 is in stores and available online. Wondering if it's a solid investment? Read this cool Injury review from Ken Parille and another from Rob Clough (CAUTION: reviews may contain SPOILERS).

Lets see, what else? Oh, if you're in St. Louis, that comics art show is next Friday at the Sheldon. And for those of you who enjoy walking around and looking at things, you can do this "Grand Gallery Walk" thing after the Sheldon. Wow, looks like there's might be a lot of action around this exhibit. Guess what I submitted for this show? A Heracles strip that features an elaborate fart joke. I'll never make it in the art scene here now. Ah well, what can you do? The comics rampage continues unabated.

Injury #2 Update

2008-04-18T10:53:00.000-07:00

Injury #2 will be in finer comic shops Wednesday, April 30th. I just got a pile of them so they're available online at the shop.

Also, I've got a strip in the upcoming issue of Arthur Magazine. It's available for download on their site (it's in Part 2). It's part of a two page spread of comics curated by Alvin Buenaventura. I'll post the strip here after the mag hits the streets.

St. Louis Cartooning Exhibition

2008-04-11T18:14:00.001-07:00

We're not quite New York City when it comes to comics heritage, but St. Louis nevertheless has a lot to be proud of. You've got Harry Tuthill who did "Bungle Family," Lee Falk who wrote "The Phantom," the first costumed superhero (and STILL doesn't have a star on the St. Louis "Walk of Fame"?? Come on!), and of course, today's little gang of upstarts.

Anyway, there's gonna be an exhibition of St. Louis cartoonists on Friday, May 16th at the Sheldon Art Galleries. I'll have a page on display (from Injury #2), as do Dan Zettwoch, Kevin Huizenga, Mardou, and Jeff Wilson. I know virtually nothing about this thing other than what's on the Sheldon site, but it should be worthwhile for comics-minded St. Louisans. Click that link for more details.

The Phantom cover above came from this fantastic Phantom cover gallery. These covers are at turns cool, surreal and disturbing. Anyway, Lee Falk is a fascinating character in his own right. If you have time and inclination, here's a nice primer.

NOTE: Like I said, I have no idea what's in this exhibit, Phantom or otherwise. I just posted these Phantom covers cause they're great.

Literature and streaking? Leon has it figured out

2008-04-08T14:43:00.000-07:00

Strip for this week's RFT. Let me know what you think.

Injury 2 Preview

2008-03-30T16:13:00.001-07:00

ITEM - Injury #2 will be out in comic shops in a couple weeks. In light of that, I've posted a 7-page preview. If you don't think you're local comics stockist is with it with it enough to have ordered it - you can pre-order online here.

sketchbook

2008-03-22T11:14:00.000-07:00

Spanish Indie Comics site

2008-03-19T09:45:00.000-07:00

Here's a wild online joint to check out. A cool spanish indie comics site:
13 Millones De Naves (that's "13 Million Ships")

It's kinda U.S.-focused. I'd like to see more stuff from the spanish indie scene - but that's not a complaint. I can't read spanish, unfortunately, but there's all kinds of quickie translation options online. Anyway, I did the art for the header currently at the top of their site.

Feel like tranlating something?

2008-02-29T11:04:00.001-08:00

We've all been there. You go to a comics show and come back with some gorgeous high-dollar foreign language comic that's great to look at - but who knows how it reads? Whattaya do?

Check out our pal Stephen Betts' new site for comics translation: Comix Influx. The site is a kind of wiki for comics translations. Members find comics from all over the place, translate them, and post the translation to the site (just the words, no scans).

If anyone wants to translate Injury or It Lives, I'd be happy to send a copy.

While I'm on the subject - here's a link to some translated comics on Words Without Borders. The Dupuy strip on here is really good as is the Gipi interview.

It's BEYOND me

2008-02-26T16:37:00.000-08:00

Hey, all - I did a strip for St Louis's "Riverfront Times" which will be appearing in this week's issue. Check it out at the strip blog here.

road to Injury 2

2008-02-01T14:43:00.000-08:00

For those of you Injury fanatics who pre-order your comics at your local retailer - you can reserve your copy of issue 2 as of RIGHT NOW. It's in this month's issue of Diamond's "Previews" under Buenaventura Press. While you're at it, order a copy of Johnny Ryan's latest strip collection, also from BP.

For those of you Injury fanatics who have no idea what "pre-order" and "diamond" means: the book will be out in April, so start saving now!

Injury Family news: Buy the Sap paperback! Jeff Wilson just put his collected Sap series up at lulu.com. This volume contains the complete storyline from issues 5 through 8. Check out some pages from that story and other punk art and photos from Jeff at his flickr site.

Finally, in StL Comics news: scope next week's RFT (Feb 6th) for a new comic strip from Kevin H. This strip is kind of a collab thing between KH, Dan Zettwoch and myself. Well, my involvement is kinda minimal at the moment but I'm more or less "involved."

So yeah, if you live in St Louis and you're a complete nerd - go to Star Clipper next week, order Injury 2, pick up a copy of the RFT on your way out, go home and order Sap comics online, and feel secure in the knowledge that the city you live in kicks every other city's ass when it comes to comics.

Flumetti

2007-12-11T16:31:00.000-08:00

I'm a couple a weeks late with this, but, if you haven't seen it yet, Blog Flume is a new comics blog from Buenaventura Press and Friends.
Man, reading it makes me wanna blog more. But pretty much all my spare time and energy is devoted to doing Injury. We leave it all on the bristol if you know what I mean. So I'm really glad these guys have gotten the blog flume rolling. Alone, any one of these men could kick ass at musing and linking. But together...? It beggars the imagination.

Kung fu knives and guts

2007-11-29T07:42:00.000-08:00

Jog posted a crazy essay about Hong Kong comics legend Tony Wong here. Lotsa great, gory covers as well! Wow, man! I love this paragraph:

Before you, says the image, waits a kingdom of untethered entertainment. Comics with a maniac in charge, and he's got a message for YOU. One that promises the glory of another nation's pop, to infest the one that's here. I suppose that's the message of all pop comics from outside cultures - but Jademan Wong made it all seem to me like the product of a man's sick, wonderful personality, the eccentric alive and validated and the fore of a mass culture just some water away.

Floating and shooting

2007-11-05T16:32:00.001-08:00

Psst, check it out. The cover for the next issue of Injury comics! Shh! In stores in a few months! Meanwhile Injury Labs is working overtime on the innards. Get ready for two hemispheres of mayhem and a molten magma core. I'll keep ya posted.

Injury #2 in progress

2007-11-02T10:17:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd give you guys a peek at my cover sketches. These are two color treatments for the front cover. I need to get it done asap so I'll post the final in the next day or two. Let me know what you think. The book should be in stores some time in March, but don't quote me on that.
HEY - If you want to get a letter into the letters column or vote for or against Heracles, you'd better get on the stick.

Injury '07 Tour continues: SPX and Star Clipper

2007-10-09T17:21:00.000-07:00

This weekend I'll be at the Small Press eXpo in the D.C. area. Mardou and I will be helping out at the Buenaventura table, and I'll be signing Injuries. Swing by and say hi if you're going there. But - don't feel like you HAVE to say hi.

I'll be doing a signing for the debut of "Injury" next week at Star Clipper in the U-City Loop. This is the first time I'll be signing Injury here in town. Stop by if you haven't bought the book yet.

It'll be a group signing Wednesday October 17th from 5-8pm with me, John Porcellino, Dan Zettwoch and Kevin Huizenga. John Porcellino will also be giving a slideshow presentation at 6pm. St. Louis has had a banner year for indie comics talent passing thru. Please come out for it - it should be a blast.

Speaking of St Louis comics events - thanks to everyone who showed up for our panel at the Big Read in Clayton. I've never done one of those so sorry for any stammering or poorly constructed sentences.

Comic shops

2007-09-30T19:12:00.000-07:00

Just retooled my little online shop here. Still kind of in progress but it works if you want to order stuff. I added Injury #1, the Injury Fashion Pin set, and a Classic Combo where you can order both at once on a sweet discount.
PLUS - for the first time, you can buy Mardou's Washing Machine and Whores of Mensa #3 online. The former is a new 16 page book by Mardou and the latter is an antho she edits that includes Ellen Lindner and Jeremy Dennis. I'll put up Jeff Wilson's brand new Sap #8 as well.

Also - I think Injury is in stores? Not entirely sure. Some hype-machine I am.

Scars for life

2007-08-22T18:26:00.000-07:00

I dunno. Sometimes I come across comics art that just leads me to wonder: man, will I ever make something this cool? I just posted such an item in my long-neglected gallery of covers.

BP Shop

2007-08-16T07:05:00.000-07:00

Injury is now for sale at the Buenaventura Shop. The first 100 sold are signed by me and Jason Robards. There' a bunch of other cool stuff over there as well. If you're interested in Injury buttons, I'll have those up on this site soon.

Sap and Chicago

2007-08-10T12:05:00.000-07:00

Item! Those attending the Chicago Wizard-World can grab a copy of Injury #1 before it hits stores in September. Jason Robards will have some available at the Short Pants Press table in Artist Alley.

Plus! Injury family member Jeff Wilson just released Sap #8, the latest installment of his magnum opus. Get one from his site here.

Also - thanks to all of the San Diego con-goers who bought a copy of Injury or just stopped by the table. That show is like being inside a comics-themed pachinko machine. It's bottled insanity which makes for a great weekend, but for an artist, it's also a little unsettling to see the grinding wheels of the slurry pump itself.

SDCC bulletin

2007-07-22T19:53:00.000-07:00

I'll be bringing new, limited edition Injury fashion pins to SAN DIEGO this week. If you're going to the con, make sure to swing by the Buenaventura Press table and pick some up to wear whilst reading Injury #1.
Thankx to Joel at 1x1 Art for making the pins of my dreams possible. Pin set hand made by Mr and Mrs COMICS at Injury HQ!

previews

2007-07-15T19:44:00.000-07:00

For those of you that do this sort of thing, you can order Injury at your local comics shop from the July issue of Previews.
I was gonna blog more but this weekend got away from me. My car is starting to fall apart and I'm replacing it one part at a time.

San Diego

2007-07-07T13:17:00.000-07:00

Injury Comics Tour 2007: We'll be at "San Diego" this year (July 26-29). And by "we," I mean me and "Your Bloody Face" artist Jason Robards. We'll be at the Buenaventura Press booth either signing or taking people's money for hot B.P. titles like "Elvis Road" and the latest "Comic Art." Please stop by, say hello and for crying out loud, buy a copy of Injury #1!

Injury Preview

2007-06-29T15:13:00.000-07:00

I just posted a quickie Injury preview. More to come.

update

2007-06-29T11:50:00.000-07:00

Thanks to everyone who stopped by our table at Mocca. The weekend went so quick - I feel like there were a bunch of cool tables and people I never got to visit. For those of you that picked up Injury, let me know what you think! Or you can wait and get it when it arrives in shops in September (you can order in the July issue of Previews).
See ya

MOCCA

2007-06-21T13:11:00.000-07:00

I'll be at MOCCA this weekend sharing a table with my wife, Mardou. I don't remember what the table number is but according to the map it's right next to the restrooms. So if you go for a whizz you'll probably see us. I'll also be over at the Buenaventura Press table sporadically.

Here it is

2007-06-08T15:06:00.001-07:00

Click on the wolf to see the cover for the forthcoming Injury Comics. The book will debut at the MOCCA comics fest in New York later this month and will soon be available from Buenaventura Press.

News you can't use

2007-05-26T15:24:00.000-07:00

I got bored with updating this blog so I haven't been doing it in a while. To be fair though, I've actually been really busy creatin' and haven't had much time to spare. Here's an update of what I've got going on:
My new book, Injury Comics #1 is being published by Buenaventura Press and will debut at Mocca in NYC in June. The book will be all new comics from me in collaboration with fellow StL cartoonists Jeff Wilson and Jason Robards. They both done South County proud!
This book essentially features manly stories about men's problems. One is about my cyborg character, Manleau, getting beaten up on the street, and the other is a cautionary drug tale acted out by junior high ne'er do well's.
Also, I'll have a contribution in the next issue of Kramers Ergot. I did one page. Wait, wait - it's one HUGE page. It's about the equivalent of ten of your earth pages. My comics page was so big I had to take it to a special place to scan it and those guys were barely able to handle it. Anyway - that's what I was working on the early months of this year. It took me two months but it will only count as ONE page toward my lifetime page count. Oh well. Nobody ever said this comics biz would be a walk in the park.
Watch this space for a sneak preview of the Injury cover!!

St. Louis Mag

2007-05-26T12:44:00.000-07:00

There's a spotlight of local StL cartoonists in the June issue of St. Louis Magazine. It's got a picture of Nelly's manager on the cover. The picture above is just one quarter of a collab spread featuring Kevin Huizenga, Dan Zettwoch, Mardou and me. It's a great article with loads of insider info penned by local dean of the culture beat, Cliff Froelich. If you live in town, go grab one. I'll post a link if/when it shows up on their site.

the Thing in my Sketchbook

2006-10-26T18:59:00.000-07:00

I saw a cover of "what if" in the comics shop a while back that I dug well enough to copy in my sketchbook. VERBATIM.

Todd H.

2006-10-24T19:30:00.000-07:00

Here's what Comic Art magazine's Todd Hignite looks like. According to my brush. Todd asked me to do an illustration of him for a website bio. So here he is inspecting a near mint copy of Canteen Kate. Todd's a pal and a true gentleman of comics. He just put out an awesome volume called In the Studio. The only book that takes you the reader into the private sanctums of guys like Dan Clowes and Gary Panter. Mr. Panter was in town recently for an exhibition of his work at a local gallery. He also did a book signing with Todd. I told him I really liked his tribute to Kirby that ran in the New Yorker. Apparently Panter visited Kirby in the 70's. Man I would love to have been the proverbial fly-on-the-wall for THAT. He said Kirby's pool was empty of water and had craggy, Kirby-esque dirt formations in it.
Anyway...
(update: I couldn't find it earlier but here's a link to an article about Todd and his mystic ways from the St Louis Post-Dispatch. The print version ran my illo but the online version is no-frills.)

TGIFR

2006-10-24T19:03:00.000-07:00

Students of comic art take note of this nice page. A short intro to the career of the incredible Frank Robbins complete with some scans of his gone artwork. The writeup is kinda nerdy but also enjoyable - to wit: "With Robbins there is not long dwelling upon abdominal muscles – something you can certainly find in abundance elsewhere."
I've been meaning to post some favorite Robbins pages to my "library" so this may inspire me to get my ass in gear.
Robbins was the best latter-day Batman artist, period. And by latter day I mean post Sprang, Robinson, etc. Check out the splash page I'm posting (click image above) to see what I mean.
It's a little hard to find Robbins' work since editors often didn't let him do the covers of the books he worked on. This is because his material was so fresh it literally blinded people. Certain comics editors found this blinding quality uncomfortable and relegated his work to be shuttered behind lame Neal Adams-esque covers. But that just makes the longbox crawling that much more intriguing.
Robbins was one of the great adventure strip artists before getting into comics. His stuff on Batman was probably his best comics work. He also did great turns on the Shadow and Capt. America before seemingly getting worn down by the system.

Sketchbook | Bugs

2006-06-14T19:20:00.000-07:00

Here's some recent bugs I drew

Cover | Flip

2006-05-27T13:44:00.000-07:00

Fellow ink-fink Jason Robards was just telling me he's getting into old Mad-style comics. This is one of the neatest covers I've seen of that stuff. Sorry I couldn't get a better scan. My covers page is mostly stuff I find online. Note: if anyone is looking to hand out any old issues of Plop, Sick or Eh! - go find Jason at itscoolsteve.com.

Junk | Monster-oriented trading cards

2006-05-12T14:16:00.000-07:00

Here we go. TGIF.

A Kraken li'l drawring

2006-05-11T18:03:00.000-07:00

Here's a yar illustration of a Kraken mutilating a vessel. My pal Drew Crowley IM'ed me at work about the next "Pirates of the Caribbean" movie and we all ended up drawing Krakens during a meeting. He posted our drawings over on his blog. So that's one for the sketchbook page.
PERMALINK! (I don't know what that means)

Dream | Norman Fell

2006-05-10T19:25:00.000-07:00

Last night I had a dream I was watching Rocky 2. In this movie, they had cast Norman Fell as the coach character played by Burgess Meredith in the first one (Norman Fell played Mr. Roper in Three's Company). I thought this was really excellent casting, but I also thought that it would be absolutely perfect if they would have had him wearing a Beatles wig. And I woke up feeling very strongly that they should have done that.

Reading | Tortilla Flat

2006-05-09T15:25:00.000-07:00

Mrs. May and I are currently reading this book, "Tortilla Flat" by Steinbeck. Well, it's an audio book so we are reading it with our ears. And it skips a lot so it's like our ears have dyslexia. Anyway, it's a really good read. I think it would make a great comic but I'm sure some transnational corporation owns it.
It's about a hobo who ends up inheriting two houses so he lives in one and rents the other one out to his hobo buddy. Then the buddy rents part of his house out to another hobo. And so on until the gang of renter-hoboes burns down the one house and the whole gang ends up living in one big Hoborarium.
I found a really great looking book jacket for the novel online so I decided to blog it.

Hugs not drugs

2006-05-08T18:30:00.000-07:00

..added to sketchbook page. Drawn during a meeting at work about "dream team". Not the dream team in the picture though. I WISH it was about them. Lemme know if you want to see a strip featuring these characters.

On Sale | Flotation Device

2006-05-03T19:45:00.000-07:00

Item! The latest issue of Keith Helt's comics-laden zine "Flotation Device" is on sale online. I did the front and back covers which were then silk-screened by the F-D squad and wrapped around an anthology featuring a bumper crop of small press luminaries. Check out my art: front cover and back cover. Click here immediately to buy a copy from Buenaventura Press.

Cover | Boy Comics

2006-04-30T21:02:00.000-07:00

Dig this way out cover. I've been reading this fantastic book about the dawn of comics publishing called "Men of Tomorrow" by Gerard Jones. That got me checking out a bunch of old crime covers from Charles Biro. I came across this gem at the Heritage Comics auction site. Covers don't come much more mind-melting than this. Posted at my little covers page.
By the way - does anyone know if there are any good reprints of Charlie Biro comics floating around?

News Roundup | April 2006

2006-04-22T19:25:00.000-07:00

Be on the lookout for the next issue of Vice Magazine. I've got a full-color one-pager in it called "Perils of Heracles". It's a new character from me and he's full of suprises. I'm thinking of making it a weekly strip on this site. Let me know if you dare me to do it. Well - bi-weekly.

Otherwise, I've been working on my bit of the second volume of the Orchid anthology on it's way from Sparkplug Comic books. We have no ETA yet on this thing, but we're getting close.

I haven't mentioned it yet on this site, but I was part of the Riverfront Times' "Best of 2005" listing under the category "Best Public Art (Temporary)". Here's a little scan of the article. The art showing was masterminded by Lisa Bulawsky and her Blindspot Galleries. Here's her photos I don't know what kind of other public art (temporary) my stuff was up against, but it's an honor to be noticed. Thanx Lisa and RFT!

AND - for all you fans of true love out there, I'm happy to announce that I just got married to the beautiful and talented Sacha Mardou. For those who don't know her, she's also a cartoonist - from the UK, no less! Check out her work at mardouville.com.