The ever brilliant Damien, who has done me many a good turn by promoting my films and connecting me with people (including most recently Savannah Murphy, star of Wakeup Call), seeks to continue the turning by spreading word of others. With work returning and a half dozen films in the works, I’ve not had time to look over all of the people, so while I cannot vouch directly for them, I can vouch for him. Anyone he wants you to know about is worth knowing about, if not also following slavishly and drowning in heaps of money.
That being said, of those on his list I can offer up a quick recommendation for artist Kirsten Brown as I own some of her work myself, the site grinding as it is among the top feeds I check, the game work of Zachary Anderson who I fortunately know in real life, albeit not as well as I’d like, and the also wonderful art of BenTemplesmith (the 21st century’s answer to BillSienkiewicz, not that Mr. Sienkiewicz is not still producing great work, but if you like the latter, you’ll probably like the former and vice versa).
Shortly after the last post six of the Yahoos, plus Dave crammed into a rented minivan for the trip to the James Thurber House. First surreal moment of the trip: being crammed in the back seat of a minivan next to Dave Sim, who is truly one of the most friendly and down-to-earth “celebrities” you could meet. While at the house he read aloud a tale from Thurber’s My Life and Hard Times which I just read about a week ago, but it was all the more hilarious actually being in the house where it occurred.
Once we got back to the hotel, Jeff T, Margaret, Dave and myself drove over to the Super Wal-Mart to do some shopping for the spaghetti dinner planned for later in the evening. Second surreal moment of the trip: food shopping at Wal-Mart with Dave Sim (and both Jeff and Margaret asked me at separate points how surreal it was for me). As I said to Margaret, I’m doing my best to keep my inner fanboy bottled up (again, for most of you, imagine standing around Wal-Mart with Neil Gaiman or Alan Moore and you’ll get an idea of what it was like).
Once back at the hotel, preparing for the spaghetti dinner began, with all cooking duties handled by Jeff T, who cooks a wonderful sausage. At dinner we were joined by the rest of the Yahoos and the creators of the Day Prize winning book Mr. Big. After dinner had settled they began recording Cerebus Live III, where Dave and the Yahoos do a voice recording of selections from Cerebus. Here’s a recording of a scene from High Society from Cerebus Live II; the rest can be found on YouTube as well. First up was issue 51, “Exodus” which was quite hilarious. After that they recorded a lot of other scenes (more than any other year I think), largely from Church and State I and Guys, though they also pulled off a wonderful reading of issue 11 where the Cockroach first appears. (As I think everyone here knows I gave up on being in front of a camera years ago so I stuck to merely being the audience.)
Shortly I’ll be heading off to breakfast followed by SPACE itself, ostensibly the reason for coming, though if I had to leave right now it still would have been a worthwhile trip. More to come though.
Remind me in the future to check my flight against the security line times before booking. I’ve never had to wait in such a long line when I wasn’t at an amusement park. The flight itself was fine though and not too cramped. Really wish Airtran flew here though so I could have gotten the business upgrade.
for those who were asking, I am in Columbus, Ohio for the Small Press and Alternative Comics Expo, or just SPACE. I’m here because Dave Sim is here as are many members of the Cerebus Yahoo group. Since arriving I’ve met three of them and used Google Maps on my iPhone to help find a Kinko’s. I have also gotten to see first hand the amazing original art for Dave’s new comicJudenhass and see a preview copy.
On that subject, if you want a copy but can’t afford it or maybe don’t want to support Dave directly due to some of his views, I’ll buy a copy for you out of my own pocket. It’s an amazing work and I want to do what I can to make sure everyone gets to see it. Should sign off now and go link back up with the other Yahoos though. Expect regular blogging or twitters over the next couple of days.
I was going to put more in here, but no time so the short and sweet. Dave Sim has two new comics coming out. The first is titled glamourpuss, part fashion magazine parody, part superhero, and part examination of the history of photorealistic comics. Your neighborhood comic book store has a special preview copy as of yesterday so you can look it over and decide if you want to order one for yourself. You may need to ask them to check their Diamond Dateline to find it (as I had to yesterday at Criminal Records), but it should be there. It’ll be published bi-monthly (though with an extra month between issues 1 and 2 so retailers can see what the reaction is to the first issue before ordering; one of those crazy Dave Sim ideas of working with retailers) likely continuing until 2012. Until then all issues will be kept in print and will only be collected when it’s done. The first issue hits stores in April and can be ordered now.
To promote it, he’s currently doing an internet “tour” visiting a number of comic message boards, taking questions. His postings to date can be found on the cerebusfangirl site and the schedule can be found here.
The second comic is titled, well, only Dave knows right now. He’ll be revealing the title at SPACE and, as I’ll be there, I’ll post it here when he does. It’s a one shot and apparently he considers it controversial so he won’t be promoting it. It’s scheduled for release in May.