Sun - February 5, 2006

five string serenade - page 27 - istvan oros (page 2) 


another failed crowd scene in the background. again, i would never refer to time like this now.





The sesqui-who?
The sequiscentennial. Kansas City's 150th birthday.

Which, compared to a 5000-year-old city like Damascus, is really something!!

You're not being sarcastic again, are you, Nips?
No, not at all, why do you ask?
 

Posted at 09:45 AM     Permalink     |

Sun - January 29, 2006

five string serenade - page 26 - istvan oros - (page 1) 


see the loaf of wonder bread taped onto that telephone pole on the right? david ford was doing that the summer of 2000, all around leedyvile. he'd tape a loaf up, and other loaf elsewhere, and then go back and tape another, and soon bundles of bread were everywhere. it was as though they were breeding by multicellular division, he said. white breadedness was spreading. a farsighted man, that david ford. and quite correct. look at leedyville today. a cesspool of city-sponsored condos and monied johnson county refugees. very nice.

anyways, this was drawn the summer of kansas city's sequiscentennial, meaning this place hasn't been burned down by barbarians (and abandoned) for 150 years . . . 156 now. very nice also. i would never mention time-related events now, but i did then, so we'll just say nips was parroting something he heard and let it go by.

note again that this was a half-sized page. note again the lack of an official title, so i'll give it a random one, which you will perceive has meaning soon.

the building on the right looks like its collapsing, but i was experimenting with odd perspectives; that's union station on the horizon and lidia's (misspelled) in the freighthouse below it. heh.






My god, it's crowded down here tonight.
It's the sesquicentennial.
 

Posted at 08:45 AM     Permalink     |

Sat - January 28, 2006

five string serenade - page 25 - go walkin' down there (page 8) 





To start--you're a lazy bastard. And a coward.

Besides, girls like boys with cars.

Therefore . . .

. . . you . . .

. . . are . . .

. . . screwed.

You know, a cabbie wouldn't have treated me this way.
That's right! You've learned.

And you owe me ten bucks.


this comic was designed to be half an 8.5 by 11 page, folded in half and bookleted, so it looks a whole lot larger and spacier, say, when printed at a larger size,or even on the internet.

i really don't like this style. if i recall correctly, i was experimenting with ballpoint pen at the time. 

Posted at 05:38 PM     Permalink     |

Thu - January 26, 2006

five string serenade - page 24 - go walkin' down there (page 7) 






Well, the truth is, when i was fifteen, my mother was teaching me how to drive. We were in a grocery store parking lot, tooling around, and I put on the gas a little too hard . . .
. . . and?

. . . and I put on the brakes just a little too hard. We spun around 360∘
. . . and?

. . . and I never drove again.
That story is so pathetic that I don't know where to begin.*


___________
*true story!
 

Posted at 07:05 PM     Permalink     |

Mon - January 23, 2006

five string serenade - page 23 - go walkin' down there (page 6) 






Why don't you get your own damned car?
You know I can't drive.
You've never explained that to my satisfaction.

It's my protest against society and conformity. I've told you that before.
Tell me the truth or I take you to the middle of the 12th Street Viaduct and leave there. 

Posted at 06:01 PM     Permalink     |

Sun - January 22, 2006

five string serenade - page 22 - go walkin' down there (page 5) 






Come on! Let's go! There'll be openings!

The things I do for peace and quiet . . . .



now, of course, i doubt christopher would want to go to the openings. bonnie and i went down leedyville-way yesterday, and it was horrifying what has occurred. gentrification indeed! and it's been a while since i have been to first fridays. the hipness is wretched and painful. i mean, if KC magazine thinks first friday's swell, and doesn't get the irony, then you know there's gotta be problem.

anybody remember shows at the dirt gallery in the bottoms? remembery leedyville before? eh? then you know what i mean. something's happened that's bad, and i recognize the inevitability of the cycle, but, like the cutworm consumed by wasp larvae, i needn't love it.



it's been a while since i posted the old stuff--may last, to be precise. that's when the house-buying project was picking up steam for real--and i never started up again. so here we go!

remember, we're doing one page at a time here . . . the current collection is five string seranade. 

Posted at 11:31 AM     Permalink     |

Sun - May 8, 2005

five string serenade - page 21 - go walkin' down there (page 4) 


 


 

Great! Door's back that way.
I was thinking more of you and i going downtown or something.

Oh, for the love of great blue crap.

You won't go away until I say yes.
That's right. I've learned.
Dammit.


The record, of course, is chris isaak's forever blue.
the song? 'go walkin' down there' . . . .

I go walking down there, I go searching down there,
There’s nothing left for you and me.
I go walking down there, I go searching down there,
But nobody there remembers me.
It dosen’t matter not to me cause I lost my baby.
Nothing means that much to me without my baby anyway.

Oh. oh. oh.oh look at all you lucky people, think of all the things you do.
Look at all you happy people, wish I could be like you.
Oh.oh.oh.oh.oh.oh

I go walking down there, I go searching down there,
There’s nothing left for you and me.
I go walking down there, I go searching down there,
There’s nothing left for you and me.

Oh. oh. oh.oh look at all you lucky people, look of all the things you do.
Look at all you happy people, wish I could be like you.
Look at all your smiling faces, think of all the things you’ve done.
Look at all you happy people, and I’ve lost my only one.
Oh oh, oh oh, oh oh.


so i would get to work at 6:00 am every morning, and load in the cd--we could listen to actual music in those days!--and go to track four and blast it as loud as i could. george worried about me a lot, and would shake his head.

Look at all your smiling faces, think of all the things you’ve done--look at all you happy people, and I’ve lost my only one, i'd shout.

yeah. good times, good times.

Oh oh, oh oh, oh oh. Oh oh, oh oh, oh oh . . . 

Posted at 06:21 PM     Permalink     |

Sun - April 24, 2005

five string serenade - page 20 - go walkin' down there (page 3) 


of course, my earliest attempts at using photoshop to replace the burden of inking the gutters had flaws. where i had clumsily written text into the gutters (anything), i just marked off a rectilinear box around it and called it even. bah. but the flickery stuff around the edges was nice . . . i just never got a handle on making it look just like i wanted to . . . and so, ultimately down the line, i gave up on it. maybe someday . . . there was a while where i was trying a little analog white on black, but i still have trouble finding the white on black method that i like . . . especially very fine lines.

 




 
. . . and just set yourself down . . .
Hey, I just dropped by to see what was up.

Feh . . . nothing's up.

Doing anything tonight?

Why?
Hey, it's Friday.

I suppose that it is.
Well? I want to do something*


_________
*note the dropped period after something. i hate finding little things like that, especially years afterward. this is the first moment i think i've ever noticed it. 

Posted at 04:19 PM     Permalink     |

Sat - April 23, 2005

five string serenade - page 19 - go walkin' down there (page 2) 


on this page appear little white line marks into the black gutters. i suddenly began doing the gutters by paint bucketing in black in photoshop, instead of using ink, which would be a real violation of my sensitivities today. it had the interesting effect, however, of white and gray feelers carrying the image into the gutter area. while only a faint anticipation of what i would do with the gutter sin a couple of yeas, it was a couple of steps into a, for me, mostly unexplored world.

as you can see, still not a lot going on here,. and a lot of white space. after the frenzied details of the recent run of comics, this was completely minimalist. i think i was tired, and wanted to get comics out faster than i was . . . not much has changed, i guess.

 




 
. . . and damned lies.
knock-knock--
Hey, Nips?

Judas Q. Priest.

Hi.
Geeze, what is this, a sit-com? People walking in all the time . . . 

Posted at 09:34 PM     Permalink     |

Fri - April 22, 2005

five string serenade - page 18 - go walkin' down there (page 1) 


here came a big switch in styles, and page sizes. all of the work in five string serenade to this point was 11 x 17 folded in half in a large booklet, drawn at a very large scale indeed--pushing 18" x 24"! don't ask me why. but, evidently tired of lugging these huge pads around with me, i began drawing at a much smaller scale, and producing the minicomics that made up this collection at a folded half 8 1/2" x 11" size.

almost at once my hard angular lines disappear: and a lighter, sketchier--'mousier' i am also told--style emerges, while the wash doesn't quickly reappear, a growing reliance on an almost pencilled look emerges.

the pencilled look is often criticized. many people seeing it on the web are happy to dive in and tell me that if only i had inked it (!) then it wouldn't look so unprofessional. lights as eminent as jeff mason and salgood sam have been happy to tell me this: my defense that, hey, it's my comic, and hey, my established style, have been rewarded by stony silence; both of 'em, i think, believed at the time that i was some thirteen-year-old snot-nosed kid refusing to take advice from his betters.

but hey, ya know what? i ain't, and plainly i'm not here to make friends or to suck up. this is what i do, and while 'real' indy comics artists can sneer, i might point out that the phrase 'real indy comic artists' has not a little in common with 'real grocery baggers' or 'real deli sandwich makers,' or 'real copy jockeys,' or 'real bookstore clerks.' no one in the 'real world' gives two bits for us, and someday we'll all be dead anyway.

so, having condemned myself to professional failure again, the first, and very uneventful, page of 'go walkin' down there' . . .


 


 
. . . lies . . . lies . . . lies . . . half truths . . . 

Posted at 05:49 PM     Permalink     |

Sun - April 17, 2005

five string serenade - page 17 - graduation day (page 8) 


and so this comic limps along to an undignified end. there's mercy in her studio again!

various and sundry notes:

tanks a million is a real world war ii vintage movie.

the picture of abraham lincoln as a clown labelled 'loser' is by local artist and YJ's owner david ford.

the name of the comic, 'graduation day', is derived from the song recorded by chris isaak of the same title . . .


Driving slowly, watching the headlights in the rain.
Funny how things change.
Think of the good times wishing you were still with me.
The way it used to be, graduation day.

Watching the stars fall, a million dreams have all gone bad.
Think of all we had.
I knew all then, thought you loved me I was wrong.
Life goes on, graduation day, oh, graduation day.

Thinking of a time when everything was right.
Thinking of a time with only you and I.
Makes me sorry that it had to end that way.
Learned my lesson now there's nothing left to say, graduation day, oh graduation day.

( Guitar Solo )

Thinking of a time when everything was right.
Thinking of a time with only you and I.
Makes me sorry that it had to end that way.
Learned my lesson now there's nothing left to say, graduation day, oh graduation day.
Oh graduation day.

meaning? last panel, that's all i'll say.

 


 

They're going to be wrestling in Guadalajara next week, facing their old nemesis El Gringo Loco. Maybe they could beat him down with fence-post holes.
I guess I could cut them down to armadillo-size. Right now theyre ten-gallon size, of course.
. . . hi, guys. How's it going for you?
Who's the yutz?

I'm Christopher Sparrow. Who are you?
Mortimer's uncle. You the crack-peddler?
What the hell?

And what did you do today?
Talked to crazy people in the park. 

Posted at 05:53 PM     Permalink     |

Sat - April 16, 2005

five string serenade - page 16 - graduation day (page 7) 


that crappy center panel was supposed to have been filled with another photo, or at least a much better drawing. never happened, as you can see. although a distant echo of a memory suggests that at least one version went out 'correct' . . . but i can't really prove it in my mind now.

 


 

So let me get it straight--your uncle sells fence post holes? Good work. Nice living?
I think it's awful. He just taking advantage.
I can't help it if they're stupid. I think it's better if I've got their money.
I hear there's people in Johnson County that built bunkers, in case all the black people attack!*

Want some trout, Uncle Grayfax?
Smells tasty. Don't mind if I do.

Fence post holes, eh? Low overhead?
Where's some more clean glasses?
Of course. I hear you're in the Mexican wrestling biz/
Yes--got some good armadillos on tour.



as you can see, what little trajectory this comic had blows to pieces across the entire sky.
_______________
*true. Y2K didn't help the sanity level of this demented country . . . and was just a runup to the real fun. 

Posted at 09:07 AM     Permalink     |

Wed - April 13, 2005

five string serenade - page 15 - graduation day (page 6) 


man alive, man alive, what the hell is this?

 


 
this is bad, is what this is.


Ever consider just drawing?

That's . . . that's not entirely the issue. I want to be part of that world, more than just doing, you know? but I'm not part of anything . . . good god, listen to me, I'm so pathetic. I need to go home now.

Ye-ah . . . ok.
I'm sorry. I shouldn't have sat down.

I'm not walking and I'll be damned if I take the bus.
Good old unreliable Yellow Cab . . .

So this is the crack house.
I don't recommend saying that to Nips.


so many things wrong. the only good panel is the bottom center one, and it's not half bad at all.

how about the center left, where christopher looks like he's trying--and failing, as he does at everything--to strangle himself? and how about everything on the right and middle there--is that a photograph? is it photoshopped in? why, yes, it is.

faugh!

please understand my stance with regards the computer: i call it cheating. not that anyone should not use it, not that you shouldn't use nothing but the computer in what you do. i don't care. i like a lot of what shows up through use of software. more power to you, etc.

but for me, i resist it. i want what i create to be on the page, in a tangible form. i don't want the original to be electricity and charged bits of ferrite.

that's just me. those are my rules, for me. and this page is a horrible violation of them, and perhaps my most infamously crappy page i can recall off the top of my head.

and that's on top of the whininess. and that's on top of the fact that i still believe that line. there are a few, i suppose when drunk, who will refer to me--i swear to god--as the 'elder statesman' of kansas city comics. i've heard it, and read it, and it mystifies me. because i'm not, and i'm not, and not, and even considered as a survival of the golden age of kansas city comics and zines--1995 through 1997--i was a minor figure--and an outsider. always an outsider. never invited, considered, or thought of, and the people doing work at the time would have thought me very bad indeed.

which i still am.

i never got the touch--the apostolic succession, the acceptance from the cool kids from the 'tute. i craved it, lord knows, and it never came, so when i hear anyone say anything about my work at all that's not negative, i feel like a damned imposter.

so i put up this stuff from 1999, to make my point. i'm an imposter. i'm not it. that it may be here, it certainly has been here, it may be here again. but it, i ain't.

sorry, but 'tis true.
 

Posted at 07:18 PM     Permalink     |

Sat - April 9, 2005

five string serenade - page 14 - graduation day (page 5) 


man, what was i thinking?

 


 

Hi. You're from Nips' class.* You're Dylan.
. . . hi. . . . yes.

You're Christopher Sparrow.
Yeah.--Looks good.
Thanks.

I like that there. I wish I could do that.

Thanks. You draw?

Sort of. Maybe. maybe if I'd gone to school for it, I could really do it.
(Why me, Lord?) Why didn't you?
. . . why? I don't know. I've been giving it a lot of thought lately. have you ever realized, "Hey, that's they way my life should have gone. Where I am isn't where I'm supposed to be?"
No, I never have.
. . . I have. It's like deja-vu, when you find yourself, just for a moment, in the right place, but you realize, "I'm here where I'm supposed to be, but only by accident, and in a little while I'll be gone and lost again."
Really?

I used to think I had failed in life, that I was responsible for wandering off the path. If I hadn't been so lazy in high school and had taken some art classes I would have found that right road. But then I realized that there was NO WAY, the way my life was back then, that I could ever have known or ever have found that direction. I hadn't failed after all.
That's good.
No. It's worse.
Why?
Well, look at it. If there's a place where I'm meant to be, a place that I've been shadowing for years now but which I can't ever quite reach, and it;s not my fault I'm not there . . . then that means there's a force preventing me from reaching my heart's desire.
Fate??
. . . no, nothing that . . . personal. I've started calling it . . . "The Way Things Are." It's just the way the universe is made.


this became my entire philosophy, and filled my entire mind with despair, until just before i met bonnie.

________________
*you may recall nips was revealed earlier to be teaching a class at the art institute. 

Posted at 04:51 PM     Permalink     |

Fri - April 8, 2005

five string serenade - page 13 - graduation day (page 4) 


yep this comic was going nowhere, and going there in style.

 


 

Good god. Why don't we go over to Nips' and have dinner.


So how's Sparrow doing? He kinda seemed bummed out this afternoon. I mean, usually I can throw a can or a bottle at him, but I hadn't the heart.

A few beers will put those question right our of your head.--Do you need lemons?



yeah, i was feeling sorry for myself. i had been for several years, and i would for several years more.

man, this drawing style was appalling. 

Posted at 10:21 PM     Permalink     |

Fri - April 1, 2005

five string serenade - page 12 - graduation day (page 3) 


it began quite apparent at this point that this comic was going nowhere.

 


 
I don't know--can you really sell fence-post holes to store water for Y2K?
Well, why not? They're waterproof, ain't they?

Besides, they ship easy.

What are you talking about?

You roll 'em up tight . . . and Fed-Ex 'em in tubes.

I've never heard of something so unethical in my life.
Ever watch the news?

and in a sudden new thread, unrelated to the rest of the comic (and it gets worse, as you will see--)

I still we should get some oven-cleaner while we get the beer.
We are not going to clean the oven tonight.


my cosmology has evolved to the point that it is always 1995 in the City . . . so Y2K and other appearing neologisms and events would fail to make it into the world of the City, and even less so into the mythical Kansas that surrounds it. but this was 1999, and i had given almost no thought to how reality in the comic operated, ever since giving up on the idea that the animals were christopher's insanity.

moreover, i am really hating the art. it is terribly scratchy: but yes, there is worse to come, before it gets better. 

Posted at 06:02 PM     Permalink     |

Wed - March 30, 2005

five string serenade - page 11 - graduation day (page 2) 





 
Bathroom up to your specs?
Could be cleaner.

Well, here's your bag and cup. I'll get the hot water and you can tell me all abut it.

So, how's business?

Doing fine. Making money paw over claw. Left Tom in charge. Rubes'll never know what him 'em.
All legal and above board, then?
Maybe. 

Posted at 02:43 PM     Permalink     |

Sun - March 27, 2005

five string serenade - page 10 - graduation day (page 1) 


as i observed earlier, this episode was, i believe, the last appearance of uncle grayfax to date.
 



 
Well, come on in, Uncle Grayfax. Put your feet up.

But you should have let me know when you were getting in.
So this is what a crack-house looks like.

Chirp and i don't live in a crack-house.

I suppose you've got a blacklight and and mushroom posters upstairs.
That's a little sophisticated for a crackhouse.

Do you want some tea?

Just don't slip anything into it. Is there a bathroom in here anywhere? Or do you just use the corner?

Up the stair.
Great. More walking.

Grumble grumble grumble.

i can see why uncle grayfax didn't want to come back . . .

for the record, whereas nips and christopher sparrow live off warwick and 43rd, chirp and mortimer easter live off about 35th and pennsylvania. 

Posted at 04:07 PM     Permalink     |

Sat - February 12, 2005

five string serenade - page 09 - the last thing a wedding needs (page 8) 


yeah, that's about how i imagine it ended.
 



 
Hi, Uncle Grayfax. How have you been doing?
Drop the small talk, sonny. What took you so long?

Sorry! I had to take the bus. It's not like they run every five minutes.
And I gotta hang out with pimps and car thieves while you're lolly-gagging. How do you live up here?

It's like hell.
Geeze.

If you'd let me know when you're coming, I could have met you at the station.
You were probably in an opium den.

How do your calendars look, Hope?
Oh, okay, I guess.


uncle grayfax was not a character that hung around long. i had meant to go somewhere with this, but he didn't appear--that i recall--past the next episode. 

Posted at 05:22 PM     Permalink     |

Wed - February 2, 2005

five string serenade - page 08 - the last thing a wedding needs (page 7) 


wait--what's that christopher's doing in the lower left panel?

hmmmmmmmm.
 



 
Fish . . .

He's at the crack-Conoco*, on a payphone. He's going to wait on our porch for me. Gotta let him in.
Great place to get mugged. And more five dollar hos than a gardener's garage sale.

How;d he get over there, anyways?
I don't know, maybe he was looking for a phone. Doesn't matter anyway.

Listen, I'll brig him over later.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.--What the hell are you looking for?
Oven cleaner.
We're not cleaning the oven.


____________________
*a real place, just a few blocks away from where we live. 

Posted at 05:34 PM     Permalink     |

five string serenade - page 07 - the last thing a wedding needs (page 6) 

five string serenade - page 06 - the last thing a wedding needs (page 5) 

five string serenade - page 05 - the last thing a wedding needs (page 4) 

five string serenade - page 04 - the last thing a wedding needs (page 3) 

five string serenade - page 03 - the last thing a wedding needs (page 2) 

five string serenade - page 02 - the last thing a wedding needs (page 1) 

five string serenade - page 01 - the year was 1996. or 1997. your call. 

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