LARCENET. AGAIN.

the last album ("le combat ordinaire", Dargaud) is released, at last.
it's huge. it's great. really. the art is cool as fuck and the story will kick your ass.
so go and buy dozens of it.
that's it. hurry up.

DO YOUR GIRLFRIEND WEARS SOME "PUMAs" ?

if so, i don't know what i'll think of her next time i'll see her ; fake or not, Puma seems to makin a new step into its communication, and going porn (here and here) in its advertising isn't, for me, a genius idea, at all.
poetry, sweet poetry... visual bullshit. i dunno.
(irrevelant infos stollen from Marshotel.)

'FANCY A TRAILER TONITE, DARLIN' ?

Kill Bill. Quentin Tarantino last effort seems pretty... i dunno. As far as there's it's stars Uma Thurman, it's ok, but looking at its trailer made me ask myself about Quentin's next shit...
LXG. poor, poor Alan Moore. first, "From Hell", and now, this. i'm so sad. this looks terrific. in its bad meaning.
X2. more and more and more X-Men mania comin' soon. as far as it's as good as the first one... or better than the second half of Spiderman...
The Hulk. well, Ang Lee did such good job on "CTHD", it must be cool. well, i hope so.

ED BRUBAKER'S "SLEEPER".

Warren Ellis sent this a few weeks ago, but i forgot to put it online. Ed Brubaker is a briliant artist who worked on nice series for many publishers, including "Batman", "Catwoman", "the Sandman" or "Vertigo" specials, but also "A complete lowlife" among other stuff :

"Ed has a new series out from Wildstorm called "Sleeper".
This is the premise of Sleeper:
"You are an undercover agent. Your assignment is go deep undercover with an organization of pure evil.Imagine that your assignment is so deep cover that only one person in your organization knows about it.Now imagine that that person is suddenly put in a coma.You now have no way out.Even worse, you don't know if you want out."
Ed Brubaker wants you to try Sleeper. And this is the deal:
"I think when my publisher is willing to spin the wheel by trying something new by me, like Sleeper, then I should be willing to
put myself on the line with it, too. So, in the hopes that it will get readers and retailers to take a chance on it, and because I love this
book and have total faith in it, I'm going to offer a money back guarantee on Sleeper : If anyone buys Sleeper #1 and is unsatisfied, they can email me at: edbrubaker1@hotmail.com and I'll send them their 3 bucks back.
"If you like shows like The Sopranos, Alias, or The Shield, or comics like 100 Bullets or Alias (again), then give Sleeper a try, because it's right up that alley, I swear."
So take Ed up on it." (Warren Ellis).

I really think that Ed Brubaker deserve respect and thanks for his personnal implication. i'm still waiting for Sleepers #1, and i hope i won't be disapointed, and even if so, i will never ask for these "money back guaranteed" stuff. and this probably some good advertising, too, to be so involved into his art, which is rare enough for nowadays top creator to be acclaimed.

here's a good interview of Ed Brubaker, by Indy magazine, and some reviews, too. another interview here (december 2001) at Comic Books Ressource. and the man's own page.

HULK SMASHING WALL STREET. OR SUPES. OR IS IT WOLVERINE ?

another interesting link posted by Paul Ewert from the Small Press Comics yahoo mailing-list, which is a too rare but always cool source of infos.
"Vintage comics are more than funny business for investors.
Looking for an alternative to the sagging stock market, some investors are turning to collectible comic books for a place to park their money. With the stock market giving early warning signs of a fourth straight losing year, some investors are seeking refuge in the arms of the Incredible Hulk, Superman and Captain America.
Sellers of collectible comic books say business has never been better — and they point to the falling stock market as a factor..."

WHO ASKED FOR THE DAILY ELLIS NEWS ?
WHO WANTS THE BRAND NEW ELLIS BULLETIN ?

yeah, this Warren guy is alive, and, uh, let's say, kicking... still from Warren Ellis' Bad Signal mailing-list :

- "upcoming Orbiter comic : cover and a six-page of sequence here".
- "Global Frequency 5, art by Jon J Muth, cover by Brian Wood. Cover and first four pages here".

"AAAAHHHH ! IT'S STARTS !!!"...

...were the first thoughts of 90% of the people around me when cames this (and sorry, it's a french link), on saturday evening. even if i didn't felt anything at all, the very middle of it was something like 200 kms from us, and it was a 5.4 on Richter scale. waoh.
oh, but, come one, it's just our old planet earth who's tell us that nothing is sure, uh ?...

"FROM SUPERHEROES TO SUBVERSIVE"

I received this, which is something that Paul Ewert sent to the Small Press Comics yahoo mailing-list.
"Minneapolis comic shop featured in local newspaper.
Splashed across the front page of the latest edition of Skyway News are the words "Superheroes to Subversives". It is the headline for an article focusing on Minneapolis comic shop Big Brain Comics.
If you are interested in reading the article and can't get a copy of the Skyway News, you can read it here.
Big Brain Comics is located 81 South 10th Street in Minneapolis, MN.The Skyway News is a free weekly newspaper distributed to 30,000 readers in Downtown Minneapolis. You can find them online here


ANGOULEME PICTURES PART. 5.

Philippe, the guy who took care of us while in Angouleme last january, for the comics festival, sent me a few pictures a while ago, and i totally forgot to put it here.
meanwhile, who will cares ? anyway. here's some shots of the friday night crew :


me, Flavien (with a "vertigo rave" that Neil Gaiman just signed for me), Cathy (reading something), Thierry (his back), and Philippe's neighboor/friend.



Cathy (reading), Thierry, me (looking for some work from the next person), and a young aspiring artist (her back) who came in Angouleme for help or publishing informations, who was also sleeping at Phil's this friday night.
Thierry probably speaks about Emmanuel Guibert, Lewis Trondheim, or about the French editor Mosquito. or about the situation of comics industry at the moment. or about how fed up he is with this rain. or maybe about our meeting with Jean Pierre Dionnet in the train for Angouleme. or maybe he asks if it's ok for using the bathroom. :)





Flavien, Thierry, me, Cathy, and the young artist girl.

oh yes, also : while in Angouleme, we saw many great artists and authors, and we got a few signs or little draws from them on some of our comics. call us fans...
Thierry got some stuff from Yann Degruel on a copy of "Gen Gys Khan" (Delcourt), from Alexis Nesme on a "Grabouillon" (Delcourt), from Eric Omond on a "Toto l'ornythorinque" (Delcourt), from Lewis Trondheim on the last "Lapinot" (Dargaud), from Emmanuel Guibert on his "La Guerre d'Alan" (l'Association), from Zanzim on "Les Yeux Verts" (Carabas), from Etienne on "Gargouilles", and of course from the loved Frederik Peeters on "Lupus" (Atrabile), probably the best comic released in this beginning of year.
I personnaly got signs from Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean on some Sandman (old original issues from DC), some Death miniserie (the hardcover of the 1st miniserie, and the first issue), a nice The Dreaming cover, and on The Day i Swapped my Dad for 2 Goldfishes (Delcourt french edition), one from Neil alone on a tale he did in some Vergigo Preview a while ago, and which is one of the greatest stuff i ever read (Kent Williams was at the pencils), one from Frederik Peeters inside "Constellation" (l'Association), from Eric Omond on a "Toto l'ornythorinque" (Delcourt), one from Jason on "dis moi quelque chose" (Atrabile), 2 from Joann Sfar on a "Petit Vampire" (Delcourt) and on "Harmonica" (l'Association). I also got one from Lewis Trondheim, while drinking something together at la gare de Lyon in Paris, with Thierry and Brigitte, Lewis's wife but also a great colorist of many cool comics. Lewis did a nice Lapinot in one
of its "Carnets de Bord" (l'Association), and a cool little fly on Sandrine's copy of "la Mouche" (Seuil).

"NOUVELLE BD" / BOURG-LES-VALENCE 2003.

yeah, we're still on this godammnnn new comics scene topic here...
and yes, Joann Sfarr is everywhere, he even did this nice piece of work for the festival. ohhhh, nice guy. :)

as i already wrote, there's a new festival (well, nearly new, as it's its second edition) in mid-march, in a little town from south/eastern france. Bourg-les-Valence, V 2.0, will see the visit from such artists like LEWIS TRONDHEIM - PAKITO BOLINO - JEAN-CHRISTOPHE MENU - MARJANE SATRAPI - JOANN SFAR - LIONEL TRAN - CHRISTOPHE BLAIN - CHARLES BERBERIAN - CIZO - EMMANUEL GUIBERT - BRUNO HEITZ - JASON - KILLOFFER - SANDRINE REVEL - TANQUERELLE - WINSHLUSS - AMBRE - PAUL CARALI - FABRICE NEAUD - ALEXIS NESME - FREDERIC PEETERS.... and probably many more to come.
right now, i'm using all the Force inhabiting me for making MC, Thierry, Seb (and maybe a few others) coming...



some Pakito Bolino (le Dernier Cri) artwork above ; one of the many, many artists to come.

HOW MANY MILES MUST WE MARCH ?

thanks thanks thanks to KookyAnnaMojoWhoElse?... who made my day this weekend by getting all the stuff you can look for about the Marchs for Peace. or, at least, not war. anyway, you got the point.
alongside the tons and tons of interesting stuff Anna's compiled for you lazy assholes, here's one link who must be watched by everybody, 15 minutes a day, and i think this world will be better. yeah, i'm a doctor. and i'm afraid i'll ask you to put off your clothes, by the way.
And while on the subject (bush versus the world, not the naked stuff), here's an inside feeling of what united states of america residents think of this shit, courtesy of my friend Ian, antiproud-of-being-american guy at its best...


i'm so sorry, i really find it so funny...

FIND YOUR OWN WAY.

* Art Spiegelman decided to leave the New Yorker, in protest to what he calls "the widespread conformism of the mass media in the Bush era." "The decision to leave was mine alone," the author of Maus, the saga of Jewish mice exterminated by Nazi cats that won him the Pulitzer Prize (the first given to a comic book), explained in an interview with the Corriere della Sera.
"The director of the New Yorker, David Remnick, was shocked when I announced my resignation. He attempted to dissuade me. But I told him that the kind of work that I'm now interested in doing is not suited to the present tone of the New Yorker. And, seeing that we are living in extremely dangerous times, I don't feel like stooping to compromise..." (...more on Tom Engelhardt's excellent page. so go, you wanker, and read it all !)

* "Mister Bush and Mister Blair
That pair are oh so silly
I think the reason for this war
Is that they've got small willies
Repression is their motto
So seldom do they spank
I think they should get mutual
And share a friendly wank" - Mister Paul, Ireland



and much more on a pretty cool link on how to help stop this soon-to-be WW v.3.1 (thanks to Ian for the name of george W' wishes, and to the Haus from the 'lith squad).

* don't miss Fabrice Neaud if you're in London !



the great french artist will be at the University of Leicester - School of Modern Languages
University Road - Leicester LEI 7RH - UK - Tél. : +44 (0) 116 252 2683
on april, friday 11th. i'm not sure, but maybe "l'Association" co-creator JC Menu and Tanitoc will be there too. anyway, Fabrice Neaud is an artist to watch for ; his work (his bio, in french, sorry !) is really amazing : plenty of emotion, and with a real huge approach of the narrative process. his appearance alongside Jiro Taniguchi at Angouleme 2003 was really smart and interesting, by the way. the guy's got things to tell, and he do it with a perfect twist, his own.

JAMES BOND IS FRENCH.

"ROUEN, France (Reuters) -- French police said Friday they had seized two lethal mobile phones capable of shooting four bullets, with the digital touchpads used as triggers". wow...
well, what can i say ? i didn't intend to hurt people, really... i'm so much into "goldfinger" or other Ian Fleming shit these days... :)

WE ALL LIVE IN A GOOGLE COMPANY, GOOGLE COMPANY, GOOGLE COMPANY.

Evan , one of the main guy under Pyra (the creators of this whole blog stuff) says it all on his page, but Blogger is now a part of Google. if not the "capitalizm" flavor of buying other tiny companies (Google already bought deja.com), i'm ok with all this, as it will probably help the bloggerisers to keep their system 100% ok, which was not the case for months or so... SiliconValley's weblog got some echoes about it, and, well, we'll see.

AT LEAST TODAY IS A SUNSHINY DAY.

looks like i'm currently reaching new heights of emptyness : i finaly leave my "brand new" flat -for the 9th time or so, in 3 years- but without any particular destinations ; in fact, the only thing i know for sure is that i got to find some places for all my stuff (tons of comics, vinyl and cd records, books...), for a few weeks or months, depending or how quickly i'll be able to make some money. and waiting for this, i'll go from a place to another, thanks to a few friends cool enough for inviting me to join their fun. heck, i hope i'll not depress 'em... :)

so here it is. i'm now back in my "life in a backbag" condition, which is maybe the thing that i needed for months, by now. kind of kick in my butt, i hope. if it's not enough for making me trying to "live again", i dunno what could help. uh ? nothing ? hmmmm....

* my english sucks hardcore than ever. but i truly fuck you, so that's ok. ;)

* so, to make war or not make war ? these stupid north americans people (i talk about those who choose their "president", not the poor others...) seems so lost in their convictions that it's hard to trust a "nice" solution. i don't give a fuck about french government but i think it's the first time i'm so ok with them... "Blair> Bush's Bee-otch", "It's nothing to do with us, we were never there at the time, honest guv'", ""Man is born free and everywhere he is wrapped in plastic and duct tape", "I'm so bored with the USA", "Fight plaque, not Iraq", "War is God's way of teaching Americans geography", "I wants it, my precioussss", "Hedgehogs against the War", "Bush is just another word for cunt"... one again, the 'lith is planet earth 1st class ideamaker when it comes to jump in the mud...

* Grant sent me the Barbelith Mixtape number one ; the Mixtape project is an august 2002 Barbelith collective idea (thanks to Saveloy), and i really enjoy it : we defined a list of lithers, and the first 'lither recorded a track on a blank tape, sent it to a second one, who did the same and sent it to a third, etc... right now there's 2 tapes going from a country to another (the Barbelith is a global thing), and i just recorded my track on the 2nd tape ; it's a interesting and fun thing, and the result will be duplicated for all of those who made their print in this musical mess.
still on the Barbelith side, i got many many many stuff to finish (cd duplication...) for some of the coolest people on this planet (Fred from L.A., mr Illmatic in UK...), who gave away some real nice stuff. so all this shit will not be this easy to deal with, as i haven't got my own place now... but i'll do it !




* above : MF sent me a link for "Stay Free magazine", which is a real huge zine i saw at his place ; issue 20 covers many great shit, like Illegal Art, indymedia activism and objective analysis of (resume speed...) how this is a mad world we living in... MF got a cd who came with one of the last ish, and FUCK, this cd is dope : kind of a direct application of their anti marketting-all-this-planet-hotdammit way of life, the editors did a great compilation of unauthorized or unpublished tracks due to so called "abusive use of samples"... which offer us a cool compilation of some fat tracks including Public Enemy, Beastie Boys, and many other great hip hop, electronica, etc... and there's one of the best tracks i've ever heard of my whole life : a kind of a "new" version of "we are the world", back in Bob Geldof's Band Aid days, where the "authors" just sing ON the original track, and i don't talk about the original instrumental track, no : they just sing ON the original edit... the new lyrics are terrific. nuff said.



* above : french fave Manu Larcenet got a new comic, released soon from Dargaud (first five pages here). and a new fan site, too.

* "LXG" ? "LXG" ? what does it means ? uhhh... I'm quite afraid of how it will turns to be... "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" becoming "LXG" ? god... :(

2003 SUCKS.

or am i wrong ? i'm going through some news "big times" at the moment, having to deal with things i'm totally new to. not this easy to talk about, but i suppose you could call it "learning about life". and it comes complete with a nice package of dead dog smell like, mellow and corrosive shit, and awfuls headaches that can only be stopped with 36+ hours without sleeping.
the best part is that a lot of the things i did for "my" future these last weeks/months seems totally useless ; i'm 200% into our little comic project by now, but it's not this easy as i got to keep on strugglin with all these fuckin shit. hmmm... i wonder if anybody can understand what i'm talkin about here... i got doubts about it, so i stop for now and will try to find better times to talk about all the magnificent stuff happening out there ; well, i suppose.

2003-VISUAL-ART EXHIBITION. IN AUSTRALIA. YEP, AUSTRALIA. AND YES, IT'S QUITE FAR AWAY.

Design is Kinky launchs some pretty big rendez-vous, kind of massive exhibition, complete with loads of artists, talks, meetings and so on : Shepard Fairey (USA) (the man behind Obey Giant and Black Market), Banksy (UK), Dmote (Australia), Puzle, Fliq & Dskiz (aka the BurnCrew) (Australia), Perks and Mini (Australia)...
yep, there's some frenchies, too, but as i don't like their work that much, i don't know if i got to speak about them... heck, it's my blog, after all, eh eh eh...
so if you're around, it's in Sidney, Australia, april 11 & 12, and it's called SEMI-PERMANENT Design Conference.