Freedom Run

...but not yet, not yet.

'Allo - you're witnessing me cautiously optimistic at the beginning of a dissertation writin' frenzy (although obviously I'd be more optimistic if I were actually writing it rather than this blog). BUT I MUST ART - I SIMPLY MUST. The frantic workload recently has taught me this - no matter how busy things get there is always time for drawing - and there ALWAYS WILL BE.

So, as per the stories of this last fortnight will be told through the medium of my fairly average art -

That then, is a picture of Cosmic Ray - editor of the superlative (and dead) small press title Solar Wind, which I was priviliged to be part of in the past. Stories published were The Whistle of Alfie Smith - a disgracefully drawn one back in like... 2004 - and The Last Blokes in the final issue 'bout two years back. So I coloured this for Paul Scott, editor and kindly comissionman - an image that was originally in the front of that final issue as a 'reader's letter' type thing. Long live Solar Wind! The bigger one is here.

That is obviously a dalek. A lecture sketch gaudily coloured-up as a tribute to the new Doctor who I'm enjoying greatly (aside from the occasional companionspaz, THANKS AMY) All of the Day and All of the Night. The dalek episode wasn't particularly good but I love Mark Gatiss and Bill Paterson so that was enough for me. The big picture here.

This is MY HILARIOUS INTERPRETATION of the 'Day the Music Died' where three talented young rock 'n' roll troubadours were tragically killed in a plane crash. I thought, only naturally, that this should be immortalised through the medium of a toddler's toy. It was part of a Feral-Gargantua jam about 'dead celebrity action figures' and it's larger form (complete with a story about Space Goblins) can be found here.

- this is a piece of art I did to justify a Crabcake fanart request from the amazing Carl 'jimoakley666' Pearce. It is clearly the Toxic Avenger, I'm quite fond of it and you can see all the details at this location.

This is an APPALLINGLY ROUGH sketch of the first page of the second part of the Crabcake epic. I felt the need to scan it because, flailing with heavy workload as I am, I wanted to prove that the Crabcake fires were still burning. During lectures I constructed a full sketch for the next part and now all it needs is a bit of light FULL-ON COMPLETION. Which I'm greatly looking forward to doing.

Lastly I rejiggered THIS OLD IRON MAN PICTURE to fit in with a new Feral Gargantua jam on Iron Man - If you are an artist reading this who's on DevArt but not in Feral Gargantua give us a shout and join in - it's A RIGHT LARK.

That's it folks - I will be back after I've written an appalling dissertation and finished my degree - when that will be I do not know, but I'll not be back without some art to justify my absence - !

ART BE HERE

AUDIO BE HERE
TWELVE HORSES BE HERE

O - x

When

...will I be out of this quagmire of work and nonwork?

The answer is May 20th. Then who knows WHAT will go down. Chrome Hoof hopefully.

Anyway, still I've managed to squeeze out some artworks and things between the last post and this one - so I'll take you through them. ONE BY ONE. Afore I do though, I'll just mention that me and Jazz's radio shows are back on air - that be Owen in Rock and Soon I Will Be Invincible. So tune in Saturdays from three for various chunks of rock majesty from throughout the years!

That image there is to celebrate my purchase of Ghostpocket's outstanding GHST annual which unleashes possibly the greatest canon of comic characters since the big ones. You know the ones I mean - The Glass Menagerie. You won't be disappointed. You can see the larger version of this on my DeviantArt page (one of the only left that doesn't have a Lady Gaga reference on it).

I decided to resurrect this slightly-old Who image for Feral-Gargantua's eleventh doctor jam. It's re-emergence was greeted with the rapturous silence that it possibly deserves - it's a bit shitty anyway. I like the last panel - but the first four are really quite amateur. Plus it's marred with the terrible truth that this could never happened. GROW SOME BALLS MOFFAT. I do like the new Doctor though - he's a dedicated follower of fashion.

Oh hohoho - for the Feral Gargantua TMNT jam - and literally the last thing that came into my mind in terms of an idea. So I went for it - even though it makes no sense and the scanner didn't work and all that other beautiful shit. That turtle's dynamite!

Here it is - the final page of the first part of Crabcake - fairly spectacular and leaving them on quite an EPIC CLIFFHANGER. What will become of the audacious crew and their spectacularly cruddy vessel, the eponymous Crabcake? You'll have to wait til June to find out :O

Oh - and finally here's the whole bally thing - you can see the larger version here and bask in it's time-consuming glow. I hope it leaves you slavering for the next part - of which I can say nothing but ALL HAIL PRESIDENT GARY!

See you on *gulp* the Second of May where hopefully I've done

- loads of work

- at least two pictures (maybe, but it would be unwise)

Yikes.

ART BE HERE

AUDIO BE HERE

TETRIS CAKE BE HERE

O - x

Paranoid

wouldn't you be? -

another fortnight another big ramp of shit that occurred. It's all good though. TERRIFYING AND GOOD.

I hope everyone has had a marvellous Eggday and received many eggs which you then MASTICATED AND DIGESTED. That's it - I'm done with that. Time for the bi-monthly update on art and all that other shite that's not proper work but is more important than proper work - and is therefore proper work. Confused? I wouldn't be. Although I am.

Before I launch into a picture-by-picture breakdown of my fortnight I want to A: Congratulate my dear friends the married Burleys on their marriage and the glorious party wot followed and B: Thank Mr Martin Collins for hanging around my ravaged self when alone last week. THANKS MARTIN COLLINS AND THE BURLEYS.

Oh additionally I did my first bit of audio drama in, like, forever last week which you can listen to over at Crazy Fox Machine on Myspace - it's all good and cheers to whomever listened to it 9 times ;)

Alright - what you can see above (and bigger here with full person list) is the most popular picture I've ever done. ELEVEN FAVOURITES?! I feel like someone who does Bleach fanart! Thank you to all the numerous progheads and friendfaces that took a shine to it. I mean - Robert Johnson and B.B. King have white streaks through their faces, Angus Young has a truncated hat and Dimebag Darrell looks like a white George Clinton (copyright R.J. Phillips 2010) but you like it, you really like it! So that's okay.

This is a picture of The Mekon who was Dan Dare's greatest foe - here we can see him hovering forlornly over the cruel malformed volcanoes of Venus which I was inspired to draw by Professor Brian Cox WHO IS THE MOST HANDSOMEST AND LOVELIEST MAN ON TELEVISION WHO ISN'T MICHAEL PALIN. Although in the next episode it was made clear that Venus' volcanoes had never been seen to have erupted. UNTIL NOW.

This was for Feral-Gargantua's monthly art thing themed around a three-panel wordless comics. I know they're not in panels but IT'S FUNNY ANYWAY. Right? Hundreds would disagree maybe - but I had fun drawing it and colouring it and surely that's the point. The enormous one is here.

All those popular men up there were drawn for this image which is portraying 'The Invention of Rock' via B.B. King's glowing guitar shining and getting in the eyes of the great and the good and the long-dead-by-the-time-B.B. King-used-it. It was for Bobbymono's enormous colab comic thing and I hope it sits well alongside artists who are clearly better than me. The full thing, as always, is here.

Finally yes - here it is, the fourth page of the first beautiful adventure of the Crabcake crew. There's one more to go before I do an annoying 'anthology' image of all five and then go on to claim that I'm a worthwhile artist. As you can see, in this page they've stepped out onto the planets surface and are generally dicking about. Those silly fools - the full thing (with links to pages 1 - 3) is here.

Thank you very much for reading when you're so busy nomming it down on various eggs - I'm sorry this wasn't exciting and cynical like the blogs so many others write but I'm choosing not to be a douchebag. It's a choice would you believe, even though so many people make it look natural.

I'll return on the 18th of April with more goings-on and potentially either NO MIND or a portion of a finished dissertation. Shotgun the former.

ART HERE

AUDIO HERE

MASSIVE PIG HERE

O - x

You Are Your Enemy

...so get over it and stop puncturing your own tyres -

Hello again - it's been a FULL-ON NERVESHREDDINGLY HORRENDOUS two weeks since last I updated - and the break has been a very fruitful one. It's all art so I won't bother with the colour-coding as life just isn't worth commenting on. Sorry - it's just not. All dull dissertation work and severe anxiety - about as interesting as Slash's guitarwork.

TALKING ABOUT overrated instrumentalists, why don't you indulge yourselves (if you haven't already) by investigated critically acclaimed new 15-minute album by Dan Shandy and the Shambling Dandies? They've been working hard at it all week and it certainly is a spiffing record - you can pick it up FREE by clicking on this sentence. It's free. I've heard tantalising rumours that they're planning a sequel WITHIN THE NEXT YEAR. Aren't we lucky pups?

Here is an image of what can only be described as a tribute to both Sword in the Stone (which is a good film, despite what my girlfriend would say) and like, those kind of storybook comics that you'd get in the forties that would always be a real PAIN to read. However, often I remember getting quite into them when I could be bothered to read, and they always seemed to be about time travel which is a bonus. The bigger picture is here - and it was part of a larger contest with FeralGargantua (naturally) which can be seen here.

What you see above is the third miraculous page of the first miraculous part of my on-going 'Crabcake' saga. I'm getting the fourth coloured as we speak and it should be good. I must do something with my hands, otherwise they'll be out the door and cutting down trees in minutes AND THEY PROVIDE OXYGEN DAMMIT. The full version (which has links to the first two pages) can be seen at this link right here.
Finally what you see is not a test - it's genuinely Dermot Mulligan of the revolutionary duo Mulligan & O'Hare as well as Det Ken 'Hutch' Hutchinson temporarily relieved from association with ironic slapstick comedies. Oh no, there goes Tokyo. Go go David Soul. The full thing is visible here - and the amazing Ralf "dunwich7" Kahlert of Feralgargantua fame produced a stunning Hardy/Batman image that is BEYOND REPROACH

There - that's it. Over the course of the blog I've decided it'll be far more productive to do these blogs every other week - so I will see you on the 4th of April and you can catch up with my goings on between then on:

Crazy Fox Machine - Facebook

Metal-Truncator - Deviantart

This blog. YOU ARE HERE - don't click on the link

O - x

Shining in the Light

...yet I can't go out in it. It's either this or essays - and I'm inclined towards this at the moment.

I'm also going to use the first half of this post to plug ALL THE BLOGS I FOLLOW, because

a - it's a nice way of wasting time

b - it's a nice way

Artists

Chris Weston - One of the most talented British artists currently working, does tons of commercialwork and occasionally produces knock-out little strips for 2000ad.

D'Blog of D'Israeli - Easily my favourite artist in 2000ad - his work on the War of the Worlds graphic novel never fails to UTTERLY DESTROY MY BRAIN.

Dave Taylor - Producer of incredibly psychedelic Moebius-styled artwork for a weekly comic I'm sure you could probably guess by now.

Dylan Teague's Drawing Board - Some of the finest 'straight' art you'll ever see. "HOW DOES HE GET IT SO CLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAN?" You will find yourself crying.

Have Pencil, Will Scribble - The art of Rufus Dayglo, the mad comic-fan turned super-stylish Hewlett successor on Tank Girl. Inspirational.

Kev Lev's Blog - Kevin Levell, a Bryan Talbot/D'israeli-style talent who I'm watching so I can go "Yeah I was there" when HE SUDDENLY GETS MASSIVE.

Leigh Gallagher - Newish fella who got popular after his co-creation of the 'Defoe' character, pages are stuffed with mad detail - it freaks me out.

Friends

Bob's Blog - Glorious cyncism from two of the most beautiful hands to have ever graced the surface of the Earth.

I Am Dead and Made of Heat - The not-at-all up-to-date and potentially never-visited blog of the superlative surrealist artist Mr GhostPockets - his Deviantart is herreee

In Girum Imus Nocte Et Consumimur Igni - The bitter hateful rantings of a cuddly kitten of an archaeologist; Mr Alex Sotheran.

Paulk Chops - The witty warblings of Paul, a Northern thrashfiend in a cinema in Canada?! Alright then.

Wizard Joe's BLOLg - The monthly observations of one of the minds behind Dan Shandy and the Shambling Dandies. Although he hasn't updated in two months. HE'S A BUSY MAN.

Words - The speech patterns of former RockSoc head, Northern Oak vocalist, grindcore veteran and all-round lovely man Martin Collins.

Institutions

2000ad Covers Uncovered - a regular look at the artists behind each cover of the glorious 2000ad. What else do you need? ...CELERY?!

Judge Minty Fan Film - A 2000ad fan film?! OKAY THEN LOL

Right - enough of that rampant pluggery. I have managed to squeeze out one chunk of art this week - which you can see just below these words.

It's for the 'Medieval Lincoln' contest where anachronistic historical characters roam the highways of time. This in large as well as other, much better, entries can be seen at Feral Gargantua - there's an Aztec Churchill, a caveman Shakespeare and MANY MEDIEVAL LINCOLNS.

Additionally I did a radio show featurin' many a funky sixties tune yesterday, which ye can listen to over at this web address that is behind these words.

...Right *sigh* I've delayed this essay long enough; NOW FOR SOME TOAST!!

See you on the frivolous fourteenth!

Art is Here

Audio is Here

O - x

Grim Utter Death

...is a pleasant way to live. Hello folks, just glaring accusingly at some sources *grumble iron age transitions in Europe* sorry you're going to get that a lot this week. I'm doing about seven billion things at any one time so BEAR WITH ME. Life dis kolor - art I dis kolor, right?

Noble intent has robbed me of my life this week so this colour will not be used to it's full extent, although I will drop a quick shout in for Activities Alan - on the off-chance that anyone from Sheffield Uni is reading this and undecided who to vote for come Tuesday - I can't recommend Al higher. He's a hard worker and really cares about his work. So, y'know - FUCKING DO IT.

If it isn't glaringly obvious, it's elections time up here in Sheffield - and basically everybody has been freaking out - there's been smear campaigns and banner destroyin' sessions and all manner of ridiculously unnecessary shit that should be left to real politicians to waste their time with. Speaking of, the Tories are pressuring the BBC to shut down their only good radio stations - add your support against this lunacy at this group.

So here we ART. - This week Dan Shandy and Ron Lamp were on Forge Radio, and it was moderately funny although Dan did come across as a bit of a shit. Rumour has it they'll finally get their-long awaited album out this year and I, for one, will be eagerly awaiting it.

The second page of Crabcake was polished off after my blog last week, and I urge you to go have a gander at a larger version over at DeviantArt - because I spent a little bit of time colouring it and I'm rather fond of it and all the other reasons that you should go. Below are two pieces of colouring I did for the unparalleled Wizard-y Joe and his UNDOUBTEDLY WARPED MIND.

Again - larger versions at DeviantArt. If you have the stomach for them. Final news this week is that I was invited by the SIMILARLY DISTURBED MIND OF MR GHOSTPOCKETS to a sketch-jam group on aforementioned Deviant-themed art site. Feral Gargantua it is called, populated by a great deal of incredibly good artists, myself not included. The first challenge was to stomach the lesser-seen Beastmaster film and produce some fanart - and the second, to visualize the Feral Gargantua creature as your mind sees it. These can be seen below, and larger at that site. That one.

Right - that's me done. I'll see you on the DEADLINE-BOTHERIN' DATE of March 7th. Shudder. Shuddery wuddery. All you'll probably get is me going "OOooooerrr" and nothing else.

If you're lucky.

Art is Here

Audio is Here

O - x

Tornado of Souls

I have returned from my brief exile into the computerless blog wilderness that so afflicted my late January/early February period. In a tornado if you will...of souls?

Now - I considered briefly stopping my beautiful system of life being in this colour and art being in this one - but it seems to work fairly pleasingly so I will continue.

See? It's like having hot herbs rubbed in your face. Now I went to see and do many a-thing in the weeks I've been debloggified, but clearly the most amazing was my transition into a goggle-eyed follower of STEWART LEE who is without a doubt the greatest stand-up I've ever seen. Like a good little consumer I went and bought all of his merchandise. All of that merchandise he has. So now I proudly sport my Stewart Lee handbag and musket-cleaner.

Too right. What a waste of a Sunday hour. Aside from Stewart Lee - the weeks went by relatively unhindered by event. Save for the obvious Asterixfest that was Valentines Day. So that leaves only ONE FONT COLOUR-CHANGIN' CATEGORY LEFT - - !

Ouch. That's massive - whatever happened to my scaling options?! Anyway, yes - above you and heavily truncated to the right (it's okay you can click on it, DON'T BE AFRAID) is the debut page of my strip 'Crabcake'. What a whacky adventure this will no doubt be. Tis the fault of those who havenae requested strips out of me that I'm churning out a fairly uninteresting one myself.

Below you will see some colouring I've done for folks - namely a Mr Rustyoldtown and a Mr Darkjimbo who reside on Deviantart and can be found by clicking their names. The last picture was one of mine coloured by the 'forementioned Rustyoldtown and seems to be a cottage being attacked by an east-end thug.

You can see all of that bigger/smaller at my art site which is linked below and at the side and on my face on certain days of the week. Just a quick note to say that this coming Saturday, Dan Shandy and Ron Lamp will be hosting my normal radio show. This revolutionary new band can be heard at their myspace.

Well - that's all for this week. Let's hope the buzzards of inconvenience don't peck off my fingers and prevent me from writing the next entry - and if you're bored of my fragment sentences and my lazy combowords then check out Bobbie Phillips' Blog - which is a great deal wittier and more considered than this nonsense. Catch you on the terrifyin' 28th ;)

Art is Here

Audio is Here

O - x