Mike Dawson Comics

Tom Kaczynski is my guest in the TCJ Talkie Hutt this week. Tom is well known for the excellent run of short stories he created for the MOME anthology, while that was still a going concern. I hear he has a story in issue 22, which I’ve yet to see, so I am looking forward to that. Tom’s comics have also appeared in The Drama and The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2009.

I had a lot of fun with this chat, but I may have broken a few cardinal rules of interviewing people with this one. 1) I kind of glossed over a lot of the biographical background and Tom’s early interest in comics, though I did my best to get back to it later on in the conversation. I think I was just too excited to talk about communism, so I kind of dived right on into it. And 2) I referred quite heavily to pages and quotes from Tom’s minicomics, “The Trans Series”. These comics are fascinating reads, full of any number of interesting ideas, each of which could lead to a conversation or a debate. But, unfortunately, as is the nature of minicomics, this stuff isn’t widely available in stores (though they can be purchased online here). So, I worry there may be many listeners who aren’t intimately familiar with the work.

If it’s some small consolation, I clipped a couple of jpegs from the minis, which you can see at the TCJ post. These are some of the pages we talk about in the conversation. I do urge everyone to pick them up if they can, or hold out for a collected edition, which I am sure is somewhere along the pipeline.

Mike and Alex crawled into The Panther’s Lair late Sunday evening, shortly after Hurricane Irene made her slow interminable crawl across New York City, and after two or three days of anxiety ridden anticipation, the Panthers were tired! But, ever reliable, they do their best to rally and get it up for a good show. And there’s lots to discuss: Natural Disasters, The Small Press Expo, Book Release Parties and Spotlight Panels. Mike and Alex reveal that they will be presenting one of the awards at the Prestigious Ignatz Gala at SPX, and brainstorm some ideas for comedic content.

Then! Just as the Panthers start to fall asleep, they welcome Gaz “Gary” Gretsky back into The Lair to settle some business. Astute listeners may recall last episode, where Mike confessed that he’d promised to ink a comic for his friend Gary, and had never followed through on that. Gary gets the opportunity to discuss the matter from his point of view. Plus: what is the worst Beatles song of all time, (Answer: Octopus’s Garden) and would you ever eat a bug? And not some halfway palatable bug, like a grasshopper, but some really nasty thing like a house “Eyebrow”.

Then things devolve into an argument about Novelty song, but the Panthers should be excused. We had two natural disasters in New York City last week!

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Noah Van Sciver! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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A brand new comic posted this morning: a short story about a working mother who has a secret. Read the full thing here.

And, a reminder: The Troop 142 book release party is going to be held this Friday, September 2nd at Bergen Street Comics in Park Slope, from 8-11PM. The event is open to the public, so please come on out. There’ll be drinks, good times, and advance copies of the book. Troop 142 officially debuts at the Small Press Expo in Bethseda, Maryland, on September 10th which I will be attending.

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Alex and Mike creep into The Lair to discuss a number of things. There’s a whole lot of comics talk up at the front of the show: SPX, The Ignatzes, Alex’s spotlight panel, and Mike’s upcoming Book Release Party. But, once all that’s finally out of the way, the Panthers talk about more regular everyday life-type things, such as strip clubs and pole dancing, and the likelihood that civilization will eventually collapse not through weapons built by man, but by microscopic germs that will give us all Super-Colds, and we’ll just sneeze and look clammy until we all eventually die.

Comments welcome!

Illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Tim Hamilton. Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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Reminder: The Troop 142 book release party is going to be held on Friday, September 2nd at Bergen Street Comics in Park Slope, from 8-11PM. The event is open to the public, so please come on out. There’ll be drinks and good times.

Also, I should note, the book won’t be available in stores until sometime later in the month. It officially debuts at SPX on September 10th, so the release party is a good opportunity to get a copy early. I’ll also be signing and sketching in them. I’ve got this idea for special book-plate sketches, which I’ll post about later this week.

Lisa Hanawalt joins me in the Talkie Hutt for a chat for a very entertaining discussion about her career.

I love Lisa’s comics. They are laugh out loud funny. I was interested to hear she has aspirations towards performance. She posits that many cartoonists wish they could be stand-up comedians. I am not sure what the numbers are, but I’ve talked on The Ink Panthers Show about how maybe it would be nice to do stand-up as a “fall-back” career, if cartooning doesn’t pan out. It’s funny, I get very nervous before I do any public speaking. I even get nervous before I record podcasts with cartoonists I don’t know very well (such as Lisa). But, I feel so good afterwards, in both situations – it’s why I keep doing it. Anytime I’ve ever done a live reading or podcast, and felt like it went well, it’s been like a natural high afterwards. Lisa seems to be able to relate. Have a listen.

We’re joined by incredibly talented MOME contributor and cartoonist Laura Park this week, and she tells us all about her recent trip to Wizard World Chicago. Hear about the celebrities spotted and the cosplay witnessed. Laura also lets us know about The Civil War, and comes down hard on the choice between Underwater and Outer Space. Additionally, the Panthers spend a good ten minutes or so in the beginning of the episode ranting about recent online discussions about Kickstarter. Sure to cause controversy!

Comments welcome!

Illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Rio Aubry Taylor. Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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Expect some drum-beating around this for the next couple of weeks. The book officially debuts at SPX, but will be available a week early at Bergen Street Comics, on Friday September 2nd. Bergen Street is located in Park Slope Brooklyn, it’s a fantastic comic book store, which has hosted a couple of comics and Ink Panthers events with me in the past. Please, come on out!

This week it’s just Alex and Mike in The Panther’s Lair, discussing that new Rise of the Planet of the Apes movie (or, RotPotA) and how great it is. This leads us back into a familiar discussion about Animal Rights, and how all animals have them (except scallops). Then, a conversation about Parents and Comics, some interesting new announcements, and Alex calls out an cartoonist who Has Wronged Him, and asks for advice.

Accompanying illustration of Alex and Mike riding Inky, the domesticated Panther, by Daniel Spottswood.

Comments welcome!

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Just so’s it doesn’t seem so much like I’m not posting drawings anymore, here’s a recent pic. I’m also still working on my Ain’t No Power comics, but taking a minute to step back and think about it some more. There’s something nice about diving straight into a new full-length story, but there’s also something appealing about catching my breath for a minute and taking some time to let the story develop.

It’s interesting – creating Troop 142 was such a rush. I’d gotten the story thought out enough in my head, that I was able to just power on through, writing and drawing the whole thing in a relatively short period of time. It’s made me realize how precious that sort of momentum is. It’s not easy to create. I don’t think it’s possible for me to operate at that level on a constant basis.

So, I’m figuring, Troop 142 is about to drop, maybe I should pause and try a couple of different things for a few months. I’m going to be doing a ton of traveling in the Fall, going to all sorts of cons. Maybe I should just enjoy the downtime.