Waccusations

Despite his suggesting that I might be in any way 'wacky', I'm going to recommend Tim Footman's blog Cultural Snow to everyone, not because it's in any way smarter or less self-conscious than mine (although it is) but because he posts a lot more frequently than I do. And that's what counts.

Perry Bible Fellowship

Berkeley Breathed was inconsiderate enough to make pictures of Opus in a T-shirt difficult to find, so I'm skipping to PBF and may circle back like Death in Final Destination to pick off Opus later.
Gary Larson's Far Side suffered a great deal from syndication and overexposure but it was often very funny. Perry Bible Fellowship is the inheritor of that mantle, at least in terms of intricately executed visual one-liners (OK, three-liners). What PBF adds is beautifully rendered individual art in each one, sometimes creating a note-perfect parody. Despite this it still has a recognisable visual style. There's a lot of care in the creation of each script, so well done, Nicholas Gurewitch's parents.

Porridgebreak

My friend Helga is allergic to anything set in a prison. There's something about people in scary oppressive situations that sends her running, which is surprising considering that we are friends. She's never The Green Mile or Midnight Express and she can't even watch Die Another Day until she reaches the bit where Bond is shaved and in a suit.
The only things she can bear to watch are Porridge and Prison Break, because they both maintain the same level of realism. In fact, Prison Break makes Porridge look like Oz. No matter how much leeway Fletcher was given, he was never called to the warden's office to help him build a matchstick model of the Taj Mahal for his wife's 40th birthday. He never had the plans of the jail tattooed on his body either, although if he did he could probably have the surrounding few miles on there too, in Ordnance Survey detail.
My favourite character so far is Haywire, the main character's cell-mate for one episode, ostensibly nuts but actually clued into the truth. It's just that the truth is so ear-twistingly absurb that it sounds like the rantings of a rubik's brain. As long as it maintains a 'Series 2 of 24' level of po-faced madness both I and Helga will keep tuning in.

Random Fool

Borrowing... OK, Ripping off the idea from The Onion's article here, I've decided to put my ipod on shuffle and talk about the first 5 tracks that come up. The idea is that your true music tastes are laid bare on the slab, ready for Grissom to prod and poke. No, wait, come back!
-Click-

Oingo Boingo- Flesh 'N' Blood
In my teens I went through a crisis of confidence and was saved by reading Grant Morrison's Invisibles, which served as a hypertext of possible interesting authors and ideas, even if in retrospect the comic itself was a bit sloppy and incoherent. While reading the Invisibles I listened either to Combustible Edison's 'I, Swinger' or 'Best Of Boingo', from which this classic piece of eighties geek-funk comes.

Kenickie- Spies
Kenickie's songs have this kind of lovely sneer to them, a sneer that doesn't seem nasty or arrogant but endearing and kind of gawky. This track would be in the soundtrack of any Bond movie I produced. The villain? Chevy Chase. The girl? Alicia Witt. The gadget? Laser moustache.

Raymond Scott- Ohio Plus
16 seconds of commercialised bleeps from Electronica pioneer Raymond Scott. This is from a huge album of the work that Scott did in the fifties, jerry-rigging his own electronic musical equipment while surviving on funds from corporations who loved the crisp, high-tech sound that he could give their ads, even if most of them sound like a toad making sweet love to Sputnik.

Beck- Sissyneck
Odelay is still one of my favourite albums, despite lots of other people ruining my fun by liking it too. Beck sews himself a coat made of seemingly disparate pieces of hip-hop, pop rock and country and runs around in it whooping like a clown on fire. Strangely comforting.

Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band-Mickey's Son And Daughter
One of my least favourite Bonzo tracks this, as it's a straight-up music hall clone with little to merit it. So there.

Now you try.

Leap On Mars

BBC1's Life On Mars, while not exactly setting my brain on fire, has proved itself to be exciting, well written, and surprisingly original in its outlook. The only thing that lets it down is its sub-Casualty opening titles. I can see they were trying to mix a John Barry/Roy Budd style chilled instrumental with a more urgent modern beat but it turned out pretty weak, especially when combined with the excellent selections of music in the episodes themselves.
The real reason for this post? I just wanted to say that last night, when a frustrated Sam Tyler muttered 'Why am I still here?', I thought the camera would pan across to show Dean Stockwell with a cigar consulting Ziggy on his little hand-monitor. Well, hoped.
Wait a minute... did Quantum Leap prefigure the Blackberry?

Criswell Predicts

Possible headline after the UK public smoking ban is installed:
PUBLIC DISCOVER WITH HORROR WHAT PUBS ACTUALLY SMELL LIKE.

Maakies

Maakies feels like the fever dream of a child spending their summer holidays in their grandparent's house, terrified of the weird nautical trinkets and stuffed animals. Ostensibly about horrible smelly monkey Uncle Gabby and his insane friend Drinky Crow, this strip has a queasy undercurrent, and a briny smell coming off it. They drink, they sail, often they die. The art is uniquely deranged and often showcases beautifully rendered sea battles. Sometimes I feel the content's a bit needlessly tasteless. But there's nothing else like it right now.
Incidentally, the picture's an atypically modern panel, but I picked it to continue my theme.

Housd

Ali Graham's Housd is a great cartoon strip, a pop-culture sleigh-ride guided by whatever its creator is currently interested in. It relies rather heavily on the 'throwaway joke becomes plot twist' technique I mentioned, like, 2 posts ago, but the places it goes are usually interesting and worthwhile. Furthermore, it follows Achewood's lead by having one of its characters, Stitch, write a fake blog. This started out fairly innocuous but has become a scathing analysis of usual web-comic tropes.If he wrote this himself and his strip had same problems he criticised, he could be called a big hypocrite. But because it's Stitch he can cut loose.
Also, he's about 12 years old or something.

Tickling the rat of love with the mechanical robo-fingers of sentiment.

My views on Valentines Day is that those who can celebrate should be free to do so, but as long as you do so behind closed doors, away from the eyes of those it upsets and enrages. Secret ninja love assignations, if you will.
I've been with my girl for over 5 years now and our life is as fun and exciting as ever. Especially since we've taken to travelling around the country solving murders at the weekend.
I love you, honey.
PS The baby in the picture is a rental.

Beaver And Steve

I'm quite new to Beaver And Steve, having been introduced to it after its friendly creator shared a table at Brighton Comic Expo with Ali Graham. But more on him later.
What can I say? Delicious art, tasty gags, a tiramisu of quality comic-strip. Ness. It's also a masterclass in the often used web-comic technique of turning a throw-away gag into a plot development. There should be a phrase for that.
By the way, a prize to the first person who can tell the link between all the panels I have chosen from my webcomix. It's remarkably obvious, so don't strain yourselves.

Achewood

I'm going abecedarianally on this one, so as not to make any of the cartoonists jealous.
Achewood's about a group of toy animals, but only in the same sense that Spaced is about two people pretending to be a couple, or Pacman is about a little yellow man with a drug problem. The key is the characters. With their unique speech patterns and sweet eccentric little relationships, it's a testament to their realism that I'm genuinely concerned about the outcome of The Great Outdoor Fight. I started off liking Philippe best( like most early readers, I imagine), but Ray's the man (cat?) for me now.
The art's deceptively simple, but extremely expressive and well composed.
And there's Cartilage Head.

Web-Comic Week

This week it's my intention to talk endlessly about my favourite web-comics, and maybe finish off with some Gingerbread Grail. Whether any of this happens or not is dependent on a staggering number of factors, including spare time, actual inclination, and whether or not the home-made energy drink I'm brewing in my loft has any effect.
I'm calling it Vermillion Swan.

Saccharine Post And Horrible Picture To Counteract It

Just wanted to say hello and thanks to my regular readers, especially those who take the time to leave comments. You're all fantastic individuals and Robotic Hat goody-bags would be winging their way to your houses, if I had any goody-bags, or the inclination to make some.
The only thing to decide is what to call you. Hatheads? Robotoids? Robotichattites? So many choices. All of them terrible.

Gingerbread Grail Links

Anticipate an imminent recap of The Gingerbread Grail, my deliberately shoddy Interactive Conspiracy Thriller, and then some more chapters with an exciting new direction. As opposed to the previous direction, which was 'sideways'.
Here's links to the previous chapters.
Trailer
Chapter 1 Part A
Trailer 2
Chapter 1 Part B
Chapter 2 Part A
Trailer 3
Something seemingly unrelated about microwaves that is in fact vitally important to the story
Chapter 2 Part B
Chapter 3 Part A
Trailer 4

Note: Lines are now closed on Chapters 1, 2 and 3.

Great Ideas That Might Almost Work

1) Football Karaoke. You put videos of classic football matches on and people provide their own commentary.

2)Screenings of childrens' films in which kids are banned. Watch the latest pixar flick without the irritation of screaming, crying or getting popcorn in your ears.

3)Nature Karaoke. You put on videos of wildlife, people provide their own whispery David Attenborough style narration.

4)Travel jazz. Making a long night time car journey? Why not hire a jazz professional to sit in the passenger seat and play mellow grooves?

5)Film Noir Karaoke. Put on an old black and white detective film, get people to do their own gritty voiceover.