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chiseler · 3 years

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Hero of Our Nation

I first encountered Roger Ramjet on a Chicago public access station in 1983. It was part of an early morning show apparently aimed at stoner insomniacs. The show came on at five and also included episodes of Lancelot Link, Secret Chimp, that awful Beatles cartoon, and a weather report clarified by some appropriate pop song (“Here Comes the Sun” or “Here Comes the Rain Again”). I was usually up and around that early for some godforsaken reason, and originally started watching on account of Lancelot Link. Always did love that Lancelot Link. But Roger Ramjet was, well, let’s just say it was a revelation.

Roger Ramjet, “ that All-American good guy and devil may care flying fool” (as he compulsively introduces himself) was a none too bright and none too coordinated drug-dependent space age superhero in an ongoing battle against the assorted forces of evil (or more specifically, N.A.S.T.Y.) to preserve the American Way of Life. He was square-jawed, straight-laced, straight-faced, and True Blue if little else, so hyper-patriotic that nearly every time his name is spoken aloud an American flag, a bald eagle, or a rotating ring of stars appears on the screen. After catching one or two episodes, I forgot all about Lancelot Link.

The show was easy to overlook, especially when squeezed between the Beatles and some secret agent chimps with a psychedelic band. The episodes were only five minutes long (maybe seven with the abrasive theme song filling out the opening and closing credits), and were so crudely drawn and animated it might at a glance seem like something a couple of junior high school kids threw together in their basement one weekend. The shows were so primitive they hardly bothered with niceties like “backgrounds” satisfied instead to settle for rudimentary suggestions of a setting. But the writing was so sharp and the voice talent so good what it really felt like, if you paid attention, was a spoof of a ‘40s radio serial like Sky King or Gangbusters, complete with a soap opera organ and illustrated by a handful of jerky drawings scratched out by someone’s kid. People who thought Jay Ward’s Bullwinkle and Dudley Do-Right were crude when compared with the output from Disney or Warner Brothers had no idea what “crude” meant.

Looking at it today what it reminds me of more than anything are the paper cutout animations of the earliest episodes of South Park, before they upgraded to Flash. Along with the lo-fi stylistics, the humor was clearly aimed at an adult audience while pretending otherwise. You may not find any child molestation jokes or crass religious cracks in Roger Ramjet, but for 1965 the lightning-fast humor was pretty hepcat and sophisticated, with undisguised satirical references to the Cold War, Central American turmoil, and the Vietnam War (“Hey kids, this is Roger Ramjet,” demanding that you stay tuned to this station to see my next adventure,” Roger announces in his commanding superhero baritone. “Or I’ll see to it that all you little rascals are drafted.”) . Mixed in with the topical jokes we also get some highly unlikely name drops, from Noel Coward and Henry Cabot Lodge to James Joyce and bawdy nightclub performer Rusty Warren, as well as film parodies and literary nods to the likes of Catch-22 and Catcher in the Rye. It’s also a little less than what you might call racially sensitive by modern standards (consider Mexican revolutionaries The Enchilada Brothers, Beef and Chicken).

While a lot of the more timely jokes might be lost in the murk of the over 50 years since it first aired, there’s plenty of rapid-fire absurdity that’s timeless, from the misspelled title cards punctuating the narration to the self-consciously dumb coked-up adventures.

Bullwinkle aired from ‘61 to ‘64. Roger Ramjet came along a year later and Jay Ward’s influence is undeniable. The difference was Roger Ramjet crammed the equivalent number of bad jokes, references, and plot twists of a typical 8-part Bullwinkle serial into each five-minute episode, both mirroring the rapid-fire screwball dialogue of the ‘30s and the frenetic quick-cut comedy to come along a year or two later in shows like The Monkees and Laugh-In.

The episodes were produced with essentially no budget and were cranked out very quickly by a small team of writers, voiceover artists and animators with solid day jobs in radio and TV. They were all seasoned pros, some dating back to the days of classic radio, who worked on the show after hours as a way of letting off a little steam and tossing around a few cynical, subversive cultural jabs their day jobs wouldn’t allow. The show was created originally by animator Fred Crippen (who went on to work on some pretty dreadful crap like the Extreme Ghostbusters and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) and Ken Snyder, an ad exec who moved over into producing cartoons. They brought in a remarkable team of voice talent and comedy writers, including Gene Moss (the voice of Smokey the Bear) Jim Thurmam (who did a lot of kids shows including Sesame Street), Dick Beals (the original voice of Gumby), and the great Gary Owens, a drive-time deejay in LA who would get national recognition soon enough as the on-screen announcer for Laugh-In. Although they would all get specific credits in the end (Crippen as director, Moss as a writer) it was a communal effort, in which everyone contributed to the writing, and everyone, even the executive producer, did a few of the voices. Apart from the regular crew, careful listeners might also catch a few uncredited guest appearances by some surprisingly big names (I’m told Sinatra and Dean Martin appear in an episode, but I’m still looking for that one). Owens was the star, though, as his ability to read the most ridiculous lines in a dramatic deadpan made him the perfect Roger Ramjet. Together they made 156 episodes (about 150 still exist), which were sold directly into syndication in ‘65 as half hour shows, each containing three unconnected adventures. I can’t say as I’m exactly sure who they thought their target audience was at the time, except maybe each other.

Much like William Conrad in Bullwinkle, each show opened with our narrator, Steve Allen alum Dave Ketchum, setting the mood and the scene (“In today’s depressing episode,” he’d begin with dramatic enthusiasm, or maybe it was an “existentialist episode,” “phlegmatic episode,” “rickety episode,” “hairy episode,” or “ethnic episode”). Then we’re out of the gate at a breakneck pace, with a flurry of gags coming from every direction. “Ramjet rode into Boot Hill,” we’re told, “where the men were men and the women were men, which can get pretty old after awhile.”

While none of the shows are connected, there are a few recurring characters and locations worth remembering: Roger hails from Lompoc, an actual California town (“where nothing ever happens, and seldom does”) and takes his orders from General G.I. Brassbottom, a no nonsense military man who “hadn’t had an original idea since he was a civilian.” He’s also assisted by Yank, Doodle, Dan, and Dee, the unusually chubby kids who make up the American Eagle squadron. Like Roger, all the members of the squadron wear their white jumpsuits and flight helmets at all times (Roger even wears his helmet on dates), and in true superhero sidekick fashion, their primary job is to get Roger out of scrapes and make sure his drugs are handy.

That’s one little detail more than a few casual viewers have taken umbrage with. Roger, see, is a pretty hapless character most of the time, but he repeatedly saves the world thanks to a little help from his Proton Energy Pills (PEP), which take five seconds to kick in, then give him the strength of 20 A-Bombs for 20 seconds. Modern viewers seem a little uncomfortable with the idea of a superhero gulping amphetamines in order to function, but all I can say is, well, it was a different time, and hey, it worked for Roger and Elvis both.

The proton energy pills come in handy when dealing with his arch-nemesis Noodles Romanoff, the short, trench coat and fedora wearing head of N.A.S.T.Y. (the National Association of Spies, Traitors, and Yahoos). Romanoff may not have a Natasha, but he does have a gang of cronies and thugs who all mumble in unison (save for one, who can’t seem to get the rhythm).

Along with Romanoff and his gang, Roger also has to contend with some lanky alien robots, the Solenoids (voiced by executive priducer Ken Snyder), and their repeated efforts to invade the planet in assorted ridiculous ways (in one episode, they begin kidnapping all the Miss America contestants, who “were disappearing faster than co-eds at a Dartmouth weekend.”)

When not saving the world, Roger found himself competing with the smarmy hotshot test pilot Lance Crossfire (who sounds an awful lot like burt Lancaster) for the affections of Lotta Love, the fickle Southern belle with a taste for the finer things in life.

Then there are the adventures themselves. Some seem standard superhero fare, but only to a point. Earth is besieged by flying saucer attacks (sort of). Roger’s hometown is terrorized by a werewolf (sort of). Roger plays tennis with a kangaroo, or becomes the first man to surf in space, or, in a personal favorite, attempts to stop the flow of bootleg comic books into America’s drug stores.

Actually, there’s an interesting moment in that one that revealed just how subtle you could be even with animation this unsophisticated. Okay, so Noodles Romanoff, see, is replacing real comics in drug store racks with bootlegs in which popular superheroes are humiliated, all in an effort to destroy the morale of America’s children. After Brassbottom shows Roger a few examples (the issues include “Superman Gets Beat Up by a Chicken!” and “Ratman Stubs His Toe!”) he explains that if this sort of thing continues, “America’s kids won’t have anyone to look up to except YOU, Ramjet.” Then, for just an instant in that crude and jerky style, Roger cuts his eyes toward the camera, revealing in that moment everything we needed to know, namely that it’s what he’s always wanted.

Thirty years on and that still sticks with me.

In the end, though, the characters and storylines are secondary at best In Roger Ramjet. At heart it’s a matter of trying to keep up with all the lightning-quick jokes and wordplay, the non-sequiturs and references. In the five minute span of one cowboy-themed episode I counted nods to at least seven classic Western films, from High Noon to She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, and I suspect I missed a few. It really is such a dizzying blur of dialogue and bad puns and cultural references, sometimes, christ, even just references to old jokes that take the form of bad puns (“Waiter, there’s a spy in my soup” or “how many angels can swim in the head of a beer?”), that absurd as it all is, repeated viewings are a necessity to catch everything. It’s a bit like having the complete contents of an issue of MAD magazine jammed onto a single page. It can make your head hurt after a while, but it’s worth it. Whether the density and the pace make it better or worse for stoner viewing is something, I guess, each stoner will need to answer for him or herself. Lots of bright colors, though.

In 1965 there was nothing new about making cartoons with adult sensibilities in mind. Betty Boop and Bugs Bunny were made to be shown as short subjects to largely adult audiences. Jay Ward’s cartoons a few decades down the line were near-revolutionary for smuggling hip, subversive political humor into what had become an exclusively child-friendly format. What made Roger Ramjet so radical was it’s blend of ‘30s radio style with mid-’60s cynicism, as well as its foreshadowing of our shrinking attention spans, a hyper-condensed proton pill of comedy and commentary disguised as just another dumb, low-rent superhero cartoon. Although it’s barely remembered today, its influence is still evident in most any subversive animated show you can name, even if they’ve slowed things down a bit.

by Jim Knipfel

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awpcomics · 4 years

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Small press Shack stock update 1

I'm opening up an online store soon and here's a look at the current stock of titles available. if interested in any of the books let me know. shipping costs vary.

Small Press Shack comic stock listing (by Company)

36k studios

Tru vibes

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

2000 A.D.

Scarlet Traces

vol. 1 $25

vol. 2 $25

Aam/Markosia

N-Guard # 1 $5

Ablaze

Unsacred

# 7 $5

Unsacred TPB 1 $25

Unsacred vol. 2

# 1 $5

Abstract Studio

Motor Girl # 1 $10

Rachel Rising

# 13 $4

# 14 $4

#15 $4

#16 $4

#17 $4

#18 $4

# 19 $4

# 20 $4

# 21 $4

#22 $4

# 23 $4

#24 $4

# 25 $4

#26 $4

# 27 $4

#28 $4

# 29 $4

#30 $4

# 31 $4

#32 $4

# 33 $4

#34 $4

# 35 $4

#36 $4

# 37 $4

#38 $4

# 39 $4

#40 $4

# 41 $4

#42 $4

Academy Comics

Robotech 2 The sentinels

book 4

# 13 $5

Action Lab

Adventure Finders vol. 2 #1 $5

Princeless

TPB 1 (small ) $80

part 2

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

#3 $5

part 3

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

#4 $5

TPB $15

part 4

# 1 $5

#2 $5

#3 $5

#4 $5

TPB $15

part 5

#0 $5

#1 $5

#2 $5

#3 $5

TPB $15

part 6

TPB $15

part 7

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

# 4 $5

# 5 $5

TPB $15

part 8

#1 $5

#2 $5

#3 $5

#4 $5

TPB $15

part 9

TPB $15

Raven : The Pirate Princess

# 1 $5

#2 $5

#3 $5

#4 $5

#5 $5

#6 $5

#7 $5

#8 $5

#9 $5

#11 $5

Action Lab- Danger Zone

Vampblade vol. 3 # 11 $5

ALC Publishing

Works vol. 1 $10

Alpha-Wave Productions

Ben Dunn Shorts

vol. 1 $20

Vol. 2 $40

Derp Dragons

vol. 1 $20

vol. 2 $20

Jenna & Ninja High School TPB $15

Mighty Tiny: Lost Tails TPB $15

Ninja High School: Ultimate Perfect Memory $15

Ninja High School : Salusian Chess TPB $15

Quagmire U.S.A. TPB $20

Silver Cross TPB $15

Small Bodied Ninja High School TPB $30

Swimmer

vol. 1 $15

vol. 2 $15

vol. 3 $15

Tales From Quagmire U.S.A. TPB $20

Tiger-X TPB $20

Zetraman TPB $25

A.M. Works

Athena

# 1 $4

# 3 $4

#5 $5

#8 $5

Antarctic Press

Gold Digger

Gold Digger # 1 (35th anniversary special ) $15

collected gold digger vol. 3 $5

collected gold digger vol.4 $5

collected gold digger vol.6 $5

collected gold digger vol.8 $5

vol. 3 (color series)

# 3 $10

#4 $10

#13 $4

#14 $4

#15 $4

#17 $4

#43 $4

#56 $4

#60 $4

#62 $5

Gold Diger Gold brick # 6 (#'s 76-100) $50

#98 $2

#100 $5

#101 $2(fcbd ed)

#103 $5

#200 $5

#202 $5

#211 $5

#213 $5

#214 $5

#215 $5

#216 $5

#222 $2

#236 $5

#245 $5

#256 $5

#261 $2

#262 $5

#268 $5

#269 $5

#271 $5

#272 $5

#273 $5

#274 $5

#275 $5

#276 $5

#277 $5

GD – 18

# 1 $5

Gold Digger Perfect Memory

# 2 $10

Gold Digger Annual

#5 $4

#10 $4

#15 $5

#16 $5

#20 $5

Peebo Tales

# 2 $4

# 3 $4

#4 $4

Tangent

# 2 $4

Halloween

# 2 $4

#9 $4

Holidays Special

Universe

# 19 $4

X-Mas Special

# 2 $4

#3 $4

#6 $4

#7 $4

#11 $5

#12 $5

Ninja High School

# 3 1/2 $4

#35 $8

#36 $25

#37 $50 (first warrior nun)

#39 $5

#40 $5

#41 $4

#42 $4

#44 $4

#46 $4

#47 $4

#48 $4

#50 $10

#66 $4

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#99 $4

#102 $4

#104 $4

#130 $4

#149 $4

#177 (clr) $5

#177 (B&W) $3

#178 $5

Furry NHS

# 1 $50

# 2 $25

Ninjas vs Aliens

# 2 $5

NHS in Color

# 3 $5

#6 $5

NHS Indie Wars vol. 1 $40

NHS V.2

# 1 $5

# 4 $2

#10 $2

#12 $2

Benzine

# 3 $8

Jenna & NHS

# 2 $10

Hitomi & Her Girl Commandoes

#1 $5

part 2

#5 $5

#6 $5

NHS Annual

# 1 $10

#4 $5

#7 $5

#8 $5

#9 $9

#10 $5

#11 $5

#15 $5

Girls of NHS

# 1 $10

#2 $5

#3 $5

#7 $5

NHS/ GD Maidens of Twilight

TPB $10

NOT Ninja High School

# 1 $100

# 2 $100

# 3 $100

Perfect Memory

# 3 $10

# 4 $15

NHS Swimsuit

# 1 $20

#3 $10

#4 $5

#7 (2001) $80 (first art by Dan Mendoza- Zombie Tramp)

Quagmire USA (Dave Matsuoka)

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

SB NHS

#2 $5

# 3 $5

NHS Spotlight

# 1 $5

Zetraman

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

part 2

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

Absolute Zero # 1 $20

Airboy: Deadeye

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

# 4 $5

Albedo #1 $25

Alley oop # 1 $4

B.A.D.A.S.S. # 1 $15

Blackhops: hare Trigger # 1 $10

Box office Poison # 6 $4

Cat Shit One

# 1 $20

Creature # 2 $4

Cybertronian guide # 3 $15

Enter the zombie # 1 $5

Exciting Comics

# 1 $10

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

# 3B $15

# 4 $5

# 5 $5

# 6 $5

# 7 $5

100 page special $15

Gigantor

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

# 4 $5

#5 $5

#8 $5

#12 $5

Gobs # 1 $4

Jungle Comics

# 2 $5

# 2B $15

# 3 $5

H-Bomb # 1 $50

Hit The Beach # 2 $60

Horror Comics

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

How to Draw Manga #8 $10

Kamen America # 1 $15

Knightmare

# 2 $5

# 6 $4

Konnichiwa Kaiju Kun # 1 $5

Legacy

#2 $4

#4 $4

#5 $4

Legend of Sleepy Hollow # 1 $5

Littlest Zombie # 2 $5

Luftwaffe 1946

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

vol. 2

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

# 4 $5

# 5 $5

# 6 $5

# 7 $5

# 8 $5

#9 $5

#10 $5

#11 $5

#12 $5

#13 $5

#14 $5

#15 $5

#16 $5

Macabre # 1 $4

Mangazine

vol. 1

# 2 $5

vol. 2

# 7 $5

#11 $50 (First Gold Digger)

#12 $30

#13 $20

#40 $3

Manga Titles (Antarctic)

Change Commander Goku # 2 $5

Gojin # 3 $2

Hurricane Girls # 1 $4

Iczer 1

# 3 $5

# 4 $5

# 5 $5

Stainless Steel Armadillo # 6 $2

Vampire Miyu

Ashcan $5

Mighty Tiny

# 1 $10

# 2 $10

# 3 $10

# 4 $10

# 5 $10

Mischief & Mayhem winter fun # 1 $4

Mythtresses # 1 $5

Neotopia

# 5 $4

Part 3

# 1 $4

part 4

# 3 $4

# 4 $4

Nine lives of Herbert Noble # 1 $2

Patriotika # 1 $5

Pirates vs Ninjas

# 1 $10

# 2 $5

Annual # 1 $5

Planet Comics

# 1B $15

# 2 $5

Plush # 1 $5

Political Comics

Incredulous Trump # 1 $50

Sarah Palin Rogue Warrior # 1 $10

She-Trump # 1 $20

Prince of Heroes

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

part 2

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

Punchline

# 1 (FCBD) $5

# 6 $5

Rags # 7 $5

Robin Hood # 1 $5

Robotech

#4 $5

#5 $5

Vermilion # 3 $5

covert Ops # 2 $5

Shanna The Firehair

# 1 $8

# 1B $15

Shanda The Panda

# 1 $50

# 2 $40

# 3 $30

# 4 $20

# 8 $15

# 10 $10

# 11 $10

# 15 $10

Sidewinder # 1 $5

Steampunk titles

Edge of Empire

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

Girls of Steampunk

2014 $5

Immortal Wings

# 1 $4

# 2 $4

# 3 $4

# 4 $4

Little Match Girl $5

Sherlock Holmes steam Detective # 1 $5

Sherlock Holmes steam Detective :five napoleons # 1 $5

Steam Hunters # 1 $5

Time Lincoln # 1 $5

Time Lincoln TPB $20

super tiny Dragon arms # 1 $5

Teether

# 1 $10

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

# 4 $5

Tigers of Terra

vol. 1 (Mindvisions)

#9 $50

vol. 2

# 1 $20

#2 $20

#4 $10

#5 $10

#8 $5

TPB vol. 3 $50

TPB vol. 4 $50

vol. 3

# 1 $4

# 3 $4

Technical Manual

# 1 $10

# 2 $10

Twilight-X

Interlude

# 6 $10

Ascension

# 3 $10

Quarterly

# 1 $5

X-Tra

# 1 $4

Storm

# 4 $4

# 5 $4

# 6 $4

War

# 1 $4

Ultrabot go go go ! # 1 $5

Valhalla # 1 $10

Velvet Touch # 1 $50

Warrior Nun Areala

vol. 1

# 3 (no CD) $10

vol. 2 (Rituals)

# 1 $10

#2 $10

# 3 $10

# 4 $10

#5 $5

vol. 3 (Scorpio Rose)

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

# 4 $5

vol. 4

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

#4 $5

# 5 $5

#6 $5

vol.5

# 1 $5

Vol.6

# 4 $5

#5 $5

#14 $5

#15 $5

#16 $5

#17 $5

#19 $5

vol. 7

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

# 4 $5

# 6 $5

# 7 $5

# 8 $5

# 11 $5

# 13 $5

# 14 $5

# 21 $5

# 22 $5

Annual # 1 $5

Black & White

# 1 $10

# 2 $10

# 3 $10

# 4 $5

# 5 $5

# 6 $5

# 7 $5

# 8 $5

# 11 $5

# 14 $5

# 15 $5

# 17 $5

# 20 $5

Brigantia

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

Frenzy

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

Lillith

# 0 $10

# 2 $4

No Justice # 1 $5

Rheintochter # 1 $5

Serina

# 1 $5

# 3 $5

Shotgun Mary

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

vol. 2

# 1 $5

blood Lore

# 3 $4

#4 $4

Shooting gallery

Silver Cross

# 1 $10

# 2 $8

# 3 $5

Vs Razor

# 1 $10

Zombie Killustrated # 1 $5

Apple Comics

Space Ark # 5 $4

Arcana

Clockwork Girl # 3 $2

Aspen Comics

Potal Bound # 0 $2

Archie Publishing

TMNT : April O'Neil # 3 $8

Avatar Press

Warrior Nun Dora

# 3 $10

Bandai

Witchblade the manga $30

Benitez Productions

Lady Mechanika : Sangre

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

# 4 $5

Blatant

Marry me

vol.1 $50

Boom Studios

Buffy The Vampire Slayer

# 6 $5

# 7 $5

Buffy: Every Generation # 1 $10

Heartbeat # 1 $5

Kong on Planet of the apes # 1 $5

Mega man Fully Charged # 1 $8

Ronin Island # 1 $10

Ruin World # 1 $5

Unkindness of Ravens # 1 $5

Welcome to Wanderland # 1 $5

Wicked Things # 1 $5

Wynd # 1 $8

Bongo Comics

Mylo Xyloto

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

# 4 $5

# 5 $5

# 6 $5

Caruso Comics

Crossroads # 1 $4

CPM Manga

Lodoss War : grey witch #4 $2

Lodoss War: Lady of Pharis # 4 $2

Princess Prince

# 1 $10

# 2 $5

Project A-Ko # 2 $5

Cubhouse

Wormworld Saga vol. 1 $15

Dark Horse Comics

Bill & Ted are Doomed

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

Dominion : no More Noise # 6 $4

Elf Quest final quest # 2 $6

Empowered

vol. 11 $25

soldier of love TPB $20

Soldier of love # 3 $5

High School Hell

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

# 4 $5

Flaming Carrot

# 18 $4

# 19 $4

# 20 $4

# 23 $4

# 24 $4

# 25 (TMNT) $10

# 27 (TMNT) $10

# 30 $4

Giants # 1 $5

Girl in the Bay # 1 $5

Mystery Science Theatre 3000

Ashcan $10

Shadow Lady

# 21 $4

# 22 $4

# 23 $4

Dangerous Love

# 1 $4

# 2 $4

# 3 $4

eyes of a stranger

# 2 $4

# 5 $4

Super Mario Encyclopedia $40

Devils Due/1First comics

Larks Killer # 1 $5

Double Diamond Press

Hepcats # 7 $4

Dynamite

Army of Darkness vs. Reanimator

# 1A $10

# 1B $10

Nancy Drew # 1B $5

Eclipse Comics

Black Belt Hamsters # 2 $4

Black Belt Hamsters 3D # 4 $4

Cutey Bunny # 5 $10

Fusion # 1 $4

Zooniverse # 1 $4

Entity Comics

Stargate # 3 $4

Stargate: one nation under Ra # 1 $4

Zen intergalactic ninja # 2 $4

Epic Comics

Memories # 1 $5

Eternity Comics

Blade of Shuriken # 3 $4

Eternity triple action # 3 $4

Robotech 2 the sentinels

# 1 $10

# 2 $10

#4 $4

#11 $4

#12 $4

#13 $4

#14 $4

#15 $4

#16 $4

Book 2

# 5 $4

Genesis

# 1 $5

# 2 $5

# 3 $5

# 4 $5

# 5 $5

# 6 $5

Malcontent Uprisings

#8 $4

# 9 $4

wedding special # 1 $10

Tom Corbett space cadet # 4 $4

Eurotica/Mangerotica

Lust vol. 1 $20 (AO)

Ogenki Clinic vol. 1 $25 (AO)

Event Comics

here come the Big people # 1 $4

Fanboy Entertainment

Spellbound # 1 $4

Fantaco

Infinite Punishment #1 $10

Fantagraphics

Critters # 11 $8

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djlook · 5 years

Text

Off the Air 11/19/19 Playlist

The Meters - Loving You Is On My Mind

Jimmy Ruffin - If You Will Let Me, I Know I Can

Aretha Franklin - One Step Ahead

El Michels Affair - Zaharila

Lemos e Debétio - Morro do Barraco Sem Água

Kim Jung Mi - Your Dream

Jack Wilkins - Red Clay

The Chordettes - Lollipop

Louis Prima - I Wanna Be Like You

Shawn Lee’s Ping Pong Orchestra - Hey Ya

Hepcat - Dance Wid’ Me

Peter Bjorn and John - Young Folks

Bob Dorough - Three Is A Magic Number

The Beatles - All Together Now

Dixie Cups - Iko Iko

Devendra Banhart - Little Yellow Spider

Lemon Jelly - Nice Weather for Ducks

Alex Winston - Choice Notes

San Cisco - Awkward

Cults - Go Outside (Menehan Street Band Remix)

The Sylvers - We Can Make It If We Try

George McCrae - You Can Have It All

Natural Child - It’s A Shame My Store Isn’t Open

Cate Le Bon & Bradford Cox - Canto!

Courtney Barnett - Keep On

Electrelane - Enter Laughing

Okey Dokey - What Do I Got Left

Vacacion - Amor De Verano

Tennis - Runner

Josienne Clark - If I Didn’t Mind

The Weather Station - Thirty

Men I Trust - Oncle Jazz

Men I Trust - Norton Commander (Album V)

Sitcom - Still Life

Westerman - Confirmation

Oscar Jerome - Lizard Street

Little Dragon - Tongue Kissing

John Wizards - Iyongwe

Zackey Force Funk - Around My Way

Todd Terje - Preben Goes To Apulco

Elaquent - Take It Higher

Panda Bear - Bros

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microshiner · 5 years

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Ska, craft spirits, and Colorado's real drinking town

The hangover bell rings loud and clear in my head as I lift a 70 pound guitar cabinet into the back of a white 2000 Ford Econoline XL. Rain falls lightly. I am running on only a few slovenly hours of sleep but despite the pounding head, my mood is jovial. My band mates and I recount the night before over and over. In the world of ska music, there are few bands more respected than Hepcat, and few bands more infamous than Mephiskapheles, and we just shared the stage with both in one night. It was also the kick off to the second leg of our spring and summer run- this morning we hit the road out of Denver and head for Durango, Colorado, where we’ll spend a week in the studio and follow it up with two shows in the area including a performance at the legendary Ska Brewing Company.

Alright.

Personally, I am excited for more than one reason. I went to school in Durango, but it’s been six years since I’ve lived there and from what I can tell, the drinking scene has only gotten better. A new craft distillery just opened up, and the number of breweries has jumped from 4 to 6 (All this in a town of 17,000. Fort Collins gets the glory, but at over 150,000 residents, are their 14 breweries and 3 distilleries that impressive? Which is the real drinking town?)

I contemplate this and other pressing issues to pass the time on a 7 hour haul over the Rocky Mountains. As we climb in elevation, my mood levels off. It always does when passing time in the van. Whether I am headed somewhere new or somewhere I’ve been many times, as long as it’s light outside touring has always had a bit of a weird vibe to me. The late nights, the shows, the people, the free drink tickets - that is what it’s all about and what makes it worth it. The rush of playing a good show is matched by no drug or other experience I’ve ever had. But during the day, driving through the middle of nowhere to the next town while getting further and further away from your personal life back home, the anxiety creeps in.

Maybe it’s because I’ve never been in a band at a level where touring was our income. I’ve always had to hurry back home after each run and get to work in order to keep the bills paid. Right now, it’s about 9:30 on Monday morning. Everyone I know (except the three guys sitting here with me) is at work, or walking the dog, or heading to the bank, something normal.

Don’t get me wrong, there is certainly a level of awesome to all this. I’m never going to be a ‘company man.’ I knew that by the time I hit high school. I take a lot of pride in what I do for a living and for a hobby. But the older I get, the harder I find it to relate the stories of the road and the stories of the pen and the stories of so many nights passed in rock clubs to people who are my age but haven’t had a night out in months. The word ‘baby’ means something entirely different to them.

As Vonnegut would say - So it goes. We pull into town just in time for happy hour but unfortunately the liquor store will have to suffice for tonight; we’ve got to get to the studio. Tomorrow I will have the opportunity to experience some of the actual culture of this town I’ve missed so much.

Tuesday morning I am walking down Main Avenue bright and early in a leisurely search for a cup of coffee and a paper. Part of me feels like a Texan, stopping to gaze into each store window as I pass by and then actually purchasing, after looking around to make sure no one I know is in sight then ducking quickly into the storefront, a “Durango” t-shirt. I’ll have to bury this down in my backpack so my bandmates never see it. I justify the window shopping and eventual purchase as a mere way to pass some time before my scheduled meeting with some real locals, the owners of Durango Craft Spirits, at 10 o’clock.

I walk into the tasting room to meet owners Michael and Amy McCardell. Immediately I can tell that the duo lives by their motto and are ‘Inspired by the true spirit of Durango’ - It is only 10 am but the room is full of bluegrass music and the McCardell’s beckoning call for a drink. Michael handles the distilling of what is currently their sole offering - Soiled Dove Vodka, made from a mash of 60% native grown, non-GMO white corn they get directly from the Ute Mountain Tribe of Ute in Towaoc, Colorado (just a little over an hour from Durango). His soft voice, with a bit of a country tinge, makes even a short sentence sound well-rehearsed and wise. Perfect for telling stories, and I’m guessing he has a lot of them.

Lucky for me, Michael is not at all shy about telling the story of Durango Craft Spirits, his pride and joy.

It is, I learn quickly, Durango’s first post-prohibition, grain-to-glass distillery. “We’ve got a couple friends over at Ska, Dave (Thibodeau) and Bill (Graham), that opened Peach Street Distillery, in Grand Junction) years ago and one day I met the old distiller and Bill brought in one of their first bottles of gin, along with a bottle of Bombay Sapphire,” Michael says. “It was just unbelievably so much better. That first opened my eyes to craft distilling.”

This was over ten years ago, and until that day Michael had no plans at all of going into the distilling business. “A couple years later, I’m hiking around a piece of property up north with the county assessor, and he said ‘I gotta tell you this story. There’s a buddy of mine who thought he found some ancient Anasazi ruins on his property and he wanted me to come check them out. They hiked up there on a cliff to an Anasazi looking wall and there was an old still sitting back there.’”

He decided to do some research and try to figure out what kind of distilling was done in the area. “I started reading a few books about distilling in the area, and there was quite a bit done,” Michael says. “Especially turn of the last century when the silver market took a crash. A lot of the miners took to cooking booze in the mines.”

With his interest piqued, Michael attended three distilling schools and landed himself an internship at Wood’s High Mountain Distillery in Salida, CO, with the intention of opening his own show in Durango once he learned about the operational side. Both Michael and Amy had spent years in the local hospitality industry managing hotels and a golf club.

As their current jobs came to end due to sell offs, the decision was made to go full-steam with the distillery concept. Step one, securing a location. Where They landed right on the corner of 11th and Main, in the heart of downtown, and opened in January of this year.

Their setup is pretty simple - tasting room in the front, still setup and work area in the back (visible to guests), and office off to the side. Nice and cozy. “We go grain to glass right in the building with all regional grains,” Michael says. “We’re real proud to mash, distill, and bottle right in house.” I had been sold on their concept already, but at this point I could not continue the interview without trying some of their product.

Amy, generally in charge of the tasting room and PR, hands me a pour from behind the bar. I stir, smell, and sip. Then I gasp.

I am not a vodka drinker. My taste for the stuff was ruined by too much Smirnoff as a teenager. But this morning I am happy to make an exception. This stuff is good. Smooth, one of those spirits that you know would be perfect in a cocktail but it almost seems like a sin to dilute it, like a fine scotch. Until you realize that a vodka of such high quality could finally allow you to drink those plastic-bottle vodka infused party concoctions you swore off in your mid-twenties because you can’t stand the headaches any more, minus the headache. “I use a pretty strange recipe for the vodka compared to other distilleries, and it gives it a pretty unique flavor.” That, I agree, is easy to notice.

“The product is tied to Durango’s history,” Michael informs me as empty my glass. “Soiled doves being a Victorian term for the prostitutes of the town. They operated into the 1960s in Durango and were fined heavily, with the fines helping to cover the cost of the schools, the police department, and the fire department.”

The McCardells pay homage to these lovely financiers on the back of their bottle. The cocktails served in the tasting room are also related to the town’s history, an effort that has most certainly allowed the curious tourist to feel more accomplished in his imbibing. The distillery looks to release an unaged whiskey this fall, with barreling scheduled to begin this month. The vodka is currently only sold within 150 miles of Durango. “We are being (probably) too cautious about our growth,” Michael says. They do, however, plan to expand further across Colorado. Not bad for a true mom-and-pop and operation.

I like to think that my band is a mom-and-pop operation. I guess it would be a quadruple-pop operation. Like Michael and Amy, we have grown our small company from nothing into nothing less than an amazing life experience, with no real guidance other learned experience. We have made plenty of mistakes over the last eight years but have slowly made progress come from each of them. We’ve dealt with marriages, jobs, mortgages, kids, operational disagreements, and an old van catching on fire on the road, and as life has happened, we have found a way to happen with it. Back in the early days, circa 2007-2010, I put all of my eggs in that basket. I was willing to work crappy kitchen jobs and live in dilapidated apartments so that I would in turn have the flexibility to leave town when I needed to and be able to keep my financial overhead at a bare minimum in order to play music multiple nights a week. I cared about nothing other than making the band succeed. I lost relationships and friends.

The other guys, at least the two I started the group with, did the same. And then, in the fall of 2010, we crashed and burned hard. So hard, in fact, that over the next two years we did next to nothing with the group. We had no money, our leases were up, and we had nowhere left to go. For a while, we went our separate ways. Our biggest lesson, and one of the most important things I have ever gotten out of life, is that you have to have options - you have to have more than one card to play. As we’ve grown up since then, we have found ways to have other priorities in life while still being able to come back and execute with the band when it’s time.

While the band was on ‘unofficial hiatus’, I filled the musical craving in another group, but I was also able to take the experiences I had with the band, mix them with my college degree, and create some kind of shit show career path based on music business and journalism. Five years later I feel I can see it blossoming. To me, the craft lifestyle embodies that same spirit - live life, take what you’ve got, mix in a heavy dose of passion, and throw it to wind. It takes awhile, but when it finally comes full circle, it tastes so damn good.

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theurbanhippieswe · 3 months

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SPRING IS KNOCKING ON THE DOOR.

Sunny day as you can see. But I still have to dress fairly warm. The M-65 by The Real McCoy’s have a liner and the slipover (some say vest) is in wool, knitted by Katarina Segerbrand. A very professional knitdesigner from Sweden. White selvedge jean by Edwin, got them at HepCat store i Lund. The Viberg boots have just been to the cobbler, Danielssons Skomakeri. Feeling good in this outfit.

Photo: @streetphotomoffe

@therealmccoyscom

@katarinasegerbrand

@edwinjeans

@hepcatstore

@vibergboot

@danielssonsskomakeri

@moscotnyc

@brillorasant

@bleudechauffe

@buzzricksons

@americanclassics

#therealmccoysjapan

#katarinasegerbrand

#edwinjeans

#hepcatstore

#buzzricksons

#styleinmalmo #menswear #fashion #heritagestyle #pinterest #instagram #vintage #agingwithstyle #theurbanhippieswe #ruggedstyle #dailyruggedstyle

#ruggedguy #vintagestyle #fashionblogger #styleblogger

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hepcatstore · 1 year

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Renovations are in full swing, and that means some extra deals for you! The week before the big move is going to be crazy, so we would love to sell off as much as we can to make our life easier, and your life more enjoyable. Enjoy some great deals on all items in our skate department, sale price on our entire vinyl catalog, and the favorite sale on sale is back, with an additional 20% off all sale items. #hepcatstore #renovatingsale #lundcity #lund #denimstore #sanktlars #salthallarna #sale #renovation #höganäs #skateboading #skate #vinyl #music (på/i HepCat Store) https://www.instagram.com/p/CpngMBDsio7/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

#hepcatstore #renovatingsale #lundcity #lund #denimstore #sanktlars #salthallarna #sale #renovation #höganäs #skateboading #skate #vinyl #music

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herooftheamericanway · 2 years

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The little Saint Teresa bum was the first genuine Dharma Bum I'd met, and the second was the number one Dharma Bum of them all and in fact it was she, Japhy Ryder, who coined the phrase. Japhy Ryder was a kid from eastern Oregon brought up in a log cabin deep in the woods with her father and mother and sister, from the beginning a woman of the woods, an axman, farmer, interested in animals and Indian lore so that when she finally got to college by hook or crook she was already well equipped for Ms early studies in anthropology and later in Indian myth and in the actual texts of Indian mythology. Finally she learned Chinese and Japanese and became a scholar and discovered the greatest Dharma Bums of them all, the Zen Lunatics of China and Japan. At the same time, being a Northwest girl with idealistic tendencies, she got interested in old fashioned I.W.W. anarchism and learned to play the guitar and sing old worker songs to go with her Indian songs and general folksong interests. I first saw her walking down the street in San Francisco the following week (after hitchhiking the rest of the way from Santa Barbara in one long zipping ride given me, as though anybody'll believe this, by a beautiful darling young blonde in a snow-white strapless bathing suit and barefooted with a gold bracelet on her ankle, driving a next-year's cinnamon-red Lincoln Mercury, who wanted benzedrine so she could drive all the way to the City and when I said I had some in my duffel bag yelled "Crazy!") —I saw Japhy loping along in that curious long stride of the mountain climber, with a small knapsack on her back filled with books and toothbrushes and whatnot which was her small "goin-to-the-city" knapsack as apart from her big full rucksack complete with sleeping bag, poncho, and cookpots. She didn't look like a Bohemian at all, and was far from being a Bohemian (a hanger-onner around the arts). She was wiry, suntanned, vigorous, open, all howdies and glad talk and even yelling hello to bums on the street and when asked a question answered right off the bat from the top or bottom of her mind I don't know which and always in a sprightly sparkling way.

"Where did you meet Ray Smith?" they asked her when we walked into The Place, the favorite bar of the hepcats around the Beach.

"Oh I always meet my Bodhisattvas in the street!" she yelled, and ordered beers.

It was a great night, a historic night in more ways than one. She and some other poets (she also wrote poetry and translated Chinese and Japanese poetry into English) were scheduled to give a poetry reading at the Gallery Six in town. They were all meeting in the bar and getting high. But as they stood and sat around I saw that she was the only one who didn't look like a poet, though poet she was indeed. The other poets were either hornrimmed intellectual hepcats with wild black hair like Alvah Goldbook, or delicate pale handsome poets like Ike O'Shay, or out-of-this-world genteel-looking Renaissance Italians like Francis DaPavia (who looks like a young priestess), or bow-tied wild-haired old anarchist fuds like Rhein Cacoethes, or big fat bespectacled quiet booboos like Warry Coughlin. And all the other hopeful poets were standing around, in various costumes, worn-at-the-sleeves corduroy jackets, scuffly shoes, books sticking out of their pockets. But Japhy was in rough workman's clothes she'd bought secondhand in Goodwill stores to serve her on mountain climbs and hikes and for sitting in the open at night, for campfires, for hitchhiking up and down the Coast. In fact in her little knapsack she also had a funny green alpine cap that she wore when she got to the foot of a mountain, usually with a yodel, before starting to tromp up a few thousand feet. She wore mountain-climbing boots, expensive ones, her pride and joy, Italian make, in which she clomped around over the sawdust floor of the bar like an oldtime lumberjack. Japhy wasn't big, just about five foot seven, but strong and wiry and fast and muscular. Her face was a mask of woeful bone, but her eyes twinkled like the eyes of old giggling sages of China, to offset the rough look of her handsome face. Her teeth were a little brown, from early backwoods neglect, but you never noticed that and she opened her mouth wide to guffaw at jokes. Sometimes she'd quiet down and just stare sadly at the floor, like a woman whittling. She was merry at times. She showed great sympathetic interest in me and in the story about the little Saint Teresa bum and the stories I told her about my own experiences hopping freights or hitchhiking or hiking in woods. She claimed at once that I was a great "Bodhisattva," meaning "great wise being" or "great wise angel," and that I was ornamenting this world with my sincerity. We had the same favorite Buddhist saint, too: Avalokitesvara, or, in Japanese, Kwan-non the Eleven-Headed. She knew all the details of Tibetan, Chinese, Mahayana, Hinayana, Japanese and even Burmese Buddhism but I warned her at once I didn't give a goddamn about the mythology and all the names and national flavors of Buddhism, but was just interested in the first of Sakyamuni's four noble truths, All life is suffering. And to an extent interested in the third, The suppression of suffering can be achieved, which I didn't quite believe was possible then. (I hadn't yet digested the Lankavatara Scripture which eventually shows you that there's nothing in the world but the mind itself, and therefore all's possible including the suppression of suffering.) Japhy's buddy was the aforementioned booboo big old goodhearted Warry Coughlin a hundred and eighty pounds of poet meat, who was advertised by Japhy (privately in my ear) as being more than meets the eye. "Who is she?"

"She's my big best friend from up in Oregon, we've known each other a long time. At first you think she's slow and stupid but actually she's a shining diamond. You'll see. Don't let her cut you to ribbons. She'll make the top of your head fly away, with a choice chance word." "Why?" "She's a great mysterious Bodhisattva I think maybe a reincarnation of Asagna the great Mahayana scholar of the old centuries."

"And who am I?"

"I dunno, maybe you're Goat."

"Goat?"

"Maybe you're Mudface."

"Who's Mudface?"

"Mudface is the mud in your goatface. What would you say if someone was asked the question 'Does a dog have the Buddha nature?' and said 'Woof!' "

"I'd say that was a lot of silly Zen Buddhism." This took Japhy back a bit. "Lissen Japhy," I said, "I'm not a Zen Buddhist, I'm a serious Buddhist, I'm an oldfashioned dreamy Hinayana coward of later Mahayanism," and so forth into the night, my contention being that Zen Buddhism didn't concentrate on kindness so much as on confusing the intellect to make it perceive the illusion of all sources of things. "It's mean" I complained. "All those Zen Masters throwing young kids in the mud because they can't answer their silly word questions."

"That's because they want them to realize mud is better than words." But I can't recreate the exact (will try) brilliance of all Japhy's answers and come-backs and come-ons with which she had me on pins and needles all the time and did eventually stick something in my crystal head that made me change my plans in life.

#japhyryder #japhy ryder #dharma bums #dharmabums #jack kerouac #beat #beat writing #writing #stories #story telling #ripoff #fan fic #fan fiction

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