Me and The Biz

What with one thing or another I've not really had much time to devote to just 'straight-up-bloggin' recently. As more and more bits 'n' bobs of art-work stack up, I regrettably find myself posting not much more than the odd jpeg accompanied by a sentence or two and a hastily constructed title. Mustn't grumble though, and thankfully I've got loads more stuff coming up that I'll be struggling to find time to blog about, so I decided to spare a bit of time to construct this post for a brief change of pace, which has a respectable word count, a title that references the Masta Ace classic of the same name, and a staggeringly awesome picture that I didn't even draw..

The specific 'Biz' to which the title of this post refers, and the artist who drew this particular picture is one of my childhood heroes Simon Bisley. Back in '88 when my gran cancelled my subscription to the Dandy and Beano and signed me up to receive 2000 AD every week, I started to skip straight past Judge Dredd to marvel at Bisley's unbelievable black and white depictions of the A.B.C Warriors. If you click on the image above, you'll see a big enough version to notice that one of Tharg's droids mistakingly credited the work to 'Steve' Bisley, but you'll also be able to get a good enough look to see the incredible quality of line and tonal balance. I've been inspired by this work for most of my life.

This all kind of sets the scene as to how totally chuffed I was when I found out that one of my comics might actually find its way into the hands of Simon Bisley himself.

A couple of months ago I went up to Leeds to a Daniel Johnston gig that I had designed the poster for. The fact that I found myself backstage with Daniel signing prints of the poster is an awesome enough story on its own. I gave him a comic too and he said I should try and get a job drawing for Marvel! He knocked back a couple of hot chocolates and we got a little production line going signing both our names on the prints. The gig he played shortly after was pretty amazing to say the least, and I was able to take away a print that he'd wrote out to me as a souvenir. Here's a detail of it.. (Big thanks to Sogol by the way, who did a great job of screen printing them up. They were selling like hot cakes as everyone poured out The Brudenell, which was nice to see.)

So, back to Biz.. Before everyone poured out The Brudenell, I was stood in The Brudenell watching the show with my mate Andy and his mate (who's now my mate) James Owen Fender. James is doing pretty well with his own music at the moment (check out his MySpace HERE if you want) and he told me that someone out of his band was going out with Simon Bisley's daughter and that he could pass a comic on to her that she would pass on to her dad when she saw him at christmas.. He also told me that her dad (who is Simon Bisley) is good friends with Glen Danzig (who is Glen frickin' Danzig!) and that when Simon's on the phone to Glen, James and the band try out their best "MOTHER!" in their best Danzig voice in the background.

This is all probably highly confidential stuff, but I don't suppose there are that many people reading this.. If I didn't know who Simon Bisley or Daniel Johnston were I wouldn't have made it past the first chuffin' paragraph.

For those of you that did make it that far (and particularly to those of you that made it this far) I hope you enjoyed my somewhat disjointed account of some things that happened to me which involved some people that I really admire. I had wanted to blog about all this before christmas, as I imagined Mr. Bisley flicking through Pictorial Showboat and checking out my website to find something like this that I'd written in time for him to see. Perhaps I've missed his brief visit or perhaps he'll see this instead. I'm just pretty stoked that he might've seen my work 'cos I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but his work on the A.B.C Warriors was truly inspirational to me.

Right, I'm gonna wrap up this waffling and get some drawing done, which I'll no doubt be posting evidence of soon. I've done some more stuff for Dazed & Confused recently and I'm doing something for Moshi Moshi Records next.. Zarjaz!

Silver 'n' Black Attack

I've got a new piece of work featured in an upcoming exhibition in Sheffield called..

The show's curated by Kid Acne who's also got a piece up in there, and this is the promotional flyer designed by Emily Forgot who's got a little something in there too.. Plus there're loads of other chuffers involved! Here's the back of the flyer with some more deets 'n' dates 'n' what-have-you..

All the prints are rocked out in proper dark black and sh-sh-shiny silver ink, and they'll be available for folks to see with their eyes and buy with their wads from Archipelago Works in real life and off Archipelago's web-shizzle HERE.

Any-hoo, here's the silver 'n' black picture that I chucked together for the event.. As well as the colour theme that runs through the show, there's a vague hint of a Sheffieldy vibe going on in some of the pieces too. I was up for getting a sense of that whole Northern grafter's mentality in my wee doodle, so I gave the hooded, skull-faced character in the picture some hardcore steel gauntlets that he could set fire to and not even be too boshed about it..

The breaking news for all you Pictorial Showboat fan(s?) out there is that once I'd finished the design for the print, I decided that the exhibition might be as good an excuse as any to release a new bit of comic action. It's been a few months since I released my first comic and I thought I'd best push myself to keep in the swing of it all, so over the past few days I've put some proper hours in to putting this together..

..It's not Showboat #2.. In fact it might actually be classed as more of a 'pamphlet' than a comic, as the page count clocks in at a mere four sides (including the cover).. I'll tell you what though, for a nice little companion piece to the exhibition that you'll be able to pick up exclusively at the exhibition for fiddy pence, it's not half bad like.

The Limited Edition Pictorial Showboat Special is host to the true story (that I made up t'other day) of how Sheffield's 'ROXY Disco' became 'RO Y Disco' and there's a bit in there about my fantastical inspiration for the metal fingered print design.

It's limited to 200 black 'n' white copies, which will be for sale at the show.. and even more limited (!) to 20 black 'n' silver (and white) mega sweet copies on thicker paper and all signed 'n' that.. These extra-spesh ones will only be available to the folks who buy one of my 20 prints from the gallery, who'll receive a sooped-up, shiny Showboat as a free gift to go with their new picture.. Rate good.

More (Unintentional) Time Wasting

Yes, it appears that time wasting is sometimes infuriating and unavoidable. Not the type of time wasting that I've displayed on here previously in the form of intricately Photoshopped celebs magically burying their nose in my comic, but the particular breed of time wasting that is far beyond my control and has no-one really to blame except the slippery hands of fate. So, as I shake my fist at the sky, you may read further about my woeful tale of woe.

A few weeks ago I was contacted by the Sheffield based events organizers Unquiet Desperation to see if I'd like to get involved in an Art Fair that they are putting together. They said I'd be able to sell some comics and whatever other random bits of merch I could drag together and get involved in some live art that'd be taking place on some big boards n' what not in one of my old Sheffield haunts Bungalows & Bears on Saturday 17th October 2009, which is now tomorrow.. but probably won't be tomorrow unless you are reading through this rant in a very specific moment in a potentially vast stretch of time.

Anyway, as much as I adore the stench and general mental torture on offer for a very reasonable price from the pink-faced drivers of 'Le Mega Bus', I couldn't really get the time off my weekend pencil pushing job, so I contacted the nice folks in charge of the event and proposed the idea of me producing some big drawings of some stuff that I could post up to them and perhaps someone up there could kindly paste the big cut-outs around the live art walls and up in the toilets n' shit like that.

Here's a couple of bits.. A decapitated, blood-splurting skull and a slightly more considered take on the classic squirting cock n' balls toilet wall favourite. I drew them all straight on to big bits of A1 white paper with a Sharpie.. no marking out in pencil, just proper do-or-die steez! This is a great way of drawing as where ever the line takes you just becomes the new direction of the picture. Each separate character or speech bubble or whatever it happened to be, I then cut out with a neat white trim surrounding each shape.

Here are two more pieces that kind of show how the different components could've been arranged by whoever happened to be pasting the work up for me at the show. Different heads could've popped off different bodies that were using different speech bubbles, and I kind of imagined that the different elements could've probably interacted with what the oher artists were producing at the event live, with my speech bubbles maybe coming out of their characters mouths etc. etc. This one is also the first example of the whole self-referential theme that I was going for with the work, where specific products that I was selling at the Art Fair were modeled by these weird characters that would potentially adorn the surrounding walls. This stumpy legged, headless chicken is wearing one of the Heebie Jeebies t-shirts that I recently designed. The little fellah is also spittin' some (MF) DOOM lyrics (out of his neckhole!) from the Madvillain song 'Figaro' or my preferred version 'No Brain' from the equally as good as the original (if not better) 'Madvillainy II' remix album. The t-shirts will be for sale at the event as well as at the Jeebies' upcoming shows and I shouldn't need to tell you where the DOOM albums are for sale, as every good home should come fully equipped with his entire back catalogue anyway.

More product placement here where a chopped-off hand takes out a very swish looking 'Good Ship Sheffield' shopper bag and shouts "Sweet!" from its bleeding wrist. These bags are also gonna be on sale at the Art Fair and are already for sale at The Old Sweet Shop in Nether Edge. All the proceeds for every bag sold will go to The upcoming Sharrow Lantern Festival... which is nice.

And here's the final case of me getting my own drawings to endorse my various wares, with another headless chicken getting his head popped off by the sheer awesome power of Pictorial Showboat. The skull heads could've potentially been positioned to look like they'd just popped off the chicken bodies (wacky) and the dog turd bearing the phrase 'Tom Newell is the shit' but with the 'the' crossed out could've been placed under the chicken's unsuspecting foot.. (zany)

These two skulls were a bit smaller than the other stuff 'cos I did them to use up the odd bits of space left on the big bits of paper after all the main pieces were done. All the skulls were basic references to the one on the cover of Pictorial Showboat #1.

Oh, and this last photo is of some bits that you've already seen in the photos above, but just demonstrates how there would've been different ways to display the various pieces. I say 'would've' as a result of the next part of the story, which I will continue to carefully unfold for you here.

I got all the drawings done with plenty of time to get them up to Sheffield where they were to be displayed, but as I feared that the postal strike would affect their journey, I contacted a friend who works in London during the week and travels back up to Sheffield every Friday evening where he spends the weekend with his family. He kindly agreed to courier the carefully rolled original drawings along with ten copies of my comic (and a complimentary copy for himself) up North where someone associated with the Art Fair would meet him and receive the drawings and comics, and eventually the work would be unrolled and wallpaperpasted onto the specially placed boards at the venue... probably some in the toilets too where they would've stayed for a while as the bogs in Bungalows are kind of like a community graffiti art project with new stickers and tags popping up all the time.

This was not to be... We met up at an exhibition opening of a jolly good show of paintings by Kate Marshall down Vyner Street, and the bag containing the drawings you have seen above exchanged hands. We then went our separate ways and my friend (who shall remain unamed and unshamed, unless he wants to be named and shamed to avoid any future responsibilities of this nature!) went to a few pubs on the way back home and lost the bag somewhere along the way.

If, by some miraculous succession of events, you happen to chance upon this recently orphaned bag and scour its contents to find my website address on the back page of one of the eleven comics in there, and then go on to the website where you are confronted with this whole tragic tale of loss right here in these very words, then I don't suppose that there would be much you could do about it anyway. It's very doubtful that the drawings will reach the event that they were intended for now, so all I can really hope for now is that the lost property in question finds its way into the hands of someone who appreciates it, and doesn't go down the lonesome road of being slowly transferred from bin to slightly larger bin and then inevitably into landfill.

C'est la vie, these things happen for a reason and there's plenty more carefully rolled original drawings in the sea. Perhaps they will fall into the hands of a crazy person and I will be worshipped as a God in a far away galaxy. Perhaps drawing them wasn't such a waste of time. I've certainly used a considerable amount of time salvaging the only (slightly crappy) mobile phone pictures I have left of the work and stringing the whole ordeal into a new form of work in the shape of this blog post.

Oh twisted web of fate, how you continually mock me and delight me in equal measures. I'll stop shaking a disgruntled fist up at your imaginary position and raise a glass instead.

Here's to you and to all those you've shat on or lifted to dizzying heights.

Are 'Friends' Photographic?

Just before the postal strike takes its toll, I'd like to once more sing the praises of receiving totally good stuff through the letter box...

A few weeks ago I was contacted by the photographer who photographed the photos which make up this phabulous book of photographs that I received through the post the other day.

Jonathan Winstone, who'd had work featured in the late, great +1 Magazine where I think he saw my stuff, got in touch with me about the possibility of swapping one of his newly published books for one of my comics. This is an awesome concept which (if embraced by the rest of the world) would allow me to ply my landlord with drawings each month in exchange for the roof over my head, and barter with people as to how many drawings I would have to draw for them in order to get nice things off them that they had made.

Obviously I agreed to Mr. Winstone's exchange, but when I received his hefty, full colour publication, I decided that it was probably worth (at least) two of my humble, black n' white offerings, so now he has a spare.

The pictures in 'Two Hundred and Sixty One' are great. They seem to effortlessly capture a unique, alien viewpoint through a series of international 'dead spaces'. Even the shots of a quite obviously British dog-track create a distance from the subject which brings an eerie otherworldliness to a seemingly mundane environment.

You can see some of Jonathan's work on his website, buy his book from Lik + Neon (where you can also purchase my comic) and read up on his side of this wonderful swapsie-story on his Blog.

Super, Smashing, Great!..

.. another weekend at work done n' dusted so I'll just Blog-on about what I got up to last week shall I?.. OK then if you insist.

First off I did another wee doodle for Dazed & Confused's Mixtape feature that will be droppin' in the December issue. I won't spoil it by leaking it onto here yet though, so get thee sen lookin' out forrit towards the end of November. Don't worry if you're allergic to newsagents though 'cos I'll slap it up on here as soon as it's released any rode.

I also dropped a comic into Concrete Hermit, which is a nice little shop knockin' out arty-farty fodder near Brick Lane, and they agreed to stock a few Pictorial Showboats for me. I'm down to the last box now and getting seriously close to trying to find the time to put pen to paper on the second issue.

If you haven't managed to get your hands on the first one yet then Concrete Hermit would be a jolly nice place to pick one up from I think. To celebrate them becoming the newest place where you can buy my first ever comic (if you want) I've been arseing about on Photoshop again, where I discovered that an old fashioned Superman was shocked and appalled about the contents of a comic that probably wasn't even made until many years after his tragic death.

Whilst I'm on the subject of Superman, there's this reporter at The Daily Planet newspaper who looks exactly like him.. except he sometimes wears glasses and has a slightly different haircut.

Time Wasting..

I've definitely got quite a few other things that should take priority over this at the moment, but when I heard that a pre-Wonderful Tonight, still credible Eric Clapton was checking out my comic forty-three years before I'd actually made it, I just had to waste some precious time on Photoshop and check it out for myself.

The Joys of Snail-Mail

I got an email the other day from a guy called Gareth Thomas who'd read about my comic in +1 magazine. He really wanted to get a copy of Pictorial Showboat, but he's based somewhere in North Wales so didn't really know how to get his hands on one. I said that I've got a few copies at FACT in Liverpool which is kind of his neck o' the woods or there abouts, or alternatively he could sellotape three quid to a bit of paper, send it to me along with an S.A.E and I'd post him a comic, a badge and a nice little drawing as a note of thanks.

I'm so glad he chose the latter option, as when I opened the envelope that I got in the post yesterday and saw those three golden nuggets carefully stuck down to a bit of paper I got such a warm feeling of nostalgia that I thought I'd pissed myself.. I hadn't, but the general vibe of the whole thing just took me back to the simpler times of doing stuff like joining The Dennis the Menace Fan Club (and Gnasher's 'Fang' Club), sending off for free skate stickers from R.A.D magazine and basically just the feeling of absolute joy I got as a kid when I received something through the post that had my address written on it in my own handwriting!

So anyway, here's a big THANKS to Gareth for taking the time to get in touch with me and for sending me the cash. I'm absolutely skint at the moment, so I'm gonna take it out to the shop now and get summat to eat! If anyone else is having trouble finding a comic out there in the real world then send me an email, I'll send you my address and we'll kick it old school from there with stamps and envelopes n' all that good stuff. It's as eazy as S.A.E!

Nick, Dave and a Bad Seed

My mate Nick (pictured here in his infamous role as 'The Rock n' Roll Cow') is on holiday in New York at the moment. Apparently he's having a great time. I'm only mentioning this so that I can use the snappy title that I came up with for this post. Thanks Nick.

Anyway, the other day I got a call from Little Lost David. He's a Sheffield based musician who's doing pretty well for himself at the moment and is currently recording his debut album up there, which is being produced by Jim Sclavunos from The Bad Seeds. Dave asked me if I wanted to play a bit of mouth organ on a couple of his tracks and I said "yes".

I went up there yesterday and spent a few hours in the studio where Jim tried out a few different microphones and amps and gave me a few instructions on roughly how he wanted me to blow the harp on the specific tracks. I hadn't really picked up the ol' gob iron since I used to toot one now and again in my old band. I suppose like a lot of things though (especially riding a bike), you could liken it to riding a bike. Admittedly I could've probably done with a set of stabilizers on the first few takes, but it wasn't long before we got it in the bag and I was on my way back to London. I gave Jim one of my comics before I left and when I arrived back at St. Pancras, I went straight to The Scala where my friends Slow Club were playing an awesome headline show where I saw Gruff Rhys from The Super Furry Animals, so I gave him a comic too.

Here's an updated list of real life famous folk who I've pestered (or got someone else to pester) into taking a copy of Pictorial Showboat. I have no idea what these celebrities think of the comic, but here's the list anyway.. in alphabetical order.

Jarvis Cocker

Richard Hawley

Gruff Rhys

Jim Sclavunos

One Love

Pick up this free magazine while you still can. Due to the Crunch de la Credit, or something heavy like that, this is the last issue of the consistently good +1 mag that you're gonna be able to pick up. Originally an offshoot of the similarly recently deceased Document Skate mag, +1 was always ingrained with a certain skateboard sensibility and it covered stuff with a neat aesthetic flair and an intelligence with enough steez to keep it real n' that. Surely a generous amount of liquor deserves to be spilled onto the nearest curb whilst you're on your way out to find yourself a copy or download yourself a virtual copy from here.

Oh yeah, and I'm in it too! Ha! Got myself a sweet bit of exposure with an interview I did about my comic. As well as being magnetized to my mum and dad's fridge (probably) the article is also on display in the window of Lik + Neon (just off Brick Lane) where the comic's for sale, so big thanks to them too!

In the Bag!

I won!.. A couple of posts below this one you'll see my entry for the Sheffield Bag Art Competition. This was an event where people picked up a plain shopper from participating establishments and handed them back all decked out fancy 'n that. As I walked the plank of 'The Good Ship' a few months back, I entered my bag through the post with the help of the lovely Emma from The Old Sweet Shop. All the bags were auctioned off to raise up the funds to print the winning design properly and sell it around Sheffield to encourage folk to give a big thumbs down to 'placcy-bags' and a big nautical thumb up to a re-useable fabric bag sporting my design!

I really didn't expect to win this thing so the only copy of the drawing was the one that I drew straight onto the bag, which was auctioned off for eight whole pounds.. Anyway, I redrew the design using the photo that I'd taken below and the finished, printed products should look something like the picture that accompanies this post.. oh, except not with a black background. I did this one especially for the blog 'cos it looks nice, but the bag will have a bag for the background which is just as sweet.

So any-hoo, if you're up in Sheff look out for the bags that'll be coming soon to all the quality, independent shops up there.

Bag It Up

I just drew on this bag for the 'Bag Art '09' competition in The Sharrow, Sheffield. It'll be up for auction at 'The Coop' on London Road this Sunday (19/7/09) at 7.30pm and I might even pop a free comic inside it.. Getcha bid on!

Scouse Stockist

Pictorial Showboat's metaphorical (and actual) voyage continues, as the illustrated vessel pulls in to The Albert Dock, crawls out of the water where Fred's map used to be, then skips up the road and places itself on sale in FACT : The Foundation for Art and Creative Design, perhaps its most high-brow mooring yet.

So (thanks to my mate Venya, who incidentally is part of the ground-breaking event organisers Kazimier 22) my comic has hit the shelves of Liverpool and I'm one more coloured pin closer to world domination on the strategic, Showboat battle plan map.  

I'll update the original 'Stockists' post below to include the Scouse addition too.. 

I was trying to think of an amusing title to this post to describe the event of a new comic becoming available in the historic city of Liverpool; a clever cultural reference or an hilarious pun... As you can see I was somewhat unsuccessful, but whilst thinking about Liverpool and comics I hazily remembered the character 'Scouse Mouse' and his mates 'The Scallywags'. I can't remember too much about this comic and apparently neither can anybody else 'cos this image is the single fruit of my Google search for the Liverpudlian rodent.

    

Bodger & Badger

If the only thing that was stopping you from hunting down and purchasing a copy of my first comic 'Pictorial Showboat' from one of the stockists listed below was that you'd have no money left over to buy a small, circular skull badge in a classic red, white and black colour flow incase you ever came across one cos you'd been searching for one like forever, then now you've got no excuse because for a limited time you'll get a free badge just like the ones on this post-it note when you buy the comic, and if you don't (or didn't) then you could probably go back to the place where you bought it from and try and nick one or summat, I dunno.  

The Stockists

Yes, 'Pictorial Showboat' has made port in several shops around the country and is available to buy if you would like to buy it. This is basic consumerism, but this is no average product..

You can purchase this monumental publication for about three quid at the following places..

...

CHESTERFIELD

Slugger Skate Shop

(in the Market Hall)

Tattoo HQ

(Rutland Road, West Bars)

..or off my mum

(a pub on Whitt Moor or looking round the Flea Market on Thursdays)

...

SHEFFIELD

Syd & Mallory's Boutique

(in The Forum)

Toast

(also in The Forum)

Rare & Racy

(Devonshire Green)

The Old Sweet Shop

(Nether Edge)

...

NOTTINGHAM

Page 45

(Market Street)

...

LEEDS

Travelling Man

(Central Road, behind House of Fraser)

...

LIVERPOOL

FACT

(Wood Street)

...

LONDON

Lik + Neon

(Sclater Street, off Brick Lane)

Concrete Hermit

(Club Row, off Bethnal Green Road)

Slam City Skates

(Neal's Yard, Covent Garden)

...

That's it for now like, but this list is gonna hopefully keep on growing, and if you're in the position to help it grow by selling the comic yourself in your awesome shop, market stall or car boot then get in touch with me at.. tomjnewell@hotmail.co.uk .. yeah?

Also, you could get in touch with me at the very same email address if you cannot possibly get to any of the above mentioned outlets, and will actually die if you do not get yourself one of these comics for chuff's sake.. and I'll just post you one or summat.

(Mo') Skulls to Pay (Mo') Bills

Following on from the last post, here are some more quick snaps of the work I'm doing for John Richmond. These are the authentic coloured skulls blazed up with a set of Sharpies.

Skulls to Pay the Bills

Pictorial Showboat's progression in the public sphere is directing more and more bizarre yet brilliant opportunities my way.

The design team at hot shot fashion label John Richmond contacted me the other day to see if I would be interested in decorating some purpose made, plaster-cast skulls, which are going to be displayed in their new Paris store.

'Jonathan Richman?!' was my initial, excitable reaction, followed by the realisation that it was not in fact the musical genius and former Modern Lover, but was still a pretty sweet job nonetheless.  I said 'Yes' and I've been working on them in their swanky Sloane Square studio for a couple of days now. I'm adapting some of their existing, tattoo inspired designs to fit on the skulls and tweaking them a bit with my creative 'steez'. 

Here are a couple of dodgy mobile phone snaps of what I've done so far. Hopefully I'll be able to get some better visual documentation of them when they're finished, but dodgy mobile phone snaps are probably gonna become a regular component of this here Blog so let's just embrace them in all their lo-fi, grainy glory. 

   

Been Dazed & Confused For So Long It's Not True

My first comic 'Pictorial Showboat - Issue 1' has been making its way in the big, wide world. I posted a copy to the Dazed & Confused office and, after hearing nothing back from them, it wasn't until my weekly 'Googling myself' session that I was pleasantly surprised to find.. THIS.

For those of you who have no intention of ever clicking on the last word of the previous paragraph, but still want to know (more than anything in the whole world) what the big 'Hoo-Har' is that prompted this post, either reconsider your somewhat hasty decision not to click on the clickable link or read on.

(For those of you who did click on the clickable link, and are dumbfounded as to why anyone wouldn't just click on such a link to investigate its content, please disregard anything else featured in this post after the aforementioned link.)

Yes, the powers that be at Dazed & Confused magazine have acknowledged the existence of my humble publication. They Twittered about reading the Biggie Smalls strip and then posted a photo of the comic and the accompanying drawing that I sent to them as a blog on their Dazed Digital site. The post also called for more comic artists to come forward for an upcoming feature in the magazine. Watch this space.. or any space in a future issue of Dazed & Confused which looks as though it may be related to the mighty Pictorial Showboat, yeah?