We get a LOT of press releases and requests to review stuff. Most of them we just can’t get to… but here are a couple of cool projects we really do think you ought to be aware of.
The first one I wanted to draw your attention to is the new Kickstarter from Tyler Chin-Tanner and A Wave Blue World.
We met Tyler a few years ago at Emerald City Comic-Con and I was impressed with his stuff then. We really dug his book American Terrorist.
A couple of years later, I was completely blown away by the anthology projects he sent our way. First came Broken Frontier…
Then Loved and Lost, which I wrote about here.
And now there’s this one, All We Ever Wanted: Stories of a Better World.
All I really needed, frankly, was Tyler’s name. The Wave Blue World track record alone is good for a sale in our home. But the project sounds like something I would like a lot: ALL WE EVER WANTED: STORIES OF A BETTER WORLD is a gorgeous, full-color anthology about a brighter future featuring some of comics’ hottest talent of today and tomorrow! Curated and edited by Matt Miner (GWAR: Orgasmageddon, Poser) & Eric Palicki (No Angel, Orphans), and published by A Wave Blue World, the book’s packed with 25+ stories meant to inspire us and restore the belief that a better world is possible. You won’t find any dystopian nightmares here. Think more Star Trek, less Mad Max, more Caprica, less Battlestar Galactica. More “San Junipero” Black Mirror and less every other Black Mirror. You get it.
The Kickstarter is here. Julie and I are in for twenty and I consider that a bargain. Do check it out.
The other one I wanted to bring to your attention is a project called Blues Ratz.
This came from an old CBR hand from back in the day, Atilla Kiss, whose work in other indie anthologies I’d liked quite a bit. This is a bit of a departure– his previous stuff was more serious– but I actually liked this one BETTER than any of the previous stories I’ve seen.
It helps that the art from Greg Woronchak has a nifty sort of 1970s underground vibe that is very well-suited to the story.
And the story itself, about a scruffy punk band trying to get it together, is completely in my wheelhouse; I’ve spent a lot of time in the company of local musicians and had a ringside seat to a great deal of garage-band melodrama over the years, and the tale hits just the right tone. I found it a little reminiscent of The Commitments in places, but it’s very much its own thing. Cute and funny and ends on a cliffhanger that’ll bring you back for issue two. Plus it’s a mere 99 cents to download it from Indy Planet. Such a deal.
Back next week with something cool.
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