NEW STUFF ARCHIVES
2Q 2006: April - June
all items still available (unless otherwise noted)
ordering info

New for June 2006

Unicorn Mountain, Volume 2
edited by Curt Gettman
As the cover states, this is a compendium of comics, writing and music.  This time around Unicorn Mountain is a chunky 206-page squarebound squareformat anthology printed in umber ink on flat white paper of (mostly) Pittsburgh culture that contains an eclectic 21-track CD, all for less than the prie of the average stand-alone CD!  Made possible in part by a grant from the seemingly omnipresent Sprout Fund, this issue is a big step up from the first issue.  Highlights include "Thousands of Mistakes" by Frank Santoro, "Niran and Theola" by Curt Gettman and Owl Kahol Systems (a pseudonym for a local comics artist), "Like Lace" by JULIACKS, "Rock & You" by Paulette Poullet, a two-page untitled piece by Brian Maruca and Jim Rugg of Street Angel fame, and a fistful of untitled illustrations by Paper Rad.  The material on the CD ranges far and wide and includes new tunes by Modey Lemon, Oneida, Ex-Models, Elf Power and Pink Mountaintops.  The Karl Hendricks Rock Band's "The Last Uncompromising Hardcore Band" will have you tapping your toes and singing along before you even realize it. 
retail price - $15.00  copacetic price - $12.00


Cold Heat #1
by Ben Jones and Frank Santoro (and lettered by Aaron Cometbus!)
As crazy as it may sound, this is the first issue of a twelve-issue comic book maxi-series written and drawn by art comics favorites, Ben "Paper Rad" Jones and Frank "Storeyville" Santoro.  Mightily manifesting the poignant praxis of pioneering publisher, Picturebox, Cold Heat is not necessarily stoned, but beautiful -- a hypnotically tranced-out, maximum-volume take on the action/adventure genre that stays out all night and doesn't come home until the party's over and it's time to crash.  From it's super-slick full color covers, to its orange-juice-orange inside covers and through its 24-page interior printed entirely in magenta and sky blue, this is a comic book that stands out in a crowd, and about which we are entirely comfortable in saying, "there's nothing else remotely like it on the market."  Feeling adventurous?  Try this.
retail price - $5.00  copacetic price - $4.00


Paper Rad -- Taking Out the Trash/Trash Talking (DVD)
And, speaking of Paper Rad, clear your mind and get ready to wrap it around this DVD of Paper Rad video zaniness that just came in.  The "Pittsburgh, PA/Northampton, MA collective that has bubbled under the elastic waistline of the world’s slacks for over a decade" presents "This DVD that includes lots of ephemera filling every color on the PANTONE wheel, but also including the recurring Alfe character in a brand new (never aired) TV Pilot. Also included will be the ultimate PAPER RAD “Guide to CD-ROMS” - essential knowledge for jammers everywhere. 60 minutes in all!"  If you don't have any idea what we're talking about here, but think it sounds kind of interesting, you might want to check out the trash talking trailer on YouTube.  Paper Rad, on DVD.  'Nuff said.  Well, maybe not -- we can't help but add: it's a deal!
retail price - $15.98  copacetic price - $12.77


Wholphin #2
It's here, the second issue of the new DVD quarterly brought to you by the fine folks at McSweeney's.  Many of you obtained the first issue as a bounus with The Believer Magazine end -of-2005 special issue or McSweeney's #18.  This issue is chock-a-block with new material from around the world.  Here's the official blurb:  "The second issue of Wholphin includes Steven Soderbergh's intense sci-fi homage to Godard. The Japanese "Bewitched" re-scripted by Daniel Handler and writers of the Daily Show. A hallucinogenic tale of murder and absolution, featuring Boris Karloff's melting head. Donald Trump channeling Citizen Kane. Two Oscar-nominated shorts. A miraculous, scientific discovery 7000 feet below sea. A gothic horror mystery about an aeronautical navigator, his plague-ridden home and the blood-sucking beast with the antiserum. "American Storage:" a short that is soon to become a feature. An instructional video on "poke-poling a monkey-faced eel." And a special moment with Andy Ritcher.  This issue will also include a free bonus disc containing Part One of Adam Curtis's highly acclaimed documentary, The Power of Nightmares, which follows the simultaneous rise of Islamic fundamentalism and American neoconservative thought."  Click here for more detailed info.
retail price - $15.95  copacetic price - $14.35


Monologues for the Coming Plague
by Anders Nilsen
Are you looking for brain-twisting, anti-aesthetic, avant garde comics?  Do you want a big fat book full of this, all by the same deliberately obscure creator, consisting of one long sustained narrative that delves deeply in to the despair that lurks just below the surface of the quotidian?  Do formal techniques that search and strive for new signs and symbols with which to represent the heretofore unrepresentable intrigue you?  Do you wish for material that will challenge your intellect?  Do you long to be asked to be a partner in the creation of meaning?  Do you want to visit an artistic terrain where you laugh to cry and cry to laugh and the difference between joy and sorrow disappears?   Well, we have it and this is it. 
retail price - $18.95  copacetic price - $15.00


Babel 2
by David B.
Insomnia 2
by Matt Broersma
They Found the Car (Wish You Were Here 2)
by Gipi
Here they are, the next three installments of that swellegant line of superior quality pamphlet comics, the "Ignatz", that is a co-production of Fantagraphics Books and Italy's Coconino Press.  The main attraction is Babel 2 which is the second installment (the first was Babel 1, published in 2004 by Drawn & Quarterly in what was the prototype for the Ignatz line) in the continuation of the epic tale begun in Epileptic.  Babel is a graphic tour de force that no comics connoisseurs will want to miss.  In the second installment of Insomnia, Broersma lightens his palette and turns in what is, in our estimation, the strongest work of his career.  Gipi continues the sombre, rain-washed tales of Italian outcasts in They Found the Car that he offered up in the first installment of "Wish You Were Here", The Innocents.  All three of these are recommended, as are all of the previous installments Ignatz line.  Do yourself a favor and check these out.
retail price - $7.95@  copacetic price - $6.75@



I Love Led Zeppelin
Panty-Dropping Comics
by Ellen Forney
with an introduction by Sherman Alexie
This slick oversize volume collects a decade of Forney's fun-filled frolics in the funny pages.  In full color and black and white this 110-page collection includes collaborations with Margaret Cho, Kristin Gore, Dan Savage and a host of various experts.  Sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll are the order of the day.  Alison Bechdel sez, "Ellen Forney's hilarious, exuberant, powerfull, voluptuous drawings are a frickin' force of nature." AND: WHILE SUPPLIES LAST (really), as a special bonus to readers of this page, we are offering a copy of Forney's first Fantagraphics collection, the 142-page Monkey Food (a $12.95 value) for FREE with any purchase of I Love Led Zeppelin (BUT... You have to ask for it; if you don't ask for it, you won't get it).  How about them apples!
retail price - $19.95   copacetic price - $16.95


Hotwire
edited by Glenn Head
Hotwire is a giant oversize celebration of the real and true comicbook.  In the words of editor Head:  "HOTWIRE doesn't believe that comics need to be elevated out of the "gutter" or put on a pedestal to be art.  HOTWIRE believes that comics with great style and cool stories are already art, and no critic, museum, or journal can change that; not one whit.  An individual cartoon-voice, and a goofball worldview that is the artist's own... that is the onlly requirement.  An unsuspecting reader with hungry eyeballs looking for a taste, could complete the picture."  Hotwire pretty much features the who's who of comics practitioners who adhere to this credo (and some who probably don't quite):  Doug Allen, Max Anderson, Johnny Ryan, R. Sikoryak, David Lasky, Tony Millionaire, Onsmith, Mats!?, Carol Swain. Sam Henderson, Michael Kupperman, Matt Madden, Ivan Brunetti, Tim Lane, Mack White, Rick Altergott, Mr. Head himself, and quite a few others fill up 136 pages of good, not-so-clean fun, in full color and black and white.
retail price - $19.95  copacetic price - $19.95 (now o/p)


De:Tales - Stories from Urban Brazil 
by Fabio Moon Gabriel Ba
Is this the first splash of a new wave of Brazillian comics?  We can't pretend to know, but are grateful to the folks at Dark Horse for going out of their way to bring us these sharply drawn tales from  the other side of the equator.  Moon and Bá's work here is strong and can easily stand the test of comparison with any of it's North Amerian contemporaries, with whose work they are clearly familiar (Moon's work shows -- in places -- strong traces of Paul Pope influence).  It's great to get this chance to compare our respective urban youth cultures.  Perhaps the most interesting thing about this 112-page collection is that it reveals that the similarities are so much  more in evidence than the differences.
retail price - $14.95  copacetic price - $12.75


Castle Waiting
by Linda Medley
introduction by Jane Yolen
A classical, magical fantasy tale that provides the reader with that rare pleasure:  the fully realized artificial world to which one can escape, to immerse oneself in an alternate reality, banishing the humdrum cares and tediums of our own world for the repspite offered by a work that is described in Ms. Yolen's introduction as "feminist fairy tale with attitude, heart, imagination, laughter, love and truth."  457 pages of careful, finely crafted art in the service of a story fit for all ages fill this nicely designed hardcover volume that's worth every penny.
retail price - $29.95  copacetic price - $25.00


Tales to Demolish #3
by Eric Haven
Astonishing but true, this labor of love from the little comic book company that could, Sparkplug Comic Books, is actually printed in full color, cover to cover.  This comic predates and is a possible source of inspiration to Michael Kupperman's more widely read Tales Designed to Thrizzle, and is an ideal read for any Kupperman fan who is more of a hardcore comics reader that your average Thrizzler; for someone who can get into the zone where reality is almost entirely subsumed in the pulpy pop culture of (mostly) old school comic books, and late night TV B-movies.  Stories like "Mammalogy," "The Gunslinger," and "Doctor Arcanus" are deep in the primordial ooze of real, down home, American comic books.  And you'll never see the Christmas holidays in quite the same way again after reading "Zander Claws."
retail price - $5.00  copacetic price - $4.50


Comic Book Holocaust
by Johnny Ryan
Well, it was bound to happen sooner or later.  The mischevious Mr. Ryan has pulled out all the stops to create the last word in jaded, cynical, parodic lampoons of all things comics in this collection of 128 pages packed with vented spleen.  Just about every comic strip, comic book series and graphic novel that a contemporary comics fan could be expected to be familiar with is given the works here.  Every scatological combination is employed and no one and nothing is spared.  The goal here seems to be to defend the western philosophical thesis that nothing is sacred, all is illusion and all illusions must be destroyed; along with its eastern corollary: nothing is true, everything is permitted.  While we are happy to grant Mr. Ryan his point, there is clearly a soul crushing aspect to this work.  The cover and title of this book are certainly fitting, as it is precisely the nihilistic disregard (also known as hate) of the beliefs and values of others that is demonstrated in this collection that was fervently embraced by the Nazis and led them to attempt to destroy all that they despised (which was just about everything).  We are, of course, grateful that Mr. Ryan has limited his targets to the creations of graphic imaginative fiction and that his only weapons are his pen and caustic wit, and that his victims are only lines on paper.  If the reader can manage the feat of viewing the entire work as a cautionary allegory of the dangers of yielding to the siren song of hatred, then, perhaps, CBH can act as a final solution and allow all involved to at last move on to more productive endeavors.
retail price - $9.95  copacetic price - $9.95 (now o/p)


Frank Black - Fast Man Raider Man (CD)
As with, Honeycomb, Frank Black's last CD, Fast Man Raider Man was recorded primarily in Nashville, Tennessee employing the all-star talents of some of the greatest session musicians in the business, including: Steve Cropper, Rich Gilbert, Levon Helm, Jim Keltner, Ian McLagen and Spooner Oldham.  This is a record that stands on pure musicianship alone.  And then there's the songs themselves:  This release contains some of the best compositions of a post-Pixies solo career that is well into its second decade.  But there's more.  Snugly nestled in the middle of the 27 tracks on this 2-Disc release are four songs co-written by the storied Brooklyn performer and former FIVE frontman, Reid Paley.  Included among these gems is the masterpiece of melancholy, "I'm Not Dead, I'm in Pittsburgh."  If there's a theme uniting the material on hand here, it's learning the lessons that life meets out as you roll on down the long haul of life.  These aren't hits for the kids, but rather finely aged tunes equally fit for looking forward and looking back.  This is a great CD to take on the road for that long summer drive, and we're willing to bet that once you get there you'll find yourself going back to the car to bring it in and listen to again.
copacetic price - $18.00


We Are On Our Own
by Miriam Katin
This is a comics memoir of a Jewish mother and child's persecution and flight in Hungary in the last year of the Second World War.  It is a harsh story of pain and persevering, of suffering and survival against the odds that is written and drawn by the grown child and bracketed by scenes of her own motherhood safely ensconced in the United States.  A unique endeavor from cover to cover, the story is told entirely in rugged pencil drawings that eloquently testify to the strength of its actors.  This attention to matching form and content continues in Tom Devlin's thoughtful design of the book itself.  Holding the book in one's hands, one immediately feels that its origins are in a harsh world filled with privation that is quite alien to the sleek comforts amidst with we comport ourselves in America today.
retail price - $19.95  copacetic price - $16.95


My Most Secret Desire
by Julie Doucet
Back in print, at last, this, perhaps our favorite of Ms. Doucet's collections, is presented here in an elegant hardcover edition that is in every way superior to the original of ten years ago, yet, amazingly, is priced less! Those crazy kids at Drawn & Quarterly -- how do they do it?   For those of you who don't know what the fuss is about, Julie Doucet is one of the select torch bearers of the surrealistic confessional school of comics.  This volume is dominated by graphic recountings of her vivid dreams, many of which center on her unconscious relationship with that most intimate aspect of the male anatomy.  Doucet's intuitive grasp of the symbolic capacities of comics enables her to give lucid -- occasionally unnerving, often hilarious -- visual signification to the stress, anxiety, fear and loathing which are an all too familiar part of our lives.
retail price - $19.95  copacetic price - $16.95


MOME 4
edited by Gary Groth and Eric Reynolds
Another great issue of the comics anthology you can't afford to miss is now on our shelves.  The highlight of this issue is another wonderful mythical/historical comics novella by David B., "The Veiled Prophet."  Also on offer are a great new story by Martin Cendreda, "La Brea Woman" that shows him moving in a new direction.  And the gang's all here:  John Pham returns to 221 Sycamore Avenue to provide the cover along with the dream landscape of a high school teacher and his family; Sophie Crumb returns with more tales of street urchins on drugs, Jonathan Bennet and Gabrielle Bell take deft turns at depicting urban melancholy; Jeffrey Brown steps out of his comfort zone and turns in an atypical (and metaphorical) tale of existential angst; and David Heatly, Paul Hornschemier, Anders Nilsen, Kurt Wolfgang and R. Kikuo Johnson each do their thing and do it well, rounding out another issue where everything is good!
retail price - $14.95  copacetic price - $12.75


Love and Rockets V.2 #15 & 16
by Los Bros Hernandez
In case you wondering, we thought we'd take this moment to let you know that Love and Rockets is still going strong, with new issues appearing at a steady clip.  And the work continues to be of the highest caliber, building, issue by issue, the most signifigant narrative structure on the contemporary comics landscape, as our in-depth look at "Saturday is Shatterday'" from #15 amply testifies.
retail price - $4.50@  copacetic price - $3.60@






Uptight #1
by Jordan Crane
Whoah!   Speaking of los bros, it looks like Jordan's been hanging out with Jaime, or at least spending a lot of time with the second volume of Love and Rockets.  The lead story in this niftily designed new comic book series from the renowned indy comics man about town, "Below the Shade of Night," features a smart, tight line, that, combined as it is with a sharp placement of solid blacks, catapults Mr. Crane to the forefront of potential heirs to the legendary Hernandez style.  Both this story, and the next, "Keeping Two," which equally divide the issue between them, embody the theme implied by the title of the series.  Each of the stories presents an anxiety that is rooted in the follies and ignorance of childhod, adolescence and young adulthood -- each after their own fashion.  And, as you would expect from someone who is widely respected for his design, this is a nice package and priced with your pocketbook in mind.  This series is off to a great start.  Here's wishing it a long run.
retail price - $2.50  copacetic price - $4.00 (one or two left)


Kings in Disguise
by James Vance and Dan Burr
with an introduction by Alan Moore
At last, this long neglected masterpiece of comics is once again available, and in the finest edition yet produced.  Originally published as a comic book mini-series in the late 1980s by Kitchen Sink Press, Kings in Disguise started out life as a one act play.  Around the time that the play premiered in 1984, Vance stumbled into a comics shop became intrigued by the comics renaissance that he discovered that was then in first bloom and a lightbulb went off.  Set in America at the nadir of the Great Depression of the 1930s, Kings in Disguise is a thoroughly engaging story told with heart and finely rendered by long suffering alternative comics stalwart, Dan Burr.  It is a story of tramps, bums and yeggs, young and old, weak and strong, good and bad, all caught up in the forces of history and trying to do the best they can.  This is a story that tries to capture the reality of lives of struggle, in direct opposition to the traditional role of comic books as escapist fare read precisely to avoid confronting these hard realities.  Do yourself a favor and give this one a look.
retail price - $16.95  copacetic price - $15.25


The Plot
by Will Eisner
Now available in a low priced softcover edition.  Here's our listing for the hardcover edition:  "The final work by one of comics' greatest practitioners and an early  pioneer of the graphic novel form, The Plot reveals the history of how the infamous anti-semitic Protocols came into being as well as how they were subsequently used.  It is in keeping with much of Eisner's later work in its exploration of the dark underside of human character, but this time around it is a documentary work based on facts, and it is quite a bit darker; but the story told is one worth learning about, for some of the 20th century's most misguided leaders looked to this false document's lies for justification, and, sadly, in this the supposed "information age" of the 21st century, some still do.  To learn more, read this review by Tony Norman at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette."
retail price - $14.95  copacetic price - $12.70

ordering info


New for May 2006

Fun Home
by Alison Bechdel
Fun Home is as forcefully felt a memoir as any yet published in comics, but it quite possibly can lay claim to being the single most thoroughly thought out as well. The deeply healing catharsis that Bechdel achieves here is enabled to no small degree by her extensive use of literary reference.  She draws on a full complement of her artistic forebears to create an elaborate intertextual support narrative in a manner that is akin to that which her father employed in his painstaking restoration of the gothic revival mansion which is the central setting for the story. Sound interesting?  Read our full length review.
retail price - $19.95  copacetic price - $17.95


Art Out of Time
by Dan Nadel
This is an awesome new book of amazing, little seen and hard to find classic comics.  These are high quality reproductions of complete stories here, taken right from the original sources; not single page "examples" folowed by lots of text "explaining" them.  No!  Author Dan Nadel employs his vast knowledge of the outer reaches of comics to introduce and put in context the pieces this volume contains, and then steps aside and lets the work speak for itself.  This is the real deal.  Make sure to check this one out! 
retail price - $40.00  copacetic price - $35.00


Carl Barks' Greatest DuckTales Stories, Volume 1
by Carl Barks
Hallelujah!  At last, Gemstone delivers on their promises with this nicely done 144 page comic book size volume printed in vibrant flat colors on bright flat white paper, very much along the lines of the high quality work of the Carl Barks Library volumes produced in the 1990s by Gladstone, only this time in the comic book rather than album format.  The six -- count 'em! -- unexpurgated Barks classics presented here are: Back To The Klondike (Uncle Scrooge #2; technically Four Color 456), Land Beneath the Ground (US #13), Micro-Ducks from Outer Space (US #65), Lemming With the Locket (US #9), Lost Crown of Genghis Khan! (US #14), and Hound of the Whiskervilles (US #29).  What?!  You say you aren't hep to Carl Barks, possibly the greatest storyteller in the history of comics?  Well then, this is the place to start!
retail price - $10.95  copacetic price - $9.85


The Education of a Comics Artist
edited by Michael Dooley & Steven Heller
This is a truly amazing compendium of the ins and outs of making comics in the world today.  The list of contributors is eye-popping, and their writings are inspiring.  Anyone interested in creating comics stands to benefit from this.  Here's a partial list of the contributors:  Bob Mankoff, R.C. Harvey, Tony Auth, Peter Kuper, David Rees, Stan Mack Mark Alan Stamaty, Bill Griffith, Nicole Hollander, Jim Steranko, Barron Storey, Bill Sienkiewicz, Dave McKean, David Mack, Monte Beauchamp, Gary Panter, David Sandlin, Peter Blegvad, Mark Newgarden, Chip Kidd, Chris Ware, Art Spiegelman, Marjane Satrapi, Kim Deitch, Rick Geary, Ho Che Anderson, Tom Spurgeon, Dan Nadel, Robert Williams, Heidi MacDonald, Todd Hignite, Eric Reynolds, Graig Yoe, Trina Robbins, Scott McCloud, Joe Kubert, Will Eisner, Ted Stearn, James Sturm, Matt Madden, Rich Kriener... and that's not all! Whew, what a line-up.  Recommended.
retail price - $19.95  copacetic price - $17.95


I Wish There Was Something The I Could Quit
by Aaron Cometbus
It was bound to happen eventually:  Aaron Cometbus has written his first novel.   It's here, and, as you would expect, it deals with a group of social outcasts that are right out of the pages of Cometbus.  And, as with all his published works, it's bargain priced.  We'll get back to you with more details soon.  And, for those of you who missed them first time around, we also received a restock of Aaron's Chicago Stories and Mixed Reviews.  This will likely be your last chance to glom onto these soon-to-be-rarities at their low, low original prices of $3.00@!
retail price - $8.00  copacetic price - $7.20


The Squirrel Mother Stories
by Megan Kelso
This is Ms. Kelso's second solo collection of stories.  Beautifully designed by former Highwater Press publisher Tom Devlin, this volume will have all those who were mourning Highwater's passing up on their feet and doing a little dance, as it is proof positive that the production values that won a place in the hearts of so many comics readers are still alive and well.  This edition is a pleasure to peruse, and was clearly done in collaboration with Ms. Kelso. (Devlin is also currently more-or-less the in-house designer at Drawn & Quarterly as well, helping them maintain that presses already high standards).  Squirrel Mother brings together fourteen stories, including three which have not been previously published.  Full color, duo-tone, monochrome and black and white as the story calls for, each finely crafted work contained herein is a perfect match of form to content.  Childhood memories are the dominant theme here, but the collection ranges far and wide and includes three truly excellent essays in comics on Alexander Hamilton's life and role in the founding of the American republic, as well as the unclassifiable "The Pickle Fork," and "Split Rock, Montana."  Recommended.
retail price - $16.95  copacetic price - $13.55


Arf Museum
edited by Craig Yoe
This is Yoe's follow-up volume to his popular Modern Arf.  Same oversize format, presenting an all new line-up of comics related in some way shape or form to the world of art.  Beautiful, funny, obscure, arcane, insane, these pieces run the gamut.  Frank King, Ernie Bushmiller, Mort Walker(!), R.F. Outcault, Rube Goldberg, a special section on... apes (featuring a Bettie Page photospread), and many more zany hi-jinx on the crossroads of art and comics.
retail price - $19.95  copacetic price - $15.95




Girl Stories
by Lauren Weinstein
This thick, full color, horizontally formatted book from the creator of Tales from Vineyland wittily weaves a torrid tapestry of tumultuous teenage travails.  There is definitely some Lynda Barry riffing going on, but it all has a more contemporary feel, and is geared more -- although not entirely -- to an actual teenage audience.  This book is all over the place -- it's like a teenager's messy room; but there's nothing on the market like it, so check it out.
retail price - $16.95  copacetic price - $15.25


:01 (First Second)
We're happy to announce the first batch of graphic novels from a new publisher devoted solely to the publication of quality graphic novels in the European tradition: :01 - First Second.  The works here in  their first batch place this publisher on the aesthetic spectrum somewhere between Drawn & Quarterly and NBM, along with seeming ambitions to compete with Pantheon's graphic novel line.  These works are certainly worth a look.  We can easily recommend the Eddie Campbell as a fresh, delightful and adventurous take on the nascent conventions of the graphic novel  that show evidence that he wants to keep playing with those conventions to keep them fast and loose and prevent them from becoming set in stone.  And Vampire Loves by Joann Sfar (The Rabbi's Cat) is a marvelously entertaining compendium of four graphic novellas -- each of which was released on its own in France -- each devoted to a chapter in the life and loves of a shy and conservative... vampire.
The Fate of the Artist by Eddie Campbell
retail price - $15.95  copacetic price - $14.00
hardcover collector's edition
retail price - $25.00  copacetic price - $22.50
Vampire Loves by Joann Sfar
retail price - $16.95  copacetic price - $15.00
Sardine in Outer Space by Emmanuel Guibert & Joann Sfar
retail price - $12.95  copacetic price - $11.50
Deogratias: A Tale of Rwanda by Stassen
retail price - $16.95  copacetic price - $15.00
A.L.I.E.E.E.N. by Lewis Trondheim
retail price - $12.95  copacetic price - $11.50

Krazy & Ignatz 1937 - 1938
"Shifting Sands Dusts Its Cheecks in Powdered Beauty"
by George Herriman
The latest in this amazing series is now on our shelves, wrapped in its fine Chris Ware designed cover and endpapers and packed with a full complement of 104 full-page full-color Sunday strips.  Page after page of visual and verbal whirlygigs and whackiness, formal experimentation, philosophical meanderings and just plain fun. 
retail price - $19.95  copacetic price - $15.95




Six Hundred Seventy Six Apparitions of Killoffer
We've finally managed to track down copies of this hard-to-find graphic tour de force, an elegantly produced oversize softcover that presents an English translation of the sensational French original.  This book contains page after page of startling black and white art that goes straight to the cerebral cortex.  True formal innovations involving the visual representation of the chronology (and chronicity, for that matter) of recalled experience, added to the core tour de force of its ingenious graphic representation of solipsism,  make this a must-read work.  Here's a couple plugs:  "676 Apparitions of Killoffer is a stark, beautifully rendered masterpiece of self-loathing horror.  Why create monsters, zombies and aliens from outer space when true horror lies under your own skin?" -- Charles Burns  "Narcissism and self-loathing converge in these neurotic, perverse, darkly humorous pages... the striking graphics are at once boldly designed and meticulously crafted." -  Ivan Brunetti
retail price - $25.95  copacetic price - $22.00


The Awake Field
by Ron Regé, Jr.
Wow, a double dose of Ron Regé, Jr.! (see below) This one is technically Yeast Hoist #(lucky)13.  It is a beautifully drawn, designed and produced square format volume.  Printed in two colors with a full color flexi cover and endpapers this book is an aesthetic treat and a bargain to boot.  Ron Regé, Jr. is channelling the spirit of the 20th century American painter, Charles Burchfield into 21st century comics.  Like Burchfield's paintings, Regé's comics in this volume fill the viewer/reader with a sense of wonder at the impossible beauty and strange otherness of nature.  His work really puts you there, it communicates, it catalyzes neurons to fire in new patterns that trigger new thoughts and new ways of seeing the world as an... awake field.  There's nothing out there in any medium to compare to Regé's work.  We say: a must!
retail price - $7.95  copacetic price - $6.75


Yeast Hoist #12
by Ron Regé, Jr.
Go Ron Ron, go go Ron Ron, go Ron Ron, go go Ron Ron.  General zaniness from Rege's sketchbook combined with comics and fully worked out drawing make for one more issue of a truly one-of-a-kind comic book.  Get with the program: "stop thinking - start sleeping - stop sleeping - start living."  Freaky Styly.
retail price - $5.95  copacetic price - $5.35


Comicore Jr.
by Paulette Poullet
Taking hand-crafted comics to a new level, this new mini-comic self-published here in Pittsburgh has to be seen to be believed.  From it's hand cut front cover featuring Pittsburgh's own Cathedral of Learning to it's full color fold-out centerfold, to the mini-portfolio of signed and numbered linoleum prints of "Comedians of the 1980s," this limited edition of 350 individualized copies is a unique creation.
copacetic price - $5.00

The Tale of Old Lady Merrell
by Juliacks
Speaking of limited editions, this 64-page squarebound volume -- printed in full color from black & white, duo-tone and full color originals -- was produced by a student at CMU in an edition of only thirty copies.  Talk about scarce!  If you're curious, you'd better not dawdle.
copacetic price - $20.00


RPM #1 & #2
by Rachel Masilamani
These two comic books from a recent Pittsburgh transplant were originally produced in Baltimore, by Xeric grant recipient Masilamani.  Each features amazingly original stories carefully rendered in pencil and/or pen & ink according to the needs of the story.  Each issue is excellent and both are heartily recommended.
retail price - $3.00@  copacetic price - $2.70@



Ed, the Happy Clown #6 & #7
by Chester Brown
It just keeps getting weirder and weirder in this epic representation of one of the strangest (and best!) comic book series of all time.  If you're looking for the truest embodiment of the surrealist ethos in comics, look no further, you have found it.
retail price - $2.95@  copacetic price - $2.65@




Buddha, Volume One: Kapilavastu
by Osamu Tezuka
Memo:  to those of you who were waiting from the ultimate work from the grandmaster of Manga to come out in a more affordable softcover edition -- the wait is over!  Weighing in at 400 6" x 8" pages, this series is value priced and is the crowning achievement of the Japanese Jack Kirby, Osamu Tezuka.
retail price - $14.95  copacetic price - $12.75



ordering info


New for April 2006



Art School Confidential:  The Illustrated Screenplay
by Daniel Clowes
Yes, it is actually here, just in time for the movie: "The official unexpurgated top-secret final last-minute shooting draft."  Complete with a for-the-first-time full color version of the original Eightball short story that started it all and pages of Clowes's sketchbook character drawings.  The only question is, should you read it before or after seeing the film?
retail price - $14.95  copacetic special price - $10.00



McSweeney's 19
This time around the package is a wild-and-crazy... (wait for it)... cigar box!  Illustrated in lavish full color on all six sides by Michael Kupperman, this issue includes replications (many) of zany  ephemera -- primarily of cold-war era vintage, but some earlier and some later, all of which is mixed together as a political cocktail of sorts.  And then, buried under it all at the bottom of the box, is the issue itself.  Here's what the folks at McSweeney's have to say about it all:  "Our first issue of 2006 turns toward earlier and equally uncertain years, traveling back by way of pamphlets, info-cards, and letters addressing bygone conflicts and still-constant concerns. Expect, among other recovered works, carefree strategies for insurgencies in Nicaragua, astrological advice for the Nixon/Agnew campaigner, sanguine guidance for the soldier stationed in the Middle East at mid-century, and commonsense reinforcement for the doughboy drifting toward a gonorrhea infection. Also: T.C. Boyle's feral child novella and additional quasi-historical work by new writers."
retail price - $22.00  copacetic price - $19.80


The Comics Journal #275
The best issue in a year at least!  This issue's cover feature is an interview with French comics supoerstar, David B.  In addition the editors have assembled a large gathering of 20 or so top comics creators and critics each of whom provide us with their picks for the best works of 2005.  There's plenty of excellent recommendations here , some of which are new even (dare we say it) to the  purportedly all-knowing powers here at Copacetic.  We'll try to get our hands on these items (promise); and, finally, the icing on the cake, the full color comics section this issue features the wonderfully whacky work of Boody Rogers:  Sparky Watts; Babe, Darlin' of the Hills; and Dudley -- they're all here!
retail price - $9.95  copacetic price - $8.95



Incanto
by Frank Santoro
A one-of-a-kind piece by the creator of Storeyville and Chimera, Incanto is a sketchbook dream diary boldly printed in black on a ever shifting background of sun orange and sea green that peels back the layers of consciousness revealing a zone of archetypes drawing equally on pop culture residues and genetic memories.  It is also a formal meditation that simultaneously deconstructs the creative process.  Incanto is a work that you'll want to take your time with, to savor.
retail price - $5.00  copacetic price - $4.00



Tom Verlaine - Around - CD
Tom Verlaine - Songs and Other Things - CD
Wow, after nearly 15 years without releasing a new album, one of the founding fathers of Punk Rock - at the center, along with Pattti Smith and Richard Hell, of the Romantic sect of the Church of Punk -- Tom Verlaine has just released two at once.  Around is a purely instrumental LP and may be seen as a sequel to his last solo work, Warm and Cool, while Songs and Other Things is a bit of a rocker and is more in line with the 1992's Television reunion LP.  While we will be the first to admit that this and other late work by Verlaine is an acquired taste, it is completely original and unique work that has influenced many performers over the years.  Unlike the vast majority of contemporary pop, the music on these two records improves with repeated listenings, the subtleties and humor gradually emerge, allowing for an equally gradual increase in appreciation.  If you're willing to take a chance, these two LPs are worth the risk.  Of course, it goes without saying that, for long time Verlaine fans, their release is a cause for celebration.  And not only that, those of us in Pittsburgh will get a chance to see him perform on Saturday, June 10 at this summer's Three Rivers Arts Festival.  Don't forget to mark your calendars!
copacetic price - $14.44@


The Bakers
by Kyle Baker
A gorgeous full color hardcover collection of all the Bakers strips seen so far, PLUS a brand new piece created especially for this volume.  This book is the funniest comics work dealing the early years of child-rearing -- especially those aspects related to gender roles -- we've ever read.  A great gift idea for comics-reading fledgling parents. Do yourself a favor and check out Kyle's wild website.
retail price - $18.95  copacetic price - $17.00




Grey Horses
by Hope Larson
Another beautiful two-color book by the creator of Salamander Dream.  Here's a fairly substantial preview and summary from publisher Oni Press. Check it out!
retail price - $14.95  copacetic price - $13.45





The Complete Peanuts Volume Five:  1959 - 1960
by Charles M. Schulz
introduction by Whoopi Goldberg
And, finally:  It's here:  the stunning crescendo to the first decade of Peanuts finds Schulz at the top of his game.  Lucy sets up her booth and offers her first five-cent psychiatric counsel. (Her advice to a forlorn Charlie Brown: “Get over it.”) For the very first time, Linus spends all night in the pumpkin patch on his lonely vigil for the Great Pumpkin (although he laments that he was a victim of “false doctrine,” he’s back 12 months later).  Linus also gets into repeated, and visually explosive, scuffles with a blanket-stealing Snoopy, suffers the first depredations of his blanket-hating grandmother, and falls in love with his new teacher Miss Othmar.  Even more importantly, several years after the last addition to the cast (“Pig-Pen”), Charlie Brown’s sister Sally makes her appearance – first as an (off-panel) brand new baby for Charlie to gush over, then as a toddler and eventually a real, talking, thinking cast member. (By the end of this volume, she’ll already start developing her crush on Linus.).  All this, and one of the most famous Peanuts strips ever: “Happiness is a warm puppy.”Page after page of perfection.
retail price - $28.95  copacetic price - $23.15


Wild Palms (DVD)
Without doubt one of the most singularly unusual television shows in the history of the medium, Wild Palms (obliquely referencing the Faulkner novel from which its title is taken) is an ultra-paranoid political thriller that takes place in a world clearly reminiscent of David Lynch, whose own unique foray into television, Twin Peaks, concluded its broadcast two years before this was aired in 1993 and was an obvious inspiration for the dream-like ambience on display here.  It is important to keep Lynch in mind when watching this series, the 6-episode entirety of which is available on this low priced two-disc DVD, to fully appreciate and enjoy it.  Like Lynch's work, Wild Palms is not overly worried about verisimilitude.  That the action is supposed to take place in the year 2007 adds to the fun of watching it today.  In 1993 the world wide web was in its infancy and the ideas of what the future of the this new medium would hold were informed more by the works of science fiction author William Gibson (who makes a brief cameo appearance early on) than by the reality on the ground, and are a bit laughable to watch now a mere fourteen years in the future.  What is not laughable, however, is the creepy ultra-politicized world of the future that is painted in Wild Palms.  There is more than a whiff of accuracy here.  It takes a staple of science fiction in taking aspects of ancient history and tarting them up to make them look like a prophecy of what's to come.  In this case, that of vicious internecine tribal warfare that looks like it was inspired by the bloodthirsty struggles for power amongst the European aristocracy -- temporal and religious -- such as that involving the Borgias (Rodrigo Borgia became Pope Alexander VI exactly 500 years before this series was made, the year Columbus discovered America), but with Los Angeles in place of Rome and Scientology instead of Catholicism.  The West Wing this is not.
copacetic price - $19.77


Love and Rockets Book #21: Luba - The Book of Ophelia
by Gilbert Hernandez
retail price - $22.95  copacetic price - $18.35
Love and Rockets Book #22: Ghost of Hoppers
by Jaime Hernandez
hardcover
retail price - $18.95  copacetic price - $15.15
Well, for those among you who, for whatever reason, have not managed to purchase each new issue of Love and Rockets and/or Luba when they're hot off the press, and/or for those who have but can't live without the collected editions as well, we have a double dose of Hernandez masterworks.  Gilbert's Luba - The Book of Ophelia collects Luba #3 - 10,  Luba's Comics & Stories #2 - 5 and Measles #3.  Jaime's Ghost of Hoppers collects his contributions to Love and Rockets V.2 # 1-4 &  6-10 (V.2#5 was already collected in Dicks & Deedees).  The legendary mythos continues.


Ego & Hubris
by Harvey Pekar And Gary Dumm
You know how Harvey is.  He meets this guy, the guy starts talking, and the next thing you know Harvey's figured out how to turn this guy's story into a nice short comics piece.  Well, this time around, the guy Harvey ran into, named Michael Malice, really knew how to talk, but didn't know how to stop.  Harvey related one of his stories -- "Fish Story" -- in Our Movie Year, but all the while Michael kept talking, and ended up telling Harvey so much about himself that Harvey -- with the ready, willing and able rendering of longtime collaborator Gary Dumm -- had no choice but to turn his tales into a full-length graphic novel!  Here's a synopsis:  "Ego & Hubris relates how, a year and a half after his birth in the Ukraine, Michael Malice moved with his parents to Brooklyn. He’s an intransigent kid, a hard-ass–both a demon to and demonized by the people who cross his path. His life is a constant struggle for validation in a world where the machine keeps trying to break him down. But Michael has a way with people . . . or rather, has a way of getting even with people. Hey, if you can’t live up to your parents’ expectations, at least you can live up to your name."
retail price - $19.95  copacetic price - $17.95


Proper Box Update
We've been remiss in not keeping up to speed with the latest from the greatest reissue label in the business:  Proper Records.  While you wouldn't have known it from this page, they've been keeping as busy as always, and have released their 100th Proper Box, and then some. 
Here's what's new:
PROPERBOX102  Muddy Waters   King of Chicago Blues
PROPERBOX101  Thelonious Monk   Monk's Moods
PROPERBOX100  Various Artists   We're Gonna Rock, We're Gonna Roll
PROPERBOX99  Charlie Parker   Chasin' the Bird
PROPERBOX98  Charlie Christian   The Original Guitar Genius
#100 is a doozy!  Proper has put their knowledge of musical history to the test of their vast musical archives and created a definitve take on the origins of Rock 'n' Roll out of the primordial ooze of the music on the ground during the years of its formation. Anyone listening to the 118 tracks on Proper Box 100 will come to appreciate the incredible breadth of musical languages that participated in the confluence of the river of rock 'n' roll.  The Charlie Christian box features the breakthrough work of this originator of the electric guitar sound, including much of his classic work with Benny Goodman; the Charlie Parker -- the second Parker Proper Box -- is all live and all amazing; Thelonious Monk's box is the definitive collection of his first half decade of recording, in which practically all his standards were first recorded, and includes his revealing treatment of Duke Ellington's standards as well (it was these recordings of Duke's works that first brought Monk national acclaim); and the Muddy Waters box presents the complete development of the this crucial Bluesman, from his earliest recordings in 1941 through to his hit, "Hootchie Kootchie Man."  As always with the Proper Box, the single most amazing aspect is the price:  4 fully packed, CDs, containing 5+ hours of amazing music, along with a comprehensive 40 - 64 page booklet containing a complete discography of all tracks -- all for the copacetic price of only $26.75@!!!



Every Girl Is the End of the World For Me
by Jeffrey Brown
Three weeks in the life of that square guy, Mr. Brown are encapsulated in this 104-page square bound, square format graphic novella -- in which each page is a four-square-panel grid -- that has our hero encircled by a world of women through which he spins wildly, loses his bearings (yet again) and, finally, weaves a zany zig zag pattern that is this book.
retail price - $8.00  copacetic price - $6.80


A Disease of Language
by Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell
When this book first came in, it sold out before we had a chance to list it here, but now we've restocked and would like to bring your attention to this spiffy hardcover volume that collects several unique works reuniting the team that brought us From Hell, one of the most challenging graphic novels ever produced.  The feature attractions here are the The Birth Caul and Snakes and Ladders. Both of these works originated as performance pieces (!) by Alan Moore that were then released as CD recordings.  These CDs were then transcribed and transformed by Eddie Campbell, making for comics unlike anything you've ever seen.  Supplementing these works are a lengthy interview with Alan Moore conducted by Eddie Campbell, and a set of preliminary drawings by Eddie Campbell for Snakes and Ladders.  This work really deserves a look.
retail price - $19.99  copacetic price - $17.99


ordering info

Want to keep going?  There's tons more great stuff here, almost all of which is still in stock.  Check out our New Arrivals Archives:

1Q 2006: January - March, New Arrivals

4Q 2005: October - December, New Arrivals
3Q 2005: July - September, New Arrivals
2Q 2005: April - June, New Arrivals
1Q 2005: January - March, New Arrivals

4Q 2004: October - December, New Arrivals
3Q 2004: July - September, New Arrivals
2Q 2004: April - June, New Arrivals
1Q 2004: January - March, New Arrivals

4Q 2003: October - December, New Arrivals
3Q 2003: July - September, New Arrivals
2Q 2003: April - June, New Arrivals
1Q 2003: January - March, New Arrivals

2002:       January - December New Arrivals
 

ordering info

Copacetic Commodities

Copacetic Collections

Copacetic Specials

Copacetic Select

Copacetic Gifts

NEW STUFF!

 
copacetic search

query
 

prices and availability current as of 30 June 2006