New for December 2016
Prince of Cats by Ronald
Wimberly
Aptly referred
to as "the B-Side to Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet",
Ronald Wimberly's Prince of Cats
pulls off quite a feat: successfully re-imagining
the world of Romeo
and Juliet in an hepper-than-hep 1980s NYC where hip-hop
and punk exist
side-by-side and duels are settled with Samurai
swords. The story here
centers and pivots on the figure of Tybalt, with Romeo and
Juliet as
supporting cast. The art is dynamic, colorful and
perfectly captures
the mood while doing an amazing job of visually
transcribing the
throbbing soundtrack of the streets, train tracks,
nightclubs,
tenements, alleyways, nightclubs, bedrooms, offices, back
rooms
and underpasses that together weave an intricately
colorful tapestry of
the overarching and immortal theme of love
amidst tribal conflicts.
While Wimberly's art here has been justly praised,
his command of the
Shakespearean mode, and its adaptation to this setting is
perhaps even
more spectacular. His intuition of meter
and measure in his
translation of the streetwise lingo of Elizabethan England
to the
hepcat patios of 1980s New York is simply spot on every
time, and a
joyous wonder to read. A delightful surprise.
retail price - $24.99
copacetic price
-
$22.22
Yazar and Arkadas by Lale
Westvind
It’s here! –
the latest hand printed
risograph comic book from Lale Westvind.
The story that unfolds here
is an interior journey to the core of being. It is
also,
simultaneously, a "road" map that shows the way there, in
a
demonstration of the power of comics to reveal hidden
passageways.
Lest this description lead you to anticipate a dry
exercise in
intellectual gamesmanship, let us waste no time in
disabusing you of
this notion: Printed in blue ink on pink paper
wrapped in a duo-tone
cover printed on heavy cream stock, Yazar &
Arkadas
("writer & friend" in Turkish, FYI) offers
up 32 blazing hot 7” x 8
1/2” pages crackling with high-voltage comics energy.
Combining a
firm grasp on classic, Golden Age, science fiction visual
tropes, and with a
keen insight into their psychological underpinnings,
Westvind here
forges a singularly personal mythographics in the service
of
illuminating a fierce vision of desire. Readers will
be effectively
transported to the “Lale-verse” wherein they will witness
the pursuit
of passions and the ecstasies of understanding, as aeons
are collapsed
into moments… and then it’s time for tea.
retail price - $5.00
copacetic price
-
$5.00
Love in Vain: Robert Johnson, 1911-1938
by Mezzo &
Jean-Michel Dupont
Prepare to have
your socks knocked off. Originally published in
France in 2014, Jean-Michel Dupont and Mezzo's Love
in Vain
is the comics biography of this blues founding father that
you've been
dreaming of. Clearly drawing on R. Crumb's comics
bios of blues greats
such as Charley Patton, and inspired by the inking
of Charles Burns,
this sensually produced, horizontally formatted graphic
novel is a work
befitting the legend of Robert Johnson, perhaps the
most storied
bluesman of them all.
Check out this Google™ image search for a peek at
what's in store... Amazing, right?
retail
price - $29.99
copacetic price
-
$25.75
By the Numbers by Laurent
Rullier & Stanislaus Barthélemy
This omnibus
collection of Laurent Rullier
& Stanislaus Barthélemy's By the Numbers
is bande dessinee at its
finest. Chronicling the adventures of a "timid
Parisian accountant" as
he travels from Marseilles to post-WW II French
colonial Vietnam in
1948 we are transported into a world of cold war
post-colonial
conflicts that runs for almost 200 pages all of
which are a real treat
for urban armchair adventurers. Drawn on the grand
example – and after the style – of Hergé, By the
Numbers more or less answers the question,
"What happened to TinTin after he grew up?" Bonus
back up features
included at no extra charge.
retail
price - $24.99
copacetic price
-
$21.75
Lovers in the Garden
by Anya
Davidson
Anya Davidson
takes us back the heady 1970s in the Big Apple for a
well
structured, and highly entertaining tale of: romance
(and bromance!),
drug dealing, the law (and fronting and
duplicity), rock 'n' roll
memories, Vietnam War flashbacks – and 1970s fashion!
64 pages,
perfect bound; full color. Nice!
retail
price - $10.00
copacetic price
-
$9.00
We Told You So: Comics As Art
by Tom
Spurgeon, Gary Groth, Kim Thompson, Eric Reynolds, Michael
Dean, Mike Catron, et al
This long
rumored book has at last
arrived, and it's a doozy! Packed with rare photos,
unheard anecdotes,
classic comics, and much, much more – including an
assortment of
Fantagraphical comics created especially for this volume,
by the likes
of Simon Hanselmann, Joe Daley and many others – this
compendium traces
the forty year history of Fantagraphics from its founding
as a
publisher of a comics newspaper titled The Nostalgia
Journal – which
was quickly retitled The Comics Journal – designed to
complement,
compete with or crush – depending on who is talking – The
Buyer's Guide
for Comics Fandom, back in 1976, to the sprawling
empire of fine
comics publishing that it is today. This book is a
real treasure trove
for long time Fantagraphics fans.
retail
price - $49.99
copacetic price
-
$43.75
Nincompoop #1 by Cristoph
Mueller
This first
issue of Nincompoop is
quite a
comic book. While some Copacetic customers may be
familiar with
his work through his contributions to Mineshaft, this is
the first
chance to see Mueller really strut his stuff.
Forty, full
color, Golden Age comic book size pages
brimming over with densely packed, finely
rendered old
school comics
that should be welcomed with open arms into
the homes
of readers of Hup, Eightball,
Collier's, Blammo, Happy Hour in America
and other such fine comic books that place an emphasis on
combining
quality writing in art in the service of creating finely
crafted
comics. Check in with Mueller HERE
and take a look at the kind of work you can expect to find
populating
the pages of this swell comic book, which, by the way, has
been
produced in a run of only 500 copies, so don't delay!
retail price - $8.00
copacetic price
-
$8.00
After Land, Volume 1
by Chris
Taylor
This 144
page, full color, oversize softcover volume is a
science fiction comic book that looks like a
science fiction comic book; angular
and minimal, yet at the same time weird
and strange.
retail price - $19.99
copacetic price -
$17.75
Jacob Bladders and the State of Art
by Roman
Muradov
Mr. Muradov
is clearly on a roll, with
a quartet of works released in the last couple
of years (not to mention
landing numerous high-profile illustration jobs,
including the cover
and cover-feature of this year's New York Times
Book Review
Holiday Issue). His simultaneously fuzzy and
sharply angular artwork
is now instantly recognizable and is put to excellent
use here in a
story set in 1947 that is full of feints and
conceits all of which
perfectly complement his artwork. So, once
you've finished
contemplating the awesome constructivist-style cover
illustration
evoking the golden age of Soviet illustration, crack
open the book, buckle up and get ready for the
ride...
retail price - $16.99
copacetic price -
$15.25
Why Would You Do That?
by Andrea
Tsurumi
Between
the covers of Ms. Tsurumi's Why Would You Do
That?
readers will find 60 pages of zany black & white
comics featuring
cuddly monsters, fighting food, poodles and swimming
pools – plus the
occasional embarrassing anecdote. Check out
this generous preview, HERE and see
what you think.
retail
price - $10.00
copacetic price -
$9.00
Sunny, Volume Six
by Taiyo
Matsumoto
The sixth
and FINAL volume of Taiyo
Matsumoto's masterpiece has arrived. While we
celebrate its arrival,
it is bittersweet being the last. Perhaps now's a
good time to go back
and read it through again....
retail
price - $22.99
copacetic price -
$20.00
Laurels of Xenon
by Ryan
Dodgson
Laurels
of Xenon is a collection
of Dodgson's meticulous, balanced, color – with an
accent on gold –
drawings, which vibrate between the flat two
dimensions of the paper
and the color fields delineated thereupon, and the
illusory third
dimension of western perspectival drawing. Not
sure what we mean?
Then, perhaps it would be best to simply click
HERE and take
a look at the gallery of sample pages provided by
the publisher of this little gem of a book, Koyama
Books.
retail
price - $19.99
copacetic price -
$16.75
Weathercraft
by Jim
Woodring
Yes, as
much as it may pain those
purchasers of the original edition of this fine
work, this second,
deluxe edition is nicer. The page size is
larger, the pages are
deckle-edged and the gold embossed cloth cover
with inlaid cover image
on a debossed rectangle make for a swellegant
package. So, basically,
those of you who missed out on the original are the
lucky ones!
Experience this masterful Jim
Woodring work composed of deftly
drawn, finely controlled, black and white
pantomime comics filled
with hallucinatory images from a dream world
that seems to exist just on
the other side of the page...
retail price - $22.99
copacetic price -
$20.00
Tomie
by Junji Ito
This 745 page
masterwork of horror
manga by its reigning lord, Junji Ito, aims to
be the last
word in femme fatales... and hits a bullseye. Tomie is
the insatiable
woman who keeps coming back for more... even after she's
been killed; and killed again.
retail
price - $34.99
copacetic price
-
$30.00
The Secret Loves of Geek Girls
edited by Hope
Nicholson
Here's an
anthology that started off in
2015 as a wildly successful Kickstarter project and moved
onto this
fall 2016 release from Dark Horse Comics. This 276
page, full color
softcover tradeback features over fifty different
works by at least
that many different creators. It's been popular at
the shop, so we
thought we should list it up here as well. Here's
the official Dark
Horse hype: "The Secret Loves of Geek Girls is
a nonfiction anthology
mixing prose, comics, and illustrated stories on the lives
and loves of
an amazing cast of female creators. Featuring work by
Margaret Atwood (The Heart Goes Last), Mariko
Tamaki (This One Summer), Trina Robbins (Wonder
Woman), Marguerite Bennett (Marvel’s A-Force),
Noelle Stevenson (Nimona), Marjorie Liu (Monstress),
Carla Speed McNeil (Finder),
and over fifty more creators, it’s a compilation of tales
told from
both sides of the tables: from the fans who love video
games, comics,
and sci-fi to those that work behind the scenes as
creators and
industry insiders."
retail price - $14.99
copacetic price
-
$13.75
Laid Waste
by Julia
Gfrörer
Ms. Gfrörer's
follow-up to Black Is the
Color, is set on a small holdings farm in the Old
Country during an
unspecified plague
year and provides another take on love
& hope
amidst despairing circumstances executed in her old
school,
rough-yet-delicate pen and ink style.
retail
price - $14.99
copacetic price
-
$13.75
Hot or Not: 20th Century Male Artists
by Jessica
Campbell
Hot or Not, by Jessica Campbell
may
just be the ultimate revisionist history of 20th century
art, as Ms.
Campbell rates some of the most prominent male artists
of the
last century not on the merits of t
heir artistic output, but on whether
they are "Hot"... or Not.
retail
price - $10.00
copacetic price
-
$9.00
Night Air
by Ben Sears
This
romping all-ages fantasy adventure
tale comes complete with alien technologies, castle
dungeons, evil bad
guys and more, all energetically rendered with a
strong visual flair by
the bold new talent of Ben Sears.
retail
price - $12.00
copacetic price
-
$10.75
A Cosplayers Christmas
by Dash Shaw
Yes, Christmas
has
passed, but it's always a good time for an all new
Cosplayers adventure
by Dash Shaw. NOT included in the recently released
hardcover.
retail price - $4.99
copacetic price
-
$4.75
She Wolf, Volume 1
by Rich
Tommaso
This bargain
priced TPB collection of the
initial story arc of Rich Tommaso's second series for
Image Comics
finds him in fine form. His growing
confidence in working through
these story arcs shows, and he's taking chances in
feeling his way
through the coloring process after his years working in
black and
white in the self-publishing wilderness, speaking
of which: this
volume includes as a bonus the long out of print
and
hard-to-find 24-page King Blood comic
book published by Tommaso's own Recoil imprint. She
Wolf is a must for Tommaso fans!
retail
price - $9.99
copacetic price
-
$9.75
Art and Beauty Magazine #3
by R. Crumb
44 pages of all
new pen and ink drawings
by R. Crumb. Each accompanied by by hand written
commentary by Crumb,
which is by turns arch and pithy. Need we say more?
retail price - $4.99
copacetic price
-
$4.75
Ditko Unleashed: An American Hero by Steve Ditko;
edited by Frédéric Manzano; critical essays by Florentino
Flórez
(translated by Rachel Waters); introduction by Robin
Snyder
This massive –
10" x 13"; 6 lbs (2.5 kg) – 375 page hardcover book
devoted to Steve Ditko is mind-blowingly good. Ditko
Unleashed was created to serve the dual purposes of
being simultaneously the catalogue for the exhibition of the same name being
held from September 29, 2016 - January 8, 2017 held at
the Palma Espai d'Art
in España (it's not too late to book that
flight!) and a general
purpose coffee table / art book for American – and
Spanish – audiences.
As a result, the text is bilingual – Español and
English – throughout.
This is barely noticeable as the text is in
parallel, and it's easy to
simply follow along in the language of your choice – but
mostly because
you'll be so engaged staring at page after page of amazing
reproductions of Ditko's original art (including pages
from Amazing Fantasy
#15, among many, many others) that you won't even
notice the text until
you've already gone through the whole book and are ready
to go through
it a second time. In addition to the glorious
super-high quality, full
page, full color reproductions of the pen and ink
originals, there are
also reproductions of half finished pages, penciled
pages, thumbnails,
and much more never-before-seen Ditko work that all is
reproduced to
the highest of standards. There are also plenty (as
in
hundreds) of reproductions of his printed work, covering
over sixty
years(!); from 1953 all the way through 2016.
If you are a hardcore
Ditko fan, you simply will not be able to live without
this book. Once
you pick it up, you won't be able to put it down.
You have been warned.
retail
price - $59.99
copacetic price
-
$53.75
Items
from our December
2016 listings may
now be purchased
online at our
eCommerce site, HERE.
New for November 2016
The World of Edena by Moebius
The day
has finally dawned on the first new North American edition
of Moebius (aka Jean Giraud) work in a generation. The
World of Edena
is the first in a series of deluxe hardcover volumes that
will
reintroduce the great French master of comics (bande
dessinée) to
readers on this side of the Atlantic. Collecting
all the Edena short stories in a deluxe,
344 page, full color, hardcover edition, The
World of Edena includes
“Upon a Star,” “Gardens of Edena,” “The Goddess,” “Stel,”
and “Sra.”
Although several had been translated into English in the
1980s, this
will be the first time “Sra” has been available to
English-language
audiences. Dark Horse has done a nice job here: the
black lines are
crisp and clear, and the colors are full and vibrant.
Moebius is one
the most influential science fiction artists in history, and
anyone who
is a fan of science fiction comics and films who
encounters his work
here for the first time will likely find the work
feeling familiar for
the simple reason that it has informed the work of so many
of the
artists already encountered, from Miyazaki, Jodorowsky
and Ridley Scott
to Brandon Graham, Simon Roy, James Stokoe, Jesse Jacobs and
countless
others, Moebius has led the way. Get ready for an
experience!
retail
price - $49.99
copacetic price
-
$44.44
Rolling Blackouts by Sarah
Glidden
This
work's sub-title, "Dispatches from
Turkey, Syria and Iraq" provides readers with a
straighforward idea of
what to expect: comics journalism from a part of the
world that
occupies a disproportionately large space in the news.
And, yes, you
will find this here in this volume's 300 pages of ink drawn
and
watercolored comics, but this is more than just "news" as
the comics
here delve into the Iraq war and its consequences
in a series of
one-on-one interactions that enable readers to gain an up
close and
personal appreciation for a multiplicity of perspectives on
what is so
often presented as a faceless conflict in far
away lands. An
additional level is provided in that the narratives are
simultaneously
interwoven with the story behind the story, the travels
of the artist
and writer with her group of friends, who are engaged in
pursuits of
their own, a detailing of the situations in which
the news was
gathered, a demonstrating that all news has a subjective and
personal
aspect. Rolling Blackouts is an engaging read that
demonstrates the strengths of comics journalism
and which readers will
come away from more knowledgeable about the human reality
behind the
conflicts than they arrived.
retail
price - $24.95
copacetic price
-
$21.75
Sunny, Volume 6
by Taiyo
Matsumoto
The
arrival
sixth and FINAL volume of Taiyo
Matsumoto's masterpiece makes for a bittersweet experience.
While
we celebrate that it is here, at last, the celebration is
tinged with
mourning the fact that this volume is the last.
Perhaps now's a
good time to go back
and read it through again....
retail
price - $22.99
copacetic price
-
$20.00
In Pieces by Kurt
Ankeny
In
Pieces: Someplace Which I Call Home
is Kurt Ankeny's debut graphic novel. It's 120 pages
are filled with
crisp, clear, pencil renderings of scenes drawn from life
and memory
which together weave a hybrid form of graphic novel;
part observed,
part recalled, part created. In Pieces
uses this works to get at the natural rhythms that make up
day-to-day life. Parts were serialized up at Comics Workbook,
which is worth checking out to get an idea of what this is
about, but
the work has a very different – colder, harsher –
feel online compared
to the printed version, which is simultaneously
warmer and sharper,
while also being much more intimate, and just plain better,
all around.
retail
price - $25.00
copacetic price
-
$22.22
Sequential
Drawings: The New Yorker Series
This
chunky little book contains 250+
individual (very) clean line drawings – each appearing alone
on its
own, faced by a blank, numbered page, for maximum
concentrated focus on
each single drawing – by the masterful
designer/illustrator/comics-maker who brought us the
startlingly
original Here. The volume
leads off with an erudite introduction by fellow New
Yorker
contributor, Luc Sante, that serves, among other
things, to help put
McGuire's drawings in a specific cultural / art historical
context,
after which we are treated to the simple joys of following a
sequence
of drawings to see where it goes; 28 discrete – and
ingenious –
sequences in all, each with a unique twist. More fun
than you might
think. Potential gift for that person whose tastes
you're unsure of? Yes!
retail
price - $25.00
copacetic price
-
$22.22
Copra: Round Four
by
Michel Fiffe
Now in
stock!
Round Four collects Copra #s 19 - 24 in another fine
French-flapped edition from Bergen Street Comics.
retail
price - $19.99
copacetic price -
$17.77
A Cosplayers Christmas
by
Dash Shaw
A
timely, all new Cosplayers adventure by Dash Shaw.
NOT
included in the recently released hardcover. What
do you get a
cosplayer for Christmas? Read this and find out!
(sort of...)
retail
price - $4.99
copacetic price -
$4.44
S! The Baltic Comics Magazine #26
by David Schilter, Sanita
Muizeniece, Agathe Mareuge, Marc Bell, Andy Burkholder,
Vincent Fritz, Roman Muradov, et al
The 26th issue of the
little-Latvian-comics-anthology-that-could tackles dADa
comics-style.
Starting off with Agathe Mareuge's succinct
summation of what dAdA is
and is not, and whether it is alive or dead or both or
neither, readers
are then treated to 21 takes on DadA from a host
of comics makers from
around the world, with the usual concentration on those of
the European
persuasion, but also including some significant creators
from the
Americas, first and foremost among whom is Marc Bell,
whose "Still
Kicking" really channeled some solid daDA vibes.
Other highlights
include Olaf Ladousse's pink and blue woodblock-style
shenanigans,
Roman Muradov's period-evocative
geometrically delineatiatory depictions accompanied
by the definitive
DAda contribution of random cut-up text, Daniel
Lima's "remake' of the
January 21, 1922 full-color, full page Saturday
strip (see Bill Blackbeard's introduction to the 1922-1924
edition of Krazy & Ignatz for details) and
Martins Zutis's "Cup and Ball."
AND, we're offering this one at a special
dadA inspired price!
retail
price - $12.00
copacetic price -
$10.11
Follow the Leader #3
by Jonas
McLuggage
#3 is
the most action-packed issue yet, as
the kids get wild and the adults get stupid in 28
knock-your-socks-off
full color art and story by Jonas Goonface (aka Jonas
McLuggage). Follow the Leader
presents readers with a world of Manicheæn dichotomy:
it's either the
city or the park, adults or kids, predator or prey, the
individual or
the community. You're either for or against;
there's no middle ground.
retail
price - $6.00
copacetic price -
$6.00
Bxtch
Slap
by Asia
Bey & Mont Tucker
This 64 page square bound volume
collects the
first three issues of BXTCH SLAP, written by Mont Tucker and
drawn by
Asia Bey, right here in Pittsburgh! In these pages you'll
find the
adventures of an all-girl band with a difference! – in
addition to performing and
bickering amongst themselves, they also find themselves
mixed up in some supernatural
goings on.
There's more to these performances than first meets the eye.
retail
price - $12.00
copacetic price
-
$10.00
Black
Hood
by Josh
Bayer, John Porcellino, Noah Van Sciver, Box Brown, Tara
Booth, Elizabeth Bethea, Pat Aulisio, Josh Simmons, et al
The
Black Hood: an anthology of Depression and Anxietyis
a
new collection by the people who brought you "Suspect
Device."
This book is determined do for comics about Depression
what Black Flag
did for songs about depression, sez editor and publisher
Josh
Bayer: 72 pages, with 10 color pieces; by
artists like John
Porcellino, Box
Brown, Tara Booth, Noah Van Sciver, Elizabeth Bethea, Josh
Simmons,
Mike Freiheit, Pat Aulisio, Katie Fricas, Mike (Late Era
Clash) Taylor,
Hyena Hell, and many others. Includes a one page
comic/interview with
Dwid Hellion from famed HC band Integrity, and an essay by
artist/writer Eve Wood.
retail
price - $10.00
copacetic price -
$9.50
Donald Duck: "The Ghost of Last Gasp"
by Carl
Barks
Fans of
the classic Barks ten-pagers from Walt Disney's
Comics & Stories
will rejoice upon opening this volume, for the table of
contents
reveals that in addition to it's title track, "The Ghost
Sheriff of
Last Gasp," this volume consists almost entirely of these
works,
nineteen in all (!), spanning from the close of 1953 all
the way
through middle of 1955, making for a collection that is
bulging with
the finest slapstick comedy comics you'll find anywhere
and featuring
all the characters in the Barks pantheon: Huey,
Dewey and Louie, Uncle
Scrooge, Gladstone Gander, Daisy Duck, Gyro
Gearloose and more. This
volume is rounded out with the ultra-rare, Donald
Duck Tells About Kites giveaway comic book
commissioned by a California electric utility
company, that Barks drew from a corporation-prepared
script, and,
conversely, the four-page story, "Tennis Match" from
Donald Duck #36
which Barks scripted but with art by Tony Strobl. In
addition there is
a cover gallery of all the Barks covers from this period
along with the
comprehensive end-of-volume notes on each piece that are
essential
reading for all Barks fans.
retail
price - $29.99
copacetic price -
$25.75
The Wolves of Currumpaw by
William Grill
The
Wolves of Currumpaw, WIlliam Grill's follow-up
to his award-winning Shackleton's Journey,
is a beautifully rendered adaptation of Ernest
Thompson Seton’s 1898
classic collection, ‘Wild Animals I Have Known’, revives
the classic
tradition of picture books. Also published by
NoBrow's children's book imprint, Flying Eye, this work
maintains – in fact exceeds – the excellent
production standards of
its predecessor volume. It's 1892, New Mexico. A
wolfpack roams the Currumpaw Valley, preying on
the cattle and evading capture by the exasperated local
ranchmen. Due
to his knowledge of wolf behavior, a British
naturalist is employed to
hunt down their notorious pack leader, King Lobo…
retail
price - $24.99
copacetic price -
$21.75
Bowie
by
Simon Critchley
This
very personal, heartfelt, thoughtful,
intelligent, concisely written and
thoroughly engaging tribute to the
life, work and figure of David Bowie is a gem of
a book sure to be
treasured by any Bowie Fan. Written before
Bowie's death, but a
fitting epitaph nonetheless.
retail
price - $16.95
copacetic price -
$15.25
Items
from our November
2016 listings may be
purchased online at
our
eCommerce site, HERE.
New for October 2016
Band for Life by Anya
Davidson
Here it
is: a 256-page full color
hardcover comics tale of Band Life. While there have
been plenty of
comics about music of all stripes –
rock, punk, metal, hip-hop, jazz,
blues and more – and plenty of comics makers have been
in bands, Band
for Life is the first extended treatment in comics
form of lives lived
wholly within the gravitational field of a band that is
in turn one of
several in orbit around a core force, and which
together make for a
music scene. The intimate, personal, character-stamped
nature of
comics make it an ideal medium in which to convey
the experience of
this particular mode of being from the
inside-out, and Band for Life's
creator, Anya Davidson, a battle scarred veteran of band
life herself,
having played and performed in several Chicago area bands
for a decade
or so, has earned her stripes in this regard, and is a
suitable
candidate for this mission. Told in a series
of vignettes that
(many/most/all?) were originally serialized online, these
gradually
accrete meaning and significance as the tale builds mass and
momentum,
and in the process demonstrate a modern
method of identity
construction. And, finally, it is notable that Band
for Lifee has garnered
some significant plaudits from those whose opinions matter
most, fellow
musicians, such as, Fishbone's Norwood Fisher, who
states: "When I came across Band for Life,
I was immediately drawn
in . The art reminded me of Funkadelic album covers, but
it had its own
original swagger. The storylines spoke to my
personal experience as a
lifelong musician and band leader/member in the same way
that This Is Spinal Tap
made me cry one I realized that my life was as absurd as
the movie.
Anya Davidson is tapped into the very human experience
that makes life
in a band the story of family;" <>and, fellow
comicker and musician, Brian Chippendale, who
waxes: "Anya Davidson gets that being in a band is
generally about five
percent playing music and ninety five percent anything
but. In Band for Life
she jams her econo-inkwork loud and hard to
hilariously document the
social sprawl unfolding all around a newly formed and
struggling band."
retail
price - $29.99
copacetic price
-
$25.75
Last Look by Charles
Burns
Here it is
in all its glory: the complete X'ed Out Trilogy – X'ed
Out, The Hive and Sugar Skull
– altogether in a single, attractive and affordable,
full-size,
softcover collection. Conceived as a Burnsian tribute
to Herge's
TinTin, the tale told in Last Look is a tortuously
twisted
take on those epic adventures in which the polyanna-ish
innocence of
TinTin is replaced molecule by molecule with the corruptions
that are
so readily at hand in the world as we find it and,
crucially, in the
world as our human imagination makes it, as well.
Perhaps most of all,
Burns demonstrates the way in which these two worlds
intersect. It is
here that the interpretive layers really pile up as,
in a
meta-fictional fashion, readers are led to understand how
comics –
and expressive acts of artistic creation and
performance in general –
can and do act as a bridge between these worlds,
between reality and
imagination, in which the latter can and does
gradually, almost
imperceptibly, at first mask and and then remake the former,
until they
seem to be one and the same...
retail
price - $29.95
copacetic price
-
$26.75
Blammo #9 by Noah
Van Sciver
Maestro
Van Sciver enters middle-age and hits his stride here in
the ninth issue of his auteurist anthology, Blammo.
This
issue is packed cover to cover with comics tightly
corseted by a
a requisite inclusion of those ancillary aspects
associated with the
traditional comic book form. Starting with the
enigmatic clown in the
woods cover image that is backed with an inside front
cover full of
pæans of praise to his work from top comics professionals,
the issue
then plunges straight into 44 consecutive pages of solid
comics
storytelling that brings readers a dazzling dozen distinct
pieces woven
together into crazy-quilt whole. The issue is
bookended by a pair of
meta-Blammo tales featuring "The Writer and the
Artist" and
include a series of short pieces that are woven throughout
the pages: a
trio of one-pagers featuring "The 19th Century Cartoonist
(Notable and
Tasteful)"; a couple of comics adaptations of stories told
to Noah in
his youth by his dad; a comics-y three-page adaptation of
"The Town
Mouse & the Country Mouse"; and a one-page "Funny
Animal Comic".
Those pieces are the threads that bind together the three
main works:
two auto-bio pieces – a multi-levelled seven-pager about
attending a
comics festival, and a ten-pager about experiences as a
comics fellow
in White River Junction, Vermont that ranges from
micro-aggresions to
the meaning of life – and the issue's centerpiece, the
16-page, "Little
Bomber's Summer Period," in which Van Sciver skirts the
edges of Tomine
Territory with a nuanced, character-driven tale –
finely seasoned with
anger and bitterness – of contemporary life in these
United States. The
issue then exits with a whacky fun-page brought to you buy
a few plugs
for Van Sciver's in-print catalogue and then closes with a
back cover
strip that serves as a coda for the issue as a
whole. Blammo #9 is a comic book for our
times.
retail
price - $7.00
copacetic price -
$6.25
Christmas in Prison
by Conor Stechschulte
PIX 2016 special guest, Conor
Stechschulte's Christmas in Prison is here.
Complex and multilayered in
both form and content, this handmade 96 page book printed
in a
combination of risograph, offset and screen printing has
to be seen and
held to be fully appreciated. LIMITED QUANTITY
copacetic price -
$32.75
Study Group Magazine #4 (Regular & Deluxe
Editions) by Zack
Soto, Farel Dalrymple, Noah Van Sciver, et al
Another --
and, supposedly the last (>sob!<) -- issue packed with
comics and
comics scholarship -- and, this time around, a playbale
board (well,
paper) game! The definite highlight of this issue is
the 16-page
process-centered, illustrated interview with comics ace,
Farel
Dalrymple, as he goes into depth and detail about his work
methods,
tools and processes. Comics makers, take note!
The publisher has this to say: 'Adventure
calls in this massive tribute to all things fearless and
fantastic! Featuring
work by Farel Dalrymple, Ed Wheelan, Lark Pien, Noah Van
Sciver, Adrea
Kalfas, Benjamin Marra, Ian Chachere, Dylan Horrocks, and
many more!
Includes comics, art, articles, interviews, and a playable
board game!
Cover art by Levon Jihanian." In addition to
the magazine, the "exclusive" Deluxe Edition
includes a playable Danger Country RPG by Levon Jihanian
(Over the
Garden Wall) and a GM screen with art by Benjamin Marra
(Terror
Assaulter OMWOT)!
regular edition - retail price
- $16.00
copacetic price
-
$13.75
deluxe edition - retail price -
$24.95
copacetic price
-
$22.22
Soft City
by Hariton
Pushwagner, w/ intro by Chris Ware
Hold onto your hats, SOFT CITY,
Hariton
Pushwagner's epic pen & ink meditation on urban
living has arrived!
Created between 1969 and 1975, this amazing Norwegian comics
masterwork
was lost for decades and is only now being published
in the
US, in this massive oversize hardcover volume. Get ready to
have your
comics history assumptions challenged. Chris Ware's
introduction will
get you up to speed so you can hit the ground running.
retail
price - $35.00 copacetic price -
$29.75
The Best American Comics 2016 by Roz
Chast, Bill Kartalopoulos, Marc Bell, Ben Katchor, et al
The
Best American Comicsseries
continues its Bill Kartalopoulos led streak of excellence
with
this volume. Any concerns that the selection of Roz
Chast would
somehow lead to a New Yorker Magazine Aesthetic-centric
edition are
immediately laid to rest with Marc Bell's playful wraparound
cover.
Yes, while New Yorker friendly marquee names like
Chris Ware, Ben
Katchor, Lynda Barry, Drew Friedman, Adrian Tomine are here,
there is
also a far ranging selection of work by many sorts of
talents, ranging
from Gilbert Hernandez to Liana Finck, Richard McGuire to
Kate Beaton,
Anne Emond to Alex Schubert, John Procellino to GG (whose
volume
closing piece was originally created for the Comics Workbook
Composition Competition), Gabrielle Bell to
Joe Sacco, Keiler Roberts to Lance Ward, Cece Bell to
Casanova
Frankenstein, and more -- along with a healthy dose of those
Americans
who, like cover artist Bell (who also is included within),
hail north
of the US border, like Dave Lapp, Genevieve Elverum, Joe
Ollmann and
Nina Bunjevac. Another great assemblage of comics.
Recommended!
retail
price - $25.00
copacetic price
-
$22.22
Tetris by Box
Brown
Box
Brown is back with another engrossing
tale that doubles as a history lesson, and he has set upon
a subject
that is perfectly suited for his spare angular
style. Tetris
is multilayered work that explores the intersection of
politics,
personality, technology and human nature as they collided
in the
creation and dissemination of the early classic computer
game, Tetris.
The story centers on two Soviet-era, Moscow-based computer
scientists,
Alexy Pajitinov, the creator of Tetris, and his pal,
Vladimir Pokhilko,
and details the underlying processes of Alexy's creation
of the game
itself (during his spare time on his government job, no
less) before
following the globe-trotting escapades that were the
result as he and
Vladimir tried to get the game officially out into the
wider,
capitalistic and US-dominated world. A parable of
the clash between
and the coming together of communism and capitalism during
the final
days of the cold war era.
Check out a nice preview and read some of the rave
reviews, HERE.
retail
price - $19.99
copacetic price -
$17.77
Naptime by Nate
McDonough
Naptime,
the latest work by
man-about-town-with-pen-ink-and-paper, Nate "Grixly"
McDonough, is,
art-wise, perhaps his strongest outing to date. Get
ready for a well
crafted read, assembled with generally heavier line weights
and heavier
blacks than in standard Grixly product -- which this is not,
being a
72-page, 8 1/2" x 11", squarebound volume. Nate
doesn't hold back in
this gleeful presentation of the darkness lying beneath the
veneer of
personal propriety and social convention. While the
thread that ties
together the elements of the story into a cohesive whole may
be
occasionally lost from sight, due to the dense and at times
opaque
narrative, the enjoyment of following the visuals never
diminishes.
Readers will be propelled through to the end
regardless, and are
likely to be challenged in the process -- before each coming
to their
own conclusions at the story’s terminus.
PLUS: Bonus pinups by Nathaniel Taylor & Nick
Vincenti and a swell
back cover by Jonas Goonface!
And, of course, given that this is a Grixly Production, it
is bargain
priced!
retail
price - $8.00
copacetic price
-
$6.95
Vile #1: The Coward's Hole
Vile #2: Lonesome
by Tyler
Landry
Just in
time for Halloween we have a pair
of creepy tales from Tyler Landry, under the title of Vile.
The first, "The Coward's Hole", is a 48-page, duo-tone
(green) SF tale
-- nicely printed on newsprint with cardstock cover --
set on some
random planet somewhere. The scond,
"Lonesome", is a nice-n'-creepy 24-page tri-color
(yellow-blue-green) tale -- crisply printed on newsprint
with cardstock
cover -- set deep in the woods; a man alone, late
at night, with a
full moon and a fire...
#1 - retail
price - $7.95
copacetic price
-
$7.25
#2 - retail price -
$5.95
copacetic price
-
$5.35
Ley Lines: For Lives
Read and Erase
by Andrew
White
This issue of Ley Lines presents
"For Lives," Andrew White's exploratory foray
into the intertwining of
the lives of Pablo Picasso and Gertrude Stein that centers
on Picasso's
definitive portrait of Stein that was painted over 1905 and
1906. The
relationship between Picasso and Stein was one of the 
key fulcrum
points in the development of 20th century modernism and this
portrait
along with Stein's record of its process and her
subsequent writings on
Picasso are thus key modernist touchstones. White here
brings these
together in this piece of experimental comics. And
then, don't miss its <>follow-up / companion
piece: Read and Erase e printed in an
identical format at the same printers (WestCan, for
you-who-need-to-know) and once again focuses on the Gertrude
Stein and
her milieu. In Read and Erase, the main
focus is on her
relationship with Alice B. Toklas, their trip to America,
death,
and presence and absence. White employs snippets
from letters and
notes between the two as well as other writings
of Stein and Toklas,
whose relationship was most famously rendered in Getrude
Stein's Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas.
White's comics here mimic Steins elliptical
repetitions in some ways,
while providing a backdrop to Stein's and Toklas's exchange.
Comics to
ponder...
retail
price - $5.00@
copacetic price
-
$5.00@
The Experts
by Sophie
Franz
Ms. Franz's entry in the Retrofit /
Big Planet line of fine independent comics, The Experts,
is a beautiully rendered and effectively creepy depiction of
getting in
over one's head. • Full color; 24 pages; cardstock
covers.
retail
price - $5.00
copacetic price
-
$5.00
Our Mother
by Luke
Howard
Laid
out on a varying series of uniform grids, Our Mother
is a 40-page, duo-tone, puzzle comic book that challenges
readers to work out their own
solution. The narrative takes the form of a series of
vignettes of
literal, figurative, or allegorical tales that once pieced
together
form a road map of a soul struggling to manage to keep it
together.
The story switches speeds between, but not within, each
tale, as the
grids range from 6-panel to 16-panel; all are relayed in
inks of pink
and brown. Our Mother works to show fantasy
in general – and
comics in particular – as a mode in and through which the
psyche can
absorb and process the shocks of reality that would
otherwise be too
much to process head on.
retail
price - $9.00
copacetic price
-
$7.95
The Secret History of Twin Peaks by Mark
Frost
Anyone
looking to let loose their inner
Twin Peaks obsession will find green pastures to roam here
in the pages
of this "novel" which provides a wealth of previously unseen
diegetic
minutae. While the material presented here did not,
for the most part,
actually make it onto the screen, it can nevertheless be
considered part
of the Twin Peaks back story -- even if it has been
constructed after
the fact. We can imagine the series being the
proverbial "tip of the
iceberg" resting atop a massive construction which lay
unseen beneath
the surface, and that is only hinted at through the
material presented
here. That's certainly the idea HERE.
This book shows just how easy it is to get lost in the
far and wide ranging imaginative world of Twin Peaks...
retail
price - $29.95
copacetic price
-
$26.75
LOA: Albert Murray – Collected Essays and Memoirs
by Albert
Murray
Yes!
Albert Murray was one of the great
cultural critics of the 20th century (and 21st!). Now,
at last, his
most significant works -- several of which were out of print
-- are
collected in a single volume, that is a bargain relative to
the cost of
purchasing each of these works individually.
retail price - $45.00
copacetic price
-
$39.75
Items
from our October
2016 listings may be
purchased online at
our
eCommerce site, HERE.
Want to keep
going? There's tons
more great stuff here, most of which is still in
stock. Check out
our New Arrivals Archives:
3Q 2016: July - September, New
Arrivals
2Q
2016:
April - June, New Arrivals
1Q 2016: January - March,
New Arrivals
4Q
2015:
October - December, New Arrivals
3Q 2015: July - September, New
Arrivals
2Q
2015:
April - June, New Arrivals
1Q 2015: January - March,
New Arrivals
4Q
2014:
October - December, New Arrivals
3Q 2014: July - September, New Arrivals
2Q
2014:
April - June, New Arrivals
1Q 2014: January - March, New
Arrivals
4Q
2013:
October - December, New Arrivals
3Q 2013: July - September, New Arrivals
2Q 2013: April - June, New Arrivals
1Q 2013: January - March, New Arrivals
4Q
2012:
October - December, New Arrivals
3Q
2012:
July - September, New Arrivals
2Q
2012:
April - June, New Arrivals
1Q 2012: January - March, New Arrivals
4Q
2011:
October - December, New Arrivals
3Q
2011:
July - September, New Arrivals
2Q
2011:
April - June, New Arrivals
1Q 2011: January - March, New Arrivals
4Q
2010: October - December, New Arrivals
3Q 2010: July - September,
New Arrivals
2Q 2010: April - June, New
Arrivals
1Q 2010: January - March, New
Arrivals
4Q
2009: October - December, New Arrivals
3Q 2009: July - September,
New Arrivals
2Q 2009: April - June, New
Arrivals
1Q 2009: January - March, New
Arrivals
4Q
2008:
October - December, New Arrivals
3Q
2008: July
- September, New Arrivals
2Q 2008: April - June, New
Arrivals
1Q 2008: January - March, New
Arrivals
4Q
2007: October - December, New Arrivals
3Q 2007: July - September,
New Arrivals
2Q 2007: April - June, New
Arrivals
1Q
2007:
January - March, New Arrivals
4Q
2006: October - December, New Arrivals
3Q 2006: July - September,
New Arrivals
2Q 2006: April - June, New
Arrivals
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
last
updated 31 December 2016
Love and Rockets: Volume IV #1