We are getting closer and closer to press time.

Slow, laborious, leaps and bounds.

And at every turn, everyone who is not currently the one slogging away is standing just behind that slogger with champagne bottles ready and little party horns in our mouths. And we’re looking at eachother like Dick Clark is counting down. All of our hard work and stress and humbling set-backs have all lead up to this one…

And then the word comes down from the desk!

10 more minutes.

1 more day.

Just a few more hours.

The champagne corks are suffering PTSD disorder from the constant on-duty, off-duty. From constantly being called up, primed and fluffed, and then bing sent back to the shelf with no indication of whether or not the next time would be the real deal, or just another drill. This constant near-elation is exhausting.

Continue reading…

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Well unfortunately things have slowed down a bit for us here. With Micah finishing up his schooling the end of last year into the first half of this year, me having to take on some extra freelance work to help out financially at home and with the wedding coming up here real quick, our production has suffered. Not by choice, trust me on that. So we just wanted to let you know we are still working on bringing this “labor of love” to the masses, just taking a little longer than we wanted it to. So we apologize to everyone for the delay. Do expect to see it released this year though, just towards the later part of this year is all.

Also for those that were paying attention today, it was Free Comic Book Day at your local favorite comic store. One of the books I was most eagerly awaiting was “THE ASTOUNDING WOLF-MAN” from Image. See this book was co-created (with Robert Kirkman of Walking Dead and Invicible fame) and all the art done by a friend of mine, Jason Howard. Anyone who doesn’t know Jason should know that he is a hard working guy and totally deserves this “big break”. I have known Jason for close to ten years now and he’s a really great guy. So anyone who didn’t pick up his book today, make sure you ask your local shop if they have any extra copies you could maybe buy, cause this is going to be a good series to get into.

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New York was a lot of fun.

Unfortunately, we couldn’t attend with the full MONOLITH representation. It was still a great time. Working a convention as a writer/publisher is completely different from going as a regular attendee. It was exhausting and overwhelming, and I mean that in a good way.

Those of you who were there already know what happened, and those who weren’t have probably read about all the stuff you care about from plenty of reliable news sources. So, I’ll skip the report.

I met lots of really cool people and saw a lot of really cool comic books. There are so many great looking books out there. There just can’t be time or money to read them all.  I was about to phrase that as a complaint, but what kind of person would I be if I complained about too many good comic books.

If you are one of the many cool folks I talked to at the con, I hope you are enjoying our web site. If I didn’t meet you at the con, then I hope that I will see you there next year. I am certainly going back. 

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Well it’s been one year since we “officially” started working on MONOLITH and Rapid City. It’s been a lot of fun and it’s safe to say we’ve learned a lot — what’s changed and what hasn’t changed since we last worked on a project. For me it’s been invigorating to be drawing again and to be working with two good friends. I’ve met a lot of people over the year at conventions and thank every last one of them for their interest in our work.

MONOLITH has grown quite a bit for us too. We’ve had over 20,000 visits to the site in one year (granted some of you came to our site to check out the “weirdo” that stalked Warren Ellis) and the numbers keep growing. You’ve given us feedback and we’ve listened and hopefully made things for the better.

So here we are, almost on the eve of a new year. We have a lot planned for 2007. For starters, getting Rapid City out the door and hopefully on a bi-monthly schedule. There is also some other little things planned, but you’ll see that stuff soon enough. So I’d like to say a big thanks to all of you and I hope to see you come back again and again, there will be plenty to see. Trust me.

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Well it’s post Labor Day now, a time when the kids go back to school from summer break (if they haven’t already), a time when the weather starts to get a little cooler. It’s almost the official un-offical start of fall. And almost time for my favorite month of the year…October!

It’s also a starting point for us to gauge getting our project done. We’ve set a schedule and now we need to start getting the work done. We have a couple more shows to do this year (small ones), but other than that, it’s straight working for the next 6 months. So look for a lot of Rapid City stuff to be coming out from us.

Now back to getting some real work done. Just wait, because we are just getting started.

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Rapid City is a comic about music.

It’s about super heroes, and werewolves, and robots and stuff, but it is really about music.

What I am saying about super powers in the comic, I am really saying about music. Music gave me a way to think about super powers, and super powers gave me a way to write about music.

One of my biggest inspirations has been the band Rancid. Their music has inspired me, and their progression and development as a band has helped me to plot out the arcs of the major characters in Rapid City.

This comic is really important to me, and this band is really important to the comic book.

So, when I saw that they were booked to play two nights in Boston, I got a ticket and headed down there.

Before the show I saw guitarist and singer Lars Fredrickson outside. I spoke to him briefly and gave him a copy of our teaser comic. He seemed to like it.

The show that night was amazing.

Wednesday, I bought my weekly comic books and headed back down to the show venue. I was hanging around reading my comics when I noticed a small commotion among the other…ummm…among the other stalkers.

Frontman Tim Armstrong was talking to the fans. Cool! I tried to play it cool. I tried to not be a grinning fan boy. But this was the guy who wrote my favorite songs.

I played it as cool as I could.

I showed him the comic and told him about it as best as I could mutter through. He seemed impressed and asked me about it. And I told him more.

Then he asked “You hooked up for tonight?”

He was asking if I had tickets for that night’s show. I didn’t. And I played it cool.

“Not yet.”

And then he turns to the woman who has been filming him and says “Put him on the list.”

Yeah, that was cool.

The show was great. I spent the train ride home scribbling notes in my Rapid City notebook.

What will come of it? Who cares? I just think it’s neat that they were flattered by the comic they inspired me to write.

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Well Wizard World Chicago has passed. Was a great weekend. Had a really fun time. Met a ton of people, went to dinner with Jason Howard and friends and bought way too many trade paperbacks. The important thing was that we were out and spreading the word about Rapid City.

Diamond Comic Distributors also stopped by and I had a good conversation with them. I think he put some of my concerns with Diamond at ease. We’ll see how that “relationship” develops.

One thing that was just incredible to see was a gentleman stopped by the booth who had some of our earlier books from when we published under Blue Comics. He had stuff that was published 10 years ago! That was very cool to see and talk with him briefly.

We are certainly looking to return to Chicago next year.

Me sketching away for Jordan who purchased a Teaser book. (Photo by Charna)

Micah finishing off his White Castle meal.

Near the end of Sunday there was much frustration with the people behind us. They were encroaching on our space and just sleeping in chairs. (Photo by Charna)

The table banner by the end was taking a beating. (Photo by Charna)

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