The Cola Pop Creemees: Opening Act

This book I got as part of Birdcage Bottom Books' 2023(!) Kickstarter campaign. The Cola Pop Creemees: Opening Act is on its surface a funny book, but its loopy, cartoon images masque several unique human dramas that all combine as one musical act. The Cola Pop Creemees consist of guitarist/front man Ralph Jonathan, drummer Wallace T.J., Mona Gertrude on tambourine, bassist Gil Christopher, and keyboardist Henrietta Susan. Part of this book details the politics of being in a band, with people jockeying for praise, songwriting credit, and attention. Part of it is a deep dive into the different band members' pasts, with a look at their childhoods, parents, and various life-shaping events.

The five members all feature very different personalities, and many of them have been shaped and influenced by traumatic events. Sometimes the tenor of the stories can be slapstick or has a tinge of dark humor, but mostly they are relatable and moving. Some of the band members are depressed, some obsessed, some stressed, and it might be accurate, and sad, to say that Wallace T.J., who abuses a good many substances, might just be the most well adjusted of the bunch. Whatever the case, each story is incredibly compelling, and I found this book difficult to put down.

The Cola Pop Creemees: Opening Act paints remarkably vivid character portraits and is one that rewards reading and re-reading. It will make you laugh, cry, and seek a solo career where you never have to be in a band.

This is the debut graphic novel by Desmond Reed. Since this, he has published two further works about the Cola Pop Creemees: Lefty and The Horrors of Being Human. Reed speaks about his work on Opening Act in this interview.

The reviews I have read of this book have been glowing. I concur with Andy Oliver who wrote that "in less than 250 pages, The Cola Pop Creemees manages to make the reader so invested in this oddball cast that a second outing feels essential." Publishers Weekly called it "an unexpected, oddly emotional gem"

The Cola Pop Creemees: Opening Act was originally published by Birdcage Bottom Books, and they offer a preview and more information about it here. You can now buy it from Microcosm Publishing. This book features family trauma, adult relationships and situations, and drug use, so it is recommended mature enough to deal with those matters.

Too Tough To Die: An Aging Punx Anthology

I have read a few anthologies published by Birdcage Bottom Books (like this one), and they have always been interesting and/or provocative, introducing me to some new artists along the way. Too Tough To Die is a weighty tome featuring 47 different entries. Many focus on autobiographical tales of people's punk rock fandom. There are references to lots of bands and multiple reasons why these people were drawn to punk rock. For some, there was family situations that made the scene relatable; others just liked the crass humor; some found it an appropriate response to hypocrisy, and others found kinship in the motley assortment of punks. Many of the stories speak to punk more as an ethos than a fashion or musical movement and also speak to how it was not just some youthful phase but a blueprint for being a critical and informed adult.

Art by Hyena Hell

These stories are not all about sharing mix tapes, though there is plenty of that. They are not overly nostalgic, depicting scenes of violence, some substance abuse, and a number of other poor life choices. Many also address some of the more sinister aspects of the scene, such as the presence of white supremacists and skinheads. Many of the stories puncture any pomposity of the narrators, as contemporary young people have their own particular mindsets and wonder why these lame old folk keep trying to impress them, even if they might be into the same bands.

Art by Ayti Krali

In terms of representation, I really liked seeing the multiple ways that people found their ways into punk consciousness. There are tales from men, women, people of color, city dwellers, suburbanites, and kids from the country. There is also plenty of discussion about how punk intermingled/juxtaposed with other movements, such as hair metal, grunge, and alternative music.

Art by Gideon Kendall

There are too many stories for me to explain fully, but I loved the range of formats and styles. Some are short, almost like gag strips. Many are pretty raw, featuring rough lines and splotchy black and white images, mimicking the format of zines. One of my favorites, concluding the book, is series of images and biological accounts by Haleigh Buck in the style of show posters. Maybe it's because I am squarely in the age demographic of many of these artists/stories, but I found much I could empathize with and relate to. This anthology is phenomenal.

This collection was edited by Haleigh Buck and J.T. Yost. Yost has done all sorts of comics over the years, including a memorable tale about the Westboro Baptist Church in American Cult, and also founded and runs Birdcage Bottom Books. Buck is a frequent contributor to anthologies and has created a number of comics and mini-comics.

The reviews I could find of this book have been positive. Publishers Weekly summed up, "This is one awesome and introspective ode to rebellion." It currently has a 4.7 (out of 5) star rating on Goodreads.

Too Tough To Die was published by Birdcage Bottom Books, and they offer a preview and more here. This book features profanity, some sexual situations, and drug use, so reader discretion is suggested.

Holler #1

I have followed Jeremy Massie across a number of different works and genres. I dug his fun superhero book Amazing Age, the horror riff Blood-Drenched Creature Double Feature, and the more mundane, solo-authored book All My Ghosts, but I feel that Holler is his best to date. As a guy who teaches in Appalachia, I was intrigued to see this period piece, about an adolescent who gets into grunge music and forms a band in the 1990s.

It has a lot of pluses going for it. The characters, settings, and scenes are all well designed and staged. The storytelling is very clear, and even though there are moments of rock-out bombastic mayhem, there are a good many more quiet moments of well orchestrated personal drama. Even though I grew up in a much different context, this sweet, poignant set of accounts gave me a lot to relate to. I feel that it offers many experiences that transcend time and are relatable even today. For instance, the day when his church group discussed a band he was into:

Awkward...

The true-to-life experiences are communicated in clear fashion in ways that pack an emotional punch. I admired the way facial expressions, layouts, and pacing create many dramatic effects. From the visuals, I found it very easy to relate to these characters and share in their joys and pains. Certainly, it helps that I am roughly the same age as Massie, so I was familiar with a lot of the music and pop culture references, but but I also feel that these stories would resonate with younger readers. There is a universality to this tale of people who feel like outsiders in their own community.

Holler is published by Massie Makes Comics, and there is more info about it here (you can buy it there, too, for $0.99 - what a deal!). A print version will be available soon from It's Alive!.

I Am Young

I Am Young is a dazzling collection of short stories that use music as a springboard to explore people's relationships to others and themselves. It features one larger narrative that is broken up throughout the book. That story is about Miriam and George, who meet at a Beatles concert in the 1960s and fall in love. Their relationship does not really work out, though they do check in with each other from time to time over the span of decades, sort of When Harry Met Sally-style, but (SPOILER) without the happy ending. The Beatles are a backdrop to their interactions, as they check in after pivotal events such as John Lennon's assassination and George Harrison's death. The story is presented in black in white in a "big eye" cartoon style, and I love how these comics feature both characters' voices in letters to each other that appear on the top and bottom of each page. I think this format requires going back and looking at these pages multiple times, but I feel that it was very rewarding to do so.

Other stories in this book appear in color and in slightly different styles. They center on other characters and they music they listen to, but I feel thematically they are linked by issues of longing, searching for one's place in the world, and also exploring life in general. In "Baby Fat" a young woman named Roberta marries her friend Pepe in order to get him a draft deferment. For him, it involves no romance, but she wants something more out of it that does not deliver. For both, the relationship does not play out as expected.

"K.M. & R.P. & MCMLXXI (1971)" is about two young women in high school who bond over Tom Jones, Camus, and literature. Both strive to be novelists one day, but there are some strains and anxieties about life after school that drive a wedge into their friendship.

"Nana" depicts an exchange between two high school teenagers who are into The Carpenters. Even though they share a love for that group, they are divided by social status, as one girl is very popular and the other more marginalized. I loved how this story in particular represented how music can play a part in joining and dividing people.

"Alvin" is set in the 1980s and is about an African-American, teen-aged boy who is into Chuck Berry. He is able to intellectualize his fandom and speak against why it's not inherently nostalgic, but even though he is into rock-and-roll, he is still out of touch with his peers. The reasons why seem partly to lie in racial terms, and the complex ways that a person can find himself separated from others while employing a strong sense of identity are both fascinating to watch in terms of character and more social considerations.

I Am Young simultaneously does two things well: it made me think about people's situations and searches for identity, and it also moved me with their emotional states. I loved this book by M. Dean, and it is a strong and welcome introduction to her comics. She was the first recipient of the Creators for Creators grant, and she also created the webcomics The Girl Who Flew Away and Coming Soon: Regents Walk.

All the reviews I have read of this book have been positive. Publishers Weekly gave it a starred review that concluded, "This stunning debut pulls off the rare feat of drawing about music with authenticity and charm." John Seven wrote about its complexities, noting, "It’s not a depiction of the importance of music in young folks, but an examination of its place in young identity and relationships." Etelka Lehoczky was lukewarm about some of these stories but impressed with M. Dean's art and concluded, "This book about the past makes you wonder what its author will do next." Derek and I also discussed this book on a recent episode of the Comics Alternative podcast.

I Am Young was published by Fantagraphics, and they offer a preview and more here.

A preview copy was provided by the publisher.

Be Your Own Backing Band

Be Your Own Backing Band is the latest collection of comics from Liz Prince, an Ignatz Award winning cartoonist. I have read, admired, and reviewed a couple of her other books, Alone Forever, which focuses on her love life, and Tomboy, which focuses on her formative years. Both books are full of excellent observational humor and they are also very relatable. I love the nerdy persona that Prince portrays in these books.

This latest collection focuses on Prince's musical tastes, and they were originally published in Razorcake Magazine. She tends to like punk bands, and I have to admit I was not very familiar with many of the ones she talks about, but I could totally relate to tales of geeking out over a particular band, elaborate trips to go to shows, and the autobiographical connections she makes throughout.

And as you can see from the excerpts here, each chapter/episode lasts about a page, and they do not necessarily follow in any particular order other than chronological. So this book is a relatively breezy read that you can take in parts or in larger chunks. It works well either way.

I am enamored with Prince's observational and self-deprecating sense of humor, and I really enjoyed reading this book. If you or someone you know is into music, or just has a punk rock sort of mentality, this would be a fun book to read.

I was not able to find a lot of reviews of this book, but the ones I read have been positive. Johanna Draper Carlson wrote that she found much to relate to and sympathize with, even if she was unfamiliar with most of the bands mentioned in the book. There are a bunch of reviews of it over at Goodreads, where it has a 3.72 overall rating.

Be Your Own Backing Band was published by Silver Sprocket, and they offer a preview and more about it here. It does contain a fair share of profanity, so it is recommended for readers mature enough to handle that.

All Summer Long

All Summer Long is a story about adolescence and relationships. Bina is thirteen years old, and during the summer after seventh grade, her life starts changing in all sorts of ways. To start with, her best friend and next door neighbor Austin is going away for a month to summer camp. Not only does his absence leave a void in her typical social life, he also has been  acting weirdly of late.

After a set of circumstances, Bina ends up hanging out with Austin's older sister Charlie. Charlie is typically loud and obnoxious, but she and Bina like the same kind of music, so they bond over that. Over time though, Bina learns that Charlie might be using her to get out and also see her sort-of-boyfriend Jae.

Ah, sibling love!

What I admired most about this book was how it handled its characters and their interactions. As you can see, the situations they are dealing with are pretty ordinary and relatable. I was impressed by how well developed and interesting all the characters were, not falling into stock stereotypes but surprising me with how they respond to particular situations. Also, there is lots of clever dialogue and interesting conversation. Oftentimes, when a comic depends on text heavily, it can be a slog, but this one is a joy to read, moving along at a crisp and effervescent pace. I very much liked getting to know these characters, and better yet, this volume is the first of three, so I'll get more chances to see how they mature and evolve.

This book's creator Hope Larson is an Eisner Award winner for her adaptation of A Wrinkle in Time. She also has written and drawn the young adult story Chiggers. She has written a number of comics, notably the graphic novels Knife's Edge and Compass South, as well as comic book series, one about a teen detective Goldie Vance and the other a run on DC Comics' Batgirl. She speaks about her work on All Summer Long in this interview.

All the reviews I have read about this book have been very positive. In a starred review, Kirkus Reviews summed it up as "a coming-of-age story as tender and sweet as a summer evening breeze." Elizabeth Bush called it a "compact but deftly developed graphic novel." Publishers Weekly praised the character work as well as "dialogue that’s fresh and funny."

All Summer Long was published by Farrar Straus Giroux, and they offer a preview and more here.

A review copy was provided by the publisher.

California Dreamin': Cass Elliot Before The Mamas & the Papas

“Pénélope Bagieu…can turn paper into flesh. And ink becomes lifeblood. Because within several pages of a work like Exquisite Corpse, her characters not only breathe and pulsate with vivid life. They also seem entirely, organically authentic in their own skin.” -Michael Cavna in The Washington Post

Regular readers of my blog know I never start one of my reviews with a pull quote from a book’s dustjacket, but that one seemed so gushing, so over-the-top exultant, that it prejudiced me against this book. Even though I had read and loved Exquisite Corpse, even though I had it on my best of 2015 list, I did not recall it being transcendent. But, holy cow, after reading this book, I feel that every word of that review was deserved and on-target for this graphic novel.

California Dreamin’ is a biography of Mama Cass Elliot, and it is simply fantastic. Excellent. And exquisite. It tells the story of young Ellen Cohen, a girl born in 1941 in Baltimore, MD, to a Jewish family who ran a deli. She was always into music and performing, and she grew up to sing some of the most memorable folk/rock songs ever with group The Mamas and the Papas. There is much drama in this book, from family dynamics to trying to fit in in high school, to trying to navigate various music scenes in the 1960s. Also, she has to deal with her weight as well as several different complicated relationships (both romantically and musically). And this is not to mention her various brushes with contemporary figures of the day, like Bob Dylan and David Crosby.

But what makes this books exceptional is not all the story beats it hits, it is the artistry of the illustrations and storytelling. Even with so much going on, what impressed and stayed with me was Bagieu’s vibrant and lifelike characters. I felt the joys of teenage dreams, the pain of failed relationships, the jealousy between lovers, and the thrills of performance. Bagieu’s lines are extraordinary, and I put her in a pantheon of a few others (like Kate Beaton and Jules Feiffer) whose artwork is almost magical in how it conveys life, emotion, and feeling. And here, unlike Exquisite Corpse, the artwork is in black and white, showing pencil lines without the embellishment of color, and it clearly highlights her masterful craft. I highly recommend reading this book.

This is the second graphic novel published in the US by Pénélope Bagieu, an accomplished artist and graphic novelist from France. She was awarded the high honor Chevalier des Arts et Lettres for her contribution to the world of art and literature, and she has drawn many different comics works, the most famous being Joséphine. She is something of a Renaissance woman, active as a musician drumming in a band and also blogging about her many works and travels here (in French). She speaks extensively about her work on this book in this interview.

The reviews I have read of this book have been universally positive. Shea Hennum wrote that "The story moves with an ease and grace." Henry Chamberlain summed up that "it is highly recommended and will prove an engaging read on many levels: coming-of-age, rock history, and just a plain fun read." Erika W. Smith called it "an entertaining, often funny read."

California Dreamin' was published by First Second, and they have a preview and much more available here.

A review copy was provided by the publisher.

Yeah!

Yeah! is a curious creation in terms of its creative team. Writer Peter Bagge and artist Gilbert Hernandez are much better known for their influential and seminal alternative comics works for adult audiences like Hate and Love and Rockets. One of the last places you would expect their work would be in an all-ages book from a mainstream comics publisher like DC, but from 1999 until 2000 this series ran for nine issues under the Wildstorm imprint.

The story follows the exploits of Yeah!, the most popular band in the universe but utterly unknown on planet Earth. Band members Krazy (vocals & guitar), Honey (drums), and Woo-Woo (keyboards) ironically struggle to find an audience and have to compete in battles of the bands in order to make money. Their main competition is a semi-successful group called The Snobs, only one part of a colorful cast of supporting characters that includes their duplicitous manager Crusty, Honey's "hippie dippie" boyfriend Muddy, and their pet goat Buckeye.

The book is full of zany, intergalactic adventures balanced with humbling experiences. Yeah! cannot spend any of the money they make out in the universe on Earth, and they are constantly scrounging for opportunities to break it big in the music business on their home planet. In all, I found this book fun, surreal, and very charming. Hernandez's art is clean and energetic, calling to mind Dan DeCarlo's classic style on Archie and Josie and the Pussycats. Even though these comics were originally published in color, the black and white is still very attractive, allowing readers to more admire the line work. Bagge's stories are silly yet have enough gravity to make the reader care. Bagge speaks about his work on this book in this interview.

Most reviews I have read of Yeah! remark on the skill of the creators but are tempered by the tone and scope of the book. Marie Penny wrote that "old school comic fans, pop music lovers, and alien aficionados will enjoy Yeah!" Publishers Weekly summed up their review calling this book "a minor but highly enjoyable effort from two masters." Jeremy Nisen admired the book's "cuteness" but added that its unfinished plot-lines detract from the book as a whole.

ALA/YALSA 2012 "Great Graphic Novels for Teens" List - See more at: http://www.fantagraphics.com/browse-shop/yeah-5.html?vmcchk=1#sthash.cAxRhchB.dpuf

ALA/YALSA 2012 "Great Graphic Novels for Teens" List - See more at: http://www.fantagraphics.com/browse-shop/yeah-5.html?vmcchk=1#sthash.cAxRhchB.dpuf

ALA/YALSA 2012 "Great Graphic Novels for Teens" List - See more at: http://www.fantagraphics.com/browse-shop/yeah-5.html?vmcchk=1#sthash.cAxRhchB.dpuf

Yeah! is available from Fantagraphics, who have a preview and more here.

Chicken with Plums

Chicken and Plums (Poulet aux Prunes, in French) chronicles the last eight days of Nasser Ali Khan, a masterful musician who loses the will to live when his choice tar, a musical instrument, is broken. Unable to find a suitable replacement, all music becomes sour to him. He falls into a depression and will not leave his room or eat. His family tries to intercede on his behalf, but he responds very differently to them than they'd like. Even though the main character is extremely egotistical, this tale is quite magical and evocative at times, almost like a fairy tale. Over the course of this book Satrapi interweaves dream-like sequences, flashbacks, and other stories quite expertly. I was very much affected by the narrative.

This is the fourth graphic novel published in the US from Marjane Satrapi. She is a graphic novelist and movie maker who is famous for her autobiographical works and also ones that focus on her family. This work focuses on her great-uncle, whom she learned about from old photographs. She talks about the making this book and its recently released movie version in this interview.

As with Satrapi's other works, the reviews of this graphic novel have been very positive. Danica Davidson wrote, "In a mere 84 pages, Satrapi gives something heartfelt and unique that can keep a reader thinking about it long after turning its last page." Carol Siegfried called the book "very powerful" and noted that "the stark black and white images are very evocative, despite their simplicity." Leroy Douresseaux gushed that "Satrapi’s ability to both engage us with the familiar and enthrall us with something different is the mark of an exceptional, special comic book storyteller."

Chicken with Plums is published in the US by Pantheon. A sizable preview is available from The Virginia Quarterly Review.