Underground Station – Column

Underground Station

by Bruce Sweeney

I hate to open with this, but there’s been an unfortunate death in the underground community. An important chronicler is dead. Clay Geerdes was one of the little people (albeit bigger than me) who covered undergrounds from the, well, ground up.

There on the scene at the beginning, Clay wrote about undergrounds for anyone who would publish, and when that wasn’t enough, he started his own newsletter and series of minis and digest-sized books which featured such later successes as Jim Valentino, J.R. Williams, and Kevin Eastman, among others.

He was a rival for writing assignments and credibility among publishers and artists. This is a world where there are three seats at the table and ten writers show up with an appetite and a fork. Nevertheless, Clay was a worthy competitor, loved alternative comics, pushed and boosted the undergrounds for years, and was committed to it all up to the very last when cancer took him away at a premature 61.

When I was voraciously hunting and collecting rare and regional undergrounds, it was easy to stay abreast of the 15-30 new titles coming out of Kitchen Sink, Last Gasp, Rip-Off, and the few from England or even gay titles. My collection of undergrounds was in the top five or ten.

Now, it’s impossible to stay on top of Fantagraphics and Drawn & Quarterly of Canada alone. The independent market alone is filled with people turning out bad to excellent product in enough volume to thwart any completist. The death of undergrounds or independent graphics? I think not.

Just got off the phone with Denis Kitchen who states that his publishing company, Kitchen Sink, is finally out of harm’s way. He managed to get financing that will keep him afloat. He went from thirty-two employees to nine and intends to creep back up to fifteen soon.

His biggest item in sight – and this is a scoop – is the R. Crumb Coffee Table Book, 11″ x 13″ 256 pages, about two-thirds in color and totally overseen by Robert himself. It will feature some of Crumb’s best stories in color for the first time, some unpublished early work, color photos of his oil paintings and seldom-seen sculptures. It will be released in two states: A limited edition of 2500 which will go for $300 with additional material published exclusively by Kitchen Sink. Also, Little-Brown will co-produce a 35,000 issue for a modest $40. Frankly, the Little-Brown item sounds like potentially a lot of book.

Rick Geary, whose fine-line style has graced many an underground and mainstream comic has developed a set of postcards that are both interesting and unusual. Postcards 701 Kettner Blvd. #204 San Diego, CA 92101 gets you his digest-sized catalogue which include a color Presidents of the USA, a great black & white Jack the Ripper postcard, and a few devoted to political figures like Dole, Nixon, Clinton, and Eisenhower.

Art Speigelnan is finishing up a kid’s book for Harper Collins entitled Open Me, I’m a Dog which should be out this Fall.

Good Cop, Bad Cop Dept: Drawn & Quarterly (PO Box 48056 Montreal, Quebec Canada H2V458) is big enough and important enough to take it, so here it is. Adrian Tomine continues to excel and grow with his Optic Nerve #4 of which is now out. Like the literature of a Raymond Carver or Harry Crews, he continues to tell small, personal emotional tales of inner turmoil with real concise feeling and insight. Rather than bog in his own personal experience like a Joe Matt or even Crumb, he has the nerve to tell other people’s stories as they move through being in the middle of their own lives. He takes comics to another level like Joe Sacco or Art Spiegelman.

I do miss the wildness of the ’60s and ’70s undergrounds though, with the fabulous excesses of S. Clay Wilson, Jaxon, and Bode before everyone went and grew up. An attempt to recapture that is Doofus #2 by Rick Mtergott, who got exposure in Peter Bagge’s Hate. Derivative of Wally Wood, this material errs on the side of dumbo. It’s largely stupid antics, sex fantasies, and dopey plotting. What is sad is that the artist can draw, but just can’t get a funny story going.

Fortunately, Drawn & Quarterly has several titles out as well: No Love Lost and Nowhere #2 by cartoonist Ariel Bordeaux, Underwater #9 by the atmospheric Chester Brown, and Palookaville #10, which was nominated for three Eisner Awards, about a young girl moving into an unfamiliar suburb.

Primal Groove Press (PO Box 15125 Portland, OR 97215) has a handful of independent titles out, including their tasty little semi-professional item, Top Shelf, which features a handful of solid area cartoonists. I love these independents; you never know what’s going to hit you when you pop these out of the envelope. It’s like someone you hardly know sending you a tape of unknown music.

Firebrand Books (141 The Commons; Ithaca, NY 14850) has a new Alison Bechdel title out, Hot, Throbbing Dykes to Watch Out For. Trust me on this series. Alison is a very, very funny cartoonist. I doubt that she wants you to take her home to meet mother, so don’t worry about it.