Trust in Chuck

I just finished reading the Chuck Palahniuk novel Rant. I've been a big fan of Palahnuik since seeing Fight Club, then immediately reading the book. His style of visceral, quick and sharp writing was hugely influential to me as a writer, (at the time I was studying fiction writing) and Fight Club was something of an eye opener at approaching stories. I try to incorporate that influence into my comics as well. The way Palahnuik would use repetition and pacing in his writing would seem to translate perfectly to comics. Filtered through me, you get something like these panels from BlackStar #4.

Rant: an oral history of Buster Casey, is probably my favorite book of his since Fight Club. For those who haven't read anything by Palahniuk, he almost exclusively writes about strange deviant shit, and Rant is no exception. I actually didn't much like the first 40 pages or so, as it's written as an oral history. So it's like one of those books talking about jazz in the 60's with quotes from a dozen people making up the whole contents. I've read a couple of books like this before and find the form rather disjointed and annoying. Now Rant is a fiction, so the non-fiction form bugged me even more, but I should have had more faith in Chuck, cause he manipulated the form to suit his needs in genius fashion. Great stuff, if you liked the movie Fight Club check out his books.

In other news my son Van just turned two! And in this modern age with all of it's digital frills, my wife and I have been documenting his growth like scientist studying protozoa. For his first birthday I edited a video of pictures taken of Van once a day for the whole year. For year two, I didn't take a picture everyday, but there are home videos mixed in with the pictures to round it all out. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3D8UZiqUlI

And now, three songs from my ipod shuffle.

Ink Studs with Sarah Oleksyk.

Sweet Child O' Mine by Sheryl Crow

Oh My God by Guns 'N' Roses

Ink Studs is actually a podcast. Like Indie Spinner Rack, Ink Studs is about the indie comics scene, with some great interviews. Not as excitable as ISR, but informative and enjoyable. They're doing a whole round of female figures in comics this month.

The Sweet Child O' Mine is the Sheryl Crow cover of the GNR classic. I like Sheryl Crow, or used to, and I love GNR, and I just sorta like this song. It's OK but it really doesn't wow me, although I did consider using it for Van365 ironically enough. In the end it was too on the nose for me, and I thought that Tender by Blur was pitch perfect.

A heavy Guns 'N' Roses round this time! Oh My God, is a song that was released on End of Days soundtrack, and is, I believe. the only original song released by Axl after "Use Your Illusion". It's the more industrial sounding G'n'R, and I dig it! Although I didn't digg it. I don't understand what the hell that website is.

Your Pal, Jeff