Posts Tagged ‘UK indie’

Issue No.12 of Crikey! the magazine of British comics should be in shops across the UK this Friday (October 30th). Once again it contains a strong variety of content, including interviews with Pat Mills (talking at length about his time at IPC plus other things), Leah Moore and John Reppion (on Albion), and veteran comic artist Frank McDiarmid (Cheeky weekly).

Also included is Lee O’Connor discussing his new project with Pat Mills (Stars: The Ayatollah’s Son) and the first part of a two parter on Doctor Who comic strips over the years.

Issues of Crikey! can be bought from branches of Borders and various newsagents across the country, priced £4.99, or you can subscribe via their website here:
http://www.crikeyuk.co.uk/sub.html

Crikey! is the only magazine devoted to British comics, and let’s face it, there have been very few precedents, so I hope all readers of this blog will support it so that it can continue to thrive. Remember, Crikey! doesn’t have the backing of a major publisher behind it so it’s up to us to keep such independent publications alive.

[via Lew Stringer]

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Redeye Magazine has been around since 2003 and was considered by many to be the ultimate UK  indie ‘zine for news, reviews, interviews, etc.  Sadly, things had been a bit quiet on the publication front since 2007′s #6 and many may have feared the demise of this fine publication. It therefore gives me great pleasure to report that the ‘zine has just been relaunched as a digital edition.

The future of comics begins with REDEYE 2.1, a pdf-only monthly magazine with all the news, reviews, features and stuff worth talking about, including:

Interviews with Leah Moore and John Reppion on The Complete Dracula and The Trial of Sherlock Holmes with artists Colton Worley and Aaron Campbell; Cartoonist and festival organiser Oliver Smith talks about throwing out the rule book for the small press and building something better; New York born and raised illustrator Liz Baillie discusses her comics, her love for the Bouncing Souls and her Jabba the Hutt face; Ben Dickson talks to Garen Ewing about Rainbow Orchid blossoming under a new deal with publisher Egmont; Northern Irish illustrator Bridgeen Gillespie talks about curious rabbits, hissy fits and being open to interpretation; and as part of his 100 Days, 100 Cartoonists series, Citizen Badham talks to creators Adam Cadwell and Jim Medway about unconventional narratives, the value of the everyday and deflated balloons.

Plus a THE SECRET HISTORY OF… IRISH COMIX, as Niall Kitson uncovers the growing Irish Comics scene ready for the international stage, and a report on the long awaited LUC@176 event.

114 full colour pages of intelligent, well written, and informative comics journalism for just £1.00/$1.50/€1.00. That really is a bargain. Yes we’re in it but we’d honestly be recommending it just as highly if we weren’t. So get over to www.enginecomics.co.uk/redeye/ and download a copy now!

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Accent UK are a UK based indie publisher founded in 2000 by Colin Mathieson and Dave West.

In 2002 AUK released Remembrance Days - a 22 page anthology dedicated to those who lost their lives as a result of war.  “Nothing too political, something about the little man caught up in the middle of it all, the one who would suffer the most … people like us had we be born decades earlier, and hopefully not decades later” according to Dave himself.

Since then AUK have released an anthology a year and the number of contributors, not to mention the page count, has increased steadily.

We first got involved with AUK in 2005 when we were still working on Albion with Shane Oakley and the father-in-law. I honestly can’t remember exactly how we got talking or precisely who were were talking to (I think it must have been a convention…?) but pretty soon we found ourselves signed up for their 2006 anthology Monsters. Our story “Lusca” was drawn by UK small press legend Dave Hitchcock whose series Springheeled Jack remains a huge favourite of ours.

For the 2007 anthology Mr. West had planned a theme of Time but, in his own words, “I let Colin and Chris [Dingsdale] go off to Komiks.DK 2006, where they spent too much time with John Reppion, Leah Moore and Steve Bissette, and so ZOMBIES was born. Still not one to give up lightly, I emailed the usual suspects and asked them to vote between the two titles, and let’s just say it was pretty unanimous“.

The line up for Zombies featured the likes of Steve (SWAMP THING) Bissette, Kieron (PHONOGRAM) Gillen and Matt (IMPALER) Timson along with dozens of other UK small press folks (including Mr. Hitchcock and ourselves once again).

Zombies received rave reviews and proved popular enough to be picked up by Diamond and distributed overseas. Not bad for a little UK indie publisher!

At the same time AUK brought out The Wolfmen - a stand alone comic set in South East London, in the 1960s. It’s the tale of Jack Grey’s chance at making something of himself, of becoming one of the most notorious gangs of the time …. of becoming one of The Wolfmen.

Written by Dave West with art by Andy Bloor the book proved popular enough to spawn a sequal which is currently in production (and being eagerly awaited).

After Zombies came Robots which attracted so many submissions that the page count finally topped out at 204 with many would be contributors being asked to re-submit for the next anthology.

The success of Zombies saw to it that Robots had a stellar line up – including a pin up from Mark (FABLES) Buckingham and another story from Steve (SWAMP THING) Bissette – and was once again distributed overseas by Diamond (see where this is going yet?).

In early 2009 Diamond Comic Distributors raised its purchase order minimum for all publishers from US$1,500 to US$2,500. What that meant in plain English was that smaller companies with titles selling considerably less than those published by the big three suddenly had to shift almost twice as many units in order to get into Previews. This was (and still is) bad news for small publishers. [see Google for more info]

So now it’s 2009 and the latest AUK anthology Western has arrived. The line up is just as good, if not even better, than those that have gone before but, chances are, you haven’t got a copy. Why? Because, if you’re outside the UK, the book probably hasn’t made it’s way to your part of the world yet. That’s because of Diamond Comic Distributors raising its purchase order minimum back at the start of the year – Accent UK now need to sell more books than ever before in order to get proper distribution.  And this is where you come in…

If you’re outside the UK we want to you to head over to your local comic shop this weekend (or as soon as) and ask them for a copy of Accent UK’s Western – order code: JUN090671.

The book is 200 pages long and costs $12.99.

Accent UK deserve to have their books read and recognised the world over – they’re fantastic guys who do a brilliant job. We love writing for them and working with them and we do it for free! Yes FREE! We’ve been contributing to their anthologies since 2006 and we’ve already got stories lined up for the 2010 and 2011 books. We want you to be able to read those stories so get down to your local comic shop and make sure AUK books are distributed to your country.

Support AUK and do your bit to help save indie comics!

Visit www.accentukcomics.com for more info or go to our Accent UK Page

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