Two Finds From Requiem (1986)

Today was supposed to be my weekend to relax but I ended up clearing out and looking over old files. I did try relaxing in 1977 but ended being driven in an army land rover at speed over an East German minefield. That won't be in my autobiography.  As for the files well you can see over at the AOP blog.

Anyway, splice me a vegetarisan kipper sandwich for lunch iof I did not make a related find! Yesterday I was looking at the back of a Zine Zone and there was the back page ad for Requiem Two and amongst contributors was one Paul Brown.  "What did he contribute?" my aged brain asked me...I often have conversations and arguments with myself but I am NOT medicated (unlike my shampoo).

Well out of the cupboard and from behind the skeletal remains fell a copy of the book itself. The zine was edited by Dan Rickwood and Adam Thomas who,  last I heard, were doing time at Her Majesty's pleasure over an act of gross indecency with a tadpole.

The whole point of the British Comic Book Archive was not to just focuss on the professional artists, writers and publications but also the Small Pressers who often produced work based on more contemporary life and events.  Their contributions to art, etc are just as important as that of H E Pease, Marie Duval, E Banger, John Cooper or Mike Western.

So I opened up the zine and there was Paul Ashley "Smash the state" Brown's contribution. Bang on for the time.

Luckily I guided Paul away from the Crayola crayons and since this piece in 1986 he has made good progress and in another 35 years he should be fine.  oooh I can be such a beyotch!

But that issue also contained a strip by Ben Dilworth -published in portrait format so that is the way I present it here. Again, Ben was lucky that I found and guided him into obscurity  fame if not fortune.

I miss the cutting edge, raw zines that had that dark feel and was more about what was going on. I despair at modern zines where the creator constantly moans about mummy and daddy not sending their allowance so they will miss the pub crawl or how....well, more "I need attention" stuff.

I may be wrong: prove it.