Focus On Paul Ashley Brown (but not his leg!)

Now, I could have written a long piece about Mr Brown (you HAVE to call him "Mr" or his mother will knife you -seriously) but he might think I'd gone sweet on him and that ain't the way the Hooper Drum Rolls, dig?

What better way to make people aware of his etchings before this Saturday's Zine Fair in Bristol than post a few past reviews and lots of lovely art and a wee bit of info about him (if you want the real truth just give me a wad of cash).

Paul Graduated from the University of the West of England in 2001 with a BA (Hons) Degree in Illustration. Since 2008 he has been self-publishing the Zine Browner-Knowle, a collection of his short narrative drawings and comic-strips. as well as other one-off titles. His work has featured in publications The Illustrated Ape, Strike! , Publish YOU!, The Comix Reader, The Affordable Amazement Catalogue, Indestructible Energy, Workburger, Stripburger, and Colour Me BAD !  .

He lives and works in Bristol, England.

Up-dated website with recent drawings, and Yo-Yo Buk Stupidity-see examples below if you can't be bothered to go there.

http://www.paulashleybrown.co.uk/

Defective Comics Get A Copy -QUICKLY!

Tell you what, you stick to your "They'll be worth even less in 50 years time" DC and Marvel comics. Me, I just bought a dozen of these because the legal notice should be served in late August -28th- so banned by DC, all the things in this mean I'll be making some easy money in about a year from now.

Never say I didn't give you the heads up.  Once gone -you lose!

Up-date If you really want to buy a book that will be rare and therefore a good investment and have a story behind why it is rare -this is it.  Word on the grapre-vine is that DC are about to threaten legal action to stop this loving parody.

Buy quickly because lawyers work fast on high salaries!

Defective Comics
Writer: Peter (The Golden Wonder Boy) Lally
Art: Paul (Bat-Probe) BrownA516pp
According to Mr Brown: "Hallo Tel um, it's £3 + £1 p&p. Paypal me at paulashleybrown@gmail.com, with your address. Isn't that enough eh? 

 Oh dear. I kept hearing Batman's dialogue in Adam West's voice and the Joker's in Mark Hamill's. Naturally, we all know whose voice Robin had -?

I reviewed the last hilarious outing of this creative duo back in 2010 -Donald Hamilton: Mind Your Manners, which looked at the sad story of a former TV icon and his fall from grace...hilariously. Sadly, the review was on the old CBO and not on Blogger.  However, Comic Reader recommended it: 

This was all rather fun and the ending sees everyone happy except, maybe, Commissioner Gordon. Lovely solid negatives (Holy black and white art done proper!). This is The Killing Joke as Moore should have done it and very relevant at the moment. Hoy -Moore: read this and see how fun comics with "social comment" should be done.

Lally does not produce enough scripts but that could be because he is living "outside the system" in Berlin and on the run from Opus 21 hit-squads -you did read my review of that, right? 

People: this is what Small Press comics should look like.Browner-Knowle 8 (or BK8 for d'yoot)
Like The Strangers That You've Met Drawings By Paul Ashley Brown

http://www.thecomixreader.com/2010/10/mind-you-manners.html

This is a darker, jaded Batman who might be described as "very weary" and angry. Quite, quite Bat-angry.  Look at that Front cover. Bloody "Hoodies".  But then, Aquaman seems almost on the verge of a breakdown while Robin...well, Robin apparently has a nice arse but cannot get a girlfriend though he does get his bum pinched a lot if he goes into bars.  ahem.

Here: http://hoopercomicart.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/opus-21-quality-birds-aka-wisdom-of.html

But when "The Golden Wonder Boy" teams up with Paul (Bat-Probe) Brown it all clicks together to make a great, and very funny read.  Add to that the quality of printing by Pat-Print Prods (my scans aren't doing it justice) and lovely thick and almost glossy interior pages -it's pure quality.

Paul Ashley Brown

48pp

A5 (Digest)

Black and White

£5.00

Firstly, no, I have no idea how you can get a copy other than to look out for Mr Brown at some effete Small Press event. Review after review I say "People need to know how to order" but does it sink in?  No. And I give up.  But it does mean -this will irritate him- that if you are looking for investment comics you need to latch on to Browner Knowle -not widely available and with limited print runs.

Before I do my bit, for what it's worth, I thought I'd look around and see what others had written -if any had- about BK 8.

Well, I found one review posted by Peter Stanbury  http://comiket.comica.london/paul-ashley-brown-comics/

"Once again, Paul Ashley Brown serves up a motley crew of characters passing through the melancholy landscape of a lost and lonely England.

From shopaholic old ladies reeling round supermarkets, to doped-up sofa wastrels off their faces and out of their minds; half-glimpsed street nutters and lonely female librarians, war veterans and street photographers, all are revealed in words and images that are by turns cruel, funny, perverse, sad, tragic, compassionate, violent and contemplative.

Expect melancholic musings of love, loss, and what it means to be (barely) alive. With added excessive offensive language, and scenes of a (peculiar) sexual nature, this is sure to affirm Brown’s position of being the most anonymous outsider out there. With justifiable cause!"

The link will take you to links for a couple other PAB books.

Paul Ashley Brown exhibiting himself in Finland

Having seen all the Browner Knowles one thing struck me straight away -colour cover.  And a very nice colour cover to boot.  There is also another nice illo on the back cover but you need to buy the book to see that!

The other thing I noted is quality of the paper and printing.  No one really cares what I think, I know, but after seeing thousands of publications in 40+ years these things jab my brain.  The thickness and sturdiness of the paper are good.  These pages are not going to tear or crease unless you want to do that. The printing is quite luscious. No faded or not-quite black printing. 

This is very good quality printing and so the negatives (black -ink/white -paper) are excellently balanced.  This is also a Perfect Bound book and I can tell you the spine is tough as concrete.  I know this because while I was on the floor (you don't need to know why) BK8 fell of a shelf and almost concussed me: that is one tough spine.

Quality wise, I have to say that this is the best issue to date.  So then we have to contents.

My two favourite pages -well, double spread- are the character looking out of the window at the night bus as it passes.  Vivianand Satellites of Love are two other favourites. Missus Necessary  might look like it is going to be just a humour strip but there's more to it.  In fact, BK8 was not as suicide inspirational as you might think from the usual Mr Brown fair.

Very enjoyable but I still have to ask why, with all the far, far lesser talents picked up by publishers to produce graphic novels, no one has approached Paul Ashley Brown?  That shows the poor state of comics or, as the arty farty set prefer to call it, the "graphic illustration scene"

If you can find a copy buy a copy!

PAB
21 x 21.5 cms
20pp
black and white
£4.00
available from  Paul Ashley Brown, c/o 15 Wedmore Vale Road, Bedminster, Bristol BS3 5HQ

Having just sold one heck of a lot of books at the Alternative Press event in London, Mr. Brown is one of those creators I keep telling people that they need to invest in. 

His books have sold in Europe and he has been to Finland and Japan which adds to his already existing following in the UK.

Mr. Brown is currently working on other projects but tends to not over expose his work.  So this makes that work much sought after!

Rather than use the familiar format of the Browner Knowle series, Mr. Brown has opted for a more squarish format and, sadly, my scanner does not show the nice yellow shade of the cover -but that's scanners for you!

The scanner does not do justice to the pencil artwork which is a great pity as these centre pages I really like.  And it is an even bigger annoyance because with today's printing technology you can reproduce pencil art superbly -it's when it gets into the hands of kack-handed scanner-reviewers that it goes wrong!

For investment, and if you can get a hold of copies because these are low print run books, I would say buy this book orBrowner Knowles or any of his books -the mini Yo Yo books sell like hot-cakes on a cold Winters day so if you can buy any of those do!

And if you have bought a copy of  number 6 of The Comix Reader -check online to buy at http://www.thecomixreader.com/

 - you will see some of Mr. Brown's colour work.

Again, if you get a folded newspaper size comic it will get creases -and the actual colours on this piece are quite subtle.

No Tobias Tak in this edition which means that Mr. Brown's work is the stand-out piece in the comic.  Again, I don't think The Comic Reader has a massive print-run so worth getting and there is the added bonus that newspaper format comics in the UK are VERY rare

But you can order the latest Paul Ashley Brown book directly from him so why not ask him to sign your copy?

Really is a nice book and I have to add it to my collection which includes Judge Dredd and Blue Saviour illustrations by said Bristol's own King of Zines!

Highly recommended.

 http://illustrators.co/sites/default/files/the-leaving-detail.preview.jpg

 

The Return Of Paul Ashley Brown Anon.

 ANON
Paul Ashley Brown
Browner Knowle Publications
8 or 16 pages
A4 or A3
£3.00 + £1.00 p&p 

The Bristol art leg end that is Paul Alouitiuos Makepiece Kitchener Lady Chaterley Brown -aka Ashley Simpson aka Paul Ashley Brown was bound to return. After the Browner Knowle issue cited in Parliament as being responsible for mass suicides -and which I am legally obliged not to mention here- we have another offering from the living Erzatz.

You know he hates me, right? Rival more like.

There may be a few who wonder why I've written "A4/A3" and "8 or 16 pages"?  Simple.  This is an un-stapled, loose-leaf offering offering double spreads so they are A3 folded to A4. There is the usual collection of eccentrics and sketches from life and do not panic -still the faint hint of depression here but all enjoyable.

However, there is ONE reason why you ought top get a copy of this latest offering. If only the story behind it were included but it is a case of "protecting the innocent".  Here is that reason:

Paul Ashley Brown: Anon 2

Anon 2

Paul Ashley Brown

Browner Knowle

A4

16pp

Firstly, this is printed on a slightly tinted paper which looks nice but fecks things up on scanning. So I had to turn 'em into black and white art pages.  Does look better with the tint, though.

Now, I do not usually look at other reviews but this one caught my eye:

"Reading this will make you a goddam sexual tyrranosaur!"

Dr Jessie Ventura

Karachi Medical Gazette

That is some recommendation.

Well, if there was one positive side to last weekends BCZF it was that Mr Paul Ashley Brown sold a fair doings of zines. He stood there, drinking an espresso with his t-Shirt emblazoned with "Je ne suis pas prétentieux, je ne suis que l'artiste!"*

 I have written "16 pages" but that is not quite accurate.  This book is not stapled and that is for a very good reason: the pages open up to make four A3 posters.  My favourite of these is this one:

 I have written "16 pages" but that is not quite accurate.  This book is not stapled and that is for a very good reason: the pages open up to make four A3 posters.  My favourite of these is this one:

 You do get the one page treats such as "Humpty On The Edge Forever" that Mr Brown calls "Mon déchirant chef-d'œuvre de la vie!"** And who could argue with that? I cried. I truly cried.*** I do like the use of solid black and white here which balances out the page.

 And Mr Brown did say that far more would be revealede about what he calls his "mes penchants sexuels torrides" and I'm guessing this page covers that. Believe me, that illo is physically spot on accurate, boy. This is half of one of the A3 posters I was referring to and if you want to see the women in the other half you will have to buy. Gave me the right horn. Although, this illustration of its own accord has a slight, what the French call "taquineries sexuelle".  Hmm?

Yes, no cover logo...and yet we knew it was Anon 2 because Mr Brown told us so.

Here is a comparison with Storm which I just reviewed.  This is an art style I've not seen anyone other than Mr Brown employ and it works for style of story telling -whether simply illustrative or text accompanied. I don't have any problem recommending this -simply contact Mr Brown and ask the cost!

 Reviewers notes.

*"I am not pretentious. I am merely THE artist!"

**"My heart wrenching masterpiece about life!"

***And did I cry -I whacked my big toe against the table leg.

I may have been lying about some things in this review but not the book.  Buy a copy and get in on why he's so popular!

_________________________________________________________

And if none of that convinced you that you need to get some PAB books for your collection let me just add that Defective Comics has been well received in Finland, Germany and, I believe, Japan.

The CBO Spotlight.....Paul Ashley Brown

 With Intermittent Squelching By The UKs King Of Comics

(That's me...)

Having ignored all my best Simon Cowell "Go on, boy -I'll make you famous! (but poor)" lines, "Old Slow Hand"/"Panting Pazzer"/"Wonder Maid" (?! -I have the photo somewhere).  From his humble beginnings as a scribbler working on 1980s legendary comic, Vigilante Vulture, a few strips -including one in Coffin Blood- and some he might wish to forget like his Phantom Detective strip.  Oh, I keep it all.

But he will probably not be remembered for....

OUTLAWS OF THE URBAN FOREST-

The Series That Never Was!

Now, I have shown low res scans of the Sad Lads Pad idea sent to TV companies and then I found the set colour scheme but I have a hefty correspondence file with the artist.

Yes, Paul Ashley Brown may be better known these days for Browner Knowle but back in the day...well a few years actually back in the 1980s...he was the artist struggling with over-written scripts for a comic that attracted the attention of many top UK comic creators (no, it was not porn)...Vigilante Vulture!

There were a few forays after that but the comics industry is full of crooks as Mr Brown discovered -though he did take legal action and get his money (but not work) back off one UK publisher.

Now, unless you know him (not in the "Biblical sense") you will know that he can produce some great humour work -drawing Peter Lallys Donald Hamilton for instance.  There is, if I can ever scan it, a comic strip telling of the Southbank TV show special on my career, presented by Melvyn Bragg. And much more.

You see, when he doesn't put a lot of thought into comics designed to drive people to despair, Mr Brown has a quick cartoon style that he can turn to some very funny strips.  In that sense he has never explored the idea of turning these into a comic which is a great pity.

Mr Brown was also inspired by my classic 1983-84 mini series Outlaws Of The Urban Forest and in..2008(??) he set to work on a follow-up which, sadly, never got completed and I really did like the art/story and as everyone knows I never ever allow people to work on things I started unless I like what I see.

I have some of those pages but here is a cover mock-up -the black and white version and the vibrantly coloured version.

Great stuff and I'd like to see more of this type of thing from him.  He has the ability and style and CAN do it.

In case he reads this, he never does, I'd like to point out I've been ill so I probably never ever said anything kind about him. 

Mr Brown's work has appeared in Stripburger and he's usually at all the hip, beat-cat zine events building up his ever growing....do my notes read "erection"?? Oh -reputation. And having already been to Japan in 2014 he had to, of course, visit Finland where he was hailed as a taxi innovative comicker.

Remember this CBO item?

Bristol Artist Paul Ashley Brown In Finland Exhibit

Yes, those Europeans know a good thing.  And in this case it is Bristol artist Paul Ashley Brown whose work is being exhibited in Finland.

Here is a photo of the man himself at the exhibit followed by an article from Helmet.fi

Helmet -http://www.helmet.fi/fi-FI/Kirjastot_ja_palvelut/Rikhardinkadun_kirjasto/Tapahtumat/Paul_Ashley_Brownin_sarjakuvia%2852116%29

Paul Ashley Brownin sarjakuvia

Paul Ashley Brown valmistui kuvittajaksi vuonna 2001 The University of West of Englandista. Sen jälkeen hän on julkaissut omakustanteena seitsemän osaa Browner-Knowle-zinestä, joka on kokoelma lyhyitä, melankolisia sarjakuvia ja narratiivisia piirustuksia, sekä muita yksittäisiä julkaisuja. Hänen töitään on ollut myös Illustrated Ape-, The Comix rRader- ja Stripburger-lehdissä. Hän asuu ja työskentelee Bristolissa Englannissa.

Paul Ashley Brown graduated from The University of the West of England in 2001 with a First Class Honours Degree in Illustration, Since 2008 he has self-published seven issues of Browner-Knowle, his zine collection of short, poetic melancholy narrative drawings and comics, as well as other small one-off titles. His work has also been published in the pages of The Illustrated Ape, The Comix Reader, and Stripburger. He lives and works in Bristol, England.

Tapahtumapaikka:Rikhardinkadun kirjasto, Hyllygalleria hyvinpieni 2. krs.

Tapahtuma-aika:1.12.2014 - 31.12.2014

 But, Mr Brown's Small Press offerings are much sought after, including, with some memorable full page illoes, Anon....

So It Is Writ. So It Must Be. Anon. The Return Of Paul Ashley Brown

 ANON
Paul Ashley Brown
Browner Knowle Publications
8 or 16 pages
A4 or A3
£3.00 + £1.00 p&p
Ordering: contact Paul through his website at: http://www.paulashleybrown.co.uk/#home

The Bristol art leg end that is Paul Alouitiuos Makepiece Kitchener Lady Chaterley Brown -aka Ashley Simpson aka Paul Ashley Brown was bound to return. After the Browner Knowle issue cited in Parliament as being responsible for mass suicides -and which I am legally obliged not to mention here- we have another offering from the living Erzatz.

You know he hates me, right? Rival more like.

There may be a few who wonder why I've written "A4/A3" and "8 or 16 pages"?  Simple.  This is an un-stapled, loose-leaf offering offering double spreads so they are A3 folded to A4. There is the usual collection of eccentrics and sketches from life and do not panic -still the faint hint of depression here but all enjoyable.

However, there is ONE reason why you ought top get a copy of this latest offering. If only the story behind it were included but it is a case of "protecting the innocent".  Here is that reason:

Anon 2
Paul Ashley Brown
Browner Knowle
A4
16pp
I have no price here...?
www.paulashleybrown.co.uk./

Firstly, this is printed on a slightly tinted paper which looks nice but fecks things up on scanning. So I had to turn 'em into black and white art pages.  Does look better with the tint, though.

Now, I do not usually look at other reviews but this one caught my eye:

"Reading this will make you a goddam sexual tyrranosaur!"

Dr Jessie Ventura

Karachi Medical Gazette

That is some recommendation. 

Well, if there was one positive side to last weekends BCZF it was that Mr Paul Ashley Brown sold a fair doings of zines. He stood there, drinking an espresso with his t-Shirt emblazoned with "Je ne suis pas prétentieux, je ne suis que l'artiste!"*

 I have written "16 pages" but that is not quite accurate.  This book is not stapled and that is for a very good reason: the pages open up to make four A3 posters.  My favourite of these is this one:

 You do get the one page treats such as "Humpty On The Edge Forever" that Mr Brown calls "Mon déchirant chef-d'œuvre de la vie!"** And who could argue with that? I cried. I truly cried.*** I do like the use of solid black and white here which balances out the page.

 And Mr Brown did say that far more would be revealede about what he calls his "mes penchants sexuels torrides" and I'm guessing this page covers that. Believe me, that illo is physically spot on accurate, boy. This is half of one of the A3 posters I was referring to and if you want to see the women in the other half you will have to buy. Gave me the right horn. Although, this illustration of its own accord has a slight, what the French call "taquineries sexuelle".  Hmm?

Yes, no cover logo...and yet we knew it was Anon 2 because Mr Brown told us so.

Here is a comparison with Storm which I just reviewed.  This is an art style I've not seen anyone other than Mr Brown employ and it works for style of story telling -whether simply illustrative or text accompanied. I don't have any problem recommending this -simply contact Mr Brown and ask the cost!
 _______________________________________________________________________________

 Reviewers notes.
*"I am not pretentious. I am merely THE artist!" 
**"My heart wrenching masterpiece about life!"
***And did I cry -I whacked my big toe against the table leg.
I may have been lying about some things in this review but not the book.  Buy a copy and get in on why he's so popular!
____________________________________________________________________________

But THE legendary work that saw his rise to fame is Browner Knowle -an explanation to our foreign comickers: "Browner" is the way some people refer to Mr Brown.  A Mr Smith might be called "Smithy" or "Smithers".  "Knowle is a rather upmarket, low guttering drain hole where Mr Brown grew up.  So the series should be titled Brown from Knowle -but this is Bristol!

BK Books: Browner Knowle 7 -I Read It Yet I Live

Browner Knowle 7
Paul Ashley Brown
BK Books
A5
Black & white
24pp
£4.00
www.paulashleybrown.co.uk/

Now before I start, that web address I have just spent an hour trying to find. Paul Ashley Brown everywhere (mostly from old CBO postings) but no web page so I'll have to look into this.

You know there are two absolute metaphysical certainties in this world. One: We'll be dead one day. Two: Suicide rates climb whenever a new Browner Knowle is published. Within the constraints of of the confined internal logic of the psycho-metaphysical rules of existentialism that engage our every day  lives Browner Knowle is the Messenger of death.

                                                                   Heh?
            
                                                                   Quite.

I love mixing medication it's like an existentialist lottery. But then....why not?

It is at times like these that I think Mr Brown might even be able to draw a comic.  Let's face it, that is how this aging poster child for the lost Thatcher generation started out -Vigilante Vulture and so on. However, having worked with the writer of said VV it was bound to affect the aging hipster's mind  -he is free and single, ladies so if interested here's his photo (and in the background LMFAOs "I'm Sexy And I Know It" blasts away):

Ahhh. Nothing like a bit of character assassination to start off a day of pain.  So now to the subject of this posting which was temporarily lost somewhere in the Himalaya's until it was found to be a polar bear-brown bear hybrid.

The cover...well, this is just another Bristol street scene and walk through Bedminster any day of the week and you can spot these...tatters.  In fact, another good example is "The Walking Man" -as seen below:

But this is not an issue full of Mr Brown's "Bristol Grotesques".  No, there are two strips in this edition -he would probably call them "contes graphiques".  Anyway, the first is "3 A. M. With The Lights Off", though since you can see that on the page below I do wonder why I wrote that.  We've all been there: the guy talking at you in the car but not really talking to you and the promise of what might be but never really is. Men can be bastards. I'm looking at this through a woman's eyes of course. 

erm

Nice, nice solid blacks.  Mr Brown really could become an artist you know. You know, I feel sorry for the poor utterly depressed man who stood on Perot's Bridge in the City Harbour. Looking into the murky, beckoning waters but terrified of jumping in just in case someone pulls him out and he contracts Weil's Disease.  All the time some git with a sketch pad is saying: "Yes. Like that. Keep that look of total and utter despair until I've finished!"

All he wanted to do was kill himself but he ended up in Browner Knowle. Quite depressing. And then we have "Charles Aznevour" and while reading this we should all be singing along. Come on now -you KNOW the lyrics as well as I do. A one...a two...a three and.....

Dance in the Old Fashioned Way.
Won't you stay in my arms?
Just melt against my skin
And let me feel your heart,
Don't let the music win
By dancing far apart.
Come close where you belong.
Let's hear our secret song.
Dance in the Old Fashioned Way.
Won't you stay in my arms?
And we'll discover highs
We never knew before,
If we just close our eyes
And dance around the floor.
That gay old fashioned way
That makes me love you more.
Dance in the Old Fashioned Way.
Won't you stay in my arms?
And we'll discover highs
We never knew before,
If we just close our eyes
And dance around the floor.
That gay old fashioned way
That makes me love you more

ahh, Charles, you may be 89 years old now but should such a singer-song-writer, actor, public activist, diplomat such as you be in an issue of Browner Knowle?  Yes. We've all been there though some of us find it harder each year to embrace ourselves. Poignant, ain't it me old luvver?

Let's cheer things up and take a peek at Mr Brown after he's met up with a certain Mr Northall (a rival if the truth be told!) for five minutes.

Yes, it is quite terrible when all your favourite 1970s British TV greats have been arrested under Operation Yewtree.  Especially when you scream at the news media for not hyphenating "Yewtree"!

"A Sound From Downstairs" for me can usually mean my irritable bowel syndrome is about to explode into a volcano of....no. No, you don't really want to know that. Besides, in this case, it is the title of the second strip in this book.  Seven pages showing that Mr Brown CAN indeed draw sequential works or comic strips. Compliment with a slap. See what I did there?

I'm guessing this is Mr Brown in ten years time?  It is a nicely drawn strip -solid negatives and even a little cross-hatching and some nice detailed garden in a panel.  I'd say this was "enjoyable" but I don't quite think that is the point here. Nor is it the point in "Face Down In A Face-Shaped Hole" -actually a third strip. Yeah, I miss-counted but I read this so I've been punished enough.

Over-all it's a nice little book with probably "A Sound From Downstairs" being the longest piece of strip-work from the aging hipster in a long time and I'm not including his preliminary work on the graphic novel "Stuart Hall Touched Me Inappropriately But Not In A Physical Way" due out on the 13/13/13.

But will this tour de force (I really must stop reading these French BD) be the last Browner Knowle -will all those Small/Alternative Press events attended by Mr Brown now be so much poorer for the lack of work from the Dean of Depression?

I put this to Mr Brown who responded cryptically, as usual, over a serving of Cream Crunchy biscuits: "Fans often approach me and ask these questions and I allways respond with 'Dear hero imprisoned with all the new crimes that you are perfecting. Oh, I can't help quoting you because everything that you said rings true' for am I now not in my cell, well, I followed you.." a glazed look takes over his eyes as he angrily presses his face closer to mine and gutterally demanded: "Reggie kray - do you know my name ?"
_______________________________________________________________


Now, when I referred to making investments for the future by buying Small Press books Browner Knowle is a perfect example.  Very low print runs, around 50 copies and no reprints, a popular creator with a following who is a "name".  So if you grab copies of his zines then in ten years (rather than 40-50+ years with mainstream comics) you ought to see a reasonable return if you sold them.


If you want really -really- rare then go for Ben Dilworth 1980s zines.


But in the meantime, as the Boy from Knowle would say, "I'm off to soak up the misery"!

So, Just Who/What Would I Suggest You Invest In Comics Wise?

Right, I have written about trying to invest in creators/publishers who specialise in short print runs -no reprints later on.  Once a book goes its gone and at 50 or 75 copies those books will be scarce.

So which creators?

I'll go with two I know and have already written about.

Creator Ben R. Dilworth

There are UK comic creators who deserve to get far more recognition than they do. I have highlighted some of these in the past but  it is worth mentioning one other.  Ben R. Dilworth.

Now the man inked over my pencils "in the day" (which is what we call the period 1986-1990) on strips such as Liz & Jen: Coming Out and D-Gruppe: Revenge of the Ice Queen.

He was also self-publishing Small Press comics under his Penguinflight banner and seemed to be  contributing to every small press comic going -Bum Comic, Creepy Crawlies, Zine Ager, Hardware -it is a bloody long list and the legendary Picasso Cafe must never be forgotten!

Neither do I forget Dilworth stapling Black Tower Adventure issues across his knee at the old Bath marts.  Nor the experimental acetate, spray-painted covers for Previews Comic or a dozen other mad things.

We ought to, really, forget the most famous and now nearly lost legendary visit of Dilworth and Andrew Hope (who recently worked for Marvel Comics) to Bristol.

The drunken outrages committed -including throwing up over the window of comic shop, Forever People, or the very long discussion between the two on the movie A Company of Wolves which kind of resulted in the 0300 hours incident of me wielding a bread-knife......yeah, let's forget that.

Anyhow, The Tall Man wrote and drew for comics such as Spider Baby Grafix's Taboo, Eternity Comics Killing Stroke and Trident Comics (PLEASE no one mention Trident to Paul Ashley Brown!!) The Shadowmen written by some Scots bloke...uh, Mark Millar.

He can also claim to be, as the artist, co-creator of Pete Wisdom, initially created by Warren Ellis and drawn by Ben , in a pitch for "Electric Angel" for publisher Trident Comics.

Didn't know all that did you?




Here are some of his credits from a data base I just stumbled across at http://comicbookdb.com/creator.php?ID=8028

Writer:

Killing Stroke (1991)

Penciller:

Killing Stroke (1991) The Shadowmen (1990) Taboo (1988)

Inker:

Gore Shriek (1986) Gore Shriek (1990) Killing Stroke (1991) The Shadowmen (1990) Shriek (1989) Taboo (1988) Trident (1989)

Letterer:

Gore Shriek (1990)
Killing Stroke (1991)

And over recent years The Tall One has had work published by Black Tower -including his Award winning Haiku (in English), Aesop's Fables, Purple Hood, Runestone, Chronos:The Watchman -and much, much more that has ensured Black Tower titles such as Adventure were able to carry on after a rough patch.

The man is a fecking comic book genius.  WFT is he not working full time in comics and getting paid??!

Calming down a bit....deep breath.  Seriously, check out the Black Tower lulu.com store front and you'll find Dilworth work.  Maybe one day he'll get a creator byline for Pete Wisdom, hmm?

From myself I'd like to offer him a big THANK YOU.

 

 

You wait, I'll make him famous yet.  Poor but famous!

And I went and forgot Loaded number 1 from 1991 in which I wrote and pencilled Graveyard  and Dilworth  inked and lettered!

 

 

The next is another creator who has been around since the 1980s and has a growing reputation in the UK and in Europe.

Paul Ashley Brown

 With Intermittent Squelching By The UKs King Of Comics

(That's me...)

Having ignored all my best Simon Cowell "Go on, boy -I'll make you famous! (but poor)" lines, "Old Slow Hand"/"Panting Pazzer"/"Wonder Maid" (?! -I have the photo somewhere).  From his humble beginnings as a scribbler working on 1980s legendary comic, Vigilante Vulture, a few strips -including one in Coffin Blood- and some he might wish to forget like his Phantom Detective strip.  Oh, I keep it all.

But he will probably not be remembered for....

OUTLAWS OF THE URBAN FOREST-

The Series That Never Was!

Now, I have shown low res scans of the Sad Lads Pad idea sent to TV companies and then I found the set colour scheme but I have a hefty correspondence file with the artist.

Yes, Paul Ashley Brown may be better known these days for Browner Knowle but back in the day...well a few years actually back in the 1980s...he was the artist struggling with over-written scripts for a comic that attracted the attention of many top UK comic creators (no, it was not porn)...Vigilante Vulture!

There were a few forays after that but the comics industry is full of crooks as Mr Brown discovered -though he did take legal action and get his money (but not work) back off one UK publisher.

Now, unless you know him (not in the "Biblical sense") you will know that he can produce some great humour work -drawing Peter Lallys Donald Hamilton for instance.  There is, if I can ever scan it, a comic strip telling of the Southbank TV show special on my career, presented by Melvyn Bragg. And much more.

You see, when he doesn't put a lot of thought into comics designed to drive people to despair, Mr Brown has a quick cartoon style that he can turn to some very funny strips.  In that sense he has never explored the idea of turning these into a comic which is a great pity.

Mr Brown was also inspired by my classic 1983-84 mini series Outlaws Of The Urban Forest and in..2008(??) he set to work on a follow-up which, sadly, never got completed and I really did like the art/story and as everyone knows I never ever allow people to work on things I started unless I like what I see.

I have some of those pages but here is a cover mock-up -the black and white version and the vibrantly coloured version.

Great stuff and I'd like to see more of this type of thing from him.  He has the ability and style and CAN do it.

In case he reads this, he never does, I'd like to point out I've been ill so I probably never ever said anything kind about him. 

Mr Brown's work has appeared in Stripburger and he's usually at all the hip, beat-cat zine events building up his ever growing....do my notes read "erection"?? Oh -reputation. And having already been to Japan in 2014 he had to, of course, visit Finland where he was hailed as a taxi innovative comicker.

Remember this CBO item?

Bristol Artist Paul Ashley Brown In Finland Exhibit

Yes, those Europeans know a good thing.  And in this case it is Bristol artist Paul Ashley Brown whose work is being exhibited in Finland.

Here is a photo of the man himself at the exhibit followed by an article from Helmet.fi

Helmet -http://www.helmet.fi/fi-FI/Kirjastot_ja_palvelut/Rikhardinkadun_kirjasto/Tapahtumat/Paul_Ashley_Brownin_sarjakuvia%2852116%29

Paul Ashley Brownin sarjakuvia

Paul Ashley Brown valmistui kuvittajaksi vuonna 2001 The University of West of Englandista. Sen jälkeen hän on julkaissut omakustanteena seitsemän osaa Browner-Knowle-zinestä, joka on kokoelma lyhyitä, melankolisia sarjakuvia ja narratiivisia piirustuksia, sekä muita yksittäisiä julkaisuja. Hänen töitään on ollut myös Illustrated Ape-, The Comix rRader- ja Stripburger-lehdissä. Hän asuu ja työskentelee Bristolissa Englannissa.

Paul Ashley Brown graduated from The University of the West of England in 2001 with a First Class Honours Degree in Illustration, Since 2008 he has self-published seven issues of Browner-Knowle, his zine collection of short, poetic melancholy narrative drawings and comics, as well as other small one-off titles. His work has also been published in the pages of The Illustrated Ape, The Comix Reader, and Stripburger. He lives and works in Bristol, England.

 

Tapahtumapaikka:Rikhardinkadun kirjasto, Hyllygalleria hyvinpieni 2. krs.

Tapahtuma-aika:1.12.2014 - 31.12.2014

 But, Mr Brown's Small Press offerings are much sought after, including, with some memorable full page illoes, Anon....

So It Is Writ. So It Must Be. Anon. The Return Of Paul Ashley Brown

 ANON
Paul Ashley Brown
Browner Knowle Publications
8 or 16 pages
A4 or A3
£3.00 + £1.00 p&p
Ordering: contact Paul through his website at: http://www.paulashleybrown.co.uk/#home

The Bristol art leg end that is Paul Alouitiuos Makepiece Kitchener Lady Chaterley Brown -aka Ashley Simpson aka Paul Ashley Brown was bound to return. After the Browner Knowle issue cited in Parliament as being responsible for mass suicides -and which I am legally obliged not to mention here- we have another offering from the living Erzatz.

You know he hates me, right? Rival more like.

There may be a few who wonder why I've written "A4/A3" and "8 or 16 pages"?  Simple.  This is an un-stapled, loose-leaf offering offering double spreads so they are A3 folded to A4. There is the usual collection of eccentrics and sketches from life and do not panic -still the faint hint of depression here but all enjoyable.

However, there is ONE reason why you ought top get a copy of this latest offering. If only the story behind it were included but it is a case of "protecting the innocent".  Here is that reason:

Anon 2
Paul Ashley Brown
Browner Knowle
A4
16pp
I have no price here...?
www.paulashleybrown.co.uk./

Firstly, this is printed on a slightly tinted paper which looks nice but fecks things up on scanning. So I had to turn 'em into black and white art pages.  Does look better with the tint, though.

Now, I do not usually look at other reviews but this one caught my eye:

"Reading this will make you a goddam sexual tyrranosaur!"

Dr Jessie Ventura

Karachi Medical Gazette

That is some recommendation. 

Well, if there was one positive side to last weekends BCZF it was that Mr Paul Ashley Brown sold a fair doings of zines. He stood there, drinking an espresso with his t-Shirt emblazoned with "Je ne suis pas prétentieux, je ne suis que l'artiste!"*

 I have written "16 pages" but that is not quite accurate.  This book is not stapled and that is for a very good reason: the pages open up to make four A3 posters.  My favourite of these is this one:

 You do get the one page treats such as "Humpty On The Edge Forever" that Mr Brown calls "Mon déchirant chef-d'œuvre de la vie!"** And who could argue with that? I cried. I truly cried.*** I do like the use of solid black and white here which balances out the page.

 And Mr Brown did say that far more would be revealede about what he calls his "mes penchants sexuels torrides" and I'm guessing this page covers that. Believe me, that illo is physically spot on accurate, boy. This is half of one of the A3 posters I was referring to and if you want to see the women in the other half you will have to buy. Gave me the right horn. Although, this illustration of its own accord has a slight, what the French call "taquineries sexuelle".  Hmm?

Yes, no cover logo...and yet we knew it was Anon 2 because Mr Brown told us so.

Here is a comparison with Storm which I just reviewed.  This is an art style I've not seen anyone other than Mr Brown employ and it works for style of story telling -whether simply illustrative or text accompanied. I don't have any problem recommending this -simply contact Mr Brown and ask the cost!
 _______________________________________________________________________________

 Reviewers notes.
*"I am not pretentious. I am merely THE artist!" 
**"My heart wrenching masterpiece about life!"
***And did I cry -I whacked my big toe against the table leg.
I may have been lying about some things in this review but not the book.  Buy a copy and get in on why he's so popular!
____________________________________________________________________________

But THE legendary work that saw his rise to fame is Browner Knowle -an explanation to our foreign comickers: "Browner" is the way some people refer to Mr Brown.  A Mr Smith might be called "Smithy" or "Smithers".  "Knowle is a rather upmarket, low guttering drain hole where Mr Brown grew up.  So the series should be titled Brown from Knowle -but this is Bristol!

BK Books: Browner Knowle 7 -I Read It Yet I Live

Browner Knowle 7
Paul Ashley Brown
BK Books
A5
Black & white
24pp
£4.00
www.paulashleybrown.co.uk/

Now before I start, that web address I have just spent an hour trying to find. Paul Ashley Brown everywhere (mostly from old CBO postings) but no web page so I'll have to look into this.

You know there are two absolute metaphysical certainties in this world. One: We'll be dead one day. Two: Suicide rates climb whenever a new Browner Knowle is published. Within the constraints of of the confined internal logic of the psycho-metaphysical rules of existentialism that engage our every day  lives Browner Knowle is the Messenger of death.

                                                                   Heh?
           
                                                                   Quite.

I love mixing medication it's like an existentialist lottery. But then....why not?

It is at times like these that I think Mr Brown might even be able to draw a comic.  Let's face it, that is how this aging poster child for the lost Thatcher generation started out -Vigilante Vulture and so on. However, having worked with the writer of said VV it was bound to affect the aging hipster's mind  -he is free and single, ladies so if interested here's his photo (and in the background LMFAOs "I'm Sexy And I Know It" blasts away):

Ahhh. Nothing like a bit of character assassination to start off a day of pain.  So now to the subject of this posting which was temporarily lost somewhere in the Himalaya's until it was found to be a polar bear-brown bear hybrid.

The cover...well, this is just another Bristol street scene and walk through Bedminster any day of the week and you can spot these...tatters.  In fact, another good example is "The Walking Man" -as seen below:

But this is not an issue full of Mr Brown's "Bristol Grotesques".  No, there are two strips in this edition -he would probably call them "contes graphiques".  Anyway, the first is "3 A. M. With The Lights Off", though since you can see that on the page below I do wonder why I wrote that.  We've all been there: the guy talking at you in the car but not really talking to you and the promise of what might be but never really is. Men can be bastards. I'm looking at this through a woman's eyes of course. 

erm

Nice, nice solid blacks.  Mr Brown really could become an artist you know. You know, I feel sorry for the poor utterly depressed man who stood on Perot's Bridge in the City Harbour. Looking into the murky, beckoning waters but terrified of jumping in just in case someone pulls him out and he contracts Weil's Disease.  All the time some git with a sketch pad is saying: "Yes. Like that. Keep that look of total and utter despair until I've finished!"

All he wanted to do was kill himself but he ended up in Browner Knowle. Quite depressing. And then we have "Charles Aznevour" and while reading this we should all be singing along. Come on now -you KNOW the lyrics as well as I do. A one...a two...a three and.....

Dance in the Old Fashioned Way.
Won't you stay in my arms?
Just melt against my skin
And let me feel your heart,
Don't let the music win
By dancing far apart.
Come close where you belong.
Let's hear our secret song.
Dance in the Old Fashioned Way.
Won't you stay in my arms?
And we'll discover highs
We never knew before,
If we just close our eyes
And dance around the floor.
That gay old fashioned way
That makes me love you more.
Dance in the Old Fashioned Way.
Won't you stay in my arms?
And we'll discover highs
We never knew before,
If we just close our eyes
And dance around the floor.
That gay old fashioned way
That makes me love you more

ahh, Charles, you may be 89 years old now but should such a singer-song-writer, actor, public activist, diplomat such as you be in an issue of Browner Knowle?  Yes. We've all been there though some of us find it harder each year to embrace ourselves. Poignant, ain't it me old luvver?

Let's cheer things up and take a peek at Mr Brown after he's met up with a certain Mr Northall (a rival if the truth be told!) for five minutes.

Yes, it is quite terrible when all your favourite 1970s British TV greats have been arrested under Operation Yewtree.  Especially when you scream at the news media for not hyphenating "Yewtree"!

"A Sound From Downstairs" for me can usually mean my irritable bowel syndrome is about to explode into a volcano of....no. No, you don't really want to know that. Besides, in this case, it is the title of the second strip in this book.  Seven pages showing that Mr Brown CAN indeed draw sequential works or comic strips. Compliment with a slap. See what I did there?

I'm guessing this is Mr Brown in ten years time?  It is a nicely drawn strip -solid negatives and even a little cross-hatching and some nice detailed garden in a panel.  I'd say this was "enjoyable" but I don't quite think that is the point here. Nor is it the point in "Face Down In A Face-Shaped Hole" -actually a third strip. Yeah, I miss-counted but I read this so I've been punished enough.

Over-all it's a nice little book with probably "A Sound From Downstairs" being the longest piece of strip-work from the aging hipster in a long time and I'm not including his preliminary work on the graphic novel "Stuart Hall Touched Me Inappropriately But Not In A Physical Way" due out on the 13/13/13.

But will this tour de force (I really must stop reading these French BD) be the last Browner Knowle -will all those Small/Alternative Press events attended by Mr Brown now be so much poorer for the lack of work from the Dean of Depression?


Now, please, forgive the rather dumb tongue-in-cheek humour.  Mr Brown deserves far more respect.

 

                                    ***********************************

When I referred to making investments for the future by buying Small Press books Browner Knowle is a perfect example.  Very low print runs, around 50 copies and no reprints, a popular creator with a following who is a "name".  So if you grab copies of his zines then in ten years (rather than 40-50+ years with mainstream comics) you ought to see a reasonable return if you sold them.


If you want really -really- rare then go for Ben Dilworth 1980s zines.