comics

Title	Creator	Publisher	Series	Price
Kramers Ergot #7	Gabrielle Bell, Rick Altergott, Daniel Clowes, Sammy Harkham and more ...	Buenaventura Press	Kramers Ergot	$125.00 ($125.00 list)
Read more and comment...	It's here!  All we can say right now is, "WOW!"  Sammy Harkham, Alvin Buenaventura and their cohorts have raised the bar once again with what must be considered as one of the most singular books in the history of comics.  This volume of Kramers rolls back the hands of time by publishing a book that reproduces that magnificent size of the original Sunday comics of 100 years ago that we have been reacquainted with through the efforts of Sunday Press and their mind-boggling Little Nemo collections.  Team Kramers has connected the dots and realized:  "If they did it then, there's no reason why we can't do it now!"  This volume presents all new work created specifically to be reproduced in the full-up, full-color, big-daddy, 16" x 21" format that will recapture the wonderful amazement of the glory days at the dawn of the comics era.  The equally amazing renaissance that comics is currently undergoing will likely come to be symbolized in some fashion by this very volume.  Kramers Ergot 7 is, without a doubt, one of the most spectacular works of comics ever published.  Measuring a staggering 16" x 21", and containing all new, never before seen work that was commissioned specifically for this giant-size format, we will see today's top comic creators pulling out the stops for this rare chance to produce comics work on this scale. Here's a l of contributors:  Rick Altergott, Gabrielle Bell, Jonathan Bennett, Blanquet, Blex Bolex, Conrad Botes, Shary Boyle, Mat Brinkman, John Brodowski, Ivan Brunetti, C.F., Chris Cilla, Jacob Ciocci, Dan Clowes, Martin Cendreda, Joe Daly, Kim Deitch, Matt Furie, Tom Gauld, Leif Goldberg, Matt Groening, John Hankiewicz, Sammy Harkham, Eric Haven, David Heatley, Tim Hensley, Jaime Hernandez, Walt Holcombe, Kevin Huizenga, J. Bradley Johnson, Ben Jones & Pshaw, Ben Katchor, Ted May, Geoff McFetridge, Jesse McManus, James McShane, Jerry Moriarty, Anders Nilsen, John Pham, Aapo Rapi, Ron Rege Jr., Xavier Robel, Helge Reumann, Ruppert & Mulot, Johnny Ryan, Richard Sala, Souther Salazar, Frank Santoro, Seth, Shoboshobo, Josh Simmons, Anna Sommer, Will Sweeney, Matthew Thurber, Adrian Tomine, C. Tyler, Chris Ware, and Dan Zettwoch.  WOW!  (This is no longer available from the publisher and we are almost out of our stock.  As a result, we are no longer offering any discount.  Sorry.)
Kramers Ergot 7 Tour in Pittsburgh - 12/4/08	Sammy Harkham	Buenaventura Press		$0.00 ($0.00 list)
Read more and comment...	The Copacetic Comics Company presents The Kramers Ergot 7 National Book Tour at The BrilloBox 4104 Penn Ave. Pittsburgh  PA 15224 Thursday, December 4, 2008 5:00pm - 10:00pm Please Note This event is open to all ages from 5pm - 9pm Over 21 only after 9pm OBVIOUSLY, THIS EVENT HAS PASSED.  WE'RE LEAVING THIS UP AS PART OF THE ARCHIVE. The Copacetic Comics Company is pleased as punch to announce that we are sponsoring the Kramers Ergot 7 national book tour here in Pittsburgh.  Confirmed Guests include Kramers Ergot editor and contributor, Sammy Harkham as well as Kevin Huizenga, John Pham, Ron Regé, Jr., Matthew Thurber and Pittsburgh's own Frank Santoro.  We also plan to have on hand a contigent of local talent including Chris Cornwell, Jim Rugg and Tom Scioli as well as local publisher Unicorn Mountain.  Watch this space for further announcements as Kramers Ergot publisher, Buenaventura Press, as well as Copacetic are working to bring more talent to this event. Kramers Ergot 7 is, without a doubt, one of the most spectacular works of comics ever published.  Measuring a staggering 16" x 21", and containing all new, never before seen work that was commisioned specifically for this giant-size format, we will see today's top comic creators pulling out the stops for this rare chance to produce comics work on this scale. A mere 200 copies of KE7 are being advance shipped for this tour.  Each will come with an exclusive print by Sammy Harkham that will only be available with those copies of the book purchased on the eight city tour (or directly from Buenaventura Press).  We have been allotted only 20 copies, so we encourage you to reserve a copy now. A book this big and this beautiful does not come cheap, however, and we know not everyone will be able to afford the $125.00 retail price.  We are offering a 10% discount (which works out to $112.50) on all copies that are pre-paid by Sunday, November 30, 2008.  We encourage anyone who is sure they want a copy to take advantage of this offer, as doing so will guarantee you a copy at the event (and, of course, this would also ensure that you get a copy even if, perish the thought, you were unable to attend the event).  Plenty of other related comics by Kramers contributors will be on sale, as well as new self-published local comics, at far more modest prices (including many for as little as $1 - $5), so rest assured that people of all means will be able to participate in this event.
Travel	Yuichi Yokoyama	PictureBox		$17.77 ($19.99 list)
Read more and comment...	While perhaps not as hotly awaited as PM2, this year's follow-up to last year's New Engineering  (which was the amazing US debut for Japanese manga magician Yokoyama) is, for our money, the sequel of the year.  Anyone wanting to see truly original, ground-breaking comics work need look no further than this unassuming volume.  It may not seem like much sitting there on the shelf, but once you open it up and let its contents pour out as you pore over its pages you will find yourself taken out of your body and travelling to realms of mind over matter, racing at a pace you didn't know you were capable of.  A very strong rhythmic component was already evident in Yokoyama's work in the short pieces collected in New Engineering.  With Travel, a single piece of almost 200 pages, the rhythm has been intensified and become an indefatiguable beat that gives the impression that it might just be the pulse of the world.   Every motion, no matter how mundane -- from the turning of one's head, to the stubbing out of a cigarette -- is rendered with a dynamism and a sense of urgency that focuses the reader's attention in a startling way and serves to bring alive every instant; "never a dull moment," indeed.  You will go back to this book again and again trying to unlock its mysteries.  This work conveys movement through space in time in sequential images that alchemically reflect the manner in which human consciousness is being reformatted by being enveloped in a landscape composed of ever increasing loads of information that must be processed at ever increasing rates of speed.  This is all the more amazing given that this work is text free and entirely imagematic.  It does, however, come equipped with an introduction by Paul Karasik and an appendix featuring commentary by Yokoyama himself.  Recommended!
The Street Angel Collection	Brian Maruca, Jim Rugg	Slave Labor Graphics		$12.75 ($14.95 list)
Read more and comment...	OK:  for those of you who have been putting off checking out Street Angel, one of the most original comic book series of the past few years, featuring breathtaking graphics and a trend-setting new character, and that was a surprise hit when it debuted in 2004 -- there's no reason to wait any longer.  And for those of you who are already fans, you'll be happy to learn that when it comes to Street Angel, this new TPB has everything and more: Street Angel issues 1 - 5; all Free Comic Book Day stories; an all-new 12-page Street Angel adventure; pinups from: Jeffrey Brown, Farel Dalrymple, Jesse Farrell, Richard Hahn, Dean Haspiel, Mike Hawthorne, Paul Hornshemeier, Dave Kiersh, Pat Lewis, Jasen Lex, Andy Macdonald, Jim Mahfood, Ted May, Scott Mills, Scott Morse, Bryan Lee O'Malley, Lark Pien, Ed Piskor, Brian Ralph, Zack Soto, Lauren Weinstein, and Dan Zettwoch; a spiffy Sketchbook section; and an introduction by Evan Dorkin.
Powr Mastrs	C. F.	PictureBox		$16.00 ($18.00 list)
Read more and comment...	FINALLY!  The most asked about sequel of recent memory is here.  Jack Kirby meets Henry Darger in C.F.'s psychedelic saga.  Now, let's all hope the wait won't be as long for #3!
The Essential Dykes to Watch Out For	Alison Bechdel	Houghton Mifflin	Dykes to Watch Out For	$22.22 ($25.00 list)
Read more and comment...	Now there's no excuse.  Fence sitters can no longer complain about the format or the price or the confusing order of the previously issued  volumes of Alison Bechdel's seminal strip.  To celebrate it's 25th year, Houghton Mifflin has released this hunky hardcover edition.  Weighing in at 392 pages, it contains a very substantial serving of the extant DTWOF strips, making it much more than your standard "best of" collection.  Even longtime fans of the strip (like us) who own all the individual volumes will be hard pressed to resist this volume.  Format fiends may find that they prefer the balance of the squarish, vertical presentation of the strips as single-pages, over their previous horizontal formatting as side by side two-pagers.  And then there's the irresistible icing on the cake:  the all-new, never-before-seen, 12-page strip that serves as the introduction.  It is the long awaited (at least by us, anyway) "secret origin" of Dykes to Watch Out For, telling the story of Ms. Bechdel's gradual realization and embrace of her latent, long-repressed desire to be a professional cartoonist.  What's that?  You say you're not a lesbian and so why should you read this?  Well, listen up -- here's why:  DTWOF is the best ongoing continuity comic strip of its time.  The characters that populate this volume are pen and ink creations that live, breath and grow in concise single page strips that precisely capture the underlying humanity that we all share and in the process have defined an era.  Yes, it helps if your politics are towards the left of the political spectrum, but even this is not a prerequisite to enjoying the pleasures of this cartoon text (the Norman Rockwell homage of the front cover serving as ample testimony to this fact).  Open yourself up to opportunity and you'll make some new friends.
Moresukine	Dirk Schwieger	NBM		$11.99 ($15.99 list)
Read more and comment...	Cleverly packaged to resemble a Moleskine™ sketchbook, Moresukine -- the Japanese pronunciation of Moleskine -- is a series of 26 short pieces drawn in Schwieger's own Moleskine™ sketchbook during his six month stay in Tokyo.  These were all originally posted on his blog. With the exceptions of the first two, in which he set the parameters of his mission, the remainder of these pieces are the result of his blog readers writing him with "assignments" which he then undertook, documented and uploaded to the following week's blog entry.  This is then followed by an appendix in which Schweiters then in turn assigned ten different comics artists -- from France, Germany, Canada and the US -- to meet and converse with a Japanese person in their home city and then document this coversation in comics.  A truly international effort.
The Lagoon	Lilli Carre	Fantagraphics		$12.75 ($14.99 list)
Read more and comment...	Yes, this slim hardcover volume has been out for awhile, and we apologize for our delay in bringing it to your attention here.  The Lagoon is Carré's first book length work.  It brings us one family's interaction with a "creature from the Black Lagoon."  A lyrical waking dream in comics that works towards revealing the play of the unconscious in shaping family dynamics.
Nocturnal Conspiricies: Nineteen Dreams	David B.	NBM		$12.75 ($14.95 list)
Read more and comment...	David B. is, for our money at least, the most accomplished contemporary European comics creator.  He is the author of Epileptic, a true graphic novel, and one of the greatest yet produced.  Nocturnal Conspiracies is, as its subtitle suggests, a compilation of dreams committed to paper; a dream diary.  Printed in black and white with a single, sparingly used, blue color overlay, the dream chronicles range from four to twelve pages in length, with the majority falling in the six to eight page range.  It bears some characteristics of being a pet project, nurtured for years until the time was ripe.  As such, it is interesting to note motifs and tropes that, evidently, initially arose in his dreams, but that found their way into not only Epileptic, but some of his historical adaptations that have been published in MOME over the past several years, as well.  That said, David B is here in full possession of his mastery of the comics medium.  The pieces are expertly paced models of concise storytelling, as well as haunting evocations of the dream state.  Here's a preview of Dream #17 (just click on the arrow to advance).
Sardine in Outer Space #6	Emmanuel Guibert	(:01) First Second	Sardine in Outer Space	$13.50 ($14.95 list)
Read more and comment...

cds

Title	Artist	Publisher	Price
Jazz At The Philharmonic The First 10 Years	Various Artists	Proper Records	$33.95 ($33.95 list)
Read more and comment...	Here's another amazing box from Proper:  Five hours of some of the (maybe the) greatest live jazz of the 1940s and early 1950s.  From 1944 onwards, impresario Norman Granz used his considerable talents as an organiser and promoter to put together the definitive musical "package tours" of the day. Starting out with a gig in LA, (and a lineup including Illinois Jacquet, Nat King Cole and J.J. Johnson) Granz booked nationwide concert hall tours that included all of the star jazz soloists of the day, playing in a jam session-style setting. These proved phenomenally popular, despite some critical sniping about the grandstand nature of some of the playing, and the tours were also notable for the racial integration of their lineups. As well as being popular with audiences, the tours were popular with the musicians and this shows in the quality of the issued recordings that originally emerged on Granz's Verve label. This 4 CD set presents the cream of the crop from 1944 - 1953, including nearly every notable soloist of the day, and tells the full story of this pioneering and much-loved institution.  Everybody's here:  Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Lester Young, Billie Holiday, Nat King Cole, Oscar Peterson, Buck Clayton, Ella Fitzgerald, Buddy Rich, Coleman Hawkins, Ben Webster, Roy Eldridge, Wardell Gray, Charlie Shavers,  Illinois Jacquet, and many more.  You don't believe us?  Just check out the info below!  As usual, Proper includes an informative booklet that provides in depth coverage and lots of great photos.  All this for one amazing low price! PLEASE NOTE:  This Proper Box is now OUT OF PRINT and as a result is  no longer discounted.  We are doing our best to keep it in stock, but procrastinators beware:  it's only a matter of time before it's gone.
Handful of Keys	"Fats" Waller	Proper Records	$29.75 ($33.95 list)
Read more and comment...	YES!!!  At last it has come to pass:  Fats Waller gets the Proper treatment.  More than any insurance policy, the music of Fats Waller will keep you sleeping safe and sound, knowing that you have bullet-proof protection from the blues.  It's simply impossible to be down when Fats is on:  He'll turn your frown upside-down.  Of all the great personalities of jazz, Fats is -- aside from Louis Armstrong -- probably the greatest. Fats would be a legend just for his mastery of the keyboard with which he launched his career,  but he has so much more to offer.  He crafted a true persona which he then donned for each and every performance.  And what performances!  Fats was the very embodiment of entertainment.  And finally, there's the songs themselves.  While Fats could take practically any tin-pan alley tune -- like, for example, My Very Good Friend the Milkman -- and transform it into a timeless classic, he also happened to be one of the greatest song writers of all times.  He brought a jazz sensibility to show tunes and a show tune sensibility to jazz.  Some, like Ain't Misbehavin',  have become standards, interpreted over and over again by cats of all colors, able to be made fresh each time. Others, like Squeeze Me, belong to Fats alone.  The people of Proper Records really had their work cut out for them with this one:  how do you bring the whole of Fats when you have a mere four CDs?  It's painful to leave out even one timeless classic!  Handful of Keys proves once again why Proper Records is the reigning champion of classic jazz packages:  On 100 big tracks, Fats is here in all his glory, from his early days as keyboard prodigy to his final blazing days of songmanship.  This is a set that will bring a lifetime of enjoyment.  If Fats isn't part of your life, then, man, you ain't livin'!  As with all Proper Box sets, this one contains five hours of music mastered with the jazz EQ in mind by people who know what they're doing, and comes complete with a 48 page career overview and appreciation by the Mr. Know-It-All of classic jazz, Joop Visser, and, to top it all off, a complete track by track breakdown of who played what on each and every song as well as when and where it was recorded.  It's a proper deal!  Here's the complete track listing and discography.

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