Jordan Crane

Jordan Crane

Title	Creator	Publisher	Price
Uptight #2	Jordan Crane	Fantagraphics	$2.25 ($2.50 list)
Read more and comment...	All hail Jordan Crane in his effort to reinvigorate the standard pamphlet comic book. Uptight is what a comic book should be: an intense, well thought out, tightly crafted, personal expression at an affordable price. Not for the faint of heart, this issue plunges the reader into a stressed out, anxiety prone world where everyone is right on the edge and some are going over: "Take Me Home" follows a lonely shift worker haunted by a late night encounter; "Before They Got Better" gives us a perfect pitch rendition of domestic tensions rocking the boat without ever quite dragging it under the waves; and the second installment of "Keeping Two" shows its protagonist's imaginiation running away with him as he anxiously awaits his girlfriend's return from renting a video. Each is vividly rendered and expertly paced. This is a comic book. Recommended.
Uptight All Night: 30 postcards	Jordan Crane	Chronicle Books	$8.95 ($9.95 list)
Read more and comment...	Speaking of top notch artists, this contemporary master of line, form and -- especially -- color, who is best known here at Copacetic for his swell comics like The Clouds Above and Uptight, now has a nifty collection of thirty original, full-color, heavy-duty (they're printed on super-weight cardstock) postcards nestled on our shelves. At the Copacetic price listed below the price works out to a mere 30¢ a piece for these little gems. Send 'em to friends, hang 'em on the wall, put 'em in a frame -- you can do it all.
Uptight #1	Jordan Crane		$4.00 ($2.50 list)
Read more and comment...	Whoah! Speaking of los bros, it looks like Jordan's been hanging out with Jaime, or at least spending a lot of time with the second volume of Love and Rockets. The lead story in this niftily designed new comic book series from the renowned indy comics man about town, "Below the Shade of Night," features a smart, tight line, that, combined as it is with a sharp placement of solid blacks, catapults Mr. Crane to the forefront of potential heirs to the legendary Hernandez style. Both this story, and the next, "Keeping Two," which equally divide the issue between them, embody the theme implied by the title of the series. Each of the stories presents an anxiety that is rooted in the follies and ignorance of childhod, adolescence and young adulthood -- each after their own fashion. And, as you would expect from someone who is widely respected for his design, this is a nice package and priced with your pocketbook in mind. This series is off to a great start. Here's wishing it a long run.