Comics fans and music lovers have one thing in common: they are completists. They may not actually end up buying everything that even slightly smells of their favourite artist, they all at least would like to. It only makes good sense in that respect to publish comic versions of famous songs, if only to combine two possible markets. And so, every so often an anthology sees the light of day with adaptations of songs by Jacques Brel, Belle & Sebastian or the Beatles, by famous cartoonists or cartoonists who would like to be more famous.
(Bob Dylan Revisited, published Delcourt)
Last year, a similar book was published by Delcourt with songs by the godfather of the singer-songwriter genre – Bob Dylan. It featured work by some of the greatest cartoonists of the moment, such as Dave McKean, Lorenzo Mattotti, François Avril, Zep and Thierry Murat. Last month, a Dutch version was published, with translations by Robbert-Jan Henkes and Erik Bindervoet, who previously also translated James Joyce, selected works by William Shakespeare and the collected lyrics by John Lennon and Paul McCartney.
(a page from Kim Duchateau’s improvised music comic on Bob Dylan)
This book inspired Flemish cartoonist Kim Duchateau, one of my personal favourites when it comes to absurdist humour, to do his own adaptation, live on (web) camera during the VRT Radio 1 programme, Mezzo. Since he had to do this strip in only two hours, choosing the right song proved quite difficult. In the end, he decided on Rainy Day Women # 12 & 35, and the result can be seen on the Radio 1 website. Save/print and paste into your copy of Bob Dylan Revisited for that special, deleted scenes feeling.
Wim Lockefeer live in Belgium and is wondering how many roads a man must walk down, before he can call himself a cab?
Wed, Jun 17, 2009
From our Continental Correspondent