FPI: Can you pick three comics/webcomics/graphic novels which you especially enjoyed over the last twelve months and tell us why you singled them out?

Kenny: Quite hard to pick but things I’ve enjoyed included Darwyn Cooke’s Parker: The Hunter, sometimes the pulp plot left me uninspired but the art was simply stunning.

Tony Millionaire has been one of the best cartoonists around for over 15 years now – the Art of Tony Millionaire showed you what a stupendous artist he is and allows you a look inside his comics version of the Hunter S. Thompson life – brilliant and funny. The third volume of the collected ‘Cinque Allegri Ragazzi Morti‘ by Italian artist Davide Toffolo came out and I loved the art so much it didn’t overly matter that I couldn’t follow the story.

I haven’t finished Asterios Polyp though it looks like it was probably the top title to come from the US in a year I found a little dispiriting with top creators seemingly running off to kids comics and adaptation projects right and left. I also must mention The Sacrifice by Bruce Mutard – released in Australia in 2008 but I only read it this year and it’s a significant work up there with Jason Lute’s Berlin – if you like political, historical comics go search it out – very, very, good.

FPI: Can you pick three TV shows and/or movies which you especially enjoyed over the last twelve months and tell us why you singled them out?

Kenny: I’m not much of a TV follower really but the outstanding programme for me was ‘Skins’. Brilliantly written it captures a lot of what my memories are of being a late teen early twenties thrill seeker. If you want to know what your kids are probably up to – this hits it out the park. Brilliant.

Most other TV, and it used to be a pleasure and is now an ordeal, is watching Man United play footie. What had been a joy last year has developed into a case of watching with my hands over my eyes only able to take small glimpses as the horror continues to unfold. I also love Outnumbered – these are the kids that will grow into the ones in Skins – or worse. Movie wise i liked the US version of State of Play and enjoyed The Damned United.

FPI: Can you pick three books which you especially enjoyed over the last twelve months and tell us why you singled them out?

Kenny: Not sure I’ve even read a 2009 vintage book last year. Favourite novel would be Hamid’s ‘The Reluctant Fundamentalist’ – deft, human, but ultimately unnerving. I loved the Charley Harper monograph and gave it to quite a few friends for Christmas.

I’m not sure this belongs in comics or books but Taschen’s huge monograph of Tom of Finland – XXL will probably be the ultimate comics book for years to come. Who’d have thought it? Amazing production value for pages and pages of Tom’s gay porn comics and images. I remember being shown this material 25 years ago by Don Melia who was then the marketing man at Titan books and being pretty shocked by it. Now my sensibilities somewhat expanded it hardly raises an eyebrow that it has become an art object to rival any in comics.

FPI: How did 2009 go for you as a creator? Are you happy with the way you got your work out this year and any thoughts on the comics industry in 2009?

Kenny: Blank Slate got 3 books to market. 1 more than the year before and probably 2 less than we should have. I thought all three were excellent books and they have been pretty well received. I think Oli East continues to expand the UK comics vocabulary with his Proper go well high and that Spleenal by Nigel Auchterlounie was simply the funniest thing I read all year – even if I published it. I think Blank Slate as a company could have done better reaching the market – and hopefully will in 2010. 2009 seemed a year of constant personal upheaval I’m hoping for some stability in the year we’ve just begun.

FPI: What can we look forward to from you in 2010?

Kenny: I’ve got 4 finished books sitting waiting to go to the printers. First up will be Oli East’s third book Berlin and That and Darryl Cunningham’s Psychiatric Tales. Darryl’s book has caused quite a stir before publication and I’m very hopeful that it will be a big hit – it’s also been sold to Bloomsbury for publication in the US in 2011 which should allow Darryl some real traction as a cartoonist.

I also have Randall C’s award winning Slaapkoppen ready at last as Sleepyheads and Ed Syder has finished his My Skateboard Life book. All 4 of those will be out by May – and we have 3 or 4 lined up after that including Stu Kolakovic’s amazing Lichen which i truly think has a chance of being a book of the year choice amongst other comics artists. On paper an exciting year.

FPI: And one final, special question – since it’s not only the end of the year approaching but also the end of the decade, is there any comics work you’d especially pick out as one of the best you’ve read this decade?

Kenny: I’m not sure it’s as simple as that – a lot of what has informed comics the past 10 years happened in the 15 years before it with Clowes, Doucet, Burns, Crumb et al. Chris Ware also emerged then but if I had to pick a book which has taken that initial vanguard forward and informed a more rigorous inventive route for comics it would have to be ACME which has pushed the door open with its awards and Ware’s continuing genius.

The only, somewhat tenuous, connection this has to comics is that Let It Be was the first album I bought at 12 years old back in 1970. It was the big fancy boxed set with the book and it was my prize possession for many years, but it cost – to a poor schoolboy like me – an arm and a leg back then. I managed to buy it by selling the comic collection I had been building under my bed since I was about 7. A big, beat-up, old, brown, leather case full of wonder. Avengers from #1 up,  X-Men too, FF’s back to the early teens, all the early Doc Strange and lots more. Bought new, or collected by way of trips to the second-hand book shop on Buccleuch street where my perseverance eventually had the somewhat grumpy owner give me access to the back room and literally thousands of old comics from here there and everywhere. By the time I came to sell my 400 odd comics, reluctantly deciding it was time to ‘grow up’, he had moved to a location near the breweries on Fountainbridge – he gave me 36/s for the lot, £1.80 today. That, added to savings from my paper round, allowed me to buy the cheapest one box record player (a BUSH from memory) and my Dad chipped in to help me buy the Beatles boxed set.

Of course by the time I was 19 or so the album had turned into something for people to roll joints on and I was in hot pursuit of trying to buy back all the comics I squandered back then. This time I didn’t have to sell anything to buy the new Beatles boxes, and whilst they may not bring the same degree of unfettered pleasure that 12 year old had, I think the next week or so may be lost to my family and friends as I slowly float upstream.

Kenny Penman

Outstanding Artist

Tim Hensley, Mome (Fantagraphics), Kramer’s Ergot #7 (Buenaventura)
Nate Powell, Swallow Me Whole (Top Shelf)
Richard Sala, Delphine (Fantagraphics/Coconino)
Josh Simmons, Mome (Fantagraphics)
Carol Tyler, You’ll Never Know, Book One: A Good and Decent Man (Fantagraphics)

This category kind of baffled me a bit. Are the jury picking a winner for the art alone – or for the art made up of art and story. I guess the latter, let’s assume so. Powell’s book is terrific – his art has shown a promising development since early efforts like Walkie Talkie (first thing I remember seeing) right up to the finished article now. I don’t know enough about Tim Hensley to guess at whether he’s a great to be or not. His work has a nice look in that HB animation, John Stanley reincarnated way (well from the little I’ve seen) is there somewhere Tim is producing reams of work to become Outstanding artist? Maybe I’ve just missed them. Richard Sala does Richard Sala – I like it all well enough but he wouldn’t be an outstanding artist pick for me. I didn’t like either of the last two Josh Simmons books – House and Jessica Farm – that’s probably just me. I haven’t yet read the Carol Tyler yet so can’t comment on this. From my limited knowledge here i’d be picking Nate Powell but I suspect Tyler may win. Is there really no place in here for Chris Ware – don’t think he’s ever won this category.

Outstanding Anthology or Collection

Abandoned Cars, Tim Lane (Fantagraphics)
Against Pain, Ron Rege Jr. (Drawn & Quarterly)
Drawn & Quarterly Showcase Book 5, T. Edward Bak, Anneli Furmark, Amanda Vahamaki (Drawn & Quarterly)
Fuzz and Pluck: Splitsville by Ted Stearn (Fantagraphics)
Kramer’s Ergot 7, ed. Sammy Harkham (Buenaventura)

I’ve pretty much read all of this. I enjoyed some of KE a lot – but overall it seemed more a statement than a truly inspiring way of doing the book. A few cartoonists used the page well, too many became illustrators and forgot comics – well for my tastes at least. I thought Rege Jr’s book was wonderful and I still think he is one of the most innovative cartoonists around. If it were up to me he would just be pipped by Abandoned Cars though. I suspect most people have missed it for its lack of hype and a general lack of showiness. The art is, I would guess, maybe not the finished article yet – but it’s more than good. The construction of the story, the real-life adventure and a sense of place and time linked intellectually to Woody Guthrie and Kerouac is a top class achievement. I thought it one of the books of the year for it’s burning ambition to be good but also by making you work a bit for it. No place for Berlin City of Smoke though, can’t quite believe that. Probably surprised not to see Spiegelman’s Breakdowns here also.

Outstanding Graphic Novel

Acme Novelty Library #19, Chris Ware (Self-Published)
Disappearance Diary, Hideo Azuma (Fanfare/Potent Mon)
Drop-In, Dave Lapp (Conundrum)
Nicolas, Pascal Girard (Drawn & Quarterly)
You’ll Never Know, Book One: A Good and Decent Man, Carol Tyler (Fantagraphics)

I haven’t read Drop-In or the Tyler. I’m glad to see Disappearance Diary here as it’s the only overseas representation but neither it or Nicolas would make my list. That seems a decent chance of a win for Ware here then. I thought it was great – both halves – I know some much preferred the Sci Fi story of the two. Maybe First:Second didn’t submit? No Photographer on here – a little surprising.

Outstanding Story

The Carnival, Mome #14, Lilli Carre (Fantagraphics)
Disappearance Diary, Hideo Azuma (Fanfare/Potent Mon)
Seeing Eye Dogs of Mars, Acme Novelty Library #19, Chris Ware (Self-Published)
Untitled, Drawn & Quarterly Showcase Book 5, Amanda Vahamaki (Drawn & Quarterly)
Willy, Papercutter #10, Damien Jay (Tugboat)

Hands down the Ware. Damian Jay reminds me a bit of Megan Kelso, he looks one to watch.

Promising New Talent

T. Edward Bak, Drawn & Quarterly Showcase Book 5 (Drawn & Quarterly)
Colleen Frakes, Woman King (self-published)
Hellen Jo, Jin & Jam #1 (Sparkplug), Diamond Heights, Papercutter #9 (Tugboat)
Ed Luce, Wuvable Oaf (self-published)
Amanda Vahamaki, Drawn & Quarterly Showcase Book 5 (Drawn & Quarterly)

Ignorance stops me from much comment here. I’ve seen some of Bak’s stuff and he seems interesting enough, Vahamaki can draw the back legs off about anything but Hellen Jo seems to be one of the most exciting cartoonists around. OK Jin & Jam looked and even to some extent read like an extension of Tekkonkinkreet but that’s no bad thing. I loved her comic – punky, couldn’t-give-a-damness, but with real drawing skills.

Outstanding Series

Danny Dutch, David King (Sparkplug)
Delphine, Richard Sala (Fantagraphics/Coconino)
Interiorae, Gabriella Giandelli (Fantagraphics/Coconino)
Reich, Elijah Brubaker (Sparkplug)
Uptight, Jordan Crane (Fantagraphics)

A bit of a sparse category now with so few still publishing actual comics. I’ve read them all barring Danny Dutch. I really like Reich – much more for story than art though – it’s a very good read. Interiorae was very beautifully drawn, maybe I wasn’t concentrating but it was a little nebulous for my tastes. Delphine was very good but Jordan Crane remains one of comics most gifted creators. Surely he’s a shoe-in here. Also 2 of these are really very short series indeed – the Sala and Giandelli, how will they fill this category next year. Want some nominations? – make sure you publish a few comics Jan/Feb/March and your on the ballot.

Outstanding Comic

Danny Dutch #1, David King (Sparkplug)
Dead Ringer, Jason T. Miles (La Mano)
Interiorae #3, Gabriella Giandelli (Fantagraphics/Coconino)
Reich #6, Elijah Brubaker (Sparkplug)
Uptight #3, Jordan Crane (Fantagraphics)

Perhaps to prove the sparsity of the above category almost all end up here as well. Maybe these two noms need rolled into one and a category of best translated book, or best all ages book added. Dead Ringer is not really a comic in any sense I understand – OK it is a set of drawings which run I guess sequentially – a page at a time – a BIG page at a time, but I failed to really grasp a story and it felt like an art project right down to the contrary and slightly crazy packaging. I guess I’d have Crane win again but I doubt he’ll get two awards. If Kramers Ergot wins above expect Dead Ringer to win this – if not maybe Crane wins this and maybe Sala the outstanding series.

Outstanding Mini-Comic

Claptrap #2, Onsmith
Just So You Know #1, Joey Alison Sayers
Stay Away From Other People, Lisa Hanawalt
Stewbrew, Kelly Froh & Max Clotfelter
Xoc, Matt Dembicki

Haven’t read any of them – shame on me.

Outstanding Online Comic

Bodyworld, Dash Shaw
Danny Dutch, David King
Thingpart, Joey Alison Sayers
Vanessa Davis’s comics for Tablet
Year of the Rat, Cayetano Garza

The Shaw is often wonderful to look at – it’s an amazing piece of work for something updating regularly, but I love Vanessa Davis’s comics so she’s winning for me.

Kenny Penman

I was recently home clearing out a load of stuff my dad left when he died early in the year and amongst the things he had kept was a little insert magazine I had written with my business partner Jim Hamilton. It was called ‘Cut Comics 88′ and we produced it for the Scottish rock magazine called ‘Cut’ (in comics circles slightly famous as the people who paid for Grant Morrison and Steve Yeowell’s ‘New Adventures of Hitler’). As far as I can remember it was the first time any mainstream UK mag did a full self-contained insert about comics and it ran a whopping 24 pages although it didn’t really feature that many comics, with most getting multiple full pages for the art. This was off the back of the first coming of comics as mainstream entertainment, the first appearances of them in bookstores, the start of some of the writers and artists themselves becoming rock and roll stars. It was a time anything seemed possible, and the comics world was full of the frisson of creation. Young, inventive, non-conformist, politically aware, agitprop creation. The old comics mould was being broken and things would never be the same again. And then, of course, they more or less were. The nascent surge died away almost as soon as it had come, strewn behind it the corpses of magazines like Deadline, Crisis and Escape – and then it was back into the comics shops – mostly.

(cover to the Cuts comics insert for 1988; click on the pics for the larger versions)

In truth we only got to do this as then editor Penny Taylor was a drinking acquaintance of mine, and after much cajoling she saw the opportunity to jump the newest cool bandwagon ahead of her competition. Still, reading it now – it’s good to see how many of the choices hold up – and if the “the year in review” page I wrote back then is more filled with faded dreams than realised ones it’s still great to read how passionate we were about it all back then.

The books we picked out and featured, with bio’s and pages of artwork were – Zenith, Akira, Love & Rockets, Stray Toasters, Concrete, Sinner, The Killing Joke, V for Vendetta, Yummy Fur and the first Calvin and Hobbes collection – talk about a vintage year! The best of the rest was Eddy Current, Grendel, Blackhawk (Chaykin), Cerebus, Batman Year One, Flaming Carrot, Luther Arkwright, Kings in Disguise, Hellblazer. Over the 20 years since some of those will have risen and fallen but most would probably hit near the top of most pre-Pulitzer Maus (1992) lists. I wonder how many still remember ‘Kings in Disguise’?

Here’s my slightly pretentious (or perhaps portentous) year in review from way back in 1988.

…Then there was light

In 1988 comics reached the end of the tunnel. Their elevation into an accepted form of popular entertainment brought massive coverage in the Press. The quality of the product continued to improve and diversify, although perhaps few reached the premier vintage of Watchmen or Batman Year 1. Names like Moore, Hernandez and Sienkiewicz, if they didn’t yet roll easily from everyone’s lips, became familiar to a growing readership. These are a few of the pivotal events of a year during which it was established that – whatever comics may become – they had finally laid to rest the public’s perception of them as kid’s stuff.

*Michael Correa is convicted of disseminating obscene material for selling, among others, Omaha the Cat Dancer and Heavy Metal. Later a Canadian comic shop is charged along similar line. The forces of repression sharpened their knives of censorship all over the U.S. Will the U.K. be next?

*Arena dedicates two 45-minute programmes to the work of Robert Crumb and Art Spiegelman – an unprecedented accolade for comics artists. Paradoxically British customs still regularly stop the importation of Crumb’s work.

*Forbidden Planet opens a superstore in London’s New Oxford Street. The shop, product of internationally renowned designers, makes it acceptable to be seen in comics shops. Similar stores open in Glasgow and Cambridge – suddenly comics are ‘trendy’ enough for the High Street.

*Robocop brings comics to the big screen with a thinly-veiled rehash of Frank Miller’s Dark Knight and Britain’s Judge Dredd. It does terrific box-office. Perhaps in acknowledgement of this, Miller is chosen as one of the writers on Robocop 2.

*Following a massive surge of interest in respected French artist Moebius, Titan publish six of his books in the U.K. The British Museum makes Moebius an integral part of a major exhibition to be staged in 1989.

*Superman’s 50th birthday is celebrated with a TV special, a week-long radio serial, and the cover of Radio Times. Strangely, the tone of coverage is rumoured to cause writer/artist John Byrne to leave the comic.

*Crossover magazines Heartbreak Hotel and Deadline appear on shelves in the major chains. Calling themselves ‘lifestyle’ magazines, their main selling point is their comics content.

*Tin Tin’s 50th birthday is celebrated with many magazines and newspaper articles. The BBC show cartoons based on Herge’s work again.

*Crisis is launched by Fleetway. It marks the first genuine royalty system for writers and artists of comics in the UK. Advertising budget is reputed to be £70,000.

*Strip Aid USA appears. It includes work by many of today’s top professionals and the money generated by its sale goes to ‘Shanti’ an organisation to benefit people with Aids. AARGH!! published by Alan Moore’s company Mad Love, fundraises in Britain. All monies go to help fight the Government’s repressive and objectionable Clause 28. Comics show their conscience to the world.

And what did we get for this you ask? Probably a few beers and the advert reproduced here showing us with 2 stores and one more due. Simpler times, so much simpler. Maybe that’s where the ‘passion’ went – perhaps we all got stuck in the complexities of life and that first youthful surge turned into something more sustainable, but maybe just a little less fun. We also got a first chance to be publishers as the “New Adventures of Hitler” story was for some time owned by myself, Grant and Jim as the first project of our company ‘Snobbery with Violence’. We didn’t really make that happen and now the strip languishes un-reprinted – I don’t even know who owns the rights now? Probably Grant – perhaps we should make an effort and re-publish it. 1988, Halcyon days……

(‘Samlat’ – a new, free collection from  Marc Ellerby, Adam Cadwell & Lizz Lunney, made especially for their recent Swedish comics excursion)

Marc says “Audiences are bored with superheroes” and outlines his “Ellerbisms” series and new comic “Chloe Noonan, Monster Hunter“. Wired notes Ellerby is “building a reputation and an income stream” by self publishing backed by additional online material. Asked if he ever dreams of a 22 page monthly he laughs and says ” The format is dead! Graphic Novels are the future, and that’s OK. The web is quickly replacing the redundant ‘floppies’.”

(some of the Nostalgia & Comics crew let their inner geek out for air during Free Comic Book Day)

Around here you can find varying opinions on Free Comic Book Day that range from wild enthusiasm for the event to muttering under the breath “could we call it something other than Free”. There are those who thinks it boosts trade and those who think it’s the only day of the year you see those who shop with competing stores who happen not to ‘do’ FCBD.

(Spiderbat, SpiderBat, does whatever a SpiderBat can. And looks adorable while doing it)

One thing can’t be ignored though and that’s it can be a lot of fun. Here are some snaps from our Birmingham store’s dressing up day. The staff get the chance to show off their outfits to more than just their long suffering partners – and the customers get to dress their kids in all sorts. We especially love Spider-Bat and mini, mini Iron Girl – like Marvel Adventures come to life…. Click the pics to see more FCBD pics from our Nostalgia & Comics crew on the FPI Flickr page; thanks to Dave and his crew at N&C for the pics.

(SuperDad with mini-Vader and even more mini Iron Girly. We always hear that superteams are like families, nice to see it taken literarlly!)

(I swear these superhero sidekicks get younger every year...)

The FPI blog has had such a moment today with the news that it has been ascertained to place 31st in Cision’s listing of the ‘leading 50 blogs’ in the UK. To say we are surprised is something of an understatement, but we are all flush with pride nonetheless. Cision are one of the world’s leading media ‘intelligence’ companies – in a simple sense they provide information for marketing and PR people which will allow them to target audiences more comprehensively in pursuit of getting across whatever useful or fanciful message they might want to disseminate. It’s pretty unusual for something as specialist as the FPI blog with its primary coverage of Comics and some related fields to feature in a list like this. It made us sit up and realise that whilst from day to day we can sometimes feel we are ‘broadcasting’ to the void there are in fact many people out there reading the blog.

I personally wanted to say a sincere thank you to you all for following us, and also give my thanks to the team that keeps the blog moving along: Joe Gordon, Richard Bruton, Wim Lockefeer, Pádraig Ó Méalóid, Rod McKie, Darryl Cunningham, Matt Badham and sadly no longer writing for us but much missed Katherine Farmar. And to Lee Eardley who helps to keep the show on the road technically.

I suppose we should now be looking for ways to ‘monetise’ the blog (horrid word isn’t it) – but the FPI blog has always tried to exist largely outside the commercial callings of the market and even the commercial callings of its own parent company. We will continue to cover comics with an eye to the art form rather than an eye to the commercial. Although if you are a publisher out there and want your books reviewed somewhere people may actually read the review, now would be a good time to stick us on that comp’s list – we could all use more free copies (as currently most of us pay for what we review)

If you want to see the methodology that produced our day in the sun go here and you can read the full top 50 listing here (where we are in some very good company, including some of the Guardian’s blog).

So until the mirror cracks or Snow White-like keeps goading us about not being fairest of all we hope you’ll all keep reading and sending your input to keep it a lively and vital blog for those in the comics world – fan and creators alike.

The Heatley piece is written rather than drawn – and comes with photos of the wooden dad toy he made to sell at comic conventions. I didn’t like it in writing or sentiment – it is what it is. As a bonus for those of a graphic bent there is an excellent set of photos from Kevin Cummins – important to me as I grew up, as a photographer on NME and other mags – which capture the bruised innocence of a bunch of wrestlers in a cross between Arbus’s love of the freakish and Mapplethorpe’s body worship.