Voodoo Child: The Illustrated Legend of Jimi Hendrix

September 18, 1970


When my friend and occasional Gentleman Shmoove loaned me this rock and roll graphic novel I was relieved to know that it would only rest in my collection a short time. Written from the perspective of Jimi Hendrix, perhaps, watching his life flash before his eyes on the verge of his own death, it was pretty easy to pinpoint the setting timeline-wise.

This book is a fantastic graphic arts approach to the glory and haze that was Jimi's life. Perhaps less detailed or clear than more formal biographies, Voodoo Child does an excellent job of conveying the emotional impact of the music and life of a rock god.

It came with a CD which Shmoove did not risk loaning to me, understandably. I understand it is rarities and demos, lacking in sound quality but oozing pure Hendrix awesomeness. The inclusion of the disc locks in Voodoo Child as a must-have for Hendrix fans.

I could go on and on about the great artwork, and the legacy of Hendrix on rock, the sixties and the culmination of all that is cool in the world, but instead I direct you to watch the following video NOW.

If you watched the whole video and can't say that your day is a little better for doing so, you are a LIAR.

The Yokota Officers Club

1969 I read this book on the basis of having lived on a military base in Asia as a child, and the recommendation of a fellow "Army Brat" who had read it. I was wary that the setting would be secondary to some kind of 'Joy Luck Club' plot, which would not fit in well with my usual diet of science fiction or comedy. But since I trust my friends I forced myself to be open-minded and check the book out. It is true that the main character does spend the bulk of the novel anguishing over her relationship with her parents and siblings in a way that threatened to lose my interest several times. The military dependant backround did bring back some nostalgia, but my family was never actually in the army or air force, so I didn't truly relate to the angst of an officer's spouse and family. What locked in this book for me is the characters. The mother, Moe, the bratty kids, the mysterious Japanese nanny, Bobby the comedian- they all succeed at breathing life, conflict, humor and love into the story. I'm not sure who to recommend this book to. Army brats? Sure. Affectionados of the military presence in the post WWII pacific arena. I guess. Mostly I suggest it to those interested in the human interest appeal. A great story about great people during an interesting time in an interesting place.

Inherent Vice

1969 Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon I heard about this book when it came out in 2009 when I read a review that largely focused on the era-specific soundtrack. The description of both the classic rock which plays such an integral part of the setting as well as the idea of a well-respected author tackling the counter-culture drug culture of the late sixties in a crime noir story seemed very appealing to me. My understanding is that most of Pynchon's writing covers historical, political fiction and non-fiction and is generally considered dense and unapproachable. 'Vice', however, draws on a very accessible pop-culture content and humor that brings to mind Cheech and Chong more than the NY Times bestseller list. The main character, Doc Sportello, is a lovable mix of The Dude and Fletch who stumbles his way through a parade of intrigues, supernatural and existential mysteries and a cast of characters begging to be performed by a mega-cast in an unavoidable big-screen adaptation. Much of the convoluted and stoned out plot-line is awash with the semblance of social commentary on the excesses of the sixties, the racial tensions and cultural divides of the time, and the onset of a decade sliding quickly toward a technological and monetarily driven eighties. That stuff is there, but is largely overshadowed by the marijuana smoke of hippie humor, free love and deranged mystery action. Serious Pynchon readers may poo-poo the silliness, and serious mystery fans may poo-poo the hallucinations which de-rail any pretense of structured plot. But fans of rock'n'roll, counter-culture and weird humor will revel in this quick and fun read. I doubt Doc Sportello will reappear in my timeline history, but he'd feel very comfortable mingling with anything that came his way there. He and his supporting cast are the sort of folks who most likely were real people at one time, and exist now as super-fictionalized versions of themselves that will live on in fantastic crossover literary universes. By the way, the 'Godzillagans Island' cartoon illustration is ripped shamelessly from Ward Sutton's review which should be reviewed in full here.

Ghandhi's Truth

1969 Ghandhi's Truth Another book which was pressed into my reluctant hands by my Indian friend at work. Once again, I am not sure to what extent my friend has any real interest in Ghandhi per se, or just enjoys making people read something that may perhaps reflect back on him in a literate and worldy way. While most of my co-workers who received this large tome of historical recounting responded by taking it home for a few weeks and then returning it unread, I took it home, made a decision about where it may fit into my timeline and committed myself to the daunting task of forcing my way through a large volume that I had uncertain interests in. Why? I ask myself this question still today, nearly two years after the sludgery of downing dry historical and socialogical musings about a dead (great, but dead nonetheless) man whose excellence was often best personified by inaction. Was it out of a debt to my friend? Was it a semi-conscious urge to better myself by reading something not containing little green men or dudes in capes? Did I think it would give me a better perspective on contemporary graphic novels about Hinduism? Perhaps I was wanting to expand my understanding of the early twentieth century setting of my readings. My overall interest was, it has to be said, just not there, though. In truth the book did contain a lot of interesting facts and musings on Ghandhi's early life, as well as many stories of his early involvement with labor strikes and unions. I read the book as set in the late sixties, as that is the timeframe in which the author visited India and collated interviews and research on Ghandi's life. It is interesting to hear friends and acquantences of Ghandi speak of him. I am quite sure that there were a few passages I read aloud to my wife, as they may have been very interesting, suprising or humorous stories about the man. Although the book served very well as something I could read on an airplane and look intellectual, and it also was a super good paperweight, it mostly worked effectively as a sleeping aid. The length seemed doubled as I could often only get through half a page at a time without nodding off. I recommend this book only to die-hard Ghandi historians. And people who are easily pressured by friends from India.

The Heaven Makers

1968 The Heaven Makers is a science fiction story written by legendary Dune scribe, Frank Herbert. Like much of his writing, it was originally serialized in a sci-fi magazine and later sold as a novel. Although written around the same time as Dune, it lacks the depth and scope of his masterpiece saga, and comes across much more like a satirical send-up of Hollywood. I was thoroughly unimpressed by the book on almost every level, and was not surprised to find other online reviewers sharing my opinion. The story, while hardly worth going into, is about aliens hiding in our oceans and using their advanced technology to film humans while they subtly manipulate our lives to make for entertaining footage. These films are edited and used as mass media entertainment back on the home world. The story rotates both around a human who catches on to the alien presence, as well as an alien investigator sent to sniff out the abuse of power by the Earth-based crazed director and leader. The criticism that this is one of Herbert's worst books is accurate, but there are glimpses of talent and even genius in this otherwise silly and unfleshed short novel. The premise is a dead-on prediction of modern reality TV and commentary that only a deranged alien mind would use human beings as playthings for mindless entertainment. But it is interesting to contrast the broad and cartoonish perspective on the immortality of the Chem against the prolonged life and immortality of the God Emperor of Herbert's much more famous Dune, which took an entire series to develop. It was also a very interesting comparison to read this at the same time as previously reviewed Black Easter by James Blish. In both cases my previous view of the author was upended, but in dramatically opposite directions. I recommend this book to sci-fi fans who still watch cartoons and won't be insulted by the lack of effort Frank Herbert puts out in what has to be considered one of his worst pieces of literature.

Batman: The Long Halloween

1968 The first comic to rebuild Harvey Dent (aka Two-Face) into a household name, The Long Halloween is not full of much originality, but does an incredible job of blending so much of what makes Batman great into a film-noir style cinematic masterpiece. Jeph Loeb is not a household name, but has been behind a lot of popular entertainment going back all the way to the original Teen Wolf and Teen Wolf Too which he co-wrote with his future Heroes collaborator Tim Kring! He has worked on superhero television shows like the Flash and Smallville as well as mega-popular Lost. But he's been collecting comic books since the seventies and writing them since the nineties. Although I think much of his work is over-rated, he consistantly writes with high standards and a love and respect for the genre that better writers often struggle with. The Long Halloween is probably Jeph Loeb's best work, a murder mystery and character piece capped by an artistic vision which is necessary for all great works in the comics world. The quantity of full page Batman spreads does nothing to undermine the fact that Batman just looks... f*ckin' bad-ass in this series. The fantastic art work that captures Batman's awesomeness and also makes old standbys like the Joker and Catwoman seem so fresh is by Tim Sale. I've been a fan of Tim's since his earliest work on my much-beloved Myth Adventures series. Although Loeb and Sale list themselves as mutual storytellers in their frequent collaborations, my opinion is that Loeb's notable works would be far less notable without Sale's style and Eisner-winning talent. The setting was a problem for me. I have been reading some collections of Best Of DC comics characters, such as Batman, and have been reading them according to when they were written. Cartoon and comic characters like these just never traditionally aged, like Charlie Brown and Bart Simpson. But unlike the Sunday funnies, Marvel comics came along and started taking their storylines seriously and DC followed suit. So eventually DC Comics had to address their decades of continuity by wiping out the 50 years of unaging backstory in the first historic Crisis and relaunching the origins and backstories of all the DC characters. I haven't read a lot of those relaunches (aka 'Year One'), and I truly don't know if they were given any specific time-setting other than 'prior to now'. But I do own and covet the Frank Miller Batman Year One. The Long Halloween is generally conceded as occuring in that universe. In reviewing both volumes, I made the call that the fashion and technology reflected in the art was a gritty late-sixties look. Maybe 15 years is too long a span than mid-eighties writers had in mind... Maybe I should have waited until I got to the eighties to read all of the Year One volumes and then bounce back into modern continuity... Maybe I should have sheltered my kids from all Star Wars media so they wouldn't know who Vader was when they first saw Episode IV.. The bottom line was that I was pumped to read Long Halloween and made the call that 1968 was a good time frame. Especially in light of knowing the huge influence it had on the recent Dark Knight movie. And although the storyline is convoluted enough that I had to re-read the plot on Wikipedia to remember the conclusion of the mystery, I was not disappointed in the least. I gave the graphic novel 5 out of 5 on Good Reads, and would whole heartedly recommend it to casual Batman fans who may not read comics normally but could dig getting into something with substance. If you liked the latest Batman movies, or would like to read a series that is likely to stay on the top ten list of Batman comics for a very long time, then The Long Halloween is a must read.

Black Easter

1968 *

James Blish is a science-fiction author who should be idolized by true Trek fans. He wrote the original adaptations of the original television show, and published the first original Star Trek novel, Spock Must Die! Hundreds of published authors have followed in his footsteps and thousands of fans as well. It's a shame that Blish passed away before The Motion Picture came out and Star Trek actually hit it's prime.

The TOS adaptations are god-awful. They are basically drawn-out summaries of each episode's plots. They remain remarkable primarily because they've never been re-done to my knowledge, and because they were printed at a time when Star Trek had no commercial support and no organized fan-base. Spock Must Die! is a much better piece of literature in comparison to Blish's other Trek work, but is still a thin novellette on a par with an episode of the television show. I love them all nonetheless.

But because of their quality, it never occurred to me to read anything else James Blish wrote, until his name popped up when I was reading up on Aleister Crowley. Black Easter's focal point, the dark wizard Theron Ware, is apparently one of many fictional characters modeled after the real-world Crowley, although the name originates from a more literary reference. And although Ware is a vile villian who (SPOILER!) releases enough demons on mankind to actually kill God, he is still portrayed in a somewhat more sympathetic manner than what the historical Crowley generally warrents- A businessman with a lack of moral compass as opposed to someone relishing in evil for the sake of evil.

I read this at the same time as Frank Herbert's 'The Heavenmakers' and it was interesting to compare Herbert's (arguably) worst book against Blish's (arguably) best. Where Herbert was known for sweeping sagas of great depth in detail and philosophy, Blish had his most commercial success in those awful Star Trek adaptations. But in Black Easter Blish truly suprised me with a rich story full of great characters and a plot that truly kept you guessing, all steeped in a very authentic (and researched) world of historical magic in the 'modern' world.

The theme and commentary of good versus evil set in a nuclear age setting has been very thoughtfully commented on in a way that is very prevelent online for an out-of-print and hard-to-find book (Hugo winner though it may be). The sequel is even harder to track down, but I understand it elaborates much farther on the premise of how Satan handles stepping back into the void left by God. Both books, I imagine, handle superficial silliness like wizards, demons and the Devil with a seriousness and eloquence that leave you feeling as though you've been ingesting much headier subject matter.

Nonetheless, readers who find magic silly in any form will be turned off by the cartoonish presence of demons and wizards as advertised so clearly on the cover. Those who are drawn to arcane incantations and perhaps a marginally veiled reincarnation of Aleister Crowley should move this book to the top of their reading list.

* I am aware that the cover shown above mentions a futuristic setting, and I can see that an apocolyptic ending may warrant the dystopian future label, but I found nothing in the book to dissuade me from thinking that Blish intended the story to take place in his current timeframe of the late sixties.

Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.

1966

Nick Fury is a bad-ass, not the first by any means but few characters in fiction so perfectly exemplify machismo. With his eye-patch, constant cigar and permanent stubble, not to mention the last name FURY, the guy is solid gold manhood on a platter.

Without checking any wiki pages on his history, I can tell you that Nick Fury got his start as the lead in a WWII comic, Sgt. Fury and the Howling Commandos. Within a few years the swinging sixties spawned the James Bond movies and multiple copycat spy dudes with slinky ladies and pychedelic dance music soundtracks in the cinemas. Marvel responded by revamping Fury to be a modern day spy. I don't even think they explained the transition at the time- in the early days of Marvel there was no swarm of fans demanding continuity. *1 It was explained eventually that Fury was taking an elixer that slowed his aging. Apparently one or two of his war buddies took it, too, since guys like Dum-Dum Dugan are still around. Oh, and every other major comic book character, too.

Nick Fury has been a mainstay in the Marvel Universe since then, popping up in every major comic as a superhero liason G-Man and exposition dude. He was the first time-traveler I know of who tried to kill off Hitler (the Fantastic Four stopped him from altering history). Despite that god-awful David Hasslehoff movie, Nick never made it to public mainstream awareness. The guy has no superpowers, no major storyline, and is too easily portrayed as a knock-off of manly archetypes.

Then Marvel launched the Ultimate series of comics. Not necessarily geared toward younger readers, the Ultimate comics were designed to start fresh with the Marvel books and draw in new readers. Storylines were started fresh, and the big Marvel icons like the Avengers and Spider-Man were fresh-faced superhero newbies, presumably more relatable to young readers than the old grizzled veterans that I grew up with in the eighties.

They tweaked a few things; mostly costumes, but also storylines and a general updating of forty year old origins. But the most drastic change, in my mind, was ole' Nick Fury. First of all, they changed him from a cigar-chompin' unshaved war veteran into... Samuel L. Jackson. From what I understand they actually asked SLJ for his permission to have the new Fury modeled after him.

I have mixed feelings about this. On one hand, how cool is Sam Jackson? The most die-hard cynic has to still admire Sam Jackson for an overall career of bad-ass-hood. His worst movie roles have still been cult or critic favorites. Say what you want about the Star Wars prequels, Mace Windu is pretty cool, and that part was made for him- so that's two major geek universe characters designed to look like Samuel L. Jackson. And Samuel loves it- I think he's the kind of guy who goes to Comic Con and genuinely enjoys it.

Also- I like the inversion of modeling fictional characters after real-world counterparts- as opposed to the tradional process of looking for an actor that can portray a character like Superman. It demonstrates a powerful co-existance of Hollywood and comic fandom that was perhaps born when Marlon Brando first donned Krytonian robes.

Still... you changed Sgt. Fury's race??!! And made him bald??!! Wait.. is that a kango? I can be a purist and resistant to needless change. It just seems a total denial of everything that was originally cool about the character. I realize that this sounds very crotchety- like something your slightly racisct grandfather would say. And yes, I realize that the original cigar smoking Fury is intact- But doesn't the whole thing smell like a marketing ploy when it's all said and done? The fact that the movie version Of Fury, which will now get more exposure than ever with the upcoming Avengers, actually features S. Jackson fulfilling the role modeled after him both excites the fanboy in me and irritates the grown cynic I've become.

Just this afternoon (well after I started writing this tirade a week ago) I passed by the TV and caught my nine year old watching yet another animated version of the Avengers on TV, a ploy that even my children recognize is marketing for an upcoming movie as opposed to an original production with artistic merit. Sure enough there was an African-American Nick Fury (but with hair- so totally different from the other versions- ushering a newly awakened Captain America about the modern world. I recognize the need to keep 46 year-old characters fresh and induct new fans like my kids, but you'll never stop professional Haters like me from stomping my feet and shouting that Nick Fury ISN'T AN AVENGER! And wasn't responsible for the formation of the group- no matter what revisionist history is the current / popular version.

And while I recognise that I'm getting farther and farther away from a review of Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., let me comment briefly (if possible) on X-Men: First Class, which I just watched for the first time the other day. Here is a movie that is as revisionist as anything (Darwin an original member... Havok older than Cyclops.. Phooey!) and yet completely retains the SPIRIT of the original. And makes many nice nods to the original X-Men comics, the greatest of which is using the original setting of the sixties. Certainly liberties have been taken with the characters and stories (the X-Men didn't know the Hellfire Club existed until the eighties (shouts the crotchety blogger)) but the core dynamic of ethical ambiguities in the light of persecution and bigotry is portrayed beautifully. One can only hope that the big screen tent-pole production (is that a new term?) of the Avengers retains the same glory of the original... oh wait, The Avengers has always been a big-screen story of star-spangled super-powered doofs banging out their internal issues through violence and spectacle.

What we won't see in the Avengers is the psychedelic and epic art of Jim Sterenko. Sterenko is awesome. He took what should have been a campy rip-off of James Bond using a campy WWII comic book character during the era of campy Stan Lee-Jack Kirby comics and slowly infused it with late sixties psychedlia and pop culture coolness. His backrounds and effects ooze groundbreaking art pastiches that took the rest of the industry years to emulate. The equipment and outfits he gives Fury are so cool it takes even the most hardened reader back to elementary school daydreams of 'wouldn't it be cool if..' And even Fury's hap-slappy dialog and Dum-Dum backslapping get toned down over the course of this collection of fifteen page short stories to portray more dimensional and real characters. Sterenko is the reason that Nick Fury survived the Golden Age of comics and is still around for Sam Jackson to try and pump new life into.

*1 We do that now, but it doesn't stop comic book writers from both companies retro-ing characters and stories whenever and however they want.