Tag: the black rubric

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July 2022: Hottest on Record

Hey folks – July is over, and with it one of the fastest (and hottest) months I remember in a while. Some nice bits of progress this month, scattered in with everything else – let’s get into it!

The Usual

After last month’s “no pages, only V I B E S” situation, I have managed some more productivity this month. Chief amongst those is managing to secure a (truly fantastic) colourist for the next three issues/second volume of BRIGANTIA, which means that the creative team is set, apart from a letterer:

Line art: Alaire Racicot
Colours: Rebecca Nalty
Editor: Claire Napier

We’ve got less than a handful of pages left to go for issue #3, and Hass has been keeping right on track with the lettering despite a brief bout of COVID, so I’m hopeful that we’ll be able to get it off to CPUK in the first half of August and I’ll have plenty of time to check the proof before we do the full run. And then we can dive headfirst into issues #4-6! I’m very excited to see how this absolutely killer team interprets the script, which has already been polished and primped by the wonderful Claire.

The Record

  • 4 pages written (SPACE COWBOYS)
  • 17 pages outlined (BLACK RUBRIC II: BACK II BLACK)
  • 4 pages lettered
  • 2 pages of secret design work

Definitely a healthier-looking section this month! I finally found the energy and words to finish off the last issue of SPACE COWBOYS; now I just need to put issues #4 and #5 for that in front of Claire and start thinking about who could draw it. I’ve also made solid progress outlining the BLACK RUBRIC sequel – I wanted to make sure I could build on the first one and have something to say as well as continuing to take the piss out of the black metal scene, and I think I’ve come up with a hook that makes it worth writing. Aiming for something around 50-60 pages long, so double the length of the last one, but we’ll see how it goes!

The Tunes

This month’s list follows a bit of a bell curve; we’re starting off with some weird experimental ambient courtesy of SUGAI KEN, a Japanese artist I read a fascinating interview with this month. This isn’t my usual sort of thing but it’s a good soundscape to write to! Next up is JAMBINAI, who make instrumental post-rock with lots of interesting sounds and big crescendoes – definitely check out the rest of their material. They’re followed by the start of our climb into “heavy shit” territory, with a new track from one of my favourite bands, Tribulation – this yet again showcases their brand of “harsh vocals/bouncy as shit riffs” and I love it. They’re followed by Uneven Structure from France, with some huge, atmospheric prog-djent – I got into this album before I knew what djent was or cared about it, so I don’t really consider them under that label. Next up is VLTIMAS, a blackened death supergroup made up of members of Morbid Angel, Cryptopsy and Mayhem – my band played a support slot for them this month which was a fun time! They’re followed by Watain with a classic (and cheesy-named) slice of black metal – I don’t have a specific playlist for writing The Black Rubric, but I like to throw on the most OTT Satanic shit I can find to get myself in the mood. Cellar Darling have a bit of a silly name, but they’re formed of members of Eluveitie (one of few very good folk metal bands) and I found them interesting – there’s a lot going on here but it all works. Gilmore Trail are local to Sheffield and friends of mine – their album launch was this month which featured a live performance of this monolithic track. Most oppressively hot gig I’ve ever been to but a good experience nevertheless! At the bottom end of the bell curve, we’re closing out with a couple of electronica/pop songs – new material from The Midnight who are always a delight, with almost frustratingly catchy vocal hooks, and a new track from Metric which is equally earworm-y and will get stuck in your head.

The Links

Not a particularly long read this month, but I want to use it as a springboard to rant a little: https://www.indiewire.com/2022/07/stranger-things-subtitles-trolling-1234740521/

As somebody who’s half-deaf, I rely heavily on subtitles when I’m watching/playing things at home – to the extent that if a show or movie doesn’t have subtitles as an option, I will struggle to follow what’s going on and will probably just decide not to watch it. This line in the article particularly hit home for me:


“What I’ve noticed quite a lot online are people who don’t really understand the subtitles are for the deaf and hard-of-hearing. I’ve seen a lot of, ‘Why are the subtitles so overly descriptive? We don’t need these.’ And I know you don’t, but you weren’t the main audience for subtitles from the start.”


I honestly love this whole approach – subtitles shouldn’t just be a boring, passionless thing added to a show to ensure that you get the bare minimum of information required to understand it, they should absolutely try to bring you into the world of whatever you’re watching. Obviously there are certain occasions where you’ll just need to indicate what’s being said (quickfire dialogue scenes, etc) but when you have the opportunity to communicate the emotion or feeling that everything audible in the show (like music, foley and other sound effects, tone of voice) is working towards – do that, every damn time. Don’t deprive deaf or hard-of-hearing people of the same overall aesthetic enjoyment that you get from it.

There’s a crossover here with comics lettering, I feel – very basic comics lettering will absolutely communicate the information that you require to understand the comic, in that there will be words and you’ll grasp what the story is as a result of them. But if you can, why not fancy it up a little? Have the lettering work in tandem with the rest of the story to really communicate unease, or joy, or whatever else. If you’re not giving it some zazz, what’s the point?

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Anyway, that’s all from me. Have a great August – I’m finally going on holiday (for the first time in about 4 years) at the very end of next month, so I’ll be giving the monthly update a miss while I cram every slice of pizza and every cannoli that exists in Naples into my gaping maw. Molto bene!

All the best,
Chris

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February 2021: Vitality of Thought

Hey folks,

Once again, the end of February crept up on me out of nowhere – I thought I had a couple of extra days to write this post! Let’s get into it.

The Usual

I’ve had something rattling around in my brain this month that I wanted to dig into here – inspired partly by some of the discourse on Comics Twitter™, and compounded by having spent a chunk of the month wrestling with writer’s block.

I’ve spent a lot of my “brain-idle” time this month dwelling on the question of why I enjoy writing stories. Not in a particularly negative way, but just out of curiosity – what’s my reason for creating characters, worlds and narratives? What does that energy expenditure mean? It feels very much like there’s a constant tug-of-war between the impetus to write stories which are “meaningful” and “important” and the desire to write what I’m passionate about. In some cases, those two things can co-exist, but often I’m reminded that the stories I most want to tell aren’t “important” or “vital”, and aren’t exactly a new and unique vision.

There’s an easy answer to this, which is that every story someone creates is unique to some degree because it’s informed by who they are as a person – how they grew up, how they staple words together, what life and upbringing they’ve had. But I don’t personally find that answer all that helpful, especially when I routinely see discussion about how stories (and the comics medium in particular) should be used to tell stories that nobody has seen before, in a way that’s never been done before. The implication (at least in my mind) is that since there are a lot of other people like me, I should strive to find experimental or downright weird methods of storytelling in order to stand out.

Don’t get me wrong – experimental storytelling can be great, and I certainly wouldn’t tell anybody not to get weird with their writing. But my personal interest is less in pushing the boundaries of the form and more in clarity – I want to tell stories which will stick with people, move and inspire them, and for me that means focusing more on content and less on the form itself. My main hope is that after I’ve shuffled off this mortal coil, I’ll leave behind something more concrete than just memories, and I don’t need to push myself into a writing style I’m not comfortable with to achieve that.

The Record

*1 page of SENGOKU written
*SPACE COWBOYS issue #2 redrafted
*Notes/basic story summary for THE BLACK RUBRIC sequel
*Two pitches submitted to an anthology
*Lettering work – 12 pages of Professor Elemental: NEMESIS lettered

I’ve taken a little break from SENGOKU writing this month – the first scene is scripted, but I’ve been reconsidering my approach to the “voice” of the protagonist. Rather than the first-person captions I would normally default to, I’d like to try something which is stylistically a bit closer to the incredible series Lone Wolf and Cub (by Kazuo Koike & Goseki Kojima). It’ll mean letting the artwork do a lot more of the storytelling, but I think it’ll make for a stronger result.

SPACE COWBOYS #2 has been redrafted based on Claire’s feedback, and next up is issue #3. I can’t overstate the positives of working with a good editor – Claire’s great at pushing me not to take the lazy/easy approach and to really find the dialogue/ideas which will make this story stand out. I’ve even drawn some location maps/reference sketches for this one so hopefully it’ll make life easier for the artist!

I really had fun making THE BLACK RUBRIC with Katie Fleming, so I’ve been idly toying with the idea of doing a longer (maybe 50/60 pages or so?) sequel since we wrapped up the Kickstarter and launched it. Earlier this month, I hit on what the central premise of the sequel could be – as well as still being a loving spoof of black metal, I think I can see an angle to make it about creative burnout and the struggles of artist desire vs. fan expectation. If that sounds rather more serious than the last issue, don’t worry – I’m still determined to make it funny!

The Tunes

The playlist is a pretty long one this month! As usual, it’s a fairly even mix of stuff that’s new to me and more familiar tracks; Together to the Stars were recommended by a friend and this is a great slab of atmospheric black metal with plenty of melody to keep things interesting. Tides From Nebula make what I can only describe as… synthy post-metal? They (along with Harakiri for the Sky) have a knack for BIG RIFFS and soaring choruses which I’m particularly into. Wormwitch and Tribulation are both in catchier, head-banging territory – not quite black’n’roll, but they know their way around a groove. Palehorse/Palerider are a new discovery, and I’d highly recommend the full album this track is from – it’s like doomy, gloomy, darkness-soaked cowboy music with a metallic edge. Blood Ceremony are one of my favourites – hints of Jethro Tull but modern, more witchy, and fronted by an incredibly talented flautist/organist/singer Alia O’Brien who I’m a little bit in love with. Of Monsters and Men are a pop recommendation from the same friend who directed me to the first track on this playlist (because only listening to one kind of music is boring) and I really enjoyed this song – any act that sounds similar to Chvrches is a winner in my book. Next up is the most pristine rendition of Aerith’s Theme (technically called ‘Flowers Blooming in The Church’) I’ve heard, from the FFVII Remake Soundtrack – this song always makes me emotional because it’s so delicate and sad and hopeful, all at the same time. Lastly, please enjoy 9 minutes of ancient Egyptian/desert temple atmosphere from Karl Sanders, also known as the guitarist of brutal/technical death metal band Nile – his solo project sounds nothing like his day job and it’s a nice, chilled end to the list!

And that’s all from me – the sun is shining for what seems like the first time in months, vaccinations are happening and I might actually be able to play some live shows towards the end of the year. How’s that for something to look forward to, eh?

All the best,

Chris