Spending so much time drawing - and dreaming up - the monstrous and the grotesque goes waaay back to my junior schooldays. It started as a mild distraction/interest which quickly twisted to an obsession. Dr. Who, Ray Harryhausen, monster stickers/bubblegum cards and horror movies all played a BIG part, but the major influence/inspiration was down to Grimly Feendish and the nuclear genius of Ken Reid: who mesmerized me with his manic drawings and anarchic sense of humour, whether it was Faceache, The Nervs, Jonah or Frankie Stein.
Add to that the weird mischievous mutant sidekicks of Grimly Feendish; tentacled, scaly, oddly-coloured hairy things called Squelchies, well, a mix like that will make young impressionable minds go funny...
Getting the chance to draw most of em in Albion was one of the strangest feelings, felt like i was channeling something long lost and hidden, felt spooky, felt exciting - felt AMAZING!
Talking of Albion, a new collection of classic reprints from the vaults of IPC/FLEETWAY is on the bookshelves(old news for some of you), giving you adventures from four of the best; Cursitor Doom, Kelly's Eye, Janus Stark and House of Dolmann.
To mark the occasion, in a slightly belated fashion ('belated', my new middle name, when i get around to it...), this week I'll be posting unseen character designs from Albion , along with a coupla pencilled pages and a new batch of originals for sale.
Meantime, if you want to learn more(and see more)about Ken Reid. visit Peter Gray's fan page at; http://uk.geocities.com/pjgkenreid/
2 comments:
Ken Reid - I remember Fachache really well - wonderful stuff and brings back so many memories.
Great blog - really interesting...
Great stuff.
My fave Ken Reid strip is Queen of the Seas - absolutely manic and very detailed.
You probably know this but Grimly is a Baxendale joint.
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