This is a website for new side-stories. I used to put them in a sub-folder on the Scary Go Round site. That’s where Giant Days, Murder She Writes, THAT, Mordawwa and a few others gestated before becoming print minis. This is the new /scare folder.
The old Scary Go Round CMS won’t take any more strain, and rebuilding the site in WordPress/Toocheke/Dr Bob’s Webcomic Superstructure was, shall we say, a bridge to madness that I will not attempt to cross a fourth time. I can’t buy any more domain names. Side projects from 2021 on go here.
Here are my albums of the year for 2020. A bad year for living but a good year for listening, that’s what I reckon. I spent a lot of time listening to old sounds that brought back better times, but also found a lot of comfort in seeking out new records.
1 HOUSES OF THE HOLY – Psychic Temple 2 FETCH THE BOLT CUTTERS – Fiona Apple 3 THE NEON SKYLINE – Andy Shauf 4 PLEASURE, JOY AND HAPPINESS – Eddie Chacon 5 SONGS FOR THE GENERAL PUBLIC – Lemon Twigs 6 MICROPHONES IN 2020 – The Microphones 7 DELETED SCENES – Once And Future Band 8 SIDEWAYS TO NEW ITALY – Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever 9 ANNUAL – Modern Nature 10 THE DIRT AND THE STARS – Mary Chapin Carpenter
11 SHORTLY AFTER TAKEOFF – BC Camplight 12 SAWAYAMA – Rina Sawayama 13 FEAR OF DEATH – Tim Heidecker 14 INLET – Hum 15 YOUR HERO IS NOT DEAD – Westerman 16 NEW KINDA LOVE – Notches 17 SUITE FOR MAX BROWN – Jeff Parker 18 BEEN AROUND – A Girl Called Eddy 19 TRADITIONAL TECHNIQUES – Stephen Malkmus 20 THE MAIN THING – Real Estate
21 ROUGH AND ROWDY WAYS – Bob Dylan 22 SET MY HEART ON FIRE IMMEDIATELY – Perfume Genius 23 SUMMERLONG – Rose City Band 24 ROMANTIC COMEDY – Summer Camp 25 ACID RAIN – Amos Pitsch 26 THAT’S HOW RUMORS GET STARTED – Margo Price 27 YOU’RE NOT ALONE EP – Semisonic 28 LAND OF NO JUNCTION – Aoife Nessa Frances 29 SAINT CLOUD – Waxahatchee 30 COULD HAVE LOVED U BETTER EP – School Of Language
31 FOOTBALL MONEY – Kiwi Jr 32 NO DREAM – Jeff Rosenstock 33 JUMP ROPE GAZERS – The Beths 34 ALL THROUGH THE YEAR EP/PRACTICE EP – Home Blitz 35 JOHNNY – Lawn 36 HIGH COUNTRY SKYWAY – R Boyd & Dusk 37 XOXO – The Jayhawks 38 DARK HEARTS – Annie 39 CUTTIN GRASS VOL 1 – Sturgill Simpson 40 GOONS BE GONE – No Age
The final Bad Machinery book is out today from Oni Press in comic shops, and will follow in normal bookshops shortly after. If you can’t find it, ask for it! I finished the original comics nearly four years ago, so even I can barely remember what happens in it. I recall a cursed pearl, a confusing traffic system and some angst. I do recall that I gave it my all in the run-out groove.
There are new pages and some bonus bits in the back, I sincerely hope you enjoy it.
I did a big process post about Circus Windows, also talking about what I learned writing Wicked Things. It’s an open Patreon post, no subscription required. There’s one of my 22-page issue breakdowns included as a download, which may be of interest to comic writers. You may just ask, “how could anyone learn anything from this gnomic document,” but that’s your problem my fine friend and this is just how Stan and Jack did it (er, it probably isn’t, don’t fact-check this).
Circus Windows has finished, but you can continue to read my webcomics on the STEEPLE website (steeple.church) with a new story, Author Unknown?, beginning on Monday. It’s a Steeple/Charlotte crossover modelled on the classic Magnum PI/Murder She Wrote tie-up episodes and I think it keeps the quality high. I hope to see you there.
I’ve done a (2-part) interview with Mark Turetsky at ComicsXF about Giant Days x Batman, you can read part one now. It deals with how Darwyn Cooke inspired me, and how my friend Rachael Smith helped me work out what to do if I get into trouble with the law.
For a while (since the great Scary Go Round website collapse of 2020), Universal GoComics has been the only place to read the Bad Machinery webcomic series online. But the cases were not broken down individually, so I’ve added a little link menu to scarygoround.com. You can now revisit your favourite stories with ease. The links are also below for your convenience.
The comics are on their second loop around on GoComics and continue to get comments every day. If you’re one of my readers who found me through that site – thanks for exploring my other comics!
ITEM! I did a long, long text interview about my favourite comics of my childhood with David Harper of SKTCHD. I love talking to David and I think it is a fun and informative read. The interview is part-paywalled but it’s so in-depth that the 2/5ths you get for free is still… hefty.
ITEM! Here’s some beautiful art, a rendering of Desmond Fishman‘s legendary Uncle Ken (“he’s quite a character,” to quote Des himself).
Entertaining myself with lunchtime daft scribblings.
