I've been busier than an abortionist in a NYC ghetto as of late which is why I haven't scooted this 'un out to you a lot sooner 'n now. Well, it ain't like I'm exactly buried up to my britches in work but I still need more time to devote to kicking up my feet and goofing off while listening to music sans attempting to tell you just how I feel about it from the vast reaches of my soul, or brain, or something like that. I do try my best, but you all know what a failure I've been in life thus the delays in these writeups. You're gonna get what'cha expect, which might be blow-hardy at times so take it piece by piece like you should do all these megaposts.

Tedium seems to be the order of the day but by this time in life I've learned to love it. There is something about monotony that seems to benefit my spirit in the same way that the better rock 'n roll groups of the sixties and seventies used repeato riffs to create a warm blanket of sonic reduction that entices rather than bores. Who knows, maybe that's why I've been playing some of my pre-chitchat with the Dalai Lama-era Philip Glass albums as of late but whatever, I sure can't wait for the days when I can do nothing but hang around the house just like I did when I was a budding suburban slob and I preferred staying in my room 'stead of going out and associating with humanity. Sorta like today only I'll be able to do it 24 hours nonstop!

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Stale old news but still...r.i.p. to Lou Christie, a name in sixties music that many associate with the rash of rumors surrounding his...er..."private" (parts) affairs. You want to know the REAL reason why the gypsy cried??? Then there's Connie Francis, and I'm not gonna make any obvious jokes about her because the last time I did I got into some hot water with a certain person and I do want to avoid controversy on this blog (BTW my mother, who at first thought Connie was swell probably because they shared the same ethnic background, went 180 against her after Connie's misfortune at a certain NYC-area motel...I mean, Connie was clearly the victim in this case but my mother though she was TAINTED by the incident and it was nothing but disgust from thereon in!). Bobby Sherman also finally bit the dust---well, at least he lived long enough to enjoy the passing of David Cassidy who certainly stole Sherman's teen idol thunder and heavy duty like at that. And of course a shout out to Mick Ralphs who should be fondly remembered for his role in Mott the Hoople (an act that I find 50/50 myself to be honest about it), though co-founding Bad Company's something that he's really gonna hafta answer to St. Peter for.

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Big thank you to Robert Forward for the old Tom Donahue radio show from May 2 of 1967 with none other than Jerry Garcia and Phil Lesh sittin' in spinnin' the records and talkin' things up just like I'm sure they woulda back at their pad on Haight. By this time the Dead really had fizzled out and but good (but then again the only GD I will do the rah-rahs for are those 1965 demos straight out of PEBBLESville...dunno if SEASTONES counts) but as you'd guess their tastes in music were better'n their ability to take such tastes and do something good with 'em. Thus the listener that particular night would have been subjected to a whole slew of surprisingly interesting tracks from Charles Mingus to Blind Willie Johnson up through James Brown which only goes to prove that Gene Sculatti was right in labeling the early Dead as intellectual punk rock supremos before the press releases and chemicals really got to their heads.  

The two do come off somewhat phony intellectual (after all, wasn't that MUSIC OF BULGARIA album [a track of which pops up on this show or else I wouldn't be mentioning it] considered some sort of total hipster gotta have and gotta love possession for every true smarter than their parents type back then? I mean, if Paul Simon loved it I kinda get the idea that every ironed hair freedom rider gal out there did as well!). However, I can see how Nick Kent thought they actually came off like Amerigan college boy types with an honest interest in European culture back when he interviewed 'em for FRIENDS 'round '72 way...they are kinda gosh darn sincere 'n all. Sheesh, after all of this maybe I should give these bozos another go at it --- perhaps if I could separate the group from their FANS somehow...

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Current tee-vee jollies include weeknight perusals of JONNY QUEST, a program that I went totally nutzo for during my turdler years though when I caught up with reruns in the eighties I thought they were somewhat unexciting and even quite stale. In my advanced age I gotta say that this 'un's got everything that was custom-made for the sixties-vintage ranch house lardass plopped right in front of the idiot box kinda guy...there's the fine comic book-styled artwork and storylines (sorta like a cross 'twixt the tales one got during the 12-cent era and a smattering of post-WW II action strips borrowing more than a few ideas from Milton Caniff) to the finest animation I've seen broadcast outside of some snoozy cartoon television special that boasted top notch efforts but total boredom. Hoyt Curtin's theme song and incidental music ain't no slouch either what with that jazzy roaring brass all over the place helping to pump up the visuals even more. In many ways JONNY QUEST was one of the last gasps of boffo and real-deal Golden Age of Television considering that within a short span of time the whole kit 'n kaboodle would (temporarily) lose a lot of the bared-wire intensity it had for the previous ten or so years what with the old line programs starting to lose their direction and the new efforts just not as potent as what had been dished out at Mr. and Mrs. Front Porch only a short time earlier.

One program I decided to catch if only to satiate my morbid curiosity was the mid-eighties revival of an early-sixties classic and I don't mean that hippified TWILIGHT ZONE either (a show which I admittedly liked even if I tuned out after awhile). I'm talkin' THE JETSONS, Hanna-Barbera's one-season wonder that flopped in the ratings because it was stacked up against Disney but grew in popularity due to incessant reruns that ya just couldn't avoid if you were living in a house with a pack of preteen turdburgers. Earlier in my lifecycle I caught a few minutes of these new 'un's here/there and didn't care for the animation much (too eighties-ish Hanna-Barbera crankout that probably took three times as many people to create as it did the superior originals) but decided to give them another go at it out of something a little less than morbid curiosity.

The revived JETSONS really ain't "that" bad, that is if you tweak your own personal tastemeters to suit your suburban slob outlook on tee-vee jollies. It's boff that the original voice actors were brought in before they all croaked, but it sure is tough listening to the likes of Daws Butler struggling to hit that high Elroy voice (and, come to think of it, George "Jetson" O'Hanlon was suffering from some heavy duty health issues 'round the same time even though it really didn't affect his vocal cords...maybe his lungs). Like I said the animation's rather television uninspired but I guess it could have been loads worse, and judging from some of the Hanna Barbera programs from the same time it sure was an improvement. And the storylines were actually OK even if the creeping tendency of eighties blanditude does date these in the same way that the original series is dated only in a good early-sixties fashion. Overall I'm glad these cartoons weren't botched by mid-eighties retroscuzz, but if you think I'm gonna stay up past snoozetime to watch any more of these you got another think comin'.

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It's infantile but it's fun! No, I don't mean grabbin' the weenie like you boys did from age two onward (and I do mean onward!) but more AI chicanery, this time of what are supposed to be the actual covers of that sixties-vintage Marvel Comics Group title THE SUBPAR SEVEN! Yeah the very concept's quite immature in a thirteen-year-old way or at least a bad idea that would have popped up in some mid-sixties comic book crudzine but eh, if I were a pre-pubesprout and I had this technology to work with I sure woulda been gung ho on creating such covers as these! The results look more 80s and beyond and definitely post-Kirby but anyway, these results are loads better'n anything any of the big and even small comic book companies have been able to cook up for quite a long time):

 

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After alla that cereal filler well, here be the reviews. Thanks to Paul, Bob, Fadensonnen, Thierry Muller and no one else (forgot who sent me the Destroyed CD, but whoever it was well...sorry it got lost in the rubble otherwise known as my bedroom).

The Destroyed-OUTTA CONTROL CD (available via bert@bertswitzer.com)

If it means a heck of a lot of difference to you, drummer Bert Switzer has a rather amazing pedigree not only having been influenced by Keith Moon and the Remains but having gathered up a certain number of friends who just could have been instrumental in making the guy a household name. That never happened but it didn't stop Bert who kept churnin' out his own breed of basement rock including some recordings by this Boston group called the Destroyed, a name that seems somewhat familiar in the back reaches of my cavernous cranium. 

This release begins with a Destroyed reunion of sorts with Bert bashing away behind guitarist and singer JD Jackson producing a roar that reminds me of various home-produced efforts from Metal Mike Saunders' Rockin' Blewz to those pre-Gizmo Kenne Highland tapes that circulated amongst the creepier of fanzine freaks back in the eighties. Like a lot of late-seventies punk rock, these guys rehash old heavy metal riffs in a way that would offend the more petunia readers of this blog to which I say OKAY!!!

Onetime big name in underground circles Henry Kaiser appears on a few tracks laying some of his experimental leads which sure sound good in this stew (never was a fan of the guy who always seemed to come off perfectly constructed to jigsaw into the tastes the people who would listen to him --- nothing wrong with that but I felt his presence a little too howshallIsay "obvious"). Sheesh. these remind me a whole lot of DAILY DANCE so I really do have to give the man a huge reconsideration!

Filling out the disque are some actual real deal late-seventies recordings by the group. They come off just like you would have expect them to with the bargain basement cassette quality improving the overall intensity just like it did with all of those other classic definitely lo-fi seventies recordings that continue to stand up to half-mastered virgin vinyl efforts the kind that alla them STEREO REVIEW nuts used to skid shorts over. Overall, a really interesting effort from these guys who I'll bet hardly any of you knew about and wouldn't care to know about, but that's not gonna stop me from educating you random clump of cells out there.

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By Any Means-LIVE AT CRESCENDO 2-CD-r set (originally on Ayler Records, Sweden)

Not much is known (at least by me) 'bout this late-00's configuration with new thing biggies Charles Gayle, Rashied Ali and William Parker, but the trio swing swell here in a fashion that brings back to me some of the more gnarllier moments of the old Sam Rivers-thrusted loft jazz scene documented on the you should have had 'em for years already WILDFLOWERS albums. 

Gayle in general brings up (at least in my rather hollow mindset) everyone from Henry Threadgill to even Roscoe Mitchell and a number of other seventies players I'm too stupid to know about but will discover in a good twenty or so years should I live so long. Parker's versatile enough to the point where you don't even feel like snoozing during his bass solo and like, what else can be said about Rashied Ali who ranked as one of the better out-of-the-groove drummers during the early prominence of the new jazz way back in the total eruption days of the late-sixties. 

There are so many of these avgarde jazz things to choose from and if you're a person who is conscious of where your hard begged goes I know you will be cautious before considering an effort like this. Heaven only knows how much $$$ I've squandered merely on hunch. But you might go for this 'un if you are a devoted follower of the form and still have the same fervor for the free sound that you did when you were a teenbo and you read somewhere where Frank Zappa mentioned Cecil Taylor 'r something along those lines. Not bad really...in fact a tip topper effort from three players, two who are no longer around to be ignored like they were most all of their lives.

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Marion Brown-LIVE AT CLUB LABRATORIUM CD-r burn

This came out as a bootleg cassette a good five or so years back, something I find a bit strange considering that no legit label devoted to the New Thing was conscious enough to release it legal-like. Sound is flat (though a pro company could make it sound really spiffy) but the performance is just what you'd hope a jazz act would have come up with during the cataclysmic 60s/70s cusp. 

This has Brown and trumpeter Leo Smith playing with a buncha krauts (including Teutonic jazz bigwig Manfred Eicher on bass) doing it slow and bared-wire intense recalling some of Brown's then-contemp. albums, the one on ECM with Braxton and Chick Corea coming to mind. Perhaps Smith's presence does lend somewhat of an AACM approach which is heightened by the heavy use of "small instruments" of a percussive variety.  

A nice slow burn play that reminds me of PEOPLE IN SORROW which would figure given the time and locale (Europe during the days of the great afro-jazz expat).

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Drew Gardner-THE RETURN CD-r burn (originally on Astral Spirits Records)

While we're on a jazz jag...well I can't say that this '95 session breaks any new ground, but it sure is a fine harkening back to the late-sixties burst of creativity that was so noticeable that even a few suburban slob kids were paying attention (yeah, a rehash of thought first delivered in the By Any Means review but like, I wrote these up a good two months apart so stow the snide!). Stellar lineup including the shoulda/oughta be legendary John Tchicai who most of you will probably remember from his appearance with John Stevens on the live portion of the John Lennon and Yoko Ono LIFE WITH THE LIONS spinner...that's him getting particularly squonky right when the song unfortunately fades out. This sesh ain't as nerve grating as the Lennon/Ono show but eh, some of you will go for it.

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The Equals-EQUALS SUPREME/SENSATIONAL EQUALS CD-e burn (originally on Repertoire Records, Germany)

"Baby Come Back" ain't on here (unless you got a special burn made for me by Paul McGarry), so superficial fanablas'll probably want to skip on this given their inherent shallowness. And considering how the Equals were pretty hit or miss, with some pretty on-target island-tinged pop songs intermingled with comparatively pallid efforts, you might want to skip on the thing as well. Features the talents of one Eddy Grant, the first black artist to pop up on the MTV screens (this during the days of rock music finally tumbling deep into the abyss) even though superficial wonks like to say it was Michael Jackson all along.

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PSYCHIC PIGS CD-r burn (originally on Slovenly Records, England)

It sure is nice hearing a punk rock group in the here and now that hasn't succumbed to the prevailing hippie tide of pink hair 'n protest! This duo creates a great straight-ahead roaring breed of rock 'n roll that brings back memories of some of those early/mid-eighties outfits who were too smart to believe alla that kultured dribble regarding punk rock being dead yet were too smart to dive whole hog into that radical left warmed over hippie drool that was nothing but them kids from BILLY JACK in Doc Martens once you get down to it. Today, like fortysome years back, the roar of real punk rock 'n roll is here to fight off the precocious strains of pampered pooch piousness!

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Wire-SEND CD-r burn (originally on Pinkflag Records, England)

Gotta say that I find a lot of these later-on Wire LPs (wha' th' heck---maybe even some of the earlier ones as well) not that bad. Hit or miss as far as some go perhaps, and this 'un 's quite the same what with the roar coming off potent in spots yet sounding like the same old heard them avgarde musical moves many times before in others. But hey, I'll take this over just 'bout any of the other late-seventies survivors of the English punk brigades who were still up and about when this offering was made. But then again I find a good portion of it more of the usual blare...a good blare mind you but y'know, nothing I'd care to spin when stacked up against the Electric Eels'r somethin'.

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Pascal Comelade-LES LIMINANAS TRAITE DE GUITARRES TRIOLECTIQUES CD-r burn (originally on Because Records, France)

This guy has a discography longer than anyone you know's arm, but I never did come across any of Comelade's music during my many-a-years of listening (not that I was looking...). The man plays what sounds like electronic takes on late-sixties instrumentals, sorta like Kim Fowley's BORN TO BE WILD without any of the gals on the cover 'r somethin' like that. Needs a low-budget German film from the seventies to go along. "A Wall of Perrukes" kinda reminds me of Cluster during their ZUKERZEIT days or even La Dusseldorf once the late-seventies began rolling in. And by the way track #8 "Green Fuz" is not the Randy Alvey song made popular by its appearance on PEBBLES.

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And if you were stoopid enough to make your way through this post then you're just the kind of person who is just ready-made for a whole slew of BLACK TO COMM back issues! Get some, shit some!

BOOK(S) REVIEW! FRITZI RITZ VOLUMES 8, 9 and 10 (Midcentury Comics, 2024)

I mourned the capitulation of Gwandanaland Comics for a short period of time (mainly because I finally learned how to spell "Gwandanaland"), but I guess that Midcentury Comics is picking up where those public domain perusers left off. Picked up in a good way too, 'cause starting your new publishing firm off with a ten volume (maybe even more!) selection of FRITZI RITZ Sundays is certainly a smart way to get the balls rollin. Crazed Bushmillians like myself who grew up with NANCY and remained loyal throughout the years deserve as much of his work as we can get, and Gocomics and "X" can only deliver so much regarding those single-digit thrills I certainly got reading the comics while spread out on the parlor floor! Besides, it's so hard to drag the computer into the bathroom where I seem to be getting most of my comic book reading done these days.

For quite a long time Aunt Fritzi had her own Sunday comic running concurrently with her niece's, at least until the mid-sixties by which at that time NANCY creator Ernie Bushmiller was clearly not the artist (whoever was doing it had a brash, wide-lined style but was reams better'n most of the NANCY artists who took over in his wake). As you'd guess even if you are a half-braincell'd person, these Sundays focused on Fritzi and seemed to deal mostly with her love/hate relationship with fuddy duddy boyfriend Phil Fumble, a definitely non-masculine blob of a weakling type who many believe was an actual Bushmiller surrogate with his real life wife the tru blu Fritzi. Lucky guy!

Whilst giving these 30's/40's era Sundays a re-perusal I've noticed a number of things that definitely prove most of the anti-Bushmiller types we've ALL encountered downright wrong. The artwork is surprisingly detailed and dare I say immaculate. I remember some wonk out there once saying that Bushmiller didn't even draw his comics but used a whole bunch of rubber stamps...well, I know that the man's abilities faded away with age and all, but these comics are about as detailed and as crisp as any of the competitors. They're perhaps even on the same level of long-gone firmness as, say, ELLA CINDERS was during the same period. I must also admit that the stories and jokes are definitely not of a Scholastic Books level but were smart and downright witty. These FRITZI's are quite clever in the way they throw that psychic cream pie tossed in your face right when you least expect it.

One thing about these FRITZI RITZes which really should discredit the rubber stamp brigade's all of the sexiness that appears whether brazenly up-front or slyly in the background. There are many a panel with Fritzi in various stages of undress (or taking a bath) as well as lots of unabashed pulchritude to be seen whether it be hula girls or majorettes showing off their curvaceous legs. I'm surprised some prudes didn't go after this comic because of its overt potential pinup nature...this sure ain't the suburban slob kiddo world that Nancy lives in but grown up horniness transposed to the funny pages that's for sure!

Bad points...at times the small reproduction hurts dem eyes, and there are way too many repeats within these three volumes making me wonder just how many of the strips that appear here also show up in Midcentury's other FRITZI efforts. Eh, given just how Bushmiller-starved one can be you'll be glad to get these strips in any wayshapeform, but hurry up because when these go O.P. you'll be paying a whole lot more for these than you've ever bargained for!

COMIC BOOK REVIEW! MARVEL TALES #4, SEPTEMBER 1966 ISSUE (Marvel Comics Group)

Whilst immersing myself in all sorts of visual and aural stimulation during my just pre-pubesprout days, it was an unfortunate fact that by the time I became seriously involved in the early days of the Marvel Age of Comics these titles were all but impossible to latch onto. Sad to say, these much desired early-sixties Marvels that I had a hankerin' to read (especially considering the high regards I held for that period in time regarding music/art/television even at that early age) were long out of my reach and sheesh, for the most part even the reprint books that came in their wake couldn't be found in any of the comic book stacks that appeared in many a garage sale or flea market that I patronized. You can betcha bottom buckskin that such a predicament led to a whole load of heavy duty angst and anxiety on my part which I get the feeling has ruined me for the rest of my life...sheesh if I only had read these comics at the time when they were needed to help build me into the Complete Human Being that I so longed to be I just might have turned out a better person, or at least something passable. Who knows? But then again, maybe I might have turned out even more warped that YOU!

At least Marvel were still pumping out their various monster and fantasy reprint books which gave me a taste of what the early superhero entries were like what with that Kirby/Ayers and Steve Ditko artwork (not so much Don Heck although I don't like to pick on him the way many in the world of fandom did) that makes most post-1970s comic art look positively hackneyed. But on that rarer-than-rare occasion when some issue of MARVEL COLLECTORS ITEM CLASSICS or MARVEL TALES would manage to enter into my life well, you can be sure that I was happier than a bulldyke at an all gal high school track meet. Forget all of that OUR TOWN sappy go back in time for one day pablum that was made to appeal to the worst aspects in one's existence...if I hadda relive a day in my life it would be one where I did nothing but immerse myself in a whole stack of vintage 1962-65-era Marvels in my farted-up bedroom with doors bolted shut, and if someone wanted me to go to the store or take out the trash I'd make sure that the radio was on full blast thus to protect me from any extraneous noise! Sheesh but did I need that Kennedy-era fantasy and campy yet ingenious storylines that made these comics so different from the competition who were trying to ham it all up while falling flat on their faces I'll tell ya. 

Did I ever mention about the time when the school was having one of those game of chances and flea-market-y type fairs being held in the gym and there was an old book booth with reading matter that was way up my thirteen-year-old expansive alley? Of COURSE I have but for those of you new to the blog well...while helping to set up for the fair I espied not only an early-sixties NANCY paperback that I wanted oh so badly given how much that gal was a fond companion ever since the haziest of my turdler days but MARVEL COLLECTORS ITEM CLASSICS #1 which was something that I most dearly needed in that very early teenbo tubbo existence of mine. Wanted to pay for 'em right then and there but was told not to because well...these turdburgers always had their own reasons for such strange rules so I decided to just stand RIGHT BY THE ENTRANCE and be the first in line when the fair officially opened and snatch these and other necessary items up before anyone else could, and boy was I ready to pounce upon 'em as soon as the go was given! 

However, when the doors were opened and I rushed to that old books 'n mag kiosk these two must-haves were NOWHERE TO BE FOUND!!!!! You can bet I was disappointed and even asked the proprietor of the booth what the fug was goin' on but got one of those weak-kneed responses, something like the donor wanted them back which I gotta say smells fishier than your cyster's underwear. Talk about being burned beyond burned! 

I assumed that somebody with clout greater than mine actually swiped these items for his own reading pleasure or (what probably happened) someone with a grotesque hatred of me (and boy were there many!) snatched these titles knowing how much I wanted them and did so just to burn my butt! Yeah, that's most likely what happ'd, though I was able to console myself by finding one of the very last issues of DC's JERRY LEWIS comics to possess for my very own. Yeah, some consolation though I will say that, for some strange reason, that joke on the text page (JERRY LEWIS not-so-surprisingly enough did not have a lettercol given it was a supposedly comedy-oriented title and who cares about those?) where a now strictly verboten mention about an Indian who liked to put cough syrup on his pancakes continues to stick in my cranium. 

As you all know, I hold grudges for a real long time and in this case things are NO DIFFERENT! I'm still miffed about this incident even to this day, but I eventually managed to get hold of both the COLLECTORS ITEM CLASSICS and the NANCY book (the first one within the year and the second one a good twenny-five earthspins later). But sheesh, even to this day I am roasting mad that I wasn't able to pick these un's up when they were just within the reach of my grubby pre-adlo paws! 

Eventually, I bought up a whole bunch of these late-sixties Marvel superhero reprint titles given that the originals by then were even more far gone than these collections. I dug 'em, especially the earlier ones which used to reproduce the original covers albeit shrunk down considerably, and even to this day I still have quite a few of 'em that I've kept o'er the years rotting away in some corner of the hovel I call my home.

'nuff autobiographical goo in a hideously lame attempt for y'all to feel sorry for me but anyway, I got hold of today's subject in question very recently (and for a relatively good price) because the one I bought well over three decades back at some flea market actually had the Human Torch splash panel ripped out (t'was sealed and boy wasn't I such a trusting fanabla!). This 'un's intact and in pretty good condition, and considering that the tales featured in this one were only three years old when MARVEL TALES #4 came out it just goes to show you just how much in demand these stories for alla them Johnny-cum-latelies who were too poor or stupid (or in my case too turdler) to get these sagas when they first hit the stands.

The Spiderman story reprinted's features the return of Our Hero's old villain the Vulture that originally popped up late 1963, a time when alter ego Peter Parker was still wearing those unrealistic-looking round Janis Joplin spectacles that would fortunately get broken in the next ish and left off his face permanently. To be honest about it I gotta say that I like the glasses because they gave Parker a Clark Kent sorta demeanor but otherwise well, this is a hotcha story that thankfully reflects an early/mid-sixties aura that I always liked (and still do) in my media. It's yet another early Marvel-era camp up which satisfies enough even if I continue to wince at the way Parker is pushed around by All Amerigan Turd Flash Thompson who, just like everyone with looks, status and High Stool Cred, deserves the severe thrashing that Parker keeps fantasizing about giving him (let's face it, Parker AIN'T John Morton). Well, Parker don't wanna blow his cover so he just has to suck it up way more'n even Georgina Spelvin could, and what pre-teenbo pudge couldn't relate to that!

For one reason or another the Human Torch had his own series apart from THE FANTASTIC FOUR that ran in STRANGE TALES, and if you ask me it was a durn good one at least until the Thing became part of the act and the entire series flopped worse'n your high-flying goldfish. In this particular series Johnny Storm is living with his big cyster Sue (the Invisible Girl) in some Long Island high-end suburb and supposedly trying to keep his true identity a secret which is weird because well, in THE FANTASTIC FOUR everybody knew who he was so why the big hush hush? Why the sibs are living the suburban slob lifestyle 'stead of in the Baxter Building I do not know but it does make a nice setting for this new series which concentrates on the Torch's teenbo comings and goings away from the rest of the crew. Anyway in this 'un (the second solo Human Torch saga in case yer keeping tabs) the kid's stacked up against a John Carradine-looking badski called the Wizard who not only has the abilities to make Houdini come off Third Grade Amateur Hour but's got a great hankerin' to put the Torch out of business because hey, why not pick on some random superhero to disgrace if you're an evil sort with loads of hoohah to your name?

Thor was also starting up 'round the same time and, other'n the story where Kirby was busy elsewhere so Stan Lee got future Spire Christian Comics mastermind Al Hartley to do the honors, the entire JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY run was what I'd call about as perfect as one could be. Yeah, the soap opera-y subplot dealing with Thor's love for nurse Jane Foster was something that shoulda been shoved into some girly romance comic, but as far as creepy badboys and twisto-changeo plots go these were fab. Here Thor, while helping the US gub'mint test out the new "C" Bomb, meets up with yet another totally bald madman from the future who steals the weapon with Thor following him a good three centuries in order to retrieve it. Lemme tell you, the year 2262 sure looks like a fine place to live...guess that between here and the future all of the detrimental to civilization ideas that we're now living through have been vanquished and the kind of ideal world I'd sure like to exist in actually is going to come to fruition despite the overwhelming odds. Sheesh, not a pink-haired (supposedly) female creature in sight!

I've been an Ant-Man fan ever since that story where he shrunk himself and was injected into the Vision's bloodstream, and I (do tell, do tell!!!) prefer him over the various future Henry Pym variations like Giant Man and Yellowjacket who seemed so one-D compared with the other Marvel heroes that were cluttering up the late-sixties and early-seventies. In this January 1963-dated story from TALES TO ASTONISH the midgie superhero is pitted against the Scarlet Beetle, an insect with the mind of a somewhat intelligent but not quite rational puny human who uses Ant-Man's growth gas to become human-size and turn Earth into an insect-ruled dictatorship (as if it already weren't as any hot summer day will tell you)! Not so surprisingly enough this story resembles those earlier Marvel monster sagas where some overgrown alien/mutant threat to society is unleashed upon us, only this time a superhero 'stead of some everyday fanabla saves the world and as usual gets not a shred of credit for his good deeds.

's all good stuff and a reminder of the days when not only did comic art look like what you would expect to be peddled to a suburban slob pre-pubesprout but the stories celebrated heroism and the problems that sometimes would go along with being one. After reading these I have come to the conclusion that Marvel really was at its peak until it became so conscious of its place in the world of comicdom and Stan Lee's head became even more swelled than previous (if that really was possible). For a guy like me who likes his comics the way they were back when the publishers actually strived for good visuals, interesting and engaging stories and best of all that pre-hippie era sense of morality and hope for a better world (and not the dystopia many people seem to be striving for today) these early Marvel sagas really do live up to their legend even if we all knew what kind of a jerk Lee coulda been at times.