Monday, 17 June 2013

Warren Comics - Creepy, Eerie and, Hubba, Hubba, Hubba, Vampirella.



My dad was a printer. Thanks to him I had a constant supply of paper but also comics. Mum too ensured I was never without something to read. I can’t for the life of me remember who it was bought me that first, Carmine Infantino pencilled, DC Flash comic. I think it was dad. I know it was 1961 and that I was seven. To this day that first American comic book was one of the defining moments of my life. It led me to eventually desert DC comics and race, as everyone else was back then, to read Stan Lee’s Marvel comics. 
The world would suggest that Mravel was all Stan Lee's idea. That he created the whole sheebang. He didn't.  Oh he was the man, the engine room behind the whole ‘Marvel Universe’ but it was Jack Krby, Don Heck, Dick Ayers and that virtual genius of comic book art, Steve Ditko that made my juvenile life, much of it spent in hospital, not only bearable but flipping wonderful.



DC and Marvel weren’t the only ones though. James Warren incorporated Warren Publishing in 1957 as homage, in many ways, to those victims of the ‘Comics Code Authority, E.C. Comics. The first magazines published had little or no effect upon me; I can’t even recall their names. It was with Creepy in 1964, Eerie in 1966 but, and for very obvious reasons now, Vampirella in 1969 (well I was only fifteen and semi-clad females, even fictional ones were part of my pubescent stirrings) was the other, the one for me as it were.

Looking back it is with a genuine fondness for Uncle Creepy and Cousin Eerie, the two characters, hosts even, who often fronted their respective comics, that remains. I liked the way those two sinister gents, much like something from ‘The Adam’s Family’ or ‘The Munsters,’ were the guys who welcomed you in to the macabre worlds they inhabited and of which we read with such enthusiasm.
 James Warren said this about Uncle Creepy and Cousin Eerie: “We launched Eerie because we thought Creepy ought to have an adversary. The Laurel and Hardy syndrome always appealed to me. Creepy and Eerie are like Boris Karloff and Peter Lorre.” Or perhaps Cane and Able?
The two comics were anthologies and, unlike Marvel or DC, always in black and white much like the many of the UK’s comics. I liked that gritty, grainy quality. It somehow seemed to fit the subject matter.
Vapirella fitted into my juvenile world like a soft, rubber doll. Not that we had things like that then and even if we did my mum would have killed me had I secreted one away under my bed. Vampy was sexy. At least I thought she was them but seeing a girl in her gym knickers had the desired effect at fifteen. Seeing her now, and with all due respects to her age, she is rather obvious; a little too tarty for my mature tastes. But boy did she do it back then

"Boy does the string cut up your ass!"
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Yes, there were other comic book publishers like Archie and Charlton but Warren, along with the big two, were my favourite of the American bunch. It was a sad day indeed when Warren went bust. Vampy is back, with a new publisher and a new deal no doubt, but the glory days have gone. I think I will go and dig my red G-string out of the attic. On second thoughts perhaps Iwon't. It does rather cut a chap in half if you know what I mean.



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all words and art are copyright © of Russell 'C.J' Duffy.

Saturday, 15 June 2013




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“I need nothing

I have everything I need


I lie upon the coffin


a doughnut in my hand” 
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Ivor Cutler
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all words and art are copyright © of Russell 'C.J' Duffy.

Thursday, 13 June 2013

Absurdist Wit or Absurdist Twit? - Postcard Absurdist Me





Perhaps I, unlike that other mammal the whale, am talking out of my blow hole. The term 'postcard absurdist' is surely a made up name?

By gad sir, you are right. It is. I know 'cos I made it up!

Well, what else could I do? When what you write is bloody daft then it stands to reason what it is called is bloody daft too - Postcard absurdist.

Of course absurdist writing is nothing new. Absurdist knitting is though. How many stand-up comedians do you know who can purl as they gibber?

There is a list as long as a Blue Whales willy of notable absurdists, Franz Kafka and Albert Camus to name but two - all a bit serious for my tastes. We have Carroll and Lear and Lennon and good old Spike of the Milligan. Of course it must be said that they were all more 'nonsense literature' than abusudist but the two forms are closely linked. There is also Ivor Cutler of whom I am very fond and of course Monty's mob the Python's.

The whole sub-genre seems related in many ways to Dada and Surrealism. There is the same sense of being 'dislocated' from reality or perhaps being an outsider looking in and seeing things from a different perspective.. It allows you the freedom to be wilfully silly whilst at the same time questioning, or perhaps illustrating is a better word, how absurd real life is.

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned the book of short stories I had been working on: Simian Simpering Private Detective and Surrealist Investigator (Dredging Silkworms and Ten Reversible Faces).  I had then written some 42,000 words - all of 'em daft, all of 'em silly. I have now finished the book. It is not a large tome weighing in at around 70,000 words but, it is all mine and very much part of the 'Fekenham Swarberry universe.' Now to find an editor and publisher; anyone of inclement weather, notwithstanding summer breezes with mild turbulence who is gifted in the English department and who knows adverb from absurd, punctuation from punctures will fit the bill nicely. The fact I am skint means payment either in kind or by tubes of Smarties; the choice is theirs. (I am a mighty fine luuver but the choice is yours)

This from 2008 (and without proper punctuation or capitals)...

the grumble of the razor blade humbled the fine growth. the shadow filed down to a suave stain. Ernest Piplove splattered some stale cologne onto his rash ravished face and grinned a toothless grin into his shaving mirror. behind him the egg yolk sun shot a reflected glare into the glass unsettling the cat that sat by the faucet. a humble day presented itself with undue fanfare and shine.
'i don't mind', said the geeky Ernie, 'i have my rum and raisins to break my fast and a pint of widows finger fer lunch'.
he swung his rusty leg into the awaiting pants and straddled his gussets like a milky thief. water cascaded down from the basin and onto the floor whereupon the cat lapped at the warm foam its face filling with a tarnished frill.
the noisome tang of industry smarted their eyes as the pair stepped out into the bright buckle shine day.
'oh foer a tram to take us toward the factory gate', said Ernie.
'feckle fit and flitch bick', said the cat for he had a bad limp and a vocal impediment the size of Belgium.
the trams rattled a confusion of the populace forth and back each and every day and today was no different being Monday.
after all.



Spike Milligan invented modern day British comedy. Without him there would have been no Monty Python's Flying Circus, no Fawlty Towers, no Blackadder, no Mighty Boosh, no Ab Fab of even Vicar or Dibley, certainly no me. We owe him everything but thankfully he's dead so doesn't need paying

King Milligan on sale here....


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all words and art are copyright © of Russell 'C.J' Duffy.To view my books on Amazon/Kindle go here: https://www.amazon.com/author/russellduffy -- For another side of CJ go here: sOMeThiNg For tHE wEeKeND, SiR?

Monday, 10 June 2013

Dumb and Dumber (Living With Mum 20)



When it comes to watching TV we all know the unwritten, unspoken rule. The remote is the property of, and therefore controlled by, the man of the house. It is one of those things where men still exert their fast fading territorial might over wife and family. It is after all only fair for what would a chap do when sport comes on? He has to have the zapper beside him, along with a six pack, so that he can switch channels at whim. No matter that everyone else wants to watch Doc Martin, he has to be able to have his football, rugby or cricket on or, in recent times, that other olde-English game, Baseball.
Yes, yes, yes we invented that too and American football. They are all ours they just get new names to dress them up a bit and the big girls blouses that play the game wear body armour. Real men? Huh! I don’t think so. Mister Bean is tougher.
Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, the remote. It is man’s province so bugger off girls and do not step into the demarcation zone.
Shame no one told my mum. She doesn’t seem to have grasped the fact that it should be me, not her, who makes the monumental decision which channel we are going to watch. But no, however frail she may have grown of late she still holds the remote in her matronly mitt in the way a Rottweiler grips a leg.
Progs are selected by Royal Decree and I, the peasant of the household, the serf to the queen must sit and watch obediently and with minimum of interruptions.
Of course having hold of the channel changer also means having power over the volume - I have spoken of this before so I shall not repeat myself. The new development is this. As ‘Stalin’ has dictated that the channel of choice is 10, that is the looped repeats of every damn detective series ever broadcast, this means that the ads are also repeated over and over and over. Mum doesn’t like many of those adverts.
“They make me upset,” she says pulling a face that could be due to constipation or perhaps is meant to invoke sympathy, “all those campaigns for cancer and heart attacks and dying children. They make me sad.” Her eyes grow large and doleful much like the cat out of Shrek.
So what does she do?
With thumb hovering over the mute button she presses it with gay abandon so what I get to hear is something like this…
“Children are...............there to …......stop….....Meer Kats …....’Oh yes!......For whiter…....Lillets.”

I would challenge her but I fear for life and limb. Perhaps I should borrow those guys body armour? 
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all words and art are copyright © of Russell 'C.J' Duffy.To view my books on Amazon/Kindle go here: https://www.amazon.com/author/russellduffy -- For another side of CJ go here: sOMeThiNg For tHE wEeKeND, SiR?

Saturday, 8 June 2013




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“How pleasant to know Mr Lear! Who has written such volumes of stuff!  Some think him ill-tempered and queer, But a few think him pleasant enough.”

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Edward Lear
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all words and art are copyright © of Russell 'C.J' Duffy.To view my books on Amazon/Kindle go here: https://www.amazon.com/author/russellduffy -- For another side of CJ go here: sOMeThiNg For tHE wEeKeND, SiR?


Thursday, 6 June 2013

Aliens On Planet Earth



They are here. They arrived a long, long while ago but have remained hidden for millennia, they come not from another planet, not from some far flung star system but from right here on earth.
The possibility of alien life forms, that is life existing on other planets is, I think, distinctly  probable. As I have said before, I do not think that aliens visited here in convenient UFO's at a time when America was waging a cold war with Russia. The USA was experimenting on technology stolen from Nazi Germany in an attempt to create new, awesome even, flying machines. There is nothing extraordinary about this fact. It has been established long ago that Germany had, still has in situ, an experimental launching area built specifically for a flying saucer type vehicle. The launchpad is still there, a little neglected perhaps, for all to see.
The modern sightings of UFO's is not a subject I want to talk about. I want to talk about the possibility, which has increased, by a huge amount following recent discoveries on this planet of ours, that life must surely be out there somewhere.
For life to exist there needs to be water. That much we know. We also know that for life as we understand it to thrive, animals that is, will need to breathe.
Right?
Wrong.
Below the surface of the earth, and I am talking miles not inches, are animals we didn't know existed until very recently. Like many discoveries they were found by accident.
It was down in the depths of South Africa's goldmines that these lifeforms were found. Demonic almost in their minuscule detail with whip like tails and voracious appetites. This was 2011. The discovery baffled most scientists for as far as we knew up until then, life needed nourishment and oxygen to survive. These creatures defied that belief.
Then the scientists went deeper.
Miles deeper.
Like something out of Jules Verne isolated ecosystems were found. Writhing worms and beetling bugs that only a short while ago we thought couldn't possibly survive down there but patently were and had been for millennia. 
It was back in the late eighties when the USA was burying sealed containers of radioactive waste beneath its nuclear processing plants that the American Department of Energy first grew concerned that microbes, if such existed at such depths, might eat through the cannisters. 
This seeming paranoia was given credence when following a sponsored borehole survey, which dug down to a depth of 500 meters below the earth's surface, bacteria and organisms were found.
The shock reverberated around the world of science.
Since then we have gone deeper..
Life has since been found living beneath the ocean in conditions once deemed impossible. Some of these animals are thought to be 86 million years old. This is incredible, mind boggling even. Here on planet earth is life we have never encountered before.
I know it sounds like science fiction and yes, I know I an laying it on a bit thick but these dicoveries really do highlight the increasing possibility of life on other planets. Not the silly green bipeds of the sort seen on the internet but real life, real bugs, microbes and goodness knows what else.
Exploration of Mars has not yet found signs of life upon its surface. Perhaps we need to dig deeper.


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all words and art are copyright © of Russell 'C.J' Duffy.To view my books on Amazon/Kindle go here: https://www.amazon.com/author/russellduffy -- For another side of CJ go here: sOMeThiNg For tHE wEeKeND, SiR?

Monday, 3 June 2013

Skid Mark Free Underpants (Living With Mum 19)



And so it came to pass that the good Lord begat Mothers and made them supreme heads of the familyunitandtribe and God gave them the gift of hindsight which only God knows why. The tribal elders accepted them and declared that all mothers held great power and that such great power deserved a seat and so the mothers sat on theirs. And after a while it became apparent through the wisdom of words which were inscribed on caves and tablets of stone and just there above the fireplace that mothers words were paramount and that no force on this planet, not even fathers after a pint or three, could forestall this wisdom. And so it was that these words were descaled as absolute wisdom. And verily life has ever been this way.

“Make sure you wear clean underpants in case you get run over by an ambulance.”

That is it; the sum total of mother’s wisdom passed down to me. Always make sure your underwear is clean. Not to ensure that my mind is pure or my soul virtuous but my Y-fronts are fresh. I have to say, as a point of clinging desperately to some sort of fashion chic, that I categorically do not wear Y-fronts. I was being ironic. I wear boxers, Not the drooling dribbling pug nose dog you understand that would be both gross and illegal but the (name dropping here) Calvin Klein type things that I used to take the piss out of granddad for wearing.


Like Mrs Bucket my mum is keen on keeping up appearances. So please remember the next time you see me; if I look a little slovenly, shabby even, perhaps a little unwashed and somewhat slightly dazed, then rest assured my underwear is pristine.
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all words and art are copyright © of Russell 'C.J' Duffy.To view my books on Amazon/Kindle go here: https://www.amazon.com/author/russellduffy -- For another side of CJ go here: sOMeThiNg For tHE wEeKeND, SiR?

Saturday, 1 June 2013

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"I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by."
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Douglas Adams
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all words and art are copyright © of Russell 'C.J' Duffy.To view my books on Amazon/Kindle go here: https://www.amazon.com/author/russellduffy -- For another side of CJ go here: sOMeThiNg For tHE wEeKeND, SiR?

Thursday, 30 May 2013

Music is My First Love and It Shall Be My Last - "Hallelujah" - Leonard Cohen - John Cale - Jeff Buckley

Without the use of words or images music has that ability to reach out, to touch and to move us in ways that seem, on the surface, almost as though some mystic force is in play; as though some magical, divine even, spirit has entered the melody, has driven the subtle rhythms like a stake through our hearts. 
We are nailed upon the crucifix of its creative wonder. All emotions rise up and are laid bare.
When the music is then joined with a matching set of words or lyrics that combine with melody to deliver a potent,holistic, mix of choral and melodic intent what is in itself wonderful becomes suddenly sublime.
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Beethoven's Ninth, an obvious choice perhaps, churns more that just male testosterone, all though Beethoven does have plenty of that male hormone pumping through his work. It is when we reach the final part, the fourth movement, the recitative, that emotions do not merely flood they hit like a musical tsunami. That final movement never fails to move me to tears. Of course it does contain Friedrich Schiller's poem 'Ode to Joy' which adds extra potency.
The ninth is not a song though even if it has words and voices within its composition. It is a piece that has been re-interpreted countless times. 
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Another piece, a song by The Who, "Won't get Fooled Again" has a similar effect. More juvenile male testosterone driven disenfranchisement I guess but again, emotional. That slow build of the synthesizers which form a fluid backdrop adding tension in preparation for the explosive power chords that punch with Superman force.  
To this day, whenever I play either Beethoven or The Who, I turn the volume up to maximum. You need to be able to enjoy the full weight of the quieter bits before the loud parts roar at you. You feel so many raw emotions fill your senses that sometimes it is all too much.
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The thing about a song, a good song that is, is how, when it is taken by an interpreter, another singer or musician, they discover within the same piece something that wasn't found in the original. This does not detract from the master, it rather enhances it. It is like looking at a perfect diamond. The more you turn the gem, revelling in its many faceted aspects, the more there is to see..
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William Blake's "Jerusalem" is a fine poem and when put to song, albeit hijacked inappropriately as a hymn by some Christians, a fine of example of words and music merging into one powerful brew. Whether the messiah landed here in Albion way back when is a moot point and certainly not the only raison d' etre of the poem. What is incredible is how the song, as it now is, changes with each interpretation yet forever remains the same.
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This song by Leonard Cohen , this almost hymn about a hymn, exemplifies how one song can sound the same whilst sounding forever different. That is the real beauty of music and of song. When taken extant then given another's viewpoint, another's take on how it might sound. That really is magic.


“Hallelujah.”


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all words and art are copyright © of Russell 'C.J' Duffy.To view my books on Amazon/Kindle go here: https://www.amazon.com/author/russellduffy -- For another side of CJ go here: sOMeThiNg For tHE wEeKeND, SiR?

Tuesday, 28 May 2013

Mutt, Jeff and Cousin Mal A Propism (Living with Mum 18)



Conversations with Mum sometimes are more surreal than seeing Dali in a Tutu baring chicken legs. Things said often go unheard or misinterpreted. Other things said seem often twisted as though accepted wisdoms have taken a hike across a swampy quagmire only to be sucked down into its boggy depths before being regurgitated  It is a strange choreography we dance. A disjointed ballet with knees bending, elbows jerking as we skirt issues, avoiding subjects that cause offence. History is taboo. When I enquire why I am told 'they' make it all up.  Obviously not the Bible then eh?  I am also told 'not to live in the past..'  The subject of the monarchy  of whom I am ambivalent about although I confess to rather liking the Queen, is a minefield best crossed wearing heavy body armour. Mention of Diana is greeted with stony face especially if I say I found her refreshing and that she was hugely popular. The silence is that of a Nun having been given a vibrator with batteries - just not the done thing.
Here are some of the odd exchanges we have had…

1.      Do you like the DVD Mum?” -  “No thanks son I'm full up.”

2.      “I have opened the blinds in the dining room so as to let air in but have left the windows closed so you don’t catch cold.”  - "Thanks?"

3.      “Why did God create dinosaurs, we never had the chance to eat them?”

4.      More tea Mum?” -  “Not since I saw her last week.”

5.      “Do animals enjoy sex?” – “I would think so.” – “I saw your cousin recently, she was looking really happy.”

6.      “So then son, what VD do you want for your birthday?”

7.      It is perishing cold out mum, my bits are freezing.” – “Put them in the fridge son so they won’t go off.”

8.      “I really must water the garden before it rains again.”

9.    "Sue from the butchers married somebody. She once was a policeman's wife. He went off with someone else. They had three daughters. It was disgusting. She inherited a lot of money."

10.  "Cup of tea son?" - "Yes, please." - "Son, do you want a cup of tea?" - "Yes please, Mum!" - "I SAID DO YOU WANT A CUP OF TEA SON?!" - "Oh, for fuck's sake. YES PLEASE MUM, THANKS!" - "I will thank you not to use that sort of language in my house!"

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all words and art are copyright © of Russell 'C.J' Duffy.To view my books on Amazon/Kindle go here: https://www.amazon.com/author/russellduffy -- For another side of CJ go here: sOMeThiNg For tHE wEeKeND, SiR?