Editorial: Camera Obscura - Punk As Folk

Never mind the mainstream; it's at the fringe that comics are likely to find a receptive market, and in that market, originality really counts. Alasdair Watson argues the case against cover versions.
23 May 2003

UNIT SHIFTER

Old punks don't die. Based on the available evidence, they simply swell, if the wall of huge bastards I saw at a gig recently is anything to go by.

I went to see Flogging Molly play the other night. It's the second time I've seen them, and they blew me away both times. But, in a marked improvement over the last time I saw them, the support act (the second one, at least - I missed the first) was worth seeing as well. The act in question are an outfit called Neck, and like Flogging Molly they play what's probably best described as Celtic-Punk (if only because the genre they put themselves in is apparently psycho-celidh, and nine out of ten people will look at you funny if you use a phrase like that in seriousness).

I am, as should be obvious, a fan of this sort of thing. I'm a sucker for a fiddle-and-guitars sound, me. But I have a yardstick I use when watching this sort of band - the number of songs like The Wild Rover, or Finnegan's Wake or any other traditional folk songs that they play is inversely proportional to the quality of the band. So I wasn't thrilled when Neck kicked off with 'Star Of The County Down'.

Mercifully, I think they did maybe two 'traditional' songs, and then got on with the rest of their set, which was strong enough that I went and bought their album after they finished.

Then Flogging Molly turned up. Crowd went wild, etc etc. It was, as I said, a fab gig. The only cover in their act is their closer - a rendition of Tom Jones' 'Delilah'.

Why am I telling you all this?

Well, this audience is one that comics shouldn't have a hard time reaching - the alternative crowd. It's not the same alt-crowd I recall from my sweaty-rock-club years - there's rather more colour, and fashion has moved beyond t-shirt and combats, thanks largely, I think, to the presence of actual women who don't entirely subscribe to rock-chick fashion (to the point where merchandise now includes spaghetti strap tops and skinny-fit t-shirts with band logos, something that was alien to this sort of band when I was younger), but it's certainly not any smaller.

A friend of mine is a professional drummer. One of his bands is a metal act (and before anyone jumps to conclusions, his other acts are reggae and jazz), and he observed that the rise of bands like Korn and Slipknot has been really good for the heavier acts too - the kids get into the softer versions, and then encounter the sort of stuff he does, which is to Korn what The Clash are to Busted, and are blown away by it. It's not that the kids don't dig the heavy stuff, just that they don't hear about it until they've been through the soft stuff.

This is the way many alternative acts grow their audience - they pick up people who liked the quasi-alt stuff on the edges of the mainstream, and from the look of things, it's working a treat for acts like Flogging Molly.

But to go back for a moment to my point about "traditional songs" - I don't think it's a co-incidence that Neck, with their cover versions of old favourites, weren't headlining on that gig. They're good, but they're not even close to what Flogging Molly do.

Do I need to map that on to comics for you, or can you follow it through yourself? Obviously, I'm not saying that they shouldn't be doing what they want with their music, and good luck to them, but it was Flogging Molly that packed the house out, and part of that is that the only material they use that's not their own is a bit of fun tacked on at the end, not the opening piece of their act.

And it's that kind of originality that allow them to pick up the fans from the edges of the mainstream, where bands like Neck might have a harder time, because lets be honest, the kind of person that likes to hear "The Wild Rover" done straight is not going to be at a punk gig, and the kind of person that likes down-the-line punk isn't going to go wild when you say things like, "They cover Irish folk songs" when describing a band.

(However, I'm not blind to the fact that the progenitors of this sort of music, acts like The Pogues, weren't shy about taking liberally from traditional folk songs, but then re-working them so much that you couldn't tell in a lot of places - the Vertigo of the Celtic Punk world, if you like.)

I don't think it's a co-incidence that if you're trying to get adults to look at comics, you give them things like TRANSMETROPOLITAN, or PREACHER rather than ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN - solid original material, rather than a cover version, however good the cover may be. And I don't think the spate of movies we're getting is going to change that much.

The inamorata was as happy as I was to go and see X2, but she's shown no interest in the NEW X-MEN trades on my shelf, while demanding to know when the next TRANSMET trade is due. Although, in all fairness, while she loves the film of THE CROW, I don't think she's looked at the TPB of that on my shelf, either.

EVERYTHING IS WEIRD

I saw THE MATRIX RELOADED last night and I have to say that it worked much better for me than X2 did.

While the concepts of the new MATRIX movie may not be any fresher or more original than those in X2, they're carried out with a bit more panache, as much as anything because it had a bigger budget, but also, I think, because it got away with a greater density of ideation.

This is, of course, the thing that people are always trumpeting as the selling point of comics, the constant barrage of lunatic notions piled on top of one another to create a dazzling world setting, but X2 confines itself mostly to the sort of things that worked in the first one, while THE MATRIX is clearly out to be louder, brasher and more lunatic with each instalment.

Not only that, but in terms of the subject matters they tackle, THE MATRIX feels like it has a wider (and perhaps less certain) scope - X2 sticks with a metaphor of discrimination and prejudce, while THE MATRIX RELOADED moves though a greater range of (linked) subjects, starting with teenage rebellion and moving through to examine relationships with authority and, ultimately, with God, bringing in elements of Gnosticism and a few interesting references to things like the Cathar Heresy.

I'm not suggesting that it did this in any more depth than the X-men did prejudice, but I just thought it was interesting that of the two big budget superhero movies I've seen this year, it was the one that wasn't based on a comic that left me with more to think about.

Or maybe it's just that I like THE INVISIBLES more than X-MEN.

ALL THE KIDS AGREE

As you read this, I'll be driving a car full of reprobates down to Bristol for Comics 2003, the UK's annual comic convention. I'm sure I'll see some of you there, for the usual drinking and more drinking, and obviously, for Hypotheticals, which has unfailingly been the best panel of the convention every year I've been.

If you've never been before, hit the link to see what you'll get. It's been a source of frustration to me that we couldn't put a transcript of the panel up on-line in previous years, because frankly, it's better than any interview or column is ever likely to be in providing an insight into the way this industry works. So, y'know, turn up.

Alasdair Watson is the author of the Eagle Award-nominated RUST.

Ninth Art endorses the principle of Ideological Freeware. The author permits distribution of this article by private individuals, on condition that the author and source of the article are clearly shown, no charge is made, and the whole article is reproduced intact, including this notice.