The very best part of this page? Line three of panel one is completely true, even now. Fourteen years later. I think. Jim was still at Eide’s the last time I was there, anyway. If you’re a Burgher, try this out – write down the bands listed in panel one, or the record label, go to Eide’s and ask Jim for either what’s in stock or to order you some.
The bands listed in the second panel are {almost} entirely fictional. While PISSPOWERASSCHRIST music exists, it all sucks* and was for-real produced in the mid aughts. For story purposes all production has been retconned to a men’s bathroom in Belgium, circa 1993. Foreplay Unit, PPAC, Kosher Pork and Fishbomb are all represented in Whitehouse’s living room, though no music or backstory exists for the other bands.
PISSPOWERASSCHRIST has a backronym. The one xeno came up with awhile back is Pretty Intense Sonic Sounds, Personally Offensive With Egregious Rhythm And Some Special Cocks Happily Raping In Syncopated Time. It’s a bit of a mouthful (hurrr), but PISSPOWERASSCHRIST is rather a lot of letters. Try using it the next time you play Scrabble.
I got lucky with camera angles for the first panel and both panels of the previous page – no vehicles removed, just minor stenciling to cover up what little was there. For one in the afternoon on a weekday, the Smithfield Street Bridge was surprisingly sparse. The shot for the first panel of this page was fired off during the two seconds of the day in which the Smithfield/Carson intersection isn’t a river of traffic – the only real “post” adjustment was switching the traffic lights from green to red. Script-wise, I axed what was originally going to be the third of five panels. To cut a long story short, a four panel layout wound up being a much more effective use of the space!
The last panel is the first direct foreshadowing of the whammy this scene is working towards, and the second panel contains a brief reference to a project I really need to get back to. I stalled out on my end of Ouija Bordello a couple of months ago, thanks largely to work pressures and a period of frequent and extreme hangovers that eventually culminated in my over-a-month-already sobriety. I do intend to get back to it at some point, hopefully sooner rather than later – I’m currently out of commission work, the comic is flowing smoothly, and dropping bars off my short list of places I hang out in has left me with a good amount of “free” time. Time I’ve been splitting between ATC and video games. I’ll admit, a friend of Ben’s stridently steering him away from the direction he’d originally intended to go with the project did a lot to hip-check it into my “later” bin. And hey, it is later. Isn’t it?
Oh, and! This is the halfway point for the chapter – which means it’s the halfway point for the book! Not for page count – the halfway on that is (hopefully) a few pages back.
Woot!
* Almost all of it, anyway. There are enough tracks that don't to fill a comp CD. Which I did. I gave out a few to friends at The Upstage at the height of the band's non-existent popularity.
Mastering notes, 2016.12.05 – Removed the decal from Jesse’s shirt. Rewrote just about all of panel two, removed a pointed reference to a cancelled side project, removed a bunch of silly-sounding fake band names, and added a bunch of awesome-sounding real band names.
