Insert Uranus Jokes at the Nearest Sword or Sandal...

This friendly looking fella was one of the strange Atlantean guardsmen in Hercules and the Captive Women (1961, aka. Hercules Conquers Atlantis).  I have a soft spot for peplum, the sword and sandal epics of Greek or Roman times or mythology.  While they'll never replace my beloved spaghetti westerns as my top Italian genre films, they're cheesy, goofy good times are almost always good for a laugh.

8...9...10...10 Victims!

A silly quicky of Marcello Mastroianni from the sci-fi satire, The 10th Victim (1965).  (I'd tell you what the image is from...but it's sort of a major spoiler...)

He Who Got the Most Moneymakers Shaking...

Blues Legend Elmore James was perhaps most famous for his extreme technical ability on the guitar and his employment of a slide, earning him the nickname King of the Slide Guitar.  "Shake Your Moneymaker" is probably one of James' most swell known tunes, and his stirring sound and shouted vocals still pack a heckuva wallop.

"Way Down in the Hole..."

Thomas Alan "Tom" Waits, one of the most distinctive singer-songwriters in sound and presence, probably requires little by way of explanation on my part.  Though I was first exposed to Tom's music through his soundtrack work for Jim Jarmusch, it was the early, melancholy satire of his piano blues number "The Piano Has Been Drinking" that sent me on a dive through his catalogue.  While his gravelly growl of a voice might have some of the acquired taste of a strong Scotch, if you've not heard his stuff, you owe it to yourself as a music lover to taste a bit of a true original.

"So You Go Your Way, Wild One/I'll Try and Follow..."

Charismatic frontman for Irish rock band, Thin Lizzy, Phil Lynott seemed to have an interesting mix between a sweet shyness in interviews, and the definite strut and swagger of the rocker on stage. Phil, unfortunately, passed away too young and the rock world lost yet another diamond in the rough.

Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)

Sylvester "Sly Stone" Stewart, singer/songwriter and creator of the great genre-fusing wall of sound and energy known as Sly and the Family Stone.

Tipitina Tipitina...

Henry Roeland Byrd, better known as Professor Longhair or simply Fess, was a New Orleans singer and pianist. Fess taught himself to play on a piano with missing keys. A long career of ups an downs, or popularity and rediscovery came to an end in 1980. His tunes and distinctive playing style are well worth a listen.

One of Us Put a Spell on You...

Maker of perhaps one of the most famously covered songs, Jalacy "Screamin' Jay" Hawkins was definitely in a category all by himself. The wild on-stage theatrics came after the drunken recording session that gave us the wild, concussive recording of "I Put a Spell On You". A fascinating icon, Screamin' Jay is well worth catching in his on-screen performances in Jim jarmusch's Mystery Train and Alex de la Iglesia's Perdita Durango.

Flash Lightnin'

This quick portrait of Texas bluesman Lightnin' Hopkins sets off what was to be a series of musicians. As it was first, it's not my favorite of the bunch. I think I may revisit Hopkins...if only because he had the coolest glasses I've ever seen...not to mention that I don't think I've heard a guitar sound so mournful as his.

99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall...

With some free time on a night out, I began to draw my environs...and got carried away...

Cocteau Cocktail

While sitting in a booth in a pub, I'm afraid that I became quite enamored with the fixture holding the globe light that illuminated our table. The small hand jutting out from the fixture reminded me of the living fixtures that lined the walls of Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast...only, the smaller size of this tiny fist gave an even more fairy tale air to it. My rendering, however, due entirely to the shadows that fell across it, looks more like the fist of some mad scientist from some other world, as drawn by Jack Kirby.

Your Vice Is a Locked Room...

Maybe it was the wild clothes...maybe it was the 2 foot long fake lashes...maybe it's just that golden nostalgia of the past...but they don't seem to make them like they used to. I won't say that they don't make them like they used to, after all, with nearly 9 billion people and 51% of those being woment, they're still making plenty and some are bound to be like they used to. In any event, today's quickie was inspired by Euro-bombshell Edwige Fenech. She starred in everything from titles like the The Case of the Bloody Iris to Ubalda, All Naked and Warm. I shan't have to elaborate I don't believe. I know I need to simplify my liine more to give it that Enrique Badia Romero-era Modesty Blaise look, but you can't say it doesn't look like I had a little fun.

A Bit More Marble on Monday...

As I was using several different sketchbooks at the time, some of these got out of order I believe...In any event, here's another rendering of a figure formerly formed in marble.

"It's the Wood that Should Fear Your Hand..."

Martial Arts film legend Gordon Liu (star of the great 36th Chamber of Shaolin) made Pai Mei something of a home name following QT's Kill Bill. I think many of us who grew up on afternoon Kung Fu Cinemas on some UHF channel (ask your parents, kids) just thought of him as the bad buy with the long, wispy eyebrows and mustache. However, Pai Mei was based on historical figure 白眉 or Bái Méi (which literally means "white eyebrows"), one of the legendary Five Elders who survived the destruction of the Shaolin temple by the Qing Dynasty. Folklore as well as film history has often treated him as the traitor who helped Imperial forces to destroy the temple, which is often why he is depicted as a villian. But conflicting historical accounts depict him as anywhere from having betrayed the monks to try and save them to having become defeatist against overwhelming odds. (Also, according to some foklore, Bái Méi was the killer of martial arts legend Fong Sai Yuk.)

El Hombre Lobo...

I had heard mention over the years of the films Paul Naschy (née Jacinto Molina Alvarez) whose most famous creation was the werewolf, Waldemar Daninsky. It was only within the age of DVD that I finally managed to see a few of them. Yes, they're a little stiff. Yes, the make-up effects are sometimes laughable. But they're trashy and fun, and have a dire earnestness about them that has understandably made them cult favorites amongst Euro-trash cinephiles. This sketch was from a still I grabbed from one of Naschy's non-werewolf numbers, El Caminante (1979), in which Naschy plays the devil who's taken human form to wreak a little havoc on the Middle Ages.

A Spooky Little Girl LIke You...

I've been told this image is creepy...oh hell...I think I agree. Incidentally, my friends Jason Shawn Alexander and Chris Taylor have a fun tale of terror in Dark Horse Comics' CREEPY #6. Very well worth a look, kids.

Not Common People...

My subjects for these quickie sketches are often jut images I see during the day or something someone randomly mentions over an email. I don't remember what chain of non-sequiturs led me to draw Jarvis Cocker of Pulp, but I did it just the same. Admittedly, this wooly version of Jarvis lands somewhere closer to Eric Clapton due to my lack of specific rendering, but I swear that's who I was looking at at the time.

"For a time I was delighted with bomb throwing..."

Manfred von Richthofen has remained one of the most romantic figures ever produced by war. Even those who think him one of the great villains of World War I still tend to regard him with an obvious respect. Credited with 80 aerial combat wins in the war, Richthofen still managed to make a controlled landing despite severe damage to his heart and lungs when he was finally shot down. Since his death, books and movie depictions or references to him continue to keep his or his plane's image in the popular consciousness. In any event, I took a long moment to produce this study of The Red Baron, another figure of what seems like a truly bygone era.

Far More Fearsome by Far...

I recently stumbled across a group of photos from World War I. It was primarily nobility farting around pretending to lead troops without getting too dirty...certainly far from jumping in a trench filled with mustard gas bayonet first. Still, this little number was based on actual uniform I saw, and not some retouched modern steampunk job either. This woman had the Jolly Roger embroidered into her funny fur hat...and some weird part of me found it far sexier that most of what passes for fashion these days (insert hearty chuckle here). Ah well, time continues to slip into the ever more moderated and modulated future.

**INSERT KUNG FU NOISE HERE**

I have no idea what I was doing here...I mean, apart from slinging ink to create some sort of dynamic and loose Bruce Lee throwdown. I referenced an image from some Bruceploitation flick...and yet, it ended up looking more like Bruce than the guy on the lobby card. It's also, oddly enough, the closest I've ever come to looking remotely like Bill Sienkiewicz's slung ink style.

Vroom with a capital "V"...

...only with while wearing jodhpurs. That's what's in this season, ladies.

"...also known as the Rat."

For fun, for Fathers' Day, I went back and did a little revision on my portrait of Eli Wallach as Tuco from The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly.

Marble in Ink...

Is it Friday...already?

Everyone like beautiful ladies right?

Haven't Lost ALL My Marbles...

Call Me...

For some reason, two episodes of the Muppet Show always stuck in my mind from my youth. One was Alice Cooper, and his rendition of School's Out with all the giant monster muppets. The other was Debbie Harry...especially her performance of One Way or Another. I might have been more than just a little bit smitten at the time. Of course, had I been a little more on the ball, I would've gotten this up for her Birthday on the 1st.

A Very Different Gian Maria...

Took in an old Italian comedy about medieval times and was surprised to find Gian Maria Volonté in comedic role. So, for a fun quickie, I gave him a sketch...

Lines, Lines, Lines

When I first started seriously taking a shine to drawing as a far more wee lad, I was attracted to hatching for some unknown reason. Then, I stopped drawing for a while in college, and when I returned to it, I had abandoned hatching all together. I'm not sure what brought it back, but now much of my work seems to be a study in angularity...an attempt to make or depict curves in a barrage of straight lines.

Danger!

A sort of clunky, sharp lined experiment of Austrian bombshell Marisa Mell. It sort of takes away from her full-lipped beauty...but sort of still works for me for some reason.

The Summer Wind...

It seems as though the June Gloom has finally blown away. Mayhap it is time to hit the beach...

Wednesday in the Boudoir Revisited...

Shootin' Marbles

I Maniaci (1964)

In cult and exploitation cinematic circles, Lucio Fulci will perhaps always be identified with bizarre horror titles (If you've ever wanted to see a zombie fight a shark, may I recommend his 1979 effort Zombie). In the stream of 60's and 70's genre cinema that's often parading before my eyes and in my brain, I've found that I enjoy Fulci's earlier comedic efforts more. The man was a gifted director for farce...which doesn't explain the often farcical leaps in logic that his horror titles usually contain. Anyhow, this quickie sketch was grabbed from a still from his 1964 collection of comic sketches, I Maniaci.

Sex and Fury...

A few posts back, I put up a quickie I had done of Meiko Kaji, and said I might revisit that territory. Well, I sort of did. Reiko Ike was one of Toei studios top stars for 'pinky violence' films in the 70's (if you don't know what they are, I shan't embarrass your delicate sensibilities). Her 1973 effort, Sex and Fury, featured a fair quantity of both and also starred Sweden's Christina Lindberg (star of exploitation classic Thriller: A Cruel Picture...which I also won't bother to explain...if you look it up, you're on your own). Anyhow, if you've ever been curious what a topless woman would look like sword-fighting....look no further. Amazing that it came along years before the internet...

Mood Lighting...

Still June...Still gloom...

June Gloom...

...deserves a touch of the girls of summer...

A Moment of Quiet Contemplation...

Diaphonous...

A word that neither you nor I use often enough.

Wednesday in the Boudoir...

At this point, all I need is an ascot and some Prohibition Bath Tub Gin, and we're ready to go.

Still in the Gardens...

Last Year at Nymphenburg...

The Bavarian Nymphenburg Palace in Munich features expansive gardens which features a variety of classically inspired sculptures. Now, the one this li'l quickie was inspired by was labelled as Pluto, but the trident he carried said Neptune to me (other images of it I found also labelled it as Neptune). Oh internet, you occasionally possibly mis-leading scamp you. As a side note, the palace and gardens were featured in Alain Resnais' surreal masterpiece, Last Year at Marienbad.

What's Cabfare to the Elysian Fields...?

A return to my statue drawing shenanigans. The Lord of the Underworld isn't often depicted when compared to his more sunny or sea-going brethren. The story of his abduction of the fair Prosperina seems to be the most frequently rendered. This one, once again, was inspired by the simple direct statue carved out by the great Canova.

The Galveston Giant...

If you're not familiar with boxer Jack Johnson, the first black heavyweight boxing champion, may I take a moment and recommend you go look him up. Even if you don't care for the sport and are somehow immune to interest in civil rights struggles, I'm sure Jack's larger-than-life style of living will be more than enough to keep you interested. The white boxing community threw anything it could at the "Galveston Giant" (I'm not sure that it's merely coincidental that Jack was from Texas) trying to take the title away from him, but Jack held onto it until 1915. It would be 20 years before another black boxer, Joe Louis, would be allowed to compete for it. By then, times had changed, and Louis' reign as champ was heralded by many and even used as anti-Nazi propaganda. In any event, I had fun drawing the big, smug galoot.

The Many B-List Sartanas...

Many spaghetti westerns had their titles and dialogue re-dubbed to turn their heroes into so many Djangos and Sartanas. This quickie was from a screen-grab I made from the '71 entry Django Defies Sartana, which was perhaps the weakest title of the knock-offs though a slightly better movie than many of them. There's simply no beating One Damned Day at Dawn...Django meets Sartana for title umph. Much like there's no beating Gianni Garko, the original and best Sartana. Perhaps I should be drawing him instead...

"Forget Everything Except Vengeance!"

Another "exploitation" quickie based loosely on Lady Snowblood star Meiko Kaji, one of the queens of lurid, blood-spattered Japanese cinema in the 70's. This one's a little rough. I didn't quite capture her the way I wanted, but I was still happy with the lines to an extent. I might have to give her another go...rarely has feral intensity looked so sexy...

Exploitation...Armed to the Teeth

This was a quickie of Maurizio Merli, star of many an Italian thrillride. I first saw Maurizio in the spaghetti western Mannaja (aka. A Man Called Blade). Despite the general power and prowess of a great 70's stache, he died young at the age of 49. My desire for Euro-Exploitation flicks, however, lives on.

The New $13 Bill...

Recreating the interwoven curved hatching that is oft featured on paper money and stock certificates is not easy...but, it can be fun...especially with a subject not traditionally depicted in such a way.

Frivolity...

"People With Ropes Around Their Necks Don't Always Hang..."

Ok, I had to slip in one more Lee. This was meant to a stylized portrait quickie of Van Cleef as Setenza, the aptly labeled Bad.

"When You Have to Shoot, Shoot, Don't Talk..."

It's been said that Clint Eastwood broke off his working relationship with Sergio Leone when he realized that the stories were steadily moving away from him. In many ways, it can truly be said that The Good, The Bad and The Ugly belongs to the Ugly, Tuco (Eli Wallach). In many respects he's the only human character in the film, and I think, one of the best characters in cinema history. The Good is an almost ethereal angelic figure who pops in and out, and The Bad is an almost purely demonic presence. Tuco, on the other hand, is grimy and gritty, and though thoroughly despicable, one can't help but root for him. I narrowly missed getting to meet Eli when Walter Hill tried to cast him in Undisputed, but at 87 years of age, Eli was in the midst of working a Broadway play.