Returned to Scotland’s autumnal sunsmear from our whistle stop Luda promo tour of sweltering hot New York and Los Angeles to momentarily inherit the Royal ‘we’ as a personal tribute to our queer old dean.
Thanks to everyone who came to the live events at Barnes and Noble in New York and at the Glorya Kaufmann Theatre in LA – sorry we couldn’t meet everyone in person as is customary and preferred but Covid restrictions aimed at getting us through the short tour without contamination meant that no contact was permitted.
Thanks for coming along anyway. Your presence was appreciated! Hope you enjoyed it, and thanks especially to those of you who left gifts and comics.
(at the end, someone handed over a slabbed copy of Animal Man #26 to autograph, even though it was explained there was to be no signing – swept away by minders, that left Yours Truly clutching what can only be assumed to be someone’s prized collector’s item. If this person was you, or anyone you know, please get in touch here and we’ll make sure you get your signed copy returned!)
Thanks also to the fabulous Seth Meyers for inviting us once again to baffle his audience with barbarously accented yawps!
To make only a couple of observations as we leave Luda behind and move onto the next big thing would be to note in passing how two separate reviewers took issue with narrator Luci LaBang’s alleged erudition, writing that her stated background in the novel rendered her cultural literacy implausible, and that her author was simply hijacking the character’s voice to pimp and parade their own book learnins!
Amusingly enough for the purveyors of class prejudice, Luci LaBang’s background is of a piece with her author’s; GM left school aged 18 and didn’t go on to university or further education. We just happen to read a lot, exactly like the character in the novel!
We also felt bad for another reviewer who liked the book but was upset by the kitten scene at the end; ours was a similar visceral response to the mouse sequence at the conclusion of Scarlett Thomas’ The End of Mr. Y so accept these sympathies. The whole episode with the kitten, including the more hopeful coda to the story, happened for real, almost as described sadly, in June 2021 as the book was in its final stages and it fit so neatly into the theme of playing God and losing, it felt necessary to include it, if only to memorialize the lost little ‘Blossom’. If it’s any consolation, the book is dedicated to Max, the kitten of the pair who lived!
And to those exhausted readers who balked at ‘too many words’, asking why, oh, why the author felt the need to use ten when they could easily have used three, a partial explanation; why would anyone choose to dress in colorful flamboyant clothes, high heels and make up when there are perfectly functional boiler suits and clogs to wear?
In other news, starting today, we’re celebrating the 10th anniversary of MorrisonCon in Las Vegas, with a bumper week of ‘content’ here at Xanaduum!
GALLERY artefact #025
Morrisoncon poster by Chris Burnham
That’s right! It’s not so much hard to believe but almost painful to believe it’s been ten tilt-a-whirl years since MorrisonCon in Las Vegas!
Ten years during which the Mayan apocalypse of 2012 arrived as promised, then proceeded way more slowly than anyone dared predict!
Who among us ever imagined the end of the world would be a swift and tidy affair?
Instead, we are reminded that doomsday doesn’t just happen overnight!
MorrisonCon was a one-off ‘happening’ occurring on the weekend of 28th – 30th September in the bizarre simulated world of the Hard Rock Café, Las Vegas. MorrisonCon organizers and friends, Ignition Sequence out of San Francisco, asked to use the GM name and pic as a way of drawing attention to the event and personifying the convention’s more ‘alternative’ intimate approach to staging and programming.
The event gathered a galaxy of comic book, film and TV creators along with readers and enthusiasts from all over the USA and the world. Friendships were forged, relationships blossomed, plans were hatched, tattoos were recklessly inked and the social boundaries between ‘creators’ and ‘fans’ that typify so many pop culture conventions were both discouraged and dissolved.
Everybody had a good time! Everybody saw the sunshine!
Contrary to howls of indignation and spite from sections of the comics internet who accused the whole endeavor, and Your Humble Narrator in particular, of encouraging sickening cult devotion and forcing mind-controlled Kool-Aid bedizened dupes to shell out 800 dollars for the dodgy privilege of kissing the brazen ass, worshipping at the purple altar, lining the wizard’s sleeve, or whatever from a concise menu of anal/genital metaphors the critics had on offer that week, Kristan and me took part for free, on the understanding Ignition Sequence booked us a nice room for the duration. We did not share in any profits and there was a distinct lack of any Golden Calf supplication as it happened!
I remember instead a fabulous, neon-lit and shimmeringly drawn out delight of endless conversation and music, with a vodka in my hand from morning until night, for that all-day Zen drunk where there’s no hangover and you never get truly wasted either like it’s all some Big Rock Candy Mountain dream of endless consequenceless hedonism!
Fragmentary mementoes of that magical weekend, that fixed, unrepeatable point in time and space, will henceforth be showing up here all week!
Feel free to join in with any memories you may have left, if you can count yourself among the delirious throng who were there!
In addition to the free-for-all, and in lieu of MorrisonCon’s rambunctious panels and discussions, we’re concurrently conducting the biggest Salon event yet for our paid subscribers so don’t let me dissuade you from joining their shining ranks!
Roger and out…
MorrisonCon was literally life-changing for me. I went by myself and had to rely on social skills I didn’t know I had. A conversation with another attendee got me to quit smoking after almost a decade. Showing my sketchbook to other artists and getting good feedback was what motivated me to quit my job and go back to school and study art/graphic design. MorrisonCon lead to my first publish comic art.
These days I don’t drink or smoke, I’m a graphic designer, and I self-publish my own comics. I don’t think I would be where I am were it not for that dizzying weekend in Vegas.
Best of all, I have small scar under my chin I got while leaving the club having danced the night away with strangers.
Morrison Con was one of the important weekends of my life. I have worked with and kept in touch with some of the most amazing people. Thank you!