Retail in Review: Free Comic Book Day

Orbital Comics

Free Comic Book Day felt much more fun than Record Store Day. You got the impression that it was a celebration of something genuinely cherished by shop staff and comic book fans.

I went to Orbital Comics, which is right next to Leicester Square Tube station. There was a fairly short line where two staff members were dispensing free comics. Everyone could take 3 comics and the staff took their time to ask me what comics I normally read so I’d get sometime I’d enjoy. I also grabbed another bunch of free comics from Forbidden Planet, which is this big comics/merchandise megastore that is based a short walk away from Orbital. I recorded a few interviews at Orbital and made an audio package for Roundhouse Radio:



There was quite a broad range of comics on offer. Most of these were compilations of previews to various series, some were first issues introductions and others were one off specials for the day. Fortunately a lot of these comics have now been made available online: http://www.bleedingcool.com/2013/05/06/free-comics-if-you-missed-free-comic-book-day-damsels-grimm-killjoys-star-wars-aspen-aphrodite-xi-steam-engines-of-oz-molly-danger-and-more/

Grabbing the free comics

The Walking Dead comic (an on-going series about a group of survivors in a zombie apocalypse) was a particularly interesting. It appeared to be specially crafted for the fans of the series, giving snippets of insight into the back-story of the main characters and even had an allusion to the joy of comics. You can read it here: http://imgur.com/a/K57Ah

Fun loving costumed fans at Orbital Comics!

There was the usually comic crowd (adolescent men with skin-problems), but there were a fair amount of parents with their kids. In fact a lot of the comic books on offer were for kids, so the day had a lively family feel.

Free Comic Book Day came across as a celebration of the medium, as opposed to being a day to celebrate a system of commence. There’s certainly an air of glee in the air, since as opposed to being charged for something at an inflated price, the comics are given away. It felt like a day out in Orbital Comics, since there was a stall selling cakes, fans dressed up in costumes and staff who were really keen to have long talks about comics.

My horde of free comics!

The difference is that Record Store Day isn’t about promoting music (since virtually everyone loves music anyway) while Free Comic Book Day was an occasion for people to share something that they were truly enthusiastic about – which certainly made it a lot more fun and heartfelt.

Retail in Review: Record Store Day

Record Store Day was on the 20^th April, which followed two weeks later by Free Comic Book Day. I checked both of these days out. Both were nice. However, Comic Book Day felt less like a commercial affair, coming across as more genuine than the frantic scramble for records I experienced in late April.

Record Store Day champions the world’s independent record shops, battling against the likes of Soundcloud, Itunes, Amazon and the rest of the 21^st century. The day is normally accompanied by limited edition singles being released on the day and in-store performances.

I heard that my favourite surf-pop band, ‘Best Coast’, was releasing a limited edition 7 inch vinyl single. Since I was in town on the day I thought I’d swing by Sister Ray Records.

What I did like was Record Day was that it gave a festival feel to London’s Soho, since there was stage erected on Berwick Street, which had assortment of bands playing to entertain the crowds.

 What I did not like was the mega queue I faced when I got to Sister Ray Records. The queue was so people could get their hands on the all the limited edition singles. It’s apparently become a normal part of the day for people to begin queuing in the early hours of the morning.

We were passed a list of the records the shop still had while in line (which snaked on for another 10 minutes once through the doors), so we could request the record we were after the second we got to the counter. It made everything feel rather commoditised. It wasn’t a day when people had the record shop experience of listening to new records, browsing through unfamiliar albums and having pleasantly inane chats with staff. Instead it comes across as a day for record aficionados to revel in their niche tastes.

 It’s not really for kids or people with a passing interest in music, since the limited release 7 inch records are extremely expensive – I spent £7 on Best Coast’s ‘Fear of My Identity’ single. Incidentally, the single was fantastic and it did feel nice to get something that felt exclusive. 

However, it seemed to be something for record shops to make more money out of the kind of people that come to such shops anyway, something to make up for their dwindling sales throughout the year. What it didn’t do was bring across why people should buy something in a shop as opposed to getting it cheaper online. 

Review of the Knife at the Roundhouse

The mildly bonkers Swedish sibling duo known as the Knife performed last week at the Roundhouse. The show ended up becoming one of the most controversial gigs of the year, dividing critics and fans.

Me and my friend Mainga expected a standard concert (opening with a few tracks from the new album, some of their hits sprinkled in and with some fan favourites for the encore), though we got something very different. The audio clip is our immediate reaction after leaving the Roundhouse.

They opened with “A Cherry on Top”, a song from their new album. It was a misty dry-ice set with Olef and Karin (the Knife) plus about seven people dressed in druid cloaks (Sorkklubben). Looking back on it, the whole thing was very Spinal Tap. 

It took me a while to realise that the giant oversized toy-like looking instruments they played (a large paper mache harp and a 12 foot slide-guitar among others) weren't actually real. They were in fact props. 

After first track, they lost the druid cloaks to reveal simmering jumpsuits. They dropped the fake instruments, instead proceeding to dance and mime to a backing track. All pretence of a musical performance was dropped as various members of the dance troupe took turns in miming the songs. There were remarks that it was a “hipster Pan’s People” and “Riverdancing in sparkly jumpsuits”, which are descriptions that I can’t entirely disagree with. In many ways it stopped being a concert and instead became a stage musical that featured songs by the Knife. 

Two things made it worthwhile. First, the on stage visuals were mostly interesting and inventive – an amazing piece which stood out was a performance of ‘Got 2 Let U’, where a video of Karin in a fake beard mouthing to the song was projected the alongside a lip-synching male dancer (err… you sort of had to be there).

Secondly, it was a performance with a cheeky point. It was a deliberate challenge to what an audience would accept as a band performance. It questioned the connection between the visual performance and the music that was played. It gradually pushed the acceptability of what a band could get away with; first with the band not playing instruments, then by them not singing and then by everyone leaving the stage at one point to allow ‘Full of Fire’ to play in its near entirety accompanied only by a techno-rave light show. 

There was a delightful shock factor at the sheer audacity of essentially playing a CD for fans who expected a standard concert. Though, it made me wonder if it was substantially different from using a sequencer or DJ-set. It made the audience contemplate how they wanted to have the music reproduced. It is clear that no fans wanted to see the Knife because of Karin and Olef’s dance moves. Given that the majority of the performance was carried out by the Sorkklubben dancers, the night could have been substantively the same if Karin and Olef didn’t turn up.

It was food for thought… but in many ways that is not why I wanted to see The Knife (I was looking forward to busting a move to a bass-heavy rendition of We Share Our Mother’s Health, with Karin singing at a mic and Olef looking moody behind a sampler). I saw a previous live performance in youtube of 'Heartbeats' and something along these lines would have been more welcome.

The Knife's performance at the Roundhouse was more interesting than it was entertaining. I’ll certainly be pondering about this gig for a while to come… but frankly I was happiest at the end, when Karin sang a reworked ‘Silent Shout’ to a dazzling light show. Simple, live and melodic.