PAUL WELLER ,THE MODFATHER MIGHT HAVE A SILLY HAIRCUT, BUT AT LEAST HE'S STILL GOT A HAIRCUT!....

To many PAUL WELLER  will always have a god-like status because of his fronting of the great old band THE JAM....With their dark suits and yanked loose ties and aggressive guitars and drums as well as the sneering cockney lyrics ,they were a great band and for a few years were very successful....PAUL WELLER was the main man in the trio, they all had silly spikey haircuts and for somebody pushing the mod ethos, smart and stylish ,it seemed funny that they had these funny 'Barnets' as they say 'darn sarf!'(down south!)....Mods were very particular about their cloths and haircuts. Weller broke THE JAM up and formed a more poppy musical band called 'THE STYLE COUNCIL'....I thought they were pretty shit so called them 'THE STOOL COUNCIL!'...Pretty witty, eh?..No, ok please yerself!...Weller may have embraced style ,but still had that silly haircut. When THE STOOL COUNCIL had folded or flushed away  Weller went his own way and years later he's still banging out classy rock and a variety of musical sounds . A very clever bloke, with a silly haircut, maybe ,but what pisses most people off is the fact that at his age he's still got the silly haircut ,silvery grey maybe ,but a full head of silly hair which is more than most of us do ...The bastard!

WE DONT WANT GORGEOUS PEOPLE ON OUR TELLY DOCUMENTARIES ,WE'RE BRITISH ..WE WANT FAT,OLD,SCRUFFY,HALF BLIND PATRICK MOORE!!!

                                                                               I quite like watching documentaries on the telly on a variety of subjects, i like history , mainly military and sporting history ,funnily enough i dont have a lot of time for current sport ,but love watching old boxing ,old motor racing and old Liverpool games ,we used to win them in the old days, except for one i watched last night ...LIVERPOOL V AJAX from 1966....LIVERPOOL  got battered over the two legs ,something like 7-2. I was also watching JACK DEMPSEY ,JACK JOHNSON(FROM 1909, ...With one fight and you could see WYATT EARP refereeing,amazin' stuff0...rocky marciano, joe louis ,etc ,all great fights i could watch all the old stuff forever ,much to the disgust of my beloved wife ,THE LOVELY LYNNE  ."Whats the point"?...They show the motor racing from the 60's and 70's and the great drivers and amazing crashes. I also enjoy the military histories ,mainly 2nd world war ,but am branching out to the first and the NAPOLEONIC time thanks to the old SHARPE series . But i love space science programmes.

I've always been space mad....GERRY ANDERSON kickstarted me off with FIREBALL XL5....The comic TV21 with wonderful artwork was all the rockets and DALEKS and space....Then APOLLO 8 went round the back of the moon....WOW!....Then APOLLO11 ,etc.....I was blown away by the last APOLLO 17 as they travelled over mountains and valleys for days the sights must have been astounding. Then i was blown away by VIKING landing on MARS and that famous picture still to this day captivates me...."MY GOD ,THATS THE SURFACE OF MARS!"....I want it as wall paper in the living room ,you'd have a martian panoramic vista around the room of the surface , except for the heating radiator ,the telly and the odd cupboard ,i wouldnt mind ,but THE LOVELY LYNNE doesnt seem as keen.

Then the VOYAGER pictures of the outer planets and moons ,totally mind blowing ,they look a little old these days, but at the tme ,MY GOD!....The planets are all HD now and are amazing. I still look at a surface pictures and am unashamedly and totally stunned n flabbergasted...."My god that is Saturn ,or thats Europa ,etc..."....The documentaries are mainly computer generated images of the wonders of the universe ,which are fairly impressive and nessesary because in most cases its the only ways of showing so much. But stuff like the MARS ROVERS photographs ,as far as i'm concerned should be shown daily on prime time telly as should the CASSINI mission to SATURN...Etc, The documentaries, though they are visually very impressive are very irritating..whereas once upon a time a narrator would talk through whatever....Now we have these bright smiley young bushy tailed American scientists telling us how...."LIKE TOTALLY AWESOME...COOL...FUN ..GEE..WOW...FUN...ETC,ETC....."And listening to these 'whizz kids' buzzing away ,gets on my f**ki' tits and  drives me up the wall....Why cant they get one of the main scientists who designed and built or flew missions or whatever and let him give us a straight explanation and the benefit of his experiance and knowledge?....We're British and we dont have 'Dudes spouting how 'awesome such a thing is and how cool ,etc, as they explain so knobheads like me can understand ...No! we have an aged ,half blind ,fat ,miserable old get to fuel our love of the cosmos ,a certain MR PATRICK MOORE...Looking a bit 'shagged out' these days ,but still ,maybe not out in his garden with his 15 inch reflector these days, but still guiding THE SKY AT NIGHT' for its 800 th year ,god bless 'im!

KENNY DALGLISH HAS GONE ,THEY SHOULD HAVE A SUBS BENCH ,NOT JUST FOR THE PLAYERS ,BUT FOR THE MANAGERS!!!

 

                                                                                           LIVERPOOL FOOTBALL CLUB have it has to be said  had better days. The last few seasons haven't been storming successes, but they haven't been terrible failures either. They brought KENNY DALGLISH back last year to run the show and rescue a club that had been screwed up by some money gobbling American owners. and for a while things seem to be going well. Dalglish did make a few mistakes ,mainly on the P.R. front defending badly behaved stupid arsehole petulant foreign players, etc, etc, but thats what managers do ,defend the club, but it didnt look good and ,after all thats all that matters in these fine days  just what looks good. There was a time before clubs bought new foreign players less than once a day and changed squads less than once a fortnight. In those long gone halcyon days of teams ,rather than squads, players were the reason that clubs lost games and would be dropped and had to fight for their places. Now as they've got agents and cost so much to pay in wages and being treated generally like royalty, clubs cant afford not to play these 'gods'....So these days dont drop the player ,just drop the manager.....

Long gone are the days of the tracksuited man with a red bobble hat ,a rusty bucket and 'the sponge, he was the trainer ,or coach sitting next to the other guy in boots and tracksuit ,the manager. That was the backroom boys .BILL SHANKLY  had the BOOTROOM were the great decisions were taken ,not by the board of suits ,but the cold wet muddy ,tracksuited team SHANKLY had put together who knew the players ,cared for them and loved the club ,its traditions and all it stood for and were getting peanuts for their work and devotion.

Now players whizz in and out through the revolving doors at the entrance to the players suites as do the managers so fast that any appreciation of a clubs tradition ,etc ,just doesnt exist anymore. Theres only a few people in a few clubs who've been there so long they are a part of the history ,not just a footnote of the story of that club. People like ALEC FERGUSON at MANCHESTER UNITED much as it pains me to mention them . One of the others was KENNY DALGLISH  at LIVERPOOL, but no more ,some Italian ,Spanish ,south American guy will step into the breech until hes earned a few million and gets sacked or his agent gets him a job abroad. Maybe its getting to the stage where they have a subs bench for the players ,they should also get a subs bench for a bunch of managers ,so they can chop, change and sack the managers whenever, even mid game.

PETE TOWNSHEND THE FEEDBACK KING AND JAMES BOND AND DANIEL CRAIG ARE GOING TO MAKE MY YEAR.

                                                                                  I may be a miserable middle aged ol' fart, but i'm still just a big kid at heart. I read comics ;watch action films and i'm even starting to read the old pulp fiction paperback novels i read as a schoolboy. I tried reading educational non-fiction, but i got really pissed off watching the daughter and the missus,The Lovely Lynne race through a 2ooo page book in an hour and a half. Lynne said to try just reading some stories and stop the futile attempt to educate myself. So i started reading paperbacks again. I remember my dad used to read war and westerns and always had a 3 foot mound of paperbacks by his chair. A few of you will remember the old SVEN HASSELL war books about the german penal battallion with PORTIA,TINY ,THE OLD MAN, THE LEGIONNAIRE ,HIEDI..As their adventures through Europe and the Russian front unfolded in a series of gory war  stories. There was a series of books called the DESTROYER,a bout a trained assasin called REMO WILLIAMS and his aged korean trainer in the killing arts CHIUN. There were hundreds of them .Also the EXECUTIONER, A guy namedMACK BOLAN waging war against the MAFIA,who not very nicely murdered his family, there are thousands of them.There were lots of characters with names like THE PENETRATER,or THE DESTRUCTOR,THE PUNISHER,etc.... There was also a cowboy series about a half indian very mean guy named EDGE, which satiated any blood thirsty schoolkid... O.K. not great literature, but i'm enjoying myself. THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. films were shown on TCM lately ,so that spurred me on to trashy telly ,VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA;THE INVADERS; GARRISONS GORILLAS ;KUNG FU. And some home grown talent;SUPERCAR;FIREBALL XL5; U.F.O.; CALLAN....And JAMES BOND.

                                                                                   Pathetic as it may seem i'm quite excited at the fact that the new BOND film, SKYFALL will be out in a few months. I just hope they cut out that hi-speed frenetic action ,or just plain bad editing that marred the last two films .They were filmed so you just couldnt figure out ,just what in god's name was going on,no matter how many times you wound foreward and back. I still, to this day cannot work out what is going on in the car chase that QUANTUM OF SOLACE opens with. But heres hoping they go back to the more traditional way of filming...Action and violence is like a fine painting and has to be done right so it looks right and can be displayed and enjoyed forever like most of the scenes in all the other BONDS through the years.

And if the worlds favourite secret agents return in SKYFALL isn't enough the worlds greatest musician, guitarist ,songwriter and character  PETE TOWNSHEND is releasing his autobiography after years of trying and failing to get his life down on paper, and dropping himself in deep troubles along the way.... . So with two of my own personal heroes making a showing around October ,i think i'm going to be a happy man thats my birthday present ,(or some) solved. And if THE WHO announce a tour to help promote the book , i'll be a happy middle aged grumpy old schoolboy.

WHAT DO 'BILL AND BEN THE FLOWERPOT MEN', EDWARD WOODWARD AND FIZZY WATER GOT TO DO WITH A FART IN THE BATH?



I was sitting having a cup of coffee having a few minutes to watch the world go by and couldnt help noticing how many people were clutching bottles of fizzy water. I cant remember anyone wanting to constantly drink bottles of water...In my day ,it were 'pop, or beer ,or tea  or coffee, but anything other than water. Water was used to make other drinks or to help you swallow tablets. But for the life of me i cannot understand what made water 'fashionable'. Everybody walking around clutching their i-pod ,or phone /internet thingey ,texting away like mad with one hand while clutching a bottle of water in the other. I still think taps are pretty handy devices, meself. Take my home turf of Warrington. I'm not crawling round gasping for water, seeing mirages of oasis's or anything ,i mean its not as if we're in a tropical hi-humidity jungle climate  and theres not a single desert ,well for miles.....We hardly see the sun and do tend to get lots of water, it just pours out of the sky.

I was contemplating this social conundrum of fashionable 'fizzy water' and wondered where it came from and a silly idea came into my head as a baby in a pram sitting at a nearby table 'let one rip '...A thunderous fart!..It wasn't me ,honest ,guv'nor!....But i had this image of somebody gorged on BAKED BEANS  and cheap lager farting their brains out in the bath producing gallons of 'fizzy water'. How do all the trendy water guzzlers know that this isn't how its made.

When i was younger, we ,like most my age never had a shower and had our weekly bath. Getting in very slowly as the water was boiling , lying there untill your body got used to the scalding heat so you could move and reach for your ,book, comic, or , as i'm sure some of you devils did ...A mucky book!....Never did meself ,being a good catholic lad i am!!!!!....And you would sit in the bath until it went cold. But one of the joys of a hot bath was the FART IN THE BATH!....The bubbles erupting to the surface and your giggling to yourself. The kids television characters BILL N' BEN THE FLOWERPOT MEN'....Used to speak in jibberish. Bill spoke something along the lines of "FLOBALOBALOB!"....and BEN said"BOBDEBOP!"....Nope! I have absolutly no idea what the hell they were talking about ,but they sounding like various BATH FART noises which amused me greatly. Before you think i've no culture or class i shall prove you totally wrong and throw a quote from the greatest actor in the world LAURENCE OLIVIER. Apparently he was working with one of my favourite actors CALLAN, himself, EDWARD WOODWARD. Olivier said that the name EDWARD WOODWARD sounded like the"noise a fart in the bath makes!"....If its good enough for a great thespian like LAURENCE OLIVIER to fart in the bath ,its ok for me, buster. Now after reading that do youstill want that bottle of water?

THE DOMINO EFFECT ..LINE THEM UP ,HIT THE FIRST ONE WITH A POOL QUE AND THEY ALL FALL DOWN...SIMPLE ANOTHER LAW OF PHYSICS EXPLAINED.

When we were schoolkids and they used to have those terrible school  disco's ,or youth club disco's everybody used to sit around the walls watching the girls dancing ,nobody had the bottle to go near one of them. Then the last dance'd come up. There was a time when that last record at any disco ,without fail was "Je t'aime", still to my mind the horniest record ever made. In that 3 minutes you had to get up there drag them screaming and kicking onto the dancefloor ;Introduce yourself ,charm them ,you weren't interested in what they had to say as there wasn't time to do all this  ,'cos you had to get a sloppy  snog in before the lights were turned on and you went out to get your lift off your dad.....Ah happy wild crazy days!!!!.

A year or so further on and we were underage drinkers in the local boozers. Again we were sitting around the walls ,not looking at women, but at a big pool table in the middle of the pub. You had the table itself and then the players whizzing around in variable orbits around the the green baize and beer stained pool table concenterating on their world championship shots ,because in those long gone halcyon days the snooker was on the telly all the time. The players were as famous as todays chefs and antique dealers .Yes! They were that famous!....The pool players in scabby jeans and tee shirts ,all good gaudy 70's fashions ,colours ,collars and flares and even platform two tone shoes . In other words absolutly F**K'in horrible. They imagined they looked dead smart ,as for that matter did we all ,we put a lot of effort into looking like absolute knobheads in those days, even as far as centre parted blowdryed hair.... Just go and find some photos of that time and i defy you not to fall to the floor in tears of belated embarressment. But the pool players imagined the snooker black waistcoats etc as they swung these bloody great ques around as they lined up for their shots . There were times you would go to have a slurp of your pint to be thwacked over the head by the butt of a unweildy que. In addition a good spin shot would cause a ball to fly off the table and on occassions land plop squarely in your pint splashing beer all over you with this bloody pool ball stuck in the pint glass. They were a bastard to get out as well.

There was often trouble at the bar as ,funnily enough when people go to the pub ,they buy beer at the bar, strange ,but true. What tends to happen is people queue and congregate about the bar and are nudged and poked by our Que -tipped pool wizard. The hardened bar drinkers get knocked into each other which is fair enough, but when that comes at the cost of spilt drink ,we are talking serious shit here, boys. I remember the odd good natured bar room brawl erupting as the regulars thouroughly pissed off with the scallies at the pool table let their displeasure known. And there is nobody better at letting their displeasure known than a disgruntled pissed off and occassionally pissed pub regular, because as far as they're concerned ,maybe not everyone else may agree ,but they know they rule this bar and have rights due to all the time and money they've spent there ,etc,etc....

I dont know if its my imagination, or just i haven't played a game of pool in half a lifetime ,but those dreaded green baize tables dont seem to be as numerous or as popular in the sadly depleted number of watering holes in our fair land.Do they still have school disco's with pop?

THE EVOLUTION OF THE MARTIAL ARTS ,FROM SMASHING FACES TO SMASHING BOARDS AND BACK TO SMASHING FACES!!!

For a mass of centuries now we've had this fascination for working out how to smash peoples faces in, or watch other people smash other peoples faces in, in a ring, cage or on the movie screen, but the martial arts have been an object of fascination ever since some indian monk went to China and sat in a cave looking at a wall for about 10 years ,stood up and was feeling a bit stiff, not totally suprisingly, but he was tougher than the other Chinese Buddhist monks who were weak and spindley and only able to sit in the lotus position for 8 or 9 years at a time. So the Indian monk BOHEDERAMA(Sorry about the spelling, but my knowledge of ancient indian monk names leaves a little to be desired. )....Anyhow ,him!...He decided they had to be toughened up and decided to take them through a series of excercises based on animal movements, which became the origins of Kung Fu and Tai-Chi and the martial arts were born. The temples produced the toughest monks in the world . The famous, legendary SHAOLIN monks had arrived. All youse out there of a certain age remember DAVID CARRADINE as the monk on the run in the old wild west in the telly series KUNG FU. They showed the monks training and fighting ;dodging spears ,blindfolded and walking on wet bog paper; most famous is picking up of a cauldron full of white hot coals which burn a TIGER and a DRAGON into his forearms....Thats what they did before coloured belts and exams. From the chinese martial arts , the Japanese ,Koreans ,Basically all of the far east developed their own way of knocking seven bells out of each other.

The interesting thing is how obviously ,once upon a time a certain monk who favoured kicking techniques went to ,say Korea ,he got in there early and developed TAI KWAN DO, which is basically a kicking orientated fighting style . Others rely on fists, power, speed ,tension, or relaxation , whatever floated the boat of whoever formulated all these martial art forms . Then each subdevides again ,take KARATE for example . Originally formed on the island of OKINAWA, sub divided from the basic tough strength power orientated GOJU-RYU style to various WADO-RYU and SHUTO RYU ,One is powerful the other fast and fluid ,then went over to the Japanese mainland  SHOTOKAN was formed, a mixture of various forms  and on it goes. Then in Thailand , for instance you have less disciplined ,in the body physics sense ,THAI-BOXING is pure fighting ,the fighters train to do nothing, but fight in the ring. I watched a tournament in Bangkok and it was absolutely breathtaking ,the speed ,power and pure violence, after i walked away stunned .

Most of the martial arts started as a functional way of defending or attacking and killing , but as time passed they became slightly mystical They becamE 'THE WAY'!!!...As wars subsided and that awful state called peace decended upon our once blood thirsty martial artists ,they developed training techniques that could be done ,with training partners or alone, and demonstrated their power on wooden planks and bricks n' blocks. Body toughening on things like a punch board called a MAKIWARA which is still used today. The fighting arts became an art and a science were bodily mechanics and physics were studied ;Breathing techniques developed to build energy and power and some really weird stuff ,which has to be said created almost superhuman masters of their arts. Most of the styles relied upon self development and made things like KARATE a life long excercise ,TAI-CHI, etc.....But in the 50's after the war the competition aspect of the martial arts came in and many traditionalists still think the sporting aspect has destroyed the traditional martial arts.  The Americans introduced semi contact from the highly controlled non contact Karate. The non contact had no gloves or body armour ,it was spirit and control. The Americans introduced Semi-contact then years later ,with gloves and guards ,control wasn't needed so control was out the window ,years later full contact with boxers gloves came about. Now ,basically with MIXED MARTIAL ART, etc Two fellahs get in a cage and pound the living daylights out of each other.....Bare knuckle, elbows, knees and joint locks ,strangles, etc and most nasty looking is the hammering on an opponents face if he's underneath you on the floor, even the winners look like shit with blood just about everywhere. But its brought Cauliflower ear and eyebrows back into fashion, with the wanderlust nose ,broken all over their faces.... Its entertaining stuff, but by the time your 30 your well burnt out. The MUAY-THAI, -THAI BOXERS they start as young children ,train every hour of every single day and only the greats get past 30. 

Now i'm at my age ,i reckon the best is TAI-CHI ,a form of excercise where you have to totally relax, move as slowly as possible and just reeelllaaaxxx, but it really does you good, its my form of training , Moving slowly and relaxed can give you speed and power ,it truly is amazing when you see it in action.

But as i said Martial arts go from a cave to a temple to smashing faces in and killing people ; then smashing boards and blocks ; now smashing faces in ,just stopping short of killing as it may be good for television ratings, but the advertisers sponsering the events might have to pull out, as it wouldnt look good for them. Thats what its all about now ,trendy kickboxing classes in leisure centres , often to music and then hammering hell out of each other in a cage , watch some of the vanishing videos on the internet of the traditional masters , thats the martial arts.

I PUT CHATTOON ON THE BLOG , BUT I HAVEN'T A BLOODY CLUE HOW!

As you probably were stunned and amazed that your glorious leader rubs shoulders with the rich and famous on an almost annual basis. This  was not only ably shown ,but more along the lines of amazingly ,astoundingly, etc shown by the addition of a video clip on the blog page....Impressed?...And so you bloody well should be!.....As you all well know my computer knowledge is on par with the average stone age man. But nevertheless. I STUCK A BLOODY VIDEO ON THE BLOG!!!!!...As to how i did this monumentous task....I HAVEN'T A BLOODY CLUE!!!.....If i try again it'll be back to pressing buttons and hoping and preying that something within a few billion light years of what i intended actually happens.

But for now ,still shocked and stunned that it got on and stunned that it stayed there, I have allowed myself a little smugness to seep through my usual cool demeanour, as theres only a recuperating wife and the dog at home with me they've been getting the full onslaught of not only  the original shock , but the Joy then the unbearable smugness. But do, i implore you have a look at what a  handsome devil the cartoonist is (thats me, by the way)..As i'm sure many of you have wondered how gorgeous i am in the flesh. But i hope you enjoy the tape its something a little different.

The CHATTOON was setup by,a certain SIMON ELLINAS of the parishwho read the blog, thought it was brilliant and put a computer connection on the comment section on the piece ,so you can click on to any of the other CHATTOONS. and see how the other caricaturists aren't half as good as me.

CHRISTINE AND NEIL HAMILTON ON SIMON ELLINAS'S LATEST N' GREATEST 'CHATTOON' (Interviewed and caricatured ) DRAWN BY ME!

chattoon

A few weeks back i dragged my weary bulk all the way down to the 'capital' Where i eventually met up with the world famous ,in his house anyway SIMON ELLINAS, god bless his wooden tie and plastic socks. He very kindly bought me a pint of dirty beer took me to his very nice house and put me in a campbed. There was a reason for all this ,not just because he's desperate for visitors, but because the following morning we were due to take part in Simons latest crazy, but fun and interesting scheme the CHATTOON.

THE CHATTOON,basically is meeting a celebrity / famous person, whatever ,basically whoever Simon can get his hands on and persuade to be interviewed and caricatured at the same time .When the interview finally comes to its end the 'targets 'are presented with and hopefully are delighted with the finished masterwork. They've had some good artists do a stint. My turn came about and it was to interview CHRISTINE and NEIL HAMILTON...Once stars of politics , now stars of stage screen ;after dinner speaking;television cookery programmes; survival in the jungle celebrity competitions and a variety of othe things. They were actually a nice couple. Christine when we arrived had a stinker of a cold and was a bit flummoxed by the sudden stampede of film crew ,photographer, cartoonist ,interviewer suddenly shattered the peace and quiet. There was a slight hiccup when we inquired about what the tone and subject matter of the interview should be and we did strike a nerve ,but the chaos and flu germs weren't helping Christine. But that passed and on we went .But she's definitly a trooper, as that evening she was on that KEITH LEMON 'S CELEBRITY JUICE...Got me some 'cool' points with the daughter, but that was short lived.

But Christine went and sat with Neil and were interviewed by the lovely DEBBIE TARRIER who charmed them and almost instantly all was joy and humour in the Hamilton appartment. The interview was entertaining and funny and enjoyed by one and all ,Christine even gave me some ideas to turn some of the 'digs' back on the people i'd included in the background and i think they were genuinely pleased with the finished result. So after a goodbye kiss, no less (from Christine)...We retired to the boozer directly opposite.

If you want to see the pile of other CHATTOONS....look up SIMON ELLINAS CHATTOONS or CHATTOONS on YOU TUBE or FACEBOOK.

THE PETE TOWNSHEND THAT DIDNT APPEAR HAS SUDDENLY APPEARED!

                                                                                       Thanks to the wonders of technology the blog chappies in their endless quest to make things easier for me have managed to totally confuse, baffle n' befuddle me. But i managed ,despite their help to get my painted caricature of PETE TOWNSHEND up before you...I'm quite pleased with the painted sans ink attempt ,so i'll plough onwards and probably downwards and who knows what wonders await you ,dear reader.

SOME ATTEMPTS AT PAINTING PICCIES ,SOME MY NERVE FAILED ME AND GOT THE INK BOTTLE OUT!!

 

Heres a couple of pictures of people wot i drawed over the  last wee while . KEN DODD as a pirate for a client, HARRY SECOMBE, as DOCTOR WHO, as apparently at some time around the JON PERTWEE /TOM BAKER era ,Sir NED OF WALES was considered for the role of the worlds, nay, the universes favourite time lord. The sight of Sir Ned squeezing in and out of the TARDIS would've been 'interesting'. The TARDIS would've had to be a 'lot' bigger inside than out.

Then the 'KING OF COOL', hisself...No not me, but a certain STEVE MCQUEEN of the parish as the COOLER KING  in THE GREAT ESCAPE. The McQueen one was watercoloured then inked ,but in my defense that was the intention all along. HARRY(SIR NED OF WALES) SECOMBE...And KEN (PROFFESSOR CHUKLEBUTTY) DODD were painted ,optimistically to be just coloured without ink ,but the famous LEATHERBARROW steely nerve failed me and the ink was slapped on. There was meant to be a painted ,sans ink PETE TOWNSHEND, but a new blog system has appeared on the computer and i tryed to put it on, but i dont know if it'll appear or not ,but that worked ok without the ink and i'm quite proud of that one ,even if i do say so myself ,nobody else will ,so i've got to.

But i shall plough on regardless in my quest for mastery of the paint medium ,but i will also carry on with my quest for mastery over ink. And as i've said cartooning and caricature ,even more than proper drawing and painting are dependant upon the particular artists own style and my style could be a blend of the two. I'll shave my head ,eat rice ,meditate and find my inner self and mastery over the painting and inking arts like a cartooning Shaolin monk.....One day i'll hold a red hot cauldron between my forearms branding my forearms with DAFFY DUCK on one arm and BUGS BUNNY on the other and wander the wild west ,not fighting ,but drawing painted and inked cartoons.

M,ARTY FELDMAN..TO INK OR NOT TO INK ?THAT IS THE QUESTION THAT IS ACRYLICING ME!

                                                                                               

                                                                                             As anyone who reads this shit on anything like a semi regular basis will know i am a great lover of humour, comedy and general funny stuff ,i'm not claiming theres any in here from me ,but theres plenty out there, the only problem is that it is ,in my ill-considered opinion long past. In these days were every second gobshite in the land is a 'comedian' and does 'stand up' .....And i think i hate every fuckin' one of them. I was tootling around YOU TUBE t'other day and hit on a few MARTY FELDMAN classics and was filled with a creative ardour and decided to pay homage to a true comic genius by painting a caricature of the man himself.

Being of a cartooning persuasion since i was old enough to draw nudey women i have always had a perpensity for ink. All cartoons and comic strip artists are a slave to the ink outline and ink shading and cross hatching . These days if you look on the internet a lot of caricaturists over the last few years were painting caricatures as they would a portrait with paint ,everything from watercolour to acrylic to oils and not a single .....(s'cuse me as i pause to shudder in horror and disbelief)....drop of ink was used. As a traditional cartoonist brought up when caricatures were and in my etes still are a form of cartoon and were drawn in ink as all the wonderful editorial cartoons(R.I.P.) through the years were drawn. Now all the caricature sites are flooded with digitally drawn caricatures and i have to admit they are on the whole beautiful pieces. But they are so good and the computer allows you to play around and redo everything they are damn near perfect. The only thing that saddens me is the fact that the original artists scribbling and inking and painting in the traditional prehistoric way on paper had their own style forged through years of getting around problems in achieving likenesses and making a funny universe in a square on a sheet of newsprint. They worked around their mistakes and often the error of their ways produced an unexpected nugget or occassional mother load of gold...Like most things the spirit and soul has been swallowed by the perfection able to be achieved on the keyboard. And i cant for the life of me do digital artwork. So, i thought i'd try to do some painted work with acrylic paint.

They do say practice makes perfect . The main problem with that is practice involves getting off your arse and doing'it'. So i've had a very hit n' miss time with my painted caricatures. I did the MARTY FELDMAN one and was pleased as punch with the pencil drawing ,but slapped the pain on and seemed to lose something. I had to grit me teeth ,bite me lips ,squeeze my buttocks ,anything to prevent the inbuilt genetic urge to apply ink. I did the picture ,put it on FACEBOOK and a few people commented and as i had a scan of the painted Marty .....I snapped ,i broke totally and inked in the painting!.....So there ,dear reader above you is the finished two results. The bottom of the two is the inked version.