Me and the Devil Jones (subtitled The Unreal Life of Robert Johnson) is an incredible new manga (well newly published and translated here in the U.S.) by Akira Hiramoto and published by Del Rey. This huge first volume (525 pages) is just the first of from what I gather from the liner notes at the end of Me and the Devil Blues is still ongoing in Japan.When I first saw Me and the Devil Blues listed in my distributer catalog it sounded interesting as I thought it was a bio piece on blues musician Robert Johnson and even though I only like the blues in really small doses as a musical subsection, I like comic biographies on almost anyone. So when Me and the Devil Blues arrived a couple of weeks ago I was initially disappointed to find that the life of Robert Johnson was only the springboard for this series as Hiromoto goes off on some really fantastically strange tangents. I overcame my initial disappointment in short term as the art in Me and the Devil Blues is fantastic, kinetic, very expressive, and highly atmospheric and the story and characters are every bit as engaging.
Blues musician Robert Johnson died when he was only 27 years old back in 1937, but was highly influential for years afterward, not just in blues circles, but to rock musicians such as the Rolling Stones, Led Zepplin, and Bob Dylan. The movie Crossroads is based on the myth of Robert Johnson's life. I was so impressed by Me and the Devil Blues that I'll be checking out some of Robert Johnson's music and looking for Crossroads.
4 comments:
This book looks really interesting, Ralph. Do you have any copies left?
Yes I do, it's a book I'll definitely keep in stock.
I plan to be in Germany in a couple or 3 weeks (?). From Scotland I aim for Amsterdam, then Germany, then Denmark. At least in theory.
Dunkel beer it is!
People reading this are probably wondering who this alcoholiday is and or why we should care if he's going to Germany - well he's a good guy who's running around the world! Seriously he's part of this runner's club that has "chapters" all over the world, except they don't just run, they run and have "DC's" (drink checks) along their courses in which they drink beer! They do these five plus mile runs and still drink beer in the middle of their runs, I don't know how though! Anyway since April of this year he's been traveling around the world meeting up with people from the various "chapters" and running and drinking with them (I'm so jealous!!). He just landed in Europe a week or so ago and I told him over on his blog that when in Germany he should have one of their dark (dunkel) beers.
If you click on his name "alcoholiday" it'll take you to his blog of his adventures (and the names that these runners / drinkers come up with for themselves and each other are hilarious!).
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