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The tour rolls on for Taking Punk to the Masses: From Nowhere to Nevermind! EMP Senior Curator and editor of the collection, Jacob McMurray, is on tour across the Northwest, doing readings and discussions of the "Seattle sound." And this Friday, August 19th, Jacob will be appearing at Easy Street Records in West Seattle! Enjoy an ice cold beer as the store spins hits from the "grunge" era, and join Jacob for a presentation, followed by a Q&A. (And don't miss the vinyl section upstairs at Easy Street, man, oh man…) Artwork by Ellen Forney, from the pages of Taking…

Love and Rockets: New Stories #4 by the Hernandez Brothers 104-page black & white 7.5" x 9.25" softcover • $14.99ISBN: 978-1-60699-490-0 Ships in: September 2011 (subject to change) — Pre-Order Now After nearly 30 years, Love and Rockets just keeps getting better, and this issue of the annual 3rd incarnation finds the Brothers Hernandez at the peak of their storytelling powers. Jaime Hernandez's emotionally powerful stories in the last issue of Love and Rockets: New Stories ("The Love Bunglers" and "Browntown") were among the most critically-acclaimed comics of the year. In this new issue, Jaime ups the ante even more….

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions: • Review: "Since… humor has emerged as such a tremendous, even defining part of Sala's appeal, I must confess that on a first reading, I was a little put-off to find it reduced to such a dim flicker. But on a second reading, with the understanding that he was exploring grimmer and more downbeat territory, other strengths grew more apparent — dreadful scenes of apocalypse, vistas of desolation, one truly appalling horror flashback set-piece, violence that feels more brutal than delirious, and tension between characters rooted more in how they treat each other than in…

I walked into Gary's office to ask him if he'd sent Johnny Ryan a contract for Prison Pit yet. He said he had. I asked him what Johnny's advance was. "Seven dollars," he replied. I was mortified. Gary stated that he meant to offer "seventy dollars" but when he wrote up the contract, he mis-typed and liked how it looked so much he decided to go with it. I suggested that perhaps $7 was more insulting than no advance at all. He laughed. I pleaded with him to reconsider. He wasn't having any of it. Suddenly, a large hawk landed…

We're introducing quite a few new artists to the pages of Mome 22, so as we wait for the final Mome to hit the stores, we're profiling some of these newcomers on the FLOG! Such as, Jim Rugg here! First and foremost, I encourage everyone to check out Kristy's incredible interview with him over at The Comics Journal.  And here are some more "Things to See" from Jim! I can't even begin to list all the awards that Rugg's blaxploitation ode Afrodisiac has received, but most recently it was a 2011 Eisner Award nominee for Best Humor Publication! Speaking of…

Make a habit of visiting Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery this fall as we approach five years of presenting comix culture to the masses. It just keeps getting better:   On Saturday, September 3 between noon and 3:00 PM, we host a sneak preview of "Hooked on Comix 3." Fimmakers David P. Moore and Audry Mandelbaum will be present for a continuous screening of the latest installment of their insightful documentary series on alternative comix. This one features the lovely Dame Darcy and always entertaining Tony Millionaire. Can't wait. On Saturday, September 10 we open Drawing Power, an amazing exhibition of cartoon advertising curated by Warren Bernard….

Ganges #4 by Kevin Huizenga 32-page two-color 8.5" x 11" comic book, with jacket • $7.95Part of the Ignatz Series Ships in: August 2011 (subject to change) — This item will be available for order simultaneous to its release in comic shops. Can you make an exciting comic out of insomnia? Kevin Huizenga rises to the challenge as he depicts his alter ego Glenn Ganges wrestling with sleeplessness, trying to trick it by reading a particularly abstruse book, obsessively breaking his past, present and future life down to ever more hallucinatory, complex grids, and wandering around his darkened house trying…

This interview was conducted by Fantagraphics' Eric Buckler. Thanks to Eric and Lorenzo! (Ed. note: Hi Lorenzo! We miss you in North America! xo janice) Lorenzo Mattotti is a talented necromancer; his hands give life to some of the most charged and heart-pounding characters in cartooning and illustration today. Having a cabaret of phantoms at his disposal, Mattotti has assembled comics that are a dangerous and dark exploration of human emotion. His latest cartooning project was a collaboration with Claudio Piersanti called Stigmata, which follows a man who bleeds from his palms as he trudges down a dark path that…

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions: • Review: "…[T]he cartoons in Willie & Joe: Back Home capture Mauldin at a low ebb personally, and ferociously inspired professionally…. The material in Back Home is bitter but witty, and remarkable for its courage. Given the platform of a major syndicate, Mauldin used his moral authority — as a firsthand observer of atrocity, venality, and want — to try and make his complacent countrymen feel a little shame. Where his wartime cartoons had said, 'I am one of you' to grunts in the trenches, his post-war work said, 'What the hell happened to you?'…

If I were up on skate lingo I would be spouting the equivalent of "holy crap" here… Penguin has produced a series of limited edition skate decks featuring artwork from their Penguin Classics Deluxe line, including covers by Jason for Kerouac's Dharma Bums, Lilli Carré for Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and Thomas Ott for We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson. At Lilli's blog you can see a photo of her hoisting hers over her head. There was a Facebook contest where you could win one (which we learned of too late) and USA Today's…