Sunday 20 August 2017

2000 AD - July 1979.

July of 1979 was a time that will always be associated with records.

It was in that month that Sheffield's Sebastian Coe broke the world mile record for the first time. He then went on to break another two world records in the space of just forty one days. Not content with that, over the course of the next three years, he broke a total of eleven world records.

What kind of madness was this?

Obviously, as a man of the people, I was always on the side of plucky habitual runner-up Peter Elliott. Surely the living embodiment of South Yorkshire.

But if July 1979 was a good month for one kind of record, it was a terrible month for another.

The kind that was round and had a hole in the middle of it.

For it was the month in which the Sony Walkman was launched - and, like fools, Sony made it only able to play cassettes and not LPs. What brand of lunacy was this? What kind of maniac would want to walk around playing cassettes when they could be playing LPs as they strolled?

Not only that but, that month, Chicago saw the infamous Disco Demolition Night in which a crate of disco records was blown up in Comiskey Park as a protest against the music form's then-ubiquity.

Not that I cared. I'm sure I was too busy catching up with the adventures of the galaxy's greatest comic.

It would appear that 2000 AD had a new logo which I think coincided with an improvement in the comic's paper quality.

It would also appear that Prog 122 featured an amazing robot game. I wish I could claim it was so amazing that I can remember it to this day but I'm afraid I have no memory of it at all.

It's interesting to see Prog 123 advertising an article about The Spaceman and King Arthur. Is that the Jim Dale movie based on A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court? Despite clips from it being a fixture in every edition of Disney Time I ever saw, I don't believe I've ever seen the movie, nor even encountered it in the schedules.
2000AD Prog 120, Big Robot issue

2000 AD Prog 121, Judge Dredd

2000 AD Prog 122

2000 AD Prog 123, Dan Dare

9 comments:

Charlie Horse 47 said...

Steve, steve, steve.... Walking around with LPs is a serious threat!

I attended the Disco Demolition night at Chicago White Sox Baseball ParkJuly 12, 1979. (Youtube it) 75,000 - 100,000 drunks showing up with disco records to be placed in a big box destroyed with dynamite in the center field! These things were being thrown around like frisbees wacking people in the head and stuff... some folks were nearly knocked unconscious.

It's worth a look on the youtube to see Chicago at its finest, LOL!

Charlie Horse 47 said...

Sean! You wrote " Check out the 1966 Valiant annual. It has some great full colour artwork by the brilliant Don Lawrence inside." THanks!

Is there a site / publication / book etc. that highlights your UK artists, the annuals, etc? Can one buy original art? I tried looking for DC Thomson but I guess they keep all their art locked up in the Fortress of Solitude and getting a piece is neigh impossible!

Anonymous said...

Speaking of Judge Dredd, I recently caught the new Dredd movie on cable and thought it wasn't half bad. Karl Urban got the Dredd frown down, and Lena Headey was great as the demurely diabolical Ma Ma. It was a tight, contained little story with plenty of ultra-violence. And judgement!
Anybody else catch it yet?

M.P.

Steve W. said...

MP, I've seen Dredd a couple of times. It's a good solid film though I'd have liked a bit more satire in it.

Charlie, I shall go and watch that Chicago video forthwith.

Aggy said...

Dredd is an absolute classic. Just enough story to hold the set pieces together and a lead that understood the character.

Of course the story is a straight rip off of The Raid which is worth looking out for too.

Kurt Urban is still looking to continue the role too. Supposedly meeting with TV production companies as recently a 2 months ago.

DC Thompson artwork is next to impossible to get hold off. They don't return artwork to the artist IIRC. So little has reached the market. Cartoonist museum in London has some on display. Google search suggests the University of Dundee (where DCT is based) has a sizeable collection.

B Smith said...

There did seem to be a time there when UK comics, especially sci-fi/fantasy sorts, tended to use that extremely condensed sans serif font on their covers. Warrior was very big on it a few years later. Whim of a particular art director, or just one of those fads...?

Charlie Horse 47 said...

Thanks Aggy! If I ever get to Dundee I'll check it out! A great grandmother hailed from Dundee but like most Americans I'm a mutt.

pete doree said...

BTW, I just caught a very good documentary about 2000AD ( 'Future Shock: The Story Of 2000AD' ), it's got Pat Mills swearing like a trooper, Dave Gibbons bemoaning about when IPC used to use original artwork as doormats, and Kev O'Neill, when asked to define 2000AD's legacy replying 'It's not a legacy, it's more like a STAIN.'
Recommended, if you can locate it on various ( cough cough ) download sites.

Steve W. said...

Thanks for the tip-off, Pete.