MIXCAFFETTOCRAFTOPTICALSLOTHGMN4

The time is almost upon us, the time being MIX at the Soap Factory on 8/21! As we've noted in past posts, GMN4 will be printed and for sale to the public at large. The plan is to have 100 of the 500 assembled in time for the show, but about a third will be spoken for by contributors, meaning the remaining 70 will be available for the low low price of $5 a pop. We've added about 40+ pages of new content, so for anyone who took a gander at the Sunday edition earlier this year, we've upped the ante noticeably. There were a couple of people who slipped through our last drag of the net, but I feel that what we have is a very strong cross-section of the cartooning/sequential art scene currently in existence in this state we call home. We will be accompanied by many of Minnesota's finest cartoonists and comics-related institutions as well as plenty of out-of-towners, it should be a sight to behold. There will be other events circling the show:

...all of which and more can be found at the show's site. Thanks again to Sarah Morean for giving us advance notice of the show and all of her efforts in putting this together. The local comics scene is richer as a result of her.

I (Justin) haven't had any formal feedback from our man in the field known as Feltz about last weekend's Caffetto Craft Fair, but I'd like to thank any and all who stopped by our table and dual gratitude to those who picked something up! It goes without saying that we appreciate Shaun's efforts in repping 2D Cloud as well.

Although it was posted a little after our fundraising efforts had concluded, Kevin Bramer of Optical Sloth fame did us the honor of doing a quick rundown/impression of "the sprawling Good Minnesotan #4" (his words). Barring a little confusion in regards to what we sent him (he was sent a copy of the Sunday edition of GMN4 as well as a copy of my first mini, RDCD Fist, but he thought it was all part of GMN4), the review was generally positive. Given how much ground there was to cover and the average length of his reviews, it's understandable that a lot of the anthology wasn't discussed, which he acknowledged. Overall he seemed to be impressed with what we had put together, as he concluded with "If you’ve seen the past issues of this series you know that “Good Minnesotan” is a mark of quality, and they didn’t disappoint this time around." Although it was lumped in with the GMN4 review, he did seem to enjoy RDCD Fist as well, describing it as "...a bizarre pile of transporting vaginas, submachine guns, brain-eating and quiet contemplation. You’d love it!" A little side note on RDCD Fist: due to the small run (around 30-some copies), I have been only selling them at shows, but if anyone outside of Minneapolis/St. Paul is interested in buying one and wants to pay shipping, we'll gladly mail you a copy! Here's a shot of the first batch at it's debut at Fallcon 2009:

In addition to all this hubbub, we are hoping to record a conversation between the venerable Dylan Williams of Sparkplug and Zak Sally of La Mano on the trials, tribulations, and rewards of running a one man label successfully, as they're both proof of. If we can pull this off it will be  posted to our semi-new Comics Crit/Interview/wannabe comicscomicscometscometsmarvelouscomahoodedutilitarian blog Itchykeen Art Fiends sometime in the near future. Following next weekend we will be sending gifts out to the proper peoples and starting on books for 2011! We have a couple shows lined up in October, but until then stay crass-y.