Tripwire Award Results!

Thanks to all who voted for Accent UK in the recent Tripewire Magazine Awards, we were runners-up in their UK Independent/Small Press category! A very commendable result and a nice swansong of sorts.

Thanks to all who took the time to vote for us and congratulations to all winners and nominees.

Please visit Tripwire's site through this link for the full list of winners :)

Accent UK No More!

Accent UK's Original Logo

Well the news is slipping out and sadly it's true, Accent UK, the long running independent comics collective run by Dave West and I is no more and is disbanding its operations.

We've been fortunate to last so long and achieve what we have in what has been a fun rollercoaster ride along the independent comics wave these last 20 years or so. 

Dave and I, along with Barry 'Baz' Renshaw and others were all producing our own small press comics in the Greater Manchester area in the early 2000's and meeting at local comic marts, chatted about joining forces to pull resources and have a greater voice within the UK's burgeoning indie comics scene.

So it was that on Remembrance Day 2002 (or was it 2001, my memory is hazy now!) that Accent UK was born in a Stockport Mill with Dave, Baz and myself agreeing to drop our respective small press publishing identities; Deva Comics, Engine Comics and M56 Comics and adopt our new moniker on all future publications. This we did and our new themed anthology comics cemented the partnership and welcomed contributions from the UK's brightest new indie talent at that time including likes of Dave Baillie, Jason Cobley, Ben Dickson, Garen Ewing, Dave Hitchcock etc. 

We kept things fairly informal with it understood that our shared objectives should not prevent us individually pursuing whatever other creative opportunities presented themselves, thus Baz left the collective in 2006 to pursue a new publishing venture building on his success with the popular (and much missed) Red Eye comics news magazine and also to concentrate on his freelance comic art work.

Accent UK's New Logo

Dave and I continued and had a relaunch of sorts in 2007 which, embracing better quality printing and working closely with WOLFMEN artist and graphic designer, Andy Bloor resulted in a significant step up in our production values. The year before, I had met industry giant and lovely fellow, Stephen Bissette during our second trip to Copenhagen for the Komiks.dk festival, (introduced by our chums, Leah Moore & John Reppion) and although retired from comics, he agreed to provide the cover for our next anthology, ZOMBIES, as long as he could also submit a strip he was working on with his son. This coup together with the rise in production values provided a welcome boost and clinched global distribution for our new titles through Diamond Comics Distributors which until then had been but a pipedream.  

More anthologies, one-shots and collaborations followed with returning contributions from not only Stephen Bissette, John and Leah but Keiron Gillen, Mark Buckingham, Frazer Irving, Dave Hitchcock, Ben Dickson, Owen Johnson and many more. Dave turned more to writing and alongside his WOLFMEN titles with Andy Bloor, produced several one-shots under the BLESSED CURSED theme, picking up an Eagle award in 2010 for his and the sadly missed Marlene Lowe's WHATEVER HAPPENNED TO THE FASTEST MAN?

We became more adventurous in our convention plans and buoyed by our Danish experience, where we successfully grew a loyal following through attending Copenhagen events from 2004 until 2019, when Covid (and Brexit) interrupted matters, we attended many overseas conventions including New York's MoCCA, Seattle's Emerald City Comic-Con, Chicago's C2E2, Toronto's TCAF and Finland's annual comic art festival in Helsinki. 

This was of course in addition to the ever expanding UK comics convention scene where there were now multiple events compared to the much missed Bristol Comics Expo that we had first attended. We did our best to go to as many as were viable, often joined by our family members, Adam, Scott and Jemma who all regularly took turns behind the table and helped Dave and I have a welcome breather.

Our Danish connection was further enhanced by a trilogy of titles published from writer/artist Martin Flink in his distinctive, thoughtful style; THE MAN OF GLASS, THE TROLL and THE LIZARD, all of whom were warmly received.

Although, global distribution became tougher in later years through changing submission guidelines (which thankfully seem to have recently relaxed), the evolution of crowdfunding sites such as Kickstarter provided a new opportunity along with the increased frequency of events to get our titles into the hands of an eager audience.

A new collaboration between Dave and frequent anthology contributor, Gary Crutchley gave birth to WESTERNOIR, the supernatural tale of gunslinger Josiah Black in the Wild West, which arguably replaced our themed anthologies as the most recognisable of all Accent UK's titles. Planned as an ongoing series its first collection quickly sold out, requiring a colour reprint and its subsequent volumes are warmly anticipated. Dave's writing continued and further successful collaboration's followed with artists Indio on STEPHENSON's ROBOT, Ian Ashcroft on KIA WORDSMITH and PJ Holden in WASTLELAND, the V2A band comic co-written with it's lead singer, Kev Judgedrone.

My own artistic contributions ebbed and flowed alongside my museum art commissions but I was pleased to produce a couple of issues of  MOMENTS OF ADVENTURE featuring my historical strips, coloured by frequent Accent UK collaborator, Matt Soffe and Aljosa Tomic, which have been warmly received since their release.

Special Steampunk Logo

In recent years, regular invites to the annual Asylum Steampunk Festival in Lincoln saw a return to our anthology roots with a trilogy of comics inspired by the splendid people we met there. The most recent of these, ESCAPE FROM THE ASYLUM with its intriguing 'Q' concept was launched at this year's festival, a mere 2 weeks ago and is likely to be the last new title with the Accent UK logo, although discussions are ongoing about this.

As stated earlier, we've always kept things informal so that our shared objectives shouldn't prevent us individually pursuing other opportunities and so it is now that Dave and I recently found ourselves at a creative crossroads. Realising that Accent UK couldn't fairly continue without the both of us, we've decided it best to gracefully retire the brand. 

We can both be justly proud of what modestly we've achieved in our small part of the independent comics landscape and give thanks to everyone out there who has been part of our journey, whether it be a contributor, reader, supporter, retailer or reviewer.

Dave and I both plan to remain active in the comics community so please watch this space and our social media channels for news of forthcoming events and projects.

Thank you for reading and for your support over the years.

 Colin

Accent UK nominated in Tripwire Awards!

Exciting news, our Accent UK comics collective have been nominated in top pop culture Tripwire Magazine’s annual awards, in the best UK small press/independent comic publisher category! 

It’s quite an honour to be included and a great way to mark the 20 year journey that Dave West and I have shared after Accent UK was formed with Barry Renshaw way back in 2002. 

There's lots of other fab nominees across the world of comics and pop culture, so if you’ve ever enjoyed our work, please consider voting, thank you very much :)

The link to the google docs form is here and quick n easy to use !

Welcome 2022!

                                                            HAPPY NEW YEAR! 

Well we may all be a bit battered and bruised by 2021 (and 2020!) but we made it this far so best pick ourselves up and get on with it!

I generally don't announce a lot of the plans I make as, a bit like 2021 (and 2020!), they don't always come off but I am fairly well placed to make the year ahead a special one for all those who have been patient with me in recent times with regards to new comic releases!

Yes this year should finally be the one - or did I say that last year - well a bit like Beetlejuice or was it Candyman?, I don't want to say the name three times but this;

 will;

 finally;

 happen!!

Watch this space!

Northwich Calling!

 

I had a fab time in space last weekend and hope to post a few pictures in due course to show but there's no rest as we have another event this weekend, locally in Northwhich!

A brand new Comic & Film Festival to help celebrate Northwich's old art deco cinema re-openning as an arts venue! There's going to be movie props, actors, comics, funkos, memorabilia and us!

Come and say hi, if you're in town ahead of the Christmas tree light switch on!

 

Steampunks in Space!

 

In a surprisingly busy end to a fairly quiet year for events, we have the middle of our three November events this weekend with Steampunks in Space!

Being held at the National Space Centre in Leicester, a venue familiar to me after I featured it in my popular 'Heart's Desire' story for Accent UK's Return To The Asylum anthology comic! 

The event has run for several years in conjunction with the Space Centre and The Ministry of Steampunk who host Asylum, The Town That Never Was and other splendid events that we try to attend or exhibit at when we can. Finally the stars have aligned allowing us, (well me really as the others can't attend), to countdown our liftoff to space!

Full details can be found at the Space Centre's website but be warned I think they have already almost sold out of tickets!

Back with a bang!

Yay! After several enjoyable 'pop-up' events since the summer, we were delighted to safely attend our first 'big' event the other weekend at ReedPop's MCM Comic Con in London!

This was our first comic con since October 2019 so we were both excited and, given all that's happened since then, a little nervous too. Thankfully the Excel's protocol's and vast space together with a reduced capacity meant that attendeess could feel safe and distance themselves should they want to.

New table layout and 'Hadrian's Wall' behind!

That said it was still a busy affair for us, possibly with less attractions elsewhere, people made a point of exploring everything that was available so made their way to Artist's Alley (the re-branded  Comic Village) to see what was on offer. Overall we did better than we had expected in the circumstances and were happy with how things went.

We only had two hiccups; the new application process meant that Dave and I's tables were in seperate aisles but being virtually 'back to back' we weren't too concerned, until we saw the new safety feature of dividing walls around each table pairing meaning that we couldn't see each other let alone have a natter, ah well, safety first.

Dave's table - the view 'behind the wall'!

  The other hiccup? My puncture and delay the following day, back with a bang indeed!

Newark here we come!

At this time of year we're normally gearing up for one of our favourite events, the Asylum Steampunk Festival, but well for obvious reasons it's not happening but we are attending a much smaller scaled back, steampunk market in nearby Newark-on-Trent! 

It's obviosuly not the same - what is these days? - but it's a lovely gesture by the Ministry of Steampunk and the local council to accommodate those, like us, who had booked their accommodation in good faith and were intending to travel just for a well deserved break, so now there will be a steampunk flavour to Newark's regular artisan and food market this Sunday, market place, 10 am to 3pm.

We're looking forward to it and if half as enjoyable as both Blists Hill and Scott's Free Comic Book Day event we'll be happy - Dave may even wear his shorts! 

I've done a few English Civil War Sketches for Newark!

FREE COMIC BOOK DAY 2021!

After a fun and succesful return to Blists Hill a couple of weeks ago I'm delighted to confirm our next appearance, (with a further few to follow as some sense of 'normality' returns!).

Free Comic Book Day celebrates it's 20th anniversary this year as a global event amongst comic stores and stockists as a way of highlighting the comic industry and reminding readers, old and new, of it's uniqueness as a medium of entertaining storytelling.

To play our part in this annual celebration, Gary 'WesterNoir' Crutchley and I will be representing Accent UK alongside three other amazing local comic creators at Warrington's finest comic shop, Scott's Pops & Comics in the new Warrington Market!

Delighted to be part of this, not least of which because Scott is of course our eldest who bravely opened his shop last year during the pandemic and recently celebrated his first anniversary - no mean feat in the challenging circumstances!

All are welcome to join us for what promises to be a fun day, please check out Scott's Facebook event page here for full and further details! 

And if Warrington is a bit too far for you to travel, try a search in your own area to see what your local comic show is up to next weekend. 

Back To School!

 

We are delighted to confirm that our comics collective, Accent UK will be returning to the convention scene this coming weekend at The Town That Never Was, the annual Steampunk Festival at Blists Hill Victorian Town, part of the Ironbridge Gorge Museums group!

We've had this event penciled in for some time, but with a change of dates, various ongoing restrictions - and sadly the continuing cancellation of most other conventions and festivals, we'd remained cautious, possibly too cautious in announcing it, but here we are! 

The Cthulu Party's succesful mayoral campaign of 2019

It'll - gulp - be my first event since Copenhagen in 2019 and the first together with Dave West in almost two years. In fact it's almost 18 months since we've last seen each other so you can see why we're getting a wee bit excited about being allowed out in the wild again!

The event is again run by the Ministry of Steampunk, (those splendid people behind the excellent Asylum Steampunk Festival, sadly cancelled again this year despite best efforts) in conjunction with the Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust and this will be it's 4th appearance with us attending them all, exhibiting at the last three.

Everyone welcome from Hopeless Main to Mars (doesn't) Attacks - ack! ack!

It's a remarkable place a town literally rebuilt brick by brick around a foundry to preserve a lost way of life with working printers, blacksmiths, bakers, pub, sweet shop, chippy & much more! Special as all this is, when enhanced by the splendour of steampunk visitors it really comes into its own with attractions, musical acts, dancing, demonstrations, dinosaur detectives, artists, traders, makers & more, really bringing the town alive.

Colin meets his Asylum comic story stars!

This time, we are to be housed in the Stirchley Board School (site 46 on the map below!) dating from 1881 where along with other artists and imagineers we are presenting the perfect Back To School tonic of ABC.....Art, Books & Comics!

We are, as you can see, quite excited by actually having an event to go to and an opportunity to catch up with visitors and the wonderful steampunk community that we are privalged to be a small part of. Please do consider popping in if your logistics and personal situation allows as you are guaranteed a very different, refreshing and inspiring experience and if you visit the school we promise to go easy on the homework!

2020 Gone ?

Ah, in not unexpected news both September's re-arranged Edinburgh Comic-Con and November's Thought Bubble Festival have now been cancelled due of course to the coronavirus pandemic. Both events immediately confirmed their return for 2021 at their respective venues and regular calendar spots. Obviously everyone's health, well being and safety have determined that this was the sensible course of action but does starkly lay bare the massive impact the virus has had on our shared hobby and community with this year's calendar of events effectively wiped out.

There are still a couple of potential events in the autumn/winter timeslots that have yet to make an annoucement, (or to invite exhibitor applications) but it seems unlikely they will be able to proceed for the same health & safety reasons and/or for logistical, economic reasons as the UK, and sadly most of the world, face an uncertain immediate future.

Thought Bubble have quickly confirmed that they will fill their now vacated November dates with a virtual event so we'll see how that goes and there are similar recent announcements about  Asylum, our cherished steampunk festival doing likewise, which should be fun, if the earlier 'Steam Over Ether' event was anything to go by, so there are a couple of highlights to look forward to in an otherwise empty landscape.

At Accent UK HQ, we are, like all independent creators feeling the pinch as planned releases, appearances and of course earnings have taken a hit. We remain though optimistic and with the likes of Kickstarter - still time to check out the current succesful Kia Wordsmith campaign - we are exploring available avenues and platforms to make our future endeavours available and are using the unexpected free time to develop a surprise or two.

Kia Wordsmith Continues!

The Kickstarter for Dave West's and Ian Ashcroft's second Kia Wordsmith comic is now live and looks to be an exciting continuation of the story. Please check it out here where both issues to date can be ordered!

John Freeman at his Down The Tubes comic news site also features the campaign here.

Heart's Desire - The Movie!

Ha! Ha! That was truly wonderful! Thhe splendid Steam Over Ether virtual Steampunk Festival has unvieled the world premiere of the first Accent UK comic strip to be animated!

Heart's Desire was one my strips from last year's Return To The Asylum comic, ably coloured by the very talented Matt Soffe. As stated, the strip was inspired by a truly lovely moment at the previous year's festival, involving two members of the longstanding steampunk community (and Asylum Festival family), which I used as the basis of a story featuring their ertswhile personas, Count Rostov and Lady M.

The story was fun to produce and thankfully well received by readers and the couple themselves and that was more or less that, until a fairly recent online discussion between the Count's alter ego and myself led to a suggestion to apply the 'radio-play' treatment to the comic strip and well that was the easy part, Keith himself and of course Malika did the rest with a wee nod from Mr B.

Well you can now see for yourself how things turned out here where the finished video was revealed in all it's splendid glory, there's even an 'after credits' bonus scene of the moment that inspired the whole undertaking! Oh, the video starts about 2 or 3 mins in but worth watching the whole thing including the Brigadier's short reading before and some Scottish chap chuntering about comics afterwards :)

The SteamPaper Shopping Channel!

As part of this weekend's splendid and fun SteamPunk Over Ether virtual festival, support of the contributing artists, musicians and performers is encouraged, all of whom have had their incomes directly affected by cancellation of events and gatherings so if you are in a position to show them any support, please do so.

There will be a dedicated shopping channel featured on the Steampaper page at or around 3pm today  but please check the channel's schedule for confirmation. Don't forget though that all performances, demonstrations and chatter will be subsquently available for 'catch up' on videos on the Steampaper facebook page.

In that spirit, you can also purchase copies of some of our comics in print or digitally by contacting me or checking out the etsy store, any difficulty, please comment below, thank you.

Steam over Ether is here!

This weekend is the splendid Steampunk Online Festival, Steampunk Over Ether which is guaranteed to bring you some fun, surprises and entertainments across the ether far and wide!

Accent UK comics have already been involved in the festival's run-up with our wee interview alongside, Time Bomb comics friend and frontman, Steve Tanner - available to catch up here!

There are lots of more treats, demonstrations and musical performances to enjoy, so please check out the event's schedule and tune in when you can or catch up afterwards.

I should also mention, that on a personal note, I'm particularly excited for the festival's world premiere of an innovative 'comic-play-animation' of my steampunk story, 'Heart's Desire', dramatised by the characters themselves aka Count Rostov and Lady M!

I'll post a link to the comic video when available but please check out Steam over Ether's weekend schedule and Steampaper's own page to discover some splendid new diversions!

Hello There!

Hi there if you find yourself directed here through a link from some of our cancelled convention or festival appearances. I'm part of an independent comic creator collective producing a diverse range of comic strips and publications, please browse this blog and its links for various information, commentary and surprises on comic, history and related subjects.

Please also have a read of some of my short comic strips posted recently to provide an insight into what we do and a wee distraction to your day :)

Comic Chats & Hats!

Well that was fun, big thanks to SteamPaper's presenter Keith for herding us all t'other night in a nice Comics  Double Feature Team-Up Crossover chat with Dave and I representing Accent UK and Time Bomb's founder & scribe, Steve Tanner.

It was really good to see each other and chew the fat on our respective comic creating approaches and forthcoming projects. Keith ably guided us through the 'techy set-up' bits and it seemed to be well received with several live comments and questions.

Thanks to all who viewed or commented and don't worry if you missed it, it's available on demand direct from Keith's SteamPaper facebook page here and scroll around for several other entertaining interviews and news on the forthcoming SteamPunk over Ether event appearing in this brave new virtual world on 25th & 26th April!