I’m pleased to see that British electronica pioneer John Foxx has a new artbook due soon. Electricity And Ghosts will offer a full retrospective of the art, photography and graphic design from his career.

I was a collector at one time, having at one time had all his early gatefold double-singles, as well as the early albums both with early Ultraxox and then solo. I say “was” a collector because he was in the bulk of my record collection, which was left behind when I went away to university in the late 1980s. But that collection and all those Foxx singles were later carted (unbeknown to me) to the local charity shop (‘thrift store’), by a relative who had always loathed the looks of Gary Numan and all those late-70s/early-80s electronica ‘Space Patrol cadets’.

Ah well, it’s all on .MP3 now (his early solo work is best had in one shot via the five-album The Virgin Years 1980-1985 which has the singles b-sides as a bonus). But it would certainly be nice to have all that Foxx pre-Photoshop artwork back again. The artbook is not yet on Amazon, and is currently only pre-ordering from the publisher. But I need books sent to an Amazon locker, so I’ll have to wait until it’s on Amazon. What a wasted marketing opportunity, since he’s currently front-page on the latest Electronic Sound magazine.

All those potential Amazon pre-orders from readers… and not even a way to save the book to your Amazon WishList.

Why write about a British electronica musician and singer here? Well, I always thought he must have been partly inspired by Lovecraft’s “The Outsider” and perhaps a little by the ‘ruined London’ theme in British science-fiction (with a nod to Ballard and the French flâneur tradition). His signature neo-romantic (not to be confused with the 80s synthetic popsters of the ‘New Romantics’ scene) imagery is of the ‘Grey Man’ in a suit walking through the sunset in a romantically-overgrown and abandoned London, through abandoned Georgian arcades and plazas and into gothic graveyards with oversized looming statuary. Very Lovecraft-of-the-letters. Though I don’t recall that he’s ever nodded to Lovecraft in an interview.

Newly arrived on Archive.org, 21 new scans of Monster Times.

I’m pleased to hear of a substantial new documentary film, on Doc Savage fandom and collecting. Nearly finished and set to preview at PulpFest 2024 in early August 2024…

Ron Hill is finishing work on ‘We Are Doc Savage: A Documentary on Fandom’. This feature-length documentary, two years in production, explores the history of Doc Savage fandom by interviewing dozens of the collectors, creators, and characters keeping the legacy of The Man of Bronze alive.

Trailers are available at the director Ron Hill’s website, as well as updates on progress. It sounds like a labour-of-love documentary and is stated as currently running 55 minutes. Though I guess there may now be scope for a crowd-funder to buy some rights, and thus make an extended version at some point? One which shows some images and clips that would require payment to use? But that’s just my guess.

Anyway, I’ve always had a soft-spot for Doc Savage. Having, as a lad, graduated from the Marvel/Curtis oversized b&w comics magazines (whole stories, effectively graphic novels and with decent artists), to some of the reprint books picked up at second-hand market stalls. That’s about where I left him in the 1980s, though I do recall the movie version (campy tone and cheesy music, but it had its moments).

What’s new with Doc? A lot of so-so modern comics, it seems. But, judging by a quick skip through Amazon, Will Murray’s very well-reviewed Doc Savage: Skull Island (The Wild Adventures of Doc Savage Book #6) (2013) novel would be the best starting-point re: the more recent Doc offerings. The ‘Wild’ series of novels ran 2011-2018, and there are 21 books. The ones I looked at have audiobooks, albeit expensive ones on CD. No Audible. Amazon finally have a chance to tempt me to an Audible subscription and yet… the ‘Wild’ Doc audiobooks are not on Audible.

Surprisingly, I see nothing on YouTube for “doc savage” “wild adventures”. I’d have expected trailers?

Now open in New York City, the exhibition “The Art and Story of Edgar Rice Burroughs: Selections from the Vinson Family Collection”. Until 27th July 2024 at the Society of Illustrators.

Currently for sale via honest Abe, a copy of Amazing Stories for September 1927 in ‘Fine’ condition. This issue carried Lovecraft’s “The Colour Out Of Space”, and I don’t recall ever seeing it come up for sale before now. It’s usually the first appearance of “Mountains” that’s for sale.

Read the scan at Archive.org.

My, how time flies at Tentaclii Towers. Tired by my new job but also sated by newly-abundant supplies of ginger beer and rhubarb crumble, I see I have let things slip. I thus need a round-up post for both March and April. Here is.

In my weekly ‘Picture Postals’ posts: I strolled around the Pendleton House courtyard; I had a close look at the The Providence Journal both as a building and as Lovecraft’s daily reading matter; continuing the newspaper theme I look in depth at Lovecraft’s possible reading of Krazy Kat; I peered into the thick ivy on Edwardian-era buildings and noted its occurrence in Lovecraft’s work and letters; I looked again at Providence’s Marketplace with the aid of a new-found vintage panorama picture; I added more items to my earlier look at Lovecraft’s marriage church, St. Paul’s Chapel in NYC; I looked briefly at his Grandpa Whipple’s school, the East Greenwich Academy; and I peered more intensively along Benefit Street and in doing so discovered that…

Ken Faig Jr. has Lovecraft’s uncle living and working as a doctor at 186 Benefit Street. Lovecraft’s funeral service was held opposite, at 187 Benefit Street. The grim irony of a funeral parlour facing a doctor’s house would not have escaped the young Lovecraft.

Also in pictures, I found a fan-visitor picture that offered a peep at the Barlow family house in Florida, and I turned up Utpatel’s original illustration board for Innsmouth.

Discovering a long-ago report on a talk by Thomas Honegger I took a long look at the similarities between Tolkien and Lovecraft. I failed to note there that Tolkien has his key ‘evil one’, Morgoth (master of Sauron) entering into Middle-earth like a walking mountain… “as a mountain that wades in the sea”. This was from the early 1950s, more than 20 years after Lovecraft’s “The Call of Cthulhu” had described Cthulhu similarly.

On Archive.org, scans of two of the early British anthologies appeared, Switch On The Light (1931) and Not At Night (1937) which had included Lovecraft. The first of these gave Lovecraft a hardcover wrapping for “The Rats in the Walls”.

Recent or forthcoming books include H.P. Lovecraft: Midnight Studies (June 2024); When Chaugnar Wakes: The Collected Poetry and Other Works of Frank Belknap Long; The Dagon Collection: An Auction Catalogue of Items Recovered in the Federal Raid on Innsmouth, Mass.; and a dead-tree facsimile edition of the “At The Mountains of Madness” manuscript. The French had a new chunky volume of translated Lovecraft letters. Coming soon from Hippocampus, a new expanded edition of Lovecraft’s Library and a new volume of Ken Faig Jr. essays on Lovecraft’s life.

In republished books, I was pleased to find the memoirs “Ah, Sweet Idiocy!” (1948), memoirs of a key early Lovecraft fan and publisher, in both the original and their free 2019 enhanced edition published in aid of the TAFF fund. I also spotted that a new edition of ‘the Eddys remember Lovecraft’ book The Gentleman From Angell Street had been funded on Kickstarter.

In journals, Zothique #17 appeared as a R.E. Howard special.

There was a call for contributions to the Dr. Henry Armitage Memorial Scholarship Symposium (still open, deadline 24th May); the journal Fantasy Art and Studies called for articles for a ‘Fantasy Flora’ issue (deadline: 10th June 2024);

Scampering around the dim tunnels of academia, I unearthed and linked a few papers, dissertations and more. With religion and philosophy prominent. Though there was one very interesting one from architecture, on “Visualizing Innsmouth” in 3D. One find was also fannish, “E.P. Berglund: Bibliographer of the Old Ones”. I even found some more far-out items, such as H.P. Lovecraft’s Megaliths: The Unknown In Plain Sight; and Theory of multidreams: a cosmic-dream investigation by H.P. Lovecraft.

In events, the NecronomiCon 2024 passes went on sale. I also found news of an interesting event at Lovecraft’s graveside, which I’m guessing is likely to be repeated around the time of NecronomiCon.

I was pleased to add another ‘Lovecraft as character’ book to the list, Shadows Bend: a novel of the fantastic and unspeakable (2006).

A game-based reference book Welcome to Arkham looked of interest and use to Mythos writers. Similarly useful, and also for steampunk writers, the old Monograph #319: Miskatonic University – The Gaslight Equipment Catalogue appeared on Archive.org.

In Mythos tales, I found that the Robert M. Price edited anthology The Exham Cycle had actually appeared in 2020 (at long last, after years of waiting). Sources and sequels to Lovecraft’s “The Rats in the Walls”.

In movies, the German movie ‘The Dreamlands’ (i.e. Lovecraft’s Dreamlands) has been funded and appears to be filming. The director previously made the highly acclaimed Die Farbe.

In comics, Randolph Carter appears as a French ‘BD’ graphic novel in June. An unknown quality at present.

In videogames I dug up the links for the Lovecraft mods for the famous early shooter videogame DOOM II.

In focused and researched podcasts there was one on Robert Bloch and the Cthulhu Mythos, and another on The Ocean in “The Call of Cthulhu”.

In the fine arts, I was pleased to discover Alfredo Baon of Spain, who has just begun a new series “Lovecraft’s Journeys”. I admired Abutova’s new “Colour Out of Space” digital paintings’ series.

In the artificial arts, I linked a number of free LORA plug-ins for free AI image-generator Stable Diffusion 1.5. I showed the results of text-generating AI (‘not quite ready for prime-time yet’, I thought) in the form of a Lovecraft poster. In April amazing AI auto-songs became possible, for free via Suno AI. Not perfect, but hugely impressive to see a listenable two-minute song pop out in seconds. Of course we’ve had quite passable no-lyrics generative music (e.g. Sonic Fire and its Smartsound modules) for a decade or more now, but… think what the new AI song / music / voice-cloning tools will be able to do in a few years time.

In Amazon bargains I spotted the hardback Mysteries of Time and Spirit for £27, and the second volume of the R.E. Howard letters in paperback for a mere £2. And offered them up to readers as links. Sadly it seems no-one wants either, as they’re still to be had.

Ok, that’s it for now. More soon.

The evil EU ‘cookies regulations’ are preventing access to this item from the UK, but thankfully Archive.org’s WayBack had grabbed a copy…

PROVIDENCE – The event H.P. Lovecraft Rising, a gathering recognizing the life and literary contributions of Lovecraft, will be held at Swan Point Cemetery, 585 Blackstone Blvd., on Sunday, April 21, at 2 p.m.

The event will feature dramatic readings of the prose and poetry of H.P. Lovecraft as well as songs, and recitations of poems composed for the occasion.

Presenters will be Christian Henry Tobler, a historian who resides in Oxford, Conn., who will preside as master of ceremonies, and Carl L. Johnson, of North Providence. Johnson is a relation to H.P. Lovecraft through three family lines, according to a news release. He has been organizing annual public literary tributes recognizing the unique literary contributions of H. P. Lovecraft since the first graveside honorarium, conducted at the author’s grave site in Swan Point Cemetery on March 15, 1987.

Admission is free. Parking is available in the lot by Swan Point Cemetery Office and Chapel buildings, located near the Cemetery’s entrance.

For more information, contact Johnson at carcosan@live.com.

So it’s been and gone, but you may want to contact Johnson, since I’d imagine he’ll also be organising something to coincide with NecronomiCon 2024.

New on Archive.org, the first scan of UFO Connection (1977). One of those oversized comic-a-zines of the later 1970s, which were able to present themes which sidestepped the U.S. Comics Code censorship. Here the readable (but not great) scan is of an Australian reprint of the U.S. Marvel Preview #13. It has a self-contained b&w 37-page strip riffing on various UFO themes of the period, with art by Herb Trimpe but nicely inked in a somewhat Neal Adams-alike manner. I’m not sure who did the cover, but it looks like Jim Starlin to me.

If you had this, you probably also had the similar ‘ancient aliens visited earth’ Marvel Preview #1 Man-Gods from Beyond the Stars (1975) somewhere alongside it. All good fun at the time, or when you found them in comic shops in the early 80s, and of course now debunked as total hokum. But still enjoyable as nostalgic science-fiction.