INTERVIEW: Eli Schwab & Bob Fingerman

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Joining me today are two very significant creative forces over at the Upstar Indie Comics publisher that promotes comics of every kind for every mind, Cosmic Lion Productions.

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One is not just the founder of Cosmic Lion, but he is also a comic creator himself, fellow podcaster, and maybe one of the most enthusiastic Grindle mega fans I have ever seen.

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The other is the critically acclaimed, Eiser nominated cartoonist who you may know for his work over at MAD Magazine and his cult comic series, Minimum Wage.

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It is my pleasure to welcome both Eli Schwab and Bob Fingerman onto the Oblivion Bar Podcast.

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Hey Chris, how's it going?

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Good to see you.

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Good to see you as well.

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Bob, had a very well-timed cough right there as I...

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um I'm a pro.

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I like to keep all my eruptions on mic, not off mic.

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I appreciate you getting that just out of the way right at the beginning.

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That's, that's perfect.

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And it's a nice sort of a break at the very beginning too, because it's such a pleasure to have both of you guys here today to again, talk about CLP, lot of the great stuff you guys are doing over there.

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Eli, mean, what I think what I'm most excited about in this conversation is, you know, of course I'm, very happy to have Bob here on the show and discuss all of his work, not just at CLP, but also prior to that.

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But I, I'm just very, very I'm trying to think of a less verbose way of just saying very excited to learn more about Cosmic Lion.

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Cause I've sort of seen your whole setup at different conventions is sort of in passing.

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And it's always, it's always like very busy, which is really, really cool to see, especially for, you know, the small press world.

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And we'll sort of get into the trials and tribulations of that.

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But I would love to start here if I can give us sort of that origin story, I guess you could say for CLP.

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And then is there an inciting incident that happened in your life that eventually pushed you towards the creation for this this publisher for I'd just like to say that it's an honor to just be working with Bob like Bob has been making comics and This might embarrass him a bit but my entire life like I was born and Bob is out there still making amazing books So it's just an honor to even have Bob mentioned in the same conversation as us.

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So let's just start there That's a very nice way of saying I am the oldest person in this room, so to speak.

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Well, I mean, it's amazing, you know, and I always tell Bob, know, like recently I was back home looking through my comics from growing up and I find this Ninja Turtle comic that I always thought was like weird and interesting and different.

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And of course, this is a Bob Fingerman joint, you know, so Bob's been out there doing it forever.

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So um I just want to make sure he has his just flower.

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Thank you.

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From me and.

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um You know, I have been making comics basically my whole life.

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So technically, you know, Bob and I have been making them the same time.

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Sure.

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Both of you have been comics your entire life Eli.

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That's true, yes.

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Yeah, so you know, I just always was drawing comics and once I started getting like out into work and wanting to figure out how I was going to really like make um a mark on the world around me, I found that it was through exalting the things I loved and comics and music always kind of being at the forefront.

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And so I started working at a music venue called Nectars in Burlington, Vermont, who recently shut down, which sucked so bad.

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um there I was given an opportunity to plan events and to be someone who is like putting together events for people.

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So I would do music.

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And then that's when I started being like, well, if I'm doing an event, I want to have comics be a part of it.

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And so that's when I kind of created Cosmic Lion.

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productions just kind of on a whim because I knew you needed to be branded.

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Everyone in Burlington that was putting on shows.

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Burlington, Vermont is where the venue was on if I said that in actors.

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um Everybody had their little um name, their cool like, you know, production company name.

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So was like, I've got to do something.

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I looked over at this poster for this band, Sound Tribe Sector Nine that I was really into at the time.

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And right in the middle, there was this lion with this kind of cosmos.

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in the forehead and that kind of combined things that I was already really into lions being a symbol that my grandparents had all over their home and is a big symbol in Judaism.

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And you know, I was big into learning about different religions and Rastafarianism at the time was a big thing.

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was listening to a lot of Bob Marley and, and many others, of course.

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And so the lion is just something that I kind of adopted.

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And then The comic that I created, Monkey Lion, was kind of all wrapped into that.

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And then just the cosmos is because of that image and then because the story that I started writing was basically like intergalactic Afro-funk band on tour through the galaxy, merging my love of like Ninja Turtles and Star Trek and music touring, which I had been working on for a while.

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And so that was like you asked the inciting incident where it was just a convergence of all these things where now I was able to provide a service for people and create something and I wanted to have it under my own thing.

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I wanted to have my own comic and my own stuff to do.

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So that all it all kind of happened at once Monkey Lion, Cosmic Lion Productions and these Cosmic Lion nights at Nectar's that I would plan which was like every Monday, which I know is a tough day, but I was just starting out.

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uh Monday nights for like four or five months I planned and they were all Cosmic Lion nights.

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There was always comics and stuff.

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Well, there's so much there to pick on.

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think there, I want to noodle on that some more, but I want to get over to Bob as well.

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Cause I think as Eli, you sort of, you reiterated this in the beginning and I definitely wanted to give Bob his flowers.

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You, Bob, have a, an insane career in comics over the last, you know, 30 plus years.

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And I just have to know from your perspective as a creator, what was initially so appealing about Cosmic Lion and for you to bring your work over to this sort of upstart indie publisher.

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Well, I mean, you know, it's probably a complicated answer.

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I met Eli at, was it the LA Comic Con?

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Yeah.

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Our mutual friend, Shelly Bond, introduced us.

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And I was kind of, you know, between publishers.

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And I was looking at everything on Eli's table.

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And, you know, kind of whenever you're looking at something unfamiliar, you do try to find something familiar to kind of latch on to.

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And he had published a book by a friend of mine, Gideon Kendall, called Way to Gets Worse.

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I thought, yeah, Gideon's here.

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Because, you know, any time you uh approach a publisher, you don't know what you're getting into.

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uh So I reached out.

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to Gideon, said, I met this guy, Eli, he seems like a nice guy, is he legit?

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You know, gotta do your due diligence.

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And Gideon reassured me and assured me, he's like, yeah, he's legit, you should talk to the man.

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So basically I had a project, thought, I couldn't necessarily say it would be a good fit, because you never know.

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My project was very different than the stuff Eli had on his table.

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But I knew it was a good book.

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I thought the quality of it would uh appeal.

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And so yeah, we got together, think, for lunch uh at a place called Alcove.

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I think And the romance began there.

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So yeah, you know.

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I mean, basically, I came with a list of demands.

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I was like, OK, this is the new guy.

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Let me see if I'll get what I want.

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uh And it was really all about production value.

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It was all about, I get the best looking book, the best format for showcasing the art?

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And I said, you know, I wanted hardcover and I wanted oversized.

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And Eli pulled a book right out of his bag.

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That was the exact size I had in mind that he had published called Ghost Agent.

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And he was like, is this the size you want?

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Is this your card?

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And I said, oh yeah.

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And that's exactly what I have in mind.

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So.

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You know, it was a pretty, I think, pretty organic beginning.

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It sounds seamless.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Did this eventually become printopia?

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Is this the series you're talking about?

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Interesting.

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Okay.

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And I guess Eli, from your perspective in that moment, I guess, A, I would love to get sort of a peek inside your mind when you have Bob Fingerman in front of you asking about this potential partnership, but also B, how do you properly uh satiate a creator when they ask for certain things?

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Do you just, are you someone who just says yes and then you figure it out or do you sort of temper things initially and then you sort of, you know, give them the moon eventually once you can get that.

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You know, I was very excited to work with Bob not not just because of like, you know who he was our great conversation, but You know, I don't think he'll be upset to hear me say this but you know I'm always trying to do things that are gonna help cosmic line and just be better too And I think working with Bob is something that was gonna do that This is a great book that I knew like I mean it was glorious And it was beautiful.

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like upon my first looking, was just another, it was just like a new like vine growing out of the body of Cosmic Lion that I knew could grow.

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And so, you know, I did just say, yeah, let's, let's do it.

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I was very excited.

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I read the book and I was like, I love this, you know, I put it on my iPad and read it.

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like, um, I think that in that first meeting, I was just like, let's go for it.

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There was no, I don't think there was much.

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You know, I like I went there for lunch and I, didn't get any food and we like talked for like a few hours.

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And by the time I was done, I was like, I am so hungry.

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I didn't take care of myself for like three hours because I was like so into this conversation, you know?

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like, I think it just was, you know, I think just sparks flew immediately and I was ready to go.

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And that's how I, most of this for me is on feel and immediate like Like sometimes for me, when I'm given a submission, know like this instantly, whether I'm going to like it or not, or whether I want to move forward with it or not.

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I get almost grasped speed like immediately.

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And if it doesn't, I'll read and dig in a little bit more.

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But when it does, when I do see it and it gives me that immediate spark, I'm like, let's go.

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I also already had lined up all the blurbs for the book.

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And I remember you said something, but I remember you said something like, well, if they're endorsing it, you know.

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Yeah Draining says it's good, it's gotta be.

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Well, I'm going to be like a dirty name dropper here, but I think it sort of coincides with what Bob is saying here in terms of, I think for creators as they get long in the tooth of their careers and they sort of establish themselves as I say that respectfully, Bob, I hope that doesn't come off across as a, keep making fun of your age.

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I promise you that's not going to continue.

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But like when you've established yourself in this medium and in this industry, I think one of the most important, if not the most important thing that you can ask for from a publisher, especially a small publisher is freedom.

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Right.

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And I've heard that from we've had Christopher priest on the show here recently.

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Uh, I don't know if you've heard of a little indie creator called Tom McFarland.

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He's talked about constantly about his career, you know, sort of like what happened in his career and how basically freedom is what drove him to where he is now.

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And you, keep hearing this over and over again about this freedom.

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And I don't know if that stems from people being burned by the big two or if there are certain rules that other publishers, but Bob, I'm just curious throughout your career.

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And I think we can all agree in this conversation that when you see a finger, man, original.

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It is so like, know, that's who that is, right?

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There's almost no mistaking it.

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I'm just curious as you've gotten, you know, throughout your career here recently, I'll say even before CLP, have you gotten a lot of resistance from people who just want to sort of maybe micromanage or dictate how your series is printed and distributed or even read?

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No, I don't put myself in that trap.

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mean, I think I probably, you can second guess a career till you're dying breath.

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And there are definitely things where I think, well, if I had done this differently or that differently, maybe I would have a bigger audience or this or that.

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But I've always stuck to my guns about what I want, for good or for ill.

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Because it's an art form and like the worst place.

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to start from for me is a place of compromise, which is not to say I'm unreasonable.

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I'm a big believer in having, if you have a good editor, your work will probably be better for it.

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But someone saying don't do this and don't do that because, and then they have some either justification that has to do with some perceived market.

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This is what the market wants or this or that.

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You're already, you've lost.

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I have a voice, you know, it's a distinct voice.

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It's not a voice everyone is gonna respond to.

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That's fine though, you know?

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I think the more anodyne the work, you know, that's that whole thing of like, let's appeal to the broadest audience possible.

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Well, instantly, you know, that work is gonna shrink in its uh daring and originality.

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uh thing that's made for everyone is made for no one.

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Yeah, exactly.

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you know, the first, obviously the first audience for anything is myself.

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Would I want to read this?

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More importantly, would I want to spend the next year or whatever writing and drawing this?

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You know, this is the other thing about comics is at least the way I do them, it's very labor intensive process.

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So I'd better like it or it's going to be a real misery.

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Like one of the only things I ever did in my career that I...

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And even there, didn't do it because I was thinking of a market.

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I just thought, well, let me try something different.

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The very first graphic novel I did was a thing for Dark Horse called White Like She that was serialized uh over four issues.

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And I drew it in a style that was absolutely different than anything I'd ever done.

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And I almost instantly regretted it.

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Because I was like, god, I've committed to this thing.

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Now I've got to do it.

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But you know, even that was a learning experience.

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You have to try something before you know it's a good fit or a bad fit.

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So I don't really regret anything I've done uh creatively.

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um But yeah, generally speaking, I think even when working with publishers like Dark Horse or, you know, uh big publishers like that, generally speaking, if they hired me to do something, it's because they wanted me to do it the way I do things.

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you know.

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So that's been pretty good.

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Yeah, it's interesting.

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I think that that lesson happened to you so early in your career is not sort of a, that's not an obscure moment.

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I think a lot of creatives, especially those that have wanted to tell stories in comic form, learn pretty quickly that you're either going to take the long road via small press, or you're probably going to end up doing like a venom tie-in over at Marvel.

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You know, like that's where your career generally starts, at least in today's world.

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I'm sure it was probably a lot different when you were first getting into the industry, Bob.

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Well, I think it also starts from what is what inspired you in the first place.

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And I know I am an outlier in comics in that I did not read comics when I, comic books when I was a kid, I just didn't.

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I'm not a superhero guy, never been a superhero guy.

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It's like, so in a way the wanting to do characters and trademarks that belong to somebody else.

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was never something I wanted.

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It's like the stuff that I responded to was very individualistic right out of the gate, like from when I was a really little kid on.

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I mean, underground comics, I probably was introduced to them a little younger than I should have been, but not too young.

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But even the creators I looked at, people who end up doing comic books, you don't hear Jules Feiffer as often as, you hear Jack Kirby.

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But that's the kind of thing I was looking at.

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And Gayon Wilson and Tintin, Tintin was big for me.

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And that's an individual.

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That's somebody who created something.

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so that kind of set the die for how I wanted to do comics.

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It's like, it should be my thing.

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Well, I'll tell you what, Eli, we're kind of on the same topic and this is kind of what I was building towards a moment ago.

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But, you know, there have been so many changes here in the comic industry in 2025.

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And, you know, we had the Diamond debacle, of course, earlier in the year.

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And I think that sort of uh that happening felt like sort of a slow burn death there for Diamond, possibly unexpected tariffs still affecting people, especially the small press folks.

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uh I've even seen and, you know, numbers vary depending on which outlet you're going to.

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But Readership is kind of down this year in 2025.

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It seems to be down this year and outside of the big two.

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So I'm just curious, you know, again, being the head of CLP, are there some huge, I wouldn't even say huge, let's, change that up a little bit.

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Are there some new tactics?

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Are there some sort of interesting tactics that you're taking over there at CLP, CLP that gets eyes on the, uh, the new titles you have there?

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Yeah, that is interesting because we you know, we got in with diamond like only it was like a year before they Imploded so was this really like whirlwind You know integration and out to Gration with them.

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It was just like like a roller coaster You know of it doing great and then it starting to fall off and then the news came out It was just a whirlwind for us.

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So like, you know, we reached this level of like, my God, we finally have this big distribution.

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We're going to all the stores around the world.

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And then it was just like taken away from us immediately.

00:18:39.491 --> 00:18:42.094
And so that really sucked for us.

00:18:42.094 --> 00:18:52.050
Now, um since then, it's been kind of this struggle to find who's going to be, you know, publishing or distributing now.

00:18:52.050 --> 00:18:53.781
Who's, do we want to go to?

00:18:53.781 --> 00:19:02.055
Who's even got the staying power that we're so that we want to put all of our birds into their basket and we haven't found anyone yet.

00:19:02.055 --> 00:19:10.576
um know, something new that I've done is we hired a press company, a modern fanatic who has been helping us out a lot.

00:19:10.576 --> 00:19:12.298
I mean, hey, they got us this interview.

00:19:12.298 --> 00:19:15.097
So thanks Tyler and all the guys over there.

00:19:15.939 --> 00:19:34.276
you know, like I'm trying to find the best ways to get help, you know, and, you know, I hired an editor and I, you know, got someone to head this manga team and You know, I just know that manga is like the number one selling, you know, paper product in the world.

00:19:34.276 --> 00:19:35.856
You know, it outsells toilet paper.

00:19:35.856 --> 00:19:40.410
So I figured like, I don't know if that's a real fact, but it might.

00:19:40.611 --> 00:19:42.613
Checking the news that is correct.

00:19:42.613 --> 00:19:42.876
Actually.

00:19:42.876 --> 00:19:44.578
Yeah Yeah, see, yeah.

00:19:44.578 --> 00:19:48.362
See, the voracious reader is more thirsty than the voracious.

00:19:49.182 --> 00:19:52.586
So, No, I don't know.

00:19:52.586 --> 00:20:01.834
Anyway, so like I'm trying all these ways to diversify, uh to diversify what we're doing and just get it out in front of a million eyes.

00:20:01.834 --> 00:20:27.454
And you know, nothing's better than having this like uh team, uh family, you know, this this strong um you know, if I am Archangel, they are the metal wings that spread and send uh metal arrows of talent throughout the world of cons and stuff, because I just don't feel like there's a better way than cons to like get this out to people.

00:20:27.454 --> 00:20:29.835
Cons! You know what I'm saying?

00:20:29.835 --> 00:20:42.692
And so, you know, that tactic I don't think can change because, um you know, getting our people out in front of out in front of their fans and being able to connect with people is the best thing.

00:20:42.713 --> 00:20:52.643
Bob and I just did a uh con here recently that was just, it was like three or four hours of just like consolidated like fans.

00:20:52.643 --> 00:20:54.125
And it was like absolutely insane.

00:20:54.125 --> 00:20:57.048
was like one of the best cons of the year, you know?

00:20:57.048 --> 00:21:03.473
And it's just, there's nothing better than finding a way to reach that core audience and really get them.

00:21:03.473 --> 00:21:04.205
So.

00:21:04.205 --> 00:21:08.826
You know, there's no definitive thing that I've found and we just continue to do more and more things.

00:21:08.826 --> 00:21:12.746
We're exploring a lot more options with distribution in 2026.

00:21:12.746 --> 00:21:16.586
We're going to find it and we're going to start doing some big moves.

00:21:16.586 --> 00:21:19.486
We've already kind of set the wheels in motion.

00:21:19.486 --> 00:21:23.486
have a full rollout for the first six months of next year.

00:21:23.486 --> 00:21:25.486
We're, we're back cataloging.

00:21:25.486 --> 00:21:26.685
We're getting stuff ready.

00:21:26.685 --> 00:21:28.526
We're planning strategically.

00:21:28.766 --> 00:21:34.205
So yeah, we're just, we're taking it from just like a dude.

00:21:34.317 --> 00:21:45.028
uh In his office to like a team across the world trying to just make it make it the best it can be You know, it's, I gotta be honest with you, Eli, this is super impressive.

00:21:45.028 --> 00:21:48.080
I'll just say from someone who's been reading comics for a lot of their life.

00:21:48.080 --> 00:21:52.864
And I know that the small press is usually up against it, right?

00:21:52.864 --> 00:22:00.319
mean, Marvel can put out seven Spider-Man books and those will be like, of those seven, four of them will be in the top 10 each month in selling.

00:22:00.319 --> 00:22:05.163
And they're probably, if we're all being honest on this call, not that great, right?

00:22:05.163 --> 00:22:10.938
And I'm just, you know, you talking about this and I'm just curious, like, What is your background in comics?

00:22:10.938 --> 00:22:12.311
you know, I obviously you're a fan.

00:22:12.311 --> 00:22:14.294
I can see just behind you looking at your background.

00:22:14.294 --> 00:22:20.589
You clearly have a deep love of the medium, but like, how did you even have the know-how to want to go about doing this?

00:22:20.750 --> 00:22:22.309
I don't know if I did, honestly.

00:22:22.309 --> 00:22:25.451
I did go to like an entertainment business college.

00:22:25.451 --> 00:22:36.036
When um I went to college out of high school, I just went on fish tour during finals and didn't really do anything.

00:22:36.036 --> 00:22:38.146
And then went out into the workforce.

00:22:38.146 --> 00:22:49.882
And then that's when I started working at Nectars and learning how to um become not just a businessman, but a business man, as Jay-Z once said.

00:22:50.125 --> 00:23:02.623
um But, uh you know, you just work with a lot of people and you worked at, I worked at a small business there, Nectars, to learn how to market yourself and do all that.

00:23:02.623 --> 00:23:04.354
And so I did that for 10 years.

00:23:04.354 --> 00:23:13.859
And then I went back to school, entertainment business at Full Sail, where I kind of got this like holistic entertainment kind of view.

00:23:13.859 --> 00:23:19.951
And Full Sail is an interesting college because, um you know, people who work there can get great people to come in.

00:23:19.951 --> 00:23:25.771
And so I worked with, you know, one of the Backstreet Boys came in and we worked with him in like a marketing class.

00:23:25.771 --> 00:23:37.806
And, you know, we worked with this guy who, who is the number one like blue camera or he, you know, he works with, no, no, sorry, red cameras and shoots IMAX for NASA.

00:23:37.806 --> 00:23:47.198
And we worked with all these different people to learn different aspects of the medium of different mediums of the business of entertainment.

00:23:47.480 --> 00:23:49.111
Unfortunately, no one in comics really.

00:23:49.111 --> 00:23:54.825
And then I just kind of like you dive into it and you fake it till you make it kind of thing.

00:23:54.825 --> 00:24:07.124
I'm not too proud to say that, but then you just meet great people like meeting someone like Shelly Bond and learning from them or Bob or getting in with retailers.

00:24:07.124 --> 00:24:13.949
I always find great friends who are retailers, some of the greatest people to talk to.

00:24:13.949 --> 00:24:15.617
And you just kind of.

00:24:15.617 --> 00:24:20.122
pick people's brains and that's how I did it.

00:24:20.122 --> 00:24:30.412
mean, you just put yourself in there and fake it till you make it and have some confidence and a little bit of elbow grease and you know.

00:24:30.412 --> 00:24:35.323
I've always said, uh, one of my favorite sayings is greatness is in the agency of others.

00:24:35.323 --> 00:24:53.949
So if you see someone that has a good idea, or if you, uh, if you admire someone, something that's really frustrating to me is when I see someone who's very talented and they just want to make their own, they, they would just want to pave their own road instead of taking, you know, little bits and pieces from people who have done it before them maybe well, and they just sort of add that to their tool belt.

00:24:53.949 --> 00:24:58.935
I mean, there's nothing wrong with the road less traveled, but I think it would be silly sometimes to not just.

00:24:58.935 --> 00:25:00.153
take a good idea when you see it.

00:25:00.153 --> 00:25:02.654
And it kind of sounds like that's what you're doing here.

00:25:03.425 --> 00:25:04.067
100%.

00:25:04.067 --> 00:25:08.871
I feel like that's something I learned from musicians, listening to musicians talk about writing music.

00:25:08.871 --> 00:25:12.253
There's a guy, Victor Wooten, I still love, he's absolutely amazing.

00:25:12.253 --> 00:25:18.837
But he just talks about how to make a great bass groove or something as you start off with the bass groove you love.

00:25:18.838 --> 00:25:24.313
And you just kind of start variating, variating until you get to something new and then you're like, there it is, you know?

00:25:24.313 --> 00:25:27.205
And so that's what I did with starting my own comic.

00:25:27.205 --> 00:25:31.670
I love Star Trek and Ninja Turtles, let's smash them together and see what I can get out of it.

00:25:31.670 --> 00:25:32.779
you know, so...

00:25:32.865 --> 00:25:36.169
you gotta incorporate the things that make it great.

00:25:36.169 --> 00:25:38.391
you know, I grew up loving R.

00:25:38.391 --> 00:25:45.676
Crumb and the Zap Comics guys and that tied in with my like love of the San Francisco scene and Grateful Dead and poster art.

00:25:45.676 --> 00:25:51.031
so then that grassroots kind of campaign stuff and just making stuff.

00:25:51.031 --> 00:25:56.886
And then that's when like Jim Mahfood and his underground, know, zines came into my world.

00:25:56.886 --> 00:25:59.088
then I just saw that.

00:25:59.088 --> 00:25:59.630
dude.

00:25:59.630 --> 00:26:00.109
And then...

00:26:00.109 --> 00:26:04.210
I actually have that first comic I bought in a little frame back here.

00:26:04.990 --> 00:26:09.769
you know, it's just, was, and I just was like, okay, this is just paper photocopied and stapled together.

00:26:09.769 --> 00:26:17.390
So then that informed me on how I could next, know, like, so it's just those little things and I just stole it, you know, like, steal it, you incorporate it.

00:26:17.390 --> 00:26:21.579
You, are the thing, the blob that just absorbs.

00:26:21.579 --> 00:26:23.010
Yeah, absolutely.

00:26:23.111 --> 00:26:28.194
guess I'm going to ask the question slightly different, Bob, because I feel like you have to have a great perspective on this.

00:26:28.194 --> 00:26:31.018
uh Gosh, I'm putting a lot of pressure on you now by asking it like this.

00:26:31.018 --> 00:26:46.589
But I guess in this very similar light, as it from a creator's perspective or just someone who just loves the medium in the industry, what are some of the biggest challenges you think facing indie creators and just indie comics going into 2026?

00:26:46.894 --> 00:26:49.273
Oh boy, Pearls of wisdom?

00:26:49.273 --> 00:26:50.473
I don't know.

00:26:50.933 --> 00:26:52.894
I don't know how you say love the industry.

00:26:52.894 --> 00:26:55.554
I don't think I do love the industry.

00:26:55.894 --> 00:26:57.480
He's on us everybody.

00:26:57.632 --> 00:27:01.404
Yeah, it's one of those things where it's like, love the medium.

00:27:01.404 --> 00:27:02.865
I love the medium of comics.

00:27:02.865 --> 00:27:04.507
I love creating comics.

00:27:04.507 --> 00:27:06.038
Do I love the infrastructure?

00:27:06.038 --> 00:27:07.805
Yeah, it's...

00:27:07.805 --> 00:27:11.352
You know, as it used to say on my report card, needs improvement.

00:27:11.352 --> 00:27:20.176
um So, you know, but the thing is, I mean, again, um I'm the dinosaur here.

00:27:20.438 --> 00:27:22.829
been doing this professionally for 40 years.

00:27:22.829 --> 00:27:26.465
One of the books that actually next month comes out from Eli.

00:27:26.465 --> 00:27:39.196
from Cosmic Lion is uh my book, That's Some Business You're In, the title of which comes from my father, because every time I would talk about what I did for a living, he would just shake his head and say, that's some business you're in.

00:27:39.196 --> 00:27:40.867
So, seemed appropriate.

00:27:40.867 --> 00:27:45.741
But I mean, it's a book about 40 years of doing this professionally.

00:27:45.741 --> 00:27:49.304
Forget about the years I did it just coming up.

00:27:49.704 --> 00:28:00.710
And the thing is, when you start a career, ah at a certain time, you think things somehow are set in stone.

00:28:00.710 --> 00:28:04.450
What you don't realize is everything is always changing.

00:28:04.569 --> 00:28:08.730
People change, the world changes, industries change.

00:28:08.730 --> 00:28:13.809
So the comics business has radically changed since I started.

00:28:13.809 --> 00:28:16.970
I started professionally in 1984.

00:28:18.029 --> 00:28:27.965
And back then, a book that would be considered an absolute crushing abysmal failure would be a huge success now.

00:28:27.965 --> 00:28:30.597
Like for instance, I mentioned White Like She before.

00:28:30.597 --> 00:28:41.124
When Dark Horse published that, the reason they didn't put it out, they didn't do the collected version as a trade paperback, is because it only sold in the 10 to 15 thousand range.

00:28:41.124 --> 00:28:45.453
ah So it was kind of a fail.

00:28:45.453 --> 00:28:47.368
Those are absolute bad hand numbers now.

00:28:47.847 --> 00:28:52.049
I was going to say, now you would literally kill somebody to get those kind of numbers.

00:28:52.049 --> 00:28:54.260
So the thing is, it changes.

00:28:54.260 --> 00:29:05.724
So when I look ahead at 2026, I look at the beginning of every year for, it might sound like it's in spite of what I'm saying, with optimism.

00:29:05.724 --> 00:29:07.365
know, I don't move forward.

00:29:07.365 --> 00:29:12.208
I wouldn't keep doing this if I didn't have some sense of optimism.

00:29:12.208 --> 00:29:20.454
But I also have learned, and it was a hard lesson to learn, to basically manage one's expectations.

00:29:20.454 --> 00:29:22.395
That's a huge thing.

00:29:22.395 --> 00:29:32.180
When you constantly are setting the goal for the ideal, all you're doing is setting yourself up for disappointment.

00:29:32.180 --> 00:29:38.102
Because that ideal is hardly attained by anybody ah anymore.

00:29:38.423 --> 00:29:49.798
So all you can do is really try to find your people and make peace with the fact that you know you have more people than you're finding and are finding you.

00:29:49.798 --> 00:29:51.179
They're out there.

00:29:51.179 --> 00:29:52.480
But that's the whole challenge.

00:29:52.480 --> 00:29:54.920
Like, how do you find your audience?

00:29:54.920 --> 00:30:01.821
Because especially, you've got 10 zillion voices screaming for attention all the time.

00:30:02.261 --> 00:30:06.384
And, you know, not everyone can be a TikTok star.

00:30:06.384 --> 00:30:08.874
And even there, I don't know.

00:30:08.874 --> 00:30:14.905
Like, say if you had a million followers on TikTok, what's then...

00:30:14.988 --> 00:30:20.763
the percentage that would actually buy something you create when they can just look at you creating content for free.

00:30:21.025 --> 00:30:28.125
So there's no, you know, I'm sorry, this is a long winded answer, but the truth is, there's really no answer to the question.

00:30:28.125 --> 00:30:29.634
I already forgot what it was.

00:30:29.634 --> 00:30:38.003
ah The question was, I want Bob just to wax poetics for uh five to seven minutes.

00:30:38.003 --> 00:30:38.759
You succeeded.

00:30:38.759 --> 00:30:40.369
Did it! Then you teed me up.

00:30:40.369 --> 00:30:55.478
uh The funny thing about the TikTok star thing too is you may get them to buy that first book, but then they usually don't come back for a second because they bought it because they're buying into your videos, not because they like to read comics.

00:30:55.478 --> 00:31:02.357
So it's more important to get them to buy issue two, issue three, or a new title, you know, to how do you keep the repeat?

00:31:02.577 --> 00:31:15.109
Because, know, my whole family and cousins and friends from home bought the first issue of Monkey line, but virtually none of them came back for two or three, four, and don't buy from me now.

00:31:15.109 --> 00:31:20.622
So it's like, have to sell people on the whole thing.

00:31:20.622 --> 00:31:21.390
You know.

00:31:21.390 --> 00:31:32.130
And I think the other thing is whether this is an old-fashioned idea or not, the consumer wants value for their dollar.

00:31:32.130 --> 00:31:34.509
And the thing is, things ain't getting cheaper.

00:31:35.589 --> 00:31:39.509
So give them their money's worth.

00:31:39.509 --> 00:31:40.269
You know, sometimes...

00:31:40.269 --> 00:31:50.730
I mean, that's the thing about comics is a lot of times you'll get this comic that you've been really excited about and you read it and ten minutes later you're done.

00:31:51.084 --> 00:31:54.537
And it's just like, well, okay then.

00:31:54.537 --> 00:32:00.521
That was five or six bucks for 15 minutes of entertainment.

00:32:00.521 --> 00:32:01.923
Am I gonna look at it again?

00:32:01.923 --> 00:32:08.428
Some people do, they'll look at it to appreciate the art, but a lot of people, that first read is also their last read.

00:32:08.428 --> 00:32:15.384
So it's gotta be something that's really gonna get its hooks into them, make them feel like, yeah, that was really worthwhile.

00:32:15.384 --> 00:32:18.886
I hope I wanna see more.

00:32:18.886 --> 00:32:20.844
As a creator, the only thing.

00:32:20.844 --> 00:32:37.294
I take into account maybe that is a little bit market based, but it's also the aesthetic that I have is I want people to feel like they got their money's worth, you know, because I do think like a consumer, I am a consumer when I'm making a decision, what am I going to buy?

00:32:37.294 --> 00:32:41.182
I want to look at it and say, yeah, that'll keep me busy for a little bit.

00:32:41.522 --> 00:32:51.998
I mean, this is where like, just as a sidebar, like people who don't play video games, Okay, pay $60, $70 for this thing?

00:32:52.357 --> 00:32:56.698
Yeah, because I'll get like 300 hours of entertainment out of it.

00:32:56.698 --> 00:33:04.258
It's like, can you name anything else where in terms of hours versus dollars, you're going to get a more bang for your buck?

00:33:04.258 --> 00:33:07.577
A great video game will keep you busy.

00:33:07.998 --> 00:33:10.117
Look at Grand Theft Auto V.

00:33:10.157 --> 00:33:12.278
That's games 15 years old.

00:33:12.278 --> 00:33:14.038
People still play it every day.

00:33:14.038 --> 00:33:15.498
There's never been a better deal.

00:33:15.498 --> 00:33:17.657
And that's why it is literally...

00:33:17.771 --> 00:33:22.463
the most successful entertainment property in the history of entertainment.

00:33:23.984 --> 00:33:34.605
you know, so that's a long way of saying if I'm going to do a comic, there's going to be extraneous detail in every panel because I want people to have something to look at.

00:33:34.605 --> 00:33:35.711
It's like, OK, I read it.

00:33:35.711 --> 00:33:37.201
Now I look at the background.

00:33:37.201 --> 00:33:37.852
yeah, look at that.

00:33:37.852 --> 00:33:38.251
Look at that.

00:33:38.251 --> 00:33:38.692
Look at that.

00:33:38.692 --> 00:33:39.393
Look at that.

00:33:39.393 --> 00:33:41.292
There's going to be eye candy.

00:33:42.284 --> 00:33:43.554
Yeah, it's interesting.

00:33:43.634 --> 00:33:45.905
like that is actually I'm a big collector.

00:33:45.905 --> 00:33:47.057
I'm a dirty trade waiter.

00:33:47.057 --> 00:33:47.467
Everybody.

00:33:47.467 --> 00:33:48.717
I'll admit it here live on the show.

00:33:48.717 --> 00:33:54.421
think most listeners know this by now, but I will say that what we're talking about right here is something that I often falter at.

00:33:54.421 --> 00:33:56.801
Is that like, I will just buy from creators.

00:33:56.801 --> 00:33:58.603
really like that sort of been Mike progression.

00:33:58.603 --> 00:34:01.785
It went from buying big two to falling creators.

00:34:01.785 --> 00:34:03.095
And now it's funny.

00:34:03.095 --> 00:34:08.847
We're talking to you, Bob, because I feel like you really, you very much sit in this camp is that I like other than how style, right?

00:34:08.847 --> 00:34:10.190
If it's challenging.

00:34:10.190 --> 00:34:12.730
or if it's, if it presses the boundaries.

00:34:12.730 --> 00:34:15.630
think Jim, you mentioned Eli, you mentioned Jim Maffood earlier.

00:34:15.630 --> 00:34:22.409
I think he's a great example of this as well, of someone who is just telling stories differently in comics today, right?

00:34:22.409 --> 00:34:24.429
I think that's so important.

00:34:24.429 --> 00:34:33.510
And I feel like a lot of times when you have a comic or this art object, I'll say that you can, again, as you said, Bob, you can sort of study for a bit, right?

00:34:33.510 --> 00:34:38.670
I'm thinking one that comes to mind immediately is like Jesse Lonergan's drone that came out through.

00:34:38.670 --> 00:34:40.911
uh 23rd Street earlier this year.

00:34:40.911 --> 00:34:45.956
That's a book that you could easily read in, you know, 30 minutes if you really want to.

00:34:45.956 --> 00:34:52.583
But if you really sit there and study panel layouts and a lot of what you're saying, Bob, like the background and what, is he trying to tell you visually?

00:34:52.583 --> 00:34:53.103
Right.

00:34:53.103 --> 00:34:54.175
I think that's so important.

00:34:54.175 --> 00:34:56.666
You could study that book for a week at least.

00:34:56.666 --> 00:34:57.487
Right.

00:34:57.487 --> 00:34:59.068
So that's very valuable.

00:34:59.068 --> 00:35:03.172
And I want to sort of tie this into a question instead of just bragging about Jesse Lonergan, even though he's great.

00:35:03.172 --> 00:35:04.637
uh He's great.

00:35:04.637 --> 00:35:05.673
He's great.

00:35:05.826 --> 00:35:08.327
So again, Eli, I'm gonna start with you here.

00:35:08.327 --> 00:35:10.748
And I've heard you say this and I find it really admirable.

00:35:10.748 --> 00:35:20.333
You said that your dream is for when someone walks up to your Cosmic Lion booth at a convention, no matter their taste, you want them to find something that speaks to them.

00:35:20.333 --> 00:35:32.717
So outside of Bob and his work at CLP with Printopia and Reese's Pieces, which I know is already among some of your best sellers, I'm sure, but who are a couple other creators or series?

00:35:32.717 --> 00:35:35.458
that are over at CLP that you think should be on people's radar.

00:35:35.458 --> 00:35:36.538
And I know it's hard to pick.

00:35:36.538 --> 00:35:37.777
It's like picking your kids, right?

00:35:37.777 --> 00:35:45.132
Like you can't, it's hard to pick favorites, just front of brain, who are some folks that you think are really making it some noise over at CLP?

00:35:45.132 --> 00:35:47.922
Yeah, I mean, I guess I can go off sales.

00:35:47.922 --> 00:35:53.144
And I mean, it kind of started with Kevin Catalan, who does Space Nights.

00:35:53.144 --> 00:35:58.047
He was one of the first kind of like all stars that we have where, you know, we had him at the booth.

00:35:58.047 --> 00:36:01.268
And this was, you know, when I maybe had like five or six books.

00:36:01.268 --> 00:36:03.710
He was one of the first guys that I picked up.

00:36:03.710 --> 00:36:07.630
And, you know, his book would just sell, just sell out and sell out.

00:36:07.630 --> 00:36:08.731
And everyone was coming.

00:36:08.731 --> 00:36:09.541
We heard about this.

00:36:09.541 --> 00:36:10.831
We heard about this.

00:36:10.871 --> 00:36:15.096
And like still to this day, I think I might have actually just sold my last one.

00:36:15.096 --> 00:36:16.505
kept like finding packs.

00:36:16.505 --> 00:36:19.226
found like, so like we're sold out now.

00:36:19.967 --> 00:36:22.967
Although I do have two that are printed upside down.

00:36:22.967 --> 00:36:25.418
you guys are in upside down and backwards.

00:36:25.418 --> 00:36:27.869
a couple oops in there.

00:36:27.869 --> 00:36:35.711
um But uh he was one of the first ones that really like started blowing us away.

00:36:35.711 --> 00:36:50.324
And, and you know, then he immediately got on with IDW and started doing turtles covers and full Godzilla book now and street sharks and oh You know at San Diego Comic-Con they had his Street Sharks piece humongous on their backdrop and he didn't even know.

00:36:50.324 --> 00:36:51.025
Wow.

00:36:51.025 --> 00:36:53.777
And not that that's bad, you know, he signed a contract.

00:36:53.777 --> 00:37:10.742
They don't have to tell him but you know, so I sent him the image and he was just like whoa, know, and so like Kevin Catalan was one that really blew us away and Kev had a lot of people that followed him who came to me to pitch.

00:37:10.742 --> 00:37:14.175
One of them being Sirajee, who is also on DC Digital right now.

00:37:14.175 --> 00:37:16.844
He's doing a book called uh Nightwing.

00:37:18.827 --> 00:37:24.717
Nothing but Nightwing B's Okay, uh and he did a Superboy.

00:37:24.717 --> 00:37:42.518
It's like a digital comic and you know his work is absolutely stunning and then again Morgan Heron came out and he was killing it with Frankie Boy Monster and then now that led us to Raymar Brunson who Raymar is like absolutely destroying it with Ghostman.

00:37:42.518 --> 00:37:45.199
Two issues of Ghostman out he's working on the third one now.

00:37:45.199 --> 00:37:49.771
He put out a biomechanical protector bone grinder.

00:37:50.253 --> 00:37:53.414
I was butchering that name, but I can't anymore.

00:37:53.414 --> 00:37:55.713
I will never do it again, Ray Marr, I'm sorry.

00:37:55.713 --> 00:38:00.914
And then now he's working, oh, and he also did Detective Pickle P.I.

00:38:00.914 --> 00:38:04.074
Yes, he's all three is the slogan of that one.

00:38:04.353 --> 00:38:06.614
He's a detective, he's a pickle, and he's a P.I.

00:38:06.614 --> 00:38:09.273
It's like a kind of humorous noir.

00:38:10.313 --> 00:38:18.027
And he's working on a super secret project with a huge creator right now, the guy like a...

00:38:18.027 --> 00:38:22.481
a Hollywood guy that we knew that came through and pitches this book.

00:38:22.481 --> 00:38:24.032
so Raymar is working on that.

00:38:24.032 --> 00:38:26.322
The first issue is going to be done next year.

00:38:26.557 --> 00:38:28.355
so Raymar is absolutely destroying it.

00:38:28.355 --> 00:38:37.360
Like, you know, I could just go on Ghost Agents, all the creators that have worked on Ghost Agents with us, many of which spun out to do their own stuff.

00:38:37.360 --> 00:38:40.784
Ben Perkins is an amazing artist that did Ghost Agents and killed it.

00:38:40.784 --> 00:38:42.434
You know, Raymar's in there.

00:38:42.434 --> 00:38:53.985
Rick Lopez is a guy who's a friend and just absolutely destroying it will finally have his cosmic cat with us, Roh Higashi, who's the head of our manga team.

00:38:54.106 --> 00:38:57.489
Absolutely like mind blowing manga art.

00:38:57.489 --> 00:39:02.625
And you know, I trust her vision so much that she went out and found three that's being published now.

00:39:02.625 --> 00:39:06.838
And I think we've got three more on the horizon.

00:39:07.440 --> 00:39:08.942
I could go on forever.

00:39:08.942 --> 00:39:09.842
Wow.

00:39:09.882 --> 00:39:11.041
mean, that's awesome.

00:39:11.277 --> 00:39:12.297
Yeah.

00:39:12.297 --> 00:39:19.438
And I, I used to brag that you could come to my table and I have, you know, we have 50 books, but there's probably, there's, a couple.

00:39:19.438 --> 00:39:23.038
So I would say I've got like at least 30 pitches memorized.

00:39:23.038 --> 00:39:24.378
So test me, you know?

00:39:24.378 --> 00:39:25.382
And so.

00:39:25.440 --> 00:39:28.143
Well, that's that's an embarrassment of riches.

00:39:28.143 --> 00:39:29.355
Honestly, that's so many.

00:39:29.355 --> 00:39:38.804
Like you said, and you were standing up to the pitch or not the pitch, the sort of tagline that we talked about there at the beginning where you want everyone that walks up to your booth.

00:39:38.804 --> 00:39:40.786
Sorry, it was a well, you said that as well.

00:39:40.786 --> 00:39:44.711
You said everyone that comes to you with you want them to find something, but also comics for every kind of every mind.

00:39:44.711 --> 00:39:46.702
I think that's really that's a great tagline.

00:39:46.702 --> 00:39:49.202
man, for all the, think you should leave fans out there.

00:39:49.202 --> 00:39:51.141
I want to be the Dan Flashes of comics.

00:39:51.141 --> 00:39:52.902
So you come in and they have my exact shirt.

00:39:52.902 --> 00:39:53.942
It's the exact shirt.

00:39:53.942 --> 00:40:01.362
know, if you're Tim Robinson fan, but trying to be just, I just want to have something perfect for each person.

00:40:01.362 --> 00:40:04.838
And I want to, and so we're just kind of branching out.

00:40:05.016 --> 00:40:07.597
Well, I absolutely love what we've talked about thus far.

00:40:07.597 --> 00:40:12.088
And again, I hope people that have listened to this conversation here are excited about CLP.

00:40:12.088 --> 00:40:19.751
And I want to give you guys one last chance to sort of, I guess, broadcast not only Bob, your work and what you have working over at CLP, but also Eli, if we've missed anything.

00:40:19.751 --> 00:40:22.793
But before we get there, I have one final question for both of you.

00:40:22.893 --> 00:40:25.635
Bob, start with you here.

00:40:25.635 --> 00:40:32.688
We like to generally end our interviews or conversations with asking folks, what's one thing that you're really enjoying right now?

00:40:32.688 --> 00:40:39.271
And again, It could be a movie, that could be a podcast, an album, a TV show, another comic, what have you.

00:40:39.331 --> 00:40:40.813
So Bob, I'm going to hand it off to you.

00:40:40.813 --> 00:40:46.717
there one thing that sort of just, doesn't even have to be your favorite, just something that immediately comes to mind that you've really been enjoying recently?

00:40:47.213 --> 00:40:50.675
my god, I'm gonna be a demon because I'm not gonna recommend a comic.

00:40:50.775 --> 00:40:57.918
But I've just been, I've been listening almost non-stop to this Italian doom metal band called Mesa.

00:40:58.079 --> 00:41:07.184
And oh my god, that's just the soundtrack of my life these days is this very melodic, very doom-y metal band.

00:41:07.184 --> 00:41:09.550
Yeah, Italian metal band.

00:41:09.550 --> 00:41:13.771
uh with a uh female vocalist who has an absolutely beautiful voice.

00:41:13.771 --> 00:41:16.054
She's not one of these growlers or whatever.

00:41:16.054 --> 00:41:16.873
can...

00:41:16.873 --> 00:41:19.695
She's got beautiful pipes, but it's great music.

00:41:19.695 --> 00:41:20.365
So, I don't know.

00:41:20.365 --> 00:41:26.798
So, that music's been keeping me very inspired while I've actually been working on writing and things.

00:41:26.840 --> 00:41:33.742
So, usually I can't listen to music while I'm writing, but there's something just about kind of the...

00:41:33.943 --> 00:41:36.375
Again, sort of the beautiful doomy-ness of it.

00:41:36.375 --> 00:41:37.644
So, you know...

00:41:37.644 --> 00:41:42.588
oh Is that okay.

00:41:42.588 --> 00:41:43.038
Gotcha.

00:41:43.038 --> 00:41:43.398
Perfect.

00:41:43.398 --> 00:41:45.070
As I say, I'm going to look it up as soon as we get off here.

00:41:45.070 --> 00:41:46.201
So thank you for that.

00:41:46.201 --> 00:41:48.291
And I'm excited to hear what it's all about.

00:41:48.293 --> 00:41:49.764
And then Eli, let's pass it off to you.

00:41:49.764 --> 00:41:54.637
Is there anything that you've sort of really been loving recently that you want to sort of let the listener know about?

00:41:54.637 --> 00:42:06.918
Yeah, unfortunately, I'm not sure I'm going to say a comic either because I've been doing other than printopia and what's the figure there, Bob?

00:42:07.820 --> 00:42:09.992
I was going to recommend one more thing.

00:42:10.849 --> 00:42:16.762
2025 film Deathstalker, Steve Kostanski's Deathstalker.

00:42:16.762 --> 00:42:23.431
He resurrected an old 80s Roger Corman Direct-to-VHS series and put his own spin on it.

00:42:23.431 --> 00:42:24.362
And it's great.

00:42:24.362 --> 00:42:25.889
It's just so much fun.

00:42:25.889 --> 00:42:26.273
That's amazing.

00:42:26.273 --> 00:42:26.797
Who's the director?

00:42:26.797 --> 00:42:27.603
I'm sorry.

00:42:27.603 --> 00:42:28.010
Who was that?

00:42:28.010 --> 00:42:32.947
Stephen Kostanski, who did Psycho Goreman a couple of years ago.

00:42:32.949 --> 00:42:39.155
It's a lot of I I saw that somewhere here recently and I just sort of passed her by because I didn't know what it was.

00:42:39.155 --> 00:42:41.769
now I'm going to look at two great recommendations by Bob.

00:42:41.769 --> 00:42:42.561
Thank you so much for that.

00:42:42.561 --> 00:42:45.835
Cause I have been looking for something new to watch too.

00:42:45.896 --> 00:42:46.746
So, Eli, I'm sorry.

00:42:46.746 --> 00:42:48.139
What were you?

00:42:48.139 --> 00:42:50.302
No, no, I'm glad we covered that.

00:42:50.550 --> 00:42:56.230
I listen to lot of podcasts while I'm working and doing things to kind of take my mind.

00:42:56.230 --> 00:43:03.969
I think, you know, and I heard like Todd McFarlane say this one time and it upset me that all I do is work on comics.

00:43:03.969 --> 00:43:15.048
I don't read comics anymore and I'm reaching the point where I work on comics all day and to relax, I don't reach for a comic.

00:43:15.048 --> 00:43:16.907
Every now and then I do and I do have...

00:43:16.907 --> 00:43:18.318
You know, guilty pleasure.

00:43:18.318 --> 00:43:22.282
like to read, pick up an X-Men or I read a Star Trek comic and stuff like that.

00:43:22.282 --> 00:43:23.543
So I do enjoy those.

00:43:23.543 --> 00:43:27.485
There's a Star Trek Lower Decks comic that's like a choose your own adventure.

00:43:27.746 --> 00:43:31.007
And so that does kind of provide you with a lot of things.

00:43:31.309 --> 00:43:32.998
I read, I did it a few times.

00:43:32.998 --> 00:43:34.992
I died like immediately the first time.

00:43:34.992 --> 00:43:36.913
Like you just die immediately.

00:43:36.913 --> 00:43:40.326
Like if you make the, if you choose coffee instead of Ractagino.

00:43:40.326 --> 00:43:42.197
So I'll give you a little hint there.

00:43:42.197 --> 00:43:57.498
But, I listen to podcasts a lot and one I'm listening to right now is about Fela Kuti, who's like one of my favorite musicians and he's also like super political and he fought like against colonialization and Nigeria and he became this old.

00:43:57.498 --> 00:43:58.617
Yeah, it's all my shirt.

00:43:58.617 --> 00:43:59.257
is.

00:44:00.197 --> 00:44:06.518
BZ Mo made this, drew this image a long time for me ago for like a mini comic.

00:44:06.518 --> 00:44:10.597
And I told him to put it up on a, on his t-shirt shop the other day.

00:44:10.597 --> 00:44:12.297
It's just cause I wanted to wear it.

00:44:12.297 --> 00:44:22.465
And, Yeah, so this new podcast, I didn't even realize it when I first started listening, but it's produced by like Obama's new podcast company.

00:44:22.465 --> 00:44:24.635
I mean, it's super highly produced.

00:44:24.635 --> 00:44:28.507
It's uh Abumrad is the host.

00:44:28.507 --> 00:44:31.797
He's from like another amazing podcast, Chad Abumrad.

00:44:31.797 --> 00:44:33.228
And it's just, it's amazing.

00:44:33.228 --> 00:44:41.021
It's got all these amazing people talking about Phela and it's uh It's just very well produced and very well done.

00:44:41.021 --> 00:44:43.581
I think it's like nine or 10 episode limited series.

00:44:43.581 --> 00:44:48.061
And it's just, it's got me absolutely hooked and I'm going to be sad when it's gone.

00:44:48.282 --> 00:44:51.862
But luckily I'm, you know, I'm a big fan of Phelous and have been for a long time.

00:44:51.862 --> 00:44:59.722
I even wrote a comic about him like maybe 20 years ago that I never really released or anything except for in my super old collections.

00:44:59.722 --> 00:45:02.422
But yeah, that podcast has got me hooked.

00:45:02.422 --> 00:45:11.771
And when I do read comics, it's more like a Like a guilty pleasure thing, I'm not out here reading the deepest, darkest.

00:45:11.771 --> 00:45:16.492
Although I do have the deep dark here that I just got, so I am excited to.

00:45:16.846 --> 00:45:19.905
Tales of paranoia really audio listeners out there.

00:45:19.905 --> 00:45:20.626
Yeah.

00:45:20.626 --> 00:45:44.146
I have to say two things during your response there Eli that I have to ask you about or I guess respond to is you talking about sort of being very into like the history of I recently I just put it on my queue is the new Ken Burns American Revolution documentary that's out on Amazon that I'm very excited to get into and then secondly, is that a dupe tattoo on your arm?

00:45:44.525 --> 00:45:49.041
uh Ken Burns jazz for me is the one that will always do it for me.

00:45:49.085 --> 00:45:49.496
Yes.

00:45:49.496 --> 00:45:50.588
Yes, it is.

00:45:51.438 --> 00:45:51.829
Okay.

00:45:51.829 --> 00:45:55.710
just had to, I saw like his little X and his little belly underneath your arms.

00:45:55.710 --> 00:45:57.802
just had to ask really quickly on that.

00:45:57.802 --> 00:45:59.342
Sorry for the deviation.

00:45:59.342 --> 00:46:00.182
And that's all right.

00:46:00.182 --> 00:46:03.144
That will, I think that's about all I have for both of you guys.

00:46:03.144 --> 00:46:05.865
And what a pleasure it was having you both here on the show.

00:46:05.865 --> 00:46:11.188
uh Again, I will have all the links for Cosmic Lion Productions in the show notes for everybody.

00:46:11.188 --> 00:46:14.891
I will have links to all of Bob's work over there at CLP as well.

00:46:14.891 --> 00:46:18.413
And I will pass it off to both of you one last time, starting with Bob.

00:46:18.413 --> 00:46:20.014
How can people follow you?

00:46:20.043 --> 00:46:24.605
Is there anything that we missed here in this conversation that you want to briefly tease or highlight before I get you out of here?

00:46:25.134 --> 00:46:40.833
Well, mean, just the three books from Cosmic Lion, Printopia, which since this will be airing after the event, I have just found out won the best humor book, a 2025 award from the Tripwire Awards in the UK.

00:46:40.833 --> 00:46:43.574
So I'm very excited about that.

00:46:44.253 --> 00:46:51.114
And Recess Pieces Reanimated, which is the radically revised version of my 2006...

00:46:51.192 --> 00:46:52.623
plain old recess pieces.

00:46:52.623 --> 00:46:59.268
This one has uh been forensically retooled ah and I think radically improved.

00:46:59.268 --> 00:47:03.452
And then the uh coffee table book uh of my career.

00:47:03.452 --> 00:47:04.733
That's some business you're in.

00:47:04.733 --> 00:47:06.034
I'm super proud of that.

00:47:06.034 --> 00:47:08.447
And this is an expanded edition.

00:47:08.447 --> 00:47:17.920
There was a crowdfunded version from Zoop last year, but this one is longer uh and better, I will say.

00:47:17.920 --> 00:47:21.724
Sorry, sorry, Zoop people, this one's great.

00:47:21.827 --> 00:47:22.806
So yeah.

00:47:22.806 --> 00:47:28.445
Is that, we were talking a little bit before the recording, you were mentioning that nothing has been officially announced as of this conversation.

00:47:28.445 --> 00:47:30.507
Is that what you were teasing beforehand?

00:47:30.507 --> 00:47:37.306
The award, yeah, because the awards are happening Wednesday night in London.

00:47:37.306 --> 00:47:40.188
So if this is Friday, the embargo will be over.

00:47:40.340 --> 00:47:40.811
That's good.

00:47:40.811 --> 00:47:41.710
All right.

00:47:41.751 --> 00:47:42.771
Eli, let me pass it off to you.

00:47:42.771 --> 00:47:44.985
there anything we missed in this conversation?

00:47:44.985 --> 00:47:47.088
And also how can people follow you, Cosmic Lion?

00:47:47.088 --> 00:47:50.461
Again, I'll have links for everything, but just in case I missed something.

00:47:50.677 --> 00:47:51.487
Yes, absolutely.

00:47:51.487 --> 00:47:54.599
CosmicLionProductions.com uh is kind of the hub.

00:47:54.599 --> 00:47:55.559
We'll take you everywhere.

00:47:55.559 --> 00:47:57.820
We're Cosmic Lion Productions on most other things.

00:47:57.820 --> 00:48:03.052
uh Those books, Printopia is available on our website or through Amazon.

00:48:03.052 --> 00:48:12.704
The uh Recess Piece is Reanimated is up for pre-order now and uh that's some business you're in will be up for pre-order very soon.

00:48:12.704 --> 00:48:15.726
They'll be shipping probably at the latest January.

00:48:15.726 --> 00:48:19.306
um And just we have a ton of new books.

00:48:19.306 --> 00:48:24.425
Lion Cosmic is our new anthology that I'm super proud of.

00:48:24.425 --> 00:48:25.326
This is issue one.

00:48:25.326 --> 00:48:28.045
Issue two is getting printed right now.

00:48:28.045 --> 00:48:40.505
So this is kind of like our ongoing kind of like heavy metal-y type of anthology, sci-fi horror adventure with a mix of music journalism in there.

00:48:40.505 --> 00:48:43.326
And that is something I've been super proud of.

00:48:43.326 --> 00:48:45.070
I've been getting my kind of editing.

00:48:45.070 --> 00:48:48.570
design chops back and going in on that.

00:48:48.570 --> 00:49:03.329
Just a galaxy of comics from us as well, you know, including working with some other old heads like Matt Howarth, who we have a bunch of new books coming out with Matt Howarth, who you might know of Savage Henry and those annoying Post Brothers.

00:49:03.829 --> 00:49:05.210
And just a ton of stuff.

00:49:05.210 --> 00:49:08.010
And we're constantly working on new stuff.

00:49:08.010 --> 00:49:19.559
Today, it was just announced that we're a sponsor rolling out with IC3, the new or we had it the last two years, it was an independent convention and now was bought by comic art fans.

00:49:19.559 --> 00:49:35.260
And so we're working with them to kind of roll out this independent comic book convention that's going to be uh there in New Haven area again next year, but then also new ones at OAX and also in Jacksonville next June or July.

00:49:35.260 --> 00:49:43.251
And so I'm hoping to have a nice presence there and just, again, uh exalting the uh word of independent comics.

00:49:43.251 --> 00:49:44.041
everywhere.

00:49:44.041 --> 00:49:45.782
I'm so excited to do that.

00:49:45.782 --> 00:49:56.597
um pod, my Grendel podcast, which you talked about briefly at the beginning, the devil in detail, the Grendel reread podcast is available wherever you get your podcast.

00:49:56.597 --> 00:50:03.260
And we chat with everybody from Matt Wagner uh to we've had Tim sale on there before he passed.

00:50:03.260 --> 00:50:09.581
have an our my most one of the most popular videos on my YouTube is me and Ben my co host.

00:50:09.581 --> 00:50:19.902
And we went and hung out with Joe Matt and walked around LA and we do this kind of roving interview with Joe Matt, another amazing dude who is no longer with us.

00:50:19.902 --> 00:50:24.382
there's just a wealth of stuff over at our YouTube.

00:50:25.262 --> 00:50:27.862
I don't know, man, I got tons of stuff.

00:50:27.922 --> 00:50:37.161
Back issues of Cosmic Lion Radio, my music podcast, where we talk to creators of comics, music and film and build mixtapes is available.

00:50:37.181 --> 00:50:38.621
I don't know, man, just check it.

00:50:38.621 --> 00:50:39.922
lot of things, Eli.

00:50:41.041 --> 00:50:55.101
When I was going, just as the last thing, as I was going through preparing for this conversation, mean, Bob has been in the industry for 40 years and somehow you have like an insane amount of things on your website of things you're either working on now or previously worked on.

00:50:55.101 --> 00:50:59.641
That includes like three podcasts, a publishing company.

00:50:59.902 --> 00:51:02.414
Like you're doing a lot is what I guess what I'm trying to say.

00:51:02.414 --> 00:51:08.673
Yeah, mean, the glories of the modern world of Internet and Zoom and all that stuff makes it a lot easier.

00:51:08.733 --> 00:51:20.454
then, you know, probably 35 of the or 30 of the years Bob's been doing it, you know, I probably wouldn't have been able to do what I do in 1984, one, because I would be only zero years of age.

00:51:20.474 --> 00:51:24.813
But also, but you know, just like he said, the world's different now.

00:51:24.813 --> 00:51:29.094
so I'm just I'm taking advantage of it as much as I can.

00:51:29.818 --> 00:51:34.782
Well, again, Bob, Eli, thank you both so much for joining me here today on the Oblivion Bar podcast.

00:51:34.782 --> 00:51:35.380
It means a lot.

00:51:35.380 --> 00:51:40.706
I'm excited to get this out to everybody and get them, if they're not already tracking what's going on with CLP, now they are.

00:51:40.927 --> 00:51:45.489
I'm just, I would love to get you guys back on at some point, either individually or together again.

00:51:45.489 --> 00:51:48.813
But until then take care and we'll talk to you next time.

00:51:48.813 --> 00:51:49.806
Thank you so much.

00:51:49.806 --> 00:51:50.708
Cheers.