EXTRACTS: Brian Bolland (illustrators special issue) © 2019 Book Palace Books (144 PAGES in Full edition)

14 Captain Beefheart. “Musicland” a record shop in Berwick St that specialised in American imports was our destination for frequent visits to London. Including, in 1968, to the Royal Festival Hall to see the Mothers of Invention. Berwick St was also the location of probably Britain’s first comic shop. Run by Derrick “Bram” Stokes and named “Dark They Were And Golden Eyed”. By 1971 I was at Norwich School of Art and while I was there Dave and I collaborated on our fanzine “RDH (this is fantastic - the end) COMICS”. The cover by me featured a photo of Norwich Cathedral with some kind of demon climbing up it. Interior pages were a combination of B J Bolland and R DHarwood. In later years I would occasionally ink Dave’s cover onMartin Locke’s “Conqueror” which he drew. In 1972 there was a comic convention in the Waverley Hotel in London. Dave and I attended and it was there that we met, in the flesh, many of the other comic fans we’d hitherto only heard of. Eagle artist Frank Bellamy was there - as were Terry Gilliam and Bob Monkhouse. ABOVE, RIGHT & FACING PAGE: More early influences, by the late 1950s imports of US comics and magazines were a regular feature in newsagents, with displays of tiered ranks of these brightly coloured periodicals enlivening the ubiquitous 'Thorpe and Porter' spinner racks. Tantalisingly many of the comics depicted featured superheroes that Brian would find himself creating covers for a quarter of a century later.