Article - NY Times - Tom Tomorrow/Pearl Jam Experience
Veddernarian
Posts: 1,924
The Arts/Cultural Desk; SECTC
Bad Luck Turns Good: That's Rock 'n' Roll
By BEN SISARIO
8 September 2009
The New York Times
Late Edition - Final
1
Dan Perkins, who writes and draws the political cartoon ''This Modern World'' under the name Tom Tomorrow, got some bad news in January.
Village Voice Media, the chain of alternative weekly newspapers, was dropping all syndicated cartoons as a cost-cutting measure, and Mr. Perkins lost 12 papers at once, a major blow to his income. He called his friend Eddie Vedder, the lead singer of Pearl Jam, whom he had met at a Ralph Nader campaign rally at Madison Square Garden in 2000. Maybe, Mr. Perkins said he hoped, he might get a gig designing a Pearl Jam concert poster.
''He said, 'Maybe we could help out a little bit,' '' Mr. Perkins, 48, remembered Mr. Vedder telling him. '' 'Maybe we could put something up on our Web site. Maybe you could do a couple posters for concerts coming up. And maybe you could have a shot at designing our next album cover.' That's about when my jaw hit the floor.''
Within weeks he was working on the cover for Pearl Jam's latest album, ''Backspacer,'' which will be released on Sept. 20. It is Mr. Perkins's first album cover, and the first time that Pearl Jam has gone outside its circle to find a cover artist. Both parties also realized that they had been brought together partly as a result of the transformations of their fields by new media, since the Internet has wreaked the same havoc on newspapers as it has on the music industry.
''It used to be real simple,'' Mr. Vedder explained. ''Dan writes a strip, it gets in the paper, people read it, Dan gets paid. That's how we felt too: make records, people buy them at a record store, we tour, there you go. It's not that simple anymore.''
For Pearl Jam, a free agent now after 18 years under divisions of Sony, ''Backspacer'' is a move into new distribution territory. The album is being sold at Target stores, but the band negotiated an unusually permissive deal that also allows it to be sold through iTunes, the band's fan club and even independent record stores.
''They just chose to do the right thing,'' said Eric Levin of Criminal Records, an independent shop in Atlanta. ''They're the first guys who have said: 'This is a very viable market. Historically, these are the stores that built our careers.' ''
Mr. Perkins said that despite Pearl Jam's offer of help, he had no guaranteed assignment. ''This is not a pity job,'' he said. ''I really had to work at this thing.''
Mirroring the album's straightforward, mainstream-rock sound, the nine-panel grid on the cover is rendered in Mr. Perkins's characteristically clean, lucid lines. But unlike those of ''This Modern World,'' the images are more surrealistic than political.
For example, after Mr. Vedder said that he often thought of a 1947 photograph from Life magazine of a young woman who had jumped off the Empire State Building, Mr. Perkins played with the image until it resembled a body peacefully floating at sea; Mr. Vedder decided it was ''kismet'' because Mr. Perkins hadn't yet known that the band had written a song called ''Amongst the Waves.''
''There are people who have a tendency to pigeonhole you,'' Mr. Perkins said, ''but I was given room as an artist to be intuitive and impressionistic, not as literal as I usually have to be in the course of creating a political cartoon.''
To hear members of Pearl Jam describe the collaboration, they were the star-struck ones. Jeff Ament, the bassist, said he read ''This Modern World'' every week and marvels, ''God, that's exactly what I was thinking.'' Mr. Vedder compared Mr. Perkins to Garry Trudeau, the Pulitzer Prize-winning creator of ''Doonesbury,'' and said he was worried that Mr. Perkins would deem his band unworthy.
''I wasn't sure if our politics were hard-core enough for him,'' he said.
Mr. Perkins, who lives and works in New Haven, said that since meeting Mr. Vedder at the Nader rally, he had become a casual fan, but that during the band's rise in the early 1990s, he was preoccupied with other things.
''What I spent most of my time listening to at that point was right-wing talk radio,'' he said. ''The whole grunge scene, I kind of missed it.''
Lately Mr. Perkins has gotten some good news: last week ''This Modern World'' returned to The Village Voice. Andy Van De Voorde, the executive associate editor of Village Voice Media, said it would be up to the discretion of each paper in the chain whether to reinstate the strip, and so far no others have.
But Mr. Perkins's association with Pearl Jam has expanded. He has designed some concert posters for the band, as well as the cover for a subscriber-only edition of the October issue of Spin, which features Pearl Jam and goes on sale Sept. 22.
''He's part of the family now,'' Mr. Vedder said.
Bad Luck Turns Good: That's Rock 'n' Roll
By BEN SISARIO
8 September 2009
The New York Times
Late Edition - Final
1
Dan Perkins, who writes and draws the political cartoon ''This Modern World'' under the name Tom Tomorrow, got some bad news in January.
Village Voice Media, the chain of alternative weekly newspapers, was dropping all syndicated cartoons as a cost-cutting measure, and Mr. Perkins lost 12 papers at once, a major blow to his income. He called his friend Eddie Vedder, the lead singer of Pearl Jam, whom he had met at a Ralph Nader campaign rally at Madison Square Garden in 2000. Maybe, Mr. Perkins said he hoped, he might get a gig designing a Pearl Jam concert poster.
''He said, 'Maybe we could help out a little bit,' '' Mr. Perkins, 48, remembered Mr. Vedder telling him. '' 'Maybe we could put something up on our Web site. Maybe you could do a couple posters for concerts coming up. And maybe you could have a shot at designing our next album cover.' That's about when my jaw hit the floor.''
Within weeks he was working on the cover for Pearl Jam's latest album, ''Backspacer,'' which will be released on Sept. 20. It is Mr. Perkins's first album cover, and the first time that Pearl Jam has gone outside its circle to find a cover artist. Both parties also realized that they had been brought together partly as a result of the transformations of their fields by new media, since the Internet has wreaked the same havoc on newspapers as it has on the music industry.
''It used to be real simple,'' Mr. Vedder explained. ''Dan writes a strip, it gets in the paper, people read it, Dan gets paid. That's how we felt too: make records, people buy them at a record store, we tour, there you go. It's not that simple anymore.''
For Pearl Jam, a free agent now after 18 years under divisions of Sony, ''Backspacer'' is a move into new distribution territory. The album is being sold at Target stores, but the band negotiated an unusually permissive deal that also allows it to be sold through iTunes, the band's fan club and even independent record stores.
''They just chose to do the right thing,'' said Eric Levin of Criminal Records, an independent shop in Atlanta. ''They're the first guys who have said: 'This is a very viable market. Historically, these are the stores that built our careers.' ''
Mr. Perkins said that despite Pearl Jam's offer of help, he had no guaranteed assignment. ''This is not a pity job,'' he said. ''I really had to work at this thing.''
Mirroring the album's straightforward, mainstream-rock sound, the nine-panel grid on the cover is rendered in Mr. Perkins's characteristically clean, lucid lines. But unlike those of ''This Modern World,'' the images are more surrealistic than political.
For example, after Mr. Vedder said that he often thought of a 1947 photograph from Life magazine of a young woman who had jumped off the Empire State Building, Mr. Perkins played with the image until it resembled a body peacefully floating at sea; Mr. Vedder decided it was ''kismet'' because Mr. Perkins hadn't yet known that the band had written a song called ''Amongst the Waves.''
''There are people who have a tendency to pigeonhole you,'' Mr. Perkins said, ''but I was given room as an artist to be intuitive and impressionistic, not as literal as I usually have to be in the course of creating a political cartoon.''
To hear members of Pearl Jam describe the collaboration, they were the star-struck ones. Jeff Ament, the bassist, said he read ''This Modern World'' every week and marvels, ''God, that's exactly what I was thinking.'' Mr. Vedder compared Mr. Perkins to Garry Trudeau, the Pulitzer Prize-winning creator of ''Doonesbury,'' and said he was worried that Mr. Perkins would deem his band unworthy.
''I wasn't sure if our politics were hard-core enough for him,'' he said.
Mr. Perkins, who lives and works in New Haven, said that since meeting Mr. Vedder at the Nader rally, he had become a casual fan, but that during the band's rise in the early 1990s, he was preoccupied with other things.
''What I spent most of my time listening to at that point was right-wing talk radio,'' he said. ''The whole grunge scene, I kind of missed it.''
Lately Mr. Perkins has gotten some good news: last week ''This Modern World'' returned to The Village Voice. Andy Van De Voorde, the executive associate editor of Village Voice Media, said it would be up to the discretion of each paper in the chain whether to reinstate the strip, and so far no others have.
But Mr. Perkins's association with Pearl Jam has expanded. He has designed some concert posters for the band, as well as the cover for a subscriber-only edition of the October issue of Spin, which features Pearl Jam and goes on sale Sept. 22.
''He's part of the family now,'' Mr. Vedder said.
Up here so high I start to shake, Up here so high the sky I scrape, I've no fear but for falling down, So look out below I am falling now, Falling down,...not staying down, Could’ve held me up, rather tear me down, Drown in the river
Post edited by Unknown User on
0
Comments
thanks for sharing.
i gotta have that upcoming Spin Issue,...
That it ain't no sin to be glad you're alive
ORGAN DONATION SAVES LIVES
http://www.UNOS.org
Donate Organs and Save a Life
http://www.thismodernworld.com/
Tom Tomorrow:
Part of the family
There’s a great article in Tuesday’s New York Times about my collaboration with Pearl Jam (already online here). One small error at the beginning though: I didn’t contact Eddie after I lost all the VVM papers because I wanted a poster gig — I contacted him because I was contacting everyone I knew in cities where I’d lost a paper, encouraging them to write letters to the editor.
What I actually said was to the writer that I’d known Eddie a long time, but never in my wildest dreams expected to be tapped for an album cover — at most, I kind of hoped that maybe someday I might get to do a poster for the band, but it wasn’t something I was ever going to bug him about.
Apart from that small nit, though, I really can’t complain ..!
… adding: this seems like good news — apparently the rest of my old papers are now free to reinstate the strip at their own discretion.
Lately Mr. Perkins has gotten some good news: last week “This Modern World” returned to The Village Voice. Andy Van De Voorde, the executive associate editor of Village Voice Media, said it would be up to the discretion of each paper in the chain whether to reinstate the strip, and so far no others have.
Sounds like a good time to contact the editors, if you live in one of the affected cities (which I am deliberately not listing, to avoid astroturfing — much better if the letters they get are from real readers aware of the situation) … and you Village Voice readers, don’t forget to send your thanks…
… also: having a pen name can admittedly be confusing, and the article does get my name(s) right — but in the photo captions, I am referred to as “Don” Perkins.
Still: major article on the front of the arts section, huge picture of my art — I can live with it if people call me Don for awhile.
posted by Tom Tomorrow at 7:07 PM
wow Kat
thanks for that,talk about fast updates / responses !
That it ain't no sin to be glad you're alive
ORGAN DONATION SAVES LIVES
http://www.UNOS.org
Donate Organs and Save a Life
I'd love to see the Tom Tomorrow art on the cover and wonder will it be a cartoon of Pearl Jam??
I saw this article last night posted by another fan in the "Hidden Findings discovered in Backspacer Cover" thread and also Tom's first edit of his post clarifying the article, along with the modified post which I caught on later...but didn't feel like updating 'cause it seems like I've been "stalking" the poor guy, so I'm glad others like the OP and Kat keeping us informed of the news/updates with Tom Tomorrow!
I have a good excuse though... I don't have a 9-5 paying job outside of my home so my eyes are out there more than an average and working person on the internet!! :P
It's a great read and I still hope there will be an interview with Tom Tomorrow with the band in the next DEEP issue...
EV: It's your band.
~Q Magazine
"Kisses for the glow...kisses for the lease." - BDRII
I wish I hadn't let mine lapse either.... :P Darn!
That'd be really cool if PJ was in cartoon on the cover - the Tom Tomorrow style!
EV: It's your band.
~Q Magazine
"Kisses for the glow...kisses for the lease." - BDRII