Saturday, August 16, 2025

Hats and Horns in Space

This is the weekly dispatch from Bizarro Studios North, where I have been writing and drawing the Monday through Saturday Bizarro comics since 2018. My partner and friend Dan Piraro created Bizarro in the late twentieth century and continues to do the Sunday comic from Rancho Bizarro in Mexico.

Wayno 


Greetings from your nose-to-the-grindstone cartoonist.

I'm planning to escape the studio for a bit, so I've been doing extra work to put more distance between myself and our deadlines. Subsequently, I'm too tired for a lengthy, clever intro today. Consider it my gift to you for the week!

Thanks to all of you who responded to the Igor Stravinsky quote about imposing constraints as a way to spark creativity. My appreciation for our readers has increased yet again.


Let's jump directly to this week's pipe pic. It's a terrific shot of a fisherman, taken in Cape Ann, Massachusetts, somewhere around 1906.


This comes to us from the website of the Library of Congress, where the original glass negative is archived (assuming it hasn't been destroyed for being a legitimate historic image).


Although my art may never end up at the Library of Congress, I'm preserving it to the best of my ability. Here's your look into my archive for Week 33 of 2025.

Not to mention plenty of overhead storage.

I think I worked there at one time.

The doomsayer carrying an ominous warning is a stock gag cartoon character, and this guy turned up on the drawing board a while back. He's not fully committed to the bit.

I opted for a vertical strip layout, positioning the Secret Symbols closer to the protagonist. I dropped one symbol from the strip, which only has four, while the panel has five. I'll do something like that very occasionally, figuring that nobody is likely to see both versions. Oh, wait a minute...

If Spotify's A.I. disc jockey were choosing the music for a drive, I'd consider steering into a fire hydrant to escape.

The strip layout required some serious rearrangement, but it works rather well.

Full disclosure: I drew the character once and made a reversed duplicate in the digital realm. The theme is carried through to the identical pairs of Secret Symbols.

The strip layout has a slightly different rhythm, with two word balloons instead of one with two tails.

That's the current batch of quirky quadrilaterals from Bizarro Studios. We'll deliver another six-pack one week from today. Thanks for checking them out.

In addition to the blog, I send out a free weekly newsletter, which always includes a peek at an upcoming gag, along with some old art or design from the files. You can read it here, and if you choose to subscribe, it'll arrive in your digital mailbox every week.

Bonus Tracks

Maynard Ferguson: Theme from Star Trek
From Conquistador
Columbia Records LP, 1977


Maynard Ferguson (1928-2006) was one of the most popular trumpeters of his time, and his performance style was often as hammy and over-the-top as William Shatner's. Ferguson was known for playing in the trumpet's highest register, and no doubt was hated by dogs.

When I was in high school, the band nerds were crazy about him and often referred to him by his first name only. This recording, with a gigantic band, is representative of his output in the late 1970s.


Scads of Bizarro Stuff

If you enjoy what we do and appreciate that it's free, we encourage you to explore the following links.


   

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Saturday, August 09, 2025

Freed by Limitations

This is the weekly dispatch from Bizarro Studios North, where I have been writing and drawing the Monday through Saturday Bizarro comics since 2018. My partner and friend Dan Piraro created Bizarro in the late twentieth century and continues to do the Sunday comic from Rancho Bizarro in Mexico.

Wayno 

The more constraints one imposes, the more one frees oneself. And the arbitrariness of the constraint serves only to obtain precision of execution.
Igor Stravinsky

I don't know a lot about classical music, but I can recognize Igor's insight about the creative process and the challenges faced by artists of all types. It definitely applies to cartoonists who do standalone gags, or "drawings" as The New Yorker refers to them.

Every time we create a cartoon, we begin with a blank page (or screen) and an infinite number of options. Defining a structure that can be applied to a series of comics can inspire a productive bout of writing, which sometimes spills over into developing additional material unrelated to the original framework. Maybe that's what I have found appealing about the occasional "theme weeks" I've done.

When I started to seriously pursue being a daily cartoonist, my default writing strategy involved searching for a joke. That's a simplistic approach, and it can work for a while. However, setting up a premise or situation, or even randomly choosing an object and drawing it, narrows things down. 

Focused exploration truly frees oneself much more than staring at a universe of possibilities or waiting for the gods to drop something into one's hands.

I'm interested in hearing from others about how Igor's observation applies to your own creative work. Whether you're a cartoonist, painter, illustrator, songwriter, cook, coder, scientist, comedian, or anyone who makes something from nothing, drop a comment about how you relate to the idea of constraints.


Today's pipe pic is American playwright Moss Hart (1904-1961).



I found this one myself, but forgot to document where. I did save a short description, but no source:
Moss Hart was one of Broadway’s most successful creators, penning such hits as You Can't Take It With You and The Man Who Came to Dinner, and directing Camelot.
I usually provide some background with these images, and apologize for the scant info on Mr. Harts's photo. Still, it's so snazzy I had to share it.


Let's see what resulted from my self-imposed constraint over the past six days.

Sometimes, an interesting turn of phrase can impose constraints that result in a gag.


When doing a crossword puzzle on the phone, all ten of my fingers feel like they're this size.

This poor character was hoping to relax in his recliner. The mind was willing, but the flesh was overactive. The most challenging aspect of this panel was placing the word balloons.

The strip layout required some serious rearrangement, but it works pretty well.

Thursday's gag can be read as ennui or tragedy. The expressionless protagonists lend themselves to multiple interpretations.

How would the child of a magician rebel against their parents?

Reversing a familiar situation can sometimes result in a workable gag.

Random observations of the week: 

1) I've noticed that my comics feature a higher percentage of redheaded people than the actual world population.

2) The same goes for bow ties.

That's the latest from my Little Shop of Humor. Please visit again in a week for another batch of rectangular risibility.

Commercial Break

This is a quick reminder that we have a fresh batch of Bizarro tees and baseball caps available in the Comics Kingdom Bizarro Shop.


If you get a shirt and like it, feel free to send a photo we can share with the Jazz Pickle Army.

Bonus Tracks

Eddie Harris: Freedom Jazz Dance
From The In Sound
Atlantic Records LP, 1965


This is the first recording of Eddie Harris's composition, "Freedom Jazz Dance.”

Miles Davis: Freedom Jazz Dance
From Miles Smiles
Columbia LP, 1967


Miles Davis made the composition a standard when he recorded it for his 1967 album, Miles Smiles. Harris's original had a relaxed, loping groove; Davis reconfigured it as a tightened-up, angular tour de force.


Buckets of Bizarro Blatherings

If you enjoy what we do and appreciate that it's free, we encourage you to explore the following links.


   

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Saturday, August 02, 2025

Thinking Outside the Bubble

This is the weekly dispatch from Bizarro Studios North, where I have been writing and drawing the Monday through Saturday Bizarro comics since 2018. My partner and friend Dan Piraro created Bizarro in the late twentieth century and continues to do the Sunday comic from Rancho Bizarro in Mexico.

Wayno 

I have always found it interesting that there are people who regard copyright infringement as a form of flattery.
Tom Lehrer (1928-2025)

Tom Lehrer, the mathematics professor who wrote satirical and humorous songs like "The Vatican Rag," "Poisoning Pigeons in the Park," and "So Long, Mom (A Song for World War III)," died on July 26 at the age of 97.

Lehrer's lyrics were sharp, witty, and dark, while the music was jaunty, upbeat, and catchy as hell. His total output consisted of 37 songs written over approximately 20 years, which may not be a large quantity, but the work was consistently excellent.

In 2022, undoubtedly aware that he wouldn't be around forever and having no family or heirs, Lehrer donated all of his music and lyrics to the Public Domain, meaning that anyone could use his material in any way they wished.

If the quote above is indeed something he said, he had little tolerance for plagiarists. Cartoonists are well aware of intellectual property theft and experience it every day. It's ridiculously simple to steal a cartoon image online and remove the artist's name. That's galling enough, but some miscreants also alter the text to fit their political loyalty or worldview.

Pointing out violations to people who (perhaps) innocently share bastardized cartoons sometimes results in them removing the offending image, but once something's out there and replicated thousands of times, it's impossible to catch them all. 

Often, when someone is notified that they're wrongly sharing a human being's art without proper attribution, they'll say something like, "Hey, you should be grateful for the exposure!"

It's 2025, and we've all been using the internet for around thirty years now. Everyone knows that it's wrong to steal, but what can you do about it? I don't have an answer, but every once in a while, I feel the need to howl into the windstorm, if only to get it out of my system.

Getting back to Tom Lehrer, I first heard one of his records while I was in high school, in a course called World Cultures. At the time, I didn't fully appreciate our teacher, who introduced us to the world beyond our rural Pennsylvania community. Some of our class projects involved preparing and sharing foods from different countries, and we covered a wide range of topics, including music.

I recall our teacher setting up one of those suitcase record players to play Tom Lehrer songs, and then explaining the meanings behind them. I wish I had been more open to learning opportunities, instead of sitting in the back of the room cracking wise. Despite myself, I memorized most of the words to "Lobachevsky," Lehrer's takedown of academic plagiarism, and I still love that tune.

I'm projecting a message into the universe for Mr. Ullman, my old World Cultures teacher: 
Thanks for broadening my horizons and putting up with my crap. You did a good job under often trying circumstances.
While I'm at it, I'll send ethereal thanks to Tom Lehrer for showing that it's possible to produce art while also working in an unrelated field. I've done it in the past, and it's not easy. I'm grateful to be working on a single career that I absolutely love.


I swiped today's pipe pic from artist Tom Neely's BlueSky account.



The panel came from an issue of Flippity & Flop, a DC Comics publication that ran from 1952 to 1960. The comic was based on a 1946-47 Columbia Pictures animated series, featuring a canary (Flippity, originally named Flippy), a cat (Flop), and a dog (Sam). 

Though similar, the series of four Flippy & Flop cartoons pre-dated Warner Bros.' Tweety & Sylvester cartoons.

Tom Neely's BlueSky account appears to have been abandoned, but he's active on Instagram as @iwilldestroytom.




After two weeks of musical gags ("Now Playing on AI Radio"), we're back to our usual assortment of random comical topics.


I'd like to thank a particular reader who contacted me to point out a punctuation error I made in a Bizarro gag a year ago. I got in touch with them and let them know that I corrected the panel in the archives. Since then, we've had occasional and quite cordial correspondence, some of which partly inspired this new panel.

At least the kid isn't being embarrassed in public.

There have been countless jokes about complicated coffee drink orders, but I couldn't find a prior occurrence of "dehyphenated" coffee. That's my style of drink: a well-made espresso in a ceramic demitasse.

Thursday's panel plays with the visual vocabulary of comics and is a hat-tip to the late Mort Walker. Walker created the Beetle Bailey comic, which will soon celebrate its 75th anniversary. He also wrote The Lexicon of Comicana, a book about the symbols and conventions of cartooning. A new edition of The Lexicon is being published in September, and it will include panels by both Dan Piraro and me as illustrative examples.

Update: A helpful blog reader recommends Bookshop.org as a source for those who aren't interested in further enriching a certain baldheaded greed monster.

We've all had this conversation, haven't we?

Desperation is the mother of folly.

That concludes this week of normal Bizarro comics, whatever "normal" is for us. Drop by again next Saturday to see what sort of shenanigans we put out there into the world.

New BizarroWear


The Comics Kingdom Shop has released a new line of Bizarro tees and baseball caps.

Due to popular demand, in addition to white, black, and gray t-shirts, we're offering several supersaturated colors. The ultra-bright colors are available in all sizes except XS, 4X, and 5X.


You can choose from five different "Eye Heart" designs showcasing your favorite Secret Symbol.

We're also working on adding V-neck tees to the shop.

As always, we’d love to see a photo of you modeling your BizarroWear to share with our readers!


Bonus Track

Tom Lehrer: "Lobachevsky"
from Songs by Tom Lehrer
Originally released on Songs By Tom Lehrer
Lehrer Records 10" LP, 1953


If you'd like to sing along, you can view the lyrics or download a PDF here.


A Plethora of Bizarro Productions

If you like what we do and appreciate that it's free, we encourage you to explore the following links.


   

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Saturday, July 26, 2025

If I Had a Plunger

This is the weekly dispatch from Bizarro Studios North, where I have been writing and drawing the Monday through Saturday Bizarro comics since 2018. My partner and friend Dan Piraro created Bizarro in the late twentieth century and continues to do the Sunday comic from Rancho Bizarro in Mexico.

Wayno 

On vacation, you can wear all the colorful and casual clothing that you like, but you must always be elegant.
Christian Dior

And when you find a quote on the internet, you can't be sure if the person it's attributed to really said it. Nonetheless, this is a good one. I may not always (or ever) be elegant, but it's a goal.

I was searching for a pithy saying about clothing because the crews at Bizarro Studios and Comics Kingdom will soon offer a new line of Bizarrowear. Dan Piraro and I have been working on several designs that will be available soon.

As a gag-a-day comics feature, Bizarro has no recurring characters to generate action figure or plush toy income. Still, we can offer snazzy wearable art to help make up for the ever-shrinking newspaper biz. We're not complaining, of course! We love doing this job and connecting with our community of comics readers.

Watch this space for news when the new duds are available. Meanwhile, the Comics Kingdom Bizarro Shop still has plenty of booty for your enjoyment.

We generally avoid marketing and solicitation, so thanks for bearing with me today.

Here endeth the commercial.


Bizarro field correspondent Steve D shares today's subtitled pipe pic.



Earlier this year, Steve wrote:
I’ve been watching the original 1966 Ultraman TV show. Wonderfully bad. The head of the monster-fighting team is referred to as “Cap” in the subtitles. I assume they mean “Capt.”
Cap frequently has a pipe in his mouth, but so far, eight episodes in, it’s never been lit. 

I'm guessing that Cap might have used his pipe as a fashion accessory rather than a nicotine delivery system. It certainly gives him an air of authority.

A hearty thank you to our pal Steve for the screen grab.


Today, we feature the second AI Radio week. I haven't run out of hallucinatory musical performers, but I'll give it a rest for a while.


Again, we kicked off with a straightforward gag to set up the concept for the week.
Many years ago, I did a drawing of Jimi Hendrix for a guitar magazine (I forget which one). After it was published, the Art Director contacted me to say that Al Hendrix, Jimi's father, had seen the illustration and inquired about buying the original or a print for the Experience Music Project, now known as the Museum of Pop Culture. I was of course flattered, and honored his request.


The only image I was able to locate recently was this low-resolution one.

Oh, yes, the magazine article was about a symphonic adaptation of some Hendrix songs.

Wednesday's gag was one of my favorites of the week, and had me humming "Midnight Drain to Georgia" for several days.

"It's All Right, Ma (I'm Only Grilling) was on Kabob Dylan's 1965 album, Bringing It All Backyard.

My favorite ZZ Topiary album is Tres Árboles, which was rereleased under the title Tree Hombres.

Everybody sing along: "All the leaves are brown, but fortunately, we don't eat at this stage of our metamorphosis."

That concludes Week Two of our AI Radio hit parade. 

Your regular programming will return on Monday.

Bonus Track

Omnigrad: "Like a Rolling Stone"


Omnigrad is a mysterious performer who has been creating "8-bit" covers of popular songs and posting them on YouTube since 2010.


A Gaggle of Bizarro Goodness

If you like what we do and appreciate that it's free, we encourage you to explore the following links.


   

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