Early Stuff WOMBAT COMICZ 1984

Early Stuff WOMBAT COMICZ 1984 

WOMBAT COMICZ 1984 COVER

Back in the early 1970s my brother and I were always drawing and doodling. We were both huge DC fans thanks to our father and the black and white licensed K G Murray reprints readily available from nearby Gordon and Gotch. This love affair took a turn for the dark side when we discovered US underground titles such as the Furry Freak Brothers, Zap, Harold Hedd and Dopin' Dan comix. The more we read the more we wanted to produce our own comic  like our heroes Gilbert Shelton, Rand Holmes, Paul Mavrides, Ted Richards and Robert Crumb- to name a few.So, in the early 1980s  thanks to the influence and proliferation of 'zines both of the musical and graphic type we decided to start on our own self published title WOMCAT COMICZ. The more punky spelling due to our musical influences of the time. Joe was a far better cartoonist than I and was quite prolific. Below is one of the few pieces we collaborated on.

We had great ambitions of selling truckloads at the Monash University Small Cafe and the Notting Hill pub, but after all the hassle of finally getting it printed we lost interest for a number of reasons and boxes of the comic were stacked in Mum's garage. Since that was also the venue of our weekly darts night for a few years we slowly gave them away to anyone who showed an interest. That interest waned (quite quickly) and we all literally moved on. Sometime in 2006  Mum sold the house and  the remaining boxes were taken to the tip with all the other crap in the now disused and rubbish filled garage.

The contents are a product of the times and most of the stories these days would have us crucified on social media by the jackbooted sook parade. But all these years later  as a father and more enlightened soul I cringe when I reread some of the stories. 

Note: The comic was 32 pages with one main story the LEGENDS OF THE DREAM TIME running 17 pages with a 3 panel RAT TALES running along the bottom of most pages . This was a direct influence from Gilbert Shelton's Furry Freak Brothers and his Fat Freddie's' Cat stories. The balance of the content were several single and two page parody pieces influenced by MAD magazine. The cover was a parody of the Life Be In It campaign ran at the time.The silly fishes were put in by the printer for no reason we could think of and without permission. The inside contents were black and white on newsprint.

Art Joe Nolan