THE HUMANS

By Jessica Hundley

Tom Neely, Keenan Marshall Keller and The Humans: Bringing the Balls Back to Comic Books

Speed freaks, acid heads, hot chicks, haggard Vietnam vets just returned empty-eyed and gape-jawed from the jungle, rocknroll heroes, leather-clad outlaws, peeling rubber, roaring engines, gleaming choppers – The Humans takes all the beautiful chaos of the 1970s California underground and tweaks and twists it into comic book mayhem.

The Humans is chock-full of everything you love about this patchouli and polyester era’s exploitation artifacts. The story of a misfit monkey biker gang, the series follows its beer-swilling, bellbottom-wearing, chain-wielding, dope-smoking, girl-banging loser/heroes – as they band together amid hangovers, sex parties, screeching guitar amp distortion and some real, real, bad trips.

Even better? Every issue comes with an exclusive EP of original rip roarers and some of the most wacked-out comic art we’ve seen in too long a while.

Animals talks to the creators about making art and riding high.

How It All Began and Where it Went: Paris, Texas / Florida Hellhole/ Henry & Glenn Forever / Dumb Cats

Tom Neely- I grew up in Paris, Texas and wanted to draw comics as long as I can remember. After being sidetracked by art school into delusions of fine-arts grandeur for a few years, I finally started making and self-publishing my own comics in 1999 and have been self-publishing under the name of I Will Destroy You ever since. I published dozens of comics and zines as well as two graphic novels The Blot and The Wolf. Also, during that time I co-created the ridiculous idea of Henry & Glenn Forever with my art fraternity known as The Igloo Tornado. Last year I finished putting together the sequel Henry & Glenn Forever & Ever as an anthology book that includes over 50 contributing artists… Meanwhile, Keenan and I were hatching our plans for The Humans...

Keenan Marshall Keller: I was born outside D.C. in McLean, Virginia.  From the age of 12 till I graduated high school, I lived in Clearwater, FL. It was horrible. I hate FL.
I'm very happy to never go back again. Went to Chicago for film school. Hated it there. Too cold. Too fat. Too stunted. No fun… Came to L.A. to work in film. Hated working on set but dug L.A. Stopped working in film, started drawing. Liked it.  Started drawing more. Doing art shows. Then I started curating shows and became a co-director at a gallery for a year 1/2. Got tired of art shows, which just became excuses for parties and loosing money and dealing with uninspired artists. So, I quit the gallery and returned to my first artistic love; comics. And in 2009 I drew my first comic, Galactic Breakdown #1. In 2010 I joined Drippy Bone Books (a small weirdo art & commix publisher) and published it. Since then I’ve been self-publishing my own works (Galactic Breakdown Series, Force Majeure, Welcome Fever, etc.)
as well as the comics and art work of Mark Mulroney, Aleksandra Waliszewska, Timmy Lampinein, Box Brown, Derek M Ballard, Victor Cayro, Pat Aulisio, Josh Bayer, Carmen Burguess, and Austin English to name a few. As of right now, I continue to create and self-publish my own comics while I write and work with Tom on The HUMANS and live in Glassell Park area of L.A. with my killer wife, drummer Lesley Ishino (Red Aunts, Smelly Tongues, Kills) and my dumb ass cat.

The Meeting: Loud & Horrible/ Worst Little Zine Fest / Kismet

KMK
We met during a really bad comics fest that was in a community center in the middle of nowhere off of Crenshaw in L.A. Our only "customers" the whole day were little kids who'd run in and out of the space all day. The worst thing was it was in a large gym space and they got a DJ to do a LIVE set with a drummer with a full kit. They'd play for 15-20 every hour for the 5 hours we were there… It was sooo fuckin' loud and horrible… So all the vendors had to make friends and talk to each other because the event was so whack. So that’s how I met Tom. He came by my table said hi. We talked then I went to his table and he had all this great shit! From there we just started talking occasionally and found out we lived in the same neighborhood basically… It was kismet. But basically we were driven to our friendship by one of the least favorite shows either of us has ever done… But I did meet Tom as well as 4 or 5 other artists that I’m still friendly with today. So it wasn't all that bad.

TN
At one of the worst little zine festivals ever! But we realized that we lived in the same neighborhood and were both self-publishing weirdos so we hit it off immediately and quickly became BFFs!

The Birth: Easy Rider/Danny Lyon/ Gang of Apes / Lots of Pot

TN: Keenan can answer that more accurately, but for me it was him handing me a stack of Easy Rider Magazines and a book of Danny Lyon photography and telling me he had an old idea about a gang of apes. I immediately was on board.

KMK: Biker movies, underground comix, lots of pot, and a love for exploitation.
I had the initial idea around 1999 while in film school. It was this "crazy idea" I had that I knew would never get made because it was too fringe and weird. So I just kinda sat on it. I'd think about it often, adding little bits to the idea here and there, always thinking nothing would ever come of it… Then one day sitting in a local bar I told Tom the idea and he got really excited. I let him borrow The Bikeriders by Danny Lyon and the next day he'd sent me two images he'd drawn the night before and from there it just took off!



What the Fuck Happens?: Orgies/ Drugs / Choppers / SPASM

KMK: Apart, they are nothing…deemed by society as outcasts, misfits, losers, no good punks! But together, they are THE HUMANS! 
THE HUMANS is a high-octane, no-holds-barred, ape-biker-gang chopper ride into ’70s exploitation genre bliss. The story follows Johnny. A long thought dead member of The HUMANS whom returns to The HUMANS after escaping a POW camp in Vietnam. Johnny’s brother Bobby is leader of the crew and they welcome him back with drugs, dancing, and orgies… but Johnny's brought some demons back from the shit with him that he struggles to deal with. Soon Johnny's back in the fold as Bobby makes a try at running a new drug SPASM and cutting out their deadly boss, Abe.
And that’s where we're at now in the series... 


The Gang: Motorcycles/Monkeys/Music/No-Brainer

TN:  I’ve always been obsessed with music and always wanted to do a comic book with a soundtrack. I tried twice before, but it fell apart. Music has always been a big inspiration to me artistically - I’ve always kinda wanted to be a musician, but never had the concentration to practice that I did for drawing. So, the next best thing was to make friends with bands and do artwork for them, so I’ve worked with bands like The Muffs, Groovie Ghoulies, Isis, Wolves in the Throne Room, The Melvins and even Green Day! I’ve always enjoyed being friends with musicians so it’s been a lot of fun to see them inspired by The Humans and writing songs for us! The soundtrack is one of the most exciting parts of working on this book for me. 

KMK: I'm married to a musician and music is a big part of our lives together. I've been on tours with a several of her bands and we go to live shows often. Because of that, I'm friends with a lot of musicians, so I've done art in the past for bands like, The Spits, Zig Zags, Wizzard Sleeve, and Farflung.  So for me bring music into the world of The HUMANS was a no-brainer. Tom and I both love the idea of music with comics and have attempted to do similar things in the past, but with The HUMANS, it was kinda a given.  We were going to do a 7-inch with the first comic.  But as we started working on that we started talking about how awesome it would be to have songs released with each issue to create a full soundtrack! We both know lots of bands and musicians and so we started asking around and it took off!
We offered 2 songs with each comic, the tracks are free to download and are up for the month that the comic it coincides with was released. When the next issue comes out we put up more songs! We've gotten several killer submissions and a few tracks that came from bands we'd never thought would work with us!  We got so many good tracks that when issue #5 comes out on June 3rd, we'll be offering 4 new tracks with it (Gary Wrong Group, Speed Buggy, Mueran Humanos, and DeGreaser)!!!!

Coming Down The Pike:  Comic Con / Born Free / Lots of Monkeys and Bikes

TN: The Humans #5 hits the streets the first Wednesday of June, and that begins the 2nd half of our first Humans tale… Volume 2 should be wrapping up by the end of the year and we hope to also have an LP soundtrack release around the same time. Other than that I’m drawing a helluvalot of monkeys and bikes, and we’ll be heading out to promote The Humans at Heroes Con in Charlotte, NC; Born Free 7 bike rally; San Diego Comic Con and then hopefully a big, fun Humans party in Bakersfield with some bands playing at the end of the summer…  

KMK: Well, we're both neck deep in The HUMANS right now. We've got lots of ideas on where its going, and ways to show a lot more of the world around the characters… so I'm psyched for that.  Also, this summer we are hitting some conventions and touring a bit, trying to get out and spread the word about The HUMANS. Tom and I have a lot of ideas on where to take The HUMANS, expanding their world, so we'll be busy with it for awhile we hope... and we have plans for a couple other ideas we're going to collaborate on together in the future which I'm really excited about too. I'm also looking for different artists to work with on a other ideas I'm writing… Hoping to find the right people to collaborate with. That's the hard part. I've got several genre ideas that are just waiting for the right artist. 
Other than that, I'm still working on my own comics. Force Majeure #2 should be coming out later this year and starting a new series with the main character of Galactic Breakdown, called "ROIDS in LIMBO" which will be my focus the 2nd half of the year. And I going to continue to work doing art for killer bands I dig.

BUY THIS SHIT, IT RULES

https://imagecomics.com/comics/releases/the-humans-1

SIDEBAR: THE HUMANS PLAYLIST

Tom Neely

- The theme from the movie Satan’s Sadists - a great movie, but even better song!

- Paul Wibier - “Killing for Satan”

- Purple Mercy - “1970s Acid Fuckfest”
- Judas Priest - “Freewheel Burning” 
- Darkthrone - “F.O.A.D.”

- Arlo Guthrie - The Motorcycle Song  “I don’t wanna pickle, I just wanna ride my motorcycle"

KMK:

- Bobby Soxx – “ Scavenger of Death:    -
- The SPITS – “Rip Up The Streets”
- Dark & Naked Angels Theme - Jeff Simons “Zero Time”
- Jerusalem- “Frustration”
- MC5- “Call Me Animal “

- Stooges – “Gimme Danger”