See, I was poking around, looking for something to do, and I found this tucked out of sight, scratched into the wall. Yeah, carved. Must have taken ages to do, right? Well, hardly anyone ever looks there, so I dunno how old it is. Yeah, a real mystery.

I dunno about you but I hear a bit of sadness in it. It’s hollow, maybe. Whoever put it there must have been hurting about something, you can hear it. I can totally see it, a guy etching his feelings onto the wall where no one would notice, like some kind of release.

It’s weird though, it just finishes like that, no real ending. There’s was plenty of room left. Maybe something happened to the guy?

Huh. Oh well. Guess we’ll never know.”

Passing through the Wasteland by TheJanusProject

A multimedia entry by Itakare!

The first is by Arby, who draws Grayling! She is an awesome artist and if you haven’t, you should check out her comic. The second is by Pomp, who draws Lunavis, which is also great. (It’s also technically a crossover featuring Thadius from Chu’s comic Slightly Damned! I’m just promoting everyone today aren’t I.) Thanks, guys!

Secondly, there’s a new vote incentive at TWC! And if you haven’t noticed, I scripted a fancy button in the right sidebar that shows you a preview of whatever the current incentive is and tells you what rank Messenger’s at presently. :D Your votes are always much appreciated. ♥

Hope everyone had a fantastic weekend, although if you’re American or Canadian, I hope you had an especially nice Fourth of July or Canada Day, respectively. I spent my own Canada Day (although I’m American) attending an outdoor concert in my area by Our Lady Peace, one of my favorite bands.

I’ve loved their music since I was in high school, so it was pretty nostalgic for me, but it also got me thinking about the influence of music on the comic. A lot of the story is indirectly inspired by some of my favorite songs, and I listen to tons of music while I’m working on the comic, so upon a reader suggestion (thanks, Ita!) I’ve compiled a list of “related songs,” so now there’s a page for that.

I sort of feel like I ought to explain what I mean by “related,” though.

I pretty much hate it when I see people slap a label like “theme song” on music that inspires their character or story. So what, you picked one song that is thematically similar to your story, or descriptive of one facet of one particular character? It just doesn’t make sense to me. I don’t see the music that inspires me as a “theme song,” but rather as background flavor. Music doesn’t dictate the story to me, but it does fill in elements like the time of day, the smell or temperature of the room or setting, or maybe the weather, for example. It helps me to complete the illustration in my head so I can more effectively put the story together in comic form.

Back when I first wrote Messenger, I was listening through a lot of different CD’s, including Naveed by Our Lady Peace, Sheryl Crow’s self-titled album, a mix CD a friend made me from a bunch of video game soundtracks including Metal Gear Solid, and assorted Metallica. While none of these songs really have anything to do with the story going on in Messenger, they do illustrate parts of it for me.

These days, I have the story pretty much written and I know where I’m planning to go with it, so music doesn’t have the same kind of influence on what I do. That’s not to say it isn’t still an inspirational factor, but it’s pretty much all there already. At this point, it’s sort of like adding extra layers to what I’ve got. Part of a scene might have been originally influenced by Neon Crossing, but now that I’m actually putting it down on paper, I might be listening to 10 Ghosts II and that becomes part of it as well.

In short, it’s hard for me to explain exactly how music is part of my process, other than I don’t see it as “X song summarizes Y character.” I find the idea of music inspiring people pretty interesting, though, and I love finding out what various artists I like listen to. Sometimes you can see a connection between that and what they create, and that adds an interesting layer to things.

The fourth page of the “Gears” minicomic is now available when you vote for Messenger!

As always, previous pages of this minicomic are archived on the forum. You need to be a registered member to view them!

I’ve been doing a mini ad-blitz lately to try and bring more readers to the site. Traffic is definitely up, so if you’re reading this and you’re new, welcome! I hope you’ll stick around. On the other hand, if you’re already a regular reader, maybe you’ll consider passing the comic along to some of your friends? Pointing in the general direction of the Promote page, hint hint. :B

Lastly, on a completely unrelated note, go download this and listen to it. It’s free and free music is good, right? I have been a huge Nine Inch Nails nerd since forever, so I’m finding How to Destroy Angels pretty interesting and I’ve been listening to it all weekend. On top of that, I’m a big fan of the way they’ve started releasing a lot of their new music for free with the option to buy a hard copy, so I’m interested in supporting that if possible. It’s a bit like the way webcomics are distributed, when you think about it – you can read the comic for free online, but occasionally there are books or other extra physical goodies available for a small amount. At any rate, I’d like to see more music available this way someday, so I’m all for that. Vote with your wallet. :V

That’s all for now, comic readers! Thanks for checking in and I’ll see you next Monday for the beginning of Chapter Eight!

Not a whole lot of other news this week, so here’s the short version of all the stuff that’s been updated:

Fan Stuff: I was going through my Messenger backup folder on my external hard drive and found an MP3 that was made for me a few years ago. It’s the “theme” for Messenger! This never made the fanart page at the time for some reason, but it’s up now.

The Shop: things are all tweaked and looking pretty nice.

The Gallery: A couple of new things up in the Illustrations section.

Other than that, I’ve been working away at the next chapter and I’ve gotten so much done. 2008 was such a busy year for me school and work wise that I never got any comic stuff done. It feels good to have time to do this stuff again, and I’m amazed at how much I’ve gotten done. Hopefully the remainder of 2009 will help make up for that. :)

That’s all I’ve got for now. Vote if you get a chance! ♥

Meanwhile, I am coloring and prepping the next month (or so) worth of pages I’ve had sitting around inked, so all that will be set to go. Looks like I should be updating weekly (barring crazy circumstances?) through 2010. I am winner. \*w*/

Going back to coloring and mourning the music that got me through high school and college. D: