Tag Archives: birdcage bottom books

J.T. Yost steps away from Birdcage Bottom Books

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Birdcage Bottom Books

One thing we predicted for 2023 is that there’d be a few publishers who would be closing their doors or consolidating. Today’s news makes it sound like Birdcage Bottom Books might be one of those.

In an email, J.T. Yost announced they were “stepping away” from Birdcage Bottom Books after the upcoming spring publishing season. Daniel Whitfield, who has been running the shipping and fulfillment department, intends to continue in his role. This means the publisher will be able to continue the distro and selling of BBB publications, even if they’re not actively publishing new comics.

A search has been on to find someone to take over Yost’s role but the search continues so that comics that were in the pipeline can go forward.

Birdcage Bottom Books was founded in 2008 by Yost with the help of a Xeric Grant. The publisher represents over 100 self-publishing artists and small-presses with a focus on handmade comics, prints, and apparel. Its publications have been nominated for and/or won multiple awards including the Eisners, Ignatz, Charly Eiselt, DiNKY and Japan Media Arts awards.

You can read the full email below:

Hello beloved BBB customers. I’ve been putting off making a formal announcement, but I suppose it’s time to pull off the metaphorical band-aid. Due to some intense personal upheaval, I must step away from BBB after this upcoming spring publishing season. Daniel Whitfield, who has been running our shipping and fulfillment department, intends to continue in his role. This means we will be able to continue the distro and selling BBB publications, even if we’re not actively publishing new comics. 

I haven’t been able to find someone willing to take over the multiple roles I inhabit, but I’m still holding out hope someone will so that BBB can continue in some form (please reach out if interested). We had a ton of remarkable comics in the pipeline, so hopefully those will still be published (Fieldmouse Press will be publishing November Garcia’s Complete and Utter Malarkey!)

I am searching for a more reliable/stable source of income, so if you know of any job openings that could utilize my skill set, please don’t hesitate to let me know. I am hoping to continue working within publishing (doesn’t have to be comics), but I’m open to other opportunities as well (especially if it’s a vegan or non-profit company!). 

I’d love to get the rest of the BBB publications currently in our basement delivered to Daniel in California, so if any of you happen to be driving from NYC to California (near L.A.), I’d be happy to pay you to load up your trunk. 

Thank you so much for being what I honestly consider my extended family. I’ve had so many wonderful interactions with many of you at shows, on social media, or through email, and I can’t thank you enough!

Love, J.T. Yost

Get Birdcage Bottom Books’ 2021 Releases, Running on Kickstarter Now

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You can pre-order Birdcage Bottom Books‘ 2021 publications now through their Kickstarter campaign and get exclusive original art, custom art, limited edition comics, and more! The campaign ends March 29 and 4:06 ET.

Coming in 2021 are:

TOO TOUGH TO DIE: An Aging Punx Anthology

From “tired of being pushed around” to “just plain tired”, the TOO TOUGH TO DIE anthology explores the spectrum of what it means to be an aging punk through personal stories by some of the best cartoonists around. Shifting perspectives on angsty rebellion, the importance of community, persistent racism within the scene, appearance and identity and more are covered within this nearly 300 page tome.

Co-editors Haleigh Buck and J.T. Yost have tapped preeminent punks including Josh Bayer, Emily Flake, Casanova Frankenstein, Hyena Hell, Janelle Hessig, Gideon Kendall, Carrie McNinch, Brother Malcolm, Liz Prince, Aaron Renier, Ben Snakepit, Jenn Woodall, and so many more to provide punk-themed autobiographical comics for your eager consumption.

6” x 9”, 260+ pages. $20
Full-color covers with b+w interior. Perfect-bound

TOO TOUGH TO DIE: An Aging Punx Anthology

Flop Sweat is an ongoing serialization of Lance Ward’s autobiographical comics arranged chronologically. Previous self-published collections of these comics were featured in The Best American Comics. Ward’s life has been rife with pitfalls: abandonment, addiction, mental illness, sexual assault, arrest, attempted suicide, and even a death experience (not “near-death”, he was clinically deceased!). Yet, through it all he has somehow maintained a positivity about and loyalty to his art, even after crushing his drawing hand!

This second issue delves into Ward’s teen years battling family dysfunction, sex & drugs, another injury and joining the military!

In issue three, Ward is befriended by a shady character while working night shifts at a convenience store leading to cocaine addiction, grand larceny and committal to a psych ward.

This fourth issue finds Ward struggling (and failing) to remember an entire year of his life after waking up in yet another psychiatric hospital.

5.5” x 8.5”, 28 pages. $6
Full-color covers and interior

Everything Is Super by Rottsteak

Everything is Super follows the misadventures of Lloyd the Human Hemorrhoid Herman as he stumbles through contemporary life in a dead end, backwater superhero town. Volume one collects issues one through four. Recommended for mature audiences.

6” x 9”, 120 pages. $15
Full-color covers and interior. Perfect-bound

Everything Is Super

Comfort Creatures by Robert H. Stevenson

What happens when the things that once brought joy and comfort to your soul have transmutated into a haunting, dripping, mess of a monster you can’t help but love/hate? It’s called Comfort Creatures, an all-ages collection of illustrated rhymes with corresponding creatures that play like cautionary tales about some of our delicious escapisms.

5.5” x 8.5”, 24 pages. $6
Black cardstock with white ink cover with b+w interior

Comfort Creatures

New From Birdcage Bottom Books in 2021

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Birdcage Bottom Books has kicked off the new year revealing new comics coming from them in 2021.

Check out what you can expect in the coming months.

TOO TOUGH TO DIE: An Aging Punx Anthology co-edited by Haleigh Buck and J.T. Yost will collect true stories and ruminations from too many punk cartoonists to list.

TOO TOUGH TO DIE: An Aging Punx Anthology

Three new issues of Lance Ward‘s FLOP SWEAT series are scheduled for 2021. Flop Sweat is an ongoing serialization of Lance Ward’s autobiographical comics arranged chronologically. Ward’s life has been rife with pitfalls: abandonment, addiction, mental illness, sexual assault, arrest, attempted suicide, and even a death experience (not “near-death”, he was clinically deceased!). Yet, through it all, he has somehow maintained a positivity about and loyalty to his art, even after crushing his drawing hand!

Everything Is Super by Rottsteak will collect four issues of a supremely bizarre comic. There’s not a cover yet, so pictured is the cover art from the self-published Issue #1.

Everything Is Super

Comfort Creatures by Robert Stevenson is a surreal collection of intricately detailed drawings of things that usually bring us comfort but elicit horror in Stevenson’s illustrated poems. The interwoven text is as gorgeous as the drawings.

Comfort Creatures

Birdcage Bottom Books’ Black Friday Sale Features 25% to 50% off Hundreds of Comics!

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BIRDCAGE BOTTOM BOOKS

It’s Birdcage Bottom Books‘ biggest comics sale of the year with 25% OFF and 50% OFF & special discounted bundles & deals!

You can use the “shop” tab on our menu bar to find the 25% OFF and 50% OFF comics in “shop by collection”. 25% OFF will be automatically applied to your shopping cart. 50% OFF items will require the discount code BLACKFRIDAY2020 at checkout. 

Participating small press publishers:

  • Alchemy Comix
  • Astro Plus Press
  • Birdcage Bottom Books
  • BigUglyRobot Press
  • Coin-Op Comics
  • Hic & Hoc Publications
  • H.O.T. Press
  • Kilgore Books
  • Retrofit Comics
  • Silver Sprocket Bicycle Club

Participating self-publishing artists:

  • Marek Bennett
  • Kevin Budnik
  • William Cardini
  • Aaron Cockle
  • Glynnis Fawkes
  • Mike Freiheit
  • Sophie G.
  • Emi Gennis
  • Delaine Derry Green
  • M.S. Harkness
  • Danny Hellman
  • Victor Kerlow
  • James Kochalka
  • Alessa Kreger
  • Karl Christian Krumpholz
  • Alec Longstreth
  • Daniel McCloskey
  • Adam Meuse
  • Chris Monday
  • Ansis Purins
  • Desmond Reed
  • Maria Sweeney
  • Sophia Glock (nee Wiedeman)
  • Jeff Zwirek

Birdcage Bottom Books is Raising Money for the ACLU

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Birdcage Bottom Books

Despite economic hardship, Birdcage Bottom Books will be donating proceeds from their publications to the ACLU over the next week. The artists will still receive royalties on their comics.

From the announcement:

This year has been really rough for all of us. I try to stay positive and optimistic, but I’m not going to lie, it has been difficult to maintain in 2020. Although BBB is struggling financially as comic shops close and people’s disposable income dries up, we do want to help those who have struggled not just in 2020 but since they were forced into slavery and have always had the deck stacked against them.

Birdcage Bottom Books is also a distributor, so this only applies to BBB products and not items for other artists and publishers.

You can shop now and see your money go to a good cause.

Review: One Minute to Wonderland

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One Minute to Wonderland

The immortal Eddie Money was one of those singers whose voice was emblematic of a time and his music was just as syncopated to the current temperature of the world. His song “Take Me Home Tonight” was one of those songs that no matter when you hear it, it’s still as good as the first time. Of course, his career was filled with even more songs that made him an icon. One of those songs just so happen to be “Two Tickets To Paradise,” a which showed his versatility as a musical virtuoso.

It’s something about music from the 1980s that felt as if it spoke to not only a certain aesthetic but to how you wanted to feel. Living in the city is a whole other experience that most do not ever really know about. The place I grew up in made me more open-minded than the people I would end up getting to know. In the articulately woven tales told by Karl Christian Krumpholz, he offers the world yet another masterpiece in One Minute To Wonderland.

In a series of panels, Krumpholz examines the city through its inhabitants and extrapolating what he sees who they are. “In the striking “He Embraced his loneliness”, we see how one man accepts his lot in life. In” He Just Wanted To Be Acknowledged”, a homeless wallows in his existence, as he denunciation to most people is far too transparent. In “And She Was Ready”, one woman whose life is under duress from an abusive relationship has seen its last days. In “Though She Left years Ago”, one woman reminisces of the city she left an what she loves about it most. In “Through Drunken Eyes”, one lush finds the beauty in city lights. In “ Away From the City”, one woman is finally able to see the world is bigger than the city she lives in. In “ She Could Never Stand The Sirens”, one woman’s disdain for the noises of the city drives her to madness. In the final story I will highlight, “ He Wasn’t Ready To Say Goodbye”,  one man finds letting go to be the hardest thing he ever had to do.

Overall, another engaging collection by Krumpholz, but one that has the audacity to challenge the medium in convention and thought. The stories by Krumpholz is brilliant and well developed. The art by Krumpholz is captivating. Altogether, a set of stories that pushes the reader to infer and to derive more from one panel than most creators do, making what Krumpholz is doing here, revolutionary.

Story: Karl Christian Krumpholz Art: Karl Christian Krumpholz
Story: 9.0 Art: 9.0 Overall: 9.0 Recommendation: Buy

Raise $ for the ACLU by shopping with Birdcage Bottom Books

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Birdcage Bottom Books is committed to ensuring that everyone’s voice is heard and that everyone is treated fairly and equally. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has worked for over 100 years to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution and laws of the United States.

For the month of February, when you buy any products from BBB or any of the following artists/publishers, 50% of the sales will be donated to the ACLU:

ALCHEMY COMIX/Jonathan Baylis Jeffrey Lewis
Pat Barrett Jesse Londergan
Josh Bayer Alec Longstreth
Marek Bennett Jonas Madden-Connor
BIGUGLYROBOT PRESS/Adam Pasion Daniel McCloskey
BIRDCAGE BOTTOM BOOKS/J.T. Yost Justin Melkmann
Kevin Budnik Ben Mitchell
ASTRO PLUS PRESS/Josh Burggraf Chris Monday
Kevin Cannon Hazel Newlevant
William Cardini NINTH ART PRESS / Dan Mazur
Aaron Cockle Alabaster Pizzo
CZAP BOOKS/Kevin Czapiewski Ansis Purins
Glynnis Fawkes Desmond Reed
Hugo Fitzgerald RETROFIT/BIG PLANET COMICS/Box Brown
Mike Freiheit ROBOT PUBLISHING CO./Robert Goodin
Katie Fricas R. Sikoryak
Tatiana Gill Holly Simple
Delaine Derry Green Sam Spina
GRINDSTONE COMICS/L. Nichols Whit Taylor
Ayun Halliday Meghan Turbitt
HIC & HOC PUBLICATIONS/Matt Moses Sophia Wiedeman
Paul Hoppe Jess Worby
Gideon Kendall Eddie Wright
KILGORE BOOKS/Dan Stafford Jeff Zwirek

bbb-aclu