Switchblade Comb

Here is the second part of our interview with Mitch Clem, creator of “the world’s first online punk comic” Nothing Nice to Say. Read the first part of the interview HERE.

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Switchblade Comb: Not too long ago you said the epicenter of punk right now is in Texas. What are your thoughts about the Texas punk scene at the moment?

Mitch: Hmm. I’m living in San Antonio right now, and gas is too expensive to go up to Austin for shows anymore, so I’m actually out of the loop a little. There’s some cool Austin bands right now, like Sex Advice, Party Garbage, the Teeners, Naw Dude… I guess the Riverboat Gamblers live in Austin now? They’re awesome, as I’m sure you know. Marked Men were the best band in the country for a while there, but now they broke up, so ALL HOPE IS LOST.

SBC: That definitely sucks. Kind of a random question, but when you lived in Minneapolis I could find you almost everyday drinking coffee and drawing at Spyhouse. Are you still able to get out of the house to work on art in San Antonio?

Mitch: Oh, so there’s a crazy thing about San Antonio: No fucking coffee shops. Go figure, take away the awful cold and you’ve taken away everyone’s reason to stay indoors and drink warm beverages. Sheesh. So now I draw at home, mostly. It’s that or Starbucks. So no thanks.

SBC: Damn. That sucks, too. So, you’ve always had a love/hate relationship with the kids on the Internet. How’s the “Internet” treating you these days?

Mitch: Same as ever, I suppose, but I’ve learned to mostly ignore all the douchebags. I feel like the Internet is taking away so much of the D.I.Y. that fueled punk for me when I was younger. Whereas once you had to sort of create a scene wherever you were. No bands coming through, you’d book a show. No local bands, you’d start one. Have something to say, you’d write a zine. And if you wanted to learn about new bands, your only options were the reviews in the back of MRR or picking up a cheap comp.

Whereas now, it’s like everything is so accessible, there’s no effort in being into punk rock, or anything, really, so people are so used to being spoon fed their interests that they get lazy and ornery about it. No one wants to contribute, everyone just wants to critique, and, at some point that just gets infuriating. For me in particular, I’ve never once, not ONE TIME seen someone say, “this dude’s comics suck, I’ve got more interesting things to say about punk rock than this guy, I could make a better comic than this” and then ACTUALLY DO IT. NOT ONCE.

You’ll see a post on PunkNews about something I did and all the lazy Internet rats will whine about me not living up to their expectations, that I’m not supplying them the quality entertainment they demand to be hand-fed like fucking goats at a petting zoo. Blah. Sorry, tirade. Fucking tools, fuck them. Except for you, I mean. And the people who read [Switchblade Comb]. You guys are awesome.

SBC: Ah, shucks. Thanks man. Kind of going a little Kanye there with that rant.

Mitch: “George Bush hates black people.”

SBC: [Laughs] So, I fucking love the poster art you’re doing these days. It’s the one thing I look forward to seeing on your site the most. Not really a question in there… Feel free to talk about poster art. [Laughs]

Mitch: Posters! Hard to think of, hard to make, very rewarding when they come out good! Which they do every once in a while.

SBC: They’re all great! And what about some of the freelance work you’re doing for Razorcake, The Kansas City Pitch, etc? Are you still looking for more freelance gigs and hoping to do that full time?

Mitch: Yeah, freelance is really fun. It’s challenging in a different way than poster art or whatever where I can draw any kind of crazy stuff I can think of, whereas with freelance stuff I need to illustrate to convey an actual idea. Which is a lot of fun. Also I like being able to pay my rent, so yes, the more freelance the better!

SBC: Trucking along, which comics are you reading these days?

Mitch: I’d still follow Geoff Johns to the sun if he asked me. Green Lantern is amazing, Booster Gold was super good. His run on The Flash is my favorite comic ever, I re-read that pretty regularly. I just read Gotham Central in its entirety, and I already want to go back to the beginning and read it over again.

SBC: I love Ed Brubaker and Gotham Central! I wish it had a longer run. Reminded me a lot of the show Homicide, but set in Gotham City instead of Baltimore.

Mitch: Yeah, that shit is awesome. My beautiful fiancée Amanda is into a lot of indie stuff, so I read things she tells me are good. She turned me onto American Elf, which I like, and Andi Watson stuff, Chris Ware, Ivan Brunetti, etc. And, in turn, I turned her on to Ed Brubaker’s run on Catwoman.

SBC: I haven’t read that yet. I’ll be sure to pick it up sometime. You just celebrated your 26th birthday. Any cliché thoughts about feeling older these days? Are you looking forward to getting married and “settling” down?

Mitch: I never used to get hung over, I’ll say that. Being an adult has its ups and downs, but anything’s better than being a fucking teenager, holy shit. You hear me, kids? You teenagers reading this? Once you hit your early 20s your life won’t suck anymore! Promise!

SBC: I totally agree! Um, so, a lot of artists in music, art, film, etc. start hitting their prime–that’s not to say peaking–around our age. You feel that happening?

Mitch: I don’t know if I’m hitting any sort of stride as an artist… Maybe I am. I appreciate things more than I used to. I take more pride in the things I do right and use that to create more stuff. But, that said, I’m still lazy as shit, so mostly I just lay around and read Green Lantern. Being old and stupid is pretty alright.

SBC: Right on. Anything else you want to talk about?

Mitch: I can’t think of anything.

SBC: Well I’ll let you get some sleep. Thanks a lot for interview dude and good luck with the new book!

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You can pre-order Mitch Clem’s upcoming Nothing Nice to Say book HERE for $10.