1978, 1979 Doubleday edition
Anonymous but copyrighted by "Rockwars Company"
Rockwars!
Original price $6.95, purchase price unknown
Worn paperback with stained spine
C
What is this thing? This was my third or fourth time reading it and I still can't do it justice. The fact that the author(s?) couldn't decide on how many exclamation points there should be in the title-- the cover shows none, the spine has one, and the title page has three-- shows that even the creator(s?) weren't too sure what the heck this book is. It's an early graphic novel. It's the story of aliens who form one or two (or is it three?) bands in order to inspire the Beatles (known in the text as "Sargent [sic] Pepper's band") to reunite, and the Beatles themselves show up because they've read the comic, and they discover that they are indeed aliens themselves. It's a collection of wordplay, and drug humor, and calls to higher consciousness, and insults to punk and disco. It's brightly colored and poorly drawn. It's got Satan as the recurring villain, although it's hardly a "Christian" story. It's the only book to blame the Beatles break-up on not only "a lawyer" but "the forces of darkness."
Has anyone else out there even heard of this thing? It may not be the weirdest book I own-- The Wonder City of Oz is arguably stranger-- but it might well be the most inexplicable.
Haha. Yeah, I picked up a copy of it from "Pic N' Save" when I was a little kid (a dollar store, of sorts). I lived in Southern California. This was very early '80s that my mom bought it for me (1980/81). I remember having NO CLUE what the hell was going on in it. My copy was tattered over the years, so I bought another one off eBay. I've tried re-reading the thing, but it's incomprehensible.
ReplyDeleteLOL at our mutual bafflement. I also grew up in So Cal (a few years older than you, definitely remember Pic N' Save) and bought this book at a used bookstore.
DeleteFYI: I just created a Rockwars! fan page on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rockwarscomic
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