002 Radiant Black Sells Out! But, You Know, in a Good Way!

Plus, We've Got a Giant Robot! And a New, ORIGINAL SCORE!

Well this has been a fun week! Yesterday, the first issue of our new comic book, RADIANT BLACK, hit the stands. As I’ve mentioned before, this book has been a true labor of love for Marcelo, Michael, Becca and myself. So, a sincere THANK YOU to everyone who’s giving this book a shot. As I said in the letters column at the end, we’re all about making and celebrating Really Cool Things. So, in that spirit, let’s talk about some fun new stuff!

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Sell Out

First off, we got confirmation that RADIANT BLACK issue 1 did in fact sell out at the distributor. Considering that final orders exceeded 70,000 copies… that’s a pretty fantastic bit of news. Especially because, it means that we finally get to debut this stunning cover by Carlos Dattoli for our Second Print (Diamond Code JAN218000)!

How great is that?

I’ve been a fan of Carlos since I was writing Power Rangers and came across some of his 3D renders and digital paintings. And then, his Lord Drakkon and Soul of the Dragon posters. I’ve wanted to work with hims since.

With any luck, maybe this won’t be our only collaboration…

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Process with the Finches

A few weeks back, I spent the evening Zooming with two of my friends, David and Meredith Finch. It was a ton of fun and also offered me an opportunity to tell them both — and now the world — how grateful I was for:

A) Dave doing an early RADIANT BLACK cover (which, in my opinion, really helped to validate the character) as well as some layout suggestions on a few pages in issue 1.

B) Meredith SAVING MY CAREER IN CHICAGO!

If you’ve got some time to spare, hopefully you enjoy this as much as we enjoyed recording it.

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An Original Score

So, fun fact… I’m a huge film score nerd. I love, love love them. It all dates back to the first Batman score from Danny Elfman, plus John Williams’ transcendent Superman work. Actually, both scores are pretty transcendent in the way that their themes have — for me — taken on nearly mythic proportions, transcending mediums and interpretations of both characters, to the point where each theme is inexorably linked with the very soul of the character.

So, yeah. We thought it’d be fun to try to also do that.

Not really, but… I mean, maybe?

Basically, this is my way of announcing and introducing another Really Cool thing by way of a new collaborator who’s joining the RADIANT BLACK world — composer Sam Ewing. Sam’s a hot up-and-coming film composer (as well as current co-composer on another little Image associated property, the Ever-So-Tiny-TV show titled The Walking Dead).

Sam’s joining us to “score” the first six issues of the comic book, with each track serving as a thematic and spiritual accompaniment to that month’s story, characters and world.

And we’re kicking it off with (Not So) Secret Origin:

The impetus behind this album, which is essentially a spiritual concept album (I kept referencing Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf), is to create one big musical suite that tells the story of Nathan, Marshall and their journey navigating the cosmic, through melodic, harmonic and thematic development.

Style wise, I was looking for us to walk a line between Classic and Contemporary — while I’m the biggest Shirley Walker fan on the face of the planet (well, next to Bear McCreary), her big superhero writing wouldn’t be quite the right color/tone/flavor for a character and a world that is so Right Now. Or at least, not for the version that’s in our heads.

That said, much like we’ve been looking to take classic superhero conventions and find a new, modernized way to explore them, Sam’s background as a really killer orchestral writer, on top of his very impressive grasp of and flair for electronics and analogue synths, has made for a really incredible combination of styles that just feels like it fits the world that Marcelo, Michael, Becca and I are building.

And speaking of tracks, while each new piece will be available on your favorite streaming services (very) soon, we’re also hosting them through Sam’s Bandcamp (Hey Editor Michael, can we get a page on the Radiant.Black website for these, too?).

Everything will be available to stream, as well as to buy/download — for all you fellow HiFiers — in a variety of formats/fidelities.

But on that last point, as a Black Market News perk, we’re making the first track available in CD quality (44.1/16) and available to download — FOR FREE — for the next 48 hours! So if you’re as into FLAC, ALAC, WAV and AIFF as I am, then today’s your lucky day!

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Mat Groom’s New Book

If you read the letters column in this week’s RADIANT BLACK, you probably noticed a really fun teaser image for a new book by Mat Groom and Erica D’urso, which I’m also editing. We’re not quite ready to pull back the curtain on all the awesomeness (and, trust me — it IS awesome), but we thought it might be fun to show off our main character’s full design. A quick heads-up: these colors aren’t final (we’ll actually have an exciting announcement relating to that next week). Here she is:

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All right, that’s where we’re going to leave it for tonight! Until next time—

Stay Radiant.

Kyle