Just put up three more deals on www.realtomatoketchup.com

"...Created in conjuction with the recently released Melvins box set, (a) Senile Animal, Your Disease Spreads Quick is inspired—at best—very loosely by the sludge metal band, which is to say that, like the best pieces of art, it borrows from the group only enough to create a jumping off point for its own independent statement, one that, if The Blot was indeed a proper indication, is undeinably Neely.

Where the aforementioned book was almost entirely wordless, however, Your Disease Spreads Quick relies ever so tentatively upon dialogue—loose scraps of lyrics cobbled together from the linear notes of (a) Senile Animal like pasted together pieces from a Burroughs word collage. Taken together, they fittingly read like statements of untethered existentialist dread—doomed proclamations in a horrific world populated by character sketches drawn from the abstractions of the Melvins’ correspondingly dark imagery.

Neely’s own images, however, succeed on their own, and while there’s no point in doubting the author’s insistence that he drew upon them directly as an inspiration for the work, Your Disease Spreads Quick would arguably have been just as successful had it maintained The Blot’s instance on letting the pictures speak for themselves. Neely is, as ever, an incredibly powerful visual storyteller. Over the course 22 pages, the mini takes the reader across a vast journey into the inner-most reaches of the artist’s sometimes frightening psyche, borrowing from sources a multitude of sources like Ralph Steadman, EC Seegar, and Fritz Lang...." - The Daily Cross Hatch

"The themes running through these strips include suffocation, failure, anxiety, and the desperate attempt to connect--both on an emotional level and as an artist." -Sequart Research

"What it has to do with the Melvins I may never know, but it works as both an ad for the band and a statement completely independent of them."- Attention Deficitdisorderly

we've been hollerin' about this melvins "(a) senile animal" project for a while, but it's really, finally, truly nearing completion. above are some images of the "your disease spread quick" comic, inspired by the music of the melvins, written and drawn by tom neely , published by robotic boot (a subdivision of hydra head industries). the comic is making its debut at tom neely's table at san diego comic con this weekend, as well as on the merch table on the current melvins/big business tour. in the next 2-3 weeks it will also be available as part of "(a) senile animal" box set, which will also include a 4 x LP vinyl version of the album of the same name and a fancy-schmancy melvins belt buckle. this shit is gonna be amazing - which sort of goes without saying since it involves the unholy trinity of hydra head, the melvins, and tom neely. we'll be doing some sort of party for the release of the box set with our friends in LA at the highly esteemed secret headquarters comic shop. more details on that and the exact release of the box set soon. the 4 x LP, belt buckle, and comic book will be available individually through the HHR webstore (and select retail outlets) for those of you that somehow mistakenly believe you don't need the super-deluxe-totally-fucking-awesome box set.

Tom Neely + Ron Bradford = Big Beautiful Branches (said in Esther's asian accent...)

We'll have a limited number of these prints available at the show as well as on our webstore (if we've got any left).

Henry Owings reminded us that Harvey Milk is from Athens, not Atlanta, so please make note of that. He seemed pissed about it.

Oops, we did it again...we just can't stop...really, its becoming a problem. This SXSW thing is a real bitch, but we just can't say no...but check it, we managed to pretty much KILL it on our line up. Again. This is Vol. 4, for those counting, and as you've come to expect from your friendly neighborhood Hydra Head, the line up represents precisely why 2008 has turned out to be a motherfucker of year for us...

Limited edition silkscreen prints of this years official poster will be available at the shows. The poster marks the first collaborative work between our very own Ron Bradford and newest best friend Tom Neely. Prints courtesy of Wez at Burlesque.

Shout out to Heatseeker, OMG and Boris who were all scheduled at one point and then couldn't make it for various reasons...ya'll are ALWAYS welcome...but you know that already.

Shout out to Craig from SXSW who's got to have the most stressful job we can imagine. Your patience and assistance is mucho appreciated.

Shout out to Jared Cannon and Red 7 for hosting us for the first time. Jared's an old family member, so we're happy to be working with him and his new club.

HHR vs SXSW 2008
date: Friday, March 14th 2008
time: 7pm-2am
venue: Red 7, 611 E 7th St, Austin, TX 78701 (512) 476-8100
line up:
Helms Alee (Seattle WA) 8pm
Everlovely Lightningheart (Los Angeles CA) 8:45pm
Stove Bredsky (Boston MA) 9:30pm
Clouds (Boston MA) 10:15pm
Dalek (New York NY) 11:00pm
Kayo Dot (New York NY) 11:45pm
Harvey Milk (Athens GA) 12:30am
Torche (Miami FL) 1:15am

Set times, Poster image, and more news to follow...

Finding out that The Wizard reads our blog was enough to make us wear our Captain America and Spiderman t-shirts for a few days in a row....and now that The Wizard is actually posting about something we are doing we might just have to post that pic we have of Aaron in his Bat Girl Underoos...in the meantime check out The Wizard's nice post about the upcoming Melvins project that the artist Tom Neely has been working on with us...maybe one of these days we'll actually tell you the exciting specifics of this secret project...

Check out the beginning stages of artist Tom Neely's comic book, inspired by The Melvins' "A Senile Animal" LP. Here is a link to Tom Neely's Blog