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SLG Publishing, also known as Slave Labor, is having a 35% off sale at their website. The site is a bit hard to navigate but you can find comics listed by creator hereincluding books by Jhonen Vasquez, Serna Valentina, Ted Naifeh, Andy Ristaino, Ben Towle, Gene Yang,Aaron Alexovitch, Andi Watson, James Turner and lots of other fine cartoonists.

SLG is one of the last still extant publishers from the first flush of indies in the 80s, and their publishing line—usually black and white comics in the goth, punk, retro, kids and humorous vein—was FAR ahead of its time. SLG was among the first publishers to adapt such now standard practices as digital publishing and a retail outlet, the Art Boutiki in San Jose.

They were also WAY WAY WAY ahead of the curve in publishing comics by and FOR women. In fact for many years, SLG was the only publisher that seemed to know ow to publish comics that girls liked. In fact, when DC started up the Minx line, they literally raided SLG for half their creative line-up.

As their slogan has it, “Too stupid to quit, too mean to die.” Publisher Dan Vado helped discover a lot of great cartoonists, like Evan Dorkin and Yang and Vasquez and Hicks, and he is truly one of the sage philosophers of comics. There isn’t a single San Diego con where I don’t stop by the SLG booth, at its still impressive location next to DC, to catch up.

It is no secret, however, that SLG has kind of shut down publishing in recent months. When I noticed the sale I dropped a line to Vado to see what was up. He told me that proceeds of the sale will hopefully be used to fund some new activities, and he hopes to be at San Diego once again.

SLG has had its ups and downs, but it is truly a pioneering publisher, so check out the back issues and see if there’s anything that tickles your fancy. They also have some cute t-shirts and other tchotches for sale, mostly in the tiki genre.

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4 COMMENTS

  1. Slave Labor has done the central service to comics of publishing a lot of good stuff over the years, things which would not have another home. Checking their current list, I recommend the fun, thoughtful, humanity-affirming humor of Halo & Sprocket; the dark, vicious, humanity-hating humor of My Monkey’s Name Is Jennifer; the adventurous humor of Zander Cannon’s Replacement God, and the sheer Faith Erin Hicksedness of Zombie Calling. All worth your money at full price, worth your-money-and-a-half at 35% off. Go, buy.

  2. One of my favorite publishers and I always pick up whatever they publish by the insanely weird and creative James Turner (NIL, Warlord of IO and others).
    I hope they survive.

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