(Originally posted January, 2022)

Picking up from the previous post, about Richard Hell… So I met Richard in ‘94, and we discussed doing some kind of project together. Soon after, he sent me the sexually explicit text to DEAR READER for me to adapt into comics. I made a 10 pager out of it, and ultimately packaged it with some other shorts, as RAW PERIPHERY. Oddly enough, this comic sees the collision of punk rock and the Grateful Dead.

By the end of '95, I had returned home to San Francisco. I spent a little time with family friend, and Dead lyricist, Robert Hunter. We decided to put some comics together, and ultimately he added text to this little scene I’d come up with. I would have loved to have done a bigger project with him, but I’m pleased to have at least worked with him on that little piece.

Here’s a write-up I found: “This comic book has full color covers by Omaha Perez and 32 black and white inner pages presenting four stories: Richard Hell’s "Dear Reader” with art by Perez, Ann Nocenti’s “Jezebel’s Virtue” with art by James Romberger, Robert Hunter’s (yes, the Grateful Dead lyricist) “The Watchman,” art by Perez, and a last story, “Dreamlogic,” “dreamt and illustrated” by Perez. Hell’s contribution is a baroque story from about 1979 (it was originally published in Hell’s “Slum Journals” column in The East Village Eye back then) attempting to seduce the perverse reader into imagining a sexual encounter with his/her “identical twin of the opposite sex.” Strange, overwrought, but interesting. Maybe Poe crossed with Borges on crystal meth.“

I have a limited supply available here: https://www.omahaperez.com/warehouse-originals-limited-editions-standard-products/standard_products/raw-peripery-comic-book?product_gallery=103381&product_id=4645970