Recent updates

The latest news from our projects

  • Scratter here! Dicky Scratter!

    An update for Catacombs of Terror! by Stanley Donwood

    Jul 30 2015

    In answer to a few queries, we are definitely publishing Catacombs of Terror! so you will receive your reward even if we don't hit the overall funding target. This is a Take What You Get Project, so it's effectively a means of you pre-ordering the new edition of Catacombs of Terror! or choosing one of the other rewards.

    Some people have also asked if Richard 'Dicky' Scratter is a real person. They've suggested that Scratter & Pomace is not a genuine publishing house and that the whole thing is an elaborate facade created by cider-crazed fools. They want to know about the role of Tangent Books and they've demanded to be told why Sterling Bland (see video) bears such a strong resemblance to long-time Stanley Donwood collaborator Ric Jerrom.

    Seasoned Donwood-watchers have even suggested that the video was shot and edited under Donwood's direction and that far from having no interest in the project, Stanley Donwood in fact developed the whole plot of lost manuscript, Solsbury Hill, Dicky Scratter and so forth.

    To those people we say: why would anyone rewrite a book, commission a brilliant cover artist, concoct an elaborate story about how the book came into being, organise a video shoot with a fictitious character in the basement of a Bath bookshop and then turn the whole thing into a crowdfunding campaign?

    Why?

    I hope that clears everything up.

  • UPDATE!

    An update for acta centre extension

    Jul 29 2015

    Hello acta supporters and friends! 

    The building works are all going smoothly and it all looks like it will be finished on time! HURRAY! 

    I have attached a few photos to this update for you to see. We are all very excited now! 

    Our crowdfunding project has almost come to an end and it has very almost reached its target, so, we have made the desicion to extend the crowdfunding time for an extra week so that we can ensure we reach our £2000 target. 

    We still need your help! Please keep sharing our video and spreading the word. We can do this! 

    Thank you! The acta Team x

  • First Chapter

    An update for Catacombs of Terror! by Stanley Donwood

    Jul 29 2015

    Here's a peek at the first chapter of Catacombs of Terror!

    CHAPTER I

    Death Threats

    Let's see. Friday 10th July, 11.30am. Not a good time for me, and not a good day either, so far. Not if you were me. The best thing about my situation was that I'd escaped the wind. And the rain. The cold was still with me, but I was forgetting it fast. I'd delegated. A third coffee was dealing with it. The worst thing about my situation you don't want to know. Yeah, well. I didn't know the worst thing about my situation either. Not yet, anyway.

    July. The coldest and wettest ever, I thought. Okay. But I thought that every year. Maybe it was getting worse, every year. The sky squatted above the city, snagging on the chimneys and aerials, sagging into the streets. I lit my fourth cigarette since escaping the downpour and tried to focus on the newspaper I had propped in front of me. The usual. Imminent terrors, tawdry killings, economic gloom. I wasn't feeling too good.

    I put my coffee cup down and stared out at the rain. I had enough available overdraft to pay this month's rent, but apart from that I was looking at a series of humiliating, embarrassing and finally futile phone calls to my bank manager. Brown envelopes through the door en route to the wastepaper basket. Reminders, ditto. Final demands. Bailiffs. Then what?

    I still hadn't been paid for my last job. Or the one before that. My first couple of years as a private investigator had gone okay. Dull, but okay. But this year had been dead. Three cases, all of them very boring. Identify, tail, photograph, deliver prints. And my last two clients had defaulted. Hadn't returned my increasingly frequent phone calls. I'd started considering employing a debt collector. Not my favourite kind of people, having been on the receiving end of their kind more than once. It wasn't a global crisis, I thought, looking briefly at the headlines. But it wasn't any kind of fun. It was enough. And Barry Eliot? He was more than enough. The guy was not necessary.

    Well, okay. Maybe the Barry Eliot problem was my fault. Partly my fault. About one third my fault, I reckoned. Half my fault would be pushing it ... maybe. Alright. I'd met Karen Eliot the night before. Again. I had been on my way home after a busy day watching the telephone, fiddling with paperclips, reading a magazine. A quick drink? Sure, why not. A bite to eat? Well, I had nothing much to look forward to in my fridge back at the flat, so, hey, why not. Well, okay. Barry's away. You're lonely. Sure. And then I'd woken up in the morning, Friday 10th July, in her bed. Groggy, hung over, and with the horribly dawning realisation that I'd done it again. I'd spent the night with Karen. Again.

    It had been only two weeks since Barry had caught us in bed, one stupid afternoon when he was supposed to be playing golf with some of those high fliers he likes so much. He'd probably suspected something was going on. Karen and me – we really got on well. And I mean it. She hated Barry. She liked me. And maybe more than liked. I felt – well, I felt that we could have had some kind of life together. In another world. Another life. Some other dimension. Anyway. Barry had walked in. It wasn't a good moment, not compared with the moment just before. He threatened to kill me – yawn – and then threatened to have my licence revoked. Okay. Death threats from Barry, with his squeaking voice and appalling taste in golfing slacks I could handle, but losing my licence ...

    The trouble was that Barry was extremely well connected. I didn't know why, but he was. He knew people in the Council. He knew people in the Police force. I mean, the guy played golf. He put on those revolting slacks, those sickening pullovers, those laughable shoes – and schmoozed in the nineteenth hole with magistrates, judges, superintendents and commissioners. He had his gig sewn up. If Barry wanted, Barry usually got. He was, you could be forgiven for thinking, not a guy to cross. And I was screwing his wife. Maybe I was in love with her. I didn't know. I couldn't tell.

    You see? That was the worst thing about my situation. As I thought then, as I shouldered my way out of the cafe and into the weather. Yeah. As I thought then.

     

     

  • Seven days to go

    An update for Catacombs of Terror! by Stanley Donwood

    Jul 27 2015

    Hi,

    Thanks for your support - we've got seven days to raise as much as possible. Please share this campaign as widely as possible.

  • Last signed hardback sold!

    An update for Catacombs of Terror! by Stanley Donwood

    Jul 20 2015

    We've just sold the final standalone signed original hardback! Final one only available as a package.

  • Are these the last signed copies

    An update for Catacombs of Terror! by Stanley Donwood

    Jul 20 2015

    I've just checked out Amazon and ABE Books and neither has any copies left of the original Catacombs of Terror! signed or unsigned. It looks as though that box of signed copies found in the broom cupboard at PRSC could really be the last ones. #stanleydonwood

  • New edition spec

    An update for Catacombs of Terror! by Stanley Donwood

    Jul 17 2015

    Hi,

    Those of you familiar with Stanley Donwood's work will know that he's a genius when it comes to packaging – in 2002, Donwood and ThomYorke won a Grammy Award for Best Recording Package for the Special Edition for the album Amnesiac.

    In his first book with Tangent, Slowly Downward, my colleague Steve Faragher arranged to print the endpapers on an opaque paper stock, the idea being that the image faded slightly from front to back. It kinda worked. But it took two weeks for the endpapers to dry at the printers.

    In Household Worms, Donwood wanted to create an 'invisible' book, so we debossed the cover ever so slightly and printed the book the Old Penguin B format size so it could easily slip into a jacket pocket. The idea was that the book would feel slightly worn, as though it had always been in the pocket, that it was 'invisible.' Try it, it works.

    Also the book is thread sewn, so when it eventully falls apart, it will do so in sections - each one containing a number of complete short stories.

    Catacombs of Terror! is the opposite of Household Worms. It's big and brash, an airport novel. Donwood commissioned Chris Hopewell from Jacknife in Bristol to design the cover because of his expertise and deep knowledge of pulp fiction art. It's a wonderful piece of work based on the fonts and motifs of the 1950s pulp fiction genre.

     

    We discussed various options to complete the 'package' and came up with a little-used technique called edge colouring, it's most commonly used on diaries and hymn books where the outward edges of the folios are coloured (usually gold). We've looked at samples and if we can get the right effect, the result will be stunning…

    Please enourage others to pledge and share.

    https://www.fundsurfer.com/project/catacombs-of-terror-by-stanley-donwood

     

     

     

  • Catacombs of Terror! update

    An update for Catacombs of Terror! by Stanley Donwood

    Jul 15 2015

    Thanks for supporting Catacombs of Terror!

    This is the first time Tangent has done a crowdfunding project, though we've supported many, and it's proved an interesting exercise. I'll be posting regular updates over the next 19 days, I'll keep them reasonably brief and try to make them interesting.

    We decided to do the crowdfunding campaign with Fundsurfer because they are local - they are based at Temple Meads and about a 20-minute walk from the Tangent office at Paintworks. Fundsurfer seem to offer all of the benefits of the big crowdfunding organisations, but there's a lot of personal support from Ollie and Derek. Using Fundsurfer is very much a case of 'Think globally, act locally'.

    A quick word about the campaign. We set it up before the Glastonbury Festival because various key people where down at Pilton and we knew it might take a while to get things moving afterwards. So, with this in mind, it's quite a long campaign and it also accommodates various people being on holiday. We've hit 10 per cent funding and a good number of backers in roughly the time that would suggest that we'lll get very near our target, so eveything is positive.

    But this is where you come in. For any crowdfunding campaign to be successful,the backers need to play as active a part as possible by sharing and promoting the project. So please share FB and Twitter posts and tell people about the campain. Please share the video and the link to the Fundsurfer page.

    That's it for now. In the next post, I'll be looking at the politics of crowdfunding and how it can be used as a model for promoting radical and independent publishing. As I said earlier, this is new territory for Tangent/Scratter & Pomace so I'd be interested in your thoughts and comments. 

    Oh, and I'll also try to explain the Scratter & Pomace, Sterling Bland thing… 

    Speak soon,

    Richard

     

  • acta centre update!

    An update for acta centre extension

    Jul 13 2015

    A huge thank you to everyone who has donated so far! You have raised a brilliant £1320 ! Please continue to share our video and help us reach our goal! 

     

    actacentre UPDATE - The new backstage area is coming along nicely! 

  • Stalled in the pre-launch

    An update for The Jura Time Machine

    Jul 11 2015

    Thank you very much for supporting the JDT's campaign to explore digital heritage opportunities for the Isle of Jura. 

    Unfortunately, this method of raising funds for the consultation phase, which we knew entailed certain risks, has not realised sufficient ooomph for us to be able to take forward our plans. It means that on this occasion, your pledges will not be collected. Your generosity and willingness to come with us into the great unknown has meant a lot to us, however, so thanks again!

    With Best Wishes,

    Jane Carswell, on behalf of the Isle of Jura Development Trust [oralhistoryjura@gmail.com]