The Lakes International Comic Art Festival Podcast does like to treat its many listeners, and with Episode 24 the team have included two great interviews that turn the spotlight on the world of North American comic conventions.
First, there's a chat with Leonard Sultana, the brains behind the terrific web site An Englishman in San Diego. Ian Loxam and Nicole Bates discuss his love of comics, the future of DC movies, the San Diego Comic Con and the UK con scene.
Plus, there's a chat with Chris and Andrew Butcher about the Toronto Comic Con (taking place this weekend) and the comics scene over there, recorded in October 2017 just before last year's Lakes International Comic Art Festival at a joyful pub - so ignore the background noise!
The team also talk about two new Kickstarters, one from The Etherington Brothers and the other Nick Prolix.
There's also a shout out about the first tranche of announced guests to the 2018 Lakes International Comic Art Festival.
Also in the Podcast, Mike Williams talks about how his comic tastes have changed and how he’s reading more (in particular, he looks at Monstrous by Marjorie Liu, drawn by Sana Takeda, published by Image Comics) and Pete Taylor (aka This Man Pete) continues his look at the life of American comic artist Jack Kirby’s life looking at the years 1955 to 1958. That's a short time frame but it's a very important one in Jack's career.
The show closes with some music from a local band based in Lancaster called Promethium.
"Some would say you need to bow to the god of metal but I say just rock," says Ian. "The track’s called 'Shell Shock' from their new album, Faces of War."
Keep an eye out too for a brand new show from the Podcast team, too, called My Neighbour, which will be a monthly Studio Ghibli based review show.
• Listen to the Podcast here on the Lakes International Comic Art Festival Podcast web site
• The Lakes International Comic Art Festival returns to Kendal in the Lake District in October 2018: www.comicartfestival.com
• Lakes International Comic Art Festival Podcast: www.comicartpodcast.uk | Twitter: @comicartfestpod | Facebook: @ComicArtPodcast | Instagram: @ComicArtPodcast
Contributors include Pete Taylor: www.thismanthispete.com and Mike Williams - find him on Twitter @CthulhuPunk