Palomino Volume 1
Written & illustrated by Stephan Franck
Dark Planet Comics, 2020
Los Angeles is not usually thought of as a country music town. But in the 1980s there were lots of country bars, and the main venue was The Palomino Club in North Hollywood. Regular visitors included performers like Merle Haggard, Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Mary Stuart, Trisha Yearwood, James Burton and Carl Perkins (all of them sat in with the band), actors and stuntmen. Creator Stephan Franck interviews several members of the house band in a backup feature called "Working Musicians." Palomino is fiction, but the atmosphere of that real place is like a character in the cast.
The protagonist is Eddie, an ex-cop turned professional musician (but he still dabbles as a private investigator). He and his daughter Lisette are trying to hold it together after the death of his wife: it was his obsession with solving her murder that cost him his career as a detective. When the wife of a famous TV actor is murdered, he comes to the club to implore Eddie to find the murderer, convinced that the authorities will try to pin it on him. Or maybe not: members of his entourage return at closing time to muscle him into leaving the investigation alone. But he does not respond well to threats, and drives off apparently committed to the case.
So the first installment of the series is mostly setup, but it's a rich, atmospheric setup indeed. Franck's previous series Silver was peopled by characters with distinctive designs and personalities, and this one continues that tradition. It's a more realistic setting, though, and is presented in color instead of black and white. The ecstatic release of the music performance scenes contrasts vividly with the dark violence of the noir scenes. There are potential connections to explore, especially between Eddie's wife's murder and the new one.
This new series was launched via Kickstarter, as several previous projects had been. Hopefully it will attract an audience beyond his current fan base. It is a compelling story, one which should be especially attractive to fans of both comics and music, as well as crime noir.
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