Metal music and comic books – the combination we didn’t realise we needed.
Brisbane metal lover and writer, Aaron Sammut has made the unusual yet ingenious choice to combine the timeless outlet of comic books with the beautiful chaos of the heavy metal world.
His 100 per cent independent comic creation, brought to life in partnership with US comic artist Jesse Hamm, is 'Maurice And The Metal', the journey of a young metal head in the mid-‘80s who unwittingly discovers he has impossible strength whenever he listens to heavy metal.
Charged with a heavy burden and with nothing but his Walkman, which has been possessed by the spirit of a Black Sabbath roadie, Maurice is fighting to keep metal alive. “It was a pretty organic idea,” Aaron says.
“I was on my way to work one morning and didn’t know how I was going to get through the day. Whatever music I had on at the time just wasn’t working, so I decided to put on ‘Master Of Puppets’ by Metallica; every step from then I was walking upright, my back was straight, my shoulders were broader and I felt an emotional change, and I could get through the day just because of that song.
“Then my overacted imagination started to wonder if that could happen with a superhero; once I got to work, the idea stuck and I pretty much made notes all shift – easily the best day of work I’ve ever had.
“I told two of my co-workers about the idea at the time, and one of them said, ‘That’s the best f...ing idea I’ve ever heard!'. And the other guy said ‘I can’t believe that hasn’t been done before’. From that moment on I never looked back.”
Aaron had not worked on a comic book previously. But what he lacked in experience, he more than made up for with an overcharged imagination and his unhealthy yet healthy reliance on music to get him through any situation.
Mixed with an insatiable determination, he managed to see this unique idea make it all the way to print. “That [idea] was six years ago, so it did take me a while to get this first issue out, but it’s something that really kept me going creatively.
“It took six months to a year to find the right illustrator; the writing process was really just note after note on that first day, it’s never really happened to me before where I could just sit down and write something that quickly.
“I’m not from a writing background; it was difficult in the beginning to understand if I’m a writer and can anybody really do it, but because it came quite easy it felt like it was natural. In the beginning, it was just notes and little scraps of paper. But 85 to 90 per cent of that did make the first edition.”
Illustrator Jesse Hamm has worked for publishers such as Marvel, DC Comics, Dark Horse, Boom!, and Dynamite, bringing the adventures of characters such as Batman, Hawkeye, Flash Gordon, and The Phantom to life.
“The [creative] process was pretty good. I never met Jesse, but we chatted once, and everything else was through email. He was a really great guy to work with, and he brought these characters to life; at one point these were just crazy thoughts in my head. But he definitely brought this to the real world for the reader and me as well.”
