Here it is comic fans – the second (and final) part of the latest fustar.info interview, with the the hot-seat being occupied by the charming and gregarious David Sque. Many thanks again to David for agreeing to do this and giving me such an abundance of material to work with. More of this sort of thing to come…I hope…

Well having talked about the production of individual strips perhaps we could talk about the different formats the comic went through…because there was a period in the mid-80s when Roy of the Rovers (and some other comics) switched over from decent quality paper to a newsprint type of thing.

[Sighs] Yes…

The stuff I still have previous to that is in great nick, but the newsprint stuff is literally falling apart…

Yeah, that was one of the indications that the comics world was falling apart too! When that happened I used to have to draw my black outline, which was then printed blue - I was no longer responsible for the colour – and then on that blue sheet someone up there in London would block colour in. So it would be a tone, a colour tone: a block red shirt, block whatever….

So I was only responsible for the line work when it went to that stage…and it was printed on toilet paper. It was all done to save money and everything, and if you're ready for it I can tell you about the demise of the comics!

Em…let’s just save that for a little later. I’m very keen to hear your thoughts on it by the way. Anyway, changing tack slightly here David, I wanted to ask if there was any specific inspiration for the distinctive look you gave Roy himself? As a Liverpool fan I always suspected there was more than a touch of Kenny Dalglish about him…

Well, you're right in the respect that Kenny Dalglish was a factor, but it was really an amalgam of four things: 1) Roy as he used to be transmogrifying to my style, 2) The influence of Dalglish's looks, and…3) a little bit of Cliff Richard. You will see in some of the artwork that his nose is like Cliff Richard's.

[laughs] Why Cliff Richard?

I don't know, I was a fan at the time…oh and the fourth thing was that I used my own hairstyle for him, which was the style back then. So basically that's how he morphed into looking like he did. I don't know if you want to put this in…but when it changed to another artist - when they were all trying to cut corners and everything – I got loads of letters sent on to me by people complaining, "Why has Roy Race become an all-in wrestler?"

Oh yes, the "He-man" period…

Yeah, they couldn't believe it, because I tried to draw him as a real, normal character. Anyway, I'd had enough of Roy anyway by that time, and when you think about it I was doing front cover, center pages, back cover, all full colour! So I was working 75-80 hours a week at home (there was no traveling to and from work or anything else) so that was a lot of work.

Yeah, that's something I forgot to ask you actually. What kind of time frame was it from the moment you first saw the script to the moment you had the artwork ready to send of?

Well, as I said about 75/80 hours. That's five, and mostly six, long days. I had a big Victorian six-bedroom house, three cars, and kids at a private school to support. You know you create your lifestyle to match what you're earning and then you're on the treadmill to keep it going.

Moving on - towards the end of the 'toilet paper' period, a lot of …er…unexpected real life personalities ended up joining Melchester Rover…

[laughing] Ah yes, I remember quite a few people - I met all the people that I drew - like Emlyn Hughes. Lovely, lovely guy.

Well as a Liverpool fan he has a special place in my affections….

Magic, big beaming smile! And Wilson, the goalie, he's a lovely guy too. Bob Wilson? Then of course we went on to Spandau Ballet, and that was a bloody nightmare for me…so much drawing! I remember one, I think it was a cover wasn't it, which featured the whole band, all their instruments etc.

That’s right. I remember it very well.

Right! Actually, I've got taped somewhere a Frank Skinner interview with Martin Kemp of the Kemp brothers [talking about his stint on Roy]. Great fans they were, absolutely great fans. In fact, a few years before then I met…em…Hadley, what's his name, Hadley? The lead singer…

Tony Hadley, was it?

That's right, Tony Hadley. Anyway, he worked at IPC before they [Spandau Ballet] took off. He worked on Love Magazine [laughs] with an old college mate of mine - just an ordinary, nice guy you know. But they were big hits at the time, and I had to draw them all, but the two [Kemp] brothers played didn't they?

They certainly did.

At that time they were touring Ireland and staying in a castle somewhere. Don't know the details of that. But come what may they had to trundle into town and get the Roy of the Rovers magazine every Saturday morning! In whatever state of hangover, or whatever, they were in. They had to go and get it and they absolutely loved it. They were tremendous fans. And another great, great fan was Nick Berry from Heartbeat and, what was it, Eastenders?

Anyway, with the demise of Roy of the Rovers, he developed this passion, that I heard about, to do an animated feature of Roy, or an animated series…but that never got off the ground.

As far as Roy went, then, the Basran bus crash story – where there was a major clear out of the 'old guard' - was the last major story that you did, wasn't it? That was the end of your tenure on Roy…

Yes, but I moved on quickly to something that really appealed to me which was "Story of the Star", and I earned more money in half the time doing that than…so I had more time to spend with my family and it was much more rewarding artistically. I still enjoyed doing "Roy of the Rovers", don't get me wrong. It's a love/hate relationship. It's the same with me with Scorer now [Ed: The strip David does for the Daily Mirror]. When I'm pushed, there's nothing worse than to go in there, read through the script and then get out a blank sheet of card and look at it. You think, "I'm going to piss this off!" Right? "I'm not paid enough, I'm just going to piss it off!" Once the pencil starts flowing though, that feeling is gone. I don't think of money, or time, or anything else…I just get involved in it and then I'm thoroughly enjoying it.

I've enjoyed doing all my strip work, but it's been a little bit sad for me that I've gone back to Scorer because I've gone on to better things. People do enjoy Scorer, I suppose, but I don't flatter myself. People only read it because they’re passing through the paper, so they read it and move on. There are, of course, quite a few Scorer fans out there but it's not like they’re saying "Oh God, did you see Scorer yesterday? Fantastic!" If you think that, you're not in the real world! In fact, I only know two people in the whole world that read the Daily Mirror. One's an ex trade union leader! Nobody turns straight to Scorer, for Christ's sake! But they enjoy it when they get to it, I guess, because it's football and it's a religion.

Indeed.

Anyway, I had to, what is the expression, beat them or join them? I had to join the computer age which none of my artist friends have done [Ed: David only does the linework for Scorer. The backgrounds and colour are added in digitally]. I should point out that most of the computer artists are not artists, they are people who have got some talent and they know how to use the art packages. The problem with that is that the clients soon realised that, because they were all using the same package, all the artwork looked the same, like plasticine people, you know.

Yes, I couldn't agree more. It does tend to look very, very samey and there's a very distinctive (and not very attractive) look to the whole thing.

It was a big threat though in the beginning, you know, when it first took off because they all wanted to go that route. So anyway, post-Roy I went on to do something that I really, really wanted to do which was (as I've said) "Story of the Star". Now that was a mixture of photographs and my illustrations.

And the stories were all based on real life footballers…

Yes, and that's where my portraiture really came to the fore. Because I'd done Kenny Dalglish, most of the big names…Gary Lineker…all about how they started off at school in the first eleven, were spotted, and we followed them right the way through their career. It was lovely to do, and if you watch out on eBay, I'm going to put some of the artwork on there.

Oh, right, OK! Let me know!

I'll tell you all about it before I do it because you might have some ideas. I thought the only people who would be interested in that original artwork would be the guys themselves. Half of them are dead, or they’re on their uppers. They're stony broke and they've pissed it all away! [laughs]

Well, you'd be surprised. I know quite a few people, like my brother-in-law, for example, who’s big into comics, and he's always bemoaning the fact that there's so little British comic art available to buy. The situation with the American stuff, of course, is completely different…and the market is pretty saturated. You can buy practically anything you want as long as you've got the money…

Yeah.

…but original British comic art is extremely hard to find compared to its American equivalent.

It's just a brain wave that came to me some time back. I haven't got Roy artwork, which is a tragedy because it was all moved from London into a warehouse somewhere up in Birmingham, I think it is, and all my old artwork is up there…of course there's copyright with that…

But it still exists presumably?

Whether it still does or not, I don't know. I shouldn't think so the way people are. They'll have cleared it out because they need space and it's a waste of money having all that space occupied - they could rent it out, or sell it, or whatever. So it's probably disappeared. It could be still there somewhere in a warehouse, but I don't know.

Did you ever actually own the Roy artwork, or once it was handed over was that it?

I actually did own it, although I didn't know it. Because the artwork is, in fact, mine so I could have gone and reclaimed it. But I wasn't interested, it was history…or that's how I felt at the time when I could have done it.

But you still have some of the "Story of a Star" stuff…

Yeah, I've got loads of that, and some other artwork too, but basically IPC magazines hold first rights and I couldn't sell it to be reprinted anywhere else. So that's why it's useless to sell on. I really, really got pissed off with the Christmas annuals where our stuff was reprinted and we got sod all for it. Mentioning that reminds me that there was a strike, oh I can't remember when - it was when I was buying my bloody house I think - and the day I was due to complete, Barry [Tomlinson] rang me up and said, "Sorry to have to tell you this Dave, but as from 12 o'clock today, Roy of the Rovers has ceased publication."

They were pushing for a rise, you see, and unions being what they were back then - it was a them and us attitude - it was all very fraught. I think IPC magazines offered two and a half percent and the union wanted eighteen percent. Quite a void! [laughs] But I think they eventually settled on twelve percent. Now IPC, in their wisdom, issued an ultimatum that said, "OK, we agree to twelve percent, but only to NUJ (National Union of Journalists) members."

So what did everyone do? We joined the union![laughs] Just for the sake of getting the increase of course. Now they said that there would be terms to be agreed for further printing of artwork - you know, second printing of artwork etc., etc. So we thought, "Thank Christ for that!", because all these years these poor artists have starved while their work has been reproduced and whatnot, and it just wasn't fair. So, I get the first huge cheque - because it was a lot of money in those days, it was something like 750 quid a week – and by the time it came through we'd been waiting and waiting because we'd had to skip some money due to the strike. So, I get the cheque and say "Thank Christ! Darling, I'm just going down to the bank, Ok?" and I get to the bank and I have got to countersign it on the back. So they'd agreed to pay us for first rights - for first publication, which is Roy of the Rovers magazine – but in small print underneath it says: "Signing this", which we had to countersign, "Signing this signs away all rights". Bastards! But that was the way of the world then…and it still is, of course, in business.

Ok, so I guess we should tackle the collapse of the British comics industry now! When did you first feel like the writing was on the wall, and what’s your take on the reasons for the collapse?

Well, my synopsis for that is, number one, that the number-crunchers came in from America, and this happened in every field of business in England. Their religion said that one paper couldn’t support another, Ok? So Barry [Tomlinson] had, as I said earlier, six publications going¹. They treated it as a group and if one was failing they would allow it to carry on with low distribution figures because they had other successful ones supporting it. These people came in, and they've done it with all sorts of businesses, and they said, "Lame duck, cut it off. It's not paying its way, cut it off." So that's one trend that spelled the end.

Two, my boys were a good barometer because they grew up very proud of their dad, you know, and told all their friends at school, "My dad does Roy of the Rovers" etc. But, having said that, they only bought the odd comic and weren't that interested because they were getting into the computer age. Stephen, my eldest son, was of the opinion - why should he spend his money on comics that were, in his mind, old hat? They were old hat because he had living pictures and would actually create levels in Doom etc., he would create rooms and dungeons and all sorts of things. He had his own version that he would play with his friends that he created. So where's the attraction in comics if you've got that sort of thing opening up in front of you?

I suppose comics could seem static, possibly, in comparison, I don't know…

We've got a nostalgia for them, we have a value on them. They just felt: "No, I'm not interested in that!".

Well, my brother is 25 and I don't know if he's ever even opened a comic in his entire life. So there you go!

Well that's what I mean. It's all about influences and what's popular around you. So that was number two. The big death knell though, which not a lot of people know about, again relates to number-crunching and all the rest of it. Now the local distributor of newspapers and magazines etc., was a company called Thunder and Clayton in Bournemouth. Now then, the principle before was a newsagent would put in an order for newspapers, magazines, whatever. Ok? So for the sake of argument, they would put in an order for 30 copies of Roy of the Rovers. Come the following week - it was called sale or return - Thunder and Clayton would make their deliveries and take back what didn't sell: Magazines, Roy of the Rovers, whatever. So that would go back to pulp, or whatever they did with it, and be recycled. Now the number-crunchers came in and they said: "No, it's not sale or return any more, they buy them." Ok?

Now then if the newsagent didn't sell all ten by the Monday he’d reorder for next week saying, "Can I have eight", then "Can I have six"…and that's it… we're starting to go down the pan. I remember, at the point that it went to the toilet paper, I think - don't quote me on this but say for the sake of argument - it was somewhere around 60,000 to 70,000 distribution of Roy of the Rovers, and not long after we were getting down to almost break even 20,000 on a Saturday each week. So that's when people were starting to poo themselves and think, "What are we going to do?".

But of course it was across the board, I mean…

Oh yeah, sure. The only one that survived was 2000AD.

And even with that, I think (though I may be wrong) that the readership is now largely composed of people who bought it back in the day and are probably in their late 20s or early 30s now! Anyway, I remember well, when I was about 13 or 14 I suppose, that every time you visited the newsagents you'd find a couple of comics had amalgamated into one publication. There was a period when that seemed to be happening almost on a weekly basis. So one question I wanted to ask is what people did when it all went to the wall? Obviously there were a lot of people employed in the industry who were now facing a crisis…

Well some artists…their artwork stayed the same year in, year out. In fact it degenerated. They were pissing it out more and more. Most of the good artists, on the other hand, if you look at their artwork over five year periods, it gets better and better and better.

They're the only ones that survived. I have survived – and I don't want to sound as if I'm blowing my own trumpet - but I have survived in this business (and that includes general illustration work as well) through quality. Quality will win out in the end. Going back to what I said I learned from artists like Velasquez, Frank Bellamy etc – where I would see something about their artwork that I would like and pick that up - I ended up, of course, with my own style…and it got to a point where people would go, "Oh, David Sque did that" - you'd just have to look to know that I did it. The artists that I cribbed from could look at it and say, "Oh, he got that from me!" - a particular part of it, you know, the way I would drawn an eye etc.

But the greatest compliment to me - and friends of mine have said, "Why didn't you sue the bastard!" - was when I went into a newsagents, picked up a comic, opened it, and flicked through it and there was a complete story that was my artwork nicked! The guy had copied my artwork religiously. So people said, "Why didn't you sue him? It's plagiarism!" I said, "No, I've been there!" and to me that is a compliment, a great compliment. That someone has chosen my style out of all the other people that he could have chosen…

I certainly would have been nicking plenty of things from your style when I was drawing. I was still at school but…

[laughs] Well that was the other thing. I used to get plagued by mothers and fathers saying, "My little Johnny, he's a brilliant artist. Would you have a look at his work and just see what you think?" And I never said no, because you cannot suppress talent, as you never know where it's going to lead. So I would always talk to them. I might think, "This is a dead, almost traced copy and crap", but I didn't say that. I'd say, "If you persevere, we'll see how it develops. If you've really got a taste for it you'll make it." You've got to encourage talent of any description.

Do you think – and this is a question I don't know if there's an easy answer to - is there a future, I mean the way there was in the 70s or 80s, for comics in Britain?

It would have to be a coming together of a sort of cult move of revival that would appeal to the younger generation. The thing about the comics of the 70s and 80s is that they appealed to all ages. That was the thing. They called them children's comics but fathers and the grandfathers used to fight over them too! Still, you just never know what's going to spark a revival…

I'm wondering how much, in terms of the way the industry was run back in those days - the ownership and management and what have you - I wonder how different that culture is now to the way it was in those days?

Unless they've swept quite a few of the old boys out, because unfortunately it's like father and son, the bosses will pass onto their underlings rules and regulations and ways to go. You get a few that stand out and change things, like the guy that did 2000AD, he's a beatnik sort of guy. I really can't think of his name because I didn't do any work for him.²

But I'll give you an example. When all of these things were tightening up, they were given strict budgets. Roy of the Rovers cost so much to produce, paying all the contributors with the printing fees and everything else. Ok? And the same with 2000AD. So, at the end of the financial year they were all hauled up to the top floor of IPC magazines in front of the big bosses etc, and each editor would be grilled. And so my editor Ian was a good boy. For the sake of argument say he had 2,000 pounds budget per issue, that's paying all the artists, everything involved, and he was bringing it in at 1,999 pounds, Ok?

Then you've got this guy that was running 2000AD and let's say his end of year figures were 2,500 per issue, Ok? So they go through it and say to Ian, "You've kept to the budget, we want you to make some more cuts, because you're doing well on that," And so they cut his budget by 10%. They go to the guy from 2000AD and say, "You're doing well, you obviously need more money so we're going to up your budget by 30%". Now where's the logic in that? It doesn't make sense does I?! But that's the way it works. His budget went up and up so he was allowed to get the top quality artists, the leaders in the field. I mean the guys that did Judge Dredd, there was a team of them I think, three or four different artists.

Well, there were some superb artists working on 2000 AD at the time…

Absolutely. Wonderful stuff. Anyway, at that point I got into computer artwork and I did some lovely work with that. I had the advantage, as I said earlier on, that I was an artist using the computer as a tool, whereas most of the other artists that were using the computer were able to use the package as opposed to being talented artists (and that's why all the artwork looked the same). I've done some lovely work that I really enjoyed and that's the way I thought I was going until Scorer cropped up.

I've got myself bogged down in Scorer now, because I’ve got to the point where I feel, well, I can do it with my eyes closed. It's still quite enjoyable work to do, but now I'm back to really working too hard for what I'm being paid. Still, it's regular work, and I'm one of the few people from that era that is in regular work.

So just going back to what we were discussing, what are most of your ex-colleagues doing now?

Well, I'm good friends with an artist that I told you about earlier- brilliant artist - John Batchelor, who went on to do lots of technical stuff. John used to do the centre cutaways in the revived Eagle. Cutaways of guns, tanks and all the rest of it. Pete Sarson [sp] was involved in that too, and he’s now a painter and decorator. I don't know what other fields they've gone into but Barry Mitchell is still scrubbing along, last I heard. There just isn't much work out there. A lot people have gone to the States for work.

Well, a lot of the British talent that went over to the States ended up becoming some of the most interesting and dynamic figures out there because they obviously brought a freshness, and totally different slant to the world of American comics.

It's unfortunate that like with most jobs, when you specialize and that's all you do, you're in deep shit if it folds. If that's all they've ever done - and there are quite a few artists who all they've ever done is comic illustration - they don't know anything else. I've diversified, doing everything from oil paintings, to magazine illustration etc. I've not got my eggs in one basket, so if all else fails, I can make a living doing oil paintings.

Anyway, it's interesting to see what'll happen. I think the key thing for any revival, really, is for it to be something that is more than simple nostalgia for people like myself. For it to be sustainable I suppose it would have to target the '13 year old boy' market successfully…

Yeah. You've got to appeal to the kids for the pocket money first. They're the highest spenders on that sort of thing.

And the most loyal as well, probably. Buying it week in, week out sort of thing, you know? Well, anyway, I think we'll leave it at that David, but I should add that, doom and gloom about the British comics industry aside, you're still easily one of my favourite comic book artists.

Thank you very much. I've had some lovely correspondence from all over the world, emails and whatnot. I had a load of emails from America and I couldn't understand why I was getting them. They said, "My dad was stationed in Oxford airbase – an American airbase - and I used to go into the local village and buy Roy of the Rovers every week religiously. I just got to love your artwork and yours was the best period", and whatnot and all these lovely flattering things. And of course, they're now sort of 40 year olds, 50 year olds. It was really great to get all that stuff and to know your work is appreciated.

The End

1. See Part 1 for details [back]
2. Not sure who David meant here…Pat Mills? [back]