The project started about a year ago, Davis said. The other service branches will be the focus of later editions.
The $3.99 printed version is available through two Vancouver stores — Odyssey Comics and Coffee, and I Like Comics — as well as Amazon and Barnes & Noble. An e-book version is available for $1.99.
Bluewater recently signed a deal to produce a “special-ops” fictional comics series in partnership with Soldier of Fortune magazine.
More information is at www.bluewaterprod.com.
— Tom Vogt
Dan Weber used to stare at his guitar. “I never played the thing,” he said. “I just lugged it through life.”
Until a musical friend insisted on a lesson. “I just started writing songs,” Weber said. “And about six years ago, I started seriously sitting down and getting into it. I just felt like, ‘This is fascinating to me now.'” At the “ripe old age of 40,” he said, he decided to debut at a local open mic.
How’d it go? “Awful. Just awful.” Then he played another. “It was worse than the first.”
But something eventually must have gone right — because Weber wound up winning an open mic contest. That was about four years ago, and he never looked back. Now 44, Weber has released two country-flavored albums — the latest this past February — and acquired a fan base that has spread the word to radio stations and other venues all around North America. One fan, Doug “Spud” Henderson, a Portland MAX train driver, first alerted The Columbian to Weber’s burgeoning career. You can have a listen at danwebermusic.com.
“It’s funny, my music keeps popping up in different places. It’s snowballing into its own thing,” Weber said. Meanwhile, he’s kept his flexible day job as a real estate appraiser. It allows him the time to travel and play as well as pay the bills.
Weber’s next stop: the Kerrville (Texas) Folk Festival on May 27. He’s a finalist in the New Folk Artist contest. “I’ll just be the best Dan Weber I can be,” he said. “I’m the accidental musician, I guess.”
— Scott Hewitt
Bits ‘n’ Pieces appears Fridays and Saturdays. If you have a story you’d like to share, email bits@columbian.com.
