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God’s Acre: From the sweaty geek’s bedroom to your living room

By Josh Riesen

Scott Lambridis is leading a double life. When he isn’t pounding the bass for local band Black Cat Revival, he is a man obsessed, obsessed with bringing unknown and unrecognized artistic talent to the masses through Omnibucket, an organization that has sprung up in the last year to help develop high-quality artistic and literary content from both the US and the UK. Omnibucket’s third release is no exception to this trend. “God’s Acre, Book One: The Ravens and the Rhyme” is a 96-page collaboration of several writers and artists dedicated to bringing the graphic novel out of the sweaty geek’s bedroom and onto the living room table. This collection of stories-within-stories told with sculpture-on-sketch art is a tribute to the mysteries of childhood, told in a macabre fashion.

“God’s Acre” is not just a single story told in linear fashion. It is two stories, illustrated differently. These two stories wrap and wind around each other, begging the reader to figure out what is going on in the world of the young protagonists, even as the characters attempt to do the same. The two main characters, Norman and Isabel, are curious youths that have a knack for exploring. Before long, the children turn their attention to the local graveyard, and begin to learn about the life of a man who lived for the ravens he had collected. As that story moves on, however, the question of who was collecting who arrives at a strange conclusion.

I recently had a chance to talk to Scott about God’s Acre, Black Cat Revival, and a little bit of Omnibucket’s history.

UW: How did God’s Acre come into being?

SL: A few years ago, Angie (Needels, artist on God’s Acre) and I were playing with some ideas, putting my short story work together with her art, and not long after that, she produced a sketch of two homicidal-looking children, and that brought along the idea of a fairy-tale-formatted work that would appeal to adults. We decided to have a graveyard as the setting, since we could have many stories that are interrelated, but still have wildly different narratives.

UW: How hard was it to put this project together?

SL: Very (laughs). It took a lot of time, especially the six months ramping up to right now, as there was a lot of editing and shifting. It was a very iterative process. We were constantly revising the text to fit and look good on the page, along with the art and the handwritten aspects of the text. We had thousands of sculpture shots, and just getting through all of those to find the right ones was a lot of work. We were really worried about how people would react.

UW: Did you have a specific goal in mind when you started this project?

SL: When we started, not really. We just wanted to create innovative storytelling through my writing and Angie’s artistic development. We just wanted to create unique, non-conventional art formats. We’ll have a couple supplements for God’s Acre out shortly, such as an ambient soundtrack for the story.

UW: I know you play for Black Cat Revival...Do you find it hard to split your time between the band and Omnibucket?

SL: It was pretty hard at first, balancing the two, but I’m an antsy person. When I have free time, I have to fill it. But even before Omnibucket, Bill (singer of Black Cat Revival) and I were collaborating on art projects such as the lyric book for the last BCR release, Eleventy Billion Miles Away.

UW: How did Omnibucket come about in the first place?

SL: A year or so ago, Dave (Senecal, co-designer on God’s Acre) and I talked about different collaborations of local art and writing and how to put it all together into a package that was content-oriented, without worrying about layout, since good work should lay itself out correctly. The end result was Ology, our small-format monthly.

UW: Where do you see Omnibucket in the next 5 years?

SL: Growing (laughs). We want to keep up what we’ve been doing for the last year, and turn it into a real company. There’s a huge glut of talent in Columbus and in many other places, and we want to show it off.

UW: Okay, just one more thing before I let you go: if you had one thing to say to the city of Columbus, what would it be?

SL: Quit having such an inferiority complex.

The Book Release Party for “God’s Acre, Book One: The Ravens & the Rhyme” will be held at Benvolence Café on Saturday, 8/19 from 12:00-5:00 PM. For more information please call 221-9330 or visit www.benevolencecafe.com online. For more information about the book and Omnibucket, please visit their website at www.omnibucket.com online.

Originally Published: August 16, 2006

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