About Andy

In the summer vacation between third and fourth grade my Dad brought home a tall box and placed it on the kitchen table. The label on the side said, “4,000 sheets of continuously blank paper.”

This paper was the dot-matrix type that is connected end to end with the holes on both sides. I was intrigued, up to this point I had never seen paper behave like this.

Anyways…

With these 4,000 sheets of continuously blank paper I began drawing a serial comic strip. Fast and furiously I worked, careful not to separate the perforated pages. At the end of every night I would  fold the story and return it back to the tall box.

The hero,  who’s full name is lost to time, was something like, Electric Man. Who’s to say the whole story was destroyed in a basement flood. From what I remember this guy was regularly getting jumped and getting his ass kicked. For one reason or another we would find him beaten bloody by whatever villain or monster he encountered that day.

Then…

Just when you thought it was over for the dude, some form of electricity would present itself, he would recharge in a bright colorful splash page explosion! His dancing skeleton would be visible surrounded by guts, fire, and lightning bolts. Slowly the smoke would rise around the dude and who ever those villains or monsters were, they would be in trouble.

I’m guessing that Electric man was inspired by Popeye, Hulk Hogan, Rocky or some other underdog. I’ll never know how good or bad this story was but I remember loving the process and the product.

After the flood I was devastated. Soon after fourth grade began I started my next project on regular old lined school paper. This was a much shorter and condensed story. The hero was, Frogman, deadly illusionist and spy. This series still exists and was a full ten books long.

Skip ahead to tenth grade, I started drawing fast and silly books with all new characters like Super Cook and Super Chicken, along with a bunch of other titles like Brandy Had a Rabit and Irene and the Fantastic Enchanted Jiggle Machine, to name a few. The stories were basically how ever much action I could fit into a spiral notebook. they were over the top silly and rude, some times violent yet not really offensive. They were crudely drawn but so fun to make and soon I had around ten of these wacky books.

After high school I started writing screenplays, filming stop motion and making spoof commercials and public announcements. Not long after that I began recording radio shows on cassette tapes for myself and friends called Cheese Time Radio. After dozens of these tapes I began painting, sculpting, carving and building exotic furniture and custom cabinets.

Then…

As anyone could guess, I jumped headlong into music. My buddies and I started a kick-ass band called ROLLING MACHINE. We recorded many albums, countless songs and performed hundreds of shows. As time went on we all got better jobs and bought houses, some of us even got married and had kids. After about ten years from the start, the band, for the most part had run its course.

I naturally went back to writing books, only this time they rhymed. The first new book of this generation was Alphabet Buffet. This book was completed with the help of my secret artistic weapon, Margrette, who I am blessed to have as a Mother.

Together we are currently working on illustrating and publishing the next nine rhyming books we have ready. The ship is being steered by my best friend and brother Danny, who has been encouraging me my whole life right from that first continuously blank piece of paper.

So the short of the long story is my life has always been guided by my artistic compass, yet so much of what I’ve tinkered with has never seen the light of day. My art has only been a release for me and a way to entertain myself, family and friends.

But…

Somehow I finally reached a point that I want to share the best of what I’ve done with the world. My work has always served me well and kept me happy even in the dark times. My greatest hope and most sincere wish is that somehow I can help someone else smile or get through a rough spot with a small piece of this vast collection of silly playfulness.

Thanks for reading my story!

Your new friend,

Andy Farah