Nate Powell

Nate Powell
Nate Powell at Alternative Press Expo, San Francisco, November 2008.
Born	1978 Little Rock, Arkansas
Nationality	American
Area(s)	Cartoonist, Writer, Penciller, Inker, Publisher, Letterer, Colorist
Notable works	Any Empire Swallow Me Whole Sounds of Your Name
Awards	Ignatz Award, 2008 & 2009 Eisner Award, 2009
Official website

Nate Powell (b. 1978, Little Rock, Arkansas) is a graphic novelist, publisher, and musician. He owns DIY punk record label Harlan Records, has performed in several punk bands (including Universe, Divorce Chord, WAIT, Soophie Nun Squad, Boomfancy, and Gioteens), and occasionally performed hip hop as Featherweight MC. From 1997 to 2002 he was an actor and skit writer for North Little Rock sketch comedy show Fun And Games. From 1999 to 2009, he worked as a caregiver for adults with developmental disabilities.^[1]

Powell moved from North Little Rock, Arkansas to Great Falls, Montana in 1980, and then again to Montgomery, Alabama in 1983 before returning to North Little Rock in 1988 upon his father's retirement from the Air Force. He began self-publishing comics in 1992 with age 14 with Mike Lierly and Nathan Wilson. Powell graduated from North Little Rock High School in 1996, briefly attended George Washington University in Washington, DC, and graduated from School of Visual Arts in New York City in 2000 after receiving the Outstanding Cartooning Student award and the Shakespeare & Company Books Self-Publishing Grant, with which he funded the first issue of Walkie Talkie.

Powell lived intermittently in central Arkansas while calling East Lansing, Michigan, South Hadley Falls, Massachusetts, and Providence, Rhode Island home from 2001 to 2003. He settled in Bloomington, Indiana in early 2004.

His 2008 graphic novel Swallow Me Whole won the Ignatz Award for Outstanding Debut, as well as the 2009 Ignatz Award for Outstanding Artist. On March 2, 2009, it was named a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in the Young Adult Fiction category. It received the 2009 Eisner Award for Best Original Graphic Novel, and was also nominated for Best Writer/Artist and Best Lettering.

Powell is currently drawing the graphic novels The Silence Of Our Friends (forthcoming on First Second Books in 2012), written by Mark Long and Jim Demonakos, and Year Of The Beasts (forthcoming on Roaring Brook Press in 2012), written by Cecil Castellucci.

Bibliography

• D.O.A. #1-4 (co-writer, co-artist. 9/92-4/93, Food Chain Productions)
• Food Chain Holiday Special (writer, artist. 12/92, Food Chain)
• D.O.A. #-47 F (writer, artist. 12/93, Food Chain)
• The Schwa Sound #1-14 (2/94-5/99, Food Chain)
• Arsenic (5/94, Food Chain)
• Billy Crash (8/95, Food Chain)
• Pantheon #1 (with Ben Nichols and Ken Edge. 2/96, Food Chain)
• The Playground Messiah (with Emil Heiple. 5/96, Food Chain; reprinted in 1998 by Tree of Knowledge Press)
• Conditions (4/99, Food Chain; French translation in 2001 by Small Budget Productions)
• Frankenbones (with Emil Heiple. 5/99, Food Chain)
• Wonderful Broken Thing (12/99, Food Chain)
• Walkie Talkie #1-4 (5/00-6/02, Food Chain)
• Good Night For a Daydream (with Jenny Holt. 8/00, Food Chain)
• Tiny Giants (6/03, Soft Skull Press)
• It Disappears (6/04, Soft Skull Press)
• Please Release (slightly different photocopied version, 1/05, Food Chain)
• illustrations for Joyland (by Emily Schultz. 3/06, ECW Press)
• Sounds of Your Name (9/06, Microcosm Publishing)
• Please Release (10/06, Top Shelf Productions)
• Cakewalk (written by Rachel Bormann)/ Bets Are Off (9/08, self-released)
• Swallow Me Whole (10/08, Top Shelf Productions)
• Papercutter #12 (written by Rachel Bormann. 3/10, Tugboat Press)
• illustrations for Edible Secrets (by Michael Hoerger and Mia Partlow. 12/10, Microcosm Publishing)
• Sweet Tooth #19 (with Jeff Lemire, Matt Kindt, and Emi Lenox. 3/11, Vertigo Comics)
• Any Empire (7/11, Top Shelf Productions)
• "Conjurers" included in the young adult short story collection What You Wish For (9/11, G.P. Putnam's Sons)

Personal Discography

with Soophie Nun Squad (1992-2007)

• "We Ate Slayer" demo tape (5/94, Food Chain Records)
• "We Rule The World" demo tape (8/94, Food Chain)
• "Vs. the USA" 7" (3/95, Food Chain)
• "The Dogtown Chronicles" comp tape (5/95, Food Chain—also vocalist for the bands Mob and Dentistry on this comp)
• "Dino" 7" (4/97, Harlan Records [formerly Food Chain])
• Don't Let Them Take You Alive CD (3/98, Harlan)
• "Heartbreakers and Rumpshakers" comp 7" (8/98, Harlan)
• The Devil, The Metal, The Big Booty Beats LP/CD (1/00, Harlan/Plan-it-X/Phyte)
• "A Compilation for Heroes" comp CD (5/00, Streetcar Music)
• "Defeated Food Not Bombs Benefit" comp CD (5/00, Defeated)
• "Listen to What I'm Made Of" comp 2xCD (7/01, File 13 Records)
• split LP/CD with Abe Froman (4/03, Harlan/ Plan-it-X)
• Passion Slays The Dragon LP/CD (9/03, Harlan/ Plan-it-X/ Narshardaa Records)
• "Rootbeer and Molotovs" comp CD (11/04, Ten Fingers Collective)
• "Plan-it-X Fest 2004" comp DVD (6/05, Plan-it-X)
• "If it Ain't Cheap, It Ain't Punk" comp CD (12/05, Plan-it-X)
• "All The Days Are Numbered So" comp CD (3/06, Harlan)

with Boomfancy (2000-2001)

• 7-song 7" (1/01, Harlan)

with Gioteens (1999-2001)

• 8-song demo (7/00, Harlan)

with W A I T (2005-2007)

• (listed as Nate Powell)All The Days Are Numbered So" comp CD (3/06, Harlan)
• Say It, Come True CD (10/06, Harlan)

with Divorce Chord (2007-2008)

• demo CDR (4/08, Harlan)
• "lose your illusion II" demo CDR (2/09, Harlan)

with Universe (2008-2010)

• demo CDR (4/09, Harlan)
• Passenger CD (6/10, Harlan)

other appearances

• co-lyricist, Tem Eyos Ki "Kids Kill Kids" from split 7" with Hundred Years War (8/00, Harlan)
• co-lyricist, Tem Eyos Ki "Stop Action" from tour CDR (5/01, self-released)
• voice and percussion, Abe Froman "Walking Distance", from Abe Froman/ Soophie Nun Squad split LP/CD (4/03, Harlan/Plan-it-X)
• coconuts, tap dancing, flavishorn, backing vocals, Spoonboy I Love You, This is a Robbery (3/05, Plan-it-X)
• backing vocals of "doo do do doo" only, Matty Pop Chart track on "If it Ain't Cheap, It Ain't Punk" comp CD (12/05, Plan-it-X)
• vocals with Lisa Bennett Merva, All The Days Are Numbered So comp CD (3/06, Harlan)

External links

• See My Brother Dance, Nate Powell's official web site
• Top Shelf Productions, publisher
• Video > Nate Powell showcase in Lucca (Italy)

Notes

1. ^ Powell, Nate. "Fluorescent Misfunction," PowellsBooks.Blog, November 10th, 2008.

Persondata
Name	Powell, Nate
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1978
Place of birth	Little Rock, Arkansas
Date of death
Place of death