I never got to meet Tony Husband before his passing in October 2023. I’d always wanted to, but we can all have good intentions to do something but never get around to it, never considering one day it could be too late. I did get to speak to him on the phone a couple of times though. On these occasions I’d sent a message to Tony asking something specific about OiNK and instead of writing back he took the time to call me and we’d chat at length about the comic.
After all these years he was still so enthusiastic about it, so eager to share stories about its making, taking every chance he could to praise those who worked on it. Some of the information Tony gave me on those calls has already found its way into posts throughout OiNK’s read through. As for everything else we chatted about I’ve now decided to sum it all up and remember what a generous man Tony was with his time.
“The rock and roll madness,” was how Tony remembered OiNK. “Mark (Rodgers, fellow editor) was the glue, he was the drummer.” He continued, “Bob Paynter loved working with us three, there were no egos working on the comic. Basically it was rock and roll, our offices were in the same building as Happy Mondays, Dave Hassle, the Hacienda DJ was next door, downstairs were Marc (Riley) and Frank (Sidebottom). It was like being in a band.”
He described the OiNK team as “all fantastic people”, and that there were “so many ideas we could’ve had an extra comic every week.” He lavished praise on the team, describing how much he loved getting to work with mates from Punch and Private Eye, trying out different styles of strips and content for the comic. “Lew (Stringer) is one of the great comics artists in the country still,” he said. “Jeremy (Banx) was fabulous and we just let his head go wherever it led.”
Tony felt OiNK lasted
the right amount of time
Tony also told me some of the funny stories that occurred during OiNK’s time, such as when he and (fellow editor) Patrick Gallagher were invited to London to appear on a breakfast TV show. They thought they were heading down to promote OiNK because it was appealing to a new demographic of young readers. But the first question foisted upon them (in relation to a Madvertisement in the preview issue) asked if they felt joking about smashing up friends’ bicycles was the “right message to send”, spectacularly missing the point of the humour in favour of some sensationalism.
According to Tony it was worth the sudden shock and typical faux-offence from the presenters for five minutes because his and Patrick’s expenses were all paid for, including travel and a night in a 5-star hotel! But that’s not the end of the story. On the return train Tony brought out onto the table a few small bottles of booze he’d sneaked out from his hotel room’s courtesy bar, thinking they’d have a tipple on the way home, only for Patrick to empty out a plastic bag full of every single bottle from his room! By the time they hit Manchester they could barely walk off the train.
I’ve previously covered how Tony met Patrick through Mark and he elaborated on this, telling me they’d meet over several drinks between local pubs and their own flats, the immediate chemistry setting into motion what would eventually become OiNK. Graham Exton was also in those early ‘meetings’ and at one stage IPC‘s Group Editor of Humour Bob Paynter wanted to meet with the team to discuss the possibility of the comic. He wanted to do it somewhere secret to stop word getting out. The solution was to meet at Manchester airport, but it ended up being on the same day that, according to Tony, “all the cartoonists in the world” arrived on their way to Tenerife for a cartoon convention and they all recognised Tony!
Another tale Tony couldn’t help laughing along with as he told it happened not long after publisher IPC Magazines had had to deal with that famous complaint to the Press Council. After it was settled Tony received a phone call from Youth Group Managing Director John Sanders telling him, “this latest story has gone too far, we’ll have to close OiNK!” Only it wasn’t John. Patrick had got one of his mates who did accents to impersonate him! Then, the following week Tony phoned Patrick to tell him something in the comic had upset a family and John’s legal team was on it, but there were concerns they could end up in court. All nonsense of course!
The Manchester music links to OiNK couldn’t have been any clearer when you take a closer look at the comic. For example, the inclusion of contributors such as Frank and Marc (who had previously been in The Fall), or Tony’s own punk band strip, The Slugs (drawn by Les ‘Lezz’ Barton). Tony also brought in Jon Langford of The Mekons to draw some strips and full-page images and the band starred in a couple of photo stories. Then Jon’s other band, The 3 Johns also featured in OiNK on the page of Janice Pong’s (Tony’s) interview with lead singer of The Cult, Ian Astbury. In the review of that issue you’ll find out what Tony told me of that experience.
As for OiNK’s demise, Tony admitted the change to a weekly comic wasn’t their decision and it was a real strain. “Fortnightly was when it was best”, he said and I have to agree. He also wasn’t pleased with another change when Robert Maxwell’s Fleetway Publications took over as publisher: “The weekly was on shit paper.” He also explained that W.H. Smith’s nonsense with top-shelving OiNK didn’t help but once Maxwell took over, “the accountants moved in and killed it.” This was in comparison to IPC. “iPC loved the attention OiNK got in the press,” he said. “Especially the celebrity attention.”
At one point he received a phone call from Yorkshire TV who wanted to do a TV version of OiNK, but Fleetway insisted the three men pay any OiNK artists working on the show out of what they were personally paid by the TV network, all while Fleetway reaped the rewards. OiNK may have been independently produced and the contents largely remained creator-owned, but Fleetway still owned the entity called ‘OiNK’. So in the end they refused the deal and after the comic’s cancelation they took Yorkshire TV up on their offer directly, creating the award-winning (and very OiNK-like) Round the Bend.
Tony said he thought of a certain Neil Young lyric when he reminisced about OiNK. The song My My Hey Hey includes the line, “Better to burn out than fade away” and thinking back Tony felt OiNK lasted the right amount of time. While it wasn’t their decision to cancel it, he truly believed if it had carried on indefinitely it may have become tired and lost its edge; the time was right to move on and have OiNK go out while it was still on top form.
The last time I spoke to Tony he was still hard at work. He had his own music studio, he was cartooning for Private Eye and could often be seen on Countryfile on BBC One. Several years before he had also released a new book and he was still travelling around meeting and talking to others about it. Take Care Son is the tale of how dementia slowly took Tony’s dad from his family and friends. The title is a reference to the last words his dad said to him before he passed and the story is framed within a touching, moving chat between the two men.
One final little tale Tony told me to finish on. Over the years since OiNK finished he’d meet fans who would tell him how important it had been to them and he’d give away signed issues here and there, until he’d none left. In the end, much to his surprise, his wife bought the whole collection on eBay for around £300 for him! From creating it, to buying it all back from a reader.
I may never have met him in person but it didn’t feel that way on the phone. Tony was so enthusiastic, so open, so friendly and was so genuinely caring it felt like I’d known him all my life and we were having a friendly, very funny catch up on both occasions. I guess in a kind of way that’s exactly what I was doing. OiNK was such a huge part of my life (and still is) that I felt I knew Tony personally from the moment I picked up the phone.
That’s just the kind of person he was. A genuine soul. One who is greatly missed.
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