Before the rise in television ownership began to dent cinema
attendances, it was common to see street performers attempting to
entertain queues of eager film fans as they waited for the
picturehouse to open. These musicians/dancers/escapologists etc would
of course be hoping to raise cash from their captive audience. Krazy
Town’s busker, Buster, was often seen performing to the queue of
kids waiting to stampede over the Commissionaire and into the
Saturday morning picture show, but his less-than-harmonious
one-man-band stylings were never seen to result in donations.
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| Buster's debut in Cheeky Weekly issue 1 Art: Frank McDiarmid |
The 03 December 1977 issue was the only edition in which Buster had two separate encounters with Cheeky – the first being in the usual pre-film show sequence, but the second occurring as Cheeky left the cinema after watching the programme. This 3-panel strip was constructed from images originally seen when Buster made his debut in issue 1 (above).
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| Cheeky Weekly 03 December 1977 Art: copied and pasted from above Frank McDiarmid artwork |
It would seem that Buster’s absence during the 16 weeks between his
31 December 1977 and 22 April 1978 appearances (something that Cheeky
remarked on when he returned) was due to a change in his choice of
audience…
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| Cheeky Weekly 22 April 1978 Art: Barrie Appleby |
In Cheeky Weekly dated 19 August 1978 the toothy funster got a glimpse of his life in the year 2038, where his bewhiskered future self met up with Buster…
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| Art: Frank McDiarmid |
The final Saturday picture show sequence appeared in Cheeky Weekly
dated 02 December 1978. A week later Buster was seen on Friday (the
first time he had appeared on any day other than Saturday) departing
for a new location…
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| More Frank |
Buster was then absent from the comic until the 05 January 1980
edition where he was seen (or WAS he?) on Monday at Cheeky’s new year party. My original thought regarding the long gap between Buster's 09 December 1978 and 05 January 1980 appearances was that the January 1980 artwork was drawn a year earlier when Buster
would still have been fresh in readers’ memories, but was not used
at that time due to the industrial dispute which caused the comic to
suspend publication for 3 weeks in December 1978. However, this is clearly not the case as Cheeky's new year 1979 party was depicted in the 13 January 1979 comic. This makes me wonder whether the one-man-band shown at Cheeky's 1980 Hogmanay bash was indeed Buster with his bass drum moved to his back to accommodate the accordion, or in fact a musician hired by Cheeky's parents. The fact that the partygoers seem to be enjoying the music (the way that Disco Kid is seriously getting down indicates some damn funky accordion) suggests that it isn't Buster.
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| Cheeky Weekly 05 January 1980 Frank again |
Discounting the above as being a performance by Buster means that the incompetent instrumentalist appeared in a total of 32 editions of Cheeky Weekly.
Since the Saturday morning picture show sequence was never depicted
in Cheeky’s strips in Krazy, it’s no surprise that Buster never
appeared in that comic.
| Character | Total Issues | First Appearance | Final Appearance |
| Buster the Busker | 32 | 22-Oct-1977 | 09-Dec-1978 |
Buster the Busker - Number of appearances by Element
| Element | Number of Appearances |
| Saturday | 32 |
| Friday | 1 |
Count of elements by artist
| Character | Artist | Total Elements |
| Buster the Busker | Frank McDiarmid | 15 |
| Buster the Busker | Frank McDiarmid pencils | 8 |
| Buster the Busker | Mike Lacey | 4 |
| Buster the Busker | Dick Millington | 2 |
| Buster the Busker | Jim Watson | 2 |
| Buster the Busker | Barrie Appleby | 2 |
like the nose gag!
ReplyDeleteGood job Lily Pop didn't try to play it.
DeleteWhy’s Teacher waggling his fingers in the direction of Claude’s bottom? “I was just trying to steady myself,” I can hear him telling the magistrates … ooer!
ReplyDeleteI choose to think that his fingers have gone rigid with ecstasy due to the proximity of luscious Lily rather than Claude's posterior, but who knows?
Delete