Goodbye Charlie — you’re probably playing with Jimi right now. Photo ©2007 Chas and Pat Balun. PS: Obviously, Charlie never played with Jimi in life; he photoshopped this dream pic!

I’ll be posting something more upbeat later today, but I have to note with a very heavy heart the death of my good friend Charlie ‘Chas’ Balun.

I just got the news yesterday via email from Tony Timpone (editor of Fangoria) that Charlie died on December 18th at age 61.

Charlie had been fighting cancer as long as I’ve known him (we first met in the late 1980s), and this latest skirmish in the ongoing war took him.

Charlie was, literally, a Viking of a man: huge, hearty, often hilarious, always deadly honest and absolutely full of life. He changed my life for the better from the moment we first communicated — Charlie was the first editor (with Deep Red) to open the door to my writing career — and though we rarely got to get together in the flesh (Vermont was too ‘hill people’ for Charlie and Pat, and his and Pat’s Los Angeles area base sure is a loooooooong ways away, though I did get to visit them a couple of times over the years), Charlie was both a beacon and an anchor in good and tough times for me, personally and creatively. I love the man, and life is going to be leaner without Charlie.

A sobering note I must add, as it’s on my mind. For all the eulogies to come, I have to note that during the last decade or so whenever Charlie and I got to talking about getting work into print he didn’t have too many kind words for the state of either fan or pro publishing. His last couple of book projects ended badly; one remains unpublished, though the finished book (Charlie always turned in complete camera-ready boards) has malingered for well over a decade. 

From his first self-published chapbook The Connoisseur’s Guide to the Contemporary Horror Film (1983), Chas forever changed how folks wrote about the genre. Sadly, the very successors who ‘adopted’ the tenor and tone that was originally Charlie’s alone and built careers of their own on copping Charlie’s attitude (but never his candor or wit) never gave Charlie his due, or made it possible for him to get his final dream projects into print, either. Fuck ‘em; they’ll never hold a candle to the man, and they’ve missed any chance they ever had to repay their debt to him.

Much as Charlie loved horror movies, his sentimental streak was shamelessly miles long; he was a sweet bear of a fellow, really. Among his favorites films was Ring of Bright Water, and he called me last year when I sent him a package of memorabilia from that classic animal-lovers gem, and his and Pat’s home was adorned with more than one of Charlie’s expansive paintings of otters and the animals he loved — hanging right next to amazing horror movie props from his pals at KNB. 

I’ll save the rest for a proper writing. He loved Pat, their pets, his music, his guitar (the photo above is one he sent me in 2007, entitled ‘Jimi & Me’), his art, his home, his weed, his life. He didn’t care much for the bullshit of doing business in this sorry world, but he made his way as a freelancer and was among the real 1980s pioneers of the minicomics form. Charlie never suffered fools for long, and always called a spade a spade, regardless of how the chips might fall. There’s so many stories — yes, it’s true that Charlie was ratted out to the FBI in a chain of events that began with idiot Charlie Sheen calling the authorities when he was grossed out screening a video boot of Hideshi Hino’s notorious Japanese Guinea Pig faux-’snuff’ film Za ginipiggu 2: Chiniku no hana / Flower of Flesh and Blood (1985); being an old hippie, Chas was outraged (and it was Chris Gore, Film Threat founder and cine ‘bad boy’, who narced!), and according to Chas one of the first things he said to the agents at his door was, “Did any one of you watch the end of the fucking video?” Jesus H. Christ, the ‘Making of’ short was right there, showing how the special effects illusions were fabricated. D’oh! 

Even at the worst of times, Charlie kept his spirit and his wicked sense of humor. Among our last email exchanges is this characteristicly candid reply:

“–Sorry it’s been sooooooooo long, my friend. Going thru yet another bout w/cancer (which has returned with a metastasizing fury and spread) and trying hard to keep my wits about me. Finished w/ radiation and nearly done w/current chemo. Have a CT scan this week to check on things. It has not been pretty. Had surgery a few months ago but they decided to pursue other approaches in the future because of the spread and location of the bad mojo. It SUCKS, really does. Taking it one day at a time and still hoping for blue skies. Hope all is well with you & yours, ol’ buddy.
Peace,
The Chazmanian Devil”

Goodbye, old friend. God, I miss you.