There's been such a flood of graphic novels that I strain to get the thread through the eye of the needle in my wrap-ups, let alone come up with an appropriate metaphor. This summer, the thread was the movies. This time, the hook is musical: The CD insert to ''Suspicious Activity?," the fourth offering from The Bad Plus (Columbia), a lunkhead-cool jazz trio of Midwestern origin, sports deadpan-wacky graphic-novel-style business jokes by antiwar graphic artist David Rees. ''Weird Tales of the Ramones," a four-CD box set (Rhino), boasts work by 26 artists, including Zippy the Pinhead creator Bill Griffith, hysterically raunchy Briton Lorna Miller, and Johnny Ryan, father of gross-out antiheroine Blecky Yuckerella. Funny stuff, and a perfect fit for the group. Good listening, too.
Capturing the passion of music and war
Two books vamping on Elvis Presley extend the musical note: Rich Koslowski's ''The King" (Top Shelf, 264 pp., $19.95) and D. A. Morello's ''The Ballad of Outlaw Elvis and Other Songs of Freedom" (self-published and unpaginated, $9; e-mail dave@adozeneggs.com for more information).
Koslowski's layered mystery suggests the late Elvis. Bloated and arrogant and charismatic, the King is an Elvis imitator (could he be the real McCoy?) with the original's allure. Trying to solve the puzzle is Paul Erfurt, a discredited tabloid reporter eager to reestablish his credibility through an exposé of this pretender. Koslowski's style is realistic, his plot gripping. Who in the King's entourage is out to get him? Koslowski's art, in elegant shades of blue, black, and white, thickens the plot, making ''The King" an intriguing inquiry into, and perpetuation of, myth.
Morello's is a shorter, more overtly poetic, and not altogether disciplined work. Striking, too, above all. It conflates such mythical icons as a young, rocking Elvis, Dylans Bob and Thomas, and Woody Guthrie into a heavily Dylan-influenced, psychedelic ballad replete with gorgeous woodcuts, one to a page. Edward Gorey's influence is clear; so is Ben Shahn's. Ruggedness and innocence coexist here to striking effect, suggesting Morello is due a wider audience.
On a nonmusical plane, several serious works have been released recently. Among the best are Steve Mumford's ''Baghdad Journal: An Artist in Occupied Iraq" (Drawn & Quarterly, 244 pp., $34.95) and Joe Kubert's ''Jew Gangster: A Father's Admonition" (iBooks, 143 pp., $22.95).