READY, CASSETTE, GO!

In this retro-soaked debut graphic novel, a prickly girl finds herself in a magical city where the music never stops.

A talented guitarist, Melody Li arrives in Cassette City with her walls up and her headphones firmly on—but this analog town has other plans. A mushroom named Taki and a green raccoon called Snackwich will need help if they want to win the Battle of the Bands. Though Melody’s a loner, she’s eager to bring down the insufferable ginger cat Styles, who fronts Taki and Snackwich’s rival act, and she agrees to lend a hand. The eventual addition of Atikus, a robot, provides the band its final missing piece. Sitter’s art is masterful. A palette of burnt orange, teal, and muted gold channels peak-era alternative comics, while confident linework gives every character vivid, distinct personality. Panel variation is deployed with skill and wit; a bravura double-page spread arranges failed auditions as a cascading collage of snapshots, each musician dismissed with a deadpan speech bubble, and on another spread, a tape unspools across the page, connecting the scattered bandmates in their separate worlds. Clever dialogue crackles throughout, but beneath the laughs, real emotional stakes thrum: Melody nursing the wound of a mother who walked out on the family; Snackwich paralyzed by the memory of dropping his drumsticks onstage and failing Taki; Atikus simply trying to be his true self. Melody is cued East Asian.

A sharp series opener, steeped in humor, heart, and nostalgia.