Boombakaboomker by Koldo Barroso, 2008.

This is a revision of a former post featuring the illustration of Boombakabakaboom, the boombakabumker. I have decided to include a little bit of the story that goes with this drawing, which was formerly unpublished. I hope you enjoy it!

Armin and Boombakabakaboom

The Boombakaboomkers are kind creatures who run and play their drums all along the dream lands to find anything you want that you once lost. They take shapes from the spirits of different animals and always come to help you when they’re called. One of the most renowned legends of Boombakaboomkers is the one about the legendary Boombakabakaboom

Armin was the only child of a burgess family from Vienna. The poor boy was confined to stay at home so he never had the opportunity to play with other kids. He would spend his entire life watching the other kids play in the nearby park from the window of his bedroom. Of course, the other kids didn’t even know that Armin was there!

Armin used to spend the days dreaming of going down to the park one day and play and shout just like the other kids did. So one night he closed his eyes tight and made a wish to find his voice back. He thought of it over and over: “I want to recover my voice, I want to recover my voice, I want to recover my voice”… and this way he fell asleep and in his own dream he could hear his own voice repeating the wish until he encountered this old guy called Boombakabakaboom who had dedicated his days to find lost pieces from puzzles.

When Boombakabakaboom heard Armin’s desire, he first thought he wouldn’t be capable of finding such a thing: a child’s lost voice. But that’s the way it works in the dreamlands: the first to hear the call is the first to get the job. And when he looked at Armin’s sad eyes, he understood he needed to help him out. It was a really hard task though. Everydody knows that Boombakaboomkers are able to find things by playing drums and making people sing along with the beat, but Armin couldn’t sing at all. It was impossible for a Boombakaboomker to find anything at all without the voice of the rider joining the hypnotic drum beat.

Anyway, Boombakabakaboom decided to start his drumming with his silent companion on top of his head, running around the dreamlands without direction. One night after the other, one dream after the other, they would get lost running in circles around the surrealistic landscapes of the dreamlands with no clues from Armin’s lost voice. No matter how far he would run, no matter how hard he would play the drum, Armin would always stay silent, with a sad look in his eyes, trying to suggest directions to go and pointing out distant places in the hopeless firmament. But Boombakababoomers are really stubborn creatures and Armin never gave up calling Boombakabakaboom in his dreams every single night for 7 months. They actually spent so much time together in dreams that they got to be really attached, like father and son.

One night, as soon as he fell sleep, Armin called his dear friend to continue their quest as the usual business, but Boombakabakaboom didn’t show up. So the poor boy waited for him but there was not a clue of his good friend. Then he started crying out, calling him louder and louder and louder. Then, out of the sudden, Armin woke up hearing his own voice shouting out loud. It was his very voice! It was himself! And his parents were there lookign at him astonished: they couldn’t believe their ears.

This way, Armin recovered his voice and of course he kept visiting Boombakabakaboom in his dreams, just for the fun of it. He would ask him to run and drum along the dreamlands to find missing pieces of puzzles that he would purposely lose, just to be with him and sing along with his drumming. And rumor says that Boombakabakaboom didn’t show up that very night because he knew that only the love for a friend would drive him to forget about himself. And to realize that whenever he would really need a voice to call a good friend this would be there waiting for him, just like Boombakabakaboomer does every night.

Note: read more about the Boombakaboomkers here!