Liver & Lights 56 Part Two

Liver & Lights No 56. 
One Shoe Michael.

The New paperback is here!!

Dear Subscriber….

There has been a slight change of plan!  

When subscribing, you might have imagined you were getting a copy 

of something entitled Liver & Lights No 57, as announced…

On reflection, I have come to believe that the whole One Shoe Mickey 

project should come under the umbrella heading of  

L&L 56, 

including the enclosed paperback containing the complete song cycle

 and all Mickey’s paintings of lost gloves collected from the streets of London.

L&L 56 also includes the handmade Verbfoot Jack hardback published 

in May and It will eventually encompass an  album of new songs by

Bonesandtheaft with  music inspired by One Shoe Mickeys’s words 

by Ian Mckean 

with assistance from 

Bird Radio and Lord Biscuit.

it will also include, eventually, Chiara Ambrosio’s film-in-progress…

If you havent seen the recently released excerpt yet, you can watch it here:

https://vimeo.com/268938724

Incidentally....if you want a copy its £12.00  including postage...

send me the cash via paypal and I'll post one to you:

paypal.me/bonesandtheaft

Hope thats  all clear!

Love JB x 

Full Colour Paperback!!

Liver & Lights No 57. 

One Shoe Michael; a London song cycle.

Coming Very Soon!!!  

A full colour  paperback containing 

the complete cycle of texts and song lyrics 

written by Mickey; his view of the world, his friends, his journey, our  city.  

The book is profusely illustrated in full colour by Mickey’s ongoing collection of 

lovingly rendered glove paintings and other illuminations from the brush of 

John Bently.

“For the last year I have been working on a cycle of interrelated lyrics that 

seem to have have been written by the mythical One Shoe Mickey, 

a former refugee who has somehow found his way to England.

Mickey believes that London’s dropped gloves are the souls of all the sons, daughters, 

wives, mothers, nephews, lovers, friends and kind strangers etc lost on all the long and 

desperate roads emmanating from the war that never ends.  

He thinks he can somehow reunite and mend them all, 

the lost and broken things of the world.

Among the gloves he seeks the One True G’love, 

that may or may not relate to his own

 lost family. Maybe it is the Universal G’love, 

containing the last secret of the universe. 

Mickey makes many friends here in England, 

as he trudges from dawn til dusk around the city, 

some most unexpected, and they all have 

their stories too and Mickey is the boy to tell them”.

"Here is his meagre vittles, but all he meets can share it

and how the one true glove will bind them all, 

for all can wear it."

Please order a pre publication signed copy:    £12.00 Inc. p&p

Cheques to Liver and Lights Scriptorium, 

229 Railton Rd London SE2 0LX

or Paypal to: 

paypal.me/bonesandtheaft

Bank Details on request, for direct payments

L&L N0 56

Liver & Lights No 56, 

One Shoe Mickey is a Verbfoot Jack.

For the last year I have been working on a cycle of
 interrelated texts/songs/lyrics that relate

 to the life of the mythical One Shoe Mickey, a 
former refugee who has somehow found his way to London. 

‘Mickey’ is what the people of London call him, although he has had many names, 

and has existed throughout history. Like in all the best superhero adventures, 

Micheal has taken a bang on the head and this has cleared his senses. 

Now he sees the world for what it  really is: a bloody mess.

In his mixed-up brain he thinks that shoes should only be worn one at a time,

 because there is only one god. 
He also thinks that gloves are significant; 

they must be - he sees so many of them dropped on the London street. 

Mickey believes that they are the souls of all the sons, 
daughters, wives, mothers, 

nephews, lovers, friends and kind strangers etc 
lost on all the long and desperate roads 

emmanating from the war that never ends.  

Mickey thinks he can somehow reunite them all, mend them all, 

all the lost and broken things of the world. 

It is said that he collects all the broken snails up from the London pavements 

on rainy days and glues them back together. 

Among the gloves he seeks the One True G’love, 

a mythical glove that may or may not relate to his own lost family…..

This is an entirely hand hand printed book made from a confection of low budget 

block printing methods and containing one of Mickey’s 

most pointed observations of the world and its sorry condition. 

It probably the most labour intensive book I have ever made, 

a labour of love for all the Mickeys. 

It is made using 100% recycled materials in a very limited edition of only 40 copies. 

The books are currently in production. 
If you want to reserve one

please send me 

£40.00

by

Paypal to: 

paypal.me/bonesandtheaft

but you can also send me 

Cheques to: 229 Railton Rd London SE2 0LX (please add £2 to total)
or email me for

Bank details for direct payments.

Liver & Lights No 56 and 57

One Shoe Mickey's a Verbfoot Jack

For the last year I have been working on a cycle 

of interrelated texts/songs/lyrics that 

purport to have been

written by the mythical One Shoe Mickey. 

Mickey is a former refugee who has somehow found his way to 

England. Mickey is what the people of London call him, 

although I believe he has had many names, and has 

existed throughout history.

Like in all the best superhero adventures, 
our Micheal has taken a bang on the head and this has

cleared his senses. Now he sees the world for what it  really is, a bloody mess. 
This he can cure,

he believes, with his miraculously acquired  superpower: 

Kindness.

Also, In his mixed up brain he thinks that shoes should only be worn 

one at a time, 

because there is only one god. 

He also thinks that gloves are significant; they must be - he sees so many of them

 dropped on the London street. He has come  believe that they are the souls of all the sons, daughters, wives, mothers, nephews, lovers, friends and kind strangers etc lost on all the long and desperate roads emmanating from the war that never ends.  He thinks he can somehow reunite them all, mend them all, all the lost and broken things of the world.

Among the gloves he seeks the One True G’love, a mythical glove that may or may not relate to his own lost family. Maybe its the Universal G’love, containing the last secret of the universe......

Mickey makes many friends here in England, as he trudges from dawn til dusk around the city, some most unexpected, and they all have thier stories too and Mickey is the boy to tell them.

Ian Mckean and I have worked a number of these texts into songs - a whole album’s worth, which we have begun to record. In the meantime I have also been making two books:

Liver & Lights No 56, One Shoe Mickey is a Verbfoot Jack.

This is an entirely hand hand printed book made from a confection of low budget block printing methods and containing one of Mickey’s most pointed observations of the world and its sorry condition. It probably the most labour intensive book I have ever made, a labour of love for all the Mickeys. It is made using 100% recycled materials in a very limited edition of only 40 copies. 

Liver & Lights No 57. One Shoe Mickey, a song cycle.

This is an A5 paperback containing the complete cycle of texts and song lyrics written by Mickey; his view of the world, his friends, his journey, the city.  The book is profusely illustrated in full colour by Mickey’s ongoing collection of lovingly rendered glove paintings, which I have been intermittently posting on instagram.

Here is his meagre vittles,

but all he meets can share it,

and how the one true glove

will bind them all,

for all can wear it.

The books are in production. If you want to reserve 

one of the hand made ones 

you can send me

£40.00 inc.p & p 

and I will keep one for you. 

There really won’t be any more than forty because 

they are so labour intensive and the printing methods 

destroy themselves in production somewhat.

You can pre order the paperback too… for £10…

that makes a nice round £50 for the lot.

Postage for the paperback only add £2.00  Free if you order both together

Cheques to Liver and Lights Scriptorium, 229 Railton Rd London SE2 0LX

Paypal to: 

paypal.me/bonesandtheaft

Bank details on request for direct payments.

100 Books again

Liver & Lights No 23 100 Books

This project was inspired, if that's the right word

by the execution of the writer Ken Saro Wiwa

by the Nigerian Government twenty odd years ago,

along with the recent random

executions of various writers by the Iranian government.

I tried to create a song in response to these acts and realised that

after fifteen drafts or so

that I wasn't doing the subject matter justice

and that the song, or at least its simple meaning,

 was staying the same  even 

though I was moving the words around. ...

So..I continued the editing and changing

and eventually stopped at 100

different versions of the poem, 

some with one word only changed.

 ......the words themselves were

writhing out of the reach 

of a mythical tyrant who was trying to ban them.

The Tyrant  executes the singers,

but the song sings on and on, eventually

coming to haunt him forevermore in hell.

In order to celebrate these 100 songs,

each one different but the same,

I constructed 100 completely different books 

to contain them...

some of them are illustrated here.

A touring exhibition of the hundred books was banned by five of the venues

who originally booked it for being 'political'....

Earlier this year the wonderful Chiara Ambrosio

brought the project back to life after

20 years dormant by arranging for 100

singers to come together at The Horse Hospital

in London to perform the  cycle in its

entirety for the first time.

The recording of this by Mikey Kirkpatrick will be

broadcast for the first time on the Radiophrenia

performance radio station in Glasgow

on Sunday 12th November at 10.30 pm

http://radiophrenia.scot/schedule/november-12th/

Liver & Lights Rochester Last 5 weeks

Some great new pictures taken by 

Rikard Osterlund at  Rochester Art Gallery  at the

current Liver & Lights / Karl Beilik exhibition,

 now entering the last five weeks...

Incidentally, I am giving a totally Free

one day 'zine workshop in the gallery on Saturday 25th November..

If you are interested

contact the gallery and book a spot...

its 10am til 3.30pm

a limited amount of places so get on the case!

(phone 01634338319 

or email: arts@medway.gov.uk)