New Years Eve Blog Entry Summary of 2017 with a short New Years Eve Poem

In terms of 2017, its been a interesting year from a creative stand-point its been a interesting year certainly helped by my relationship with Amanda (which has just gone into its second year) has deepened certainly helped by the fact both of us are writers and general creative types.

On the writing front, my proposed third poetry book 'From the Diabetic Ward' has gone on hold at least temporary after the collapse of my deal with Goya Press back in March. I'm not the sort of person into mud slinging but would advise anybody who has any future dealings with them to be very very careful with them. However from a creative standpoint, this book wasn't going the way I wanted it to go and therefore perhaps is best being on hold until I get it right.

Writing wise after stepping away from it, I spent the rest of this year working on the first books of two new series 'Role Reversal' and 'The Barbarians of the Wall' both of which will be out likely hand in hand at the start of 2018. (Both books have sequels already on the way).

I've also been expermenting with fiction properly for the right time also and have also a kind of autobiography on the go which is on its second draft (and is around 63,000 words) and a few novellas in two other not previously announced series (all of which are between 13,000 to 30,000 words or so currently) and have a few mini poetry collections on the go which will show up over the next few years with titles such as 'Mini Soap Operas', 'Selected extracts from the end of the World' and 'The Streets where all I saw' or 'The Birth of Autumn'.

A lot of these projects has come from simply making sure I do a bit of writing every day I can, whether it is 15 or 20 minutes every day at lunch at work or a little bit at home or at Amandas, it is simply a case of keeping active with it and keeping writing something.

Outside of that, Spoken Label (my podcast intervewing series) has progressed nicely this year releasing albums and podcasts by 23 different writers and artists. I'm currently struggling with a bit of a virus but when better by the start of 2018, I have a number of other artists in mind I want to speak to so am excited by that too.

Ocean in a Bottle my solo ambient, classical project is also developing into deeper, more emotional territories from 'Dream Frontier' and 'From Choirs to Dischoirs' – the first in two different ambient series (both series will be carrying it needs stating), Finale which was originally designed to be the final Ocean in a Bottle which then turned into the beginning of something different and eventually lead to 4 Eps in a new Autumn series. There are a few new EPS on the way which I'll talk about more when they are ready for release From Choirs to Dischoirs Part 2, a vocal led loop led experiment piece by me called Building Bridges and a new hopefully ongoing band with a musician from Brazil (more to follow).

The eagle eyed of you will have noticed the annual DIH and friends also was released at the tail end of 2017 also. It's too early to say if 2018 will result in another album but we live in hope I guess, and all being well a new live band will follow finally from A Means to an End. (Watch this space)

Concluding, I would like to wish you a suceessful New Year. In the New Year,

Andy N

At the end of each year we all hug the world of its night

watching the ice solemnize the vows we make to ourselves

glistening untouched until the dawn taps above the houses

cosseting the space between the chimneys

quiet in reflection counting down the seconds

until the neighbours fireworks lace the sky

welcoming in the new year with all of its glory.

Christmas Poem (2017) with a few new Bandcamp links

Spoken Label (my podcast series of interviews with various writers, artists etc) has recently published three different podcasts all available for free download:

These are with:

David R Mellor 

Isabelle Kenyon

Matthew Nicholson


My old friends in D.I.H. (Legendary nose / experimental terrirosts) got back together with me to do our annual anti Christmas album recently which contains the usual mixture of spoken word, classical, experimental, ambient drones and traditional songs.

As always this is a free download and can downloaded from here

Lastly, the last few Ocean in a Bottle singles have all had a autumn like feel to it (more Winter based ones will follow in January and February next year when Winter is really with us)

They can be streamed at:

Tuning into Autumn 

Birth of Autumn

Dancing across Autumn

Breeze across country meadows in autumn

the writers cafe magazine issue-3 ice and snow

Been a bit quiet recently with submissions as I have been tied up with working on 'The Night of the Wolf' and 'Enemy of the Wall' as well as future yet to be revealed projects so it was a great pleasure to receive a notification from the lovely Marie Lightman the other week that for the third issue of her Writers Cafe Magazine has accepted one of my one

of my poems 'Skating in others expectations' (which itself will be appearing in my third full length poetry book 'Birth of Autumn' (which is a bit off from being completed)).

The magazine itself can be read below. There's some excellent stuff in here and I am honored to be in alongside some great writers. (thanks Marie)

https://thewriterscafemagazine.wordpress.com/2017/12/16/the-writers-cafe-magazine-issue-3-ice-and-snow/

Enemy of the Wall (coming soon)

NB. The Night of the Wolf is now ready, but this book was wrote hand in hand with it as the start of another series and is also nearly ready

Sadie Davidson - Council House and Silent (New Release on Spoken Label)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Council House and Silent" is the raw and unsettling debut spoken word album from urban performance poet and poetry slam champion Sadie Davidson.

Recorded at home in her airing cupboard after spending months in a hostel with her partner and two small children, "Council House and Silent" is a truthful, heartbreaking and highly provocative window in to life in Britain's underclass.

"Council House and Silent" offers more than simply "Poverty Porn' -beneath the gritty realism and rage at a failing system is an inspiring message of fulfilment, resilience, and the reminder that "you can get out if you fight".

According to Spoken word promoters, Sadie Davidson "Bites with lightning like fury and machine gun delivery" and has been described as "An absolute spoken word beast" as well as "Furious and unstoppable".

Her facebook page is www.facebook.com/sadiedavidsonpoet/

 

The album can be downloaded / streamed at: https://spokenlabel.bandcamp.com/album/sadie-davidson-council-house-and-silent

 

Without a clue (New Poem)

Poetz (New Podcast series)

Poetz are Andy N and Myth the Poet (aka Keith) 

Their mission to discuss some of the influences poetry wise and how this impacted on their own work and what made the writers tick, express themselves and how their work has stood the test of time over a series of new podcasts. 

First of all, Emily Dickinson. 

Born on December 10, 1830, in Amherst, Massachusetts, Emily Dickinson left school as a teenager, eventually living a reclusive life on the family homestead. There, she secretly created bundles of poetry and wrote hundreds of letters. Due to a discovery by sister Lavinia, Dickinson's remarkable work was published after her death—on May 15, 1886, in Amherst—and she is now considered one of the towering figures of American literature. 

Poems read out during this session were: 

1. I am nobody, who are you? 
2. A bird came down the walk 
3. I heard a fly buzz when I died. 
4. Caus I could not stop for death 
5. Success is the sweetest by those who don't succeed

The podcast an be streamed / downloaded for free FROM https://poetz.bandcamp.com/album/podcast-1-emily-dickinson

Ghosting the fields (New Visual Poem)

From Friendship to Love (V)

Working in isolation
our love built itself up
from almost nothing
brushed against the end of winter
just before spring kissed the air

playing a secret with
everything we felt
throughout that summer
with laughter stealing
each other hearts

and then autumn
when a innocent picture
revealed more
than either of us expected
into a explosion of feelings

and now almost a year later
returning into autumn
the clues of those seasons
leave evidence of  a story unstudied
all over what went before

a hourglass turned upside down
as if to start a race
only to fall off suddenly a table
in a turning point of a film
completely changing everything

and a love that didn’t
just build up slowly over time
from almost nothing
but a feeling that was thereright from the beginning.

Press release for The Hour of the Wolf (Role Reversal Book 1)

It should have been a straight-forward mining exploration to a asteroid a few light years away by a mixture of miners and prisoners wishing for a early release from their prison sentences.

It should have been a straight-forward in and out of a carefully scouted out mine over in under a year which had enough coal and gold to save a dying race for generations.

But then the Wolf came , slaughtering everybody it encountered turning order to chaos, turning brother against brother and survival into a deadly, murderous game.

Told in tense, horror micro poems, The Hour of the Wolf is the first book in a new series 'Role Reversal' by acclaimed poet, Andy N (Author of 'Return to Kemptown' and 'The End of Summer) redefining horror and poetry in a very different way.

** COMING MID OCTOBER 2017 **

DIH and friends - Christmas 2017 - tracks wanted

Back again for its 16th anniversary (Barring a few gaps off course), DIH and friends at Christmas are now after experimental and music tracks on the theme of Christmas.

Back now in it’s 16th year, as can be seen on www.digitalvomit.com/dih-and-friends, DIH and friends have since 2002 been producing a annual series of anti Christmas songs for people who really don’t like Christmas or have a very alternative viewpoint of the season in question.

The history of the project from digital vomit state ‘The origin behind the infamous series of DIH with friends at Christmas began back in 2002 when for a one off joke as a side project from his more official work in DIH, Andy N one year decided with the help of one or two friends decided to do in his words ‘ A Christmas album for those people who don’t really like Christmas’ where in the space of half an hour (as was the original plan) – Andy and a few friends would murder, cripple and take the piss out of as many songs as they could.

However, as is the nature of the beast with this sort of thing things snowballed and by the time the second album came along, It had become officially a DIH project where they would between the three of them alongside with an ever-increasing cast play around with the myth of the Christmas, which will often be funny and sad sometimes within the same breath.

The music contained within this series of albums are varied and can vary from spoken word (sometimes with musical backing or experimental backing), acoustic singer songwriter stuff to music that could appeal to fans of Aphex Twin, hardcore, breakbeats, dubstep, fans of the spoken word,

re-imagining of carols and classic songs, faithful versions of Christmas carols and songs and generally people who like their music to challenge and make them think.

For reasons too long winded and boring to go into here, DIH took a break from the Christmas albums in 2012. 

Following on from their 2015 comeback, we are now expecting submissions for our 2017 album, our third album since starting up again. 

Anything is welcome by email to either myself aen1mpo@yahoo.co.uk. (Andy N)

Me and Keith can also be contacted viva facebook for further questions 

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100011783198151 (Andy)

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=627682972 (Keith)

The complete archive can be sampled here - http://www.digitalvomit.com/dih-and-friends

Closing date is 10th December 2017 and will be released viva bandcamp as a free download just before Xmas.

Scrumping Arundel (New Poem)

Scrumping Arundel

Tangling over tunnel walls

His call still rings over the gate

Next door to the castle

Clinching with rage

Across the chiffon like mist

Skating across the ground

Spiked with a half asleep stubble

With his braces barely on

Rubbing the essence of sleep

From his eyes in shock

‘Oi’ He shouted out

blanch white in shock

stumbling through the trees

skipping heartbeats

in a glib eyed silence

stalled across the orchard

with at least ten different crimes

in each of our pockets

before you eventually shouted

‘Oh fuck, run’

Snaking through memories

Curved in regret

We both said we didn’t realise

It was a private orchard

Let alone had a gamekeeper

Leaping over plaited gates

Escaping across the bridge

On the other side of the orchard

Until his swearing

Eventually faded into the distance

Disembodied into a sanctum

Over the edge of a nearby quay,

Our apples laid out a trial out for us

Even if it was a accident

Barely into our teens

Pulling us into adulthood

Like a accidental travelogue

Roaming in future tenses

Distilled in changes over time

Across adventures almost out of reach. 

From the Diabetic Ward on hold for now.. and forthcoming books due in 2017 (Autumn / Winter)

A few of may have noticed I haven’t talked about what was scheduled to be my third full length book ‘From the Diabetic Ward’ for quite some time.

This doesn’t mean that the book is abandoned. This is far from the case. It just more likely to surface in either 2018 or 2019 and will be closer to the vision that is closer to the way it should have been.

This doesn’t mean either I have stopped writing. Personal problems creeped into my life in April to June shortly after withdrawing from the deal to work with Goya Press (which I could write a lot about but that is not the place or the time and also caused the withdrawal of the reissue of the End of Summer) in April and then finishing Ghost Story IV.

Thankfully now things are somewhat calmer, I have been very busy writing a few novellas and my autobiography (which I will talk about over Autumn and Winter of 2017 and 2018 in more depth). Before all of that however, I am currently writing the first books (both of which are poetry but very different poetry) of two series – Werewolf Moon and The Barbarians of the Wall. Both have been coming for quite time and will be out over Autumn / early Winter of this year. (Extracts to follow).

I am proud of both of these and in 2018 and 2019, will certainly be carrying them both into Books 2 and who knows maybe beyond and other projects.

I have been working hard on my writing and can't wait to show you all the fruits from this. 

Sister in a Box (New Poem)

Stood there on the left outside the kitchen
Crying out my eyes
While you were sat in a box
Our emotions carry across camera shots
From another lifetime ago.

Now we are both deep into our 40s
I am still stood there even now in amazement
Every-time I pass our first house
Remembering our mother
With that battered old camera

Swiping at the leaves on the footpath
In her broken slippers
Directing the four of us
Like a flag to a pole
For that one shot

Fusing emotions into moments
When I wouldn’t stop crying
After she directed you and Maria
Into two battered old cardboard boxes
Leaving me and Stuart on the verges

Facilitating that picture like a film director
Into a improvised melodrama realising after
Once we had completed your art statement
I had been crying my eyes out
Wanting to be in one of those boxes.

Almost 40 years later
I am still startled with wet eyes
With your words reaching out
Like hands to comfort you
Scaling those memories again.

Each tear imprinting itself
In the shadows of the alleyway
At the back of where we once lived
Brimming with our childhoods even now
Reprinting pictures in my memories.

(NB. Picture is from 1976 with me, my sister and two cousins)

Ocean in a Bottle - new single and Interview with Girl with a suitcase @ Spoken Label

Ocean in a Bottle - From Choirs to Dischoirs - Part 1 Tears from Heaven

Pure emotions is what a friend who heard the early mixes of the new Ocean in a Bottle or actual tears falling back from the heavens themselves. 

But what is emotion? Is emotion a sound itself or a feeling that comes somewhere in-between tapping on the edge of your conscious until it provides a different feeling altogether that may start off as sadness but becoming something else altogether. 

The new Ocean in a Bottle EP ‘From Choirs to Dischoirs’ actually began off as a experiment with choir like sounds, starting off as something else altogether and building up with layer after layer until the emotion it began off ended up in a different place altogether staying in the genre of Ambient but building upon it until it became as much about memory and sadness as well as music itself.

Free download from https://oceaninabottle.bandcamp.com/album/from-choirs-to-dischoirs-part-1-tears-from-heaven

Girl with a suitcase - Spoken Label Podcast June 2017


The latest podcast from Spoken Label is with performance artist Jenny aka Girl with a suitcase. 

Borrowing directly from Jenny's website her work is described as 'These days my work can be defined best as 'performance art' and can be subversive, hilarious, painful... or none of the above. 
​ 
My passion is to create work around mental health, challenging the silence and stigma that surrounds the issue. Humor is at the centre of my practice and I want to create work that is accessible to everyone.' 

More about her work can be read at her website -www.girlwithasuitcase.co.uk 

The podcast be streamed or downloaded for free from https://spokenlabel.bandcamp.com/album/girl-with-a-suitcase-spoken-label-podcast-june-2017

Ghost Story 4 (NaPoWriMo) questions answered

Over the past few weeks, I have received a few questions about Ghost Story IV after my blog from April for NaPoWriMo (National Poetry Writing Month) concluded. I won’t name the people in question but firstly they asked when Ghost Story is completed would I try writing in another short burst like this say for example a Western or a love story under the rules of NaPoWriMo.

I must admit, I have had a go at writing in a love story some years back and the first two parts of it got published in a little zine Unsung. Writing it at the time, if I am honest in hindsight, I simply wasn’t ready to do a longer sequence of poems like I did and I did maybe half a book of it over a few months. Doing The End of Summer and my Edge of the Flames sequences, both from my last book The End of Summer proved a learning curve how to start doing a slightly longer curve, and certainly when I did Ghost Story, I really started to learn how to write sequences and quicker also.

In short, it’s something I would consider in the future certainly but Ghost Story has at least another two parts to go, and outside of that over the rest of the year, I’m currently working on another huge sequence called Role Reversal which all I will say at the moment is I am onto Part 31 of this sequence and each piece will have 6 lines and has a bit yet to go I think (Not quite sure if it is a poetry sequence or something different altogether) on it as well as a fantasy novella (which I originally wrote when I was 17 and recently re-found and am up to Page 81 on it and am really pleased with it) and my epic poetic series The Wall. (Part 2 is halfway now Surivors of the Wall) and my my third (and likely last full length poetry book) From the Diabetic Ward book is still pending possibly for next year or 2019.

Secondly, Why did you decide to set Ghost Story in Manchester? 

A lot of this simply comes from something that grabs my attention really and the fact I wanted to use Manchester as a backdrop to the full story as I hadn’t seen anything tackle this before. There is a very old horror film from the 1970’s called the Living Dead of Manchester Morgue (also released as Let Sleeping Corpses) knocking around which was filmed in Rochdale actually, but I wanted to write something that was set straight in the heart of modern day Manchester.

While Part One and Two were reaction pieces, Part Three and Four in contrast have been completely different as my brother got me a book called Below Manchester for Christmas between the writing of Part Two and Three which went on about the tunnels and secret bunkers below the centre of Manchester which led by chance to where I was going to next, and is referenced about four times in the sequence.

This year’s Part 4 really is set in a gig venue on Oxford Road which of course I won’t name and of course, it is not a dig at that wonderful venue as I have seen countless excellent gigs there, but the research really came into through Pendle Witches came by accident again, and will be mentioning again in Part 5 next year which will go in a direction hopefully nobody will be expecting, and who knows over Part 6 in 2019.

Lastly, why wasn’t Andy in Part 4? What has happened to him?

That’s coming in Part 5 I can promise and with a few other mysteries answered of course

Or maybe not….  (:

From 1996 to 2017 (An emotional history off tragedies in Manchester looking at things from the outside)

In 1996 when the IRA blew up the Arndale
I was barely able to leave my house
After getting mugged the night before
Which left me with a major limp
For the next 18 months or so
And forced me to ring around friends
That I knew would normally be there
Praying they would be at home.

In 2007 I got led out of my works
Viva an underground tunnel
I hadn’t known about previously
After it was deemed unsafe outside
To walk around the corner as normal
When a hurricane dragged a bollard
Through the Chief Exectuive’s car
And other cars onto the next street.

In 2010 I ended up leading three women
I worked alongside at the Co-operative
To Manchester Piccadilly Train Station
Like James Bond mixed with the Pier Piper
Avoiding all of the bars laced with drunk fans
Just before Ranger’s Europa Cup final
At Manchester City’s Ethiad Stadium
Just before it exploded into chaos.

In 2011, I was getting drove back home
By a kindly Ambulance Crew
Hours after getting registered with Diabetes
When we drove into a gang of youths
And barely reversed out alive
Looting a shop I used to go in for
A sandwich nearly every morning
On the way into my work.

In 2017, I walked past
Manchester Victoria Train Station
About a half a hour before
A terrorist took the lives off
22 people including children
And left me barely able
To sleep for two days afterwards
Laid in complete shock.

Each tragedy or event
Staining emotions
No matter how close
I was to the action

Cherry-picking memories
Into frozen images
Across feelings
Stuck in time

Reprinting each day
Over and over
Into a compressed version
Of Groundhog Day

Shooting grief from my heart
No matter how close to the front I was
Or whispered in braille rain
Tapping in shadow like tears

Brining my eyes
Pushing my grief aside
And carrying on
Like so so many others.

Comics Unity Podcast

After a break after the end of NaPoWriMo, I am pleased to now announce a new project which all been well will be a new monthly audio podcast talking about comics and the comic TV / film industry with my friend Michael Bradbury.

I met Michael Bradbury around a year or so through the literture scene in the Greater Manchester in the process discovering that Michael also has a interest in Comics from Marvel and DC among other comic industries.

Recently as a few of you will have known, I did a podcast with Michael where we talked about him as a person and his writing (https://spokenlabel.bandcamp.com/album/michael-bradbury-spoken-label-may-2017). Less known on the way to record to the podcast, Me and Michael both decided it could be fun to record a podcast talking about comics and the comic industry with their involvement in the TV / Film Industry.

Comics Unity which came from that original discussion was recorded a week or so later will be a monthly (roughly) will be a new series where we will talk about comics news, films, a discussion over a comics related topic, reviews and a reading recommedation.

The first episode recorded in May 2017 contains as well as comics news - contains lengthy discussions on the trailers for the up and coming Defenders mini series on Netflix, the up and coming films on the Dark Tower and Wonderwoman and the recently released film Guardians of the Galaxy 2 as well as a discussion about the difference in relaunches between DC and Marvel and what works and doesn't work.

More links will follow over the following few months but initially it will be available to stream / download on

https://www.mixcloud.com/andynwriter/

https://comicsunitypodcast.bandcamp.com/

Conclusion of Ghost Story IV/ NaPoWriMo 2017

The more regular viewers of my blog will have noticed I’ve been quiet for a few weeks now knee deep in poems for NaPoWriMo (National Poetry Writing Month). NaPoWriMo (or National Poetry Writing Month) as a poet is always a challenging time of the year where you have to write a poem a day throughout April. It may sound easy to some people out there, but let me gently say it is not. I first attempted this in 2012 by following each one of the prompts on the excellent NaPoWriMo website on a daily basis throughout that April and struggled like heck with it. It didn’t help that was for sure I was working in a job at that point which left me exhausted some days by lunch-time and trying to focus to write sometime over lunchtime was let’s say was very hard work indeed and so in the result I produced a very mixed bag of poetry indeed.

2013 I followed the same rules again and although I found it hard again, I came away with around 1^st drafts of a good half a dozen poems which eventually made The End of Summer but like last time burnt me out completely, it took me about two months to actually start writing poetry again.

I changed my perspectives in 2014 in the middle of March by deciding to try to focus the poems into a circular narrative which became Ghost Story.

The origin behind Ghost Story was only slight. Although I had wrote a number of sequences by that point, for example the four poems that made up the end of summer, trying to do a thirty part poem was a challenge that goes without saying, let alone trying to tell a tale which I would have got away in a novel or a novella possibly better.

The names of both characters if my memory is correct didn’t reveal themselves to me until several pieces, and I can’t remember why I chose them both like I did. The location of course at the metrolink (or tram or light railway stop) near my works and I was stood there a few days before 1^st April and came up with the gory thought what if I was due to get on that next metrolink and a Ghost stopped me.

That first year was difficult as I didn’t know where the story was going, let alone who the characters were until halfway through the story and I treated it as a one off and gave them a strict one off kind of feeling.

In 2015, the origin of Ghost Story II came simply from walking across a certain major train station in the centre of Manchester a few days before, and I looked up at the roof and thought to myself why if a rifle man got up on the roof and started picking people off and Andy was in the train station and Michelle came to him again.

Last year 2016 and 2017, Ghost Story III and Ghost Story IV both were planned a bit more but not blogged until 1^st April in both cases, in the case of III with my brother buying me an excellent book about secret tunnels underneath Manchester and for this year, I thought about some over the top rock bands I’ve seen over the years and thought what they would be like as Vampires with their myths set among the Pendle Witches.

All been good, Part V will follow next year with the story at least starting in Altrincham and we’ll see what horrors I can drag the characters through but part of the fun with NaPoWriMo at least for me now is seeing where the story goes for myself as well as everybody who reads it and all being good, there will be at least another two or three years’ worth of stories to come for Ghost Story and then perhaps health permitting I’ll start something else.

Ghost Story can be read at:

Ghost Story I   
Ghost Story II
Ghost Story III
Ghost Story IV
Ghost Story V (** Forthcoming April 2018 **)

Ghost Story IV Begins

It begins..

http://ghoststoryiv.blogspot.co.uk/

Anybody else doing NaPwrimo this year? (A poem a day throughout April).

Here is my blog so far. I am going to do as a 30 poem story. 4^th in a series.

Let me know your links if you are doing it and hope you like. 

World Upside Down (a short tribute to John Lever, Band on the Wall, 1998)

Pushing and shoving on the dance floor

We must have looked a right sight

Ducking and diving next to the waves

Of distorted guitars and tribal like drums;

Our Hair blowing wild in the over ripe summer air

As we laughed at the singer

Stumbling at his words for a few seconds

Before carrying on, pushing each other

Up and down the dance-floor

Your hair was punked up, dyed bright purple

And resembled Sonic the hedgehog a little

Whilst I ended up got stuck at jury service

I was attending up the road

Until just before we were due to meet,

Leaving me with no choice but to turn up in my suit

Which drew some curious looks

From the bouncers at the front door.

The first beer went down, a bit too well

In a full measured stroke

As we both laughed at the support act

Pulling time, with a casual swagger

With how I dodged a horrible case

In the morning, only to end up on a botched robbery

That went on and on and on and on

While you carried on moaning

About your boss who was about to leave.

By the time the band you wanted to see

Came on, we were both half cut

On three and a half pints of Skullsplitter

Which left us wobbling all over the club

Stitching our drunkness

In out of synch singing

When-ever the band started songs

You said you knew,

Ribboned in energy.

When World upside down came on,

I stuck my head up with a primitive yeah

Adding unwelcome backing vocals

With a drunken slur

Gliding over the guitars

And drums bursting into life,

Only for you to fall into me

And sending me spinning

All over the place.

Waking up afterwards

I was told I had fell backwards

Spinning around in a huge circle into

A small group of chairs

That could have seriously hurt me

If the drummer hadn't leapt from his stool

Like an Olympic diver,

In a frantic panic

To make sure that I was okay.

I found out afterwards

That was John Lever.

(John Lever was most famous for being the drummer in 1980’s and early 2000’s Manchester, UK band The Chameleons which was my favourite band but also played in bands such as Chameleons Vox, Sun and the Moon, Weaveworld, The Professionals, Wilson and others I no doubt have forgotten about. This story above was a personal memory put into a poetic form about a gig I saw at the Band on the Wall in Manchester in 1997 when he drummed for Wilson which has been wrote upon hearing of his sad passing recently).

New Write Up on the End of Summer

The following write up has appeared on the publication page of The End of Summer by Michael Holme (for which i am grateful for)

Right from the start of the first poem in this collection, I realised I was reading words penned by a writer very different to myself: “The first few times we met / was under a crossing of invisible bridges…” Whilst hard to picture, it seemed ironic, then not, crossing bridges separate, whilst it was established that a meeting had occurred. Andy’s words are sometimes simple, sometimes hard, and at other times plain obscure. I thought he offered a set of poems levelled at all manner of minds. My own poetry often mentions the season, more often spring than any other, and I like the seasons as a theme in Andy's poetry. Do not expect clichéd descriptions here though: “After Summer / autumn is always brushed / under the carpet / like a half baked afterthought…” Expressions such as “womb sunrise,” “forgotten shadows,” “splattered hammers,” “colliding motionless,” “like a postcard out of breath” and many more, make the poems the readers own. They offer an ambiguity that begs the book is reread with a different angle on previous suggestions. Some poems, for example, Out of Reach II, make me imagine parallels with the abstract painters, but not total abstraction. Again, there is left an offer for the reader to define the looser parts. In “Edge of the Flames” I recognised a poetry I was more accustomed to, and it’s presence in the volume only added to the overall richness. This, as an example, was admittedly, an easier read for me. But still offering gems like, “Before morning / the night was as vicious as ice / and the wind branded the windows / with a punk like sneer.” And the poet doesn’t always restrict himself to formal sentence structures, something I have never had the courage to do myself. Does it lack because of that, and the odd missing comma? I don’t think so. It’s like further food. For me the clearer works like “Divorced Memories” were favoured. Then I though, is that a laziness? And I loved seeing local references. I felt the last piece summarized much, in a hope and mystery perhaps?

Ghost Story IV

Ghost Story IV will follow on from Ghost Story I to III looking at horror over a series of at least 30 poems told in 30 days.

In previous stories, we explored horror through a tram crash in Salford where a ghost came to warn a man about the forthcoming crash to a shooter at a un-named train station and a poisoned rat king running amok, Ghost Story IV will follow a new theme and turn the volume up louder than before.

In this story, although the core characters from Part I to III will remain Andy and Michelle, a human and a ghost trapped in a whirlwind of a puzzle of a up coming un-seen horror creeping into play, Part IV will focus on a character who came into the forefront Ghost Story III right at its end, Mandrake with his war that was hinted at during Part III now boiling over and exploding from one point onto the streets and into the underworld.

Andy and Michelle will still be an important part of this story and the full narrative, as will Inspector Brooks and Ghana and all over surviving characters (so far) but Ghost Story IV will look at things at a slightly different way before spinning back into focus and dragging the reader on a gore filled journey

As always told over 30 days, Ghost Story IV will consist of short and sharp poems designed to build up the tension and by the end of the sequence will leave the reader battered to the point of exhaustion but filled with an excitement what next?

And where next?

Due to start: April 2017

More details here 

Review of last year / a few hints of things to come in 2017 / 2018

Review of last year..

Some quick notes on things that happened last year..

1. Ocean in a Bottle pretty well managed a EP or album throughout all of 2016 which I am pleased over and it should carry onto in 2017 all being good.

See here for more details – https://oceaninabottle.bandcamp.com

2. Spoken Label– my interview podcast with writers, poets and all kinds of artists and I managed to do 36 separate podcasts throughout 2016. It is currently sleeping but the second season of it should start towards Spring 201The archive for this can be heard - https://spokenlabel.bandcamp.com/

3. I maintained doing solo poetry readings through 2016. Although none were videoed – highlights of some audio can be heard on my own bandcamp page Andy

    More details here - https://andyn.bandcamp.com/

4. Work has been progressing slowly but surely on my third full length book ‘From the Diabetic Ward’. Expect a release date in 2017.

5. My second full length book The End of Summer was re-released at the end of 2016. It can be bought here and has had some excellent reviews https://www.amazon.co.uk/End-Summer-N-Andy-ebook/dp/B01LY7YR9K

6. A split book with Nick Armbrister, Europa II following on from our well received anti war book in 2014 also followed. This can be seen here

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Europa-2-True-Cost-War-ebook/dp/B01MXRSAAS/ref=pd_ecc_rvi_3

7. A steady stream of publications has also followed this year. These can be read here

See here for more details http://onewriterandhispc.blogspot.com/p/publications.html

8. My live band A Means to an End alas finished in 2016 but not before releasing their debut album.

This can be heard and purchased from here

https://oceaninabottle.bandcamp.com/album/a-means-to-an-end-live-at-tyldesley-top-chapel-12-december-2015

9. Ghost Story III – my third Napwrimo Supernatural series was released and blogged

     http://ghoststoryiii.blogspot.co.uk/

     (Part 1 to 3 were also released in a book - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ghost-Story-Andy-N/dp/1326774522)

Plans for 2017 are varied but will hopefully include:

10. From the Diabetic Ward

My third full length poetry book.

 

11. Ghost Story IV

(See http://ghoststoryiv.blogspot.co.uk/)

12. The Wall ‘series’

(A series of epic fantasy – swords and sorcery poems set in a world which has a land called The Wall in it – the first one is now called Enemy of the Wall. All being good when the third is done – I’ll then be able to start looking for a publisher for the book and then work on the next three)

13. Acers and Jokers (A joint comedy novel with Adam focusing on two very stupid kids akin to the Inbetweeners who get fed up of seeing the local drug lords make loads of money and decide to join in with chaotic results)

14. The Author Series – more likely 2018 at least but this will be a rewrite of childhood novellas wrote focused on a character called The Author who is a Charles Bukowski ish kind of character mixed with John Carter from Mars who stumbles his way into all kinds of adventures.