The Manual: How to Have a Number One the Easy Way – The Graphic Novel

Description

About the book

In 1988, following the chart-topping success of Doctorin’ the Tardis, The Timelords – Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty, better known as The KLF – revealed the strange, cynical and surprisingly practical method they claimed could turn almost anyone into a pop star.

Part manifesto, part instruction manual and part calculated assault on the music industry, The Manual: How to Have a Number One the Easy Way became a cult classic. It has been reissued several times, goes in and out of print, and second-hand copies regularly sell for well above cover price.

The way records reach the charts has changed beyond recognition since 1988. Physical singles, record shops, radio playlists and carefully timed publicity campaigns have given way to streaming, downloads, social media and algorithms. This graphic novel does not attempt to rewrite The Manual for the modern age. Instead, it faithfully follows the original 1988 text, offering a fascinating and frequently outrageous look back at how the record business once worked.

Inside the graphic novel

Across 145 full colour pages, Inkantation brings the words, ideas and Zenarchistic philosophy of The Timelords vividly to life. Enter a lost world of samples, studios, pressing plants, promotional stunts and calculated chaos, and discover how ambition, audacity and a little borrowed noise could once take a record all the way to Number One.

Follow the instructions. Make the record. Conquer the charts.

By what right?

This graphic novel is a work of the KLF Re-Enactment Society, produced under the entitlement set out by Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty:

As a member of the KLF Re-Enactment Society you are entitled to Re-Kreate, Re-Position, Destroy or Destruct the work of The KLF, or Re-Kreate, Re-Position, Destroy or Destruct, the work of fellow members of The KLF Re-Enactment Society. These entitlements can be Re-Interpreted in whatever way you feel the need to. No chasm in time or space is too wide for the KLF Re-Enactment Society to straddle. And no thought too dark to be embraced by its more wayward members. The afterlife awaits your work in wonder.

This book is a literal Re-Kreation of The Manual in its 1988 form. It is not published by The KLF or KLF Communications.

About Inkantation

AI slop is low-quality, mass-produced digital content created using generative artificial intelligence with little human effort and no real meaning or value. Inkantation is the opposite.

It begins with human writing, human ideas and human intent. Characters are designed. Locations are built. Visual identities are established. Scenes are interpreted. Panels are composed. Continuity is maintained. Dialogue is placed. Pages are designed, reviewed, rejected, rebuilt and refined. Artificial intelligence is part of the machinery; the creative decisions are human.

Inkantation does not exist to make more content. It exists to make graphic novels worth making.

Format and printing

• 145 pages, full colour throughout
• US Trade paperback, 6 × 9 inches (15.2 × 22.9 cm), perfect bound
• Weight approximately 200 g
• Printed on demand in the UK – allow 7–14 days from order, plus postage
• ISBN: 9798193501251

Frequently asked questions

Is this the full text of The Manual?

Yes. The graphic novel follows the original 1988 text by The Timelords without modernising it. The 1988 record industry – singles, record shops, radio pluggers, Top of the Pops – is presented as it was.

Is this an official KLF product?

It is a work of the KLF Re-Enactment Society, produced under the entitlement set out by Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty: members may Re-Kreate, Re-Position, Destroy or Destruct the work of The KLF, and may reinterpret that entitlement however they see fit. It is not published by The KLF or KLF Communications.

What is the KLF Re-Enactment Society?

The KLF Re-Enactment Society (KLFRS) is the body sanctioned by Drummond and Cauty through which members re-enact, reinterpret and rebuild the work of The KLF and of each other. Inkantation produced this graphic novel as a member of the society.

What is Inkantation?

Inkantation is a graphic novel imprint that adapts existing texts into visual storytelling. Writing, design, character and location design, page composition and lettering are human-directed; AI image generation is used as a production tool under that direction.

How big is the book?

US Trade paperback, 6 × 9 inches (15.2 × 22.9 cm), 145 pages, full colour, perfect bound. It weighs about 200 g.

How long does delivery take?

Each copy is printed to order in the UK. Allow 7–14 days from order for printing, plus postage.

Is the original book still in print?

The original has been reissued several times and is periodically hard to find, with second-hand copies often selling well above cover price. This graphic novel is in print now and made to order.