Beware of the Bull: The Enigmatic Genius of Jake Thackray

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Exclusive access to personal papers has allowed for the inclusion of a wealth of rare poems, photographs and 'lost' lyrics. Bantam Cock, freed from its maddening keyboard refrain, was out-and-out funny while the Widow Of Bridlington was both sad and wry (a precursor to Richard Thompson’s Beeswing). He knew he had messed up his broadcasting career through drink, but he never seemed to be miserable or unnecessarily self-critical. Not that Thackray’s ‘enigmatic genius,’ as the authors describe it, meant that he never put a foot wrong when it came to lyrics, some of which we might now find questionable (to put it mildly).

His life revolved around Monmouth and its pubs, where he could still have the locals in fits of laughter with his tall tales. We’ve marched off and the way we march off, you’re supposed to think to yourselves, ‘Well, good God. Then, of course, there is Sister Josephine, a brilliantly accomplished tale of an escaped burglar who has been hiding out in a nunnery for fifteen years disguised as one of the Sisters, has introduced them to pontoon and --it has been noticed-- is oddly hirsute compared with the other nuns. Nevertheless, such was Thackray’s popularity amongst viewers that he regularly appeared in all four series of Braden’s Week. For Old Molly Metcalfe, for Leopold Alcocks, for Sister Josephine, but mostly for yourself, if your hands aren't too encumbered, gather a book or two for Jake’ Jon Richardson; ‘Jake was the best of us, and this book helps us understand why’ Richard Stilgoe; ‘A timely paean to a velvet larynxed, storytelling wonderman’ Cerys Matthews; ‘A fascinating exploration of the most unheralded artist in the world’ Don Black --This text refers to the hardcover edition.Thackray’s path is traced from the deprived areas of Leeds in which he was raised, to Durham University where he read English Language and Literature, before teaching in France, and Leeds. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice. With exclusive access to his personal papers, it includes a wealth of previously unpublished letters, poetry and lyrics, and is illustrated with many rare and never-before-seen photographs. Two rarities graced the performance at the NCEM, The Ferryboat, extolling the charms of a public house, and a scabrous number about National Service that was aired, reluctantly, once in 1986.

It might be worth diving into the “warts and all” aspects I mentioned, since they are, thankfully, not ignored. Thompson and Watterson were granted access to hitherto-unpublished personal papers, as well as lyric sheets for unknown songs, lost recordings, and television programmes from which only snippets have been available on YouTube.

Growing up in East Grinstead, West Sussex, in the 60s and 70s, the British-born author and Sandman creator had perceived Thackray as a vague voice on the peripheries of childhood, this lugubrious wooly jumpered raptor of a man, his voice a foggy, owlish hoot steeped in dark Yorkshire bitter, who doled out droll topical songs on such lighthearted TV consumer affairs shows as Braden’s Week and That’s Life! Unbegrenzter Zugriff auf enthaltene Hörbücher und Audible Originals von deinen Lieblingsstars sowie neuen Talenten. John Watterson aka ‘Fake Thackray’ presents ‘Beware of the Bull’ – an evening of the wonderful songs of Jake Thackray, with anecdotes and readings from the first ever biography of the Yorkshire chansonnier. Yorkshire is the centre of the Thackray cult, so with luck we will be graced with many more opportunities to savour this underappreciated master of his craft channelled through Thompson and Watterson.

Paul has performed Jake’s songs at venues and festivals across the country and appeared on Radio 4 and BBC6 Music.Above all, the book makes a very convincing case that the high-stakes use of the word 'genius' in the title is fully justified. Eventually, however, the BBC’s Head of Light Entertainment (Sound) came across a tape that Thackray had made of his songs and was struck by their quality and originality. However, while this renewed interest seemed to herald interesting prospects for Thackray at the beginning of the 1980s, Thompson and Watterson note that “as the new decade dawned he was becoming unreliable. One of the theories that Thompson puts forward in the book is that Thackray was writing in character, in the manner of an English Randy Newman.

Curiously enough, it was written around the time of punk rock, but its message is more genuinely anarchistic than anything the Sex Pistols ever came up with. He wrote poetry, fell in love, and was influenced by the French singer-poets, or chansonniers, most significantly Georges Brassens who wrote elegant songs about the outcast, the underdog and the poor.The authors describe Brassens’ sympathies as lying with “the outcast, the underdog and the poor, and his anarchism underpinned his hostility to authority” – which also sounds very much like Thackray’s natural disposition.