John Cooper Clarke - Music Box. Comedy ****

Had Giacometti sculpted the Cures' Robert Smith, John Cooper Clarke would have been the result - a spindly body half-obscured by a microphone stand.

He kicks off with complaints about the UV lighting - he wouldn't want a tan after all - and runs through a catalogue of favorite poems: “I wrote the songs” and “Burnley” feature, and there's a rare appearance of “You ain't nothing but a hedgehog.”

His poetry, delivered at a sten gun pace, is cringingly funny, and the last two poems even achieve a genuine sense of feeling. Admittedly, it's a rock'n'roll emotion but he's a rock'n'roll poet so one would expect no less. Or no more. His jokes are by turns hilarious and awful. “My wife and I got divorced. We split the house, I got the outside.” His delivery wavers arbitrarily between deadpan and giggly.

Clarke fully deserves his cult status. Like an illegitimate son of Patti Smith and John Hegley, he is truly in a class of his own.

Until August 26th

Richard Turner

Thanks to SPG for sending it to us.

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