Jake Thackray, 1938 - 2002

What a magnificent, odd creature he was. Seemed totally out of time with what was happening around him, probably why he sounds so fresh today.

It is a shame that the "Jake in a Box" set wasn't there though, as I may very well have buyed that myself.

my thoughts exactly.

The documentary was shown on BBC2 last night.

Excellent and absorbing stuff.

Reminded me of Scott Walker in a lot of ways - not so much because of the common French chansonnaise influences as his not really wanting to play the celebrity game and being perfectly happy to live in the world he created for himself, seemingly from the point of childhood (and no wonder given his pretty horrendous upbringing).

Danny Baker also surprisingly perceptive, particularly in spotting the Nick Drake crossover in terms of guitar tunings etc.

In addition JT made me think of Ted Hughes quite a bit but I can't quite pinpoint why.

Pity we didn't have any input from Gilbert O'Sullivan, someone else who I'm sure learned more than a little from Jake's work.

Hughes and Thackray = both bleak existentialist Yorkshiremen with a dry sense of humour. The orchestrations on the first album remind me of Nick Drake, too.

They do as well! Arranger on (most of) the first album: Brian Fahey, the man who brought us "At The Sign Of The Swinging Cymbal" a.k.a. the Pick Of The Pops theme tune.

Having said that, I like unorchestrated Jake a sight more than I do unorchestrated Drake. Also I am now gonna see how many Youtube clips I can find.

This song is offensive.

Best lyric ever written by a human being, that.

I'm just waiting for the nearly 30,000 complaints to start flooding in...

"And I honour them every bit as much as the next/Misogynist" on its own is worth more than most people's careers.

It's brilliant!

I (for once) was right along with Danny Baker's appreciation and his mentions of Drake, etc. I was exposed to Thack's stuff early on via the TV, as I was learning the Classical Guitar at the time.

I was going to revive a thackray thread, but couldn't find it, guess I wasn't spelling it right or something.

Oh, and I did see Vic Lewis-smith's name on the credits. So, I figure, forgive him his past sins for this prog alone...

Victor Lewis-Smith gets a permanent free pass from me for "Gay Daleks" alone.

My Dad was a fan too, and he and I went to see him, at Barrow-in-Furness Civic Hall of all places, when I was about 14. He bought his 'Live Performance' album after that, so when the expanded CD was released a few years ago, I bought it for him, and immediately borrowed it back to stick in iTunes.

As I recall, he was quite popular back in the day thru' his appearances on those Rantzen programmes.

I think it's fair to say he divided opinion! They just go ahead show some of the programmes he made and be done with it - if they still exist, they were made for the BBC after all. Watching this again, I found myself thinking... clothes... accent... physical appearance... general demeanour... Gareth!

yeah me too

Oh man, can't believe I missed this. Love the Thackray!

I just shelled out for the downloads of Jake in a Box and it was worth every penny x 1 million.

It's kinda like the Ted Hughes Collected Poems set in my head.

Who would the present day equivalent of JT be? Other than Momus that is.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8r2vp_lahdidah-1971_music

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=geDSL19TXDI

Absolutely brilliant performance this one.

Epiphany time!

http://devonrecordclub.com/2014/11/20/jake-thackray-the-very-best-of-jake-thackray-round-75-toms-selection/

That's reminded me to get the DVD that came out earlier this year. It's wonderful that he's starting to more attention from younger listeners, although he's still a long way from being fully recognised as the English Brel, which is what he really deserves.

A new biography of Jake Thackray is coming out and there's a Guardian article about him today.

Most excited I've been about a biography in quite some time tbh