Beware of the Bull: The Enigmatic Genius of Jake Thackray

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The diary he kept during this time offers an evocative insight into his peripatetic lifestyle with entries such as “Off to Boscombe Down. Jake’s songs are exquisitely funny, satirical, incisive, irreverent, witty and gloriously un-PC – and sometimes all of these at the same time.

This piece about him, published in The Guardian in August, explores this with the help of Neil Gaiman, Mike Harding, Ralph McTell, and Paul Thompson. He was in his mid-twenties before he first picked up a guitar, inspired by hearing French chansonnier Georges Brassens, and a succession of remarkable songs flowed mysteriously out of the aether. Co-authored by committed fans Thompson and John Watterson, it’s a book that seeks to unravel the mysteries surrounding Thackray’s life. 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.

Gradually, Thackray stopped turning up to gigs, and bookings started to dry up, along with the money. His playing, his punctuation, his timing, the way he phrased, had nothing to do with American or British folk music. Unbegrenzter Zugriff auf enthaltene Hörbücher und Audible Originals von deinen Lieblingsstars sowie neuen Talenten. Thackray’s appearances on Braden’s Week, a Saturday night prime time show fronted by actor and comedian Bernard Braden, gave him national exposure on a larger scale. Even so, by April 1967 Thackray was in the EMI studios at Abbey Road at his first recording sessions.

His anti-capitalist principles meant he even turned down a lucrative deal with Dulux to appear in an advert that would have solved his family’s money problems. But to consign Thackray to the outer darkness due to some offensive turns of phrase would be to wilfully ignore his abundance of compassion for the characters in his songs, combined with his biting wit about their comedic frailties. TV work dried up because formats were changing but also his audience was getting smaller because that 70s folk era was in a process of change.

He eventually became notorious for not turning up to gigs and regaling his agent with ever more bizarre excuses (‘a snowdrift in August’). Beware of the Bull was written with the full support of the Thackray family, who granted exclusive access to Jake's personal archive. By most estimations it is Thackray’s finest, not least for the musical arrangements which infuse the songs with a laconic jazz acoustic aura that perfectly complements them. I sometimes wonder if it was the recklessness of a lifestyle he was denied, breaking out from that religious encumbrance. On Again’, Beware of the Bull hangs opinions and interpretations not on onerous analysis (leave that to me) but various excellent sources like Thackray’s ex-wife, son, agent, close friends, and the man himself.

He’s perched on a couple of stacked bar stools, there is no stage and the audience sit and stand around him some with drinks to hand. Those familiar with Thackray’s life will know he went bankrupt, stopped playing music (save for ringing church bells), and alcohol took an even greater hold on him. No longer a ‘performing dick’ or ‘a real Archie Rice’ he was simply ‘Jake’ a valued member of the community but nobody special.That’s about to change with the publication of the first Thackray biography, Beware of the Bull: The Enigmatic Genius of Jake Thackray. Soon a radio programme pilot was on offer along with a music publishing deal, although Thackray, with characteristic insouciance --and mindful of his teaching commitments-- proved initially somewhat reluctant to take up these opportunities. Performance was always a trial for him in any venue bigger than an upstairs room in a pub; the demands of show-biz and the long hours and miles on the road gradually sapped his confidence and spirit. It does not shy away from the sadness of his decline and later years, and also makes a strong case for his writing (Thackray was a columnist of note for the Yorkshire Post in the early 1990s, his contributions posted, often hilariously late, from his Welsh outpost). For those who cottoned on in his lifetime (he died in 2002), or have discovered him through famous admirers, Thackray is held in the highest of esteem.

Oh that someone had been able to take care of him in the way he couldn't for himself, shielding him from the aspects of performing that he found difficult and leaving him some headspace for the rest. Nevertheless, such was Thackray’s popularity amongst viewers that he regularly appeared in all four series of Braden’s Week. As well as the unparalleled joy of keeping the publication alive, you'll receive benefits including exclusive editorial, podcasts, and specially-commissioned music by some of our favourite artists. And I remembered and then I started blushing…and there’s nothing worse than blushing to yourself in the dark. Thackray was uncomfortable with the fame that had been thrust upon him almost accidentally; it was the wrong sort of success.More television and radio work followed alongside his live appearances until, in 1972, a third studio album appeared entitled Bantam Cock. A biography works best when it adds local colour, humbly shades in knowledge gaps, situates its subject in a loose timeline, when its author is transparent, and there’s clear blue water between hunter and quarry (there’s no ‘Jake: My Story’ attempts to point us to any pre-existing connections between author and subject).