This time we are doing a tape of poetry and soft jazz music from a man call Malcolm Julian-Swan who is a man who does poems who sent me his tape to review. I am interested in reviewing this one because it is something a bit different that I've heard before because I don't really listen to much poetry.
When we were doing this review we listened to some other poets who have done their poetry to music, we listened to John Cooper Clarke and Linton Kwesi Johnston and some others and I like hearing these very much because I thought it was very interesting and it made a nice change from hearing singing all the time.
The tape starts off on Side A with cymbals and bass guitar and no poetry, it is all very soft and nice to listen to and relaxing and I think this is to get you in a relaxed mood for listening to the poetry. The poetry starts after a bit with Malcolm saying "My name is Malcolm Julian-Swan and I am an anarchist..." but I didn't know what an anarchist is so we looked it up and found out that it means somebody who doesn't like government and thinks we'd be better off without them. I had a bit of a think about this and I think I agree with that because I don't think much of the government really because they are always making people unhappy but I don't know much about politics so I don't really know if I'm an anarchist or not. This poem and the others on the tape too is like a story and it talks about working at a Christmas cracker factory and how he was told he might get the sack for being an anarchist and then he tells some jokes that I couldn't quite make out and then the poem stops. I thought this was a nice way to start the tape because I learnt what an anarchist is.
After this one is one about David Cameron on Ready Steady Cook. I don't know much about Ready Steady Cook because I never watch it because I think it's a bit boring and I don't know if he's ever been on it really but I suppose he might have been because David Cameron is the Prime Minister and Prime Ministers are always on the telly. After that there is some stuff about communism which is where things are all shared out and it is like "all for one and one for all" and I think this might be a good thing but I don't know because, like I said, I don't really know much about politics; I do know that I am left wing though because I vote labour.
The tape goes on and talks about some other things then this side of the tape finishes off with more of the nice instrumental music.
On the other side of the tape it starts off with Malcolm talking about the olden days and how violent it was but I don't know much about that because I never saw much violence in the past. He goes on to talk about a violent green man, I thought it was a funny story because the green man gets thrown off a train for being violent. After this Malcolm starts saying; "War and peace and peace and war… and I know this is a book by somebody called Tolstoy that i've heard of. I've never read War and Peace though so I don't know if this book is about it but it is about wars and stuff I think. I think war is a horrible thing and it shouldn't be allowed because they are dangerous and people die.
After this things on the tape change and there is more music on it and it is not as relaxing because the music is not quiet jazz because it is noisier and sounds kind of like an army marching off to a war because of the drumming. This is quite a gloomy sounding one but I still liked it because I thought it was very interesting. The next one is one without music in it about a school kid called Derek but the story doesn't make sense and is quite funny and mad and I think this is a good thing.
And then after the one about Derek is one about television telling lies and I'm not too sure if that's true but I think it might be sometimes and it is difficult to tell when it isn't. I don't really worry about television telling lies much but I do think it should tell the truth when it's news otherwise people won't know what's going on in the world.
The last one on the tape is Malcolm saying thank you to everybody and that's the end except for a story about a joke in a christmas cracker but I won't tell you what the joke is because that would spoil it.
Overall I think this was a very nice tape and I thought it was good and interesting to listen to the stories that Malcolm tells. They are funny stories that made me smile and made me think about things and I enjoyed listening to it very much. I would give Pheasant 10 out of 10.
Pheasant Poem by Peter Kemp.
I listened to a tape called Pheasant,
It was very, very pleasant,
Pheasants live in the woods,
This tape is very, very good.
