A live event promoter once asked me if he could have a claim to fame he could stick in my biography or perhaps use in the introduction to my live set. I'm appalling at self-promotion at the best of times, so the only thing I managed to come up with was an economical version of the truth - namely that I had appeared on the "UK Poetry Podcast" more times than any other writer, including Will Self. You can guess the truth for yourselves, surely? Oh, come on, stop being so damn slow:
A/ Will Self only fleetingly appeared on the service once probably because he was never going to be the sort of person who would ever have the time to appear week in, week out as some kind of regular guest - especially on a podcast which was popular only within its own particular niche. Great though it was, it was never going to take priority in his diary over "Newsnight". I, on the other hand, am usually always available.
B/ The "UK Poetry Podcast" actually made an error in their programming and included me once more than they intended to. Having run one of my poems in an early edition, they accidentally used another one a little later on, then had me back yet again for a live show from the Poetry Cafe along with many of the other writers they'd featured during the first year of their activity.
C/ To be honest, even taking into account answers A and B above, I'm still not 100% sure that what I'm saying is true anyway. It definitely was once, but it's perfectly possible that the podcast eventually ended up featuring other people more frequently than me before its run came to an end.
Anyway, never mind all that undoing of a particularly transparent piece of hype. Please find an mp3 of my live set from the Poetry Cafe show below which I remember as being a particularly good evening, and thanks to Dominic O'Rourke for giving me access to the recording (and do come back to the poetry circuit and do some more stuff soon, Dominic, you're missed).
