Les Barker
A Peculiar English Poet
by Tom Nelligan
There's another, less well-known aspect of Barker's work, as well, a series of penetrating and often angry songs about the way people can mistreat each other that have been powerfully recorded by some of the leading figures in English folk music, including Martin Carthy, Norma Waterson, and June Tabor. Whether about environmental disasters, African famines, or rampant militarism, his serious songs are often fierce, always deeply humanistic, and full of frustration that powerful people can cause so much pain.
Such are the two sides of a man who cheerfully describes himself as "a peculiar English poet." He grew up in Manchester, where he worked as an accountant for 18 years while discovering his true calling. "I wrote a poem while I was in college taking economics," he recalled. "Several years later, I handed this poem to my boss, who was in a folk group, and he started performing it. I went along to the club to see him perform, and I got bullied into doing something. And it just grew." Around 1974 he began delighting audiences in English folk clubs with his offbeat humor, reading poems and parodies while accompanied by a small shaggy dog named Mrs. Ackroyd. Ten years later, he became a full-time writer and performer, with 62 self-published booklets of poetry and 13 albums to date. The albums, both comic and serious, are on the Mrs. Ackroyd label. "The dog started the label," he insisted. "I just helped out. I had to do the paperwork because she couldn't hold a pen."
The titles of his poems give a pretty good idea about what he does. There's the alternative perspective on the Titanic tragedy called "Have You Got Any News of the Iceberg?," the saga of a circus performer of limited talent called "Cosmo, the Fairly Accurate Knife Thrower," and the observation on physics and anatomy called "Dachshunds with Erections Can't Climb Stairs." About the last, Barker deadpanned, "That's a really nice one to do at North American festivals like Old Songs, because you've got somebody doing signing for the deaf, and it's a really good one to do with a signer." About his poems in general, he said, "I'd say you probably don't want to be listening to this kind of thing. It's not good for you."
A performance by English poet and songwriter Les Barker is utterly unlike anything else you're likely to see at a folk club or festival. Or perhaps would want to see, if you're afraid of dachshunds, troubled by horrible puns, unsettled when the English language is stretched to surreal limits, or otherwise humor-impaired. On stage, a slightly built, tousle-haired man with a perpetual grin will read engagingly clever and very silly rhymes about subjects like sexually challenged glow worms, lonely lemmings, and misdirected Greek adventurers, while the audience rocks with laughter and shouts back chorus refrains. If he's accompanied by his semi-all-star backing group, the Mrs. Ackroyd Band, you can also expect wonderfully funny parody songs that suggest what might have happened if Dr. Demento had been an English folkie.
