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I Wanna Be Yours

Written by: John Cooper Clarke
Narrated by: John Cooper Clarke
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Publisher's Summary

This is a memoir as wry, funny, moving and vivid as its inimitable subject himself. This audiobook, read by the author, will be a joy for both lifelong fans and for a whole new generation.

John Cooper Clarke is a phenomenon: Poet Laureate of Punk, rock star, fashion icon, TV and radio presenter, social and cultural commentator. At 5 feet 11 inches (32in chest, 27in waist), in trademark dark suit, dark glasses, with dark messed-up hair and a mouth full of gold teeth, he is instantly recognizable. As a writer his voice is equally unmistakable and his own brand of slightly sick humour is never far from the surface.

I Wanna Be Yours covers an extraordinary life, filled with remarkable personalities: from Nico to Chuck Berry, from Bernard Manning to Linton Kwesi Johnson, Elvis Costello to Gregory Corso, Gil Scott Heron, Mark E. Smith and Joe Strummer, and on to more recent fans and collaborators Alex Turner, Plan B and Guy Garvey. Interspersed with stories of his rock and roll and performing career, John also reveals his boggling encyclopaedic take on popular culture over the centuries: from Baudelaire and Edgar Allan Poe to Pop Art, pop music, the movies, fashion, football and showbusiness – and much, much more, plus a few laughs along the way.

©2020 John Cooper Clarke (P)2020 Macmillan Publishers International Ltd
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What the critics say

This is not a ‘ponderous trudge through the turgid facts of an ill-remembered life’ but the kind of autobiography Rimbaud might have written if he had been a Mancunian stand-up comedian. (Graham Robb)
John Cooper Clarke is one of Britain’s outstanding poets. His anarchic punk poetry has thrilled people for decades and his no nonsense approach to his work and life in general has appealed to many people including myself for many years. Long may his slender frame and spiky top produce words and deeds that keep us on our toes and alive to the wonders of the world. (Sir Paul McCartney)
I say to people, have you heard of John Cooper Clarke and if they say, yes, yeah he's an absolute genius and you just go, 'oh - ok, you've saved me a lot of time (Steve Coogan)

What listeners say about I Wanna Be Yours

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Well worth a listen

I’m always a little amazed people remember so much minutia. I imagine once you get going it all comes back, but you’d expect it wouldn’t be sharp.

At any rate, this was a nice and chill, contemplative recounting of the authors life. It’s very much an assumption of the writer as to what is interesting or not; this time being you obviously want to hear about the punk rock scene in the UK and a sort of behind the scenes meets my life hooked on drugs.

That meets my expectations. It is quite candid and unapologetic (the way I expected it would be based on his personal), what-you-see-is-more-or-less-what-you-get way. He is certainly not painted in a great light, problematic in the ways you’d expect, raised in the 50s. I imagine this will put off some people. You’re not a great person if you give your girlfriend VD, invite her to move in because you feel bad, go on tour, shack up with some else, and completely ghost the ex who doesn’t know she’s an ex.

I imagine this about the same as most of these stories, a bit of embarrassing stories, wow I was an asshole, but also there’s some stuff I’ll never air and it is what it is.

It is more enjoyable because it’s read by the author and the delivery is great. It’s genuinely interesting if you’re interested in the scene or him. It’s granular in his early years and then the pacing kicks it up when he starts writing poetry and getting into the scene. It stops somewhat abruptly as he says from here on out it’s more of the same.m, which is odd because there’s none of the ‘Here’s what I became’. It’s anchored solely in growing up and professional career/ The Scene, with some personal accounting of addiction and who he was dating at the time.

It’s unnecessarily sad a bit that his more progressive thoughts and actions don’t make the cut after the most “interesting” part of his life, kind of. I suppose it might have undercut the more shitty/dramatic aspects of the narrative? Or perhaps that bits saved for another book. Who knows.

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