During this edition of John Peel’s Music, our esteemed host received a postcard from a regular contributor called Oink. Whether they called themselves this because they were readers of the anarchic mid 1980s UK comic of the same name which Peel was an occasional contributor to is unknown, but Peel was disappointed that during his recent drive around Europe, he’d been unable to make time to meet up with Oink in Berlin for a drink. He proposed taking another tour around Europe at the earliest opportunity in which he intended to meet up with and get drunk with as many of his correspondents around the continent as possible.
Oink’s postcard contained a question asking why so much of the African music Peel played was concentrated in the same regions. Peel attributed it to cost and a tendency to fall back on French-DRC connections because he was more certain that he would like the music. He agreed to take Oink’s point on board and given his friendship with Andy Kershaw, he certainly had a gateway to music from all over the continent if he wanted to exploit it.
Peel certainly gave credit to Kershaw after playing Claudie by the Haitian compas musician, Coupé Cloue, who had been a star in Haïti for several decades, but was now seeing his work gain appreciation in Europe due to exposure on Kershaw’s programme. It wasn’t only Kershaw's musical judgement that Peel admired but his globe-hopping bravery. Kershaw had come across Cloue’s music on visits to Haïti, a country Peel had always wanted to visit but admitted to being too timid to do so. Kershaw’s mix of intense curiosity and headstrong attitude towards foreign travel had, during the previous two years, landed him a gig presenting Channel 4‘s live travelogue show, As It Happens, albeit with a presenting style described by TV Cream as “forever heading down the first dark alley in sight and swearing profusely.”
Video courtesy of Coupé Cloue - Topic
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