Britain’s best loved and most important performance poet, Dr John Cooper Clarke has today announced a very special UK summer tour for June 2016, where he will perform across some of the UK’s major cities.

John Cooper Clarke, also known as the Bard of Salford, shot to prominence in the 1970s as the original people’s poet, and emerged as one of the leading voices of youth culture. Thanks to his biting, satirical, political and very funny verse, delivered in a unique rapid-fire performance style, he became a seminal influence on the punk movement.His impact far-transcended that cultural moment though, and John became the world’s leading alternative literary figure, whose work is loved and recognised on a global scale.

Today, John Cooper Clarke is as relevant and vibrant as ever, and his influence just as visible on pop culture. With TV appearances on Have I Got News For You, Never Mind The Buzzcocks and Would I Lie To You, his influence can also be heard in the satirical and keen social observations of artists such as Plan B and the Arctic Monkeys. Alex Turner, frontman of the Artic Monkeys cites him as a huge inspiration and this was highlighted by the band’s cover of JCC’sI Wanna Be Yourson their critically acclaimed fifth studio album ‘AM’. In addition UK rapper Plan B featured John’s performance poetry in his directorial film debut ‘Ill Manors’, their duetPity The Plightappears in the movie and on the films hit soundtrack.

These collaborations mean that John has been involved in 2 global number 1 albums in the last 2 years.

Dr John Cooper Clarke has recently announced the first anthology of his work, a unique 3CD/DVD bookset collection of his work ‘Anthologia’. Released through Sony on 16 October 2015 this includes an expansive archive of poems fromEvidently Chickentown, I Wanna Be Yoursand live performances from the Manchester Ritz and Hulme Playhouse. The one-off collection truly encompasses Cooper Clarke’s wicked humour, originality and his mastery of the spoken word in a career spanning five decades.