The Poet's Tale

Blogmate Age of Uncertainty has begun an innovative series of podcast interviews, beginning with another blogmate and real-life poet friend, Oliver Gozzard.
Oliver is just about to publish 'The Commuter's Tale', an epic ballad concerning a jaded commuter about to be made redundant from his city job who finds his destiny transformed when he encounters a latter-day Lord Byron (now a rapper) on his train one morning who persuades him to ditch the city for a life of adventure on the high seas!
My contribution was that I helped design the cover, aided by my web designer friend Daniel Hart, (since my photoshopping skills are zero.) Too many poetry books we decided had terrible jackets in the form of abstract blobs or similarly meaningless standard-menu designs, demonstrating no care or imagination on the part of either poet or publisher and virtually condemning the publication to sell no more than a handful of copies, however good.
Oliver himself did not want imagination restricted to the narrative either and has come up with an equally imaginative marketing plan, which means hopefully everyone who's ever commuted or heard of Lord Byron will get to hear about his poetic debut in due course. Watch this space...

Not that I don't retain a sneaking affection for the cheesier draft image V1.