Karaoke King

'George's ear is precise, rueful, sanative. His images amaze, yet through each poem journeys a voice we always want to know better, capable even in the tightest situations of the sort of thought you wish you'd had.' - Vidyan Ravinthiran'The poems of Karaoke King are nothing less than transcendent. No tricksy stuff here. Just lucidity and formal grace: the words and the music. Their ability to move us to tears, to laughter, or contemplation of the mess we make of the world, and its extraordinary capacity for forgiveness, offering fresh opportunities for redemption.' - London Grip'Bravo Dai George, Karaoke King is my poetry book of the year so far.' - Caroline BrackenThis confident second collection addresses the contentious nature of the time. Always deeply thoughtful but also alternately ebullient, angry, curious, ashamed, the poet moves through urban and digital spaces feeling both uneasy and exhilarated. There is a sense of history shifting, as a younger generation confronts its ethical obligations, its sense of complicity and disappointment. Karaoke King also contains numerous reflections on popular culture, culminating in 'A History of Jamaican Music', a sequence speaking to urgent contemporary questions of ownership and privilege, pain and celebration.

Dai George was born in Cardiff and has studied in Bristol, New York and London. His poems and criticism have appeared in The Guardian Online, The Boston Review, New Welsh Review, Poetry Review, The White Review, The Lonely Crowd, and many other magazines and anthologies. His first collection, The Claims Office (Seren, 2013) was an Evening Standard Book of the Year. He works as Reviews Editor for Poetry London and teaches widely, in universities, schools and adult education. His first novel, The Counterplot, came out as an Audible Original in 2019.