John Peel, by his own admission, was no musician. He could not sing in any other than a vibratoless low baritone and knew no instruments, , and so limited himself to spoken word appearances, whistling, and once only as part of a backing chorus to one of his favourite bands. (The exception to this rule is his performance of the original Top Gear sig on jew's harp, included on the BBC Records Top Gear album from 1970.) He started a project recording hippy poetry (including some by Syd Barrett) to musical backgrounds in around 1967, but abandoned it when he realised that it would be a dubious legacy that could come back to haunt him, and claims all available tapes were destroyed.