What the pop papers say: God, isnt BlueYonder rubbish - 36 hours and nothing's fixed edition

"Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez talk about how they'll celebrate their wedding" promises Hello - apparently by Jennifer turning into Jackie Kennedy to judge by the front page. "Jennifer explains why this marriage will be her last" - I'd imagine because having worked her way through the men, she'll be getting cracking on the chicks next, is it? Or maybe it's because interest is waning, what with Jenny From The Block barely managing to sell more than 40,000 copies...

In Music Week, Alan Jones takes a hard look at Shania Twain's album and its oddities - a double CD that isn't advertised as such; in the US disc 2 is country mixes, while in the rest of the world you get the ghastly-sounding 'world mixes' and, scarily, nine of the tracks have exclamation marks. As does Up! itself. It sold 73,000 copies in first week in the UK racks, which compares well with the start Come On Over made (just 122 copies). If Up! reaches total sales as proportionately high to its week one as its predecessor, Shania can expect to flog nearly two billion here...

MW also reports further changes at the nme where, following on from appointment of former Daily Express writer Melissa Myers as news editor, deputy editor James Oldham is quitting to run a pretend indie label, Loog, part of the Vivendi-Universal conglomerate. Actually, we wish him well, although its a pity that he feels his time at the NME has "reached its natural conclusion", which we wouldn't be so cheap as to suggest has anything to do with the recent change in the editor's chair at Kings Reach Tower...

talking of what and which, there's two things lurking in the placcy bag the paper comes in this week - a Chain With No Name advent calendar (December 7th has a Haven Album clearly shoved in a girl's vagina); poorly drawn versions of celebs litter the calendar, offering a badly drawn Badly Drawn Boy and Conor Oberst looking like he's mid-change from mild scientist David Banner...

then there's a Bring It On - another month over so soon? - with The Datsuns on the front, pretty girls make graves, the thrills, the kills (rhyming bands alert), glassjaw, kinesis, the rapture and a scary close-up of conor oberst plus a better quality shot of Pete Libertines in his skirt...

so, onto the nme proper, with Black Rebel Motorcycle Club on the front - huzzah...

news: Kelly Osbourne says "I'm no Britney" - thats right, love, Britney can carry a tune when she has to; eminem is thinking about taking more acting roles following the success of 8 Mile - apparently playing largely himself in a film has given him to confuse himself with an actor. Someone should play him Desperately Seeking Susan and Shanghai Surprise back to back, and quickly; "Could former Marilyn Manson guitarist Twiggy Ramirez be about to join Blur? Could Courtney Love be about to join the former members of Guns N Roses?" asks the nme. No, and no. Next? Fabrizio Moretti has cut his hair off (hmmm, you'd have to say, having the Daily Star's gossip columnist at the news desk is starting to look less like a duff plan if this is the standard her news coverage is going to have rise to next week); what's puzzling about Kylie getting the huff over a body double being used for the unofficial hits package is not why she's arsey, but why the label behind the album had trouble finding a nearly nude Kylie shot to use for real; stars are asked what they think of Kurt's Diary in a feature entitled "Let's see if we can squeeze some more mileage out of this, then." What do the stars think then? We simply don't know. But we do know what Ryan Adams ("I'm just trying to read the stuff that makes me laugh" - anyone who can explain how you go about doing this wins a prize); Wayne Coyne ("He knew he was going to die, why didn't he take these things and burn them?"); Henry Rollins ("I'd like to see the version of the journal that says 'I'm really trying to get away from my psycho wife" - thanks for playing, Henry"); Roddy Woomble ("I don't feel the need to read it"); Steve Lamacq ("I met him") and Eddie Vedder ("I probably could relate to the suspiscion coming out of his brain [...] I've [...] I've [...] I've had a hard time [...] I used to [...] I'm [...] I've [...] "); Fischerspooner story blah blah blah oh give it up; you can win a free Winona Ryder tshirt by completing a sentence - which is ironic, being as how that's how Winona's going to have to win her freedom, too. ("Winona is innocent because...", by the way. Um, only she's not, is she?); there's a thing which claims the nme has come with three free badges "this week" which, clearly is meant to run next week - still time to realise just how shitty and awful the concept and, indeed the badges themselves are (More Melody Maker style "you all use our catchphrases like 'You Cock' and 'If they bring someone in over my head, I'm off to Polydor' all the time, don't you?" self-regarding nonesense, I'm afraid); there's two pages of Robbie Williams news - like we give a shit; there's also fevered speculation as to why Chris Martin had the letters BH on his hand at the MTV Music Award - it was a greeting for one of his friends who was having a birthday. You might think that someone with a top ten album might have sent a card and a bottle of beer or two; Ryan Adams has recorded hardcore punk for The Finger's We Are Fuck You album; Tim Burgess says that the solo album has come about because he feels isolated from the rest of the Charlatans - presumably the implication of living on the other side of the world not thought through, there, then; he's also been on a pilgramage to the Joshua Tree National Park to try and capture the spirit of Gram Parsons. Probably lucky the body had already gone, then...

hot new bands: pretty girls make graves - hot? yes; new? debatable...

sum 41's dave baksh does the pretend cd thing... he calls it Ass Invaders... huh huh huh huh... he said 'ass'... heh heh heh heh... Beavis chooses Anthrax, Pantera, Carcass and Death...

the pisspoor concept of getting readers to email gossip in is showing itself up for the mouldy cake it seemed like - Ladytron were spotted backstage at their own gig, believe it or not. Fancy...

Cranebuilders are interviewed so briefly as to have nothing worth mentioning there...

ryan adams is smeared lusily over four pages. He addresses the "humourless" charge over the Bryan Adams affair by pointing out the guy he gave the money back to had been using the same joke right through the gig, and it was at the Ryman Auditorium which was, personally, a big deal to him. And apparently Neil Young has since told him "You're lucky. All my life I got Neil fuckin' Diamond." He also claims he never went out with Beth Orton, and then turns his attention to Denise Richards who wears a mask to avoid breathing the air on planes: "How do you hold a penis in your hand? Charlie Sheen's penis mind you... you put that in your mouth and yet you put a bag on your head so you won't breathe the same air as other people."...

James Murphy/ LCD Soundsystem believes he's reuniting rock and dance, which were separated by homophobia and racism...

Good idea to investigate rock at violence, post-Leeds toilet riots and someone getting sexually assaulted at a Richard Ashcroft gig. Bad idea to try and do it in half a page, although Anton Brookes is on hand to provide the backbone to the piece: "You get these idiots, they read about what the hardcore days were like... but they don't get it. It used to be about self-expression and everybody would help each other. Now you just get a load of morons going mental."...

BRMC, then: it's a good article, but it's perhaps a little too heavy on letting daylight in on magic and explaining the new songs...

reviews: albums:
ladytron - light and magic - "it doesn't all work, but...", 8
audioslave - audioslave - "what does this parade of heavyweights amount to? nothing very much at all", 4
meat beat manifesto - ruok? - "none of this sounds less than seven years old", 4
ja rule - the last temptation - "aimed at the doubters, not the kids", 6
blazin squad - in the beginning - "PG treatment of adult themes", 6

singles:
sotw - eminem - lose yourself - "genius"
the raveonettes - attack of the ghost riders - "best JAMC-indebted Danish goth-garage band around"
tegan and sara - monday, monday, monday - "they have no tunes. rubbish"

live:
doves - glasgow - "untouchable"
the rapture - london ICA - "absurd in theory; compelling in practice"
john squire - liverpool uni - apparently a lot of Roses stuff
ladytron - london WC2 - "'can we stop talking about porn now?' asks Danny 'can we talk about nice things?'"

best thing in nme this week: the model in the virgin mobile advert. in tights. he's yummy.