No Rock And Roll Fun

IT'S NO TIME TO BE AFRAID: As we work our way through the music news, something is coalescing into a big jellopool of good intentions and did-they-catch-me-going-in worries: Band Aid 20. BBC News Online is blogging the recording from outside Air Studios. Jamelia manages to be as irritating as ever:

"Of course, we can't stress any more it's for a fantastic cause and something I truly believe in," she said, revealing she would be travelling to Rwanda in January.

"I'm using my popularity to create awareness for something that's so real, it's still here. It's very sad that we're living in a world where we want for nothing but not too far away, there are people in 100% poverty."

Meanwhile, ominously, Midge Ure has announced that Dizzee Rascal has done a "brilliant little rap thing" - so, like every other remake of a classic pop song in the past five years, even Do They Know Its Christmas is going to have the addition of a pointless "rap" wedged in to make it seem more street' more alarming, according to Midge, Dizze "came up with this fantastic line, something about 'help the helpless', which was fabulous." If by "fabulous" you mean "patronising and trite, with overtones of Victorian paternalism" Midge, it really is fantastic.