"Our outrage goes up to 11"

It is, perhaps, one of the less-popular tracks when labels are compiling their Christmas compilation CDs, but Christmas With The Devil seemed just the ticket for the BBC to use as a bed for their "compilation of festive villains" trailer. After all, everyone enjoys a bit of Spinal Tap, don't they?

Not quite. The sort of Christians who manage to give a two-thousand year-old religion a bad name have missed the point entirely, and have kicked up one of their "look at us, with our wounded pride" calling the song "Satanic":

Canon Peter Howell-Jones, of Birmingham Cathedral, said: “It’s in very bad taste. I’ve enough to do without having to defend God from things like this.” Retired Rev Betty Stephenson added: “It’s disgusting, diabolical.”

She said the Devil — also called Beelzebub — “always works quietly in the background” and mentioning him demeaned the “true meaning of Christmas”.

The Devil is working quietly in the background making trails for BBC One? I find that very hard to believe. Writing the puns they use in Homes Under The Hammer, maybe. Constantly reminding Trevor McDonald of the deal they did (for why else would McDonald repeatedly turn up to demean himself on Tonight, twice a week, for all eternity?), for sure. Scheduling Channel Five, unquestionably. But working doing the trailers?

The BBC have elected to take the line of least resistance and re-record the trailer (clearly, the devil must have taken an attachment to the sports department, tallying the results of Sports Personality of the Year), thereby freeing up Canon Peter Howell-Jones to concentrate on all those other things he has to do now he no longer has to defend God, the deity, from a thirty second snatch of music from a spoof film about a made-up rock group being used on a short advert to promote a special episode of Doctor Who.

music spinal tap