Adams app-pulled

Ryan Adams has requested the closure of a fan website - one that he would sometimes post to. Dave Smith's ryanadams.org agreed to wrap up when Ryan got concerned about personal details (his) appearing online. Dave says it's not censorship:

“I just had a good discussion with Ryan about his concerns and reasons for requesting that the board be taken off-line temporarily. There's been a lot of talk about censorship and restricting free speech, but I can assure you he has no grand plans to silence the .org. In fact, quite the opposite, he sees it as a valuable resource, and has enjoyed taking part in the message board, discussing shows even when someone gives a negative review.”

Of course, Dave thinks it was Ryan who asked him to close the site; it could have been someone who stole his identity using information pieced together from the website.

music ryan adams

Coyle has a go at being Wilson

We imagine it's meant to suggest there's more to Girls Aloud than they're credited with, but it could equally mean there's less to Kaiser Chiefs than they'd hope: the centerpiece of the extra stuff on the Girls Aloud career-spanning restrospective (okay, boil-down of the last handfull of albums) is a cover of I Predict A Riot.

That career in full:

Disc One

'Sound Of The Underground'
'Love Machine'
'Biology'
'No Good Advice'
'I'll Stand By You'
'Jump'
'The Show'
'See The Day'
'Wake Me Up'
'Life Got Cold'
'Something Kinda Oooh'
'Whole Lotta History'
'Long Hot Summer'
'Money'
'What A Feeling'

Disc Two

'No Good Advice (alternative version)'
'Wake Me Up (alternative version)'
'Love Machine (demo)'
'Wicked Game'
'I Predict A Riot'
'Sound Of The Underground (instrumental break down mix)'
'Hanging On The Telephone'
'Loving Is Easy'
'Singapore'

We've scanned and scanned, and can't see any sign of One True Voice's best-of anywhere...

music one true voice girls aloud kaiser chiefs

In praise of Colin Murray

The reaction to Colin Murray's new Radio One show hasn't been universally bad: Guardian radio critic Elisabeth Mahoney was quite positive:

What's interesting is how the station is expanding the accessibility of its evening programming, with Murray and Jo Whiley in the line-up, gently blurring the division between the popular, mainstream success of the daytime schedule and the strongly demarcated specialist shows after dark. This is a good move, and I'm sure I won't be alone in tuning in more in the evenings now that Murray is a happy creature of the night.

Which is true, but misses the point of Radio One somewhat. If the network wanted to make daytime and nighttime less distinct from each other, surely the way to have gone would have been to give Bobby Friction an afternoon show rather than taking Murray into the evenings - giving the daylight hours a stronger injection of the new music they supposedly trust in, rather than bringing more Top 40 and oldies into the specialist schedules.

Mahoney's pledge to join others tuning in after the curtains are drawn does little to reject the feeling this is more about audience figures than supporting new bands.

[Earlier post: Our review of the new show]

music colin murray radio one

David Sneddon comes out of retirement

Yes, you do know who he is.

Think back. No, further than that.

David Sneddon won the first season of Fame Academy, released an album and then withdrew due to lack of anything approaching interest. But now he's back, back, back - thrust into the limelight.

Okay, it's an MBE party for footballer Barry Ferguson.

Since Ferguson is getting his award on October 18th, there could only be one possible theme: Halloween. (We know, but he's a footballer - cut him some slack for at least getting the right month.) And if you're theming a party around people rising from the dead and ghost-like apparations who weren't quite there, who better than David Sneddon to play?

music david sneddon barry ferguson

CD technology has passed the Daily Mail by

They're very excited by the plans to make iPod low-power transmitters like the iTrip legal in the UK over at the Daily Mail:

The technology will transform long holiday drives down through France or Florida, where families are currently restricted to local radio output.

... or, you know, having to try and figure out them controls on damn foreign CD player thingys.

[Plug: Be prepared for the change in the law with your own iTrip. Or be forever "restricted to local radio output"]

music ipod itrip

Robbie Williams is not as strong as Gary Barlow

We're sure when Gary Barlow sidles up to journalists, waving sheafs of less-than-lukewarm reviews for Robbie Williams' new work, and worries that they might send his former bandmate over the edge, it's heartfelt:

"I'd hate to see him go through what I've been through... I don't know if he'd come out the other end."

Possibly a heart feeling schadenfreude, but a feeling heart nevertheless.

music robbie williams take that gary barlow

They're only a step away from syndicating Onion articles on the front page

The inability of The Sun to tell when people are having a laugh strikes again this morning, as they straight-facedly report that Christian O'Connell is going to be the new Twice-Nightly Whiteley:

RADIO star Christian O’Connell could be the next Countdown host, it emerged yesterday. The 34-year-old said Channel 4 has asked him to audition to take over from Des Lynam.

He told Virgin breakfast show listeners: “I’ve always been a fan and doing a breakfast show means I’m free in the afternoon.”

Let's not detain ourselves with the use of "it emerged yesterday" as if there's a similarity between between, say, the slow oozing of the details of the Mark Foley sex scandal and someone saying something on the radio and just stare, slack jawed. How many editors will this have passed through before they published it? And none of them stopped for a moment and thought "the man who replaced Chris Moyles on his Channel Five show for late-night drinkers being in the running to present a show aimed mostly at the stairlift and Sanatogen market - how likely is that?"

music christian o'connell countdown

Moss Top Shop boss strop shock

You'd have thought the deal to bring Kate Moss in as a "designer" for Top Shop would have caused more distress to Kate's people than Top Shop: apart, maybe, from getting her a job stacking the sweater racks at Ethel Austin there didn't seem to be a harsher way of cracking and discarding her image of effortless cool.

Instead, it's Top Shop who are reacting badly: Brand director Jane Shepherdson had thrown a wobbler and quit, claiming she hadn't been kept in the loop.

Philip Green took a couple of minutes off trying to prop up BHS to deny Shepherdson was leaving because of Moss:

“As far as I’m aware, she is going for personal reasons. She’s done this for 20 years and maybe fancies something different.”

Kate seems to be such a lousy fit, unless Top Shop is going to try and reposition itself as a different kind of store. You can understand why Green would have been keen to get her onboard - this is a move that has "whimsy of a rich man" all over - but why is she keen to do this? Couldn't she at least have held out for River Island?

music top shop kate moss

Who's the Stooges here?

Maybe we're just a little too old and cynical, but we can't help but feel that the Stooges rider request that's currently gracing The Smoking Gun was written with one eye on it turning up there.

Which is not to take anything away from the quality of the document - stipulating, for example, that the backstage vodka isn't made in England and "a recent" New York Times ("today's would be nice"). And if the real idea was to build some extra awareness of the apparent Albini-produced new album, it's a deft way of doing it.

music iggy pop the stooges steve albini

Back to Church

Depsite having evaporated viewers over the course of a few weeks, Channel 4 is renewing the Charlotte Church show for another two series. Partly, we guess, on the basis that they don't have much else they could do if they didn't.

Andrew Newman, head of entertainment and comedy at Channel 4, said: "Charlotte has proved herself to be a hugely talented star and has got better and better each week.

"She has become an incredibly charismatic all-round entertainer while remaining 100% natural, relaxed, down to earth and completely unfazed by her stardom."

Sadly, while she was getting better and better, the audiences were getting smaller and smaller - down from 2.1 to 1.4 million so far. Still, it's nice to see Channel 4 actually giving a programme time to develop - if she'd been with ITV, she'd have been hauled from the schedules by week three.

music charlotte church channel 4