Rowntree pledges devotion to Blur

Last week, The Independent - the freesheet you get in the Toby Carvery - carried a story which suggested Dave Rowntree would quit Blur after the reunion dates, the better to carry on his legal career.

Surprisingly, Rowntree saw the report and has issued a response:

"I want to set the record straight following the bizarre and inaccurate piece in The Independent," he wrote on Forums.blur.co.uk. "As anyone who follows the band will know, we all have interests outside Blur.

"I am currently at law school, about to sit the exams for the first part of my training as a solicitor. I am fitting my studies around our preparation for the shows in the summer.

"I have one more year of academic training to complete, but if we decide to do more as Blur, I will obviously continue to fit my studies around the band and not the other way round. Whatever else I do, first and foremost I am a musician."

It's interesting and definitive - not entirely sure how I'd feel if I was instructing a solicitor to defend me only for him to wave a hand and say "look, you realise that if we get invited to go and record a Hootenanny for Jools Holland, you're on your own, right?", but good look with the studies, Dave.