Spandau ReBallet: I know this much is true

Did... did the BBC Ten O'Clock News really carry the news of the Spandau reunion?

They bloody did. Spandau Ballet. I mean, I know you can't spend forever showing photos of the damage to Fred Goodwin's car, but the getting back together of the Spands surely only merits flagship news coverage if you happen to be broadcasting exclusively to Steve Norman's house?

Still, it's good to see that Spandau Ballet have got so poor they're having to pretend to like each other again ("it's good to see that the Spandau boys have put their difference behind them") and will get out to do the job of playing the three songs everyone likes and some others to fill out the time:

Gary Kemp, the group's songwriter and guitarist, explained: "This is my other family really and I just missed them for the last 20 years.

"I wanted to get together just to have a chat about all those great experiences we had. To be able to make some new experiences is a really great opportunity and that's what we plan to do."

Actually, Gary, one of them is also your actual family, isn't he? But I take your point.

Yes, yes, the one they relied on to write the words did just make that clunky "it's all about the experiences we experienced, and now experience tells me that we should experience some unexperienced experiences" statement.

But here's Martin, again with the family metaphors:

Kemp's bassist brother Martin - also known to EastEnders fans as club owner Steve Owen - added: "Families go through terrible times sometimes and they argue.

"But in the end we've got back together - which is the main thing."

Yes, yes, family. All this talk of family might be more touching if it wasn't coming from the pair who played the Krays, who were brothers for whom family had a distinct and slightly chilling overtone.

Still, nice to get the family back together, isn't it, Tony? Tony? Sorry, can't hear you through those gritted teeth - could you speak up?

Hadley said they had buried the hatchet after "the realisation that time is a great healer".

"We all realised how powerful the band were, the songs, and what we did as a band in the '80s," he said.

"We first met in the pub, had a few beers, the stories came up and the anecdotes and we just realised that we're great mates."

... the realisation coming just about the same time as the barman said "come on lads, time to settle the slate before I serve you any more."