Keef grief

It appears that Keith Richards used to hate being called Keith Richards, as it didn't live up to his expectations:

"It made me sick – my name's Keith Richards," he said. "It hardly makes it against Howlin' Wolf or Muddy Waters, does it?

Presumably Keith knows that Mr. Wolf and Mr. Waters weren't actually known by those names to their mums, right? Surely Keith didn't sit about cursing his luck that he was born to the Richards family rather than the Fox clan?

It seems, yes, as he did try to rebrand himself:

On my first guitar I had Boy Blue written – just pathetic. But that was as good as I got at the time.

Ah yes. Looking to channel the great Mississippi bluesmen, Keith Richards tried to get himself passed off as a gay jazz mag.

Still, it would have all made for a wonderful Aviva advert - a shot of Keith being cheered back when he had internal organs, with modern Keith digitally inserted: "Would any of this happened if I'd been called Keith Richards... oh, actually, it did, didn't it? Bugger."

Ringo Starr: Now I'm confused

In the first batch of weak ads marking the rebranding of Norwich Union to Snickers, Ringo Starr was featured, muttering that it was only by changing his name that he was able to unleash the power of fame. Or words to that effect. "Would any of this have happened", he asked, "if I was still Richard Starkey?"

In the new batch of even weaker ads, Ringo pops up, looking grim-faced, insisting that he doesn't want to be called by his stage name.

Eh? So he rebranded successfully to Ringo, and yet doesn't want to be known as Ringo, believing that his actual name is still Richard Starkey? So if his name is Richard, then his question in the original advert, 'would this have happened if I was called Richard' would be answered 'yes, because I am.'

And if he's Richard sometimes, and Ringo at others, isn't the message from this that you can be flexible with your name according to circumstances? And doesn't that mean that, actually, Norwich Union could still be Norwich Union when it's drumming for the Beatles, and Aviva when it's at home?

Or... did nobody really think the adverts through at all?