People who like guns like Rihanna's gun bag

A short while ago, Rihanna carried a handbag shaped like a gun. This led to a very small smattering of tutting on Twitter of a 'don't do that, it's not even a practical shape for a purse'; this, in turn, has brought out a rash of over-excited people who enjoy shooting things:

Some Liberals Are Freaking Out Because Of The Harmless Things Carried By This Pop Star

Oddly, the Western Journalism's claim isn't backed up very well - rather than 'liberals freaking out' it offers a couple of tweets of 'people who use celebrities as linkbait going "look, this is controversial"', but that isn't what should detain us here.

Because, although poorly laid out and badly argued, these gun-toting men's feature on chi-chi catwalk accessories does offer something of a classic case of the blowyourfaceoffophile's logic. Hidden amongst its claims that carrying a bag shaped like a gun is somehow empowering is a glimpse behind the curtain.

How would you describe Rihanna? Pop princess? The Umbrella hitmaker? Grammy Award Winner?

Not if you're writing about guns; then, she's just a victim:

Nevertheless, some anti-gun activists used the opportunity to criticize the domestic abuse victim for her ostensible glorification of firearms.

All the talk is about how empowering carrying around the ability to take away people's lives like a capricious god-toddler, but whenever a justification is reached for, it usually turns out to be about focusing on victimhood.

Concert evacuated after Lil' Boosie fails to think things through

You know what? If you're playing a town where there was recently a high-profile shooting incident at a gig, you might want to think twice before using gunfire sound effects.

Lil Boosie didn't think twice, and ended up causing a problem. 9News:

The artist Lil' Boosie was performing at the National Western Complex Thursday as part of his Touchdown to Cause Hell Tour.

Denver police say during his first song, people heard gunshots. The sounds forced the large crowd to quickly clear the venue.

It turns out, the gunshots were only sound effects that were part of Lil' Boosie's performance.

It's possible, I guess, that the audience were just looking for an excuse to leave the venue as quickly as possibly.

Michael Jackson loved UK gun laws, apparently

Did the UK's relatively tight gun legislation lead to Michael Jackson choosing London for the comeback that never happened?

Yes, according to Jason Pfeiffer.

Hang on, who's Jason Pfeiffer?

Jackson's friend and dermatologist

Ah. Well, that makes sense. Who knows our secrets better than the person who writes the prescription for face cream, eh?

Tell us more, Jason:

"The last time I saw him he ways saying his goodbyes to everyone in the office," Pfeiffer told The Sun.

This really does sound like in the construction "friend and dermatologist", the skin care was much more significant than the friendship.

"It was like he knew he was never coming back, and he would often say he thought he was going to be shot on stage.

"He said the comeback was in England due to the gun laws there.

"That's why he ditched a US comeback as people had access to guns here and would shoot him. He thought America was too dangerous.

"But he still had some fears that he would be shot on stage."

I hope nobody ever showed him Velvet Goldmine.

Happily, Michael wasn't shot on stage. Although the amount of painkiller swilling round his system, he probably wouldn't have noticed if he had been.

Bookmarks: NRA

Chris Willman in Popdust explores how the NRA has found a gun propaganda vehicle through country music:

“I would say the community is conflicted,” says one of the most powerful executives in Nashville, who also requested that his name be withheld. “Only the extreme right has stepped out on this. And that will never be Nashville. That will never be Lady Antebellum or even Jason Aldean. It’s too touchy. Most of our artists will stay quiet and appropriately solemn. But you never know.

“If I could do anything,” the executive continued, “I’d push the NRA out of it. I resent the incursion of the gun lobby into this music, and I think I’m not the only one. NRA Country is subversive. It’s like The 700 Club sponsoring country music artists. In fairness, I wouldn’t want anybody buying up our artists who is trying to counter the view of the NRA, either. I wouldn’t want there to be Anti-NRA country—as if you could recruit for that!”
[...]
[At a supposedly apolitical NRA Country event] Academy of Country Music CEO Bob Romero was standing at the podium in front of the participating artists, shaking hands with NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre and mentioning the need to work together to turn Obama out of office. Then Romero chuckled and added that maybe he shouldn’t be saying that.

Queens of the long stretch: Nick Oliveri in serious trouble

Things aren't looking too good for Nick Oliveri right now - police claim they've found drugs and a loaded rifle at his home, and his girlfriend alleges that he's been beating her.

NME lists the depth of legal help he's going to need:

He has been formally charged with two counts of possession of a controlled substance with a firearm, two counts of possession of a controlled substance, and one misdemeanor count of resisting, obstructing or delaying a peace officer. If convicted, he faces up to 15 years in prison.

Lil Wayne schedules prison time

It's yet to be convincingly explained to me how Americans get given prison dates the way the British get hospital appointments - an invitation to come over some time in the future.

Lil Wayne, American justice has decided, must spend time in prison to make society safer (he was waggling a gun round.)

Fair enough. But if prison is vital in turning him from a gun-toting threat to society into a good and honest man, why does he not have to go until February? Isn't it a bit dangerous having him wandering round over Christmas, potentially shooting at Santa as he flies overhead?

Or... are the authorities really saying that prison has such little effect, it doesn't really matter when you go?

Gordon in the morning: Williams this do?

Is Gordon going to try and crank out a "story" about Robbie Williams every day until the new single comes out?

I'm afraid it looks like it will:

The singer says he assumes a different personality for each disc. He told Capital Radio: "For this album I've been Luke Moody.

"I don't like the name Robbie. Bert Williams for the next album, come on!"

Yes, Capital Radio. Gordon now gets his scoops by sitting on the sofa with a mug of cocoa and a notepad.

Robbie said: "I love reality TV. It's the only stuff I watch.

"But yeah, if this CD fails and TAKE THAT doesn't do too well, Strictly Come Dancing then straight to panto."

I don't think he has to worry about a Widow Twankey role just yet.

Um... Gordon, you remember that Williams has already done panto, don't you?

Meanwhile, Dappy - yes you do, bloke in the hat out N-Dubz - turns out to have made a silly gay-hating, gun-waving track a couple of years ago.

Gordon's approach to the story is interesting: first, he has to pretend that Dappy is some sort of role model (if that was the case, wouldn't Britain's streets be awash with inappropriate headgear?); second, in the link through to the story Smart announces that you can watch "Dappy glorifying gun crime". No mention of the homophobia, no mention it was two years ago, and no indication that Dappy issues a full and frank admission that he was a bit of a knob when he made the track. Sure, you find all this when you click through, but if the story is 'children's entertainer says sorry for being an idiot', shouldn't that be the headline?

Don't stab, watch a film about idiots with guns instead

I'm still trying to work out if the Daily Mirror was having some sort of joke by tying its campaign to stop knife crime in with the hagiograph-flick of Biggie Smalls' life:

Biggie shielded his mother from his secret street life when he was growing up.

She said: "I didn't even know about the drugs until after he died. I thought it was powdered mashed potatoes he had under his bed, not drugs."

And presumably she thought that when he was banging on about his guns, he was talking about spudguns.

Seriously, Daily Mirror, you're elevating the man who sang Machine Gun Funk to some sort of spiritual figurehead against a knife crime crusade?

"When you kill you end up in a dark place yourself," she said. "I know Christopher wouldn't want to see so many young people feeling that they need to carry a knife.

"He would not want to see all the bloodshed."

If only he'd left some sort demonstration of that desire, eh?

All I want is bitches, big booty bitches
Used to sell crack, so I could stack my riches
Now I pack gats, to stop all the snitches
from stayin in my business, what is this? Relentless
approach, to know if I'm broke or not
Just cause I joke and smoke a lot
Don't mean I don't tote the glock
Sixteen shots for my niggaz in the pen
Until we motherfuckin meet again
Huh, I'm doin rhymes now, fuck the crimes now
Come on the ave, I'm real hard to find now
Cause I'm knee deep in the beats
In the Land Cruiser Jeep with the Mac-10 by the seats
For the jackers, the jealous ass crackers in the (car sirens)
I'll make you prove that it's bulletproof
Hold ya head, cause when you hit the bricks
I got gin, mad blunts, and bitches suckin dick
The funk baby

Oh, yes. He'd really be upset to think about people carrying knives.

Eric Clapton's got a shooter

Well, yes, Eric Clapton does love his guns, but you've got to understand: he only loves them because they're talking points:

"I'm not really that gregarious," the 63-year-old musician told the Art Newspaper. "And shooting with groups of people up and down the country has taught me a lot about how to get on with my fellow human beings."

I think he means that he enjoys other shooters' company and bonding over a shared love of using deadly weapons as playthings, and not that he can now force people to have a lovely conversation with him by ramming a sawn-off into their faces and insisting they "chat, NOW, and CHAT NICELY if you value your face."

Regarding his recent fixation with guns and game, Clapton explained, "It is following the same pattern as when I collected guitars -- I get obsessed, then engulfed and finally narrow the collection down."

It's not clear from the interview if he takes the same approach with the "fellow human beings".

Police are said to be considering reopening an investigation into claims Clapton was associated with a 1974 gun-homicide of a sheriff.

Surviving Ramones do best to reduce interest in legacy

Marky Ramone, with the sort of eye for accuracy that would make the New Yorker proud, has flatly denied the old story that Phil Spector pulled a gun on the band while they were working together:

"There were no guns pointed at anybody," he said. "They [guns] were there but he had a license to carry.

"He never held us hostage. We could have left at any time. We had the keys."

Of course, the guns and hostages story may very well not be true. But why on earth would you be so keen to kill a tale that makes your band part of rock legend? It's as if Alistair Cooke had suddenly blurted out "actually, I wasn't even in town the night Kennedy got shot..."

It must be the first case in history of a story getting smaller in the retelling.

Confessions to a beat

Rapper Rico Todriquez Wright is settling into prison right now for shooting Chad Blue. Wright didn't exactly help himself evade justice when he recorded a song about shooting Chad Blue, including the line:

"Chad Blue knows how I shoot"

Eric Clapton is now worried about police reopening thirty year-old investigations into the murders of serving police officers.

James P - to whom, thanks for the story - adds this:

The surviving members of Thin Lizzy are currently preparing an urgent statement reiterating that 'Whiskey in the Jar' was a cover of a folk song. (Although that won't stop the Daily Mail checking Amazon.co.uk to see if a Thin Lizzy Peel Sessions CD is available, then phoning Captain Farrell's descendents to see if they're outraged that the BBC is profitting from their bereavement...)

Wright is now going to serve twenty years, each day cursing that he hadn't been able to think of another rhyme for "ladies know I'm hot in my suit".

Former Kitten in trouble - no, not Katona this time

One of the more-balanced Atomic Kittens, Natasha Hamilton, has quietly been making a new life for herself as a bar owner in Liverpool. It's been going well, so far.

So far.

Liverpool City Council has closed the place down on police advice, suspending the licence:

PC Moore [told the licensing meeting]: “Several gun crime nominals have been seen in frequenting the premises and are known to be active in criminality in the city. At a meeting with the directors in August, we voiced concern about the calibre of clientele and that some of the characters frequenting the club have the capacity to carry lethal weapons.”

Isn't the "capacity to carry lethal weapons" having hands and perhaps a belt? I know he meant "may own lethal weapons", but could he not say that?

The club had started checking for knives and guns on Fridays and Saturdays; their suggestion to try and save the licence was to really crack down and see if people were bringing in knives every night of the week. It's possibly a little too late, given that people were stabbed in the H Bar on Sunday night/Monday morning.

The H Bar is appealing against the decision; the appeal will be heard tomorrow.

Hamilton has pronounced herself gobsmacked:

“Since we opened the bar nearly a year ago there has not been a single incident of violence or disorder of any kind and the atmosphere we have generated has been fantastic.”

“We pride ourselves on the safety and security of all of the crowd who fill H every weekend and that of our staff."

Not a single incident of violence or disorder. Erm, apart from the double stabbing, of course.

Ted Nugent loves his guns

We do love that people keep giving platforms to Ted Nugent to talk about gun rights as the more the pro-gun lobby parades violent, ignorant, paranoids to represent them, the better the 'why do you need an assault rifle' side looks.

Nugent had gone to Western Michigan University to speak up for guns:

"Nothing makes me happier than idiots attacking me," he said. "I take crowbars with self-evident truth on the end of it and whop liberals on the head every day."

Not, of course, that there's any link between violence and gun-ownership. It's just unfortunate that Nugent seems incapable of debating his point without lurching into violent imagery.

Nugent said Michigan needs leaders "who are absolutists, uncompromising of the U.S. Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Michigan Constitution."

Is Nugent sure that he wants leaders who are uncompromising on the Constitution? Only the right to bear arms wasn't in the original constitution, was it? It was, in itself, an ammendment and presumably an absolutist view of the constitution would refuse the possibility of any amending?

Baby got a gun and gone

In what clearly wasn't a bid to generate a little extra publicity, James have designed an album sleeve and had it banned by the Advertising Standards Authority, because it has a baby and a gun on it. Larry Gott explains:

“We talked at length about hitting a problem with the Advertising Standards Authority, but it’s such a strong image we decided it go with it anyway.

“The scale of the reaction has been a surprise, but we kind of expected there’d be some ripples. We were looking at lots of ideas with the designers and they came up with an image of a baby and a gun that related to a story in America of a ten month old child that had been issued a firearms certificate.

“Firearms are dangerous, they’re not to be taken likely, and we as a society are becoming over familiarised with the image of gun and gun culture.”

If we wanted to be over cynical, we might wonder if choosing a cover that would run into a little eye-catching trouble might be a better way of marketing a James album than a few hundred poster locations.

Darkness at 3AM: Noel gets guns

Noel Gallagher's a working class lad, right, he's a man of the people, yeah?

Only, according to Tom Meighan (apparently Kasabian have become so successful at channeling Oasis they're now acting as the Gallagher's spokesmen) via 3AM, he's taken up country sports:

"He sent me a text about going shooting in America, and about how scared he was of shooting himself.

"I've not heard from Noel in a while, so as soon as he's finished recording in LA it would be nice to meet up and find out what happened. He was going to get some guns and rifles I think. It was supposed to be a leisurely day out or hobby to get stuck into."

Now, we know that getting hold of shooters isn't unknown in some of the suburbs of Manchester, but it'll be interesting to see if Noel attempts to balance his claims to be the same man he was when he was growing up with his new-found desire to bag a brace of grouse for fun.

Elsewhere, the 3AM Girls are puzzled at not being loved by the people whose lives they rifle:

Ok, we'll try to put it down to a bad case of PMT - but WTF is up with the Sugababes? Keisha Buchanan led her boyfriend Dean, along with bandmate Amelle Berrabah and her fella Freddie Fuller, in a chorus of childish hisses at us as we left the 27 Dresses premiere.

Fairly strange considering we've been nothing but supportive of the girls ... but we can go off people you know, Keisha.

You've got to love columnists whose job involves sniping at people calling other's behaviour "childish", and the little bit of threat.

As if to illustrate the point, the 3AMies then call Keisha fat:

Perhaps the girls were just tired after their gruelling work schedule - or perhaps Keisha's more annoyed about piling on the pounds.

Not that they'd ever be accused of being childish or anything.

You're surrounded by the Sugababes: come out with your hands up

Apparently waking up and thinking she's Nick Ross, Heid Range has called for the killer of Rhys Jones to come forward.

After all, if all you have to worry about is facing a possible trial as an adult, a life sentence, being used as the face of Evil England by the tabloids and getting battered as an example by Jack 'Big Stick' Straw - who actually has "the Orwellian-sounding Minister of Justice" printed on his business cards - why would you not want to make a Sugababe smile by coming forward.

Tomorrow, Mutya's going to go to Iraq and say "please, make it stop."

Kinks 'shootist' set free

Ray Davies failed to show up in court for the trial of Jerome Barra, the man accused of shooting him in the leg after trying to steal Davies' girlfriend's bag, which lead to Barra having charges against him dropped.

Davies has complained that he wasn't given enough notice of the court date, and says that he's not happy:

Davies told New Orleans' Times-Picayune newspaper he had been unable to get to the trial in time.

"I am very disappointed with the way this case has been handled," he was reported as saying.

"I intend to pursue it further."

The trial had first been attempted in 2005, but was put on hold when, yes, Davies was unable to attend. The trial date for last Friday had been agreed in May.

Rap sheet: two arrests in New York

Police-related problems for Lil Wayne and Ja Rule, both of whom were stopped by police while allegedly carrying guns at the weekend.

Wayne managed to draw attention to himself by smoking a joint in the street; Mr. Rule's car was pulled over for speeding. Both men were carrying handguns, according to the crimesheets.

Remy Ma abandons SUV, disappears after shooting

Remy Ma's SUV has been found, crashed and abandoned, by police investigating a shooting incident in New York. The suspect in the shooting has been described as "a woman in her 20s"; the 26 year-old Ma scampered away from her car a block away, and is being sought for questioning.

Marilyn Manson: Did I mention Columbine was nothing to do with me?

Marilyn Manson's attempts to suggest he had nothing to do with Columbine, and would people stop mentioning Columbine in the same breath as his name, because Columbine and Marilyn Manson are nothing to do with each other, right, gets another outing on the Orange Playlist tomorrow night:

"I always knew that I never felt guilty or that I did something wrong. I despised people who accused me of doing that. The whole point of my name was to make a statement about the very same thing I was being blamed for.

"I almost feel cheated if Columbine is talked about and I'm not mentioned because I went through so much bullshit and torment, emotionally and personally, and so much concentrated effort to destroy me that I feel I'm being left out when I'm not mentioned. No one else can take credit for or take responsibility for what I already got blamed for. I don't wanna take responsibility because I already took it.

Really, Marilyn? Are you actually saying that you have taken responsibility for Columbine? Because we remember at the time you were rapidly trying to distance yourself from it, in case it harmed your career?

Are you actually saying that "no-one else can take credit or responsibility for" the shootings? What about Harris and Klebold, especially Harris, who quite convincingly has been diagnosed as a psychopath in the strict medical sense?

Isn't it a little bit sickening for you to still be making hay from telling the world how you suffered in an event where people actually died? To ask for our sympathy because you might have been given a tough time on Fox News for a couple of weeks, without a noticeable dent in your sales figures? At least George Michael's ill-judged piano of peace stunt at the Columbine gates has some desire to heal, however wrong-headed he might be. You, Manson, are still making hay from your non-part in the tragedy. Time, surely, to move on?