TwoToneObit: Rico Rodriguez

Rico Rodriguez, who worked with The Specials and led Rico And The Rudies, has died.

Born in Cuba in 1934, raised in Jamaica and settling in Britain, Rodriguez had developed his style working with Oswald 'Count Ossie' Williams, taking part in jam sessions as part of the Mystic Revelation of Rastafari in the 1950s, and living with the musicians in the hills. He would later cite this as his formative experience:

"They're more developed, mentally and musically, than the average musician. When you play with them you can really explore. Most of what I know I learned from playing with them."

In the 1960s, Rico relocated to London and continued to play. There, he came to the attention of Chris Blackwell, landing a contract with Island in 1976. This allowed him his first trip back to Jamaica since leaving for Britain, and the resulting recordings sessions - released as Man From Wareika - set a template for the ska revival which combined the reggae-in-exile developments from the UK with the more traditional take from the Caribbean.

Having helped kick-start a ska comeback, it was appropriate that he would be in demand from the second revival wave acts - most notably joining The Specials on A Message To You, Rudy. He earned a namecheck in Reasons To Be Cheerful Part III; toured with The Police and seemed to be at last on the edge of a breakthrough.

Oddly, though, despite his success, Island lost interest and - besides a half-hearted attempt at recording a live cover of Guns Of Navarone with The Sprcials - the label first withdrew support, and then dropped him. He signed with Two Tone for the That Man Is Forward album, but, tiring of the music industry, in the early 80s, he retired back to the Wareika Hills.

His return to Europe, and European music, was down to the Swizz Heart Beat Band, who - unwilling to accept that such a brilliant musician was no longer working - sought him out, and persuaded him to pick up his career.

He was kept busy - between 1996 and 2012 he was a regular with Jools Holland's Rhythm And Blues Orchestra; he made his own records; and worked with second and third wave ska acts. He was made an MBE in 2007; in 2012, his contribution to Jamaican culture was recognised by a Silver Musgrave Medal.

Rico Rodriguez died on September 4th, in London. He was 80.

Rewinding Rewind The Tube

Channel 4 did an 80s night on Friday, and like most 80s nights, it was unrecognisable to anyone who lived through it.

A 15 to 1 remade as a jokey celeb gameshow in a studio which looked like Thomas Edison's torture chamber missed the point of a programme where the only thing that mattered was the questions; 8 Out Of 10 Cats Does Countdown's sole concession to the theme appeared to be Jimmy Carr wearing a mullet wig for two seconds; Alan Carr - Chatty Man featured those 80 icons Jessie J and Matthew Fox, but probably had a Rubiks Cube on set.

That just left Rewind The Tube, yet another official history of the programme which, supposedly, put an end to this sort of hagiographic genuflection to the past. At some point, there will be a programme that really explores the series, but instead this was the standard 'it was unlike anything before or since and mostly was about sex and shocks'.

The trouble is, even on its own terms this official history made no sense.

Paula Yates was supposedly a complete outsider - and yet she got the job off the back of getting rock stars to pose in their knickers. Which is hardly something an outsider would be able to do.

The guests were the sort of people you'd never see on staid old Top Of The Pops - except here's Glenn Gregory, talking about having done Pops before The Tube.

Before The Tube, there was no programming which allowed young people to address the horrors of Thatcherism - but this claim is illustrated with clips of young people on a different programme talking more directly about unemployment.

The Tube gave a platform to striking miners to kick over the traces. Hang about, though, this footage shows that it was The Redskins, not the producers, who brought a miner on to the set; and when he attempted to make a statement, his microphone was meekly cut by the gallery.

In order to work in an anecdote about an exploding car stunt, Rewind The Tube had to hope you didn't stop to think how 'Jools Holland driving around America meeting the people from his childhood record collections for what felt like months' looked a bit like the sort of self-indulgent travelwank middle-aged TV executives have been enthusiastically green-lighting since Logie-Baird got back from the patent office.

Oddest of all was the bid to try and claim Band Aid as a Tube thing - "nearly all the artists were Tube-related" ran Tim Healy's voiceover. Which is true; but given you've been trying to frame the series as the home of cultural outsiders, how could what was the original Rock Royalty Potluck fit into that narrative in any sensible way?

The clips from the final Tube really nailed the story that wasn't being told - Duran Duran, U2, Tina Turner bidding the show farewell. The legacy of the Tube was as much Q Magazine as Network 7.

The suggestion that The Tube came from nowhere and was like nothing else on TV is also vexing. It must rankle with the people who made Tiswas - which had ripped up the idea of well-organised, linear television while Jools was still working out how to play four-bar blues on a school recorder - but also ignores Malcolm Gerrie's ITV kids pop show Razzmatazz. Out the blocks over a year before The Tube, Razzmatazz was pretty much The Tube fuelled by tartrazine and midget gems rather than booze n coke.

Curiously, for a programme celebrating a show about live performance, there was very little live footage - indeed, whenever a musical discursion was called for, they went more often for a clip of a pop video. Did we hear anything about how The Tube was running against the MTV-fuelled promo tide of the times? No; but then if we had, it might have thrown too much light on how the ballyhooed "launching" of U2 relied mostly on shoving Live At Red Rocks into a tapemachine and pressing play.

There was a load of good stuff on The Tube; but there were also a lot of editions where it was blessed relief when Peter Sissons turned up with Channel 4 News. For every Frankie Goes To Hollywood doing the sex, you'd have to sit through an overlong giggly-but-awed interview with Paula Yates helping George Michael launch his solo career, Go West playing the same song forever, and Paul Young sweating into the camera.

The upshot? Rewind The Tube conceded that the most famous moment on The Tube wasn't on The Tube, and wasn't even on Channel 4. But it never really pursued the question of why a show that could call on a-list musicians and had access to the hottest upcoming comedians is mostly remembered for a trailer and something said by a presenter.

There's a great story to be told about The Tube. I fear, though, we'll just get another half-dozen of these every five years or so. The Tube would never have treated The Tube like this.

Mercury rising

The big news about this year's Mercury Music Prize is that the long tradition of a gentle-fluff from Jools Holland as the winner is announced has come to an end; from now on, Lauren Laverne will be at the podium trying to explain to the young winner what this "cheque" thing she's just given them is. Or maybe it'll be all modern now, and they'll contactless technology to transfer the prize money.

There's a knock-on, of course, as now Lauren is going to be trying to keep the room interested after the third bottle of wine, the BBC are going to need a new host for the TV coverage. I understand Jools Holland's become free on that night.

Anyway, there's no point in having a presenter without a competition. Here's the shortlist and odds:

Richard Hawley: 'Standing At The Sky's Edge' – 4/1
Plan B: ‘Ill Manors’ – 4/1
Alt-J (∆): 'An Awesome Wave' – Odds 5/1
Django Django: 'Django Django' – 5/1
The Maccabees: 'Given To The Wild' – 7/1
Jessie Ware: 'Devotion' – 7/1
Ben Howard – ‘Every Kingdom’ 8/1
Michael Kiwanuka: 'Home Again' – 8/1
Lianne La Havas – ‘Is Your Love Big Enough’ – 8/1
Field Music: ‘Plum’ – 10/1
Roller Trio – ‘Roller Trio’ – 10/1
Sam Lee – ‘Ground Of Its Own’ – 10/1

The odds - from William Hill - suggest that whoever did them didn't really have much of an idea what they were doing. "The jazzy one probably won't win, will it? But what if it does? I'll give that the same odds as the folky one. Shit, but what if this year is the one they give it to the token album to pretend it's not about having a token album. I know, I'll just group everything round six-ish to one and hope.

Mercury Prize 2011: Very little to add

So, now we've got a second truth to add to "winning the Mercury curses your career": PJ Harvey always wins in a year which ends in a 1.

It was a bit of an odd show on BBC Two. Not least, there was Jools Holland twice confusing "album" and "envelope", which isn't great for an album award prizegiving. Maybe he was nipping up the road to do the Stationery Suppliers Awards afterwards.

Polly's acceptance speech reference to September 11th 2001 seemed surprisingly ill-judged; like a thought that truncated itself for fear of accidentally turning into a funny anecdote about mass murder.

But: in a strong field Let England Shake is a worthy winner. See you at the 2021 awards, Polly.

Mercury Music Prize: Well done, theme from General Election 2010

Congratulations, then, to The XX for their victory in the Mercury Music Prize last night.

The Sun describes their reaction to winning as "low-key", which appears to mean they didn't invite anyone from The Sun to their party afterwards.

It's a great album, but perhaps the safest choice - maybe second-safest, after Mr. Rascal. I suppose with both Lauren Laverne and Miranda Sawyer heavily pregnant on the balcony, the judges were afraid that going for a shock winner might have sent Jools Holland scurrying for hot water and towels.

Incidentally, was Jools having a bad night last night or did it just come across that way on the TV? It looked like he'd not only opened the winner envelope prematurely, but that he'd also had a quick peek inside the prize money envelope before he'd handed it over. It made the prize giving look more like that awkward moment when the bloke from upstairs knocks on the door clutching your Giro in a raggedy envelope and mumbles "sorry, mate, didn't see it was addressed to you before I opened it..."

YouTube vs the PRS: PRS summons a mob

The YouTube - PRS dispute is, let's be clear, about the level of royalty paid by the video host to the royalties agency. That is all it as about. YouTube place one value on a play of a video; PRS believe it's something different.

You might not guess that from watching the PRS "Fair Play For Creators" site, where songwriters are given the chance to put their case directly, and have a bit of a moan about Google:

Just remove advertising from the 'offending' pages. These pages would earn no money...Google ARE becoming evil.

Roy Williams (Nervous Records), PRS for Music publisher - 24 March 2009

Roy seems to be referring to Google AdWords appearing on sites which allegedly host unlicensed music - a talking point that seems to have bubbled up from nowhere in the last couple of days. And, yes, although he might have completely oversimplified the idea (you can tell an offending page, presumably, by the tiny Skull and Crossbones in the address bar) it's not a bad demand. And one that Google complies with, when sites breaching its AdWrods terms and conditions are reported.

And, much more importantly, one which has nothing to do with the YouTube-PRS skirmish.

PRS for Music exists to ensure songwriters and composers are paid their rightful reward for the music they create. It is not a commercial organisation, but a not-for-profit collective of songwriters, composers and publishers. Google is a big commercial entity which must properly pay the very people who make the YouTube service a success.

Jools Holland, (Broadcaster - Squeeze), PRS for Music songwriter - 24 March 2009

Well, yes, Google is a big commercial entity. That's hardly relevant, though, is it? If someone was booked to go on the Late Show's Later With Jools Holland and demanded a fee based on the number of hits the BBC News website gets worldwide, rather than the audience the specific programme on BBC 2 gets, you might wonder if your guest had lost control of their faculties.

YouTube, financially, isn't a success; it's doing alright, but not printing cash when you take into account its scale. And the company does want to pay, the dispute is over what a fair rate is.

And why is it significant that PRS is "not for profit"? Sure, it makes it sound a little like a charity, which it isn't, and it's lovely that PRS only creams off a little over one pound out of every ten to pay for its administration, and luxury central London offices, and expensive rebranding operations, and campaigning websites. But "PRS is not for profit and Google makes a profit" is hardly a convincing argument, and until PRS starts to campaign for EMI to be nationalised, we're chalking that one up to attempts to disguise the row as being about 'how much money'?

Abba are angry, too:

I get cross when internet companies paint the picture of a faceless and immensely powerful 'intellectual property industry' as their main enemy just because it suits them. Those under attack are people of flesh and blood, who are passionate about their profession. When I speak with younger colleagues about their current situation I feel a strong sense of compassion for them and I understand their anxiety about the future. Some of them feel that their work is being degraded. There are those crusaders for the right to share files who say: 'Why don't they go on tour and sing for their supper'. This argument shows a staggering ignorance of the fact that so many of the people who write the songs have more often than not never been in contact with artist life. They are producers and songwriters, full stop.

Björn Ulvaeus (Abba), songwriter - 24 March 2009

Well, yes... when, exactly did Google or YouTube characterise the PRS as part of the "intellectual property industry" (even although, of course, that's exactly the industry that PRS is in, even if Abba aren't.)

Bjorn is right, of course: there's less money about for songwriters. But isn't that a structural thing, a side-effect of music going from being scarce and distributed through very limited, tightly controlled channels to being not-scarce, and distributed through an unlimited range of outlets beyond anyone's control? Yes, it's terrible that that makes music - in a strict financial sense - less valuable than it was. But why would you conclude that YouTube has a moral duty to recompense on the basis of the 1989 music industry model instead of the 2009 one?

It becomes increasingly obvious that this is the problem facing YouTube: songwriters and musicians are selling a product whose financial price has tanked, and need someone to blame. It's unfortunate they're blaming one of the few companies which seems to genuinely be interested in trying to help them extract as much value as possible from their songs.

Pete Waterman, at least, does put some figures into his argument:

YouTube is not alone in the online hall of shame where the worthy notion of greater consumer choice is used as a cloak to disguise the fact that copyright infringement happens on a grand scale.

I co-wrote 'Never Gonna Give You Up', which Rick Astley performed in the eighties, and which must have been played more than 100 million times on YouTube - owner Google. My PRS for Music income in the year ended September 2008 was £11.

Music videos and music generally is at the very heart of User Generated Content sites. It is the hard work and creative endeavour of songwriters and musicians everywhere that has been the bedrock upon which many of these websites have been built, creating along the way huge value for their owners. As well as arguing with them over royalty rates, we should be fighting them to get proper recognition for the part we've played in building their businesses.

Pete Waterman, (co-writer 'Never Gonna Give You Up'), PRS for Music songwriter - 24 March 2009

Ignore the first paragraph, which has nothing whatsoever to do with trying to agree a royalty rate with a specific company - it's like BAT insisting that Tesco pay more, wholesale, for fags, to make good its losses when people flog knock-off tabs - and instead, let's look at his figures.

He's done a lot of smudging, of course - he doesn't quite say what period the payment actually covers (was it before Rickrolling really took off?), and his claim of "more than 100 million times" seems a bit unlikely - as of now, the two most popular versions of the video on YouTube have hit about 35 million between them, so "more than 100 million" by the end of September might be a bit of an inflation.

Let's also remember that YouTube counts starts of the play, not full play, and given that Rickrolling was a gotcha moment, it's probably that most of those plays were by people who didn't really want to see the song and would have only heard the first few seconds before pulling a wry grin and clicking elsewhere.

And there's three songwriters for the track. So that does treble the amount to £33, plus ten per cent which went to PRS to pay for its staplers and staff, so that's £36. Not a massive amount.

To be fair, Waterman does concede that the use of Astley on YouTube in this way generated massive mainstream media coverage, and lots of events using the tune as well, bringing with it much more substantial PRS earnings that, but for YouTube, he would never have seen. Oh... hang on, he doesn't, does he?

Still, £36 for millions of views. Is that much?

Consider this: Radio One pays £18 per minute for music paid on its most popular programmes. So, two plays of a three minute song on Chris Moyles show, with an audience of 7.5 million, equates to £108 for the equivalent of 15 million single plays; ten per cent off for PRS comes to about £98; between three people, that's a little over £33 for Pete from 15 million "views". Three times as much as he earned from YouTube, perhaps. But again: not an enormous sum of money.

Also: didn't the payment of which Waterman is complaining come through an agreement negotiated by the PRS in the first place?

It's great that songwriters are joining the debate. But all the while they're blaming Google for the world having changed, it's not really going to get us very much further, is it?

Catatonia Bank Holiday: Nothing Hurts

It's still the Bank Holiday weekend, so a spot more Catatonia. This is Nothing Hurts, from the 1998 Hootenanny. (Note to Daily Mail: this isn't streaming live.)



[Part of Catatonia Bank Holiday]

The death of innocence: Mail discovers not all TV is live

The Daily Mail is outraged - outraged - at the discovery that Jools Holland's Hootenanny isn't actually live at all, but prerecorded. It's found some people who have managed to get through the last twenty years or whatever it is believing that all those people have nothing better to do on News Year's Eve than sit around watching Jools play boogie-woogie piano, and it feels their pain:

It meant the Hootenanny was riddled with anomalies that left many people baffled and angry.

And it came at the end of year in which the BBC was embroiled in controversy over faked programmes misleading the public.

But who's actually "mislead" by this? Frankly, the programme never sets out to decieve - as the list of "anomalies" the Mail lists demonstrates. It suggests that having Kylie on the programme while she was in Melbourne on New Years Eve, and David Tennant while he was elsewhere, was a "mistake" which revealed the programme was on tape, rather than just an indication of who was around at the time it was programmed.

The actual upsetment seems to be restricted to some people who post to the Points Of View message board:

"I personally find all this a complete insult to the viewer. The Hootenanny would work just as well without all the constant 'lying' about the time/date."

But it's not lying, is it? It's a programme for New Year's Eve, going out on New Year's Eve. It's tailoring the programme for the viewer. And what does this poster want? The programme to be renamed "the shortly before Christmas hootenanny" and to have the big count-down to 7.38pm on December the 20th instead of midnight on New Year's Eve.

The hilarious bit comes at the end:

This is the second time that the Hootenanny, a festive spin-off from Holland's Later With ... show, has sparked controversy.

Five years ago, British rapper Ms Dynamite left viewers baffled when she appeared on the programme at the same time as performing at the Hogmanay celebrations in Edinburgh.

So, in two decades, only twice has anyone cared that it's been recorded. Funny that.

Thanks to James P for the link.

Mercury Music Prize: Liveblog

9pm
BBC Four's continuity promises us that "anything could happen" at the "most controversial music prize in the world". Controversial? Sure, it's not like there's many actually controversial music awards - nobody's ever gone to war over the Junos, for example, but The Source Awards surely are more fractious?

Jo Whiley and Jools Holland are presenting, as bloody ever - can't they find someone, anyone different for this? Dizzee Rascal's always there for no reason, they could get him to do it, surely? Make the trip worth his while.

The View are the first live band - "truly fantastic", says Jo. After their song, Jools has to announce them twice before the audience realises they're supposed to applaud.

9.10
Maps. It's hard to make mainly electronic music seem exciting in a live context, and great though Maps are, it would probably be wearing to sit through much of this at a gig. BBC Four try to perk things up by using an effect to make it look like you're actually watching him on a television. It doesn't help; nor does the low-budget version of the digital dotstream Nine Inch Nails had at Reading, to be honest.

BBC News Online have blown the one surprise of the evening - Amy Winehouse does turn up. Oh, so it's not live, and so, erm, the claim that "anything" could happen is a bit of a fib. If anything surprising, like bombs or evisceration had happened, they could have edited it out.

9.15
Jamie T does Salvador. He looks astonishingly like a young Stuart Adamson this evening; and his vocals are completely swamped in the mix, which means that anyone taking this chance to judge Jools Holland's praise for his wit and wisdom would be out of luck. The audience look a bit bored, but then every act at the Mercury is greeted with something akin to half-stoned indifference.

9.20
Picking up his nomination prize, Jamie T mutters some thank yous.

Ooh! New Young Pony Club!

Tahita's gone for a Davina-esque red dress; Lou has an ill-advised neck decoration that reminds me of Mrs. Macey, the school secretary who always seemed to be wearing a neck brace. Latterly, I've come to suspect she might have had a fetish rather than a neck problem.

The sound is pretty poor for them, which is a pity, but at least they had the wisdom to not do the one from the telephone commercial.

9.25
They're on the 'second stage' so they don't get to shake Jools' hand when they get their prize.

Radio 3's Charles Hazlewood (who's helping judge) and Holby City's Adrian Edmondson are now talking to Jo Whiley.

Hazlewood is telling us what a "massive job" listening to all the records "in theory" was. He looks a bit like Keith Allen tonight - he's always smarter when he's doing stuff about Tchaikovsky. He reckons the Mercury is "more esoteric" than The Brits, which is true, in the same way that having your arm cut off is less painful than having a red-hot poker put in your eye.

9.30
Adrian said New Young Pony Club were "more like a normal band" this evening than a group of children "on vodka".

"Songs are very hard to write" observes Adrian. Luckily, before he can elaborate, The Young Knives are taking the stage with their "misfit anthems" (as Jools explains.)

It's interesting that wearing some cheap-looking suits is enough to constitute a gimmick these days.

More than ever, tonight, The Young Knives prove to be the British Weezer.

9.35
Jools muffs reading out the name of Bat For Lashes' album. They're "wonderful and incredible", but he was clearly reading that.

She's already got her nomination award sat on her keyboard - I wonder if you get to choose if you'll be touching Jools Holland or not?

Being mainly vocal is a big plus, with the dreadful sound mixing not working against BFL.

I wonder if those are real peacock feathers.

9.40
Jools details The Arctic Monkeys' current tour schedule, leading into a bit of film of them holding a prize in Tokyo. They've abandoned doing amusing or interesting acceptance videos, then.

By not being in the room, they've left the choice of track representing them to a BBC Producer. Which is why the last thing the judges will hear from them prior to voting is, erm, Teddy Picker, from Glastonbury, a track whose filler-status was so obvious it's being offered alongside baked beans and cheese in the Spud-U-Like chain.

9.45
Fionn Regan has been called "a modern day Irish troubadour" says Jools. Why not just spit at him, Jools?

It was a character on A Bit of Fry and Laurie who first observed how distressing it is to have the harmonica played badly at oneself. To be fair, judging by how much Fionn is blinking, he's very, very nervous. Perhaps he realised that it's not a good idea to throw hungry critics a line like "be good or be gone" to play with.

He's got FR in blue sticky tape on his guitar, presumably because he's afraid that it might get muddled up with one of Amy Winehouse's guitars backstage. He might also have his name stitched into his underpants. The audience does cheer him, though, slightly lukewarmly. But it's a cheer, nevertheless.

Is Spud-U-Like still going?

Jo is now on the balcony getting the names of The Young Knives wrong. They don't seem to be bothered, though, giving off the air of men who;ve just completed a successful audit.

Natasha is also up there with them: she says the Mercurys are like a giant hamster wheel.

9.50
Apparently, there are still about two dozen Spud-U-Likes around the country, and a couple in Dublin. "There are only 25 calories per ounce in a spudulike potato" they tell us.

Dizzee Rascal is "a unique voice" says Jools - presumably meaning unique in the sense of the "only British black artist they can think of at shortlisting time". His DJ is doing something to the turntable with his mouth, which may or may not be a tribute to Daniel Day-Lewis in My Left Foot. Dizzee loves it, apparently, when he sees a pretty girl.

9.55
Spud-U-Like's website also boasts that "spudulike potatoes have value as a supplementary source of good quality protein", which is one of the few claims that Dizzee Rascal doesn't make during his track. Maybe in next year's Mercury nominated album, eh?

Amy Winehouse - "we're thrilled that Amy's here" says Jools, as in "surprised". She's wearing a beach towel, so presumably rushed here straight from that Caribbean Drug Getaway. It sounds like she knows she's got to do a shut-'em-up-performance, but doesn't quite make it.

Still, the record industry audience applaud like Jesus has just brought a round for them all. They'll be turning to each other and saying "and they say we don't support our artists..."

10.00
Basquiat Strings. My wife takes one look at the hair and calls a bathroom break.

Since bands like this never win the prize, but are there purely to allow the organisers to pretend they're eclectic, shouldn't they get an extra award alongside the standard nomination trophy? Or at least their cab fare paid. Or something.

Actually, it's like Prince Harry with Charlie Chuck on drums.

10.05
The Klaxons. "Exhilarating" pronounces Jools, sounding more relieved we've finally made it through the shortlist acts. Blimey, an act that sounds halfway decent. Could the mixing desk have advance intelligence of the judge's decision and are attempting to give the winners a secret hand by making them sound better than their peers this evening? Or are they just so relieved that Winehouse didn't vomit into the monitors they're able to concentrate on the affair at hand?

10.10
Briefly, Jools Holland looks like a man who is going to have to hold up a copy of today's paper and read out a list of his captor's demands.

Jo has now been joined by Adrain Edmondson and "friend of Bono" Neil McCormick from the Telegraph (he hasn't yet mentioned if people he doesn't know are still trying to kill him.)

McCormick tells us that Jamie T is "so now" but burbles on instead about how great Winehouse is. He then says before the Mercurys "we hadn't heard about Bat For Lashes before", which might be the case, we guess, if you spend most of your time hanging out with Bono.

Whiley cues up the obligatory package of previous winners, the only time the name "Roni Size" is ever heard on television all year.

10.15
Adrian Edmondson is still there. Now, I loved his adverts for Nat West as much as anyone's sell-out commercial work, but in a room supposedly full of the cream of the UK music industry, can't they find anyone else to share an opinion? Surely Conor McNicholas will be there with his hair washed and a clean shirt?

McCormick is bloody obsessed with Jamie T.

There's a comedy posh bookmaker doing a show of the odds now. He offers a "maybe the Klaxons" but Bat For Lashes leading the betting.

10.20
Jools is going to announce the winner: "only one can be the overall winner tonight" he helpfully reminds us. In case we've not quite got the idea of how a prize for best album might work.

Jools has two envelopes - one with a cheque in, one with the name of the winner in. Nationwide pay the winner by cheque?

Blake Idiot is in the audience.

It's The Klaxons. They are, it's fair to say, more surprised than they are drunk. And they're very drunk indeed. The microphones are unable cope, so they trash the microphones.

Lauren Laverne has now popped up on the balcony. Neil is slightly shocked - "they were always on the outside of who I thought would win" he says, forgetting that, erm, he hadn't mentioned them as possible winners in his earlier interview.

Oh, Lauren's been a judge again. The Klaxons have run onto the balcony - be careful, lads, she's pregnant. Jools has run after them with the cheque - which, if Nationwide used chip and pin technology to make the transfer, could have been avoided.

The Klaxons are being very happy and pleased, as if it's not quite sunk in that this, for them, is going to be the high water mark.

We know he's a big bloke...

But, sometimes, the truth just has to be told. We believe that streaming albums before release over the web is a handy way of allowing people to sample the wares when deciding to buy, and can often turn a waverer into a purchaser. However, when Vinnie Jones does it with his new album, Respect, it's sole purpose is presumably to kill of any of the last interest that may reside in the project.

His voice is so weedy and rubbish, we can't start to work out how anyone actually decided that getting him to sing at all would be a good idea; much less why they decided to ask him to have a crack at such tricksy classics as Dock of the Bay and - oh, sweetgwen - Minnie The Moocher. By about halfway into the collection, Vinnie seems to twig that he's not going to hit any notes anyway, and so just makes do with rasping the words out as blandly as he can in the hope that it'll all be over soon.

At least with Christmas confections like the Eastenders cast singalong albums, the effect of many voices bellowing tunelessly suggests a party atmosphere someone's tried to recreate on record. With Jones effort, it's like listening to a neighbour singing while ironing his trousers prior to the golf club Christmas party, unaware he's serranding the entire block.

Hi Ho Silver Lining seems to last for the best part of fifteen minutes. And how did Jools Holland end up on the thing? And how, how, how, did it get released? The Queen's not wrong when she says there's forces we don't know about at work...