Making enemies

Alex Zane and The Enemy have fallen out, apparently after the band took offence at his interview approach. Zane, for some reason, failed to treat them like they were the most astonishing band ever; the countered with a letter that claimed he'd slept his way to the top. (We know, the 'top' being Xfm and the declining Popworld strand in this case.) Oh, and they appear to have scattered some cheap homophobia over the top, too.

The two sides then met at the Vodafone awards:

"He came up to me saying thanks for the letter and I said that was alright mate because I genuinely do think you're a shitt presenter. I then said I'd find it humorous if, upon leaving the building, he'd get hit by a bus."

Clearly, The Enemy are as funny as they are musically talented.

Zane has had enough:

"I think if someone can be that rude, offensive and nasty, no matter how good his music is and how nice his bandmates are, I'm done with them."

Words which would send a chill through the marrow of all right-thinking people, were Zane in a position to damage their careers in some way.

The end of the Popworld

The last redoubt of pop on old-style television, Popworld, has been cast into the same darkness as both its spin-off magazines.

To be honest, ever since Simon Amstell jumped ship there's been dwindling point, but Channel 4 tells the MediaGuardian that it's keen to keep the Popworld "brand" alive, and that T4 would carry on sticking the odd music video out between reruns of Friends:

Channel 4, which has a minority stake in Popworld Ltd, said it was committed to the brand and would try and develop it elsewhere.

A spokesperson for Channel 4 said "Channel 4 has decided not to recommission Popworld, T4's flagship music show for the last six years.

"The show has performed very successfully over this period but we are keen to continue to use our T4 platform as a launch pad for new music formats that reflect our audience's tastes and the way in which they consume music."

We're not sure, since it's flopped in print and crashed on telly, quite what the Popworld "brand" might be worth now - perhaps HP are too far along the road developing Alex Zane shaped spaghettis to stop now, and so Popworld Pasta Shapes will soon grace the shelves. There is a Popworld website, but it's so far out of the loop nobody has bothered to tell it that the plug has been pulled.

Pulped?

We're hearing rumours from a couple of places that Popworld's Pulp magazine has been axed on the day of its second issue.

Certainly, the website is currently returning the following:

Permission Denied

Error Code: 3
Request: http://www.popworld.com/pages/popworldpulp_home

We're not sure if this is a terrible shame or not - we couldn't find it on sale anywhere in MK - but it was something of an inevitability. Didn't the pop-fortnightly incarnation of Raw last for two issues as well?

Popworld in your pocket

Remember the second version of Raw, when EMAP attempted to launch a fortnightly magazine that sat between Smash Hits and Select? Nope, neither does anyone at Channel 4, who have somewhat bravely decided the time is right for a weekly music glossy based on its Popworld brand.

The cover stars on the dummy issue are Maximo Park, and there is a target audience intended:

[Popworld] will focus on new music and cater for a wide range of tastes including emo, R&B, indie pop and rock.

Now, while we would buy a magazine that loved the Sugababes and the Wedding Present equally, unless we wanted to lose large sums of money we wouldn't try to selling one, having seen so many attempts to do similar quickly dumped into the crisp box with "OLD MAGAZINES 25P EACH" written on in it biro.

Still, the publishers are quite upbeat:

"This is the most finely honed magazine we have ever launched - and I believe we will surprise and delight the market," said Darren Styles, the Brooklands Group chief executive.

If a pop-and-altrock magazine is the most finely honed title they've produced, it makes you wonder what else they're producing - Golfing Goths? Pigkeeping Express incorporating Church Weekly? Allergy Alert and Wordsearch?

A surprising number of the staff - and, apparently, the design - have been lifted from Zoo and/or Nuts. If that suggests a magazine which makes Pink For Girls look like The Economist, that's intentional:

"It's affordable, accessible, easily consumed and as portable as the medium it represents - it's all about sharing great music, at gigs or with your mates, and getting the inside line," Mr Styles added.

Lets hope nobody shows Mr Styles the internet, which already does that for less money. Still, it explains why the NME is giving away stickers - stickers - this week.

Scissor, cut and paste, Stone

Thanks to James Page for the following email, which we run in full as we can't really improve on it:

Unsurprisingly it appeared on Digitalspy on Friday (or, as I believe it's
known in their offices, 'Sod it, we go home in half an hour, just copy and
paste a couple of press releases into the News section and we can all chuff
off'-day). And it went like this:

"T4 presenter Steve Jones sends up Joss Stone's infamous Brit Awards
appearance on Popworld tomorrow morning.

"Jones, dressed in a purple wig and floral dress, is seen mimicking the
bizarre mid-Atlantic accent that the 'Fell In Love With A Girl' singer
revealed at the awards ceremony last month.

"However, the presenter was forced to end his impersonation abruptly when
Stone herself arrived at the studio to record an interview for the show.

"According to reports from the set, Stone and her imitator missed each other
by a matter of seconds.

"Popworld airs tomorrow at 10.30am on Channel 4. "

(http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/showbiz/a43739/steve-jones-mocks-joss-stone.html)

So... Medicore TV presenter attempts slightly-stale 'skit' on ailing TV show
and, in a twist of almost Shakespeareian ingenuity, the subject of that skit
walks in just seconds later. Golly. It's as if Terry and June never left our
screens. No mention of whether the presenter's trousers then fell down just
as the vicar came round for tea, but that would round things off nicely.

I don't know what was worst about that story; The fact that it went into the
'News' section of Digitalspy, the blatant stench of lazy PR, or the
suggestion that us thickies in the general public are supposed to believe
that a programme on national TV is filmed in one little room in which guests
and presenters alike wander in and out unannounced, nobody sure which
popstar will stroll in next, with the risk of hilarious consequences hanging
in the air the whole time.

The only thing we'd take issue with is the jibe at Terry and June - sure, it was no Ever Decreasing Circles, but how many suburban set sit-coms gave the audience a chance to enjoy a spot of illicit pre-Casino-and-online-poker living room gambling by guessing what would collapse in the opening credits?