Cheryl upset at people calling her Cheryl

You know what makes Cheryl Fernandez-Versini angry? Apart from low-paid toilet attendants?

It's people not using her surname. Ooh, that makes her livid:

The X Factor judge changed her surname from Cole when she married Jean Bernard in a secret ceremony in the summer and she told Marie Claire magazine that making the change felt like the right thing to do.

"It's come quite naturally, you know", she said of getting used to her new name.

But the 31-year-old added: "People are so ignorant about it, they just start calling us Cheryl, but I'll take that, whatever."

Why would people be so ignorant? Why? Why?

It's not like you told them it'd be okay, is it?

Except when you said it was okay:

But only weeks after their wedding the pop beauty wants to be known only by her first name.

She said: “It’s just Cheryl because everyone seems to be having a hard time saying it.”

Or, indeed, when you dropped surnames altogether back in 2012, having assumed you had reached Madonna/Gandi one-name status:

The singer is reportedly dropping the name Cole - and like the music world's biggest stars, will simply be known by her first name - Cheryl.

It's hard to imagine how people could just call you Cheryl, what with you trying to use that as your personal brand and all. How ignorant people can be, eh?

Las Vegas trusts Britney with a key

I suppose the strangest thing about Britney Spears being given the key to the city of Las Vegas is that Las Vegas has keys at all. I've always pictured it as more of a place that has those plastic strips hanging in the doorway, like bookmakers used to have.

When life gives you lemons, you just push back the deadline

A general lack of interest in giving insurance salesperson Iggy Pop money to make a film in which Iggy played The Sandman looked set to keep the movie unmade.

Trouble is, rather than shrugging off the failure to raise the crowdfunding target, they just pushed the deadline back by a month.

For the time being, though, you'll just have to make do with this:

The horror: if you say 'Iggy' three times, you lose your no-claims bonus and have to pay a £500 excess.

The backing singer suing Beyonce isn't the key bit of the story

Javon, a backing singer, claims in a lawsuit that Beyonce pinched XO off him. Not directly, apparently, Javon gave the song to someone else (apparently the third party was backing someone else with Javon, and then went on to back up Beyonce.)

That's not really interesting. Nor is the idea that Javon thinks he's reached the sort of status where he only needs one name.

What's shocking is this bit:

Javon is asking for millions in damages from Knowles in the handwritten complaint that he filed in New York without a lawyer. The judge granted him “pauper” status — which waives his court fees — because he said he makes just $2,800 a month working for Carnival Cruise Lines.

That's what's scandalous here. Not that Beyonce may or may not have stolen a song, but that pay on Carnival Cruise Lines is so crappy their staff are officially classed as paupers.

Carnival Cruise Lines pay their people so poorly, judges waive their court costs.

Javon, you're directing your anger at the wrong person.

Rudd charged with attempting to get men killed

Sometimes, Google answers its own questions:

Rock or bust? It's a bust.

ABC News has as much detail as we're allowed to know:

The drummer of Australian rock band AC/DC, Phil Rudd, has been been bailed after being charged with trying to procure the murder of two people in New Zealand.

The 60-year-old was also charged with threatening to kill and possession of methamphetamine and cannabis.

Rudd was arrested at his Tauranga home this morning and appeared in Tauranga District Court this afternoon.

In court, a judge ordered that the names of his alleged victims and that of the alleged hitman be suppressed.

There's a potential ten year sentence, should Rudd be convicted.

You cannot overstate how serious Iggy Azalea splitting her pants is

Iggy Azalea's tight pants split while she was playing a bar mitzvah. Elle doesn't quite suggest this is a significant event in human history, but only just manages to hold off:

But maybe the most striking thing about this incident is how horribly, cringe-tastically, shiver-inducingly relatable it is.

If that isn't to overstate it enough, there's more:

Iggy Azalea is all of us.

Yes, which of us can say we've not worn trousers a size too small to an event where a young person is coming of age? Truly, Iggy is all of us.

The stream is not Swift

As you'll know, Spotify no longer has Taylor Swift: No 1989; no nothing.

People are viewing the yanking of her catalogue through a prism of a Wall Street Journal piece from last year:

"Music is art, and art is important and rare," Swift wrote in the Journal. "Important, rare things are valuable. Valuable things should be paid for. It's my opinion that music should not be free, and my prediction is that individual artists and their labels will someday decide what an album's price point is. I hope they don't underestimate themselves or undervalue their art."

(Nice fudge there of 'individual artists and their labels' setting album price points; good luck, Iggy Spiggott out of Iggy And The Spiggotts in telling Sony you want your debut record to retail at £17.23.)

But is there another aspect to this story?

Music Ally has an interesting nugget:

Music Ally understands that [Swift's label] Big Machine was even in talks with Spotify at one point to have Swift’s new album ‘1989’ available to stream for premium customers only early in its sales window, but was knocked back by the streaming service.

Streaming is bad, especially when you've had a falling out with the people who run the servers.

Katie Melua finds a spider in her ear

Given the story is Katie Melua with a spider in her ear, shall we just go straight to the punchline which is the entire world shoving spiders into their ears when Katie Melua plays? Because we all know that's where this thing is going.

Jackobit: Tom Sneddon

Tom Sneddon, the prosecutor who somehow failed to convict Michael Jackson of child abuse, has died.

Jackson made a hamfisted attack on Sneddon via his music (although, to be fair, this was well into the period where everything Jackson did was hamfisted):

Jackson shot back in a thinly disguised swipe at the prosecutor in a song called "D.S." on the "HIStory" album. The song contains the lyrics, "Dom Sheldon is a cold man."

Sheldon, though, maintained that pursuing Jackson brought him no pleasure:

"If he had been convicted I think that part of it would have been a tragedy — like a Greek tragedy play of a person who obviously can bring great joy and entertainment to the people around the world, (who was) obviously a great entertainer at one point in his career, (who) could end up this way for whatever reason," he told The Associated Press in an interview after the verdict.

Sneddon might be better remembered as the man who pursued an Israeli couple accused of murder in the US despite the Israeli bar on extradition. But there were no idiots outside the courtroom with doves for that one, so it's Jackson which marks out his career.

Tom Sneddon was 73.

98 Degrees to a name on the ballot?

Justin Jeffre is running for mayor of Cincinnati. Or at least thinking of it:

A former pop star says he wants to run for Cincinnati mayor [...]

Justin Jeffre of 98 degrees is a queen city native.

And what, you may wonder, is the main political question that is driving this interest in representing the people of the Queen City?

He's pitching the idea for VH1 to do a reality show on his mayoral campaign. The cable network is considering it.

Excuse me, I'll just be over here, trying to sob myself to death.

In 2011, Jeffre was arrested for his part in Occupy Cincinnati, so he does at least have some sort of record to campaign on. Other than his records.

Clarinetobit: Acker Bilk

Acker Bilk, probably the most famous clarinet player in the world, has died.

This means news bulletins for the last day have been reverberating to the sound of Stranger On The Shore (or Jenny, as it was originally called when it was first released).

It's possible that Bilk, while enjoying the warmth of the tribute, might have been a little disappointed at the choice of music:

Clarinet player Acker Bilk says he is "fed up" with playing his most famous tune - Stranger on the Shore.

The 83-year-old jazz musician, who lives in Pensford, Somerset, had a worldwide hit in the early 1960s and has played it regularly ever since.

He told BBC Inside Out West reporter Alastair McKee the tune is "all right but you do get fed up with it after a bit".

Here he is, then, playing something else:

Acker Bilk was 85; he'd been ill for a short time.

Rockobit: Wayne Static

Wayne Richard Wells, who as Wayne Static led the band Static X, has died. He was 48.

Static was as known for his back-combed hair (the result of a 20 minute process) and his facial hair as his music; the band with which he shared a name was disbanded last year as spats over ownership of the brand had got so convoluted Wayne thought it easier to walk away.

The cause of death hasn't been officially announced, but most tributes make reference - direct or veiled - to drug problems.

This week just gone

November spawned these monsters - most-read November stories of all time:

1. RIP: Casey Calvert
2. Nelly Furtado turns down half a million from Playboy
3. Katie Melua's friend hopes she's found a way to make her interesting
4. Casey Calvert's probable cause of death
5. The best of 2006, as chosen by other people
6. Adam Lambert fakes a blow-job; ABC freaks out
7. Kylie Minogue is flogging her knickers
8. RIP: John Beatz Holohan
9. RIP: Donda West
10. NME publishes cool list; Zero magazine launches

These were this week's interesting releases:


The Twilight Sad - Nobody Wants To Be Here And Nobody Wants To Leave

Download Nobody Wants...



Ting Tings - Super Critical

Download Super Critical



Taylor Swift - 1989

Hold on and stop what you're doing

November 17th. Bo Ningen & Savages collaborations of the last couple of years are resulting in an album.

Bo Ningen and Savages announce a collaborative recording as a co-release by Stolen Recordings / Pop Noire Records on November 17th. ‘Words To The Blind’ comprises of one 37-minutes long track. Taking their cross fertilisation a step further, following occasional live appearances together and Savages’ Jehnny Beth guesting on Bo Ningen’s current album ‘III’, ‘Words To The Blind’ is an astonishing piece of work, a ‘simultaneous sonic poem’ inspired by the Dadaist concept of the ‘Simultaneous Poem’

That's later this month. That's just over a fortnight away.

What do they sound like together?

Whoever thought we'd have something in common with Usher's son?

We're both unimpressed:

Usher says his son Naviyd Ely Raymond, who turns 6 in December, isn’t impressed with the multiplatinum singer.

“He doesn’t care about what I do as much. … He’s like, ‘I’m the star. Who are you? You sing?'” Usher said in a recent interview.

“He told me the other day, he says, ‘You’re not a great singer,'” Usher, 36, continued with a laugh. His reply to his son: “What? I’m a great singer!”

To be honest, if you're son's only six and already twigged that you're not the greatest everything in the world, you've got a terrible problem there. Most sons are convinced they've been sired by a cross between Superman and Superman II until they're eight at the very least.

Brits 2015: Hosts announced

Exciting news - the hosts of next year's Brits have been announced.

It's Ant And Dec.

Sorry... I think I've got confused; that must be an old news story from the time when CD:UK was on the television. Obviously Ant And Dec wouldn't be hosting the Brits in 2015. That'd be absurd.





Oh.




Hang on.

Brits chairman Max Lousada said it was "a real honour" to have them back.

"Ant and Dec are two of the most popular TV broadcasters this country has ever produced," he said.

"It's great that these two pillars of British TV will be part of a night about celebrating icons in British music."

There's a slim justification for this booking tied to the charts:

The return of Anthony McPartlin and Declan Donnelly comes in the wake of them reaching number one last year with Let's Get Ready to Rhumble - a re-release of their 1994 hit.

That's true. But I'm not sure a novelty hit in 2013 is quite the cutting edge happening to build an event around in 2015.

More to the point, that a twenty year-old joke that wasn't funny anymore steamrollered its way to outsell all the other music around that week doesn't really send the 'British music is creative, vibrant and modern' message that the Brits is supposed to be sharing with the world.

I suppose we should be grateful that Mike Read already had a corporate gig booked for that night.

Emeli Sande returns to public life

You might have been worried about the recent non-appearance of Emeli Sande at public events. There was some concern she might have been extraordinarily rendered or something.

But she's emerged: Campaigning for West Cumberland Hospital:

The award-winning singer/songwriter publicly backed the cuts protest after visiting the county to see family, some of who live in west Cumbria. She used her Twitter account to express her support for the We Need West Cumberland Hospital campaign to her 1.2m followers.

Emeli Sande takes on Jeremy Hunt. At last, a Sande gig we can all get behind.

Little Mix take the big prize

I think that Today managed to do a piece on the Popjustice £20 Music Prize yesterday means that it's now moved beyond a thing that happens to a Vital Part Of Our Cultural Hinterland.

Although Little Mix won it this year with Move.

Which is nowhere near as good as last year's winner...

... but then what is?

Mercurys snap Twigs; Young Fathers victory doesn't really impress

Last night was the Mercury Music Prize. It's now found a home on More4, so let's hope the nominees remembered to offer some tips on redeveloping houses otherwise the regular audience would have been very confused.

This was the shortlist:

Anna Calvi – One Breath
Bombay Bicycle Club – So Long, See You Tomorrow
Damon Albarn – Everyday Robots
East India Youth – Total Strife Forever
FKA twigs – LP1
GoGo Penguin – v2.0
Jungle – Jungle
Kate Tempest – Everybody Down
Nick Mulvey – First Mind
Polar Bear – In Each and Every One
Royal Blood – Royal Blood

A golden year for the shortlist, because it's the first time both penguins and polar bears have been represented, honouring both arctic and antarctic creatures.

But it seemed fairly certain that FKA Twigs would waltz it. I would imagine she'd already ordered a new sofa from DFS expecting the cash prize to be hers.

Except that didn't happen.

Today I will mostly be asking 'WHO THE BLOODY HELL ARE THE YOUNG FATHERS WHEN THEY'RE AT HAME?'

— John Niven (@NivenJ1) October 30, 2014

Yes, Young Fathers won. And the world...?

Who? Ah, of course! *writes down 'Young… Fathers…'*

— Andy Dawson (@profanityswan) October 29, 2014

Who the fuck are the Young Fathers?

— Carl (@RFCCSN) October 30, 2014

Why haven't I heard of Young Fathers before?!

— Kimberley Blythe (@Kimbosss) October 30, 2014

The world wasn't so much surprised as confused.

And then decided that it must have been one of those Mercury years.

Young Fathers wint de Mercury Prize? Really? De nieuwe Speech Debelle http://t.co/UNmvYgKS80

— Atze de Vrieze (@atzedevrieze) October 30, 2014

The one where they give it to a Roni Size or someone to show that it's not just about popularity.

It must suck to be in Young Fathers - "hey, guys, you've made the best album of the year and so everyone's now decided you're Speech Debelle v2.0". They're actually better than that. But that's not going to stop people complaining:

Who has heard of Young Fathers? Best album at Mercury prize. How is that possible when no one has ever heard of them????

— mike taylor™ (@miket_343) October 30, 2014

'How can this possibly be the best album if I've never heard of it' perhaps misses the point of the Mercury, which is supposed to bring under-appreciated albums to wider attention.

Mostly, though, it's been about weak jokes based on the band's name:

#r4today Doesn't "young fathers" seem to encourage underage sex?

— DinoGreycat (@dinogreycat) October 30, 2014

Robbie Williams isn't getting any better

Well done, Robbie Williams. Through clunky mugging, you managed to make the birth of your second child all about you.

The music industry underestimated Taylor Swift

When people who work in the industry tell you how everything else has ruined their business, never forget the biggest problem is that they don't really know what they're doing.

Take how badly they misjudged Taylor Swift:

Just a couple weeks ago, industry sources were telling the music trade publication Billboard they expected Taylor Swift to sell about 750,000 copies of her new album, 1989, in its first week.

How good was that estimate?

Now, with 1989 out for just one day, Billboard says she’s likely to hit a million.

So, industry sources out by a quarter of a million copies.

To be fair to them, how could they be expected to know Taylor Swift was going to sell a million in a week? Nobody's done that since... erm, Taylor Swift did it with her last album. (Her album before that did a million, too.)

Music industry execs: they wouldn't even bother killing the goose that laid the golden egg, as they wouldn't even have realised it was laying golden eggs in the first place.

Placebo are going on a huge UK tour next year

That's really all there is to this story, apart from the observation that they're not small venues, but they're, shall we say "cosier" than the venues they played the last time they did a big UK tour:

25/02:Dublin Olympia
26/02:Belfast Waterfront Hall
28/02:Edinburgh Corn Exchange
1/03:Glasgow o2 Academy
3/03:Aberdeen Music Hall
4/03:Newcastle o2 Academy
6/03:Hull City Hall
7/03:Blackburn King George’s Hall
9/03:Leeds o2 Academy
10/03:Liverpool Guild Of Students
12/03:Manchester o2 Apollo
13/03:Sheffield o2 Academy
15/03:Norwich UEA
16/03:Leicester De Montfort Hall
18/03:Birmingham o2 Academy
19/03:Bristol Colston Hall
21/03:Bournemouth o2 Academy
22/03:Southend Cliffs Pavillion
24/03:London Hammersmith Apollo

Here's a lovely creative commons image of Brian Molko from 2007:

Image by Marinjo_zg under CC-BY licence.

UKIPtube: Farageland

As Mike Read's calypso fades into the past, here's a UKIP parody that's actually funny - Attila The Stockbroker's Clash-meets-UKIP Farageland:

The end of a long, historical mistake

Oh, we have waited for this moment:

Beady Eye are no longer. Thanks for all your support. LGx

— Liam Gallagher (@liamgallagher) October 25, 2014

Can it really be true? Can we get a second source?

Thanks to all the Beady Eye fans. I had a blast. See you on the other side. Big Love Andy B X

— Andy Bell (@Andybebop) October 25, 2014

Beady Eye formed when the leftovers of Oasis weren't thrown away quickly enough and started to become semi-sentient.

The hope is that Liam is now going to throw himself into his expensive trouser shops; the fear is that decks are being cleared to allow Oasis fans to be shaken down for a few quid on a reunion tour.

Taylor Swift hasn't done a murder but fears you'll be told she has

In an interview with Ellen, Taylor Swift has said her biggest fear is of being framed for a crime, like murder.

Of course, it's possible she's ALREADY DONE A MURDER and trying to plant the idea that she's been framed in the mind of a jury yet to be selected.

IT IS VITAL WE KNOW HOW OFTEN TAYLOR SWIFT HAS KILLED AND ACT BEFORE SHE KILLS AGAIN.

(Sidenote: Taylor Swift is excellent at being a pop star, isn't she?)

Bookmarks: Lana Del Ray

You'd think 'why do some people dislike Lana Del Ray' would be a question too small to bother the hive mind of Quora - 'not everyone likes everything' being the answer, right? - but there's been 30-odd people so far who've had a crack at answering. Including taking a leap that involves betting that most people who dislike her are passionate fans of Genesis P Orridge, which I suspect might be overestimating their musical knowledge:

She's been blasted for such things as changing her name and perhaps having some cosmetic surgery and losing weight. Because these things are not indie, goes this reasoning. Somehow I don't think Ms. Del Rey particularly cares if she is perceived as indie, nor do I. She's too busy making interesting sounds. Furthermore, some of the same people who probably think Genesis P. Orridge is so transgressive and cutting-edge for having his boobs, eyes, teeth, lips, and taint done to look as much as possible as his deceased wife as to be unrecognizable are probably the same ones who are cutting Lana down because they think she had her lips done. Girl, please.

This week just gone

The most read October stories:

1. UKIP bungle taking down Read's racist tune
2. Bono tries an 'aw shucks' apology
3. Tom Watson wants 6 on FM
4. Ben Watt spots a scorpion
5. Glastonbury ticket servers stay up long enough to allow sell out in record time
6. Man doesn't recognise Jay-Z. MTV loses its shit
7. Video: Johnny Marr on Sara Cox
8. Mike Read explains you can't make a racist record without a funny accent
9. Douglas Carswell compares Tories to HMV
10. One Direction own a slice of 5 Seconds Of Summer

You can tell Christmas is coming by the depth of the release schedule:


Half Man Half Biscuit - Urge For Offal

Download Urge For Offal



The Orchids - Beatitude #9

Download Beatitude #9



Tindersticks - Ypres

Download Ypres



Jane Weaver - The Silver Globe

Download The Silver Globe



And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of The Dead - IX

Download IX



Scott Walker & Sun-O}}}} - Soused

Download Soused



Thurston Moore - The Best Day

Download The Best Day



Inspiral Carpets - Inspiral Carpets

Download Inspiral Carpets

Photographerobit: Alfred Wertheimer

Photographer Alfred Wertheimer has died, says his niece.

Wertheimer had a small but notable part in rock history - he spent six days with a young Elvis Presley, taking over 2,500 photos of the singer on- and off-stage. What's even more remarkable is that the photos were largely overlooked until the 1990s - nearly two decades into the Dead Elvis Industry.

Wertheimer also worked on the Woodstock movie, but it's the closeness to Elvis that made his career (and, indeed, paid off handsomely as the photos toured in later years.)

Bookmarks: Rush

Perhaps you life would be better off not knowing there's a Tumblr dedicated to Rush making cumfaces. Perhaps we should say nothing about it.

Cookachoobit: Alvin Stardust

There's been a lot written about Alvin Stardust, who has died at the age of 72. Most of the obituaries called him a "glam rocker", which is only sort of true. Perhaps nobody wanted to be too blunt about how he was a rocker who uncomfortably glammed up for money.

Anyway, this week cannot be allowed to conclude without reminding ourselves of Stardust's greatest moment - stopping kids from becoming roadkill: