Alex James: The big cheese is rotting

The Guardian's Lost In Showbiz returns to the flop of Alex James' cheese festival, which has gone bankrupt. And guess who's left out of pocket?

Erm, the local school. Marina Hyde explains:

But perhaps our greatest sympathy should be reserved for the local school, Kingham primary. The school organises its own annual music festival, and was asked to use its contacts to book performers for the Friday night at Harvest. It duly provided seven bands. (How quaint that the acts at Alex James's festival were being provided by the local primary. Does he not have a contacts book of his own?)

The school now feels unable to comment, but a couple of weeks ago, headteacher Ed Read told the Cotswold Journal that it was owed £7,000 for the entertainment it organised.

It's hard to believe that the idea of mixing music and cheese could produce a terrible festival. Perhaps it was the type of people the event attracted kept away larger numbers of punters?

Helpfully, Marina has a photo of the types who did show up:

Yes, that's a photo of Clarkson and David Cameron, enjoying themselves at the expense of a state school. An ordinary day for Dave, in other words.

Just when you think Alex James can't sink any lower:

He has also made several appearances to promote his Alex James Presents line of cheese at Asda. "It's generated something like £2m worth of publicity," he trilled recently. "It even made the New York Times! But I suppose that's what I set out to do."

Ah, hooking up with the not-entirely-cuddly WalMart organisation. Because we know what a great friend of the organic, local food movement WalMart are.

Take That saved for a grateful nation

The collapse of Woolworths had thrown a ghastly shadow over Britain - as the biggest distributor of impulse-buy records to UK supermarkets, it could mean that the grudging racks of CDs provided by Asda and the like could run dry.

Into this crisis, the record companies have marched, kind of like the magnificent seven, organising alternative deliveries of Take That's new release and Britney's album:

A spokesman for Asda said new deliveries had been organised, adding that customers "won't notice a thing".

"We are pushing ahead with a planned national poster campaign for a new range of DVD box sets, and can reassure fans of Take That that we will have their new album in store from Monday," he said.

So, your evil plan fails again, Robbie Williams - you won't stop people getting their hands on the new Take That record.

Gordon in the morning: Swearing in

It's possible it's built on intelligence as solid as that which led him to claim Joss Stone was recording Obama's campaign song, but Gordon reckons that Leona Lewis is going to sing at the inauguration:

LEONA LEWIS did well out of a public vote – triumphing in The X Factor in 2006.

Another fella who’s not come out of a recent popularity contest too badly is America’s President-elect BARACK OBAMA.

And it looks like the pair’s paths will cross in spectacular fashion.

See how thoughtful Gordon is, explaining who Barack Obama is in case any of his readers might have missed the election?

Gordon trills about how popular Leona is - although, yesterday, Lefsetz suggested she is "not a star in America". But even an inauguration needs an undercard.

The recharting of the album at number one catches Gordon's eye:

The repackaged version of the chart-topper’s hit album Spirit raced to the top of the album charts here again yesterday.

The double-disc now features the star’s much-loved cover of SNOW PATROL’s hit Run.

Oddly, this somewhat neutral report seems to have lost some of the anger over the padding out of the record in this way that Smart had last week:

Angry fans were yesterday claiming bosses made a U-turn on the download plan to force people to spend more cash on the physical album re-release.

My insider revealed: "If that’s the case, the Leona camp will be furious. Given the choice of a single or double No1, I know what they would have preferred."

Are the fans no longer angry? Was what was a nasty con last week somehow now alright as its finagled a number one?

Suzanne Shaw out of Hear'Say is rebuilding her career, advertising the scratchy take on sexy pants that awkward men will buy for their girlfriends from Asda on Christmas Eve. Gordon has got hold of some of the photos and, oddly, turns in to Lance Percival:

I SAY! Former HEAR'SAY star SUZANNE SHAW looks on song as she launches a Christmas lingerie range – by unwrapping HERSELF.

Meanwhile, Lily Allen has been on a waterslide. Can Gordon and his team come up with a witty headline?

It's a thrilly for Lily

No.

Staff announcement: Raging against the machine required aisle 6

I've always cherished the memory of seeing a Rage Against The Machine fan helping his Mum do the weekly shop in Asda, wearing his "I won't do what you tell me" tshirt while his mam sent him up and down collecting Dairylea Dunkers and Bisto granules.

So it's with some delight to discover that Asda and Rage Against The Machine have come together again, as a member of the electronics department in the Fulwood store decided to stick on Killing In The Name during shopping hours.

Customers were not amused at hearing "fuck" quite so often as they shopped.

Which, of course, would be quite enough of a story for most people - Asda looked awkward and said 'sorry', plans to get Peaches to perform in the coffee shop hastily dropped. Everyone happy?

Well, not really. This is a storm in a teacup, and so it needs some stirring. I mean, won't someone think of the children?

a song peppered with foul language was blasted out yards from a children's aisle.

Just yards from the bit of the store where the crayons are sold? Will the f-bomb now be ingrained in those crayons, perhaps leaking out every time a curly-haired nipper draws a picture of Jesus?

That's good, but what sort of fuss is it if there isn't a completely spurious parallel drawn by a councilor desperate to get their name in the local paper? Could the Lancashire Evening Post find one of those for us?

Preston City councillor Jennifer Greenhalgh, for Garrison ward, said: "I am absolutely appalled. They have got to take responsibility, and that is not being responsible in any shape or form."

Coun Greenhalgh said the supermarket's gaffe is comparable to the recent scandal involving Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross, who broadcast a lewd answerphone message on BBC Radio 2.

She said: "It is insupportable and, like the BBC, somebody has to be held to account. Children now are open to all sorts, but to get it from Asda is ridiculous.

Yes, it's exactly the same as Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand, as someone who wasn't there is calling for heads to roll on the basis of a sense of wounding they can't quite justify. Children shouldn't have to have all sorts thrust at them in an Asda. Except in the sweets aisles, of course.

But look: the outrage is starting to wane - can't we add some confused self-appointed guardian of the nation's morals to try and keep this going?

John Beyer, director of Mediawatch UK, said: "Asda should issue a policy statement to say this kind of music should not be played. I have never heard of this before."

Yes, come on Asda: do as the bloke from Mary Whitehouse's old gang says - remove that policy which encourages staff to play songs featuring profanities. He has never heard of "this" (what? the song? people choosing their own music at work with unfortunate results? supermarkets? the 21st century?) before.

Naturally, Lancashire Evening Post readers - god-fearing clean-living types to a man - probably won't have heard of the Raging Machine band. Can you bring your readers up to speed?

In September, Rage Against The Machine, sparked protests after they were not allowed to perform at a political rally in Minnesota.

The left-wing rockers had planned to play at a convention called the Ripple Effect all-dayer, which was held to coincide with the Republican Party Convention. When prevented from playing the band marched through the streets with a megaphone, as fans chanted their songs.

Very, very possibly, those people chanted the song with the rude word in. Sadly, the Associated Press coverage of these incidents don't record how close the chanting crowds came to the children's aisle - nor, indeed, if they might have been secretly funded by Wal-Mart.

I'm not sure the Lancashire Evening Post believes that Zac and his mates will react to being thrown off the shuffle on the electronics store CD player by marching on Fulwood, yelling rudeness through a megaphone like some sort of fuming Ty Pennington, but they do seem to imply that might be a risk here.

Luckily, though, the paper indulges in a spot of investigative journalism: has Asda learned its lesson, or have they added Touch Me I'm Sick to the playlist?

When the Evening Post visited the supermarket, Asda FM – which broadcasts to all its UK stores – played a variety of family-friendly songs on the PA, including Love Me Do by The Beatles and We've Got Tonight by Bob Seger.

Isn't that Seger song about having a one night stand? Would MediaWatch approve of children having their ears stuffed with a song like that? I can't believe that at the crucial moment, the Post suddenly goes soft on premarital sex.

[Thanks to Simon T for the story]

Asda kills the single

Faced with prospect of sales dropping away to nothing, Asda has dropped the CD single from its stores.

It says it can barely bring itself to do so:

"We're reluctantly saying goodbye to one of the most important products in music history," the retailer's music buyer Andy Powell said.

The CD single? Surely not? The 7" vinyl single, unquestionably, had an important part in the history of music, but the CD single... that was just a delivery method, surely?

Woolworths, meanwhile, says its remaining committed to the single:

"They are still an important part of the music business," said the chain's music boss Jim Batchelor. "If you give people what they want, they will buy it."

We don't know what marketing course he went on, but that was worth the money, wasn't it? Mind you, what Woolworths knows about giving people what they want is debatable - their teeny-tiny range and focus on selling just a few titles has helped strangle the singles market and - with about a third of all singles sold in the UK going through a Woolies till - has to take some of the blame for the dull charts we've grown used to. If the people who buy the most singles have the smallest choice, how can you ever hope to have exciting charts?