Glastonbury 2009: In other Glastonbury news...

This is Fake DIY's crack Glastonbury squad disappear from Tweetdom, although Jemima Kiss was saying it was hard to get a data connection there this year.

That'll be all the iPhones. Thank god the 3GS hadn't had much time to propogate.

NME is reporting that Jamie Cullum did a 'tribute' to Jackson as part of his set:

Midway through his performance, the crooner climbed up on top of his grand piano to lead his band through a jazzy version of 'Thriller'.

Clearly reacting to the news of Jackson's death quickly, Cullum relied on a printed out lyric sheet before breaking the song down with some human beatboxing towards the end.

In unrelated news, staff at an exclusive LA funeral home reported that one of their corpses has asked to be hurried to his grave as "he had one fuck of a lot of spinning in it to get done."

Cullum had turned up earlier in a guest capacity with Spinal Tap - along with Jarvis Cocker, presumably canceling each other out.

Bruce Springsteen filled time before headlining tonight by helping out fellow New Jerseyites The Gaslight Anthem on the John Peel stage. It's a nice gesture, but the entire world is hoping they don't feel the need to return the favour.

Swearing and spoofery

After all that unpleasantness with bad language during Live 8, the BBC production team must have been hoping that the message about keeping it clean had got through.

I think it was two minutes into the start of the BBC One segment that Russell Brand was yelling "Jesus Christ" after Jonathan Ross pretended he was drinking water he'd previously passed; if the production team had been hoping that crossing to the stage would prove safer, how they must have been delighted when Chris Rock came on and tried to get out of his first joke (about Paris Hilton playing Wembley next week) flopping like a jellyfish without a moral compass by throwing out a "motherfucker". Quickly, we found ourselves back in the BBC commentary box for apologies from Ross.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers - if you ignored the bizarre poncho Kiedis was wearing - turned in a fine set; it does seem that nowadays they exist almost solely to pop up in the middle of these monster gigs.

Coming back after spending some time up in the loft (don't ask) the somewhat pointless Spinal Tap set was winding up - if you didn't know it was a spoof, you'd be wondering why there was a not-especially good rock band so far up the bill; knowing it was a spoof it was even harder to work out what they were here for: is this a serious statement, or is this ironic detachment? - before going back for more apologies about bad language from Jonathan Ross.

It's impossible to tell if Ricky Gervais' tale of only doing the Diana Concert because "I'm a sucker for the personal touch, and William and Harry asked me" is the spoofy-starstruck persona he used for his first couple of Comic Relief films, or if it's more like the "big mates with Bono" stuff he was showing off in this year's Comic Relief contribution.

James Blunt is singing Wild World at the moment, with all the conviction of a man whose idea of wildness is sneaking into the ten items or less checkout with a dozen eggs.

Our rising sea level goes up to 11

While we can see the point of getting Spinal Tap to reunite for Live Earth... hang on a mo, actually: we can't. The joke was a good one, but isn't it wearing more than a little thin?

But we can understand how they might have wound up on the bill. What we don't get is how they're going to work a made-up band into the proceedings without either undermining the point of the whole event, or else taking refuge in jokes so weak it wouldn't be worth the carbon emissions to get there?

[Rob] Reiner spoke to The Associated Press on Tuesday to explain the reunion of Spinal Tap — a band always known more as a parody of rock `n roll excess than environmental awareness.

"They're not that environmentally conscious, but they've heard of global warming," said Reiner, whose other films include "When Harry Met Sally" and "Stand By Me." "Nigel thought it was just because he was wearing too much clothing — that if he just took his jacket off it would be cooler."

Oh. Weak jokes all the way to climateggedon, then.