Gordon in the morning: Olly Murs' guide to girls

Another staggering piece of high-quality journalism from Gordon Smart this morning:

[Olly Murs] admitted he only used to head to malls with pals to get girls’ numbers.

He said: “I used to go after them and try to chat them up.

“Once I walked home from one and we had seven or eight numbers up our arms.”

Plus five pairs of tight trousers...

Young man goes to public place to talk to women - you can see why Gordon would make room for such a story, can't you?

Not entirely sure about the five pairs of tight trousers - I'm presuming that's a reference to erections in a family newspaper, but why five? Has Gordon conjured this image up so clearly in his head he's been able to count the numbers of swelling groins? Or does he know that Olly has four friends? All rather curious.

Saxobit: Thomas Marth

Long-standing Las Vegas musician Thomas Marth has died.

Marth is probably best known for his work with The Killers - he played on Sam's Town and Day And Age, and was a part of the expanded touring line-up for the band. In Vegas, he played with a number of acts, including The Big Friendly Corporation - a family concern which also had his sister and brother.

Reports suggest Marth took his own life; he was 33.

A snippet from Jack White's interview on Today

- has Meg heard the album?
- I don't know... she doesn't often answer the phone. I don't know if she's heard it; I'd have to fly to Detroit to ask her.

George Galloway springs Pete Burns

Apparently George Galloway keeps in touch with his reality TV chums - he says he got Pete Burns released from a police cell. The Telegraph reports:

“I got him out of jail,” he says. “I had to go to a police station and pay a sum of money, of surety, to get him out of the cells.”

Pete Burns' spokesman (I suspect this might be Pete Burns pretending to be his own staff) confirms to the Telegraph that Galloway did help during an incident, but insists that no charges had been laid.

Which does raise the question: what sort of surety would Galloway be paying to spring someone who hasn't been charged with anything? My - admittedly limited - understanding of the law is that although you can be released on bail while an investigation continues, such a bail release wouldn't require a cash sum to be laid down.

Gordon in the morning: No flipping

A dispatch from Kasabian's US tour bus? With Gordon Smart's very own byline on it?

Surely this must be a deeply serious story. Brace yourselves, Britain:

WHAT is the most vital thing on Kasabian’s tour bus? The band’s instruments? Their supply of Pot Noodle snacks?

Neither. Frontman Tom Meighan explains: “The televison remote control is the most important thing. If that gets lost, everyone s**** it.

“I just watched Fargo this morning – bit of an intense film for that time of day.

“We’ve got satellite TV on the bus so we can watch footie on Fox Soccer.”

On Fox Soccer? I'm sure Meighan actually named the channel, as - since we know - Rupert Murdoch's newspapers do not push his other business interests. He said that on oath yesterday, and Rupert Murdoch would never tell a lie.

Obviously, Gordon wouldn't have snuck a little reference to one of News Corp's other businesses onto the page the very day after Murdoch had said that, because how would that help?

But: seriously - lost remote controls and 'what I watched on television'? I think Meighan would probably have judged that a little dull for his own Twitter stream, never mind a national sort-of-newspaper.

Gordon in the morning: Song for whoever

Presumably assuming we don't understand that most chart pop hits are now made like Per Una trousersuits, sitched together to a basic design and then offered up to someone in the hope they'll fit, Rita Ora turns up to insist that she was given the chance to do the new Cheryl Cole song first:

She decided the house track — which is written and produced by Calvin Harris — was too dance orientated. She said: “I heard Call My Name quite a while ago because I was offered it.

“I turned it down. I do like the song but I didn’t want to sing it ’cos it’s not really me.

“I don’t want to go down the dance route that a lot of other pop stars are doing.

“I prefer to have my own sound and do my own thing.”

That would be the "doing your own thing" which, er, involves auditioning songs written for whoever fancies doing them.

Sinead O'Connor axes tour

Sinead O'Connor has pulled most of her outstanding dates for the year:

With enormous regret I must announce that I have to cancel all touring for the year as am very unwell due to bipolar disorder. As you all know I had a very serious breakdown between December and March and I had been advised by my doctor not to go on tour but didn't want to 'fail' or let anyone down as the tour was already booked to coincide with album release. So very stupidly I ignored his advice to my great detriment, attempting to be stronger than I actually am. I apologize sincerely for any difficulties this may cause. While touring will be cancelled I do hope and plan to appear at the Curtis Mayfield tribute in The Lincoln Centre in July."

Gordon in the morning: A man who uses the word 'ogle'

Ogle, ogle, ogle. Oy, oy, oy. This morning, Gordon runs a photo of Gerard Butler at a basketball match:

GERARD Butler made no attempt to hide his admiration for the LA Lakers cheerleaders.

In the photo, Butler is smiling, and looking forward; in the foreground there's a cheerleader. For comparison, there's a similar photo of David Beckham not looking in the direction of a cheerleader.

The fact that both these are snaps and, for all we know, Butler might have been looking past the cheerleader to someone selling snowcones and smiling at those, while Beckham could have just had a quick glance upwards to try and cope with his excitement.

Butler doesn't even seem to be looking at a cheerleader. It's a single moment in time being spun.

But bachelor Gerard, who sat courtside at the Staples Center in LA on Sunday, won’t get in any trouble at home for having a good old ogle.

Ogle. Yes, really. Ogle.

Given the Sun is, basically, some writing wrapped around soft porn, isn't having a go at a man for - possibly - looking at a cheerleader a bit of a stretch anyway?

Wyclef Jean: What if you threw a gig for stoners and they were, like, whatever or whatever?

4/20 is, according to Wikipedia, a secular holiday in America - it's not, it's just a day when people who haven't quite got over being pleased with themselves at smoking dope gather to be pleased with themselves in public. It's pretending to be part of a counterculture from firmly within mainstream culture.

To mark the day, Colorado University in Boulder booked Wyclef Jean to do a gig. Although the stressed that he wasn't to mark the day:

From item twelve in the contract ("The Agency Shall" section):

"The Agency shall ensure that Attraction avoids making direct referrences to marijuana and other illegal drugs or make 4/20 related remarks as this is a University sponsored event."

It's like booking Perry Como to do a Christmas Eve set and making him sign a waiver barring him from mentioning Holidays, Jesus or gifts.

So, how did it go, then? Not well, as Jean played to a mostly empty room.

Westword was speculating there were 400 people in the 11,000-capacity venue; even if that number doubled as the evening went on, with Jean getting a flat-fee of $80,000 for the event, that'd make it a $100-a-head event.

Moral: probably don't bother holding a big event on a day when everyone is getting out their faces. They should probably have spent the fee they gave Jean on Curly-Wurlys and crisps.

One Direction: Capital Radio really are big babies

Back when the Brits happened, and One Direction got confused and thanked Radio One for a prize voted for by Capital FM listeners, Capital vowed that One Direction were dead to them.

At the time, I raised a curious eyebrow. Would a pop radio station really be so bitter as to not play songs by one of the biggest bands for their target audience?

Turns out, yes. Capital really are holding a grudge, regardless of how self-damaging it might be, and how petty it makes them seem:

Figures from Compare My Radio provided to Radio Today show that in the period between 1st January and 21st February this year, 95.8 Capital FM in London played ‘What Makes You Beautiful’ 50 times and follow-up single ‘One Thing’ twice. That works out on average at one play of the band every day. Between 22 February and 18 April the station hasn’t played a single One Direction track, according to the monitoring by Compare My Radio which takes information from ‘Now Playing’ feeds.

When the group’s album became the first ever debut release by a British act to go straight in at the top the US charts, news bulletins on Capital didn’t mention it – despite many of their rival stations highlighting one of the biggest UK music successes in America since The Beatles.

All because One Direction aren't the fizziest drinks in the cupboard. There are Jewish grandmothers suggesting that Capital might need to stop playing the victim so much.

Gordon in the morning: Any umbrellas to fix today?

Really, Gordon? Five years on the best joke you can come up with to promote Rihanna's show on Sky Living ("welcome Rihanna's move to Britain") is a joke about Umbrellas?

Well... not quite:

The singer — famous for her skimpy outfits — filmed two episodes earlier this year and is due back next month.

Rihanna has won 18 American Music Awards, two Brits, three MOBOs and five Grammys. She's sold over 25 million albums and 60 million singles. In what way is she "famous for her skimpy outfits"?

One Direction fans are passionate about One Direction, or nearest equivalent

Oh, how much do One Direction fans love One Direction?

With a fierce and burning passion that can only be sparked by the band.

Or, erm, anyone who looks a bit like they might be in the band:

New Zealand teenage girls turned out in their thousands over the weekend hoping for a glimpse of British-Irish boy band One Direction but it seems not all knew who they were screaming for.

A radio producer wearing a beanie, dark glasses and a scarf, was mobbed when he left an Auckland hotel after interviewing the stars with young girls believing he was a member of the five-piece band.

Guy Parsons, 23, is older and taller than members of One Direction but still fooled the hysterical young girls who chased him down the street.

This could be a risk when you construct a band out of unthreatening bloke-types; it becomes impossible to recognise them out of context.

Interestingly, even when they had their error pointed out, some fans didn't care:

"I said 'I've got you, I'm not one of them', but they still wanted photos," Parsons told the Sunday Star-Times, adding he enjoyed his brief moment of fame.

There's a lot of critical theory which would tell you that boybands just fill a hole which gives young girls something to direct their passion at; this would seem to support that.

One Direction fans: incredibly passionate; just not that fussy.

This week just gone

The most-read April 2012 stories so far:

1. The illustrated Friends
2. Joni Mitchell fights the bugs
3. Courtney Love apologises to Frances Bean for being rude about Dave Grohl
4. Man stabbed at Jessie J/Blackberry party
5. Krissi Murison jumps the NME ship
6. John Lydon draws attention to record he doesn't want you to buy
7. Gordon Smart reveals George Michael is haunted by a vampire ghost
8. Mail takes NME pro-Doherty piece, turns it into anti-Doherty piece
9. RIP: Dick Clark
10. Cowell's One Direction fans threaten the original One Direction

This week's interesting releases:


Loudon Wainwright III - Older Than My Old Man Now

Download Older Than My Old Man Now



Battles - Drop Gloss

Download Drop Gloss



Human Don't Be Angry - Human Don't Be Angry

Download Human Don't Be Angry



Spritiualized - Sweet Heart Sweet Light

Download MTV Unplugged



Sheena Easton - The Collection

Download The Collection



Crass - Ten Notes On A Summer's Day

Gennaro Castaldo Watch: Who's doing nicely out The Voice?

Is anyone doing well from The Voice? Obviously the procession of hats and brave faces competing have yet to pitch any wares (except, I guess, for the Five Star back catalogue), but the judges are doing very nicely.

Gennaro Castaldo, HMV's head of abacus-wielding, explains:

"So far Jessie has seen the biggest lift - with sales of her album nearly 100% up on the period before the show started," Gennaro Castaldo, head of press and PR at HMV told The Radio Times.

"It tends to be the performing guest artistes featured on reality TV audition shows that normally steal the headlines and see a lift in sales of their products, but for the first time it's actually the panel of judges on The Voice who appear to be benefiting."

Jessie J's album sales have been boosted by 89%, albeit in some sort of vague way:

[She] has experienced an 89% increase in sales of her first album Who You Are since the show began in March.

Presumably that's not she's sold 89% more than the total sales up until that point, but it's not entirely clear what period the comparison is with.

Fellow coach Danny O'Donoghue has also seen an increase. His band The Script have seen sales of their first two albums rise by 57% over the past four weeks

I'm presuming there's also been a 57% rise in people getting an album home and feeling really cheated in the same period.

Tripadvisor apparently not good enough for Bono

Bono popped over to Jerusalem and stayed in a swish hotel.

Rather than spending the time like a normal person, forcing towels into his suitcase and moaning about the sachets of UHT milk, he dashed off a little poem:

The poem Bono left behind at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem. What are the 3 words above the dog? "Reading Am ..."? twitter.com/bethandbono/st…

— bethandbono (@bethandbono) April 18, 2012

I think they'd have preferred a tenner slipped onto the bedside table, but still, it's quite a nice gesture.

Obviously it's not a very good poem, and it's horrible overwritten, relying on clunking imagery to fumble towards a big political theme. But that's how you can be sure it's a genuine Bono work and not a forgery.

[Thanks to Michael M]

German court might just make YouTube, internet unworkable

GEMA, the German rights organisation, has won a significant victory in a case against Google.

In short, the German courts have decided that YouTube is responsible for the content posted on its site, not the individual posting videos, and as such should be paying royalties for any music that winds up there.

BBC News explains what the ruling means:

If enforced, the ruling could also slow the rate at which video is posted to the site as any music clip would have to be cleared for copyright before being used.

With sixty hours of new video hitting the servers every sixty seconds, the "slow the rate" here would mean, in effect, stop video being pushed to YouTube.

It's a silly move for GEMA to seek this sort of judgement, as it won't stop the content being posted online - their pyrrhic victory over Rapidshare shows how all they do is scatter the content - and backs into a corner an organisation which is sort-of-trying to do the right thing.

The obvious move would be for YouTube to just bow out of Germany. And who, exactly, would be better off as a result of that?

I'll bet Pinterest were watching this judgement with, erm, interest.

Woodwindobit: Greg Ham

It's been quite a week for loss, so I'm a couple of days late with mentioning the death of Greg Ham, multi-instrumentalist with Men At Work.

The cause of Ham's death is still being investigated.

The Telegraph notes that Ham was deeply affected by the court decision that his riff in Down Under was lifted from an Australian kid's song, and even runs his quote that he hated thinking that this would be what he would be remembered for. Right at the end of the story about his death. Which might be a little insensitive.

So, instead, let's take a look a little further along Men At Work's debut album. This track features Ham on lead vocals, and he got a writing credit for it. A more fitting tribute:



[Thanks to Mike E]

Twittergem: Record Store Day

I used to distrust anyone over a certain age who didn't own a record player; now I distrust anyone under a certain age who does #hipsterscum

— Simon Price (@simon_price01) April 21, 2012

Gordon in the morning: Aguilera fitter

Beci Wood takes to the Bizarre column to suggest there's something not-quite-right about a magazine cover:

CHRISTINA Aguilera turns back the clock with a VERY Dirrty magazine photoshoot.
[...]
Christina's body also appears to have been remodelled — indicating the photoshop wizards have been hard at work.
[...]
It's just a shame magazines feel the need to get the airbrush out.

Hang about... this is someone in The Sun complaining about reality being manipulated to make something fit the needs of a publication? Really?

Still, two cheers for The Sun taking a stand against setting up ridiculous expectations of body image. Clearly, Beci isn't the sort of person who is part of the journalistic trend of tutting over women's bodies reacting to food and the passage of time...

The 31-year-old star's yo-yo'ing body shape has been the subject of many discussions.

In the snaps a chain metal belt is wrapped around the star's 'waist' while her arms look much thinner than recent images we've seen as she poses hand on hips.

Oh. So this faux outrage about photoshop is just an excuse to point out that sometimes women's body shapes change when they have babies. At least the Mail doesn't pretend to be concerned.

I'm indebted to Michael M, by the way, for pointing out a story from Gordon Smart - with his actual byline - from last Sunday's News Of The World ("Sun on Sunday"): Woman eats breakfast in restaurant.

Guitarherobit: Bert Weedon

There's a lot of love online right now for Bert Weedon, who died yesterday.

Although a formidable musician with a body of recorded work which would put Aesop's ant to shame, Weedon's greatest gift to music must surely be the Play In A Day books.

The name was an inspired and forgivable piece of marketing bluster - you weren't going to be able to play in a date; not like Bert, and not to any recognisable standard. But the books would give you enough basic skills to encourage you to keep going and - as the makers of motivational posters and authors of works about moving cheese will tell you - selling a promise of a quick fix is a great way to get people started.

How many people who play now were given a boost into taking the first step by the promise on a book cover? And how many people did they go on to inspire?

Teachers are important - that's something as a society we're scandalously bad at recognising. And Bert Weedon was a great teacher.

Some nice Weedon-related things amongst the many published in the last 24 hours:
Music Radar republishes a 2002 Guitarist interview with Bert
DigitalJournal places Weedon in the ranks of people who aren't household names, but should be
The Daily Telegraph obituary gives a solid account of 91 years well-lived

Singerdrummerobit: Levon Helm

Levon Helm, who drummed and sang with The Band, has died:

"He passed away peacefully at 1:30 this afternoon surrounded by his friends and bandmates," Helm's longtime guitarist Larry Campbell tells Rolling Stone. "All his friends were there, and it seemed like Levon was waiting for them. Ten minutes after they left we sat there and he just faded away. He did it with dignity. It was even two days ago they thought it would happen within hours, but he held on. It seems like he was Levon up to the end, doing it the way he wanted to do it. He loved us, we loved him."

Rolling Stone claims that Helm was "literally a witness to the birth of rock & roll", by which they mean that as a teenager he saw Elvis and Little Richard playing gigs. Certainly he was inspired; by 1960 he was part of a backing band for Ronnie Hawkins which contained the team who become the Crackers, then Levon And The Hawks, and then Bob Dylan's backing band.

Levon took a break from the group during 1965, when their role helping Bob Dylan's eletrification of the folk circuit brought so much hatred he needed a rest. By the time he rejoined, the band was The Band and were already stepping out from Dylan.

After Robbie Robertson split the group - against Helm's wishes - in 1976, the pair would enter into a longterm grudge-feud that was so bad Levon refused to attend The Band's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction. Which makes Levon a good few years ahead of Axl Rose.

Levon Helm was 71. He had throat cancer.

RIP: Bert Weedon

The Press Assocation is reporting the death of Bert Weedon.

Gordon in the morning: The ghost of you stays

Clearly the cupboard is empty at The Sun today. As it continues to grind out extracts from the book about Cowell that nobody cares about ("that everyone's talking about"), the rest of the paper seems to be scrabbling about to try and find anything to fill the yawning holes. Like this:

Ghostly vampire shock for George Michael

Not just a vampire shock, but a ghostly one. For George Michael.

Has David Austin turned up again?

Not quite...

POP legend George Michael’s street is haunted by a VAMPIRE, it was claimed yesterday.

Hang about... if a vampire becomes a ghost, it's not really a vampire any more, is it? It loses the ability to suck blood, so it's just a ghost, surely? That's if a vampire can become a ghost, as not having a soul what would 'create' the ghost?

And where exactly is the 'shock' for George Michael?

Ghostbuster Mickey Gocool, said “exceptionally high levels” of paranormal activity surrounded the ex-Wham! star’s £3million mansion.

So there's just a bloke claiming there's spooky stuff on the street. I don't think that's going to "shock" George Michael, is it? It's not the sort of shock you get when you come to and discover your car is parked alongside the mousemat and mug shelves of Snappy Snaps, is it?

But, come on, let's treat Mickey Gocool like he's an expert - you say there's a ghost vampire on the street, do you?

The house is near Highgate Cemetery, North London, where the vampire was first spotted.

So the 'vampire shock' for George Michael is that there's a claim that a cemetery a short distance away might have a ghost vampire in it.

I can't believe Gordon Smart is breaking such shattering news to him this way. Imagine the trauma that Michael will be going through this morning.

But there's more:

Another alleged ghost is a 17th century woman who murdered 50 kids.

You'll spot the canny use of the word "alleged" there - as we know, Gordon Smart promised Leveson that he diligently fact-checks every word that appears on his pages. The cagey "alleged" suggests that Smart couldn't quite get proof that this ghost actually exists.

Perhaps in the old days he might have made up a quote from a pal of the ghost - "A source said 'she will wake George Michael up before he goes woooooooooooooooooooh'" - but those days are past.

Almost like a proper journalist, Gordon carefully makes clear that there's no proof at all that the made-up bollocks actually exists.

Coming tomorrow: Tulisa plans trip to Austria. Quite near where Dracula comes from.

Gordon in the morning: A morning outing

The Sun has been dribbling out extracts from the Simon Cowell book all week - the suspicion that Sun staff might struggle with the reading borne out by the fact that it appears to take two people to copy chunks out and pretend it is interesting. They've bought a second book, too, a muck-rakey story about Jessie J. As a result, today's front page is especially unedifying:

Jessie gay
Simon NOT gay
Voice star 'is a secret lesbian'
Cowell: I'm totally straight

POP beauty Jessie J is 100 per cent lesbian, an explosive book claims.

Yes, the front page of a national newspaper is given over to a claim about a young woman's sexuality based on a book that isn't even about her.

The Voice judge, 24, was ordered to hide the truth from fans by claiming to be merely bisexual, the unauthorised biography says.

What? "Merely bisexual"? What the hell is that supposed to mean? Besides "demeaning to bisexuals". Does the paper believe that bisexuality is somehow the easy option? That isn't true.

Oh, but it's trendy, isn't it?

The Voice judge, 24, was ordered to hide the truth by record bosses to avoid turning off male fans, the unauthorised biography says.

They advised the star to say she was a bisexual who liked boys AND girls, because that was trendy.

That'd be right, as no man has ever had a sexual fantasy featuring a lesbian, ever. That's a fact.

Does The Sun really think that outing people - or, rather, choosing to disparage their own choice of self-sexual identification - is what a newspaper should be doing in 2012?

The author of the book, Chloe Gavin, claims:

“Being gay would alienate people. They knew how important image was and asked her to tone it down a bit.

“There are so many homophobes out and there were fears of a career-damaging backlash.”

It's true - being bisexual really takes the huff out of the homophobes. Who can forget Westboro Baptist Chruch, picketing funerals with signs saying 'God hates fags - if only you'd had sex with a woman from time to time, that would have been alright'.

There's a stern warning at the foot of the page:

© The Sun. Our lawyers are watching.

Presumably not lawyers who understand the bit about the right to a private life. Although, given how their company hacked and trailed solicitors, that's a typo and should read 'we're watching your lawyers'.

Presenterobit: Dick Clark

Dick Clark with his 1990 Grammy
image: Alan Light CC-BY

Dick Clark has died.

Clark is a strange figure - a massive, massive star in the US who barely registers in the UK, which feels like a category of celebrity which couldn't happen these days. Mind you, his lack of interest in Britain might have been based on a fundamental misunderstanding:

That started in radio and I learned it from Godfrey. Just be yourself. I’m of English heritage, the English are not known for a great sense of humor. Second only to the Germans, maybe. They don’t come by it natural. So all I could do was be myself. I did pretty well doing that.

As the host of American Bandstand, American radio's chart countdown show and, for decades, Dick Clark's Rockin' New Years Eve, Clark combined the roles of Jimmy Savile and Jools Holland.

Oh, and he was a restauranteur too - with American Bandstand themed diners, mainly at airports. And a businessman (he told Larry King that he owned all the Krispy Kreme franchises in the UK, and, as we know, he didn't really do jokes). And a producer - bringing the American Music Awards and Donny and Marie to television, amongst others.

It's arguable that he did nothing of any great consequence - doughnuts and Osmonds and burgers and "Mariah Carey at number one for a third week" and ringing in the new year - but he was the lubricant on which American pop culture ran for decades.

Dick Clark had been unwell for some time; he died from a heart attack during an outpatient procedure. He was 82.

[update: minor edit, changing 'could' to 'couldn't' - see the comments area for explanation]

Bob Geldof wants you to put your money into bricks and mortar

Like his chum Bono, Bob Geldof isn't just interested in equality and aid; He's also fascinated with making a quick buck out of property.

He's turned up to push a thing called Progressive Property - shill is such an ugly word, isn't it, so let's use that. He shills in the least attractive way possible, by claiming that land-grabbing is exactly what Gandi would do. PlanetyPropetyBlog raises an eyebrow:

They’re a bit like ... Gandhi (I swear, I’m not making this up!)... who, as we all know, was famous for preaching the redeeming qualities of buying Below Market Value.

Then he goes on to laud Germany for its relatively stable housing market – it’s not a casino economy based on property says Bob, because lots of people rent and rents are capped by the Government (“not something you want to hear”, he admits).

Ooops. Quickly changing tack, he then gets back to the flattering stuff (you’re all great entrepreneurs who will save the country!) and slags off the banks for not lending money to property investors and for giving themselves big bonuses.

Hmm. You can watch the full video here; it's rather long and a bit rambling, but in short: free Daily Expresses and Bic-style razors all round...

Gordon in the morning: Off-colour

How can you tell when you're just running a pap snap for the sake of it, and not because there's even a slither of a story attached?

Yes, having to change the colour of your headline in a bid to add some sort of interest. That'd be a clue.

Lydon draws attention to single he doesn't want you to buy

John Lydon is livid - livid - with the re-release of God Save The Queen. Livid, I tells you:

In a statement, Lydon said of the re-release: "It is certainly not my personal plan or aim. I am proud of what The Sex Pistols achieved and always will be but this campaign totally undermines what The Sex Pistols stood for.

"This is not my campaign. I am pleased that the Sex Pistols recordings are being put out there for a new generation, however, I wish for no part in the circus that is being built up around it."

'Yes,' continued Lydon, 'those singles that are available in all good stores, via Amazon.co.uk and to download from iTunes certainly don't have my blessing. I'm certainly doing my best to stop people from noticing what otherwise would have been an insignificant and frankly embarrassing re-release by trumpeting quite loudly how I don't approve of people buying them'. He then got a box of records from the boot of his car, yelling 'roll up, roll up' as he sold them, tutting in the face of everybody as he pocketed their cash.

Embed and breakfast man: First Aid Kit

Fresh from an appearance on Conan O'Brien:

Gordon in the morning: I'm sorry, we don't take faces

I'm not sure Gordon's story about Tulisa in a shop makes any sense.

Tulisa is, supposedly, buying some wine. But - because she looks so young - she is challenged for proof of age.

She said: “I didn’t have my ID so he wouldn’t give it to me.

"There were all these mags with me on the front cover so I pulled out one, slapped it on the desk and said ‘Look, there’s my ID.

"Can I have the wine?’ He gave it to me.”

There's a problem here, though. You're not asked for ID to prove who you are, it's to prove how old you are. And even if Tulisa happened to find a magazine which happened to quote her age, I'm pretty certain a gossip column in Closer doesn't have the same legal status as an official proof of age issued by the Home Office. Or The Economist.

Still, there is something refreshing in this story, as it's not often you'll hear a person off the television telling a story which revolves around people not knowing who they are. Tulisa, and - in yesterday's Countdown - Margaret Mountford, and that's about it.