So the identity of Jack the Ripper has been finally exposed as...Walter Sickert? Shurely shome mishtake?

God, but it feels good to be fully recovered and back out in the world. After just two days of sitting around at home, I was already starting to feel institutionalised. Now I feel ready for whatever the day has to throw at me. Come on world – do your worst!

It looks set to be a good weekend. Straight to the cottage after work, where we‘ll be receiving a visit from Beyoncé, Kelly & Michelle. A table has been booked at The Gate in Brassington – our favourite country pub. We’ll be joined there for a meal by our fellow Nottingham/Peak District weekenders OldEngland and NewEngland, plus OldEngland’s lifelong friend Bumble (NB: that’s the only name we know him by – it’s not some clever blog nickname). We haven’t met Bumble before, but OldEngland has been keen to introduce us for some time. He’s supposed to be quite a “character”. As most of OldEngland’s friends have turned out to be “characters”, I’m rather looking forward to this. It certainly promises to be an eclectic mix of people round the table – not too eclectic, I hope – but the one quality I think they all share is a robust good humour, so everyone should get on famously.

Tomorrow is supposed to be either a hike, a walk, or a stroll, depending on hangover levels. Or we might just go shopping. Actually, I bet we just go shopping. Then back to town for the Yes concert (I am practically counting down the hours at this stage). Sunday is Christmas shopping.

And yes, I think that is officially the first mention of Christmas on this blog. It’s K’s most hated time of the year, so I have to tread carefully. Luckily, January also happens to be his favourite time of the year, so it helps to remind him that it’s only just over three weeks away. Strange though: the Christmas / New Year holiday period always seems like such a full stop to the year, that we never think about the fact that January is so close at hand.

So why does K like January so much? Well, it’s the other side of the coin. What he hates about Christmas is the enforced jollity – the way everyone is expected to be Having Fun. What he likes about January is the way everyone is skint and miserable and staying indoors. This means that it’s his absolute favourite time for going out and having fun. You know how city centre pubs are always better on Wednesdays and Thursdays? Well, January is like a whole month of Wednesdays and Thursdays. It does make sense, doesn’t it.

On the Popbitch question archive, members of the message board were asked to name their favourite record ever, and the worst record ever. As an incorrigible list fanatic, the results made fascinating reading. So much so that I ended up compiling the results onto 4 CDs. Three CDs for the favourites, and one CD for the horrors (with some judicious editing and mixing, so that 26 tracks could be crammed into 79 minutes). I have to say that the finished results sound great. Yes, even the horrors, in some strange twisted way.

I’d quite like to send Popbitch copies as a Xmas present, but Popbitch hasn’t given me a postal address (quite understandably I suppose), so I can’t.

Anyway, last time I played the “worst ever” CD, all sorts of thoughts started popping into my head – some of them quite interesting thoughts, if I may be so very bold. So why not share them with my loyal readers?

This is a long one. Get yourselves comfy, now….

1. Yoko Ono – O’ Sanity

Oh, but hang on, this is really cute! One minute and two seconds of Mrs. Lennon wibbling away about her fragile state of mind (“I don’t know what to do / with my sanity / when the world’s at the verge / of calamity”). It doesn’t commit the sin of outstaying its welcome, and at no point does Yoko start wailing, screeching or dry puking – in fact, it’s really quite a restrained little number by her standards. Although I’ve never actually heard “Two Virgins” or “The Wedding Album” myself, I’m still prepared to wager there are far, far worse Yoko tracks than this out there.

2. Missy Elliot – Get Ur Freak On

How curious that so many of the tunes included in this list are actually some of my all time favourites. This gloriously inventive masterpiece being a case in point. OK, so why would someone consider this to be the worst record ever made? Well, there’s no tune (of course), the overall vibe stays pretty much on one level throughout, the instrumentation is sparse in the extreme, and there’s this rinky-dink little six note figure that runs almost all the way through – which could sound like Chinese water torture to some. And yet, and yet – it just works.

My favourite bit is the last 30 seconds or so, when the rap has finished – a male voice counts to four in Japanese, then we’re into a lovely, atmospheric, instrumental wind-down – like a slow unravelling of the backing track.

Doing this kind of repetitive, minimal stuff can either be a sign of laziness of bravery. In this case, it’s firmly the latter.

3. Ace Of Base – All That She Wants

Swedish reggae. It could have been a thrilling cultural juxtaposition of two polar opposites, couldn’t it? That glacial Nordic melancholia fused with that laid-back Caribbean spiritualism, the essence of both sensibilities being distilled into an exciting new musical brew.

Unfortunately, it’s shit. An anaemic clod-hopping dirge with a nasty, strained vocal drained of all emotion. And whistling. And didgeridoos. Suddenly, you feel like forgiving UB40 for everything.

And the lyrics? Oh, don’t get me started on those lyrics…

4. The Cranberries – Linger

A shit group, but this was their best record, so a strange choice to make. That first album did have a certain winsome appeal at the time, but this was effectively obliterated by the heinous crimes against music which they went on to perpetrate. As Dolores started taking herself seriously as a cultural commentator (“with their tanks / and their bombs / and their bombs / and their guns”), so her reasonably pleasant, soft, lilting vocal style lapsed into a ghastly, harsh, hiccupping self-parody (see “Ode To My Family”). But I can still listen to “Linger” without wincing.

5. Mike & The Mechanics – The Living Years

The one redeeming feature of this abominable ditty is that it is sung wonderfully well – far, far better than it deserves to be – by Paul Carrack. This guy previously gave the world two quite fantastic singles: “How Long” by Ace, and “Tempted” by Squeeze, so he can’t be all bad. But there my compliments must end.

There’s a graceless, clodhopping, portentous, lighters-in-the-air sincerity to this record which is only surpassed by the Scorpions’ equally grim “Wind Of Change”. The lyrics are pure Iron John / men’s movement / self-help twaddle, which conjure up visions of bearded middle aged men in funny hats and flannel shirts, standing in a circle in the middle of a forest on some weekend workshop course, banging drums, weeping, and screaming “My father was never there for me!”

And as a final touch – the emotional equivalent of a Chinese burn, just to finish you off good and proper – there’s a sodding children’s choir in there as well, bleating away about “listening” as well as “hearing”. Strewth!

As Genesis solo projects go, this is right up there with “Another Day In Paradise”. They were so much better when they were singing about hogweed and lawnmowers.

6. Berlin – Take My Breath Away

My personal choice, this one. Though I guess on reflection, “Another Day In Paradise” does knock spots off it. Still, I have my reasons. This will always remind me of when we spent a few days in a hotel on the edge of Lake Malawi, back in the summer of 1990. A glorious, idyllic setting, everything you could wish for really – but the hotel only had one C60 cassette, which they played continually, day in, day out, through speakers which penetrated every public area. And this track was on it. Every time those opening notes of doom struck up, my heart sank. Make it stop!

7. Los Del Rio – Macarena

I like this ‘cos I can sort of do the dance - which makes me a big hit at parties, obviously. Generally speaking, I don’t have a problem with this kind of relentless vulgar jollity. Especially if it has dance steps. Whigfield, come on down!

Oh, and extra cred points for the Yazoo sample.

8. Four Seasons – December 1963 (Oh What A Night)

What the blazes is this classic slice of pop-disco perfection doing here? The lyrics are a bit pants, but every other element of this record is just sublime.

This was a big hit on the record player in the school common room, when I was just 14 and madly in love with a boy in the year below (a secret, undeclared passion which ruled my life for far too long). As I recall, we both bought this single in the same week, so there were always two copies knocking around. Every single time I hear this - without fail - it lifts my soul and gives me a bittersweet reminder of just what it felt like to be so intensely, idealistically, hopelessly, idiotically “in love”. Nothing like the real thing of course, but I’m kinda glad I felt that way for a while.

So – “worst record ever”? Pah! Be off with you!

9. Spice Girls – Wannabe

Hmph. More of that relentless vulgar jollity, then. Weren’t there loads of broadsheet hacks queuing up to hail this as a work of pop genius at the time? Dearie me, it really hasn’t aged well at all.

But – there’s something poignant about hearing those young voices again, now that we know how the Spices all ended up. You can sense that raw eagerness, that devil-may-care optimism, that “get out there and grab it” lust for life which seemed so fresh and appealing for a few weeks back then. The ambition had yet to harden – to acquire that ugly edge of “love me! love me!” desperation. The characters had yet to become cartoon self-parodies. We weren’t to know that “Wannabe” was single-handedly ushering in a whole new age of production-line plastic pop. We were still firmly in the era of classic Britpop – we could make room in our hearts for one daft little pop song, couldn’t we?

Oops. Big mistake. Well, you can see why people loathe this record now, can’t you? Maybe not so much for what it was, as for what it did.

10. Luther Vandross – Never Too Much

Huh? Once again, I’m speechless. This record is PERFECT. It gets me RIGHT HERE. I never, ever tire of hearing it. I can only presume that whoever voted for it has a problem with the whole genre of white-socks-and-loafers, flick-wedge, Caister-weekender, fluffy-dice smooth eighties soul – of which this is a text-book example. However, smooth eighties soul is one of my absolute favourite genres, so they can FUCK RIGHT OFF, D’YOU HEAR?

Sorry. Sometimes, dispassionate critical language fails me.

11. J Geils Band – Centrefold

Confession. In my pre-politicised dark ages, I bought this single – ‘cos it had, y’know, a catchy tune, like. Which it does still. Anyway, come on, is it really so lyrically indefensible? Are we really all still supposed to be subscribing to that “all porn is rape” orthodoxy? Can’t we all just lighten up a bit? Huh? Huh?

Hmm. Running with this argument a bit further…so his angel was the centrefold …so what? Good luck to her. Why should she let this creepy rock star dude dictate what she does with her body? This is a guy who almost certainly has hordes of groupies attending his every whim, but here he is getting all moralistic. “My memory has just been sold” – well, boo-hoo, mister! A skanky looking old rocker like you is going out with this patently gorgeous woman, whose only crime is to publicly disrobe, and we’re supposed to feel sorry for you or something?

Hmm - controlling, hypocritical, and self-pitying. OK. Shit record it is, then.

12. Stevie Wonder – I Just Called To Say I Love You

Having to slow dance with that mad old bat from the other end of the village at wedding discos.

Bad cover versions at pre-glasnost Eastern European dinner dances, played by bored, frustrated, secretly talented rock musicians who have to pay the bills somehow.

The worst bassline ever constructed. Or was it just a preset that came with the machine?

The final confirmation of the total artistic decline of a once stratospheric talent.

Yup, shit record. Next!

13. Whitney Houston – I Will Always Love You

As originally performed by its composer Dolly Parton towards the end of “Best Little Whorehouse In Texas”, this killer song delivered a knockout emotional punch. Her delicate, understated, wounded vocal beautifully captured the heartbreaking fragility within the lyric.

Then they gave it to Whitney. Whose vocal pyrotechnics cannot disguise the fact that she has absolutely no affinity with the song she is supposed to be performing. In Houston’s deathless rendition, Parton’s classic ossifies into the worst kind of breast-beating, tub-thumping, self-pitying emotional masochism. Celine Dion herself could not have done a worse job.

I bet you that half the people who kept this record at Number One were buying it on the strength of the title line alone, i.e. as a “dead romantic” gesture. Cos, you know, I will always love you, babes. Tsk. The general public, eh?

14. Gloria Gaynor – I Will Survive

When this record was actually at Number One, way back in 1979, I loathed and detested it with all the righteous fervour of the public school punk rocker. Disco music? Mindless brainwash music for the sheep-like masses, obviously. The enemy of passion and integrity, as found in the music of, erm, the Skids. And the Dickies. And Tubeway Army. Posterity would surely prove me right.

Four years later, I’m buying up every second hand late 70s disco single I can get my hands on. I Will Survive was one of the first. Disco was a Golden Age for music, the likes of which we may never see again. Why is it so derided these days? Why are people so blind? Posterity would surely prove me right.

Five years later, I’m a club DJ, having set up my own “alternative” night “for lesbians, gay men, and their friends (NO HI-ENERGY!)” Suddenly, all the old disco classics are filling my floor. Especially I Will Survive. It’s a timeless classic! Everybody loves it!

Now, if I so much as hear that opening piano flurry, my ears go into automatic shutdown. I completely tune out until the bloody thing has come to an end. I could happily never hear it again as long as I live.

But one of the worst records ever? Hell no. I could never go that far.

15. Rick Dees & His Cast Of Idiots – Disco Duck

You remember how I fessed up earlier about having a soft spot for relentless vulgar jollity? Well, I draw the line at comedy records.

MAD magazine, pet rocks, “I’m with stupid” t-shirts, and Disco Duck. America in the mid-seventies sure was a barrel of laughs all right!

16. Supertramp – The Logical Song

The popularity of Supertramp at boarding school really irked me. People who liked classical music, who openly sneered at the very concept of “pop” music (drawing no distinction between Led Zeppelin and the Bay City Rollers), always seemed to have a copy of Supertramp’s “Breakfast In America” album in their studies. Because Supertramp were Quality, see? They made you think, as well. Oh yes.

“Won’t you please / please tell me what we’ve learned / I know it sounds absurd / but please tell me who I aaaaaaaaaam…”

Ooh, don’t tempt me, mate.

17. Orbital featuring David Gray – Illuminate

The Popbitcher who nominated this track qualified his choice with just one word: unforgivable. And I do know what he means – this feels like nothing less than a betrayal.

Orbital produced some of the most majestically beautiful music of the 1990s. Along with Leftfield and Underworld, they transcended the whole “intelligent techno” genre from which they arose. Hell, even people who didn’t like dance music could get into Orbital. Yet they made no concessions to popular taste, or even to prevailing trends in dance music. Their audience found them, not vice versa.

So why, in the name of all that is good and pure and true, did they feel the need to sully their musical legacy with this insipid piece of POR (Pine Oriented Rock)? I suppose in retrospect the writing was on the wall: reworking the theme tunes from The Saint and Dr. Who showed dangerous signs of populism. And the albums were getting steadily less interesting. But having committed this dreadful act, they have to understand this. There Is No Turning Back Now. They will never be credible (or popular) again.

Leave me alone with my “brown album” and my memories. They are all I have left now.

18. DJ Ötzi – Hey Baby

Look, this is a soft target. DJ Ötzi gets undeservedly bad press, in my opinion. People who slag off “Hey Baby” are setting up the wrong comparisons. Like Black Lace said about “Agadoo”: it’s not a record – it’s an event.

Whenever I hear “Hey Baby”, I remember standing in a the middle of a field at Alton Towers at the end of October, waiting for the annual firework display to start. We were surrounded by thousands of happy families, the kids all wearing these daft illuminated bonce-boppers which lit up the darkened field like so many fireflies. The mood was happy, excited, expectant. There was a warm-up “personality” DJ on site, to get us all in the mood. You just knew what record he’d play last, just before the big event. Yes, “Hey Baby”. And – just like Oasis at Knebworth in 1996 when they played “Wonderwall” – everybody, but everybody (except us of course) started singing along, jumping up and down, waggling their bonce-poppers and grinning from ear to ear. You had to smile. It was an uncomplicated moment of simple happiness.

Half an hour later, after the fireworks had ended, we had “Hey Baby” again, as people started heading for their cars and coaches. Twenty minutes later, as we approached the car, you could still hear kids singing it to themselves, over and over again, in that sweetly obsessive way they have.

It’s not a record. It’s an event.

19. ATB – 9pm (Till I Come)

You can’t get away from it. The vocal sample really does sound like someone is whispering “D’you like cock?”

Which is easily the most entertaining thing about this big pile of stinking poo.

20. So Solid Crew – 21 Seconds

And here comes what is, to my mind, another rather unfair reason for nominating something as the worst record ever. The Popbitcher in question added this comment: “Wankers. The lot of em.” Which is quite possibly true, what with all that shooting and jaw-breaking and general thuggish unpleasantness, and ting. But since when have we insisted that great music is made by nice people? History shows that this quite clearly isn’t the case. So why single out So Solid for particular vilification?

Anyway, what of “21 Seconds” itself? Well, I think it’s really rather impressive. It has a unique atmosphere all of its own, and it’s fascinating to hear just what each crew member does with his/her allotted period of time. All these different voices, all these variations in tone, but all with that same urgency, that same unified purpose. Clever stuff, and it works. No, this record shouldn’t be here either.

Unlike this next record…

21. Fragma – Toca’s Miracle

Here’s an interesting little fact for you. Both Fragma’s “Toca Me” and Spiller’s “Groovejet” started life as instrumental pieces. In both cases, the songs themselves (“I Need A Miracle” and “If This Ain’t Love”) were added at a much later date, to accompany the major label commercial re-releases of both tracks. This was sufficient to propel both tracks to Number One in the UK singles charts.

Both “I Need A Miracle” and “If This Ain’t Love” were written by the same person: Rob Davies, formerly “the camp one” in 70s glam rockers Mud.

So, if they were both written by the same person, why is one tune a universally liked dance classic, and why is the other tune a universally derided piece of shite?

22. Ian Van Dahl – Castles In The Sky

I know, I know, I know I shouldn’t, but I have such a soft spot for this tune. God knows why: on every objective level, it is truly awful. Yet another further moronic dilution of a once thrilling musical genre (European trance). Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But oh, those grandiose synthetic brass stabs! That pounding bassline! That hopelessly catchy one fingered melody! Those DEEP, DEEP, questioning lyrics! It gets me…..here. Sorry.

23. Meri Wilson – Telephone Man

We’re back with MAD magazine, the pet rocks and the “I’m With Stupid” t-shirts. Nuff said? Oh, I think so.

24. Starship – We Built This City

Everything about this record seems deliberately calculated to infuriate. The vocals are horrid. The synths are horrid. But most of all, this is Starship. Formerly Jefferson Starship. Formerly Jefferson Airplane. You know, the seminal San Francisco counter-culture hippy band. Voices of a generation. “White Rabbit”. Technicolour dream-ins, or what have you. Burning of draft cards. The, uh, revolution, man.

Then twenty years later, this. “We built this city on rock and roll.” Corporate capitalism GOOD! The Man, he give me NICE CAR! He give me LUXURY DUPLEX CONDO! But hey, I can still rock out, right? When I’m cruising home with the top down, the wind lightly buffeting my rock solid Big Hair, my jacket sleeves daringly rolled up, my skinny leather tie loosened.

Bastard revisionist sell out running dog lackeys! Never trust a hippy! Kill kill KILL the piggies!

You see? This record can turn you into Steven Wells.

25. John Lennon – Imagine

Oh, give me strength…

26. Lee Greenwood – God Bless The USA

Absolutely impossible to listen to. Mawkish patriotism which disturbs me in a way that I’m not sure I know how to express. Unlike all the other records on this list, I really feel I’d just rather Not Go There. Okay by you? Phew.

So come on then. What other record should have been on this list? You tell me. Just click on the “comments” link below….

basement jaxx - romeo (acoustic version)
gillian welch - elvis presley blues
kings of convenience - toxic girl
angie stone - brotha
groove armada - my friend
n*e*r*d featuring kelis & terrar - truth or dare
gonzales - take me to broadway
playgroup - number one
jon cutler featuring e-man - it's yours
macy gray - sexual revolution (blaze shelter vocal mix)

Well, I did the sensible, grown-up thing. I listened to my bottom, and missed the Human League gig. Last night's Eighties Pop Moment was instead provided by Paul Young on This Is Your Life - which, as substitutes go, is about as weak as they come (K: "I can't believe I used to fancy him.")

We then attempted to watch a video of Snow Falling On Cedars, but the pace was way too slow for my pathetic concentration span. So we gave up and I ploughed on with the Mitford sisters biography - which is actually far less interesting than the fictionalised versions in Nancy Mitford's novels. Maybe it will perk up when we get to the Moseley/Hitler stuff.

I still © dear, dear Debo Devonshire though - what a gal she is. The overlooked youngest one, the (comparatively) non-intellectual, non-political, non-glamorous one, who ended up becoming a bloomin' duchess no less, happily married for over 60 years, and a highly successful businesswoman to boot, her success still growing even though she's now into her eighties. Great taste in C20th British art, as well. Honestly, it's enough to give the aristocracy a good name.

Dictionaraoke: "Audio clips from online dictionaries sing the hits of yesterday and today. The fun of karaoke meets the word power of the dictionary."

For some reason, this works well on old punk songs: Troubled Diva recommends Blitzkrieg Bop and Anarchy In The UK. Born Slippy is also something of a surreal experience.

17 out of 21, and I didn't cheat! Wa-hey!

For me, the merry month of December means two things above all else. The all-important Best Of 2001 lists (see last year's here), and the "2001 - The Year In Song" double CDR which I lovingly compile and distribute to my nearest and dearest, in time for the festive season.

I started compiling the playlists for the CDs last night, and have got the running time for each CD down to about 2 minutes over the 79.30 maximum. Which means that one more track from each will have to be eliminated. I've already bid a tearful goodbye to the following tracks:- so which will be next? But they're all sooo brilliant!

I also place a "customer feedback card" inside each CDR. The recipient is asked to vote for their favourite five tracks in order, their least favourite track, and the track which I should have included but didn't. The penalty for not filling in this card is not to receive a CD next year (I HOPE CERTAIN PEOPLE WHO SHALL REMAIN NAMELESS ARE READING THIS NOW AND BLUSHING).

So, it's time to reveal the winners of last year's poll. The top 10 tunes from "2000 - The Year In Song" are, in order:And the least popular? Craig David's "Fill Me In", by some distance. Well, it seemed like a breath of fresh air at the time, I thought....

Oh, my sodding arse. It may look cute, but it brings me nothing but pain. And no pleasure, no pleasure at all! Honestly, I'd be better off without it.

One of the unfortunate side effects of my "mad fer it!" mid-90s clubbing phase was the gobsmackingly humungous haemmorhoids I used to end up with after a marathon session at Trade or suchlike. (NB - K once accurately described my dancing style in those days as just like the Mogwai from "Gremlins". As in: "You've been out mogwaiing with a flooze again, haven't you?")

Sometimes, the piles would thrombose, and I'd end up in bed for a couple of days in acute pain, punctuated with hourly visits to the bidet. I had a series of hospital appointments: injections, bandings, even an endoscopy one time. They could remove the piles, but not the propsensity for getting new ones.

Since then, I've learnt how to avoid getting them. Nurofen or Ibuprofen immediately I feel an itch - it has an anti-inflammatory effect, and generally nips them in the bud, so to speak. Anusol suppository if I've got a big night out ahead. Ease up on drinks, smokes and other stimulants if things are looking dicey. And since spring 1998, this has worked a treat.

However, I must have missed the signs last week, 'cos the bloody things are back up my bum, and by God, do they mean business. I have a strong suspicion that one has thrombosed, as there's a particular intensity to the pain which I remember from the old days. Actually, just as Eskimos supposedly have loads of different words for snow, I need loads of different words to describe my pile pains. Three of the worst being:

1. The Fist. Not that I've ever been down that road, but this is how I imagine it might feel like to have someone's hand up your bum. And people do that for pleasure?

2. The Screwdriver. More of a sharp, twisting, stabbing thing. Sometimes a Fist will convert into a Screwdriver - when this happens, the change in sensation actually comes as a strange sort of relief. A change being as good as a rest, I suppose.

3. The Spasm. The most feared of the lot, these only occur rarely, but their after effects can last for hours. The Spasm usually happens just when you're feeling OK, having sat still and relaxed for several hours. There is a build-up of about three seconds, which is when you realise that a Spasm is on the way and there is nothing you can do about it. Life goes into slow motion, as you freeze in your seat with a sense of mounting dread. The Spasm itself is quick but deadly. It feels like a cramp, or like having a shit in reverse. The entire contents of your arse undergo some sort of tectonic shift. The new alignment of elements will leave you in pain for the rest of the day.

I bet you're wondering what all this has to do with Ash at Rock City. Well, Callfox and I were standing around waiting for them to come on, when I got a Screwdriver, and got it bad. After 10 minutes of sitting on a comfy stool in the basement, I rejoined Callfox upstairs just as the band were coming on stage. They were OK, but they've never been a particular favourite band of mine (though the current album is pretty good, and Burn Baby Burn is great). But I've dragged Callfox to so many gigs with a promise of "You'll really like this lot, honest" that I felt it was only fair to let myself be dragged along in return (Callfox being a big Ash fan, you see. And a big Linkin Park fan as well, but we'll try not to let that come between us).

I tried, I really tried to enjoy myself. The band started off sounding ragged and under-rehearsed, but got into their stride within a few numbers. The songs off the new album sounded good, as did old faves such as Angel Interceptor and especially Goldfinger, which produced a mass crowd singalong. There was a good-natured, sweaty atmosphere, but space was at a premium and visibility was unusually poor. And my Screwdriver was starting up again.

Come on boy, mind over matter. R-e-l-a-x. Those rumbling bass notes - let them gently massage your poor ailing bum grapes. Mmm, that's better. Ouch, no it isn't. God, would people just stop pushing. And now that tall person is directly in front of me. And I don't know this song. Oh sod it, the pain is outweighing the pleasure. Best go home I think.

So I apologised to Callfox and left the venue after maybe a dozen numbers, which was enough for me anyway - they'd played a lot of my favourites and weren't going to get any better.

And today, I'm taking it easy at home, with a doctor's appointment booked for tomorrow morning.

But it's the Human League at Rock City tonight! I can't bear the thought of missing them. What to do?

Time alone will tell.

Great website, but alas, a shit programme. Like the scriptwriters of the Eleven O'Clock Show trying to "do a Chris Morris". K went to bed after the first sketch, as I continued sitting there till the end, willing it to improve. And anyway, where was Nathan Barley?

From the ages of 10 to 15, like many others no doubt, I always had an official Favourite Pop Act. I suppose this is, in some ways, an adolescent extension of the Imaginary Friends that people have in childhood (except in my case, I had an entire Imaginary Parallel Universe, but maybe we’ll talk about that another time).

My Favourite Pop Acts were, in order: The Sweet, Slade, Queen, Yes, Gong, Kevin Ayers, Eddie & The Hot Rods, and The Clash. Which possibly tells you all you need to know about my shifting musical tastes from 1972 to 1977.

However, up until this autumn I had only ever seen one of these acts live. That was Kevin Ayers, in 1980, 4 years after his final good album, supporting the bloody Little River Band (for chrissakes!), giving a wholly indifferent performance to a wholly indifferent Rainbow Theatre, and utterly crushing what remained of my former adulation. Other than that, the nearest I ever got was seeing Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros enthusiastically chomping their way through a bunch of Clash classics – a lot of fun, but not strictly the real deal.

Which makes this Autumn all the more remarkable. This period will undoubtedly stick in my memory as The Season That Prog Came In From The Cold. For not only did I witness the splendid spectacle of Gong a few weeks back (now old enough to draw their pensions, but still utterly, radiantly marvellous), but I now have Yes to look forward to on Saturday. To prepare for this, I’ve unearthed the set list for their current tour, and have been working my way through it this week on vinyl and the odd CD. Some of these are tracks I’ve not heard in decades, and I’ve certainly not been exposed to such a concentrated dose of Yessongs since, ooh, 1975 probably.

I don’t think there’s another band in existence capable of producing such an ambivalent reaction in me. The music is simultaneously: a) dated, overblown, self-important, self-deceiving, quite ludicrous (those lyrics!), the reason why Punk Had To Happen, and b) intricately, meticulously arranged and played, with a seriousness of intent coupled with a joyous, exhilarating exploration of musical possibilities, which I find extraordinarily evocative and powerful.

And there’s something else that I find bizarre: despite their immense success, this band have left absolutely no musical legacy. Their influence on the music of today is…non-existent. They might as well never have happened. Their work exists in its own little bubble, quite outside other musical movements. This robs you of the ability to make meaningful comparisons with other acts – you can only judge Yes on their own terms.

I could never, ever, recommend this band to someone who had never heard them before. Trust me, you’d hate them. But I’m so excited to be seeing them (complete with full orchestra, no less). I don’t know how I’ll react: with mockery, laughter, irony, boredom even, or will I be weeping in my seat, blown away by their artistry and reasserting my inalienable Right To Prog? I suspect that it will be all of these things.

My sister rang at the weekend all the way from Peshawar, where she has been visiting Afghan refugee camps as a nutritionist with Oxfam. We were out, so she got the machine. Her reason for ringing? She wasn’t sure what band Midge Ure was in before Ultravox, and was it Slik, and could I get back to her ASAP as not knowing was driving her mad. Now these are priorities I can relate to!

It was of course Slik – and the Rich Kids as well, if you’re being completist about things.

She has since e-mailed back, including the following curious snippets of info:

Last Thursday, in Wagamama, on our office night out, somebody starts going round the table, asking everyone the ages of the oldest and youngest person they’ve ever slept with. I feel my turn approaching with mounting apprehension, as I Can Never Tell A Lie (this isn’t a particular high moral position of mine – it’s just that whenever I attempt a porky, or even an evasion, my face gives me away instantly).

“So Mike, how old was your youngest?”
“17.”
Mild frowns around the table.

“And, er, how old were you at the time?”
“17.”
Smiles of mild relief around the table.

“And what about your oldest?”
I hold 5 fingers up, then 3 fingers.
“FIFTY-THREE?!”, they cry. “And how old were you at the time?”
“35.”

For some reason, I feel the need to offer a justification.
“Well, I was completely off my face at the time. It was my hardcore clubbing phase.”
“You went through a clubbing face AT THIRTY-FIVE?”
Looks of baffled incomprehension all round.

Having "de-gayed" myself to such a large extent over the past couple of years, I forget that sometimes, there can still be a massive gulf of understanding between us and the hetties.

I seem to be back on Google again after several days of being removed, cached as before at November 15. So far, only one search request has reached me: biker gaydar. But now that I've also set up Site Meter on my Geocities home page, the referrals are coming in, with predictably depressing results - ticklish male celebs indeed! Two things cheered me up though: search engine referral number 2 was for cute bum (butt of course!), and I've discovered that I'm on the first page of results for madonna london.

Yay - another link, and from the very first blog I ever read, as well! The second blog I ever read being this one, from which I have shamelessly ripped off tons of source code (and to whose excellent content I continually find myself returning, with a vague frisson of stalker-like queasiness).

This restaurant charges up to £17 for main courses, with bills per person averaging around £50 per head. It is clearly positioning itself amongst the very top restaurants in the county, and should therefore be judged as such. So I'm going to be picky.

Upon arrival, there was no-one to greet us, so we hung around the entrance to the bar until a passing waiter spotted us. We ordered aperitifs – our request for kir could not be met (crème de cassis clearly being too exotic an ingredient), so most of us had gin and tonics instead. The accompanying snacks, for 6 of us, were one small dish of olives and one small dish of dry roasted peanuts. Yes, dry roasted peanuts. What a treat!

The wine list didn’t list the years of each wine, which made choosing difficult. K ordered a Sancerre and a Chateauneuf du Pape (the latter at a whopping £29 per bottle). The waiter looked a bit baffled, and had to ask K to shout out the numbers instead. It’s not a long wine list.

Last time we ate at Ashbourne Hall, our table had been in the large bay window overlooking the car park, and had been freezing cold. So, when booking this time round, K had a long conversation about the table we wanted, to ensure we didn’t get put in the same place again. However, this didn't stop us from being shown back to the very same table in the bay window. As we sat down, everyone remarked on how cold it was. We got ourselves moved.

My game consommé was described as containing a sprinkling of shaved black truffles. When it arrived, none were visible and the distinctive flavour was missing.

The wine arrived at the table already uncorked. No-one was offered a tasting. The wine was not poured for us. The Sancerre had not been properly chilled (the second bottle still less so). When we asked for a second bottle of Sancerre (the empty first bottle still being on the table), the waitress looked baffled and asked if we could remember the number of the bottle. We suggested she took the empty bottle away so she could find another one with the same label.

When the Chateauneuf du Pape (29 quid, remember) arrived for the main course, we weren't offered fresh wine glasses, even though we were switching from white to red. More importantly, it tasted nothing like Chateauneuf du Pape. It had the light flavour of a very ordinary Beaujolais. All 6 of us agreed on this point. We sent it back and asked for another bottle to be opened in front of us at the table. The waiter did his best not to look flustered, but failed. He started explaining that it was our choice as to whether the bottles were opened at the bar or at the table. He also started waffling about the great variety of tastes between different Chateauneuf du Papes, and made a learned sounding reference to the characteristic Pinot Grigiot grape. Unfortunately, Pinot Grigiot is a white wine grape, and Chateauneuf du Pape is a red wine made from many grape types - but not this one. Oops!

The second bottle, which of course had the same (1999) label as the first, tasted nothing whatsoever like the first. It had the flavour, the fullness, the richness, the dryness and the length of a proper Chateauneuf du Pape. Not a particularly good one mind you, but acceptable enough.

K and his father decided to do a quick tour of inspection at the bar. They discovered a row of full wine bottles already opened, with the corks put back in the necks to keep them fresh. Ashbourne Hall does not sell wine by the glass.

Dear reader, you may draw your own conclusions from this. We have already drawn ours!

The remainder of the food ranged from pleasant to quite good. If the prices had been around the £10-12 mark, it would have been perfectly acceptable. At the £14-17 mark, it was unquestionably overpriced for the quality on offer. The exception to this was the grilled sea bass (the most expensive item on the menu), which was a miserable, tired looking lump of soggy fish lacking freshness, firmness and texture.

Around 3am that night, K's sister started suffering from constant diahorrea, which continued till breakfast time.

It won't surprise you to hear that we won’t be eating at Ashbourne Hall again.