(More: Birmingham's convention centre, Kurdish problems, The Alarm, Pete Wylie, Silver Bullet, and N-Joi. With a song from the Wonder Stuff, and a track from Transvision Vamp)

Down two to 5 went Rod Stewart with Rhythm of my heart, and Madonna had the highest new entry at number 4 with Rescue me. It's the second new song from her greatest hits set, the Immaculate Collection, and feels like a b-side with designs above its station. Up eight places to number 3 went the Waterboys with The whole of the moon, of which more next week. No move at number 2 for James's Sit down, and a third week as the UK's best-seller for Chesney Hawkes's The one and only. Surely four weeks is beyond him. Isn't it?

| Permanent link

Bournville was a giant ego trip, says insubstantial careerist. Hazel Blears says that she prefers identikit housing estates built by big businesses to the model villages of a century ago, not least because Mr. Cadbury's construction didn't include a single bar. Humbug to you, Miss Blears. Without the progressive policies of Mr. Cadbury and fellow philanthropists, the Labour movement of which you are a nominal heiress would never have gained such traction. It is clear that Miss Blears is not cut out for the job of housing minister; indeed, we believe that she would be out of her depth in a paddling pool, and could profitably be replaced by Radio Active's Martin Brown.

Spiked has a look at the culture of ribbons, where Jennie Bristow argues that the loops of fabric are a form of self-promotion more than they're genuine concern for the good cause.

Yet more reasons to block G****e: it's arrogant enough to assume that it is better than all other search engines, even though we all know that it is nothing of the sort. G****e has been blocked from this site for two-and-a-half years.

A brief word on Russell "T" Davies. His best creations were 1) Benjamin Rory Slade 2) Marcie 3) The entirity of Century Falls, which we've not seen in years and would like to see again (BBC-4 controller: HINT). Everything since has been rubbish to a greater or even greater degree, and evidence suggests that Mr. Davies is now believing his own hype. The fool. We far prefer Russell Davies of the art-and-craft of the popular song fame.

6 April 2006: There's no need to fear a house price bubble, says Gavyn Jennings. 8 April 2008: The house price bubble will be the ruin of Britain, says Gavyn Jennings. Meanwhile, Het Graun tries to explain the root cause of the credit crisis: sliced 'n' diced debts.

George Lamb. The best advertisement for Ken Bruce. Or Jo Whiley. Or that Birdsong channel.

John Naughton remembers Channel 4's short-lived late-night sports phone-in Under the Moon

We're jealous. Really, really jealous.

For those of you who are Brig Bother, JJ72 split in 2006. We're waiting for news of the inevitable reunion.

| Permanent link

Here's something we've not looked at before: London's assembly. We're not going to touch the mayoral election: rightly, that is about personality far more than party.

The first thing to note is last time's result:

C   31.4% - 9 seats
Lab 24.8% - 8 seats
LD  18.6% - 4 seats
Oth 25.2% - 4 seats (G 2, UIP 2)

Mayor: Labour

LAB Gain from IND

This time, the poll doesn't coincide with European elections. This means that the Europhobes are likely stay at home in slightly greater numbers. There are also a plethora of new parties to fragment the mixture.

(More: Musings on the plethora of parties, the constituencies, the top-ups, and how they all fit together.)

For what it's worth, yesterday's Indytab Poll of Polls - C 41 Lab 30 LD 18 - gives the Conservatives 10 constituency seats plus 2 topups; Labour 4+4; the LD 0+3; and the Greens 0+2.

| Permanent link

Start with the Best of the Web nomination: Rachel North on the 7 July tapes, retelling the events through CCTV footage.

No easy way to follow that, so a bit of radio news. Reasons to think Chill is the best thing since sliced bread: they play Angela smiled. Some will remember this from the except about half-way through Why Jordan Can't Read. Those of you who are Mr. Pokery may have some catching up to do. For the rest of us, finally: a compelling use for Twitter. Updates on life every five minutes? Generally not worth the candle. What's playing on your radio? Time-sensitive information, distributed in a time-sensitive way. Genius.

Global Radio has given up on radio, putting out a cheap show from London on Heart in the afternoon, evening, and overnight; and Galaxy will take cheap shows from Leeds apart from breakfast and driveltime (so all the time, then). It's a rubbish decision, for reasons best expressed by Man in the Morning.

The new GWR Global Radio has decided not to sell Xfm stations in Scotland and Crater Manchester, but will flog off its license in South Wales. It's also putting a hold on plans to sell Digital 1, and we're not clear who owns the multiplex at the moment.

Right, on to proper news. The UK government has forced the cancellation of concerts by top pianist Grigory Sokolov by insisting that he gives biometric data in order to secure a visa. The government department responsible for this act of cultural barbarism said, and we quote, blah blah waffle waffle terrorism bullshit waffle asylum blah blah Daily Hell waffle bullshit waffle. Chief barbarian Jacqui Marginal is currently the MP for Redditch. Why?

Fundamental Truths: Tim Callahan on orthodox jews being a bit like fundamentalist godbothererers.

One problem with the spoon theory mentioned in dispatches recently: it is not a theory. It neither has predictive power, nor can it be falsified. Call it a model, be done with it.

As ever, Dominic Lawson is wrong in his detail, but there is merit in his big picture. If you have two mutually exclusive and expensive alternatives, then it is better to spend money reducing uncertainty than in preparing for both of the expensive alternatives. So it is with global warming and the conjoined dash to biofuels. At the very best, they're a stopgap technology, something to use if oil begins to run out (which it might be doing) while we re-engineer society to become less dependent on the fossil-fuel motor (which the west is signally failing to attempt). Biofuels are not a sustainable solution, because they artificially push up the price of wheat and wheat substitutes. For instance, a loaf of bread that cost us 70p last July now sets us back £1.09. About half of that rise can be directly traced to the increased cost of wheat, and much of that increase derives from the explosion in ethanol and derivatives. (The remaining half is naked profiteering from the supermarket.)

The bottom line: bread has gone up by a third purely because of the dash to biofuels.

| Permanent link

A quick word on the elections outside London. These seats fall into two categories. In metropolitan districts, these are the councillors who topped the poll in the all-up elections in 2004; outside the mets, it's seats last fought in 2004. There are also all-up elections in the 22 Welsh unitary authorities; in Barrow-in-Furness following significant boundary changes; and for shadow unitary authorities in Cheshire, Durham, and Northumberland.

The tale of 2004 was bad for Labour, moderate for the Conservatives, good for the Lib Dems, and it was the high-water mark for the Fourth Parties. With the exception of the Greens in Norwich, Oxford, and Brighton, and RESPECT in Birmingham, these minor parties have all fallen far below their mark from last time.

(More: Previewing the rest of the elections, and the quarterly update on the local council swings.)

| Permanent link

Boring old Madge hits the top in the Netherlands, but Amy MacDonald is top 20. This is the life. In Norway, Morten Torten Forten Harket's back! Back!! BACK!!! (etc). Darkspace (you're with me) is new at, er, number 19. Sugababes hit the top in Estonia with Denial; they know a good hit when they hear it. Surprise of the week is the bounce for REM's Supernatural superserious following the release of the album: it's into the top 20 sales charts in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, top 30 in Germany, and makes the top 10 of Latvia's airplay list. And Ireland has a new number one, Galway girl performed by Sharon Shannon and Mundy has been on release for 44 weeks on downloads alone. It's finally got a physical release, and moves up to the top.

Outside the top 75, there are re-entries for the House of Pain's Jump around, which we can sort-of understand because it's been there or thereabouts for years; for Guns n' Roses's Sweet child of mine (ditto), and (er) Sweet Female Attitude's 2000 number 2 Flowers, which makes no sense at all. Adele's Cold shoulder is in at 65, and Soulja Boy's Yahhh! makes 49. We also see a 20-place climb for Queen's Don't stop me now; again, there's no logical reason that we can see.

Adele's Hometown glory is a re-entry at number 38. It was played over the closing credits of this week's Skins, and it's clear that a lot of people wanted to blub a little more after the show ended. (SPOILER! Oh.) New at 37 comes Cahill's Tripping on you, which is just dire. Will I Am's Heartbreaker climbs 20 places to 29, and it's rubbish. Last Shadow Puppets are a spin-off from the Arctic Monkeys, and The age of understatement is new at 24. They may be the biggest band not to have a page on My Spayed, but only because they deleted it last week. Birtney's Pears, the bigest pair around, up two to 23. Elliot Minor return at 22 with Parallel worlds; the original made number 31 a year ago.

A climb for Nataaaaaaasha Bedingplant, Love like this is up 10 to 20. Still only a very minor hit, and still a higher than it deserves. Scouting for Girls put Heartbeat up 8 to 19, and Toca's miracle is up 13 to 16. Usher's Love in this club moves up one final place to 15, and after a million billion zillion years in the top ten, Nickelback drop 10-13. A high new entry for Black Kids, in at 11 with the ever-so-indie I'm not going to teach your boyfriend how to dance with you. They've been praised to the skies by 6 Music and interweb taste makers, and (gasp!) they're actually worthy of some of it. Not a patch on Johnny Boy, natch.

In the top ten, Chris Brown comes down one to 10, and the highest new entry is in at 9, Cry for you by September, a top ten hit in Sweden, Finland, and the Netherlands back in 2006. With this success, and the hit for Alphabeat (still number 12), maybe there is hope for us to take The Amy Diamond Experience. Leona Lewis is down a place to 8, and the Kooks slump 3-7. Duffy drops a place to 6, swapping places with Mariargh Cantsing. Madonna and Justin Numberwang are up 4 to 4, which (for those who have lost count) is a new peak. Flo Rida drops a place to 3, and Sam Sparro's Black and gold is up two places to 2. Still no move at the top, Estelle bores the pants off us for week 4.

We've never had this week's top 5 structure before, but the top 4 is familiar from 10 August 1974. That week's top five:

01 01 George McRae - Rock your baby
02 04 Three Degrees - When will I see you again
03 02 Stephanie De Sykes And Rain
  - Born with a smile on my face
04 08 The Stylistics - You make me feel brand new
05 17 Bay City Rollers - Summerlove sensation

On the albums, Duffy's Rockferry returns to number 1, with the Rolling Stones in at 2 with Shine a Light. REM drop to 3, and the Courteeners come in at 4 with St. Jude. Those of you who have been reading the 1991 nostalgia posts will recall James, Hey Ma is their first new studio album since 2001; it's in at 10. Good climbs for Goldfrapp (32-21) and Take That (38-22); Tammy Wynette's latest singles collection, Stand by your man, makes 23 - at least her estate's not released one every five minutes like some we could mention. The Breeders and Long Blondes land in the top 50, In Flames and Nine Inch Nails hit the top 60, and Michael MacDonald slumps 27-74.

| Permanent link

This week, we've been watching and hearing...

After ten years of uncertainty, a jury concluded that a corner shop owner's son and his playgirlfriend who died in a car crash while being driven by a drunk and not wearing seatbelts were, er, killed by being in a car crash while being driven by a drunk and not wearing seatbelts. Glad we've got that sorted. Any word on what colour the sky is?

Symbols of the Crass Spectacle were paraded through London and Paris. Jacques Rogge, head of the Crass Spectacles, said that violence was not compatible with the values of the torch relay. So, it is right to parade a political symbol through the streets of two major capitals, but wrong to protest against the politics that are being paraded? M. Rogge allowed the propaganda of the flame of harmony through the door, nakedly promoting his political view, one that allows no room for dissent because he believes sport and politics to be separate. Yet his actions contradicted his public statement: if he really believed that, he would not have competitors marching under their national colours, but as individuals playing their game.

It was not clear if the organisers of this particularly Crass Spectacle sought permission from the police to stage their demonstration at Downing-street? If they didn't, it would constitute a prima facie breach of the Stop Brian Haw Act 2005, and ensure that everyone involved should be thrown in prison for a very long time i.e. forever. Similar protests occurred in Paris and Buenos Aries, while the ambassador from Red China flounced out of the Green Party congress in Ireland after the party's leader criticised the occupation of Tibet.

The British government was accused of perverting the course of justice when it interfered, on behalf of the Saudi king, to stop an investigation into British Aerospace. The arms-to-tyrants company was being investigated for taking bribes after selling arms to Saudi Arabia from 1985. The country's government intervened, muttering about stopping the flow of intelligence, and planting stories about "another seven-seven". The High Court found that there had been irresistable pressure from ancien prime minister Mr. Mister Tony Blair to persuade the nominally-independent Serious Fraud Office to stop investigating the case. It appears that Mr. Mister Blair will not be charged with conspiracy.

The stand-off in Zimbabwe continued, with neighbouring Zambia calling a conference of countries in southern Africa. Zambia pointedly invited both Mr. Mugabe and Mr. Tsvangerai, only for Mr. Mugabe to decline the invitation, and Mr. Mbeki of South Africa suggesting that such corruption was normal practice in southern Africa. The opposition MDC insisted that it had won the election, but the ZANU-PF-dominated civil service had failed to cook publish the result after two weeks. Amongst the increasingly ludicrous reasons offered for not releasing the results was that they were sub judice as commentary on an ongoing court case. ZANU-PF later insisted that there should be a re-count of ballots in some constituencies, a blatant and increasingly desperate attempt to rig the poll further.

| Permanent link

Spring remained a distant prospect, with cool northerly winds lasting all week, and some beefy and wintery showers from Thursday. Next week looks for more of the same, though Tuesday and Wednesday should bring slightly better conditions for most places.

07 Mo sunny spells       1/ 7, 0.5
08 Tu sunny spells      -3/10, 1.0
09 We sunny spells      -2/11
10 Th showers            2/10, 1.0
11 Fr showers            1/ 9, 2.5
12 Sa sun, showers       3/11, 2.5
13 Su sunny spells       1/11

Rainfall in April: 13.5mm; monthly average: 53mm

Degree heating days: 734
2006-7: 489½/499
2005-6: 683/684
2004-5: 549½/556
2003-4: 734½/754

| Permanent link