Random Thoughts from the weekend...

Maybe against my better judgement, I've decided to blog about some randomness from the weekend...

"Don't Go, Stephen!"

Biggest story of the weekend - a story so big, it actually merited the front page of the BBC news site! - was Stephen Fry's threats to quit Twitter.

I'll admit, I'm one of Fry's 90,000 followers. I find his tweets charming and nowhere near as inane as other celebrity Tweeters, but him getting into an on-line scuffle and then threatening to quit the site is not news. I'm sorry, BBC, but it's not. And it's still not news when he patches things up with the guy.

To me, that whole thing comes across as two things:

1. Lazy Journalism
2. Trying to jump early onto the next big Twitter controversy

Yes, it's lazy journalism to essentially pull random quotes from people's Twitter accounts. It's basically the same as copying massive chunks of text from Wikipedia. But it's conceivable that it's all been done in a bid to get in on the ground floor over the next big Twitter controversy. We all know about the Jan Moir incident, and how Twitter users were a major driving force behind that, so it's realistic to believe that the BBC see this whole Fry thing as the next big one, and they want to make sure they're there before anyone else.

(And that's before we even get into the tone of the articles, which seem to suggest that we're not actually allowed to criticise Fry, lest we be branded unpatriotic or something. I mean, could this be the beginning of Fry's dictatiorship? "One Nation Under Fry!")

However, BBC, someone should probably point out that if it was a headline every time that two people disagreed on the Internet, there wouldn't be any room on your servers or in your news broadcast for, you know, real news.

"That makes you relevant."

Against my better judgement, I have - I admit - caught myself watching a bit of X-Factor over the last two weeks. There's nothing much I can add that hasn't already been said about the utter shiteness of the show, but there's something I feel I have to point out: it's a Karaoke contest, people! And, judging by the "performers" on last night, you could probably find better singers down your local pub.

It's an interesting collection of "judges" there, too, with not one of them having any idea about music at all - which, considering that this is meant to be a music-based show, you'd think they'd have someone on there who knew something.

There's Simon Cowell, a man with more money than God (but still can't seem to get himself a decent haircut) who sits there watching the contestants, clearly counting in his head how much money he can make off them. I swear, he's seeing sacks of money holding microphones. There's also Louis Walsh, a music mogul who's only claim to success is putting together Boyzone (a cheap, Irish knock off of Take That) and Westlife (a cheap Irish knock off of Boyzone), who throws media friendly hissy fits over the choices of songs the other judges "make" for their contestants. We also have the voluptuous Dannii Minogue (aka Kylie's sister). Apparently, having a lovely pair of breasts and being related to someone infinitely more famous is enough to get you on that show. Well, it certainly wasn't her musical career, was it?

And then we have Cheryl Cole, the only judge I'd put stock in, simply because she'll be able to tell the winners about the gruelling schedules, endless media training and total personality make overs that they'll have to go through to make Simon Cowell even more money.

Oh, and let's not forget the special celebrity guests (aka whoever has a new album out to plug that week). Last week was Michael Buble, a - and I do use the term loosely here - crooner. The amount of fawning the contests and show did over him was actually sickening; one of them actually said "When you think of "Big Band", you think of Michael Buble." Really? I'd bet good money that you'd never actually heard of Michael Buble until they handed you that script.

So, yeah. All every week they do a theme, but all that's actually for is prove that these contestants can suck the life and emotion out of any song they're given - even when they're given bad cover versions of the original song to perform (those two Irish fuckwit twins doing the Five/Queen version of We Will Rock You, for example).

Still, I can see why it's so popular: because it's so bad you just can't stop watching.

"And at Number 1..."

I know that I'll get flak for this, but that's OK. You, dear reader, are allowed to be wrong on occasion.

I had the misfortune to listen to a bit of the newly re-fitted Radio 1 Chart Show over the weekend, and it made me think about how little the pop charts actually mean any more. For me, the Chart Show was always about music - you can argue the toss about that as much as you want, but it was probably the only show on Radio 1 where they had to put music before the inanity of the presenter. No matter what, they had to play those 40 tunes in that allotted time. Unfortunately, that's not the case any more.

When it was announced that Fearne Cotton and Reggie Yates were taking over, I stopped listening completely. Why? Because they're fucking idiots. They take inanity to a whole new level. Cotton alone re-defines the entire concept of inane; she's a fucking personality vacuum, a walking, talking void. While Yates... Well, he is what he is: a children's TV presenter who doesn't know how to play in the grown up media.

Since Cotton's been given a daytime slot during the week, I can't listen to Radio 1 any more without wanting to tear my own lungs out and throw them at the radio. My only other sensible option would be to switch over to 6 Music, but as long as they continue to have Legendary Knob George Lamb on that station, I will refuse to listen to that, too.

Still, it's all a good excuse to plumb the depths of Spotify and start hunting through my CD collection again.