Do you wonder what music your neighbours like?

Not what music your immediate neighbours like, of course - that, thanks to poor building materials and high density housing you can't help but know as the dull thud of Heart FM trickles through the party wall.

But what music do the people of your town and/or city like? Spotify have created an interactive map which spits out a playlist of tracks favoured by people at any given postcode, and over at Quirker Michael Moran has been looking at it with his beautiful eyes:

For example, Hull's music selection shows quite a lot of love for local band The Beautiful South while down the road in Lincoln they're more promiscuous in their taste, taking in the likes of Spanish DJ Dr Kucho and Bristol duo Blonde.

If I were Spotify, I'd nip over to Hull and check that it's not actually members of The Beautiful South with a room full of iPads trying to boost their royalties, to be honest.

The Quirker piece has the full map, so you can decide - once and for all - which is the most godforsaken musical toiletbowl on the face of the planet.

Thatcher-off: Number two

With Thatcher's cultural legacy now playing for honour alone, we move to to a sniff of the top of the charts.

Number 2, April 1979: Racey - Some Girls



Remember, this was outselling all the 1979 songs we've seen so far, so Callaghan can't be too complacent. Aimed squarely at the Look-In, Non-Threatening-Boys market, the middle prong of the crepe-suits attack alongside Shawaddywaddy and Darts, this was pretty much the same song Racey kept releasing.

1990 is going to have to have a stinker to lose out here.

Number 2, November 1990: The Beautiful South - A Little Time



To be fair, it's hard to see that this record would even have existed had Thatcher not been around. Paul Heaton existed solely in opposition, with even his band's name attuned to the tenor of the times. Plus, it's an excellent song. I can never remember the reason we're supposed to despise The Beautiful South.

1990 wins a round.

Pre-Thatcher: 6; Post-Thatcher: 3

Fatboy whim: Norman Cook to tweak the music industry's tail

Emboldened by Radiohead, Norman Cook is drawing inspiration for his next record. He doesn't, however, quite say what he intends to do:

"Artists are beginning to realise they don't need record companies any more, before we were their bitches and they got the lion's share of the money.

“It might be the death toll for traditional record companies as we know them, but I'm not shedding a tear."

Cook knows a thing or two about shabby treatment from record labels - not least the shabby and pointless welding together of the Housemartins back catalogue with stuff from the Beautiful South to create a tenuously connected best-of.

How longs a tear take to dry

Of course, it's tremendously unfashionable to admit it, but The Beautiful South were quite a brilliant thing when they were on form. And, yes, sadly the "were" is correct, as they've called it a day after nineteen years.

It's unclear if they're ending it now to avoid the 20th anniversary celebration horrors, or if it's got more to do with their last single, The Rose of My Cologne stalling at a not-encouraging number 99.

There is, of course, a statement:

In a two-line statement, the Hull-based band [...] attributed their break-up to "musical similarities".

"The band would like to thank everyone for their 19 wonderful years in music," the statement said.

Hats off to BBC News online for rewriting, rather than quoting verbatim, the whole two lines.

Let us take this moment to remember the greatest contribution the South made to British cultural life: the moment during Christmas 1996 when numerous households put on their brand-new copies of Blue Is The Colour and turned pale as they realised that nice single Don't Marry Her, Take Me wasn't quite so nice in its album version.