Bookmarks: Phish

There's a wonderful piece in Vogue about what it's like being married to someone who really, really, really likes Phish. Of course, it's called Confessions Of A Phish Wife:

Phish and its music are polarizing—either you get it or you don’t. Katie is one of the partners who don’t. “I am constantly like, ‘When are they retiring?’” she wondered aloud one afternoon over coffee. “It’s this constant hope of, Will this be the last one?” Katie was a Phish fan in high school and simply outgrew their music (“The lyrics are like Dr. Seuss, except not as clever”), and she finds the Phish stoner stigma a little embarrassing. “It took me a year into dating Will to tell my parents that he was a Phish-head,” she said. “We did it over dinner one night. I was like, ‘Guys, I have something to tell you . . .’”

It took me years to “find out”—I say “find out” with mock solemnity; after all, Phish fan is better than Ashley Madison member—the depths of my husband’s love for Phish. I knew he was a fan, but when we first met, the band was broken up. By the time they reunited in 2009, we were living together, and his secret was laid bare.

Avril Lavigne sticks to her word

You'll recall Avril Lavigne's pledge, back in 2003I won't wear skanky clothes that show off my booty, my belly or boobs".

But, of course, the workaround to that rule is, if the clothes that show off your booty, your belly and your boobs have been chosen by Italian Vogue.

The Daily Mail is outraged

The Daily Mail really is outraged about the Vogue/Kate Moss/Evan Voytas pop video. Really outraged. It just can't get it out of its head:

Saucy Kate Moss flashes her bra and hitches up her skirt to show her pants in one of her raunchiest shoots ever

Two things here, I think. First: is it saucy or is it raunchy?

Secondly: as the Mail itself concedes, she pole-danced for the White Stripes. And in most of her photo shoots, the top usually comes off at some point. Jesus, one of the iconic Moss images is her, topless in dom boots clutching a teddy bear. She's on the cover of Love overheating commentator's tolerance for who we're allowed to kiss. "Flashing her bra" isn't really measureable on the Moss-raunch scale, surely?

But this is the Mail, so it's not just - uh - outraged - by the shoot, stills of which it runs just so its family audience can understand that, you know, it's not making this up, and you can see her pants and everything.

Oh, no. The Mail has other concerns:

Music obsessed Kate Moss has had one of her raciest shoots yet turned into a pop video - but it's not for boyfriend Jamie Hince's band The Kills.

You know, it's one thing to make a raunchy video for your boyfriend's band, but making one for some other act? What sort of hussy is she, anyway?

Gordon in the morning: Come on, Vogue

Seriously, Vogue? You've put Cheryl Cole on the cover this month? What's it going to be for November - "My man turned out to be a vampire - but I love him anyway"?

Still, the magazine's decision to swallow hard and go with sales instead of style has given The Sun's Lynsey Haywood the chance to 'write' a piece by copying out some stuff from a magazine. Cole tells Vogue how terrible it's all been:

CHERYL Cole spoke out over her divorce from love rat husband Ashley - and admitted: "I feel betrayed."

The X Factor judge said: "Yes, definitely I do, but I've got to take everything that's happened and learn from it. I accept that that's a chapter of my life that's finished.

"And I've just got to be grateful that I've got so many good things going on. I have. And there's no children, you know?"

Although Cole has ended the chapter, she seems to spend an awful lot of time going through some sort of comprehension exercise based on it.

It's curious that someone who apparently needed her divorce to be listed in a secret fashion in the court papers is happy to chat all about it in a glossy magazine. It makes it look like the courts were used as an access management tool rather than as, you know, courts.

Cheryl Cole: That sort of exclusive

Oh, fiddlesticks, eh, Gordon? The Mail has also got 'an interview we read in Vogue' story this morning. Still, it's 33% exclusive, right?

Gordon in the morning: A new year of Gordons

Given how Gordon Smart had drilled Bizarre and his minions to try and split up Cheryl and Ashley Cole, it's something of a surprise to power up the Sun's website to discover an "exclusive":

Cheryl tells how she is putting husband's cheating behind her

Why would Cheryl share this with Gordon?

The story itself answers that quite simply. She hasn't.

Not only is the piece written by Richard White ("showbiz reporter") but it's not an interview with The Sun at all - it's something White's read in Vogue:

Cheryl, covergirl on February’s edition of Vogue, told the mag how Ashley regularly double-books nights out when he attempts to treat his missus of 2 1/2 years.

How on earth do you claim an exclusive on something from another magazine? Even if the team at Vogue - and it's UK Vogue, not the proper one, as you can tell from Cheryl Cole being on the cover - shared their story only with The Sun prior to publication, it's still not an exclusive because it's appearing in two places.

So, what's Gordon himself up to when his column is full of stuff Xeroxed from other parts of the newsagents?

I PREDICT this will be the year of JAMES CORDEN.

What's especially odd about this - besides it being something that has been obvious for about nine months and is about as close to risky soothsaying as saying "I predict next year will be called 2010 and have an April 24th in it" - is that Smart says this like it's a good thing.

In 2008 I made James a Bizarre Clown Prince alongside Mat, Russ and Mighty Boosh pair NOEL FIELDING and JULIAN BARRATT.

Now James looks ready for his coronation.

Russ is, of course, Russell Brand - you might remember Gordon's boss writing about him in an editorial last year, and his:

obscene bullying of Andrew Sachs

Or, indeed the:

Brand-Ross filth

I'm sure James Corden will be delighted at being thought of as being 2008's Russell Brand by the Sun, then, if that's what being a Bizarre Clown Prince does for you.

Still, let's just enjoy for the moment Gordon's increasingly strange world, where his entirely made-up system of Bizarre honours is starting to require a Debretts of its very own. I wonder if the guy who does Big Brother's Big Mouth with James Corden is a Bizarre Clown Earl or something? Or is that title reserved only for the eldest son of a Bizarre Clown Baronet?

Gordon in the morning: Location, location, location

Although his predictions of divorce and broken homes came to nothing, Gordon Smart has decided to continue banging away at the story, reporting this morning that, oh, anything really. Let's say she's insisting on moving house:

FURIOUS CHERYL COLE is insisting love-rat hubby ASHLEY buys them a new house — because she suspects he cheated on her in their marital bed.

There is something charmingly old-fashioned sounding about the phrase "marital bed" turning up in a trashy gossip column, isn't there?

But hang about a moment... those of us who have followed this story through Gordon's eyes will recall (as he keeps telling us) that Ashley is supposed to have had whatever sex he could manage between bouts of spewing in some sort of hotel, didn't he?

Didn't you say that, Gordon?

The Sun revealed in January how 27-year-old Ashley romped with blonde hairdresser Aimee Walton at a pal’s flat in North London.

So...?

But the source said Cheryl, 24, still feared he had cheated in their mansion in Oxshott, Surrey — and “ruined it forever”.

Really, Gordon? Or - if they are actually moving - could it just be that they want a new start?

Elsewhere, Gordon's turned in one of those I have read a magazine, I shall tell you what is in the magazine pieces, picking up Victoria Beckham's Vogue cover:

VICTORIA BECKHAM blows ’em away as she recreates the glamour of VIVIEN LEIGH in Gone With The Wind.

I'll be honest. I spent thirty seconds thinking that Gordon was confusing Dirty Harry with Gone With The Wind before I got the wind/blew pun. You might have thought something along the lines of "It's not just Atlanta that'll be set alight by Posh's new look" would have been sharper, but it turns out Gordon's not assuming his readership will have heard of the movie. He tries to prompt them:

The classic film is famed for the line: “Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn.”

But having thrown the damn into the pot, Gordon flounders slightly trying to take the thought on:

But Posh obviously does.

Um... yes. She clearly gives a damn about... um... anyhoo...

The announcement of Nelson Mandela's 90th birthday party for Hyde Park generates the headline

It's Nelson Bandela in Hyde Park

We read the story through, trying to work out what was going to be banned. Then we realised it was meant to be Band-ela. I can't decide if Gordon's working on a level too intellectually demanding for me, or if the puns are really so weak they're turning into something like a suduko puzzle when you try to work them out.

Madonna tells Wintour: Rocks' off

There are some mutterings around the gossip blogs that Madonna has displeased Anna Wintour, editor in chief of Vogue, by pulling out of a deal to be on the cover of this year's Fashion Rocks magazine.

The usual denials are in place - Madonna never under consideration, no falling out, plenty of room for two Ice Queens - but are somewhat undermined by the story having started out the traps from the Portfolio blog - part of the same Conde Nast empire where Wintour roosts.

Beth en Vogue

Beth Ditto has given an inteview to Vogue which, with her typical tendency to see herself as the centre of things, she has decided must be historic:

“This is probably the first time a chunky person has made it into Vogue, right?”

Although doubtless we'll hear in a couple of months how that was a misquote.

Meanwhile, Victoria Newton is thrilled:

Long may it continue, I reckon.

Beth is far more interesting than most of the skinny airheads who usually make it into the posh glossy.

We're not sure what she wants to "continue" long - Beth Ditto in Vogue? Fashion magazines covering generation two Bis bands? - but it's great to hear that Victoria finds skinny airheads boring.

Having said which, the big splashes on Bizarre this morning are "Britney lapdances for Lindsay Lohan" and "Paris goes to jail", which presumably she's headlining despite finding the "skinny airheads" less interesting than the Ditto story, buried way down below the fold.

Ugly Betty

I'm sorry, but you had to see this with your own eyes. Vogue has slapped Johnny Borrell on its cover - apparently the seventh man in Mode, sorry Vogue, history to be on the front - although, to be honest, it looks like the cover is really Natalia Vodianova, and he's just there as a prop. A tool, you might even say.

After all, if Vogue is meant to be ahead of the fashion loop, why would they focus on a bloke who wears the same thing every time he goes out, and who has been wearing that (cheap white jeans, no shirt) for the last three years?

And the photo? Jesus, if this was America's Next Top Model and this was his best shot, they'd be sending him back to the model house to pack his little vanity case without even bothering with a critique. Nigel Barker would chase him out with a broom.