The Second Serve // The Next Andrew Ridgeley

Self Esteem joined in with the weekend’s big media story by wearing a “Free Gary” T-shirt on stage for her encore on Saturday. It’s a nice gesture of solidarity, but sticking up for Gary Lineker at a Self Esteem gig in London doesn’t risk much in the way of backlash.

If you want to see someone really skirting the edges of free speech, MIA was a headliner at the Wireless festival in Abu Dhabi this weekend. She walked on stage in a niqab and an explosives belt, performing her set   dressed as a suicide bomber.

Despite being critically acclaimed, The Banshees Of Inisherin came away from last night’s Oscars empty-handed. That’s perhaps not entirely unexpected, given the response that LA-types had to the film.

One of our favourite moments from the whole awards campaign was when Variety had writer Martin McDonagh sit down for an interview chat with Taylor Swift.

SWIFT: I’ve been talking about [Banshees] with my friends. I talked to a friend of mine who’s a therapist and she was saying, “If someone brought in this dream to me and said that ‘I’m wanting to cut my finger off,'” she would say, “You feel like your aliveness is being cut off by a part of your life and this art represents the fingers.” What do you think the fingers are a symbolism for?

MCDONAGH: I don’t know. I just thought it was funny.

A band who played a Kerrang tour of Freshers’ Week club nights back in the early 00s ended up sharing a venue with Pat Sharp one night. They were playing the student union’s “rock” room, while Pat was DJing in the adjoining “pop” one (doing pretty well out of it too).

Around 2am, the band were packing up their kit when Pat walks over to the band (we quote) “pissed as a lord”. He joined them on the stage where they were throwing drum stands into cases and stage-whispered, “I’m Pat Sharp!” They told him they knew.

He asked if they also knew the twins from Fun House. They said they did.

“Fucked ’em both,” he said, before wobbling off into the sunset. The band were passingly impressed.

The best celebrity profile of the weekend was Geri and Christian Horner in Telegraph. Some of the things we learned from it:

* Geri has a horse called Lift Me Up (named after her godawful solo track)

* The couple have got stables for 14 horses at home and all her stable staff have to wear clothes marked GHR (Geri Horner Racing)

* Geri has just finished another children’s book: Rosie Frost and the Falcon Queen. It’s set on an island called Bloodstone where there is a Hogwarts style school started by Elizabeth I and the children are all polymaths

* She says she’s already talking to producers about the film rights

* Geri and Christian got together after meeting clay pigeon shooting at Highclere – the stately home used in Downton Abbey

Further to Thursday’s bit about Robbie Williams recording his video for Freedom 96 absolutely hammered, it’s a wonder that Robbie ever got to record a George Michael song full stop.

Around the same time in his post-Take That career, Robbie found himself at Jimmyz nightclub in Monte Carlo where he saw George Michael on the dance floor. Aware that every boy band member who went solo always said something along the lines of “I want to be the next George Michael”, Robbie thought it might be funny to turn that whole trope on its head.

So he went up to George and said: “I wanna be the next Andrew Ridgeley…”

Not only did it not get a laugh out of George, George looked Robbie dead in the eye and said: “Don’t take the piss out of Andrew.”

When one of Shane MacGowan’s old drinking buddies confirmed to us that Shane was also partial to Saoirse Ronan’s Guinness and Tia Maria, we couldn’t resist asking them for a few more drinks suggestions. So if you want to drink like The Pogues, this is how…

* Guinness and Barley Wine: “Not particularly nice, but lethal. And very warming on a winter night.”

* Dry Vermouth: “His standard tipple was dry vermouth – triple measure with a glass of ice on the side.”

* Blackcurrant Hooch and Vodka: “In a pint glass, that was Tom the banjo player’s favourite.”

* B’n’B: Remember a while back we told you Shane MacGowan once hung out with a Popbitch reader in a beer garden on a baking hot summer day and Shane drank a full pint of Baileys? Apparently it wouldn’t have been straight Baileys. There’d have been a few shots of brandy in it too. Hence “B’n’B” – Baileys and Brandy.

And to get the most authentic MacGowan experience: “Normally he’d have three or four different drinks lined up in front of him and would take sips of whatever took his fancy.”

Betty Boothroyd was once asked to open an exhibition at Wednesbury Museum and Art gallery around early 2000s. The museum was surprised when, a few weeks later, she sent them an invoice for her appearance – including a bill for her chauffeur.

Being the local MP, staff at the museum thought it was a bit much.

Last week was Samples Week, with all the quizzes made up of songs sampled by De La Soul, Beastie Boys, Snoop Dogg, Notorious BIG and Will Smith.

This week we return to normal, with each quiz being made up of snippets from ten songs – each selected by some loose connection to an arbitrary theme. You just have to name the ten songs and the ten artists who perform them; a total of twenty points across each quiz.

Monday’s Theme: Oscar Winners

[Play it here]

Fuck Cocaine Bear; Cocaine Shark is here
[Trailer on YouTube]

Donald Trump and the imprisoned Jan 6th rioters reached No.1 on the US iTunes chart this weekend
[Recorded down prison phones]

Now that early influencers’ toddlers have become teenagers, how are the kids reacting to discovering their parents mined them for content?
[Not well…]