The Daily Tonic: Pryde And Joi

When we started doing these daily issues, we thought we’d be doing a 14-day course to help get people through quarantine. Instead, we’ve ended up sending out something every day for almost four full months.

We figured we’d take a break at 100, then brace ourselves for picking it back up if there’s a second wave – but we’ve since had another idea.

We’re due to send out the 1,000th weekly edition of Popbitch in mid-August. To build up to it, from Monday we’re going to send out Daily Tonic issues on Mon/Tue/Wed/Fri (as well as the Thursday weekly) revisiting some of our favourite stories from 2000 to 2019 – bringing us up to date just in time for PB1000.

In the meantime, we’re going to take a short break, but if you’ve enjoyed what we’ve done over lockdown, please do consider donating to keep Popbitch running as we depend on reader donations to keep us safe from angry lawyers…

[Help support Popbitch!]

Drivelcast writes:
“One night in the late 90s I was in a Camden bar trying to flog copies of my fanzine, when I spotted top DJ Steve Lamacq. I nervously offered him a free copy, which he insisted on paying for. We then had a lovely chat about his own days as a fanzine writer, and he gave me the top tip: Always drive to gigs with not enough money or petrol to get home. Then you’ll have no choice but to sell a few copies…”

MS writes:
“In 2012, I was dispatched to a posh London hotel to interview Usher about his new album, Looking 4 Myself. Not unexpectedly, the interviews were running late. He was ‘just finishing up with another journalist,’ I was told. Clearly, their last question was a killer – because two hours later, he still hadn’t appeared.

“Eventually, a flunky came in and told Usher’s PR in the world’s least convincing whisper: ‘Uh, he’s fallen asleep and no-one wants to wake him. What will I do?’

“Luckily, he woke up just 45 minutes later and folded himself into an armchair for a slightly drowsy chat. As I was wrapping up, the conversation turned to his fans. ‘Has anyone ever told you they’ve conceived a child to one of your songs?’ I asked.

“‘I certainly know of one,’ he replied, fixing me straight in the eye. ‘My son.'”

In preparation for the next set of daily issues, we’re curious to know if you had any memories of the year 2000 that you think Popbitch would enjoy. As it was the year Big Brother started, Madonna married Guy Ritchie and Victoria Beckham went solo – we’re sure there’s plenty we missed at the time.

Today’s Question: What are your favourite celebrity stories from the year 2000?

Send your millennium memories to us hello@popbitch.com – and we’ll send our favourites whatever goody bundle we assemble for this next round of mailouts.

By only mentioning Tony and Toni Iommi and Danny and Dani Dyer in yesterday’s daily, we did a great disservice to the many other celebrities who have made the single letter changes to their kids’ names.

Our apologies to:

* Tony Hadley’s daughter, Toni
* Mauricio Pochettino’s son, Maurizio
* Kieren Fallon’s son, Cieren
* Mike Tyson’s daughter, Mikey

We’ll continue the audio quizzes in the next batch of daily emails, but to round out this set we’ve got one last round of rap samples for you.

For this one, you don’t need to name the artist and song you’re hearing; you need to name to 90s/00s rap track that famously sampled it – and the artist behind that.

So, for example: you don’t get a point for naming David McCallum for the first track. You get it if you remember who sampled it at the turn of the century, and then another point if you can remember its title.

[Play it here]

Plasticine penguin v Shape-shifting alien
[Lee Hardcastle’s “Thingu”]

Beatboxing Buddhist monk
[Watch on YouTube]

Carole Baskin got duped on Cameo
[“Jimmy… Saveel”]

Serenading a beluga whale
[Watch on Digg]