Tuesday, July 05, 2005
The Long and Whining Road
If Geldof gets his way, come tomorrow afternoon a million activists will be in Edinburgh and in the evening, assuming the city hasn't been burnt down to the ground - and given the hysterical overreaction by the media covering yesterday's events in which an anarchist/authority stand off plus a couple of skirmishes, mainly involving, as far as we could tell from our standpoint which was, admittedly, miles away from the incident as we were at home watching it on our telly, photographers trying to get the best shot of vaguely angry looking protesters, became known as the "Battle of Princes Street", we can only assume that as far as the coverage is concerned it will have done - 50,000 of them will be 'treated' to a big old gig in Murrayfield Stadium. But what's in store for them? Well, let's have a look, shall we? Incidentally, regular readers might think this is familiar territory but we have, for once in our life, written some 'new' 'jokes' for this. We should also point out that this list is in no way accurate, and is based upon a number of sources which may well prove to be nonsense by the time tomorrow night actually happens. And given that there appears to be far too many acts for an evening gig, we fully expect that it will be.
- Daniel Bedingfield - Daniel was also one of the speakers at the rally organised for the Make Poverty History march in Edinburgh on Saturday. Our eyewitness said of his appearance "He kept singing 'Make Poverty Histor-eee-eee-eee'. It was a bit like something out of South Park". Which is fair enough as he is quite two dimensional. What Billy Bragg made of sharing a stage with the hyperactive Jack Black-a-like is, as yet, unknown.
- Natasha Bedingfield - We know we say this every time we mention her name, but just as time won't wither her beauty, it won't make us able to do any more than sigh wistfully in her presence. Sigh.
- Richard Branson - Will hopefully only be there to introduce an act. We imagine his singing voice to be similar to one of his jumbo jets taking off. He arrived in town on Monday, presumably not trusting his own train company to get him there on time. Yes, that's right, we did just do a joke about trains running late. We really are that cutting edge.
- James Brown - If you're stuck for how to get home after the gig, feel free to hang around back stage and ask James for directions. He knows the way to the bridge.
- George Clooney - George will be manning the First Aid tent throughout the gig. He's predicting an epidemic of swooning amongst women of a certain age.
- The Corrs - Yup, it seems that, contrary to all expectations and rational expectations, they are still going.
- Jamie Cullum - Cunt.
- Dido - Having tired herself out performing at the Paris, Eden and London Live 8 gigs, Dido will be attempting to do the same to the Edinburgh audience, hoping to quell their potentially riotous thoughts by sending them into a happy slumberland. She's likely to be disappointed, however, as while slumberland is a guaranteed stop on the Dido railway, happiness can only be found by not even getting on her train.
- Embrace - Recently had a comeback thanks to Coldplay's Chris Martin writing a song for them. This is a bit like being a slightly dull painter who's suddenly become quite successful because you handed your paints over to a chimpanzee.
- Bob Geldof - Seriously, The Great Song of Indifference really is good. Anyway, as with Live 8, he'll no doubt do another 'surprise' performance of I Don't Like Mondays, in the sort of unplanned event that involves your entire backing band ready to go on stage and everything all soundchecked in advance.
- Lenny Henry - Taking on introductory duties, reminding the world, as if the world needed reminding, that he's far better at charity than comedy these days.
- Natalie Imbruglia - Parental Advisory: Contains Explicit Simpering
- Eddie Izzard - "Woargh, eeeehr, so, ummm, yeah, Make Poverty History? How about we, urrgh, make jam history instead, yeaargh, the cats could help. Because cats, errm, hate jam. And wasps. Urrr, the cats that is, they hate wasps. But wasps love, erghh, a bit of jam, can't get enough of it, buzzz buzzz, jam, mmmm. yeah. Woargh."
- Peter Kay - Will be joining the crowd at the stage door to ask James Brown for directions.
- Ronan Keating - When the going gets gruff, the gruff get Ronan.
- Beverley Knight - One of the UK's least essential but strangely resilient artists. What your mum would be like if she was a pop star. Although we do realise we're using the word 'star' somewhat recklessly there.
- Annie Lennox - She'll do another emotional performance of Why?, we reckon. Boredom is an emotion, isn't it?
- Baaba Maal - A good thing about the Murrayfield gig is that, rather than sending all the African artists away to a big glass dome in Cornwall and hoping nobody notices how offensive this is, they get to play on the proper stage and get treated as equals. Hopefully the audience won't be twats and rush on mass to the toilets during their slots. Such behaviour is entirely unnecessary, especially when you've got Annie Lennox on the bill.
- The Mahotella Queens - They do 'Mbaquanga', which is apparently a fusion of traditional South African tribal music with South African jazz, blues, soul, and gospel, which explains why the name's a bit of a mouthful.
- Miriam Makeba - She's sang before both President Kennedy and Paul Simon. If only there was something else linking those two names.
- McFly - They did the Tokyo Live 8 gig, where they appeared on the same bill as Bjork. Since then, bookies have drastically shortened the odds on porcine aviation.
- Youssou N'Dour - Now that he's dueted with Dido, he's never going to feel clean again.
- Brad Pitt - Seriously, what has he done with his hair?
- The Proclaimers - Who are scheduled to open the gig with 500 Miles, which is vaguely appropriate, what with the marching theme of the day. Of course, when you get right down to it, few people would walk 500 miles to see the Proclaimers play, but if they could get a bus they'd probably be up for it.
- Oumou Sangare - She practices the Wassoulou sound, which is based on an ancient tradition of hunting rituals mixed with songs about devotion and praise. We reckon she might be a bit like Charlotte Church.
- Claudia Schiffer - Probably a good bet for a "nice dress" moment.
- Snow Patrol - Probably not a good bet for a "nice dress" moment. In fact, Claudia's probably a better bet for a "good song" moment than these chancers.
- Sugababes - They know all about poverty, having had many hits with songs about the subject, Hole in the Bread, Cheap Like Me, Overdrawn and In the Red-dle.
- Texas - You can say what you want about Texas, unfortunately you can't help but pepper it with uncomplimentary swearwords
- The Thrills - Not since The Incredibly Entertaining All Tuba Orchestra has a band been so inappropriately named.
- Travis - We believe they'll be doing Why Does it Always Rain on Me, Side, with it's "A circle only has one side" lyric, and it's follow up single Fuck Me! Aren't Triangles Pointy?.
- Midge Ure - Someone sent us a cryptic e-mail which suggested that he'd be doing something about an Austrian city, but that means nothing to us.
- Wet Wet Wet - We've ran out of Marty Pellow/Heroin gags now. Sorry.
- The Zutons - Don't Ever Think (Too Much) they sang, which is good advice if you're listening to The Zutons. Thinking too much while listening to the Zutons is playing is likely to lead to you coming up with better things to do with your time, such as not listening to the Zutons.
