Front Row Dress Circle

Not so long ago you used to get complete losers who got their rocks off by picking up the phone, dialing a random number (yours) and then breathing heavily down the line at you. Obscene phonecalls is what they were generally known as and the best way to deal with such a moron was to have a whistle handy and blow it down the receiver as loud as you could manage. If you were really lucky you could hear as they screeched and dropped the phone - I suppose these days that person would report you and sue you for using undue force…

These days things have not changed, you still get these idiots who think it is funny - and weirdly a turn on - to send stupid and obscene messages to women only now it id done by mobile phone and commonly in the form of text messages. Text Pests you call them - ’small things amuse small minds’ as the saying goes. TV presenter Vernon Kay has been apologising in overdrive recently when he was exposed as one of these numpties by The Sun - no problems with me Vernie-baby, but I am sure your wife Tess Daly is very upset that you have been sending racy texts to a collection of bimbos over the past five years. She is, in fact, feeling rightly humiliated and betrayed and why should she not…? this couple market themselves as tv’s Golden Couple and have two young children, even though Vernon is no real catch - about as sexy as Ringo Starr - his wife must be wondering why on earth he had to behave in such an immature way.

Here’s your answer Tessie dear: he is a man. Some men - not all thank god - find this kind of thing titillating, amusing and it relieves some sort of inner-boredom they have. It is like those little boys who play knock-knock-run-run and flash-your-winkie-at-the-girls in the playground. Tess, you will have to rise above this and as you have two small children you will have to make this man of yours behave himself. You are far better than any of those plastic, flammable blow-up dolls he pleasured himself over - chin up, keep smiling…and give him absolute hell at home!

Popularity: 15% [?]

Personally I cannot for the life of me detect a single note of the old campfire song Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gumtree in the flute riff of the huge Aussie hit song Down Under by Men at Work.

But the Australian band may have to pay millions in royalties after a court ruled that they copied a well-known children’s campfire song for the flute melody in their 1980s hit Down Under. ‘Kookaburra Sits In the Old Gum Tree’ was written more than 70 years ago by Australian teacher Marion Sinclair for a Girl Guides competition and the song has been a favourite around camp fires from New Zealand to Canada. The teacher died in 1988 and publishing company Larrikin Music owns the copyright to her song about the native Australian bird. Larrikin filed the copyright action last year.

Down Under and the album Business As Usual topped the Australian, American and British charts in early 1983. The song remains an unofficial anthem for Australia, it was our official victory song when Australia won the 1983 America’s Cup yacht race, and was ranked fourth in a 2001 music industry survey of the best Australian songs.

Men At Work won the 1983 Grammy Award for Best New Artist but I remember when they appeared on television for the very first time. It was 1981 and Ian Meldrum introduced them on his show Countdown - he announced them as a ‘new group with a cute song…Who Can It Be Now’. The rest is history.

Trivia: When Men At Work performed their hit ‘Down Under’ at the 1983 Grammy Awards singer Colin Hay was so nervous he fluffed the start of the song singing a line of the chorus instead of the first line of the song.

Popularity: 10% [?]

Those Irish twins Jedward (John and Edward) are really going from strength to strength since their exit from the X Factor competition last year. Despite what members of the public thought and said about them they have not disappeared into obscurity, nor have they fallen flat on their faces. I think the public have taken these boys to their hearts and the reason they are still around while other more successful contestants such as…funny, no names spring immediately to mind!

Well Joe for instance, the winner of X Factor - anyone heard of him just lately? John and Edward have what the others do not possess - a gimmick. You need a very unique talent to not need a gimmick if you want to be noticed, John and Edward know this all too well and they are raking it in while…Olly (that’s his name!) will probably finish up singing at Butlins. And Olly was the better performer by far…

I have seen John and Edward on the television three times this week so far - as for the lovely, talented Joe McElderry…a successful gimmick can sometimes be more lucrative than natural talent. Sad but true.

Popularity: 9% [?]