HIP-HOP HACKS
Almost
a year after recording it, Worthing Herald series “supergroup” the
Hailing Stones unleashed their debut single on an unsuspecting public
on Thursday (20 January).
Sports editor Richard Amey
(guitars/bass), Shoreham Herald reporter Jamie Hailstone (vocals) and
Shoreham production editor Frank Horsley (drums) hope local record
buyers will warm to the funk and hip-hop combination of original title
track One-Shot Charlie.
The single also includes an
“Eighties-style remix of Charlie and an unusual cover version of The
Weight , originally recorded by The Band back in the Sixties”.
Every penny raised from the CD, a bargain £3, is going towards local children’s hospice fund the Chestnut Tree House Appeal.
The
single was made possible by local guitarist Richard Durrant, who agreed
to let the Hailing Stones into his studio to do their musical worst for
charity.
One-Shot Charlie can be ordered online from www.longman-records.com
Newspapers are beyond his ken
London’s
ever-energetic Lord Mayor, Ken Livingstone, in Edinburgh spreading the
good news about congestion charges, took the opportunity to have a dig
at his nemesis – the Evening Standard .
Cheekie chappie
Livingstone pointed out that the Standard was making massive savings
from congestion charges after cutting its fleet of vans because
deliveries are now far easier. “Yet they have a go at me on a daily
basis”, he complained to The Scotsman ‘s diarist Simon Pia.
People in glasshouses…
“Your
diarist’s famously exhaustive factchecking procedures have
unfortunately let him down in my case,” writes Andrew Gilligan about
Dog’s piece last week.
“My story was not about Martin Markwell’s
surf into his hotel. As subtle clues like the headline, intro, second
par and payoff should have made clear, it was about the previously
unreported fact that the Markwells went missing in the jungle for five
days.
“The fact that the Markwells’ surname was Markwell, not
Hambrook, came from the hotel register, which the manager read to me,
and from a school exercise book their son, Jai, left behind with his
name, Jai Markwell, and age, 5, written on the cover.
“PA’s
errors on this story were completed by their misspelling of Vicky’s
(Jai’s mother)n surname as ‘Maxwell’, which is why it didn’t come up on
the cuts check that I did.
“It is regrettable that your sources’ passion for accuracy in other people’s journalism seems not to extend to their own work.
Oh no… he isn’t?
Veteran
crime hack Chester Stern, now freelancing for the sports pages of his
old paper The Mail on Sunday , had a classic excuse for missing the
Fleet Street leaving bash of MoS investigations editor Paul Henderson.
Told
by a former colleague of the date and venue, Stern sheepishly replied
he couldn’t make it – because the keen amateur actor was that night due
on stage in Croydon, playing one of the ugly sisters in Cinderella
NOW THAT’S WHAT DOG CALLS AN EXPOSÉ
The
Barrhead News isn’t the first newspaper to fall victim to a prankster
footballer getting his tackle out, but few will have used the picture
bigger, across a full page width.
The team boasting an extra
member was Johnstone Burgh, whose John Sherry was pictured with his
tackle out, broad smile on face, and arms round a couple of colleagues.
The
following edition of the Barrhead News (19 January) reported how
“horrified”readers had called to complain and that the club and player
had offered a full apology.
Also that the local police will be “looking into the matter” further.
Ironically,
the same edition featured a shock-horror story about a website which
“features a catalogue of shocking pictures”including “crude snaps”.
There
was obviously something in the air on the national picture desks last
Thursday, judging by these two efforts from the Times and the Indy .
The Independent ‘s obit of film star Ruth Warrick was illustrated with
a picture of Claudette Colbert. Even fewer excuses on the Times for
getting former president Richard Nixon mixed up with Jimmy Carter.
Times
editor Robert Thomson was a little sniffy about Press Gazette ‘s trust
survey last week.”I’m not sure a quickie poll is the most accurate
measure of public sentiment.”he said of our YouGov survey of more than
2,000 members of the public.
So Dog was delighted to see this item in the Times on Tuesday, reporting a poll of, er, 150 “opinion formers” in the UK.
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