Phill walks on to the stage with Noel Fielding to whoops and cheers and the lights go down, as does Spooner, into my handbag with my mobile phone. Noel is wearing an Icelandic jumper in a colour of terrier grey which must, surely, be as uncomfortable as it looks. I do know this to be true as I once, not only owned a sweater of a similar type, but actually knitted one as a stop smoking remedy a couple of decades ago.
It kept my hands busy.
The one I knitted, however, was a vivid blue with red and white patterns draped around the yolk and it was given as a present to my then fiance. Poor soul. You would think he would have seen the writing in the yarn. It was almost Grimmlike - you know - as in one of those fairy stories where the heroine has to weave a cloak out of nettles and throw it over the neck of the wild swan to turn him back into a prince, except that in my case it entrapped the previously footloose and fancy free prince and turned him into a domesticated old turkey for twenty five years until he managed to completely unravel himself. There's a picture of him gamely wearing it, looking terrified, overstuffed and startled, exactly like Colin Firth in the Bridget Jones Christmas Party scene, except shorter. Worcester better watch out if I ever appear brandishing a pair of knitting needles.
Anyway, I digress. Roll the camera back to Noel Fielding hunched on stage like a mangy dog with eyeliner surely sweating under the studio lights. I can't understand why a) he's wearing it, and b) he isn't scratching himself with a silver high-heeled hind leg. The guests appear. I'm so not a hip and happening person (a fact to which, had you not already guessed, the previous sentence would have alerted you) and I so I don't really know any of them. One is a blonde with hair falling over her face and a lot of black eye make up, and another is a comedian I haven't heard of. The third is a member of Spinal Tap and also does the voices for, amongst others, Mr Burns in The Simpsons so I have, at least, heard him, if not of him. He is also possibly the closest person to my age in the whole theatre (well Phill is 47 so not quite the only person). The final guest is Jameliah, and I had to Google the spelling of her name so it's safe to say I have only the vaguest idea of her importance in the musical universe. Claudia Winkleman, possibly my least favourite television presenter, is centre stage in the chair. I haven't liked her ever since I appeared on a dismal regional show she presented with George Fake Tan Hamilton III. It was, readers ( or let's be realistic here, reader), a high moment in television broadcasting history for all three of us. Claudia is also sporting the panda-eyed, my husband beats me, look. There seems to be something of a theme going on here.
The show kicks off. Or at least stumbles off at random tangents that have absolutely nothing to do with the questions. Jamelia tells us about filming with Vinnie Jones in Hungary. The chap from Spinal Tap speaks in the voice of Mr Burns but otherwise struggles to be either funny or witty or even, apparently, alive. Little Boots, the floppy haired, black-eyed Blonde hides her personality under her fringe and says nothing. Jamelia is gorgeous, adorably quirky and irreverent, Phill is as Phillish witty as ever and Noel looks like someone who should be sitting on the street holding an upside down sign asking for spare change. The biggest surprise, however, is Claudia who, though I hate to say it, is actually quite likeable. And then finally, it's the line-up.
This is the part of the show I don't get. Why on earth would you want to trot yourself onto a stage holding a number to remind a world that has forgotten you, just how forgettable you truly are, while three smart-arse gits on a panel game sit and make personal jibes about your appearance? Is any 'new single' really worth the humiliation? Apparently so, since they churn it out week after week.
This time it's a rapper. Or something with black guys in hoodies. What do I know, I'm fifty ffs? They show the video and on come the mugs. I can immediately tell it's No 3 because he looks nervous and sullen while the others just look sullen. Claudia asks Noel's team to chose and Jamelia excuses herself. 'I'm going to have to sit this one out,' she says. 'As I actually know him.'
'Have you worked with him before?' Asks Claudia, cheerily.
'No, he tried to sell a story on me to the papers.' Says Jamelia.
Gulp. Audience-wide sharp intake of breath.
'Yeah, but I mean, I like to think there's some justice in the world because all these years later and look, I'm on the panel and he's in the line up.' She snaps her fingers.
Ah. Can't you just see the panic in the producer's eyes at this point as they realise that of all the people with new singles in all the world they have inadvertently chosen the one wannabe artist who has tried to sell a story to the press about one of the panelists.
Televisual gold.
We're publishing Sod's Law by Sam Leith at Pedantic next month. This would be one for the book.
