Author Archives: Paul

….your younger sister is expecting her first grandchild. Though it’s hard to imagine anyone looking less like a grandma than my sister Caroline, who celebrates her birthday today. But then my family have a tradition of youthful grandparenthood. My mum was even younger when my sister Anita had her first baby and as for my […]

Especially on the first anniversary of his death but, well, I’ve never been a huge Prince fan. I thought he was fantastic – brilliant musician and an astonishing live performer. He was phenomenally talented but although I quite like a lot of his records, I’m not mad about any of them. I saw him at […]

…….it was ever thus. In 1960, an American singer called Ray Peterson had a big US hit with Tell Laura I Love Her. Decca Records thought its tragic tale was in very poor taste, so they declined to release it in the UK. EMI had no such scruples. They found an unknown Welsh singer called […]

Some tracks just pick themselves.

Around 1989, I went with my then girlfriend to see Diana Ross at Wembley Arena. It was very strange – an almost quasi-religious experience with Diana like some sort of deity who’d deigned descend amongst her adoring disciples. Her performance betrayed a person who’d become too accustomed to 25 global adulation, but one bit will […]

They now have a Premier League football team. Brighton’s 2-1 win over Wigan means they’ll be playing in the top flight next season. If I had to live outside the M25, I’d head for Brighton. I love its relaxed tolerant vibe, thriving gay community, countless artisan coffee shops and the fact that it has a […]

The cult film was released 30 years ago and I have an odd thing in common with Richard E Grant who, of course, played Withnail. We share a deep love of Christmas pudding. Like me, he apparently stocks up with a few while they’re in the shops, so he can enjoy them throughout the year. […]

Then I’d put this on. Fifteen seconds in, when he says “Thunderbirds are go!” I’d bring on the the swirling multicoloured lights, strobes and boom – the dance floor would fill and we were away. This was the typically low-key way I’d begin my DJ set when this record was a hit. And now I […]

Good Friday was always the most miserable day in the Catholic calendar. Around Kilburn and Cricklewood in the 1970s, any display of happiness was, quite literally, frowned upon. This was the day that Jesus was allegedly crucified, so sad faces were compulsory. Except that it was all a charade. We knew perfectly well that two […]

My friend Bertie Miller cycles a few laps of Regents Park every Friday morning with a band of like-minded enthisiasts including Gary Kemp. He invited me to join them and, since the sun had got its hat on this morning, I did. I soon discovered that the sun wasn’t the only one with its hat […]