Alex James. Remember when you fancied him? You were cooler than your friends because they all fancied Damon when eyeing up Blur like a sexy meat hamper. Alex James was the dreamboat on bass and oh! How he made you swoon.

Sadly, for The Alex James Fan Club, he’s always been an unbearable peen. We’ve been told first hand by one member of Blur that people have to write his basslines for him and he copies them for live shows.

And of course, these days, he’s an even bigger weapon. He makes cheese and has named some of his children Geronimo, Artemis and Galileo. AND BETTER YET, he likes hanging around with Jeremy Clarkson and David Cameron (see above) AS WELL AS running a festival which has financially crippled a primary school!

The Alex James Fan Club has probably been sticking their collective fingers in their ears for the last few years, desperately trying to avoid the obvious shortcomings of their fave Britpop hunk. However, seeing as most Blur fans from the mid-90s are now in respectable jobs and giving off an air of being a conscientious member of society, they’ll have to try twice as hard to ignore this slop of news.

Remember when James ran something called ‘Harvest’? It was a festival that had food, music and visiting Tories. Alex tottered around in tweed like Lord Snooty’s vaguely eccentric, scruffy cousin and well…

…the festival has abruptly ceased trading according to The Guardian and everyone concerned is now “uncontactable” despite the fact that “tickets for next year’s festival had already been sold.”

The Alex James Presents Harvest website offers no information about refunds and the former Fat Les’er isn’t keen to talk about it to anyone.

His publicist is similarly quiet, although, they will tell you about his new mozzarella and the “foodio” he’s building so he can think about cheese. But maybe Alex is just busy, right? Yep. Busy talking about his line of cheese at Asda, which he recently crowed about, saying:

“It’s generated something like £2m worth of publicity! It even made the New York Times! But I suppose that’s what I set out to do.”

So far, so boring business. But what about the local primary school he’s shafting?

The local school, Kingham primary, organises its own annual music festival. Alex James used their contacts book and the school duly provided him with entertainment. However, now the festival has gone belly up, this little school is out of pocket.

Headteacher Ed Read told the Cotswold Journal that it was owed £7,000 for the entertainment it organised.

“There are 200 children at this state school who rely on that money. It’s going to have a huge impact. With the national austerity measures, budgets in schools have been reduced. Our music teacher is paid largely by the music festival we do ourselves. We are either going to have to lose the music teacher, or take it from other budgets which will reduce other parts of the curriculum.”

So there you have it. As we stand, Alex James is not only an irritating tit, but one that could well lose someone their job and bugger up a load of children’s schooling.

We should’ve known really, afterall, he was in a band called MeMeMe.

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Liam Gallagher, a man who facially resembles a cross between a Dickensian henchman and a brain damaged howler monkey, is well known for holding certain controversial views on the world around him. He’s the kind of gent that, if he were punch a GPS satellite out of the sky for ‘looking at him funny’, most people wouldn’t be 100% surprised.

Now, the former front brother of Oasis has decided to launch into a fashion crusade in an effort to clean up the image of some of music’s biggest stars. The bowl-cut-toting funster’s love of the finer fashions have often seen comparisons drawn between him and some of the most flamboyant characters in modern celebrity and fashion.

Who can forget that parka that he wore at Glastonbury 1996, T in the Park 1998, V Festival 2005, Knebworth well, actually… pretty much every live show that Oasis have done**. Still, it had a nice furry hood and was very practical in the winter, according to his mummykins.

Seemingly hoping to reignite some sort of North-South music rivalry with one of the biggest indie bands of the last two years, Gallagher has slated the style of ‘folk’ band Mumford and Sons.

“They look like f****** Amish people…”

Gallagher, who has clearly never seen an Amish person, was speaking in an interview with The Sun newspaper. Of course, the Oasis moaner is never short of a ridiculous pejorative and went on to say:

“You know, them ones with the big sides that don’t use electricity? Growing their own food and putting barns up…I need music to be a bit more sexy and played by people who look a bit f****** dangerous.”

We’re no experts but there are many hazards which are inherent in both farming and construction. Have you ever been to a building site? It’s full of signs telling you how dangerous things are. What about growing food? I doubt anyone who has ever had their hand passed through a wheat thresher would try to tell you that farming is a safe occupation.

Oh, hang on. He doesn’t mean dangerous in the sense of hazards to health. He means the Beady Eye sense of ‘dangerous’. C’mon. You know the one. The people that love Oasis and Kasabian and throw their arms around as though they’re plants desperately trying to drag themselves up towards the sun by swaying back and forth. The sun in this case being the one that Liam seems to believe shines out of his rectum.

Still not with us on the danger thing? He means idiots in parkas and Adidas gazelles that have haircuts that look as though they’re an experiment designed to prove the effects of gravitational pull and are liable to glass anyone who looks at them for too long for being a ‘f**king ponce’. Yeah- those guys. Liam’s guys.

**hecklerspray would like to point out that we couldn’t care less if Oasis ever actually played these festivals on these dates.

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Once upon a time, rock stars had to do outlandish things to get noticed. David Bowie pretended to be from space and had sex with Iggy Pop. Led Zep were rumoured to stick fish up lady’s front bottoms and Fleetwood Mac blew coke up each other’s arses when their noses were too hammered and frail. Let’s not talk about GG Allin. And now, just to prove that rock really is as dead and dull and Nana Mouskouri’s knicker drawer, Damon Albarn has managed to cause small outrage with a single, legally bought in a shop cigarette.

Yessir, the Gorillaz honcho could apparently be in ‘big trouble’ after lighting a cigarette, which can be bought by any tall 15 year old with enough confidence to try buying them, whilst performing on stage.

The Blur warbler was performing with his cartoon band Gorillaz when he sparked up mid-way through a live set at a gig in Portsmouth. But you can’t smoke in this particular venue and… well… it’s likely Albarn absent mindedly did it as opposed to sticking a fist up, Wolfie Smith style and saying “Fuck the nanny state!”

It’s pretty likely that no-one in the audience really noticed either because, y’know, it’s not like he got his dick out, slap it a bit to find a vein to stick a manky needle in and then passed out, smacked up is it? That’s not stopped people from being ‘outraged’ though.

Albarn could be fined up to £2,500 after anti-smoking campaigners were ‘outraged’ by his wild, brutal, insane actions.

Idiots at Action on Smoking and Health are calling for Albarn and guest performer Paul Simonon, who also smoked the cigarette to be punished.

A source told The Daily Mirror:

“There can be no excuse for that as it is an indoor place and the law is very clear – we are not allowed to smoke on stage unless it’s relevant to the act.”

Oooooh!

“They should be fined. It’s not just the artist, it’s the premises where the act is held. I would expect the local authority to take the appropriate action.”

Jesus wept. Some people really are joyless c*nts aren’t they?

They added:

“It’s not just illegal but more importantly it’s about the message it sends out to fans. People in the public eye have a duty not to promote smoking. It’s very irresponsible…”

Imagine if these people had been around in the sixties. They would have been found crying in UFO/Haight-Ashbury wagging their fingers at people rolling reefers and saying:

“You think you’re expanding your mind now… but what about the hidden dangers of carcinogens in smoke? Didn’t think about that did you? Hmm? Are you listening to me? No, I don’t understand what you mean when you talk about the infinite capabilities of the human soul when traversing through a fourth dimensional universal platform. Harshing what vibe?”

Anyway, there’s nothing to get worked up about here. Someone smoked a fag. Next week: Lobbyists sit outside public house tutting.

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Has Nick Leeson just been arrested for his part in the downfall of Barings bank? Has eBay just been founded? Has Rose West just been sentenced for the killing of 10 women and children?

No, that’s because it’s not 1995 any more (sorry, mid-90s fans). But looking at some headlines you might be forgiven for thinking that it’s 1995, because the WAR between Oasis and Blur is back ON. Apparently.

After Blur had critical and fan adoration heaped on them in big hot dollops for their reunion gigs at Glastonbury and Hyde Park, its now been decided by someone that the classic Britpop feud is to resume.

Oasis are playing Wembley this week, and it’s reported they have to do ‘something special’ in order to make Blur look like a bunch of Fred Perry sponsored pony-bummers.

Despite Oasis’seses three dates at the London stadium selling out, many tickets have apparently gone on sale online for as little as £25 – which is almost half the face value. Or, just 51p less than the 12 jar wooden revolving spice rack you can buy in Argos.

Back in ‘95 it was Blur’s Country House which won the battle of Britpop, outselling Oasis’ Roll With It. Although that’s a bit like asking “Which is the best? Solid, but really smelly poo – or sloppy, but smell-free poo?”

14 years has passed - Damon has developed an ape comfort zone with his involvement in the Gorillaz and the opera Monkey: Journey To The West – whilst Liam has launched his own clothing range and Noel currently appears in a promo on Sky News saying how much he likes Sky News. Oh, they also released some albums as well.

Whether or not you give a shit about either band, it’s not really about the music, or north versus south, or even knees-up versus fook-off. It’s a series of headline friendly soundbites between the two that we can all enjoy.

In 1995 Noel famously told The Observer that he hoped Albarn would catch AIDS and die. But it was to be another four years before Albarn made this equally shocking statement about the Gallaghers: “I just think it was a shame when they started appearing in Hello and OK magazines”.

ZING! Couple that searing, pithy wit with the fact that Damon Albarn has the world’s most boring speaking voice and 2009 will clearly be the year of Britpopageddon 2: This Time They’re All A Bit Older And Probably Go To Bed Earlier. It is on. Or not.

This was a guest blog by the insultingly talented Simon Swatman from Mediapill, which you should all look at now because it is phenomenal.

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Alex James – the Hugh Grant-haired, bass-playing, cheese-making lovey of Brit Pop superstars Blur (the pretty one who pursed his lips in every video) – has re-sparked rumours of Blur reuniting.

True, this is perhaps the 27th time he personally has sparked the rumours of Blur reuniting.

And, true, it’ll almost certainly be as fruitless as the rest of them. But still, anything to make people realise the Kaiser Chiefs are nothing but an insulting pretender to their throne is worth commenting on.

It’s been five years since they released Think Tank; a kind of ‘half-good, half-wanky’ take on modern culture (a feeling encapsulated perfectly by the usage of a Banksy painting on the front cover – the King of ‘half-good, half-wanky’). Since then the Blur boys have all taken their own unique paths.

Lead guitarist Graham Coxon – one of the greatest guitar players in the world (how will the hecklerspray massive react to that statement we wonder?) was the first to leave the band. He featured on just one track of Think Tank before realising that the studio walls weren’t big enough to hold his talent and Damon’s ego.

And we can only thank baby Jesus for that, for he has since gone on to become the finest solo-artist in the country (think differently do ya? Well bring it on. And if any of you so much as think of challenging that with Paolo Nutini, then prepare for the wrath of hecklerspray).

Damon Albarn, the self-confessed overlord of creativity, has, among other things, made an album in Mali with a bunch of Malinese musicians, which was lovely.

He has furthered his work with Gorillaz and announced himself to be a communist – something that finally explains the collaboration with Ken Livingstone in The Great Escape on the track Old Arnold Same.

No wonder Oasis won.

Damon’s latest project was to make a Chinese opera with the Gorillaz, which he composed via some interesting yet half-wanky thinking. He said:

I created a mathematical system that guaranteed I wouldn’t be able to use any of my western melodic ideas. I came up with this system based on a series of numbers that relate to the five pointed star of the Communist party. Then there is a fight scene based on a 15 point star system. You rotate the numbers on the star and put in different keys

A genius, or a wanker? You decide.

Dave Rowntree, the drummer, was famous for having literally no personality. He has since gone on to become a Labour MP.

And Alex James has become a farmer who, as previously stated, makes his own cheese, writes about life in the countryside endlessly, telling stories about hanging out with flocks of sheep and Jeremy Clarkson.

Little wonder then that his voice is the most often heard in regards to a reunion.

Damon recently dismissed the idea of a Blur reunion, because none of them need the money, but Alex aint so sure. According to the Evening Echo, he said:

We’re all pretty busy, but I’d be surprised if it never happens, but I would be terrified if it was happening on Monday.

Sunday, Sunday, here again, a walk in the farm, you speak to Jeremy Clarkson and you make some cheese, you dream of Blur reuniting, cos the life you’ve made is depressing, to gather the band around the table, and have another go, fuck those Sunday sheeeeep.

Yeah, it may turn out they’re half as good as before, but half as good as old Blur is twice as good as new Kaiser Chiefs and as far as the youth of today are concerned all we used to listen to was the Spice Girls and Take That.

Come back and show them there was more.

Read More – James Hints at Blur reunion – Evening Echo