OK, it goes without saying that you wouldn't really want to be Ringo Starr at any moment, unless you're into being recovering Scouse alcoholics who hit things for a living and sing songs about boning 16-year-olds.

But, seriously, you wouldn't want to be Ringo Starr right now. He's stropped off Live With Regis & Kelly right before he was supposed to appear, you see.

Ringo Starr hasn't had the best of years. He's watched Paul McCartney sign a clever new record deal and get lauded as a visionary. He's seen John Lennon get commemorated in a monolithic tower of light that will outlast us all. And he's seen George Harrison get crowned as the fourth-richest dead man alive. And what about Ringo?

Well, Ringo Starr was lucky enough to open Liverpool's tenure as European capital of culture last week, but that couldn't have backfired more spectacularly. Yes, Ringo Starr may have called his new album Liverpool8 and, yes, Ringo Starr may have told the thousands of fans watching him that he was going to move back to Liverpool.

But thanks to a subsequent TV appearance where he basically just went "Pffft – live in Liverpool? Fuck off, have you actually been there? It's shit, and I'm Ringo Starr. I'm Ringo fucking Starr!" he's just about the most hated man in Merseyside at the moment.

And things aren't going particularly well for Ringo in America at the moment. Yesterday Ringo was set to appear on Live With Kelly And Regis to perform his song Liverpool 8, but the song didn't fit with the show's strict 'two and a half minute performances only' policy. And then it all kicked off. The New York Daily News reports:

When he did a run-through yesterday morning, the song took nearly five minutes. "Live" producer Michael Gelman was willing to go 2 minutes and 45 seconds. Starr's camp said it couldn't be cut, and he was gone. "They refused to keep the performance and the interview commitment," said the spokeswoman. "We offered to cut back our chat time and asked them to fade or go to commercial," Starr's spokeswoman told The Associated Press. "They were not willing to do that and Ringo was not willing to cut it further, so without a compromise we were not able to stay. Ringo left saying, 'God bless and goodbye. We still love Regis.'"

It's clear that Ringo Starr obviously took the cutback request as a personal affront because if, say, Paul McCartney phoned up Regis tomorrow and asked to perform all of the Sgt Pepper album on the show, they'd agree immediately. But because it's boring old Ringo Starr he has to live by the same rules as everyone else.

Having said that, it was wrong of Live With Kelly And Regis to ask Ringo Starr to limit his performance to 150 seconds. They should have tried to limit it to zero seconds because – shitting Christ – the song's horrific.

It's like Ringo asked a sensory-deprived toddler to write down the history of The Beatles and then just wailed them in the first tune that popped into his head. Frankly we're wondering if Ringo Starr would be better protesting by never appearing in public ever again. Look…

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Ringo Starr bolts from 'Regis' gig – New York Daily News