For the time being we have our Top Tens and Number Ones and while science marches to the beat that will finally destroy it all, it also comes up with the goods that will satisfy our other endless appetite, that of apparent change. Also, my worst fears about the book, that it’s a compilation of quackery mixed with the odd musical reference, were assuaged by the fact that Ben Goldacre is quite possibly the best known British crusader against quackery. Just remember that they in reality will have very little genuine idea of how they arrived at their success or what they should be doing next in their career to prevent it from crashing to the ground. I dread when people my age are old enough to start writing these books and tell me how the Iraq War protest marches were the last bastion of civilised society etc.

From now on every time you telephone someone on business remember to give them your name and the company you are from (even though it’s only you). THIS BOOK IS SOLD SUBJECT TO THE CONDITION THAT IT SHALL NOT BY WAY OF TRADE OR OTHERWISE BE LENT, RESOLD, HIRED OUT OR OTHERWISE CIRCULATED WITHOUT THE PUBLISHER’S PRIOR CONSENT IN ANY FORM OF BINDING OR COVER OTHER THAN THAT IN WHICH IT lS PUBLISHED AND WITHOUT A SIMILAR CONDITION INCLUDING THIS CONDITION BEING IMPOSED IN THE SUBSEOUENT PUBLISHER.

I remember playground rumours that their name stood for ‘Kings Love Fucking’ (it doesn't, I don't think) and I remember feeling baffled by the news in 1994 that they had deleted all their recordings and burnt a million pounds in cash on a remote Scottish island. Sometimes, the music is just a means to an end – in their case, a million-quid bonfire that Higgs suggests may be “a magical act that forged the 21st century”. The other common way that recording studios are classified is whether the desk is computer assisted or not. Those nights when I was unlucky enough to be semi-unconscious on a couch while an inebriated loser has been spouting cod philosophy inspired by the latest science class he’s taking and mixing it with the little philosophy he thinks he knows, more often than not for the benefit of some girl who decided an hour ago to give him the benefit of the doubt and is patiently waiting for him to be done talking and solicit her preference of his room or hers. Subirono un'azione legale dagli ABBA per l'uso di un sample e offrirono un finto disco d'oro ad una prostituta svedese sosia di Agnetha Fältskog, prima di distruggere in un rogo tutte le copie del loro primo album, scatenando le ire di un contadino che li allontano con gli spari.

I just hope to all that is holy that this is the last time I get tricked into reading about psychogeography and the sun coming up when you're on pills. I certainly wasn't expecting this mind-altering manifesto from John Higgs, which somehow draws connections between such disparate entities as the Cabaret Voltaire and Doctor Who, between Bill Nighy and the Kennedy assassination. The book is a gauche attempt to weave together the story of a band (about which I actually learned very little, but perhaps and in retrospect more than I needed to) with an eclectic mix of incongruous, incoherent and poorly stitched together theories about art, psychology, alchemy, magic and (I’m serious) the world financial crisis of 2008.Succeeds by ignoring music for much of the story, in favour of the group's philosophical and psycho-geographical underpinnings in Discordianism, situationism, art and magic. The period of the early-to-mid 1990s is frequently overlooked in our cultural histories,’ Higgs says, ‘yet it was far more potent and strange than it is usually given credit for. I don't know who the hell Ben Goldacre is, but, quote attributed to him on the cover has to be a joke. Unwrap pop’s layers and what we are left with is the same old plate of meat and two veg that have kept generations of pop pickers well satisfied. People equate a Number One with fame, endless wealth and easy sex – a myth that they want to believe and one that the popular press want to see continued.

Was this destruction of the remaining savings from their music career - “the act they can never explain or get over” - some form of confrontational artistic statement? The one star I am assigning to this book is a total insult to the other two books I’ve given one star to. You can begin any Sunday evening by listening to Bruno Brookes introducing the Top 40 Show between 4pm and 7pm. Although a Number One single cannot sound like an indie trash record, they do not have to sound like they have cost a million to make, unlike a Number One LP. There will also be a recreation room with a television, pool table and computer games to keep musicians amused whilst the traditional producer casts his spells without being hindered by the traditional musicians’ paranoid presence.Our age will be remembered in the future as a period in history when banks went to ridiculous and unparalleled lengths to compete with each other to win the allegiances of the young and account free. This book is out of my regular wheelhouse and yet it has plenty of facets such that there are enough to overlap and catch my interest.