Pink Floyd: the Good News

I'm feeling like Cyril Fletcher in That's Life. Today I am indebted to......Nicky in Belgium for today's good news snippet.

Nicky discovered that Pink Floyd were reuniting, which, depending on your view of the band, may be good or bad news.

But what's good is that they're doing it for charity, unlike a lot of greedy oldsters (yes Spandau Ballet, Status Quo and Genesis, I mean you.)

Stay off the screen, 80s heart throbs

I know there's a big trend at the moment for bands from the 80s to go on tour and make big profits. But it's one trend I'm keen to avoid. I inadvertently recorded a programme about the 80s which I thought was going to be more of a tribute with some history and old footage. I should have thought twice when I saw that shrieky old Denise Van Outen was presenting it. Instead, it was lots of formerly great acts from the 80s belting out their hits, but now in their 40s and 50s.

Yeuch!

The sad fact was, none of them had been botox'd, dermabrasioned, "filled" or anything else. So there they were, a horrible reminder of the ageing process and one's own mortality.

Glenn Gregory from Heaven 17, now presumably bald (wearing a cap) with a ferocious set of unnaturally white teeth. Nick Kershaw - bald - and unrecognisable except that the song sounded exactly the same. That Limahl from Kajagoogoo, tragically wearing the same dyed coxscomb and kids' clothes. Paul Young, not ageing too badly but a horrendous shade of orange. And Nick Heywood with a creepy beard and sad looking bleary eyes.

I said it before when Spandau Ballet reunited. Don't do it guys! Trouble is, there's plainly cash to be made from these reunion tours and plainly enough old fogies to turn out and relive their youth. Not for me. I don't mind listening to the gloriously naff old songs on my iPod, but I wouldn't be seen dead doing a staid little jig to the middle-aged groovers now. I prefer to remember them - and me - in my heyday, when Maddie Grigg and I used to polish off a bottle of Concord wine and then go on the bus down to the Cooperage and knock them all dead, dancing to Heaven 17 and ABC.

Spandau Ballet - there's no need to reunite

The BBC carried a news item today "for ageing New Romantics." (thanks!). Viz a viz, Spandau Ballet have now agreed to reunite, following their acrimonious court case. Mind, their ageing fans will have quite a wait because lead singer Tony Hadley claims his diary is too full for four years.

Four years?! I mean, nice work Tony, you've scored a few points with the fact that following one or two appearances on reality TV, you have a good gig going with Butlins and Pontins, but my advice would be to act quickly. The band members must all be pushing 50 so who knows if one of them might snuff it by four years.

Frankly, I wouldn't care if they didn't reunite. I wasn't a big fan of SB. We used to refer to Hadley as "the opera singer" because of his strangled vocals. I hated "Gold," although some of their earlier songs were OK. I remember dancing to them wearing the uniform of the time, stripy red and white knickerbockers, flowing belt, frilly white shirt and ballet pumps. Yes, quite.

It's ok when a pop star grows old with you, eg David Bowie; but when a group disappears and then decides to resurface to hopefully pay off their mortgages, it's very disconcerting to see them all looking fat, jowly, bald and/or grizzled. It reminds you of your own mortality (and appearance). I think we all believe we look the same, hardly any different, so seeing Tony Hadley et al with beer guts and enough chins to rival the Chinese phone book is a bit of a zeitgist moment.

Mind, I don't think we're talking the Take That reunion, are we? Those boys do look a bit old to be a boy band now but at least they've still got their own hair and teeth.

I remember watching a terribly sad programme a while ago featuring 70s band The Sweet, who were still gigging. Their lead singer Brian Connolly (now deceased) had been a heavy drinker and paid the price: he was shown shuffling into a club, a shadow of his former self after a stroke, but still trying to perform Blockbuster and the other hits. Tony and the gang, don't do it! Leave us with our memories, with you in your prime.