They’re coming to take it away ha-ha, hee-hee, boo-hoo. Yes, the Raccoon Arms Jukebox has spun its last scratchy disc. It has expired. It is an ex-jukebox. It has served us well. Many is the time a

Most of you probably didn’t notice, but a new Liberal Democrat leader was elected this week. You remember the Lib Dems, don’t you? They used to form a small and stubborn little pocket in the last

Once upon a time, there was a Princess much beloved by the people, one who bemoaned the persistence of press intrusion until she wanted to showcase an exclusive couture outfit at a movie premiere or plug a

Viewing the past through the prism of the present is slowly becoming accepted practice. At one end of the scale, we have the conspiracy industry that has now turned its attention away from the JFK assassination and

The Common Market, the Eurovision Song Contest, the European Cup, ‘Jeux Sans Frontieres’ and the European Capital of Culture – initiatives hatched on the continent with the admirable aim of creating a greater understanding and sense

Once a vital lifeline to pop-picking teenagers when the pirates had yet to set sail and the BBC Light Programme swung to terminally upbeat orchestral mood music, Radio Luxembourg finally gave up the ghost of the 208 wavelength

A ballerina with the Royal Ballet being interviewed on the radio the other day described the manner in which so many people outside her profession seem to assume her job is closer to a hobby. The common

It’s an over-familiar sight where TV news bulletins are concerned, one of the predominant clichés employed to emphasise what often seems a curiously testosterone-fuelled competition between broadcasters to bring the scene of the crime into the nation’s

‘White Bear’, the truly unnerving and remarkably horrific 2013 episode of Charlie Brooker’s ‘Twilight Zone’-for-the-twenty-first century series, ‘Black Mirror’, was the main topic of discussion when I saw a close friend the day after its transmission.

With creditors at the door, Greece hovers on the brink of bankruptcy, is finally declared insolvent and then has to be bailed out by an international financial authority. No, not 2015, but 1893. I’ll refrain from saying

Exactly twelve months ago, I was summoned to an office by a distinguished and venerable media magnate, a room of such vast expanse that the intimidating distance between the door I entered through and the monolithic mahogany