Light entertainment stars do the funniest things

And there I was happily reading a Sunday Times news item on Michael Barrymore and the inquest into Stuart Lubbock's death, thinking there was no more frightening epithet in the English language than "serious sexual injuries". How wrong I was. This particular hack preferred the even more unpleasant "extreme anal injuries". OWW.

Also spotted in yesterday's Times: a less-than-admiring review of Will Self's rewriting of Wilde's 'The Picture Of Dorian Gray' and a fine feature on Low by Mark Edwards. Self was criticised for his unwieldy and exhibitionist use of language, and to be fair the bits quoted did seem ridiculously OTT even by his standards - but then that sort of excessive language is his trademark. Incidentally, it sounds like the subject matter of 'Dorian' might make its publication at this moment in time extraordinarily apt, dealing as it does with buggery and serious drug intake... Maybe Self would make the ideal ghost writer for Barrymore's memoirs, if they ever see the light of day.

The tone of the Low piece was somewhat different, but then there are few bands as deserving of such critical awe. 1999's Secret Name redefined the idea of 'heavy' for me - an awesome album.