Sound advice

If you've ever signed up to do something daft and then faced the incredulity of concerned friends eager to dissuade you from going through with it, then you can probably sympathise with Radiohead's current predicament. For some reason, they agreed to play a gig in Tel Aviv as part of their tour this summer, and now a whole host of artists - from Ricky Tomlinson, Mike Leigh and Ken Loach to Thurston Moore, China Mieville, Roger Waters, Michael Rosen and Robert Wyatt - are attempting to convince them via the medium of an open letter that performing there would constitute hypocrisy, given the band's support for human rights issues and organisations in other contexts.

Backing down at this stage would be a little embarrassing - but better that than flagrantly ignoring the cultural boycott of Israel for which Palestinians have protested.