“…For the purposes of this book, I will be dealing with rock music and pop music, the subtle distinction being that ‘rock music’ is a loud aggressive form of entertainment enjoyed by many people, whereas ‘pop music’ is crap.”

Many years ago, BB bought a small yellow hardback called “What with being Stone Deaf and Everything” from a remaindered books shop in Manchester. It was a satirical guide to being a musician and caused much hilarity when taken into the studio that the Scarlet Martyrs were using at the time; for example, it quickly became verboten to argue with Meic the producer because, as the book said, he “watches Channel 4 and ‘knows what the kids want’”.

Several years on, while wasting time as usual on t’Internet, BB discovered that the pile of “Stone Deaf” copies had been the last act in a short story of a publishing failure (which was a bit of a blow, as we’d misplaced our copy while failing to become a musician - maybe this explains it). On his web site, author David Hallamshire relates the tragic tale of how publishing conglomerates, takeovers and stock dumping led to only a thousand copies of the book ever making it to the shops before the rest were snapped up for pennies by discerning (and tight) people like us.

Having tried and failed to interest publishers in a revamped version (presumably because Hallamshire isn’t a C-grade celeb with a minor talent, a recovery problem and/or huge false bazongas), he’s said “Stuff the lot of ‘em” and published it himself via Lulu so go there and buy a copy now. It’s got all the old jokes (e.g. the “drummers are thick” gag), lots of new ones and some cartoons for the drummers who can’t read, and all the money raised goes to charity David.