Wednesday, 31 December 2025

RIP, 2025

As I embark upon preparations for our annual New Year's Eve party tonight, there is just one more task to perform...

Yep, it's time for me to open "The Book of the Dead" again - and once more, it's quite the list!

Lady Sally Oppenheim-Barnes (British politician, MP, Minister in Mrs Thatcher's government, made a Baroness)
Rosita Missoni (Italian knitwear designer, co-founder of Missoni)
Wayne Osmond (US singer-songwriter, The Osmonds, Crazy Horses, Let Me In)
Britt Allcroft (British writer, creator of Children's TV show Thomas & Friends (based on the books by Rev. W. Awdry))
David Lodge (British Booker Prize-nominated author, Changing Places, Small World, Nice Work)
Costas Simitis (Greek statesman, former prime minister)
The Vivienne (British drag performer, RuPaul's Drag Race UK)
Jean-Marie Le Pen (French politician, founder of the National Front)
Peter Yarrow (US singer-songwriter, Peter, Paul and Mary, Leaving on a Jet Plane, Puff, the Magic Dragon)
Laurie Holloway (British pianist, musical director and composer, Engelbert Humperdinck, Parkinson show, wrote TV show themes for Game for a Laugh, Blind Date and more)
Phyllis Dalton (British Oscar-winning costume designer, Lawrence of Arabia, Doctor Zhivago, Oliver!, Henry V, The Princess Bride)
Sam Moore (US soul and R&B singer, Sam & Dave, Soul Man, Hold On, I'm Comin')
Oliviero Toscani (Italian photographer, Benetton adverts)
Tony Slattery (British actor and comedian, Whose Line Is It Anyway?, Peter’s Friends, Just a Minute)
Teddy Osei (Ghanaian Afro-rock and jazz saxophonist, founder-member of Osibisa, Sunshine Day)
Lynne Taylor-Corbett (US choreographer, Footloose)
Diane Langton (British character actress, Hollyoaks, Heartbeat, EastEnders)
Christopher Benjamin (British character actor, Doctor Who, Dick Turpin, It Takes a Worried Man)
Linda Nolan (Irish singer, actress and television personality, The Nolans)
David Lynch (US television and film director, Twin Peaks, Blue Velvet, Mulholland Drive)
Dame Joan Plowright (British actress, Enchanted April, The Entertainer, Tea With Mussolini, Nothing Like a Dame, widow of Sir Laurence Olivier)
Denis Law (British (Scottish) footballer, Manchester United, Huddersfield Town, national team)
Leila Hayes (Australian actress, Prisoner Cell Block H, "Beryl" in Sons and Daughters)
John Sykes (British guitarist, Whitesnake, songwriter Is This Love)
Charlotte Raven (British journalist, Modern Review, The Guardian, New Statesman)
Marianne Faithfull (British singer-songwriter, As Tears Go By, The Ballad of Lucy Jordan, and icon)
Diana Melly (British author, widow of George Melly)
Brian Murphy (British actor, Man About the House, George and Mildred, Last of the Summer Wine)
David Edward Byrd (US music and theatre poster graphic artist, created the original poster for Sondheim's Follies)
Nigel McCrery (British screenwriter and producer, creator: Silent Witness, New Tricks)
The Aga Khan (Swiss-born British-Portuguese religious leader, imam of Nizari Ismaili)
Mike Ratledge (British musician, founder member, Soft Machine)
Lord Dafydd Elis-Thomas (British (Welsh) politician, Welsh nationalist campaigner, former leader of Plaid Cymru, first presiding officer of the Welsh assembly)
Tom Robbins (US novelist, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues)
Asil Nadir (Cypriot businessman, convicted fraudster, Polly Peck scandal)
Geneviève Page (French actress, Belle de Jour, El Cid, The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes)
Francesco Rivella (Italian chemist and chocolatier, Ferrero, inventor of Nutella)
Julian Holloway (British actor, Carry On films, father of Sophie Dahl) 
Paquita la del Barrio (Mexican singer, songwriter and actress)
Rick Buckler (British rock drummer, founder-member of The Jam)
Jerry Butler (US soul singer, Only the Strong Survive)
Gwen McCrae (US soul singer, Rockin’ Chair, All This Love That I’m Givin’, first artist to release Always on My Mind)
D. G. Hessayon (British-Cypriot author and botanist, best-selling "Expert Guides" series of paperback gardening manuals)
Roberta Flack (US singer, Killing Me Softly With His Song, The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face, Feel Like Makin' Love, and legend)
Henry Kelly (Irish-born British TV presenter, Going for Gold, Game for a Laugh)
Michelle Trachtenberg (US actress, Gossip Girl)
Gene Hackman (US actor, Oscar winner, The French Connection, Mississippi Burning, Unforgiven)
Boris Spassky (Russian world champion chess grandmaster, famously beaten by Bobby Fischer in the World Chess Championship 1972 during the Cold War)
Jane Reed (British journalist, editor, Woman’s Own, Today, director, Times Newspaper Holdings)
David Johansen (US musician, founder member of the New York Dolls, actor, Scrooged)
Tuppy Owens (British disability rights and and sexual health activist, founded the Outsiders Club)
Angie Stone (US R&B singer, Wish I Didn't Miss You)

Jack Vettriano (British (Scottish) painter, The Singing Butler (the UK's biggest-selling image))
Bill Dare (British comedy show creator, The Mary Whitehouse Experience, Dead Ringers, producer, Spitting Image)
Kathryn Apanowicz (British actress, "Nurse Rose Butchins" in Angels, regional ITV television presenter, widow of Richard Whiteley)
Carl Dean (US businessman, married to Dolly Parton for 60 years)
Roy Ayers (US jazz-funk musician and composer, Everybody Loves the Sunshine)
Brian James (British punk rock guitarist, founder-member of The Damned, songwriter, New Rose)
Janet Pharaoah (British dancer, choreographer and artistic director, the Moulin Rouge)
Stanley R. Jaffe (US film producer, Fatal Attraction, The Accused, Kramer vs. Kramer)
Stedman Pearson (British singer, founder-member of Five Star)
Bob Rivers (US radio personality and parody musician, Twisted Christmas)
Maisie Trollette (British oldest drag queen, gay scene legend)
Felice Picano (US ground-breaking gay author, Like People in History, The Lure, editor and publisher, SeaHorse Press)
John "Paddy" Hemingway (Irish/British RAF pilot, last surviving pilot of the Battle of Britain, centenarian)
AnNa R. (German singer, Rosenstolz, Gleis 8)
Torquil Norman (British businessman and philantropist, led the restoration of the Camden Roundhouse concert venue)
Eddie Jordan (Irish racing driver, manager and businessman, Formula 1, broadcaster and pundit)
George Foreman (US world champion heavyweight boxer, businessman, "the George Foreman Grill")
Andy Peebles (British radio DJ and presenter, BBC Radio 1, Top of the Pops)
Richard Chamberlain (US actor, Dr. Kildare, The Three Musketeers, The Thorn Birds)
Betty Webb (British WWII code breaker at Bletchley Park, centenarian)
Trevor Lock (British policeman, awarded the George Medal for bravery during the Iranian Embassy siege)
Val Kilmer (US actor, Top Gun, The Doors, Batman Forever)
Johnny Tillotson (US singer-songwriter, Poetry in Motion)
Amadou Bagayoko (Malian musician, Amadou & Mariam)
Clem Burke (US award-winning drummer, Blondie, Plastic Letters, Parallel Lines, Eat to the Beat)
David Sassoon (British couturier, designer for Princess Diana, Princess Margaret, other royals and Hollywood stars)
Nino Tempo (US singer, Nino Tempo & April Stevens, Deep Purple)
Mike Berry (British singer, The Sunshine of Your Smile, actor, Are You Being Served?; his brother was the legendary Bette Bourne)
Roy Thomas Baker (British record producer, Queen: Bohemian Rhapsody, The Cars: My Best Friend's Girl, T'Pau: China In Your Hand)
Jean Marsh (British actress, Upstairs, Downstairs, The House of Eliott)
Paddy Higson (British (Scottish) film and TV producer, Gregory's Girl, Monarch of the Glen)
Wink Martindale (US radio and TV host, singer, Deck of Cards)
Colin Berry (British radio DJ, presenter and newsreader, BBC Radio 2)
Clodagh Rodgers (British (Northern Irish) singer, Come Back and Shake Me, Jack in the Box and TV regular)
Damien Thomas (British character actor, horror film star, Twins of Evil, Shogun, Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger)
Pope Francis (Argentinian Roman Catholic prelate, pontiff)
Virginia Giuffre (US-Australian massage therapist, claimed to have been trafficked by Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, Prince Andrew's accuser)
Philip Lowrie (British actor, "Dennis Tanner" in the first broadcast of Coronation Street, returned in 2011 after a 43-year absence)
Mike Peters (British (Welsh) rock musician, songwriter and vocalist, founder member of The Alarm, Sixty Eight Guns)
Ruth Buzzi (US comedian, Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In)
James Foley (US film director, Glengarry Glen Ross, Who's That Girl; music video director, Papa Don't Preach, Live To Tell)
Joe Don Baker (US actor, GoldenEye, Edge of Darkness, Cape Fear)
Sir Tom Farmer (British businessman, founder and CEO of Kwik Fit)
John Edwards (US vocalist, lead singer of the Detroit Spinners, Working My Way Back to You, Cupid)
Robert Benton (US film writer-director, What's Up, Doc?, Kramer vs. Kramer, Bonnie and Clyde, Superman)
Charles Strouse (US composer and lyricist, Annie, Applause, Bye Bye Birdie)
Taina Elg (Finnish-US actress, Les Girls)
Yuri Grigorovich (Russian ballet choreographer, artistic director of the Bolshoi Ballet from 1964 to 1995)
Colton Ford (US gay pornographic actor)
George Wendt (US actor and comedian, "Norm Peterson" in Cheers)
Michael B. Tretow (Swedish record producer and audio engineer, ABBA, Chess)
Barry Fantoni (British author and cartoonist, "E.J. Thribb" in Private Eye)
Leslie Dilley (British (Welsh) Oscar-winning art director and production designer, Star Wars, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Alien)

Billy Williams (British cinematographer, Women in Love, On Golden Pond, Gandhi)
Lillian Boutté (US jazz singer)
Alan Yentob (British television executive, controller of BBC1 and BBC2, TV presenter, Imagine, Arena)
Gigi Canu (Italian guitarist, founder member of Planet Funk, Chase the Sun)
Barry McIlheney (British (Northern Irish) journalist, magazine director and editor, Smash Hits, Empire, Premiere, launched Heat and Zoo)
Peter David (US comic book writer, The Incredible Hulk, Supergirl, Spider-Man 2099, X-Factor)
Loretta Swit (US stage and television actress, "Hotlips" Houlihan in M*A*S*H)
Roland Curram (British actor, "Freddie" in Eldorado)
Edmund White (US author and gay memoirist, A Boy's Own Story, The Beautiful Room Is Empty)
Arthur Hamilton (US songwriter, Cry Me a River for Julie London)
Wayne Lewis (US singer-songwriter, Atlantic Starr, Always, Secret Lovers)
Frederick Forsyth (British journalist, spy and author, The Day Of The Jackal, The Odessa File, The Dogs of War)
Sly Stone (US musician, singer-songwriter, Sly and the Family Stone, Everyday People, Family Affair, Dance To The Music)
Brian Wilson (US vocalist, musician, songwriter and producer, founder member of The Beach Boys, Surfin' USA, I Get Around, God Only Knows, Good Vibrations)
Violeta Chamorro (Nicaraguan stateswoman, 55th President of Nicaragua, first elected female head of state in the Americas)
Leonard Lauder (US businessman, heir and former CEO and chairman emeritus of Estée Lauder, billionaire and philanthropist)
Kim Woodburn (British television personality, How Clean Is Your House?)
John Reid (British (Scottish) producer, singer and founder member of Nightcrawlers: Push the Feeling On, songwriter, Westlife, Tina Turner, Monica Naranjo)
Alfred Brendel KBE (Austrian much-lauded classical pianist, Vienna Philharmonic, Berlin Philharmonic)
Lou Christie (US singer-songwriter, I'm Gonna Make You Mine, Lightnin' Strikes)
James Prime (British (Scottish) musician, keyboardist and founder-member of Deacon Blue)
Cavin Yarbrough (US musician, arranger and songwriter, Yarbrough and Peoples, Don't Stop the Music)
Mick Ralphs (British guitarist, founder-member of Mott the Hoople, All The Young Dudes, and Bad Company, Feel Like Makin' Love)
Bobby Sherman (US singer and 70s teen heartthrob in America)
Lalo Schifrin (Argentine-US composer, theme from Mission: Impossible, arranger, The Three Tenors)
Walter Scott (US singer, founder-member of The Whispers, And The Beat Goes On, It's A Love Thing)
Stuart Burrows (British (Welsh) operatic tenor, Welsh National Opera, La Scala Milan, Metropolitan Opera, nicknamed "The King of Mozart")
Sandy Gall (British (Scottish) journalist, Reuters, ITN, newsreader on News at Ten from 1970 to 1991)
Jim Shooter (US comic book writer, Secret Wars, Superman, editor, Marvel Comics)
Kenneth Colley (British actor, The Empire Strikes Back, Monty Python's Life of Brian)
Jimmy Swaggart (US televangelist, bigot and arch-homophobe, caught paying prostitutes)
Julian McMahon (Australian actor, Nip/Tuck, Fantastic Four, Home and Away)
Gerald Harper (British actor, Hadleigh, Adam Adamant Lives!, A Night to Remember)
Michael Madsen (US actor, Reservoir Dogs, Kill Bill films, Donnie Brasco)
Lord Norman Tebbitt (British politician, senior cabinet minister under Margaret Thatcher)
Donald Rose (British supercentenarian and World War II veteran, oldest man in the United Kingdom)
Iris Williams (British (Welsh) singer, He Was Beautiful)
Judy Loe (British actress, Singles, The Chief, Casualty, widow of Richard Beckinsale and mother of Kate)
Connie Francis (US singer, Who's Sorry Now?, Lipstick On Your Collar, Stupid Cupid, and gay icon)
Felix Baumgartner (Austrian record-breaking parachutist)
Alan Bergman (US songwriter (with his late wife Marilyn), In the Heat of the Night, Windmills of Your Mind, The Way We Were, Yentl soundtrack)
Sir Roger Norrington (British conductor, Kent Opera, Camerata Salzburg, Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra)
Eamon Downes (British DJ, Liquid: Sweet Harmony)
Chuck Mangione (US jazz trumpet and flugelhorn player, pioneer of easy-listening “smooth jazz”)
Ozzy Osbourne (British heavy metal rock musician and singer, Black Sabbath, songwriter, Paranoid, TV personality, The Osbournes)
George Kooymans (Dutch guitarist and vocalist, founder member of Golden Earring, songwriter, Radar Love)
Michael Ochs (US pioneering rock and pop photographic archivist)
Hulk Hogan (US professional wrestler, TV celebrity and actor, Rocky III)
Dame Cleo Laine (British vocalist, the UK’s most successful and celebrated jazz singer, national treasure)
Tom Lehrer (US satirical singer-songwriter, The Vatican Rag, Poisoning Pigeons in the Park, TV regular, That Was The Week That Was, The Frost Report)
Amelia Freeedman (British classical music impresario, founder and artistic director of the Nash Ensemble chamber music group)
Allan Ahlberg (British children’s author, Burglar Bill, The Jolly Postman)
Sylvia Young (British drama teacher, founder and principal of the Sylvia Young Theatre School)

Loni Anderson (US character actress, The Jayne Mansfield Story, former wife of Burt Reynolds)
Dame Stella Rimington (British archivist and intelligence officer, first female director general of MI5)
James Whale (British radio personality, "shock jock" and television presenter, The James Whale Radio Show)
Jane Morgan (US singer, The Day the Rains Came, Fascination, nightclub, stage and television performer, centenarian)
Ion Iliescu (Romanian statesman, first democratically-elected president after the fall of the Ceaușescu regime)
Jim Lovell (US astronaut, Gemini and Apollo missions, piloted the ill-fated Apollo 13 to a safe return)
Ray Brooks (British character actor, Big Deal, EastEnders, the voice of Mr Benn)
Graham Fenton (British singer, lead vocalist, Matchbox, Rockabilly Rebel, Midnite Dynamos, When You Ask About Love)
Biddy Baxter (British children's television producer, ran the most successful British kids' TV show Blue Peter for 23 years)
John Cruickshank (British flight lieutenant, last surviving WW2 Victoria Cross recipient, centenarian)
Terence Stamp (British actor and "Swinging Sixties" icon, Billy Budd, Poor Cow, Superman II, Priscilla Queen of the Desert)
Joe Caroff (US graphic designer, James Bond‘s 007 gun logo, posters for West Side Story, Cabaret, A Hard Day’s Night, centenarian)
Gordon Bowker (US businessman, co-founder of Starbucks)
Manuel de la Calva (Spanish singer, founder-member of "Spain's answer to the Beatles" Dúo Dinámico, Eurovision Song Contest winning songwriter, Massiel's La, la, la)
Graham Greene (Canadian First Nations actor, Dances With Wolves, Die Hard with a Vengeance, The Green Mile)
Joe Bugner (Hungarian-born British champion boxer)
Giorgio Armani (Italian fashion designer, founder of the House of Armani, style icon)
Baddie Winkle (US nonogenarian influencer, fashion model and internet personality)
Katherine, Duchess of Kent (British Royal, cousin-in-law to the late HM The Queen)
Mark Volman (US singer-songwriter and guitarist, founder member of The Turtles, Flo & Eddie, backing vocalist, T Rex, Bruce Springsteen)
Richard Davies (British singer-songwriter and keyboardist, founder member of Supertramp)
Christoph von Dohnányi (German conductor, Oper Frankfurt, Hamburg State Opera, Cleveland Orchestra, London Philharmonia Orchestra)
Stuart Craig (British Oscar winning production designer, Harry Potter films, Dangerous Liaisons, Gandhi, The English Patient)
Francesco Trapani (Italian businessman, former CEO of Bulgari jewellery empire, great-grandson of its founder)
Nicky Ryan (Irish music producer, Enya)
Charlie Kirk (US conservative activist, murdered)
Bobby Hart (US songwriter, Monkees, Hey, Hey, We’re the Monkees, Last Train to Clarksville)
Chris Hill (British DJ, pioneer of "Soul nights" in the 1970s/80s, Caister Soul Weekenders and Brit Funk)
Stephen Luscombe (British musician, founder member of Blancmange, Don't Tell Me, Living on the Ceiling, Blind Vision)
Ricky Hatton (British professional boxer, World champion several times)
Sir Nicholas Grimshaw (British award-winning architect, The Eden Project, Waterloo International terminal, former president of the Royal Academy)
Robert Redford (US actor, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, All the President's Men, The Sting, Oscar-winning film director, Ordinary People, heartthrob and icon)
Sonny Curtis (US musician, The Crickets, songwriter, I Fought the Law, Walk Right Back, More Than I Can Say)
Claudia Cardinale (Italian actress, Once Upon a Time in the West, The Leopard, )
John Stapleton (British journalist and broadcaster, Nationwide, Newsnight, Watchdog, GMTV)
"Dickie" Bird (British international cricket umpire, best-selling memoirist, eccentric "national treasure")
Sara Jane Moore (US accountant, attempted assassin of President Gerald Ford)
Lord Menzies Campbell (British (Scottish) politician, MP, former leader of the Liberal Democrat Party)
Shirley Abicair (Australian-British zither player, singer, actress and television personality)
Sir Terry Farrell (British award-winning architect, the MI6 Building, Charing Cross station (Embankment Place), TV-am HQ)
Patrick Murray (British actor, "Mickey Pearce" in Only Fools and Horses)
Soo Catwoman (British punk pioneer, model and fashion icon)
Dame Jane Goodall (British zoologist, primatologist, anthropologist and conservationist, world's foremost expert on chimpanzees)
Dame Patricia Routledge (British Tony award-winning stage, musical and TV actress, Keeping Up Appearances, Hetty Wainthropp Investigates, Victoria Wood: As Seen on TV, national treasure and gay icon)
John Lodge (British singer-songwriter, bassist, The Moody Blues)
Adrian Sutton (British theatre composer, War Horse, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, Angels in America)
Diane Keaton (US Oscar-winning actress, Annie Hall, The Godfather, First Wives' Club)
Admiral of the Fleet Sir David Benjamin Bathurst (British naval officer, former First Sea Lord and former NATO Commander-in-Chief for the Channel and Eastern Atlantic)
Tony Caunter (British character actor, "Roy Evans" (married "Pat Butcher") in EastEnders)
Jack White (born Horst Nußbaum, German music producer, Gloria, Self Control for Laura Branigan, Looking for Freedom for David Hasselhoff; songwriter, Who's Leaving Who for Hazell Dean)
D'Angelo (US neo-soul singer-songwriter)
Samantha Eggar (British actress, The Brood, The Butterfly Collector, Doctor Dolittle)
Ace Frehley (US guitarist, songwriter, founder member of Kiss)

Martin Townsend (British journalist, former editor of the Sunday Express)
Lady Annabel Goldsmith (British socialite, after whom Annabel's nightclub was named, friend of Princess Diana and other royals)
Melanie Ward (British fashion stylist and editor, The Face, Karl Lagerfeld, Helmut Lang, Harper’s Bazaar)
Dave Ball (British musician, founder-member of Soft Cell, The Grid)
June Lockhart (US actress, Lost In Space, Lassie, centenarian)
Sirikit, Queen Mother of Thailand
Tony Adams (British character actor, "Adam Chance" in Crossroads, "Dr Neville Bywaters" in General Hospital)
Björn Andrésen (Swedish actor, the "most beautiful boy, Tadzio" in Death in Venice)
Prunella Scales (British actress, Fawlty Towers, Mapp and Lucia, After Henry, A Question of Attribution)
Diane Ladd (US actress, Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore, Chinatown, Wild at Heart)
Dick Cheney (US statesman, former Vice President)
Gopichand Hinduja (Indian-British billionaire businessman, chairman of Hinduja Group, head of Britain's richest family)
Gilson Lavis (British drummer, founder-member of Squeeze, Jools Holland and his Rhythm & Blues Orchestra)
Pauline Collins (British award-winning actress, Shirley Valentine, Upstairs Downstairs, Quartet)
Manfred Goldberg (German-born British educator and Holocaust survivor)
James D Watson (US scientist, joint Nobel prize-winner with Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins for the discovery of the nature of DNA)
Lee Tamahori (New Zealand director, Mulholland Falls, Die Another Day, Once Were Warriors)
Quentin Willson (British motoring journalist, television presenter, Top Gear)
Richard Darbyshire (British singer, songwriter, founder member of Living in a Box)
L.T. Lam (Lam Leung-tim, Hong Kong businessman and manufacturer, inventor of the yellow rubber duck, centenarian)
Lady Helen Newlove (British rights campaigner after the murder of her husband, appointed UK victims’ commissioner)
Marina Lewycka (Ukrainian-British author, A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian)
Charlotte Bingham (British novelist and television scriptwriter, No, Honestly, Jilly Cooper’s Riders)
Alice and Ellen Kessler (German singers, dancers and TV personalities, "The Kessler Twins")
Gary "Mani" Mounfield (British bass guitarist, founder-member of The Stone Roses, Primal Scream)
Jellybean Johnson (US musician and producer, Alexander O'Neil Criticize)
Jean Guidoni (French out-gay pioneering singer-songwriter, collaborated with Astor Piazzolla and Michel Legrand)
Paul Costelloe (Irish fashion designer, personal designer to Diana, Princess of Wales)
Udo Kier (German out-gay character actor, Story of O, My Own Private Idaho, Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, Madonna's Erotica and Deeper and Deeper videos)
Dharmendra (Indian actor, Bollywood star)
Jimmy Cliff (Jamaican reggae singer-songwriter, Wild World, Wonderful World, Beautiful People, Many Rivers to Cross)
Jack Shepherd (British character actor, Wycliffe, Wonderland)
Pam Hogg (British (Scottish) fashion designer, Blitz club regular, designed outfits for Debbie Harry, Siouxsie Sioux, Björk and Kylie Minogue)
Sir Tom Stoppard (Czech-born British playwright, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, screenwriter, Shakespeare in Love, Empire of the Sun)
Chubby Tavares (US funk and disco singer, founder-member of Tavares)
Sir Andreas Whittam Smith (British financial journalist and editor, co-founder of The Independent newspaper, president of the British Board of Film Classification, and of the Church Commissioners)
Brian Hayes (Australian-British Radio presenter and DJ, LBC, BBC Radio 2)
Sir Alec Reed (British business executive, founder of Reed recruitment agency, philanthropist)
Steve Cropper (US blues guitarist, Booker T. & the M.G.'s, songwriter, In the Midnight Hour, record producer, (Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay)
Frank Gehry (Canadian-American deconstructivist architect, Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Walt Disney Concert Hall, The Gehry House)
Martin Parr (British photographer and photojournalist, The Last Resort)
Iain Douglas-Hamilton (British zoologist and conservationist, world-leading authority on the behaviour of African elephants, founder of Save the Elephants charity campaign)
Raul Malo (Us singer and musician, founder-member of The Mavericks, songwriter, Dance the Night Away)
Sophie Kinsella (British novelist, Shopaholic, Can You Keep a Secret?, The Undomestic Goddess)
Joanna Trollope (British novelist, The Choir, A Village Affair, The Rector's Wife, "queen of the Aga saga")
Stanley Baxter (British (Scottish) actor, comedian, impressionist, female impersonator and "national treasure", The Stanley Baxter Picture Show, Mr Majeika)
Rob Reiner (US actor, film director, This Is Spinal Tap, When Harry Met Sally, Stand By Me, Misery, murdered)
Carl Carlton (US singer, She's a Bad Mama Jama)
Dame Shân Legge-Bourke, DCVO (British heiress, Glanusk Park estate, mother of the nanny to Princes William and Harry, Tiggy Legge-Bourke)
Gil Gerard (US actor, Buck Rogers in the 25th Century)
Antony Price (British fashion designer, stylist for Roxy Music's first eight albums and Lou Reed's Transformer, designed for Mick Jagger, David Bowie, Duran Duran, Amanda Lear, Jerry Hall and Robert Palmer)
Sir Humphrey Burton CBE (British radio and TV broadcaster, Aquarius, Omnibus, Classic FM, former BBC head of music and arts, founder of BBC Young Musician of the Year, biographer)
Chris Rea (British singer-songwriter, Fool (If You Think It's Over), Driving Home for Christmas, The Road to Hell)
Annette Dionne (Canadian media personality, last-surviving of the "Dionne babies" (quintuplets))
Don Bryant (US rhythm and blues singer, songwriter, I Can't Stand the Rain)
Brigitte Bardot (French actress, And God Created Woman, sex symbol, animal rights activist and legend)
Michael Lippman (US music artists manager, David Bowie, Melissa Manchester, George Michael)
Khaleda Zia (Bangladeshi politician, former Prime Minister on two occasions, second female premier of a Muslim state)
Vicomtesse Jacqueline de Ribes (French aristocrat, designer, businesswoman, philanthropist and style icon)

RIP, (almost) all!

Tuesday, 30 December 2025

Arise...

...Sir Idris Elba, Dame Meera Syal, historian Dan Cruickshank OBE, and Bill Bailey MBE!

Also recognised in the New Year Honours list for 2026 are (among hundreds of others, famous and otherwise, including members of the national women's football and rugby teams):

  • Sir Roy Clarke (writer, Last of the Summer Wine, Open All Hours), Sir Tristram Hunt (director of the Victoria and Albert Museum);
  • Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE): mezzo-soprano Alice Coote, composer Max Richter, conductor Richard Farnes, former rugby player and charity boss Jonathan Davies;
  • Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (OBE): actor Warwick Davies, sports TV presenter Gabby Logan, comedian Matt Lucas, author and TV personality Richard Osman, champion marathon runner Paula Radcliffe, gardening historian and Gardeners World regular Advolly Richmond;
  • Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE): actress Sally Lindsay, children's entertainer Paul Chuckle, celebrity chef Marcus Wareing, singer and actress Cynthia Erivo, singer Ellie Goulding, singer Eve Graham (of The New Seekers), gay poet Andrew McMillan.

...and Dame Jane Torvill and Sir Christopher Dean!

New Year Honours List 2026

Monday, 29 December 2025

Shop Around


Hats!

John-John and I are are off again on our annual shopping pilgrimage to leafy Chiswick in West London, home of the classiest charity shops, today - and who knows what we'll find [if our millinery choices allow us into any of the shops]?

For this Tacky Music "bit-in-between" Monday, here's a sort-of appropriate number:


I think she may be singing about a different kind of "shopping" altogether...

Have a good week in the run-up to 2026, dear reader!

Sunday, 28 December 2025

Of Benoit Blanc, boffins, break-ins, bang!, bad smells and Bardot


Daniel Craig and Josh O'Connor in the utterly brilliant Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery, that we watched at John-John's last night. One of the best films of the year!

It's another snippets post, dear reader:

  • Apocalypse news: Apparently our universe isn't expanding as much as boffins once thought, and may even collapse. Not in our lifetimes, of course... We hope.
  • Winged intruder news: Imagine sitting down to watch telly, then being terrified by the sound of someone trying to break your front door down - only to discover it was a bloody enormous Canada Goose wedged in the broken glass? It certainly gave them something to talk about in the village of Countesthorpe, Leicestershire.
  • Picked the wrong moment go skiing news: As people were enjoying the snowy slopes of the ski resorts of Sicily, Mount-bloody-Etna erupted! I imagine the snows turned brown after that shock...
  • Love it or hate it news: Unsurprisingly, a Marmite-scented deodorant spray has been voted the most unwanted Xmas gift in 2025! Ewwwww.


[click any pic to embiggen]

  • And finally: RIP, Brigitte Bardot, the ground-breaking "face" of 60s/60s French cinema, and of the sexual liberation revolution to come. Such a shame she ended up as an embittered, homophobic old lady...

And the weather? Gloomy, chilly, dank. Just about right for this time of year.

Saturday, 27 December 2025

Música nueva

And so here were are, officially in that "bit-in-the-middle" - and were off en famille to John-John's for an afternoon/evening of jolly japes and a "picky tea". Meanwhile, how about a little selection of some of the "newer" choons that have caught my ear of late?

I heard this on on the radio very recently, and I was hooked!

Here's another one from the "final fling" of Saint Etienne that I loved back in late summer, but neglected to feature up to now:

Twenty-five years on since it was a popular bootleg that Fatboy Slim used to use in his DJ sets, the Rolling Stones have finally given their blessing to the release of this remix/mash-up of two magnificent hits - and the result (even with its AI-generated video) is rather good:

I can absolutely, categorically state that my office party last week was nothing like this:

Yay! Robyn's back...

...as is the very lovely Robbie Williams!

And, finally...

...the campest of the lot [and another Madam Arcati discovery], this!

Thoughts of warmer weather are upon us as we speak - our next trip to Spain is just over a month away!

As ever, dear reader, I'm interested to hear your thoughts on the selection...

Thursday, 25 December 2025

Ho, ho, fucking ho

The "great day of doing fuck all except eat and drink" is here.

Bah Humbug!

It's traditional...

Wednesday, 24 December 2025

Stinking reindeer

It's Xmas Eve... Hark! Is that carol singers I hear at the door?

Sack'o'shit, indeed. Now - what time do we knock off from work, that's what I want to know?!

Bah Humbug. Soon be over.

Tuesday, 23 December 2025

I just can’t be arsed

Jesus Christ has told friends he is not really feeling his birthday this year and is probably just going to stay in.

Jesus has sent the Disciples Banter WhatsApp group into a spiral by admitting that while he normally makes a big deal about it, this year he wants to keep it low key.

His friends, who clearly need this more than he does, have floated the idea of doing an escape room or visiting an axe-throwing bar, both of which have been rebuffed by the Son of God.

He said: “I’m just over all the gimmicks. Especially at this time of year, when everywhere’s full of pissed-up pricks on work nights out demanding a selfie.

“Peter suggested we go out for a meal but we couldn’t agree on a place, then nobody’s got a free date, then everywhere’s booked and it’s just more stress than it’s worth. Plus nobody needs the extra strain on their wallet.

“Maybe we’ll do something when it’s quiet in January, go away for a few days or whatever. But December 25th? Sorry, I’m not on board.”

When asked if Jesus’s reluctance to get together with all his mates was due to a previous occasion when going out for a meal did not end well for him, Jesus replied: “I can see why you’d think that, but honestly I just can’t be arsed.”

The Daily Mash

Of course.

Bah Humbug!

Monday, 22 December 2025

Let's take the road before us and sing a chorus or two


Bah Humbug!

Sigh. Back to bloody work again. At least it's only for a few days - but it's always a pain in the arse...

Never mind, eh? On this Tacky Music Monday, how about one of our favourite, traditional Xmas carols?

'Tis the season...

Sunday, 21 December 2025

Some boys romance, some boys slow dance - that's all right with me


Happy Midwinter's Day! It's uphill all the way from now on...

By way of a diversion away from all the forced-jolly Xmas-music shit that's clogging our airwaves, not to mention every shop and every pub, during this Festering Season, how about another slice of genius, courtesy of Mr Scott Bradlee - here moonlighting away from our house band Postmodern Jukebox [although one of its singers does make an appearance]?

Sublime...

Bah Humbug!

Saturday, 20 December 2025

Chim chim cher-off!

Londoners have confirmed the bloody lights and Christmas markets are bad enough, but the soot-covered chimney sweeps performing upbeat musical numbers are worse.

Every street, alleyway or Pret doorway is now packed with troupes of mucky-faced bright-eyed Cockney lads armed only with harmonised optimism and inexplicably perfect tap-dancing abilities.

Hackney resident Martin Bishop said: “Set a foot outside and you’re ambushed by eight sweeps, of different ages and races, shouting ‘Blimey guv’nor, it’s a right ol’ jolly Crimbo!’ and requesting sixpences that are no longer legal tender.

“At no provocation they launch into tumbling routines involving brooms, backflips and unhealthy amounts of cheer. Repetitive songs are sung. One even addressed my wife as ‘muvver’.

“They’re choking the tube. Warbles about pies fill the air. At any moment they might shove a crownless top hat onto your head and demand you join them to sing ‘Cor, miss, Christmas’ll be scrubbed spick-and-span once we’ve sung it proper!’”

“I am not a chimney sweep. I am a senior lecturer in applied economics.”

The Daily Mash

Of course.

Friday, 19 December 2025

Fever?

It's the last weekend before the Festering Season hits full swing! Despite the fact we had our office meal and drinks last night, I still say "Bah Humbug" to the whole thing.

A weekend is a weekend is a weekend, however - no matter if it is likely to be dominated by amateur drinkers and pissed-off shoppers - so to let's try and ramp up the end-of-the-week party spirit, in the company of Mr Giorgio Moroder (masquerading as Munich Machine), shall we?

Lord only knows what's going on in this video clip, but it's fab, regardless - and Thank Disco It's Friday!

Happy last-minute shopping, folks!

Thursday, 18 December 2025

You know you're something special and you look like you're the best

RIP, the most subtly influential of fashion designers Mr Antony Price, who departed to sort out the tailoring in Fabulon yesterday...

This lot were definitely avid fans:

Wednesday, 17 December 2025

Of bulges, ancient Eastbourne, bye-bye Ramsey Street, the high life, good fortune, prehistory and a pop princess


RIP Gil Gerard, aka Buck Rogers, with his impressive space weapon! [click any pic to embiggen]

It's another snippets post, dear reader:

  • Oops! news: An ancient skeleton that for decades was mistakenly cited as African, and as "the earliest black Briton", has been scientifically identified as a locally-born girl, probably from what is today the coastal resort of Eastbourne.
  • The soap that wouldn't die news: The beloved Aussie soap Neighbours - that launched the careers of such heavyweights as Kylie Minogue, Guy Pearce, Russell Crowe, Natalie Imbruglia, Margot Robbie and Liam Hemsworth - has ended for good (again! It was revived after its last grand finale in 2022 as a streaming show on Amazon), after 40 years.

  • Luxurious living news: Coco Chanel's Mediterranean villa La Pausa [above], at which she hosted the kind of parties that we would never be invited to, but the likes of Jean Cocteau, Colette, Igor Stravisnksy, Luchino Visconti and Salvador Dalí were, has been completely restored and reopened as a cultural centre.
  • Lucky bastards news: A Welsh couple is celebrating winning £1 million on the lottery - for the second time, seven years after their first million-pound win! "All day long I'd biddy biddy bum, if I were a wealthy man." But I'm not. Dammit.

  • Mountain-climbing dinosaurs? news: Thousands of dinosaur footprints have been discovered on a rock cliff - about 600 metres (nearly 2,000 feet) above the nearest road - high up in the Italian Alps.
  • And finally: The race to be Britain's Xmas #1 single is hotting up - with Wham! and Mariah-fucking-Carey both in the running again - but one of the bookies' favourites this year is... Our Princess Kylie! Fingers crossed for Friday, when the Xmas Chart is announced...

And the weather? Blustery, but not that cold if you're out of the wind.

Tuesday, 16 December 2025

Xmas shopping is underway...


Choice of font matters...

   

Last date for posting is looming...

Monday, 15 December 2025

Lucy wants to be dressy, Jessie wants to be juicy


I know that Monday morning look all too well...

90 years ago yesterday , the very lovely Miss Lee Remick - who died tragically young, aged just 55 - was born.

Renowned for her piercing steel-blue eyes and for her serious acting talents (Days of Wine and Roses, The Omen, The Medusa Touch and more), she was also a theatrical trouper, and a great favourite of Stephen Sondheim.

Conveniently for a Tacky Music Monday, here's a fine example of one of their collaborations! [Skip to 1:55 for the sparkle to begin]:

Have a good week, dear reader.

Sunday, 14 December 2025

Belles and banjos


Hard to believe it's December! [Fuchsia "R.A.F.", taken today]

We're having a lovely laid-back weekend - the first in ages where we haven't had some social event or other - just pottering around the house and garden.

To complement the mood, how about another wallow in the cavortings of impossibly glamorous people doing exotic things, courtesy of the faboo Soft Tempo Lounge? That'll do nicely.

Fab - but banjos? At a fashion show?!

[Music: David Snell - Light and Easy]

Saturday, 13 December 2025

Beelzebub operating the churro stall

It is now obligatory, on visiting a Christmas market, to pronounce it ‘hell’, ‘hellish’ and that Beelzebub himself was operating the churro stall. Here are some key differences worth noting:

A distinct lack of torture
Every vision of hell involves torture of the medieval kind. At a Christmas market the pain is limited to crowds, aching feet and paying 25 quid for a fucking candle. The distinction between this and having a hot poker thrust up your arse is pronounced. If you sincerely can’t tell, have a think about your grasp on reality and sexual options.

You can’t get out of going to hell with a lame excuse
Flu, a decorator coming round, needing to plump the cushions; there are plenty of believable excuses for not going to a Christmas market. You can’t fib your way out of hell. Medieval theologians would really have fucked up on the ‘terrifying threat’ aspect if you could just excuse yourself because you’re expecting an Ocado delivery.

90 minutes is not eternity
An hour and a half at a Christmas market – nobody has ever lasted longer – isn’t comparable with infinity. It may feel like that, as you trail behind your partner while she searches for a present for her sister and the same brownie stall seems to roll past again and again, but that’s an illusion caused by how boring and repetitive it is.

No ironic punishments for sins
Satan loves irony. He’s always making gluttons eat tables of delicious food until they burst, or fornicators bone each other raw. At a Christmas market the only irony is you wasting your hard-earned money on shit. It isn’t a cuttingly ironic to blow a day’s earnings on hand-knitted Austrian bedsocks. It’s just stupid.

Christmas markets have no confusing system of morality
Hell is where bad people go, but also good people who aren’t Christians, despite a supposedly loving God giving you no rational reason to believe in him. The confusion engendered by a Christmas market is on a much smaller scale, such as wondering how they can charge £12 for a portion of chips in instant gravy and call it ‘poutine’.

No demons
Christmas markets feature no demons whatsoever. Admittedly this is just as well, because grudgingly handing over £18 for two hot chocolates lightly graced by Baileys is bad enough. What cackling demons would charge to pour hot lead into your stomach through a long funnel doesn’t bear thinking about.

Hell has no unexpected wins
Hell is a daily grind of being torn limb from limb, stints in the lake of fire and flaming pitchfork violations. There really isn’t a hidden upside. However going to a Christmas market can prove worthwhile, like when your wife decides a wooden cuckoo clock is what she’s always craved and it’s £80 so that’s your shopping done. Nice one.

The Daily Mash

Of course.

Friday, 12 December 2025

Deep in my soul, I've got nothing to hide

It's almost that time - and after a busy week, I have never needed a weekend so much...

Time for a party, and who better to provide it than this Eurodance combo? Thank Disco It's Friday!

In case you're wondering, dear reader - here is the "original" source of that 90s mega-dance-hit, Miss Abdul's version (with our Patron Saint of Yemenites Ofra Haza):

Have a great weekend, dear reader!

Thursday, 11 December 2025

Carry On Up The Bunbury!

The social whirl continues...

Last night, Madam Arcati and I shimmied our way to the West End (again) - this time to the Noël Coward Theatre for the new, much-lauded Max Webster/National Theatre production of the Oscar Wilde masterpiece The Importance of Being Earnest!

This Wilde satire on society mores, manners and relationships, replete with many of the great man's finest, funniest and most-quoted lines has been subject to myriad interpretations in the 130 years since its debut, not least the memorable 1952 screen version with Dame Edith Evans as the play's pivotal character, the redoubtable Lady Bracknell. Indeed, the cream of British theatricals have queued up to play that particular imposing aristocratic dowager, including Dame Judi Dench, Dame Maggie Smith, Athene Seyler, Irene Handl, Dame Hilda Bracket (of Hinge & Bracket fame) and even David "Poirot" Suchet.

Knowing that for our production, none other than "national brainbox treasure" Sir Stephen Fry was donning the taffeta and wig to take on the role made it even more of a delicious prospect!

He was utterly perfect, of course - bringing the right balance between embodying Lady Bracknell's strict and conventional upper-class Victorian respectability with the ease in which her opinions could be swayed at the merest sniff of financial and reputational gain out of any situation, all the while spouting memorably disdainful barbs at anyone in her way. Think "The Dowager Countess of Grantham", and you're not far off.

The main protagonists in this entangled tale, however, are the effete and ever-so-trivial boy-about-town Algernon Moncrieff (a rather good Olly Alexander, of Years and Years and Eurovision pop fame) and his excitable friend who goes by the name of Ernest Worthing (Nathan Stewart-Jarrett, also excellent). Both men have many secrets, and both have created imaginary relatives - Algernon's is a perpetually-ailing friend called "Bunbury" - whom they use as an excuse to get away from their responsibilities and travel elsewhere on a whim (a habit that Algernon refers to as "Bunburying"). This is the stuff that all good farces are made of - and needless to say, as lie upon lie unravels it all gets hilariously frenetic...

It turns out that "Ernest" is actually John/Jack Worthing, a country squire with a respectable reputation and a wealthy heiress ward in his care to look out for. It's only in town, enjoying the high life, that he adopts the name "Ernest" - principally because his intended, Algernon's cousin (and Lady Bracknell's daughter) Gwendolen Fairfax (played with brilliantly mannered yet acidly barbed aplomb by Kitty Hawthorne) won't, it appears, consider marrying anyone of any other name.

Lady Bracknell, of course, has other ideas, and when she discovers that Ernest/John/Jack knows nothing of his parentage, having been found as a baby in a handbag in Victoria Station by a wealthy family - cue her much-quoted retort: "A HAND...BAG?!" - she forbids the engagement.

Meanwhile, in the country, that aforementioned ward Cecily Cardew (well-played as an impetuous and fiery spoiled teen by Jessica Whitehurst), has been led to believe that Jack's "troublesome brother Ernest" is the reason he has to leave for the city so often, and she has created a whole fictitious romance with this wayward spirit. Then Algernon gets it into his head that he will utilise another "visit to Bunbury" in order to pretend to be "brother Ernest", visit the Worthing abode in the country and woo Cecily.

Of course, Jack unexpectedly returns - in funereal mourning garb, having decided to "kill off" that very brother "from a chill; in Paris"; much to everyone's surprise, since he is apparently ensconced in the house. To top it all, Gwendolen arrives, and the girls play out a game of extremely polite bitchery over tea and cakes (one of the very best scenes in the play), albeit with a slightly sapphic twist.

What?! Homosexualist shenanigans? In an Oscar Wilde play? Heaven forfend! From the review by Andrzej Lukowski in TimeOut:

All four ‘lovers’ go about their relationships with the breezy silliness of a group of primary schoolers playing mummies and daddies. [Producer-director Max] Webster’s interpretation amps up Wilde’s wit by unburdening it of any need for us to believe in the romance. Indeed, the contrived plotting - Bunburying, the women only being into guys called Ernest, the whole handbag thing - makes more sense if viewed as role play by a group of people who are strangers to their own sexualities.

You don’t need to think too deeply about any of this, but my point is that Webster explicitly asks us to view Earnest as a queer text and refuses to take the romance, well, earnestly. Okay, it was always an allegory for closeted Victorian society and the social allure of heteronormativity. But this version is fun because it throws off any pretence otherwise.

Indeed it does that! From the opening - and somewhat bewildering - "introduction" to Algernon, dressed in a pink tulle frou-frou full-length evening gown, playing the piano and cavorting with amorphous and androgynous party-goers [presumably a "dream sequence"], through the Wildean repartee often played with a snigger and a wink and a nod to the audience ["Carry On up the Bunbury", perhaps?], to the utterly preposterous curtain-call [after the happy denouement of this tangled web resolves itself, with a complicated series of events involving aforementioned handbag, Cecily's chaperone/tutor Miss Prism (Shobna Gulati from Dinnerladies) and a clamber through a library of military records - and yes, they do "live happily ever after" (after a fashion)] that saw the entire cast reduced to wearing pantomime-esque sparkly flower costumes [what the fuck that was all about, I have no idea!], this was hardly the most - ahem - subtle interpretation of a dear old Oscar comedy we have ever seen.

However, it was a bloody great evening's entertainment - and we thoroughly enjoyed it!


[click any photo to embiggen]

The Importance of Being Earnest is running at the Noël Coward Theatre until 10th January 2026.

Don't miss it!