Will he watch? Won't he?

Music I couldn’t be less excited about watching LiveEarth tomorrow. As someone I spoke to earlier noted, it’s all the usual suspects, which is true to an extent (oh look -- Madonna -- yeah great -- perhaps she’ll swear again to the tea time audience because that just soo rock and roll), but other than that I’m deeply under whelmed by the line-up. Granted my literacy in relation to the popular music of the kids has taken a nosedive, but Duran Duran? Are you being ironic? Plus it’s being presented by Graham Norton and Jonathan Ross, because he obviously did such a great job last year assuming that his ego and humour making were more important than the music and the cause.

And isn’t a bit backwards that most of us, in watching this melody fest, will actually be contributing to the thing it’s trying to get the message out about? Wouldn’t it benefit the planet more if those of us who’ve already got the message played out in the rain instead or handed out leaflets to our neighbours to save them having to watch it? Is catching a set by Bloc Party really more important than stopping a polar bear from drowning? Perhaps I’m just in a misanthropic mood after this hellish week and I’ll be sitting down for Corinne Bailey Rae -- although probably not since her album contains exactly two good songs and screed of amateurish sappy ballads of the order that makes you long for the days of M People.

How come though that New York get KT Tunstall and the Smashing Pumpkins, Sydney has Toni Collette (who I really hope is the actress) & her band, Kyoto have Michael Nyman, Hamburg will be enjoying Shakira and Rothera Point will be rocking out to British Antarctic Survey’s Rothera Research Station house band, which has got to be a more exciting prospect than James bloody Blunt. Perhaps there’s more to be gained from surfing the interactive channels trying to chase these down, although if it's anything like Glastonbury, one of two channels afforded to freeview will be taken up by some DJ wittering on about what a great time everyone’s having, even though we’ve already realised there’s no substitute to actually being there.

Well, OK, I do have a soft spot for The Pussycat Dolls who are being introduced by David Tennant, and it’ll be fun to see Spinal Tap back in the saddle again, especially since they’re being introduced by Rob Reiner whose recent career missteps are entirely forgiven by that film, When Harry Met Sally, The Sure Thing, A Few Good Men and The Princess Bride (just about -- The Story of Us was shocking). All of this grumpiness is more than likely just an expression of my general resistance to new and good music of late. In my weakened condition and with Winamp on random, I’m in the middle of Daphne & Celeste’s Ooh Stick You and thinking it’s a work of genius. Perhaps I should lay off the Ibuprofen again.