Desperately Seeking Something

I know I’m new at this whole blogging thing, but I’d like to think that perhaps in the future I’ll be uncovering hot new musical talent as I trawl through the delight that is the Internet. And I’d like to start right here, with a young singer I’ve come across recently. Here he is, making his live TV debut, singing This Is The Moment.

Yeah okay, so it’s actually David Hasselhoff singing on the show on which he’s a judge, America’s Got Talent. Hmm. The Hoff. Singing. On a show called America’s Got Talent. Yep, that all blends together nicely. America sure do got talent.

Big Brother 8 is, apparently, still going!

Who knew, eh?

P.S. Next week is the final week. Phew.

Now, I don’t smoke. I don’t intend to start anytime soon…or ever, in fact. I’m much in favour of the recently introduced smoking ban in England, mainly for selfish reasons – I don’t come out bars/pubs/venues smelling like and ashtray, and my clothes don’t need to be entirely decontaminated the next day. BUT! I could see how smokers may be having some trouble adjusting. Sure, you can step outside for a quick ciggie break, whatver the weather, but what happens when you’re at an indoor venue from which you just can’t make a quick escape?

Easy. Be old. In a band. Full of other wrinklies. Light up on stage. Repeat til relaxed. You’ll get away with it, trust me. At least, that’s what the Rolling Stones’ band members Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood managed to do when they played a gig at London’s O2 Arena on Tuesday night.

• Spark me up! Stones defy smoking ban at arena gig

[The title of this post should be sung to the tune of Backstreet's Back by The Backstreet Boys, incidentally. Heh. That'll be in your head all day now.]

So this is Beckham’s first test for his long-haul commute from his new day-job in America back to his home country. After playing in against the New York Red Bulls at the Giants Stadium in New Jersey on Saturday evening, Beckham jetted off back to England to practise with the national team ahead of tonight’s friendly against Germany at the new Wembley Stadium. He’ll then jet back to Los Angeles to play against Chivas USA in a game on Thursday night.

Hey, it’s not so bad. I’m sure he’s flying all over the place in plush, first-class seats. My only worry is jet-lag – how’s he going to cope with that?! Sit him on the bench for the England, and he’ll probably dose off. And then he’ll be wide awake at 1am. Poor lad.

Apparently, Pete Doherty ISN’T in jail. Yeah, who knew?! The number of times this man gets arrested on drug offences, you would’ve thought that at some point he might have received a sentence and be in some prison cell somewhere.

Well, that’s not the case…until this week! Ha ha! Or was it? Appearing in court at the beginning of August, on earlier offences, the judge warned him to kick his drug habit or face jail. But alas, early on Monday morning, after a somewhat shambolic set at the V Festival, Doherty was arrested again in East London, thereby breaching his bail conidtions.

So what do you think happens next? What do you reckon his punishment is? 1) He gets thrown into jail, never to be allowed out again? 2) Gets ordered to rehab forever and ever? 3) Gets forced to listen to one of his own records 4) Is made to read all the incredibly boring coverage of his and Kate Moss’s relationship?

Nope. It’s 5) Gets let off the hook. His case gets thrown out on a technicality – that he wasn’t presented before a judge within 24 hours of Monday’s arrest. Great.

• Singer Doherty freed by court

Keira Knightley has slammed those seeking to be famous and given them an alternative career possibility instead: to go and work on the stock market. Err, okay. She also criticises those who concentrate too much on her looks. She says:

“Okay, I’m on the cover of a magazine but somebody else does the hair, and the make-up, and airbrushes me. It’s not me, it’s something other people have created.”

Too true! Look at some of the other examples on this blog – SJP, Christina Aguilera, Gwyneth Paltrow…sometimes these magazines turn their cover stars into someone else entirely!

Unless…is this a secret cry for help from Keira? Is there something underhand going on in the magazine industry? Perhaps all these fashion mags are undergoing some vast cloning experiment…and that’s why those on the cover always look a bit “odd”. Hmmm.

Or maybe Keira Knightley is just stunningly beautiful, and the magazines try and perfect her even more. Yeah, whatever. I like my “experiment” theory better.

• Keira criticises fame-seekers

Continuing in the trend of magazines doing freaky things to our lovely celebrities is the UK edition of ELLE magazine. When photographing the cover of their latest issue, they’ve obviously played a nasty, nasty trick Sex and the City actress Sarah Jessica Parker. I can picture the scene – she’s come in, and they’re persuaded her to do some “test” shots. They insist the test shots would be better if she were wearing the dress. And perhaps some make-up. Ohanddidwetellyouthisistheactualcoverphoto:

You can tell it by her facial expression: “Wait, guys, what?? But my hair! It’s greasy! I didn’t get a chance to wash it this morning!! Matthew was recreating his Ferris Bueller-talking-in-the-shower bit!”

Poor love. I’d be miffed, for sure. She should have read the latest edition of UK’s InStyle magazine (with another slightly “different” looking celeb – Christina Aguilera) – it has “16 super easy hair makeovers”.

…from 23 in the UK chart to 33. Don’t worry, actual Spider Pig is fine. Phew.

By the way, the “song” at 38? I reckon someone’s typed it into the charts accidentally. I don’t think that’s a song. That’s a plea from someone’s 9-year-old brother who’s been locked in the airing cupboard. The school holidays can drag on quite a bit, y’know…

EXCLUSIVE! Paris Hilton recently signed up to serve in the US Army and is on her first mission to an unknown destination. She first made a brief stopover in Croatia, landing at Split’s military airport, and did some last minute partying with sister Nicky in local hotspots…like the famous Carpe Diem nightclub on the island of Hvar.

Okay, so she’s not really joined the army, silly! But as to why she’s allowed to land at a military airport is beyond me. This was an apparent attempt to avoid the papparazi, but I never would have thought that was something she was seeking!

The Croatian media are ever up to the minute on exciting developments about the Hilton sisters. The article below states that at 18.00 hours today they are due to arrive at Papaya nighclub in Zrce, Novalja, Pag island. Quite how the website has such a detailed timetable on them is beyond me. And who turns up to a club at 6pm?! They’re there to promote the drink Rich Prosecco. Rich Prosecco?! Wasn’t he that Italian dude I went to school with?

Oh and by the way, forgive me dear readers, for I have sinned…this is my first post about Paris Hilton…I’m sorry, I cracked!

• Paris and Nicky Hilton tonight arrive in Zrce
• Carpe Diem, Hvar
• Novalja, Pag Island
• Visit Croatia

David Beckham last week finally scored his first goal for his new team LA Galaxy from a wonderful free kick. More impressive was that it was his first start for the club. Galaxy went on to win the game 2-0, win the MLS league by 37 points, win the FA Cup, and win the US Presidential Election 2008.

Okay, so not really. (Ha! Had you fooled for a second there, didn’t I?!) But they may as well have down, what will all the hoo-hah. Still, congrats to Becks for his first goal. Take a look at the video above because of 1) said beautiful free-kick 2) the Galaxy fans practically slaughtering themselves over the excitement that they’ve got a free kick which their new god will take, and then going mental when it’s gone in 3) Posh’s completely over-the-top celebration – seriously, woman, calm yourself and 4) the commentators speculating that he probably did this sort of thing way back when for Preston North End. Yeah, right!

• Beckham’s first start for Galaxy full of firsts