"Guilty Pleasures"

Saw this story on BBC News yesterday, about a poll in this month's Q Magazine (which I admit not having bought for a while, though I used to get it regularly) talking about the list of so-called uncool records it is OK to love.

OK with whom, exactly?

Reading most of the entries in the list, I have to say that I own many of them and listen to quite a few of them. Of the top ten listed in the article, I own seven of them and like eight. The number one, Livin' Thing, by ELO, is a great song by one of my favourite bands. The only two I'm less keen on are S Club 7, mainly due to the relentless nuclear-white smiling chirpiness and Gloria Gaynor because it's a bit melodramatic (well, actually, gay) for my tastes (though even as a kid I always liked Mandy by Barry Manilow, so make sense of that if you can). I think a glance at my iPod's contents would confirm that I've got a somewhat catholic taste, maybe even bordering on the schizophrenic. I'll basically listen to anything at least once, which was a wise piece of advice from the late, great John Peel. And look, it turned up the Undertones, The Fall and Half Man Half Biscuit for him, inter alia, so it can't have been all bad!

What it all boils down to is this: there are no guilty pleasures as far as I'm concerned. I don't mind admitting I like all sorts of things, from Edith Piaf to the Macc Lads. They're all great.