INSURERS STRAP IN FOR BLUNT’S MILE-HIGH RECORD-BREAKING GIG
EVER wanted to watch James Blunt sing his heart out – live – at 42,000 feet? No, neither have we, but let’s not diminish Royal Sun Alliance’s (RSA) achievement in breaking the Guinness World Record for the world’s highest altitude live music show.
The insurance group has kicked off its 300th anniversary celebrations with gusto by bundling 190 lucky attendees into a Boeing 767 to watch the blue-eyed singer serenade them for a 20-minute gig as they soared around the skies over the North Sea. The audience, made up of some of RSA’s top insurance salespeople plus a gaggle of giddy Heart FM competition-winners – and, of course, The Capitalist, went along for the ride. Blunt was allowed to stand, but the audience’s seat belts made getting into the groove a little tricky and certain RSA marketing types were heard to admit that: “It’s not the sort of thing that’s usually on my playlist at home”.
Still, they were proud to boast that for the firm’s 310th birthday, they are hatching a plan to hire out Sir Richard Branson’s space shuttle for the first pop gig in orbit. Rumoured performers include Robbie Williams.
BORIS LIGHTS A FIRE
Mayor Boris Johnson is clearly working hard for London. After jetting back from his World Cup sojourn in South Africa, where he learned to play the vuvuzela and enjoyed many a game from exciting environs of various stadium stands, he is today going to be lighting up fires all over town – well, torches at least. Boris will this morning set alight the torch of the Balfour Beatty London Youth Games, in which 9,000 London kids will compete for the Jubilee Trophy. The games are happening as part of a fitness promotion campaign that comes at a modest cost of £30m (were a few public TV screens for the World Cup really too much to ask?) and kicks off a long weekend of sports. Meanwhile, Boris has also been busy gearing up on a bicycle made for three as he cut the ribbon to open London’s 400th Travelodge. This puts the number of local Travelodge locations on a par with the number of bike-hire stations to be rolled out across the capital in Boris’ cycle-renting scheme.
STEAMY NERDS LOSE
There’s no rest for the wicked, as Ryanair is determined to prove. First, CEO Michael O’Leary grabbed attention at a colourful press conference this week, in which he won a bet by wearing a Germany football shirt and offered to undercut Fabio Capello by accepting a £4m salary and “picking a team that’s just as shit”. Now, we hear, Ryanair is launching a Europe-wide search for its sexiest female crew-members after 50,000 passengers voted that they should star in the firm’s 2011 charity calendar, which raises €100,000 each year. More than half of those polled voted that “sexy female crew” should front the project, while 18 per cent picked “sex passengers”, 17 per cent opted for “sex male pilots” and, in last place at 8 per cent, came the “steamy nerds in the Volcanic Ash Advisory Centre”. The Capitalist is only disappointed to see that sexy male stewards and hot female pilots were not on the billing – but hey, there’s always 2012.
LITERATI WEEK
The Southbank Centre has opened up the London Literature Festival 2010 after a launch party where London literati defended their honour in a sciences-versus-arts football game. The festival runs until 18 July and will this week feature controversial cultural critic Slavoj Zizek – famous in part for his insightful but relentlessly sexual Freudian interpretations of films – in conversation with philosopher Anthony Clifford Grayling. Also this week Whitbread-winning writer Jeanette Winterson will give the Southbank lecture, while Lovely Bones author Barbara Kingsolver will give a reading and answer questions just before the festival’s end.
BEWARE iCLARE
Clare Spottiswoode, scourge of dodgy business practices, has enlisted a new ally in her job as part of John Vickers’ banking commission team tasked with determining whether to break up large banks. The hard-line former policyholder advocate who took on Aviva is one of 3m worldwide owners of Apple’s brand new iPad, which launched just 80 days ago. The tech-savvy Spottiswoode reportedly carries her thoughts with her on organised PowerPoint slides on the device. With the iPad up her sleeve, don’t be surprised to see her take on recalcitrant bankers while on the move. Watch out!
LONDON CALLING
Don’t miss an opportunity to pick up works by some of modern Britain’s best artists and musicians this evening as The Idea Generation Gallery hosts a party to conclude a silent auction running now in aid of the Ray Lowry Foundation, a charity set up by the satirical cartoonist. Many of Lowry’s beautiful works are on sale, originally drawn for Private Eye and Punch Magazine. You can also bid on works by Mick Jones (lead guitarist of The Clash) and Tracey Emin.
Victoria Bates is away.