Woss on the Web

....along with Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, the Harry Potter series, and anything else American conservatives deem to be vaguely threatening.

Check out the top ten most challenged US library books here - Gossip Girl novel aside they all look pretty entertaining, especially the one about gay guinea pigs.

To celebrate the Sugababes' latest (and with any luck fatal) bout of internecine hair-pulling, here is a diabetes-inducing rundown of their top 5 worst bits.

When they let Keisha bully Siobhan out
Sugababes were a breath of fresh air when they burst onto the scene in 2000. Such moodiness! Such refined pop tunery! Such inability to convincingly dance! It all went horribly wrong when they replaced Siobhan Donaghy and her icy charms with a vapid Atomic Kitten refugee, and though it was with Heidi onboard that they hit the big time commercially, they would never sound this good again.



'In the Middle'
Just one of a number of terrible single choices from over the years. Replete with gaudy computer-generated name tags, truly appalling costumes - not to mention the many horrors of the song itself - the video was a particularly low point for the group.



When they didn't split up in 2005
Rightly or wrongly, the group enjoyed a certain level of credibility for their first five years together, probably by the simple virtue of not being S Club 7. Their edgy image was blown out of the water by Mutya Buena's departure and subsequent cut-and-paste replacement with someone who was deemed by the group's string-pullers to look and sound vaguely similar. Suddenly they were looking every bit as manufactured as Girls Aloud, only with songs that weren't as good. THE SUGABABES NO LONGER MADE SENSE AND IT WAS ALL VERY CONFUSING.

When they decided to advertise some ugly shoes


Not the best way to try and reposition yourself as a relevant and exciting musical force really.

'Get 'Sexy''


A last gasp attempt to relive former glories, which oozes desperation out of every sub-Gaga beat and laboured gyration. Should they decide to split up this week, Get Sexy makes an unworthy endnote to the group's chart history, which includes properly brilliant tracks like Freak Like Me, Hole in the Head and Run For Cover. One shouldn't apportion blame in such tragic times, but let's face it - it's probably all Keisha's fault.

The more persistent readers among you may be already be aware that my bedroom here in Falkirk is haunted. Some of my less spiritually minded friends claim that this is impossible, rather naively insisting that ghosts don't generally hang around in houses less than three years old while completely disregarding the possibility that my family's new home was constructed on a tribal burial ground. "The house cooling" has never struck me as adequate explanation for the recurring eerie tapping I can hear in the wall behind my bed, and though I have yet to capture that on tape I think at the weekend I finally obtained conclusive proof that my bedroom is playing host to the trapped soul of a ritually sacrificed child. I just hope you appreciate the immense effort involved in reaching out for a camera while at the same time sobbing with fear for your very life.



"Yes, yes, very nice," I am sure you are thinking. "This is all just one big excuse to post a picture of his beautifully painted and maturely decorated bedroom." But no. Look closer. Look at the door. Take a good long look to the left of David Tennant's beautiful face, and feel your blood run cold.



VOLDEMORT'S FACE, READERS. VOLDEMORT'S FACE HAS APPEARED WITHIN MY DOCTOR WHO POSTER. The sacrificed child knows my deepest fears and is playing them against me. What next? Macavity reflected in the TV? A General Woundwort shaped tea stain upon the desk? Sauron's eye looming from the bookshelf discoballs? Madonna's new single blasting out the hifi?! These are dark times readers, dark times indeed.

Well this is all a bit exciting. Used to being treated as the cuddly tartan cousins of the US - probably illiterate, lacking in electricity, yet to discover Christianity but ultimately harmless - we Scots are now international pariahs; beloved of terrorists and murderers the world over. How can this be? It's been a while since we invaded anything, and our troublesome loch monster's been dormant for several decades. Perhaps the informative demagogues over at boycottscotland.com can help shed light on the matter.

BOYCOTT SCOTLAND AND THE UNITED KINGDOM

Gosh. Maybe we did invade something after all.

The government of Scotland has decided to release convicted Lockerbie terrorist bomber Abdel Baset al-Megrahi on "compassionate grounds."

The government of the United Kingdom has washed its hands of the entire affair, allowing the Scottish government total freedom in taking this perfidious action against the families of the victims of Pan Am Flight 103.

"Compassionate grounds"?! Ugh. Perfidious indeed! But there is more:

The actions of the Scottish government are inexcusable. A man who is responsible for the mass murder of 270 innocent civilians must be held accountable for such a cold blooded and ruthless act. Freeing a terrorist in order to further ties with the tyrannical Libyan regime of Muammar al-Gaddafi and to further the commercial interests of British Petroleum in that region is repulsive and sickening.

How rude. British Petroleum has nothing to do with this. These are our wicked designs, and it is Scotland that shall reap the benefits of renewed trade with Libya. Screw you, Westminster. Screw you, America. And screw the victims of the Lockerbie atrocity! Cheap oil is worth whatever sanctions you throw our way!!

Unless the Scottish government rescinds this decision to release al-Megrahi, and if the British Parliament continues to avoid intervening in the matter, we urge all Americans to protest this action by boycotting the United Kingdom and Scotland in full. Don't travel to Scotland or do business there (or in the United Kingdom in general) and don't buy any British or Scottish products.

Hmm, we'd better nationalise our gaudy tartan giftshops - they're unlikely to survive without US custom since no one else really wants haggis-themed snowglobes. As much as I'd like to believe this boycott nonsense is just empty posturing from a nation which is deeply and incurably addicted to celtic paraphernalia, boycottscotland.com have come up with a cunning solution:

Ireland has been advocated by many as the best alternative to those who regularly travel to and conduct business in Scotland. Many have advocated avoiding Scotch whisky and opting for American, Canadian, or Irish whiskies.

Curses. Anyway, I suppose we asked for it. As the wise boycotters point out,

After the horrific events of 9/11, the world needs to be reminded that terrorism must be punished and never rewarded. Terrorists must never be shown compassion or mercy, for these people have no respect for human life. The British, who ironically have themselves been victim to numerous acts of terrorism on their own soil, seem to have forgotten. They need a reminder, and protesting by boycotting travel and business with Scotland and the United Kingdom is the best way of doing so.

Blah blah blah blah blah. Doubts about Megrahi's guilt aside, I'm proud to live within a judicial system which isn't driven by vengeance, and I'm proud that justice secretary Kenny MacAskill didn't allow himself to be bullied out of making the right decision, and yes, releasing Megrahi was undoubtably the right decision. It makes no real difference to those affected by his crimes whether he spends the last three months of his life in prison or at home, but it will make a whole world of difference to his family - compassion over revenge, every time.

Mr. MacAskill, the so-called "Justice" Secretary of Scotland, you should be ashamed of yourself. You know nothing of justice, nor will we ever forgive your heinous action, and it is our sincere hope that the people of Scotland will strongly voice their opposition to what you have done. You have shown to the international community that your government and the United Kingdom as a whole will stop at nothing to pursue the neverending and relentless acquisition of oil revenues.

Seriously?

I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with the insufferably lo-fi indie trendsetter snobmongers over at Pitchfork, much as I do with anyone who often agrees with me but sometimes has the temerity to not. Though they are only too happy to applaud the likes of Sufjan Stevens and Patrick Wolf, their willingness to heap plaudits on stuff that sounds like cutlery being slowly raked along pot-holed concrete by a depressed, bell-toting pony meant that I approached their Top 500 tracks of 2000-2009 rundown with some trepidation. Would I recognise anything on it? What unknown ukelele-toting Romanian circus troupe would sneak into the top 5 at the expense of Jump Down, B*Witched's sole singular foray into the noughties? Is it really possible to condense ten years of music into such a short list and manage to please anyone at all?

Pitchfork are often maligned for their alleged Radiohead over-worship and infuriatingly overthought, overwritten and decimal-place spattered reviews, but they have - god bless 'em - actually done the unthinkable and come up with a very mixed, very inclusive and really rather good summation of the last 3600ish days of music. I personally can't think of anyone else who would elect Outkast's B.O.B. as their defining single of the decade, but any list that includes Biology by Girls Aloud and gives a shout out to Annie in the top 20 is fine with me.

Here's the top 20 in case anyone's interested, the full thing's over there somewhere.

20. The Walkmen - "The Rat"
19. R Kelly - "Ignition (Remix)" (?!?!)
18. Hercules and Love Affair - "Blind"
17. Annie - "Heartbeat" (Properly amazing)
16. The Rapture - "House of Jealous Lovers"
15. The Knife - "Heartbeats"
14. Jay-Z - "99 Problems" (One of the few things in life that can be said to have been improved by Linkin Park)
13. LCD Soundsystem - "Losing My Edge"
12. Outkast - "Hey Ya!" (Shake it like a etc)
11. Gnarls Barkley - "Crazy"
10. Arcade Fire - "Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)" (They obviously meant #3)
9. Animal Collective - "My Girls"
8. Radiohead - "Idioteque" (Not number 1, Pitchfork?!?)
7. Missy Elliot - "Get Ur Freak On" (I prefer the one with the bees in the video)
6. Yeah Yeah Yeahs - "Maps" (Amazing)
5. Daft Punk - "One More Time" (Amazing)
4. Beyoncé [ft. Jay-Z] - "Crazy in Love" (Amazing)
3. M.I.A. [ft. Bun B and Rich Boy] - "Paper Planes (Diplo Remix)" (Amazing)
2. LCD Soundsystem - "All My Friends" (Pretty Amazing)
1. Outkast - "B.O.B." (I have never heard this before in my life)