Restoring Paloma's Faith

By Author: pangsiyan
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An honourable Glastonbury mention must go to singer, actor and consummate clothes-horse Paloma Faith, 24, who spent much of the final day of the festival standing outside the press tent in a gold lamé arrangement topped by preposterous green headgear and a parasol.

"I'm drunk. I'm going to sing in the gay area at Glasto," she then tweeted provocatively. "Hopefully it'll make the tabloids." Sadly, despite her vast enthusiasm and the attentions of various passing paps, Ms Faith failed to be featured, as far as we can tell, in any of the post-fest gossip columns. When she took to the Pyramid Stage for her big performance, her get-up was yet more arresting: some sort of spangled, skin-tight, skin-coloured leotard and swimming cap, apparently suspended by parachute straps from a pair of giant inflatable testicles. Yet, Ms Faith lamented later: "I don't think the BBC even filmed my insanely large balloons, which was tragic because I put a lot of effort into them."

Since we're bereft of any other Glastonbury gossip, and poor Paloma seems so downhearted by her lack of media coverage, Diary would like to take this opportunity ...
... to redress the balance.

* Leading private equity boss Jon Moulton is popular in the business world, and well-liked by fellow residents in Shoreham, Kent, where his investment was instrumental in saving the sole village shop from insolvency. His firm Better Capital also rescued Reader's Digest magazine after it was put into administration; no doubt some of the sleepy conurbation's inhabitants are subscribers. So why is Moulton moving out - and when the vineyard at his Shoreham country house has just started producing its own wine? "He never actually slotted into the village," explains one local. "He planted lots of leylandii when he first came here, to stop the peasantry looking into his grounds, and people didn't like that. Somebody in the village eventually cut them down." Might Moulton, who was unavailable for comment, relocate to the house he owns in Guernsey? After all, he never much cared for the 50p tax rate, which the coalition's new budget retained. His vineyard's first vintage was called "Recession Red", and featured Gordon Brown's face on the label.

* Thrift begins at home for Chancellor George Osborne, whose Tatton constituency office is advertising for a full-time PA for the princely sum of £12,000 per annum - about half the average wage. "This post," the classified ad reads, "will provide valuable 'coal-face' experience for those looking for a future career as parliamentary support staff." In other words, you won't make much when you get to Westminster, either.

* Blame the ball, blame the ref, blame the woodwork, blame Sepp Blatter, blame the manager, blame the punishing Premier League schedule or... blame Condé Nast. The publisher's magazines GQ and Vanity Fair both featured fancy photoshoots with potential World Cup stars on their June covers, almost none of whom have lived up to their billing. GQ's cover stars included Rio Ferdinand (injured), Didier Drogba (who made it to South Africa but not as far as the second round), Cesc Fabregas (yet to start a game for Spain at time of writing) and Fabio Capello (enough said). Vanity Fair's models were Carlton Cole (not picked for Capello's squad), Alexandre Pato (not picked for Dunga's squad), Michael Ballack (injured), Gianluigi Buffon (injured), Samuel Eto'o (knocked out), Landon Donovan (ditto), Dejan Stankovic (ditto), and Drogba (see above). Of the 13 (lucky for some) featured players, just three remain in the competition: Brazil's Kaka, Ghana's Sulley Muntari, and either Cristiano Ronaldo or Fabregas, depending on whose team won last night. Here's hoping it was Fabregas. Need I really explain why?

* Tell a lie, we have one other Glastonbury story. Reviews of Damon Albarn's Friday-night performance fronting Gorillaz at the festival were disappointing. The band was a last-minute addition following U2's cancellation, but Albarn was going against his famously good instincts by performing. At the NME awards in February, after picking up the Best Live Event award for Blur's Hyde Park gigs last summer, the singer said he wouldn't like to try following his former band's fantastic comeback set at Glastonbury 2009. "At the moment I wouldn't want [Gorillaz] to play Glastonbury or something because I'd be setting myself a very high benchmark," he said. It sounds, sadly, as if he was proved right.

driver from www.independent.co.uk