Just one question for Alex James. WHY?
As with quite alot of posts, this one originates from Twitter. Alex James, the former bass player with Blur, has written a column for The Sun newspaper. Normally the tabloid rag wouldn’t get column inches on this blog, being a Liverpool Football Club supporter of over 35 years Hillsborough it is a constant reminder. But Mr James has yet again set himself up for the fall, so who am I not to give him a helping hand?
In August 2011 Mr James launched his new range of cheeses in conjunction with ASDA, curious about the partnership I read the PR blurb. Mr James’s other claim to fame apart from music is (or was, as it may well be now) artisan cheese. His cheeses fast gained gastronaut recognition with his Farleigh wallop winning Best Goats cheese in 2008 & Little wallop winning Best Soft White cheese in 2009. But in more recent times his artisan cheese credibility has been on the wain, mainly through his own stupidity and or greed (delete as necessary). Besides the ASDA cheese being promoted as ‘Alex James Presents‘ there was the failed festival. The great & the good of the Cotswolds were present, but the organiser went bust owing thousands leaving many suppliers out of pocket. I’m sure Mr James got his slice for lending his name to the event & holding it on his Oxfordshire farm.
Back to the cheese, the list of produce for ASDA under the banner of ‘Alex James Presents‘ just makes the mind boggle:
- Cheddar Tikka Masala
- Cheddar Spudsworth
- Cheddar Mozzarella
- Cheddar Spring Onion
- Cheddar Sweet Chilli
- Cheddar Tomato Ketchup
- Cheddar Salad Cream
In a guest post for the ‘Aisle Spy‘ blog (I hasten to add it’s actually a PR blog for ASDA, rather than a Wikileaks style whistle blower) Mr James says:
I love posh cheese but the world of posh cheese is a ghetto, closed to all but the few. There is nothing wrong with liking posh cheese and everyday cheese. They can both be excellent.
Posh cheese Mr James, is a ghetto because people like you charge nearly £7 for 150g of cheese.
As you’d probably expect Twitter exploded into a tsunami of ridicule, even prompting blogger Chris Pople to put his money where his mouth is on his ‘Cheese & Biscuits‘ blog, exclaiming:
…instead of using this power for good, he has sold out in the most dramatic way possible, by putting his name to a bastardised commodity boil-in-the-bag slop and range of novelty sandwich toppings in return for yet another hefty income stream.
Five months later……..
And Mr James is back, this time extolling the virtues of Greggs, McDonalds & KFC. I applaud Greggs, I really do. A nationwide company making growing profits in a recession that is the worst in living memory, based in an area which is renown for high unemployment. Surely the last thing they need is a gormless gurning idiot draping himself over their sausage rolls.
But what has really upset the foodie twitterati is the comparison that the kitchens of McDonalds is:
..in some ways it’s very similar to a Michelin-starred restaurant.
In what way?
Do the staff work 14 hour shifts? Look like they’ve just been released from some middle eastern prison? Are they kitted out with Thermomixes & waterbaths? Prey tell Mr James. The only thing & I mean the ONLY thing that McDonalds has in common with any Michelin starred kitchen is consistency. Granted you can have a Big Mac the world over and it’ll taste pretty much the same – terrible, here the similarities end.
But to conclude his piece in the most widely read tabloid in the UK he says:
Now I’ve seen how it works I’m going to try Kentucky Fried grouse at home this weekend.
How very common man of you Alex.
we asked 100 people who is the biggest c**t…our survey said…