philip sherburne

Alexis Petridis might be more convincing if he didn't have a habit of twisting the facts to fit his argument. In a recent article chronicling a minor new "British invasion" of the US pop charts, he documents at great length the recent successes of a number of UK artists on American shores (including, intriguingly, Mis-teeq, who apparently needed the green light from Carson Daly before they could land a deal here) before concluding on the wry, pessimistic note -- how quintessentially British can you get? -- that despite these blips, significant cultural hurdles remain.

Andy Pemberton, "English-born editor of US music magazine Blender," writes Petridis, "has reservations about talk of a new British invasion. Too many factors are ranged against UK artists, he says, from the sheer size of the country to the power wielded by 'gatekeepers' such as MTV and radio conglomerate Clear Channel, both of which are obsessed with music fitting demographics rather than breaking boundaries. And, he adds, there are some things that Americans are just never going to get. 'I played the Streets album to the managing editor of Blender amid much trumpeting and enthusiasm. It's had fantastic reviews over here, critics love it. He just said, "I can't understand a word this guy is saying", and that was pretty much the end of that.'"

Except, of course, that two months before Petridis published his piece, Blender had already run a four-star review of A Grand Don't Come for Free, written by none other than Petritis' Guardian colleague Dorian Lynskey. So what was pretty much the end of what, now?