British singer Sting has waded into the X Factor debate. In a week where the show’s most famous judge Simon Cowell came in for some fierce criticism for what British viewers saw as a cynical ploy to fix the results, Sting has called the popular television show “preposterous” and “appalling”.

In an interview with London’s Evening Standard, ostensibly to promote his new CD “If On a Winter’s Night”, the Police frontman-turned-solo star launched into the music talent contest which regularly attracts peak audiences of more than 15 million in the UK.

“I am sorry but none of those kids are going to go anywhere, and I say that sadly,” he said of the contestants. “They are humiliated when they get sent off. How appalling for a young person to feel that rejection. It is a soap opera which has nothing to do with music. In fact, it has put music back decades. Television is very cynical.

“They … are not encouraged to create any real unique signature or fingerprint. That cannot come from TV. The X Factor is a preposterous show and you have judges who have no recognisable talent apart from self-promotion, advising them what to wear and how to look. It is appalling.”

Whether the 58-year-old’s comments will bother Cowell, the show’s other judges or the ITV channel which airs the hugely successful series is far from clear. They may be watching the upcoming viewing figures closely, however, after many fans vowed not to watch the programme again after Cowell’s recent antics.

Welcome to the Reuters live blog of the MTV Europe Music Awards in Berlin - hosted by U.S. pop singer Katy Perry (photo). 

A dozen Reuters reporters, photographers and television crew will be covering the event, one of the pop world’s biggest nights. From the news conference on Wednesday to the after-show party on Thursday we’ll bring you the highlights and low-lights. We’re using the #mtv as the hashtag if you want to follow us on Twitter:

Irish rockers U2 will play the single “Get On Your Boots” from their upcoming album live during the BRIT awards, the UK’s answer to the Grammys. It will be interesting to see whether the high-profile performance will help boost the TV audience of the annual event, which is being broadcast live on ITV on Wednesday, Feb. 18th.

Organisers are certainly not shy about talking up the show and the band. “Their addition to the line-up for this year’s show makes it possibly the best we have ever had,” says Ged Doherty, chairman of the BRITs. “This cements the BRITs as one of the biggest TV events in  the world.”

That may be stretching things a little, but U2 are big (140 million albums sold and counting), and the industry will be watching sales of their new record closely for signs that the slump in recent years may at last be levelling off.

British “X Factor” winner Alexandra Burke has just become a singles millionaire. Her version of “Hallelujah”, originally by Leonard Cohen, became the 10th single to reach the landmark this decade, according to the Official Charts Company, which compiles UK record sales.

The feat, putting Burke in the company of the likes of Kylie Minogue (”Can’t Get You Out of My Head”) and Bob the Builder (”Can You Fix It”), underlines the strength of the UK singles market which has been boosted by digital downloads. Singles sales last year rose by a third, a rare piece of good news for the struggling music industry which has been hit hard by Internet piracy and the rapid rise of video gaming.

It’s a safe bet that her debut album, whenever that may be, will enjoy similar chart domination, aided by the considerable marketing muscle of X Factor judge and producer Simon Cowell.

British popster Lily Allen has issued a statement addressing remarks she made in a magazine interview about illegal drugs which caused a bit of a brouhaha in the media over the last 24 hours.

Speaking to “The Word” ahead of the launch of her new album “It’s Not Me, It’s You”, on the EMI label, she said: “The only story is that drugs are bad and they will kill you. You will become a prostitute or a rapist or a dealer. But that’s not true. I know lots of people that take cocaine three nights a week and get up and go to work every day, no problem at all.”

Some readers would think the comments fairly harmless, but a handful of voices expressing shock and outrage were enough to get the 23-year-old’s publicity machine grinding into action.

“At no point does she say that drugs are a good thing or that she condones drug use,” said a statement from the singer. It later adds: “Lily Allen would like to state unequivocally that she does not condone illegal drug use and has every sympathy with individuals and families whose lives have been blighted by drugs.”

NEW YORK - It seemed a strange time for a shave. After the main set and before the encore at The Police’s last ever concert, Sting sat down in a barber’s chair backstage and relaxed as two women shaved his face, first with electric razors then with a blade. The moment was filmed and beamed to a giant screen above the stage. 

Why, you might ask? Media commentators in the past week have been less than kind about his salt-and-pepper beard that was showing serious signs of grey — and age. Sting was quoted on Monday as saying “The ladies love it,” but perhaps something changed his mind.

Check him out before and after — here’s a photo taken early in the show on Thursday night at Madison Square Garden, and then click on this link to see the official video of the encore — after the beard was shaved.

You can read the Reuters report on the band’s last concert together here.

PICTURE: REUTERS/Brendan McDermid

Pity the showbiz press pack.

About 30 reporters and TV presenters packed into an east London courtroom earlier this week to hear the sentencing of Amy Winehouse’s husband for attacking a pub landlord and then trying to cover up the crime.

Blake Fielder-Civil pleaded guilty to both charges, so the story was whether he would be handed a jail term or let off with a warning. He had already spent about nine months behind bars awaiting the judge’s decision.

So when judge David Radford began reading his ruling, we all strained to hear the decision. Trouble was, no one really understood it. One colleague of mine back in the office said a leading British broadcaster rushed out the news that Fielder-Civil had been handed a suspended sentence and so would be free to go. Judging by the happy hug Fielder-Civil gave to co-defendant Michael Brown at one point, he also got the wrong end of the stick.

In actual fact, the judge gave him 27 months, which was the headline figure most reporters phoned through to their desks. But that was also misleading. Keen to get to the bottom of what this really meant, I spoke to Fielder-Civil’s lawyer who explained that the real amount of time his client had left to serve was actually nearer four and a half months. Apparently you divide the sentence by two (equals 13.5 months) and then subtract the amount of time he has already spent in prison for the crimes (equals 4.5 months).

Anyone reading the first headlines could be forgiven for thinking that the 26-year-old, who married soul star Winehouse last year, would be behind bars well into 2010. In fact, he should be out in time for Christmas 2008.

Amy Winehouse hits the headlines more for her private life – battles against addiction, health and the odd fracas with members of the public — than she does for her music. So it was refreshing to see the media focusing on that aspect of her life again after the 24-year-old appeared at Nelson Mandela’s tribute concert on Friday night and at the Glastonbury music festival on Saturday.

While neither was a disaster, in the opinion of people watching, neither was great either. At the Mandela concert, she showed flashes of her ability and charisma but they were only flashes. Overall she looked lost on stage before the 50,000 crowd, and her voice sounded strained on the higher notes. Tabloid reports picked up on her altering the words to the anthem “Free Nelson Mandela”, which rounded off the tribute to the elder statesman before his 90th birthday. “Free Blakey, my fella”, she sang, referring to her jailed husband Blake Fielder-Civil. To be honest, I couldn’t tell her exact words when watching, but several reporters said they could.

Then she was off to Glastonbury, where 80,000 or so fans generally enjoyed her set, albeit with reservations, including what they described as a slurred, lazy rendition of signiature tune “Rehab”. And again, a scuffle with a member of the crowd midway through the performance and a swear word aimed at U.S. rapper Kanye West dominated coverage.

The question now is “where next?” for Winehouse, who was recently diagnosed with a mild form of lung condition emphysema, and whether her tentative comeback last week heralds a return to the good old days of music-making for the five-time Grammy award-winning star.

OK, they may not be Prince in terms of their importance and popularity, but youthful band McFly are a pretty big deal in Britain, boasting seven number one singles and two chart-topping albums. So when they announce they will be giving their new album away for free with a Sunday newspaper, perhaps they should not be ignored.

The band is following Prince’s lead to the letter. The U.S. star also issued an album free with the Mail on Sunday last year in a move that enraged retailers and record labels, for obvious reasons, but which was seen as a commercial success when the tour he was promoting sold well.

McFly will release “Radio:ACTIVE” with the same newspaper on July 20 in order to lure more people to their live shows. It underlines the trend in pop music towards giving your music away for free, or at least selling it for a song, in order to make money through live performances, merchandising and advertising.

Prince has done it, Radiohead has done it with their “pay-as-much-as-you-want” scheme, Coldplay gave away a single from their latest album online — the list gets longer and longer. The reason? Selling music does not make enough money, due to online piracy and the popularity of other forms of entertainment like video games.

Artists are convinced they will be the winners in the long term as revenues from touring go on rising. Record labels are going to end up among the losers if the trend continues. But there is another potential loser. The music fan.

Industry executives, perhaps unsurprisingly, argue that the more music is given away for free, the less money music labels make, and the less money labels make, the less money they spend on discovering new talent.

Do you buy that argument? And will the trend towards cheaper music continue to the point where some or even all of it is free?

The little-known Creaky Boards just became a little less little known thanks to an accusation of copying against mega-band Coldplay via a Youtube posting.

The video cuts snippets from the Boards’ song “The Songs I Didn’t Write” (oh, the glorious irony of it all) with clips from Coldplay’s “Viva La Vida”, the title track from the group’s new album which is selling fast in the UK. The posting even claims the band thought they spotted Coldplay lead singer Chris Martin in the crowd at a gig last year when they performed the song, hence making the link between the two.

The allegation prompted Coldplay to issue a blunt denial, saying that “Viva La Vida” was actually written seven months before the night in question.

The blogosphere has been busy with reactions to the accusations, with what seems to be a slight majority accusing the Boards of a cheap publicity stunt. Still, it may have worked. More than 320,000 visits have been made to the Youtube posting to date, about 1,000 times the number of clicks on other Creaky Boards’ contributions.