Age: 55.
Appearance: Village solicitor.
I see what you mean. Does a bit of conveyancing, a few wills, maybe the odd divorce … Ah, but appearances can be deceptive.
You mean he's actually a surveyor? What I mean, my facetious friend, is that Norman Baker is not only the Liberal Democrat MP for Lewes in East Sussex and a junior transport minister …
Ooh! … he is also embarking on a career as the lead singer in a rock band.
Some might say that the embarking is the easy bit. They might, but he and his band the Reform Club have gone about things fairly seriously. They have recorded an album in a studio, they are promoting it through their website, they are offering it for sale to the general public. They have even made a video for their first single, Piccadilly Circus.
Is it good? The song or the video?
Either. No.
Pity. Well the song is competent, but very simple, and sounds too much like the Kinks. (Indeed, it has been pointed out that the first few chords sound exactly like the Kinks.) The video is just Baker bothering people while looking embarrassed.
Still, nice to have a Norman on the music scene. Apart from Norman Cook, you mean? And Norman Blake from Teenage Fanclub? And Norman Lamb, another LibDem MP, who was an early investor in British rapper Tinchy Stryder?
Erm … wow … yes, apart from them. Yes, it is nice. Although, in other ways, Baker fits the rockstar profile perfectly. He has been a troublemaker in the House of Commons, and campaigns for environmental and animal welfare causes.
Does he have an insatiable hunger for groupies and cocaine? I am happy to make clear that there is no evidence whatsoever that he does. Indeed, the Reform Club does joke about being a bunch of sad-case old rockers.
How sweet, and yet still sad. I know. "I doubt we're going to get chased by huge numbers of fans," Baker told the Today programme.
Unless you count protestors against the High Speed Two rail network? I don't think you do.
Do say: "The first album is called Always Tomorrow."
Don't say: "Is it about the LibDems?"
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