Vengeance is mine for £350...
Justin Hawkins. Photo: Yui Mok/PA"My mamma wants to know / Where I'm spending all my dough," trills Justin Hawkins in Givin' Up, but, as of today, he might find things a little harder to explain. According to the BBC, the Darkness frontman has managed to blow £350 - not on skag, poetic subject of that song, but on buying a copy of his new album for some 35 times its cover price.
Incensed by the fact that someone has had the temerity to flog an advance copy of the band's second album, One Way Ticket to Hell ... And Back, on eBay Australia, Hawkins took matters into his own hands and snapped it up so that it wouldn't be leaked before release. If only Chris Martin had thought to get a PayPal account, eh?
In best rock hard-man tradition, Hawkins has threatened to go after the culprit personally: "It's encoded so we'll have a name and a number - we'll know which disc it is, who distributed it and who they distributed it to. And that person is going to go down," he told the Beeb this morning.
How so, Justin? Spine-curdling vengeance? Day of Judgement wrath? Um, nearly. "He is either going to get some sort of legal intervention," Hawkins continues, "or he certainly won't receive an album from our record company ever again." Feel that earth tremble.
No matter. Whoever the guilty party is - speculation so far is that it's either a journalist or some kind of industry insider - it seems pretty certain that they're going to get caught. Which raises just one question: will Hawkins actually get his precious CD before the lawyers swing into action? A tricky one even for eBay's much-used dispute resolution centre, surely.
