At a small independent record store tucked away in a neat courtyard of shops next to St Albans’ famous cathedral, a vinyl record that one band is hoping could become the most expensive ever sold in the UK is about to be released.
Just one physical copy of prolific indie band The Pocket Gods’ latest album Vegetal Digital has been produced, going on sale at their hometown’s Empire Records for the rather large sum of £1 million.
With charts of the music industry’s “most expensives” usually throwing up world-renowned artists such as The Rolling Stones, Madonna and U2 (most expensive tours), and songs such as Michael and Janet Jackson’s 1995 hit Scream (most expensive music video of all time), it might seem an improbable feat.
But the Hertfordshire band’s frontman Mark Christopher Lee is confident they will find a buyer.
Why are they trying their luck? Well, they have long protested about what they say is the lack of fair royalties paid to musicians by Spotify and other streaming services – an issue raised by high-profile stars including Taylor Swift in recent years, which was also the subject of an inquiry in the UK in 2021.
Highlighting the fact it only takes 30 seconds for a song to trigger a streaming payment, The Pocket Gods have been recording songs of around this length since 2015; Only The Rich Can Tour and We’re All No Hit Wonders Now are among the quickfire tracks you’ll find in their back catalogue.
But Lee says it’s now time to “stop moaning about Spotify” and do something productive to help artists and songwriters. So if the one copy of Vegetal Digital sells for £1 million, the proceeds will fund a new rival “ethical” streaming platform, Nubplay.
It sounds ambitious, but the musician says he believes the record could be snapped up within a couple of weeks.
‘Actions speak louder than words’
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“Someone who’s got lots of money and wants to do something good with it,” he tells Sky News, pondering what kind of person might invest. “It’s a crazy world we’re getting into… but we’re making a stand, we want to make a better future for artists and songwriters. We talk a good game but actions speak louder than words and this is what we’re going to do.
“For years and years, music – a lot of the arts – has been devalued. And I just can’t imagine a world without music.”
Nubplay would guarantee to pay artists and songwriters a minimum royalty of 1p per stream, says Lee. “It doesn’t sound that much, but it’s 50 times the current rate we get from Spotify.”
Formed in 1998 at Tower Records in London, The Pocket Gods are said to have been championed by the likes of the late John Peel and Steve Lamacq over the years, and have broken Guinness World Records for the most studio albums released digitally (75) and most songs on a digital album.
Earlier in 2022, the band – now made up of founding members Lee (vocals and guitar) and Noel Storey (keys), Simon Herries (bass) and former Searchers drummer Scott Ottaway – released Nobody Makes Money Anymore, an album of 1,000 30-ish second tracks.
“That went really well, it went viral around the world,” says Lee. “It’s had nearly a million streams, which sounds really, really good, but we’ve had about 450 quid in terms of royalties. So, no, it hasn’t been a great money-spinner but it has gained us a lot of fans and helps us to raise this issue.”
The one-off $2m Wu-Tung Clan album sold on by the US government
As Vegetal Digital is released, the band will remove their back catalogue from streaming services; if it does go for £1 million, it could become the most expensive album ever sold in the UK. However, Once Upon A Time In Shaolin, the seventh album by American hip-hop group Wu-Tang Clan, holds the title of most expensive in the world.
An early stand against streaming, the group made just one physical copy which sold for $2 million (about £1.3m at the time) to pharma company executive Martin Shkreli in 2015. Shkreli, however, was jailed in 2017 – and last year, the US government confirmed it had sold the one-of-a-kind album to help pay off the $7.36 million the businessman was ordered to forfeit after being convicted of fraud.
According to a 2019 article by music company HMV, the top five most expensive albums chart is a Beatles-heavy list; after Once Upon A Time In Shaolin are copies of The Beatles (the White Album), Elvis Presley’s My Happiness, Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, and John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s Double Fantasy.
But could Vegetal Digital become an unlikely contender for the number two spot? A £1 million sale would place it ahead of the first mono pressing of the White Album, sold by Ringo Starr at auction in December 2015 for $790,000 (about £521,000 at the time).
“I’m excited to see it and hear it,” says Dave Burgess, manager at Empire Records. “We certainly haven’t had [a record selling at this price] before. It’s really interesting and exciting. I jumped at the opportunity to get on board.”
Lee is documenting the band’s unique story in a film, entitled Inspired The 30 Second Song Movie, which is set to be released in December.
He hopes a million-pound sale will be part of it. Could a big-name artist be the one to invest?
“Well, I did message Taylor Swift on Instagram, invited her to the launch,” he says. “Maybe we’ll see her there.”
Vegetal Digital, by The Pocket Gods, is on sale from Tuesday 4 October, only available at Empire Records in St Albans
The search for Jay Slater in an area of Tenerife has been called off, police have said, nearly two weeks after his disappearance.
The British teenager, from Oswaldtwistle, near Blackburn in Lancashire, has been missing in Tenerife since 17 June, when he vanished the morning after a rave.
The Civil Guard called for volunteers to join a new search in the Masca area – near his last-known location – on Saturday.
It has now confirmed to Sky News that the search has ended. Police are keeping the investigation open and could yet open up searches in the south of the island, but have not provided an update.
A handful of volunteers turned up to help rescue teams on Saturday, forming a total group of 30 to 40 people scouring a huge area of rugged and hilly terrain.
Mr Slater, 19, had been on holiday with friends on the Spanish island and was last pictured at Papayago, a nightclub hosting the end of the NRG festival, late on 16 June.
After the event ended, he got in a car travelling to a small Airbnb in Masca with two men, who police said on Saturday are “not relevant” to the case.
His last known location was the Rural de Teno Park in the north of the island – which is about an 11-hour walk from his accommodation.
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‘I just want him back’
A local cafe owner told Sky News he tried to catch a bus back to Los Cristianos, where he was staying.
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Ofelia Medina Hernandez said she spoke to the teenager at 8am on 17 June, telling him a bus was due at 10am – but he set off walking and she said she later drove past him “walking fast”.
The apprentice bricklayer called a friend holidaying with him at around 8.30am on 17 June and said he was going to walk back after missing the bus.
He also told his friend he was lost and in need of water, with only 1% charge on his phone.
On Friday, Mr Slater’s friend Brad Hargreaves told ITV’s This Morning he had been on a video call with him before his disappearance when he heard him go off the road.
He said he could see his friend’s feet “sliding” down the hill and hear he was walking on gravel.
Meanwhile, Mr Slater’s family shared a blurry image of what they believe could be the missing teenager captured on CCTV in a nearby town 10 hours after he was first reported missing.
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Police have begun visiting more than 160 families in Hull to repatriate ashes recovered from a funeral parlour in the city.
Investigators have been able to identify them through documentation and extensive enquiries.
However, some of the ashes will never be formally identified because cremation makes it impossible to extract DNA.
It emerged earlier in the year that officers had removed a number of bodies from three branches of Legacy Independent Funeral Directors – two in Hull and one in Beverley.
Humberside Police said it had received a “number of calls from concerned members of the public”.
Now, the force says it has “begun the process of visiting 163 families across the city in regards to the repatriation of ashes” recovered from the branch of the company located in Hessle Road in Hull.
It added: “Officers from the force along with support staff from Hull City Council and East Riding Council will provide those affected with a detailed update on what they’ve recovered and discuss the options available to them.”
Richard Shaw, whose wife Rita died after a short illness last October, had unidentified ashes in an urn at his home for many months.
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Mr Shaw, 70, used Legacy Independent Funeral Directors. After the firm was raided by police in March, he became concerned he might have been given the wrong ashes.
His worst fears were realised when police recently contacted him to say they had recovered what they believed to be his wife’s ashes during their inquiries.
They have just been returned to him, eight months after her death.
He was given ashes in December while his wife was cremated in January, according to a letter found by police.
The unidentified ashes have been scattered around a rose tree he planted for Rita.
It still feels “raw”, he told Sky News.
“It’s heartbreaking,” he said. “It comes over you in waves.”
Mr Shaw, who volunteers at the hospice where his wife died, added: “I’m taking [it] that they’re Rita’s ashes, but it’s just a case of if I didn’t accept that I don’t know how I’d cope with it all.
“I think I’m more positive that they’re Rita’s ashes but they’ve been cremated so they can’t check on the DNA side of it.”
The families are calling for a permanent memorial for their loved ones.
Monthly candlelit vigils have been taking place at the city’s Pickering Park, providing those affected with support in uncertain times.
Some families say it would be the perfect location for a memorial garden.
Karen Dry, who used Legacy Independent Funeral Directors when her parents died, has organised the gatherings.
She told Sky News: “We need a permanent memorial – we need somewhere people can come and sit and reflect on their loved ones and families, somewhere that’s peaceful so that we know that they’re always resting.”
She added: “We were all perfect strangers at the beginning and now we’re very good friends. We’ve created our own community.”
A man, 46, and a woman, 23, were arrested on suspicion of prevention of a lawful and decent burial, fraud by false representation, and fraud by abuse of position.
They have been released on bail while inquiries continue.
The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) says there’s a conspiracy of silence this election – that all of the major political parties aren’t being honest enough about their fiscal plans this election.
And they have a point. Most obviously (and this is the main thing the IFS is complaining about) none of the major manifestos – from Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Conservative parties – have been clear about how they will fill an impending black hole in the government’s spending plans.
No need to go into all the gritty details, but the overarching point is that all government spending plans include some broad assumptions about how much spending (and for that matter, taxes and economic growth) will grow in the coming years. Economists call this the “baseline”.
But there’s a problem with this baseline: it assumes quite a slow increase in overall government spending in the next four years, an average of about 1 per cent a year after accounting for inflation. Which doesn’t sound too bad except that we all know from experience that NHS spending always grows more quickly than that, and that 1 per cent needs to accommodate all sorts of other promises, like increasing schools and defence spending and so on.
If all those bits of government are going to consume quite a lot of that extra money (far more than a 1 per cent increase, certainly) then other bits of government won’t get as much. In fact, the IFS reckons those other bits of government – from the Home Office to the legal system – will face annual cuts of 3.5 per cent. In other words, it’s austerity all over again.
But here’s the genius thing (for the politicians, at least). While they have to set a baseline, to make all their other sums add up, the dysfunctional nature of the way government sets its spending budgets means it only has to fill in the small print about which department gets what when it does a spending review. And that spending review isn’t due until after the election.
The upshot is all the parties can pretend they’ve signed up to the baseline even when it’s patently obvious that more money will be needed for those unprotected departments (or else it’s a return to austerity).
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So yes, the IFS is right: the numbers in each manifesto, including Labour’s, are massively overshadowed by this other bigger conspiracy of silence.
But I would argue that actually the conspiracy of silence goes even deeper. Because it’s not just fiscal baselines we’re not talking about enough. Consider five other issues none of the major parties is confronting (when I say major parties, in this case I’m talking about the Conservative, Labour and Lib Dem manifestos – to some extent the Green and Reform manifestos are somewhat less guilty of these particular sins, even if they commit others).
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First, for all their promises not to raise any of the major tax rates (something Labour, the Conservatives and Lib Dems have all committed to) the reality is taxes are going up. We will all be paying more in taxes by the end of the parliament compared with today.
Indeed, we’ll all be paying more income tax. Except that we’ll be paying more of it because we’ll be paying tax on more of our income – that’s the inexorable logic of freezing the thresholds at which you start paying certain rates of tax (which is what this government has done – and none of the other parties say they’ll reverse).
Second, the main parties might say they believe in different things, but they all seem to believe in one particular offbeat religion: the magic tax avoidance money tree. All three of these manifestos assume they will make enormous sums – more, actually, than from any single other money-raising measure – from tightening up tax avoidance rules.
While it’s perfectly plausible that you could raise at least some money from clamping down on tax avoidance, it’s hardly a slam-dunk. That this is the centrepiece of each party’s money-raising efforts says a lot. And, another thing that’s often glossed over: raising more money this way will also raise the tax burden.
Third is another thing all the parties agree on and are desperate not to question: the fiscal rules. The government has a set of rules requiring it to keep borrowing and (more importantly given where the numbers are right now) total debt down to a certain level.
But here’s the thing. These rules are not god-given. They are not necessarily even all that good. The debt rule is utterly gameable. It hasn’t stopped the Conservatives raising the national debt to the highest level in decades. And it’s not altogether clear the particular measure of debt being used (net debt excluding Bank of England interventions) is even the right one.
Which raises another micro-conspiracy. Of all the parties at this election, the only one talking about whether the Bank of England should really be paying large sums in interest to banks as it winds up its quantitative easing programme is the Reform Party. This policy, first posited by a left-wing thinktank (the New Economics Foundation) is something many economists are discussing. It’s something the Labour Party will quite plausibly carry out to raise some extra money if it gets elected. But no one wants to discuss it. Odd.
Brexit impact
Anyway, the fourth issue everyone seems to have agreed not to discuss is, you’ve guessed it, Brexit. While the 2019 election was all about Brexit, this one, by contrast, has barely featured the B word. Perhaps you’re relieved. For a lot of people we’ve talked so much about Brexit over the past decade or so that, frankly, we need a bit of a break. That’s certainly what the main parties seem to have concluded.
But while the impact of leaving the European Union is often overstated (no, it’s not responsible for every one of our economic problems) it’s far from irrelevant to our economic plight. And where we go with our economic neighbours is a non-trivial issue in the future.
Anyway, this brings us to the fifth and final thing no one is talking about. The fact that pretty much all the guff spouted on the campaign trail is completely dwarfed by bigger international issues they seem reluctant or ill-equipped to discuss. Take the example of China and electric cars.
Just recently, both the US and European Union have announced large tariffs on the import of Chinese EVs. Now, in America’s case those tariffs are primarily performative (the country imports only a tiny quantity of Chinese EVs). But in Europe‘s case Chinese EVs are a very substantial part of the market – same for the UK.
Raising the question: what is the UK going to do? You could make a strong case for saying Britain should be emulating the EU and US, in an effort to protect the domestic car market. After all, failing to impose tariffs will mean this country will have a tidal wave of cars coming from China (especially since they can no longer go to the rest of the continent without facing tariffs) which will make it even harder for domestic carmakers to compete. And they’re already struggling to compete.
By the same token, imposing tariffs will mean the cost of those cheap Chinese-made cars (think: MGs, most Teslas and all those newfangled BYDs and so on) will go up. A lot. Is this really the right moment to impose those extra costs on consumers.
In short, this is quite a big issue. Yet it hasn’t come up as a big issue in this campaign. Which is madness. But then you could say the same thing about, say, the broader race for minerals, about net zero policy more widely and about how we’re going to go about tightening up sanctions on Russia to make them more effective.
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Think back to the last time a political party actually confronted some long-standing issues no one wanted to talk about in their manifesto. I’m talking about the 2017 Conservative manifesto, which pledged to resolve the mess of social care in this country, once and for all.
It sought to confront a big social issue, intergenerational inequality, in so doing ensuring younger people wouldn’t have to subsidise the elderly.
The manifesto was an absolute, abject, electoral disaster. It was largely responsible for Theresa May‘s slide in the polls from a 20 point lead to a hung parliament.
And while most people don’t talk about that manifesto anymore, make no mistake: today’s political strategists won’t forget it in a hurry. Hence why this year’s campaign and this year’s major manifestos are so thin.
Elections are rarely won on policy proposals. But they are sometimes lost on them.