Russell brand

Russell Brand comes to Jeremy Corbyn’s defence

From our UK edition

Jeremy Corbyn has been having a difficult time of late. The Labour leadership favourite has become increasingly tetchy with the media after facing questions about his links to a Holocaust denier, as well as being the subject of criticism from a host of former Labour bigwigs. However, there is one man who he can rely on to fight his corner; step forward Russell Brand. Although Ed Miliband had to pay a late night visit to the comedian-turned-revolutionary's £2 million apartment in order to win his endorsement during the general election, Brand has come out for Corbyn all on his own accord.

Nuclear overreaction

From our UK edition

When I was growing up in the 1970s, my three main fears were: being blown up by the IRA; being eaten by a Jaws-like great white shark; being vaporised by a nuclear bomb. I expect it was the same for most kids of my generation. The first two, obviously, were a function of the Birmingham bombings (et al.) and the Peter Benchley/Steven Spielberg axis of shark terror. And the third was the product of the relentless propagandising of CND as rehearsed faithfully on pretty much every BBC programme going from John Craven’s Newsround to The Archers, Animal Magic and Roobarb and Custard.

High life | 9 July 2015

From our UK edition

Wow, what a week. London may be bad for one’s health, but it sure makes it fun on the way to where we’re all going. I’m determined not to mention Greece — too much has been written about my poor country, most of it quite nice — so I will stick to London in general and The Spectator in particular. It began with a nostalgic party for about 28 chez George and Lita Livanos, childhood friends, in their treasure-filled house in Mayfair. A drunken lunch in a St James’s club followed, five old buddies reminiscing about the days when hangovers didn’t register.

Ed Miliband is subject of ridicule in new song

From our UK edition

After anti-austerity protesters turned on Russell Brand for endorsing Labour at a protest on Saturday, it was only a matter of time til Ed Miliband faced a similar backlash over his party's defeat. Alas for Miliband, his takes musical form. Sleaford Mods - the working class mod band - have attacked the former Labour leader in their new album, with the song In Quiet Streets: 'Miliband got hit with the ugly stick, not that it matters. The chirping c--t obviously wants the country in tatters' Boris Johnson is also in their firing line with the song Rupert Trousers inspired by his speech at last year’s party conference, where he used a brick to demonstrate his plan to build more homes.

Portrait of the week | 25 June 2015

From our UK edition

Home Tens of thousands took part in a demonstration in London against austerity, and thousands more in other cities. Russell Brand was heckled for being too right-wing: ‘Fuck off back to Miliband,’ protestors in Parliament Square cried. David Cameron, the Prime Minister, explaining his thinking on further benefit cuts: ‘There is what I would call a merry-go-round: people working on the minimum wage having that money taxed by the government and then the government giving them that money back — and more — in welfare.’ The government sold more shares in the Lloyds Banking Group, bringing its ownership to less than 17 per cent.

Charlotte Church takes her anti-austerity message to Glastonbury

From our UK edition

Last week festival goers were disappointed to learn that Foo Fighters had cancelled their headline slot at Glastonbury. While bookies were quick to offer odds on the different musical giants who could take their place at the music festival which takes places this weekend, the organisers ended up simply moving Florence and the Machine, who were already performing at the festival, up to the headline slot. However, fans who were keen for a new act can at least take heart that another artist has been added to the line-up. Step forward Charlotte Church. The classical singer turned anti-austerity 'prosecco socialist' will now appear at the festival on Sunday in a Left Field debate to talk about politics.

Jemima Goldsmith: my Tinder has ‘loads of Pakistanis and people with beards’

From our UK edition

Jemima Goldsmith's love life has been well documented by the red tops in recent years, with her former loves including Imran Khan and Russell Brand. So Mr S was pleased to hear that - in the name of research - she has been adopting a new approach and experimenting with the dating app Tinder. Goldsmith took to the stage at Vanity Fair's digital summit to conduct a Q&A with the app's founder Sean Rad. Things started off politely with Jemima, who is the sister of Zac Goldsmith, quizzing Rad over why he had come up with the idea for the app, which has over 50 million active users: 'I think meeting people should be fun. The ultimate aim is to be the place you go to when you want to meet somebody new and sort of make these connections.

Lucy Powell: the campaign genius behind the ‘Milibrand’ interview

From our UK edition

Lucy Powell's list of PR blunders reached epic proportions through the course of the election campaign, with the Labour campaign chief messing up several media appearances: However, Mr S understands that one of her biggest cock-ups remained unknown until this weekend. Writing in the Sunday Times, Tanya Gold revealed that it was Powell who helped organise Russell Brand's much mocked interview with Ed Miliband. 'The deal was brokered by Lucy Powell, the now equally discredited vice-chairman of the election campaign, and Mr Eddie Izzard.

The biggest loser of the night? Russell Brand

From our UK edition

Forget Vince Cable. Forget, if you can, Ed Balls (and I know that’s hard, because what a joyous result that was). Expel from your mind the image of Nick Clegg crying into his cornflakes this morning while texting his old pals in the Euro-oligarchy to see if they will give him a new plush job that involves no contact with pesky plebs. For last night there was an even bigger loser than those guys. Russell Brand. Or ‘Rusty Rockets’, as his politics-packed Twitterfeed has it. Rusty being the operative word, for now we know that the much-hyped ability of slebs like Brand to sway public sentiment is in a serious state of decomposition.

Letters | 7 May 2015

From our UK edition

Bees vs Belgians Sir: To answer Rory Sutherland and Glen Weyl’s question: yes, everyone should vote and no, just because someone is more interested in politics, his opinion should not count more heavily (‘Plan Bee’, 2 May). Belgium has had compulsory voting for over a century. The troubles that follow every general election may seem to make it a strange example to follow, but those troubles are a consequence of the fragmented political landscape and not of the polling system. Compulsory voting motivates people to stay informed and care about what is happening to their country. It is, however, only compulsory to show up at the polling station, not to cast a valid vote, so the happily apathetic can draw a chicken or write a poem on their ballot paper if they’d rather.

High life | 7 May 2015

From our UK edition

If any of you sees Graydon Carter, the editor of Vanity Fair, walking around with a begging bowl in his hand, it’s because he took me to dinner recently. I sort of went a bit nuts with the wine and the VF chief ended up with the bill. We went to a new Bagel restaurant, Chevalier, a futuristic marvel with great food and wine and even grander prices. New York is no longer elegant, and there are no longer society types dressed to the nines sitting on the banquettes and downing Manhattans. The Jewish ascendancy that downed the Wasps was as elegant as the one it replaced. William Paley, John Loeb and others like them dressed at Anderson & Sheppard, were shod by John Lobb, and had their shirts made by Sulka. They had exquisite manners and aped their predecessors.

Unfortunately celebrity endorsements really do matter

From our UK edition

Whoever comes top on Thursday, Labour has won the only poll that really matters – that of Britain’s beloved celebrities, with recent endorsements by Steve Coogan, Delia Smith, Robert Webb, Ronnie O’Sullivan and Jo Brand, among others. The Tories in contrast can only muster a few self-made businesswomen and Peter Stringfellow. https://twitter.com/PJStringfellow/status/595577294355238915 Labour’s most important conquest, however, has to be comedian-turned-people’s poet Russell Brand, who previously suggested that voting was a waste of time, but now backs Ed Miliband. When it comes to this 21st-century political colossus, no one can better Rod Liddle’s words from a few months ago: ‘That’s why I enjoy my mornings in bed with Russell.

I’m not voting on Thursday — but don’t you dare call me apathetic

From our UK edition

With just 48 hours to go before we get to vote in officially the most boring election in history, the great and good are fretting over the apathy of the little people. We’ve seen the emergence of Poets Against Apathy — a group of northern scribes keen to shake the public out of its anti-political stupor — and numerous newspaper articles bemoaning the apathy of the masses. A whole section of the Guardian website is devoted to ‘Voter apathy’, featuring Owen Jones, Polly Toynbee, Charlie Brooker and others shaking their liberal heads over the disengaged. Brooker even refers to them as ‘idiots’ who say ‘Bah to everything. BAH BAH BAH.

Comedian Brand u-turns and urges people to vote

From our UK edition

There’ll be satisfaction in the Labour leader’s office today as Russell Brand has done a reverse-ferret and urged his voters to vote and vote Labour. Or, to be more precise, to vote Labour in England—with the exception of Brighton where he wants them to vote Green. He seems to be implicitly urging a vote for the SNP in Scotland. To win Brand over, Miliband channelled his former US grassroots adviser Arnie Graf and talked about community politics and how the idea of a living wage came not from a policy seminar but activists in the US talking to low-paid workers. But Brand’s endorsement is of limited value given that it comes long after the deadline for registering to vote.

Russell Brand says vote (but not for Ed Miliband)

From our UK edition

At a recent screening of his new capitalism documentary the Emperor's New Clothes, Russell Brand, the revolutionary who refuses to vote, said he was too angry to say nice things about today's politicians: ‘When I watch it [the Emperor's New Clothes], I sort of think come on Russell people really want to hear you say something about the election like Caroline Lucas is lovely, or Natalie Bennett is lovely, or Tom Watson is lovely or Ed Miliband is really trying his hardest, but when I watch this I think "nooo! Justice!"’ However just a week later and the comedian has changed his tune. After Ed Miliband paid a late-night visit to his home earlier this week, Brand has been inspired to ditch his anti-voting policy for one MP and their constituency.

Portrait of the week | 30 April 2015

From our UK edition

Home The British economy grew by 0.3 per cent in the first quarter of 2015, the slowest quarterly growth for two years. The Institute for Fiscal Studies pointed out many absurdities in party election promises, noting that most people would see tax and benefit changes that reduced their income; it said that the Conservative and Liberal Democrat plan to increase the personal allowance to £12,500 would not help the 44 per cent of people who now pay no tax, that Labour’s promised 10p tax band would be ‘worth a princely 50 pence a week to most income-tax payers’ and that it could not be sure whether the reintroduction of a 50p rate for high earners would raise any extra money for the Treasury.

Russell Brand is the future, like it or not

From our UK edition

I write at a difficult time. The balls are in the air, but we know not where they will land. Perhaps, by the time you get to read this, more will be clear. Right now, however, we know only that Ed Miliband has been interviewed by Russell Brand. We do not yet know what he said. Or what Brand said. Probably he said more. ‘That was interesting enough, but Russell Brand was a bit restrained’ is something that nobody has said, after any conversation, ever. Most likely he’ll have quite liked Ed Miliband. They’ll have friends in common. Probably even girlfriends, what with them both having such voracious sexual appetites.

Young people want a future, not freebies

From our UK edition

Ed Miliband wants the youth vote enough to have spent an evening with Russell Brand earlier this week. My generation could decide the election next Thursday, and politicians seem to think there are two ways to win young voters’ hearts: celebrity endorsement and self-interest. The battle for the youth vote has hinged around promising to save us money. Now they’re done bickering about tuition fees, the party leaders are busy telling students how we would personally benefit from their governments: Labour would ban unpaid internships, the Tories would help us buy our first homes and the Lib Dems would cut our bus fares by two-thirds. But when it comes to young voters, self-interest doesn’t sell: we want a vision for society.

The cultural significance of Ed Miliband’s mockney accent

From our UK edition

I’m mildly posh – nowhere near David Cameron posh, for example, let alone the Olympian heights of Brian Sewell, but I’m unlikely to ever play a football hooligan or an East End gangster in a Guy Ritchie film. And I’m better spoken than I was as a teenager, when I used to affect a slight Mockney accent with a mild Jafaican inflection, as is the case with most Londoners born after about 1976. Not as bad as some of my contemporaries, but enough to sound like a bit of a berk. One day, as our gang was walking down that notoriously deprived inner city street, Holland Park Avenue, I heard an almost comically plumy voice cry out: 'Edward West! You were at my prep school!

Campaign kick-off: eight days to go

From our UK edition

There will be more promises from the party leaders today — plus a comedic twist. David Cameron will pledge a five year ‘tax lock’ that will be enshrined in law, while Ed Miliband will attack the proposed £12 billion welfare cuts and promise to raise working-age tax credits in line with inflation. And then we have Russell Brand. To help guide you through the melée of stories and spin, here is a summary of today’s main election stories. 1. The taxman banished David Cameron doesn’t appear to feel confident that the electorate believes his promises.