I Don't Like Mondays (C4)

Gay Muslims (C4)

BOB Geldof and the Boomtown Rats had a number one hit in 30 countries with their single I Don't Like Mondays. Hearing how the song was inspired by America's first school shooting makes you realise how insensitive it was.

In January 1979, 16-year-old Brenda Spencer opened fire with a rifle on the school across the street from her home. She left two adults dead, eight children and a policeman injured. She did it, she said, because "I don't like Mondays. It livens up the day".

As she pleaded guilty, her story was never told in court. Now she's applied for parole and the C4 documentary did a thorough job in not only covering the hearing but reconstructing events on that dreadful day through survivors and witnesses. More intriguingly, it tried to understand Brenda's motives, gaining exclusive interviews with her parents. It was her father who bought her the rifle as a Christmas present.

What emerged was a complex story of a far-from-ordinary suburban family. By the end we had a better idea of the influences driving Brenda, although the entire truth remained elusive.

Her mother blamed her father ("I feel he should be where she is for buying her the gun and what have you"). Her father, still living in the same house and who married Brenda's pregnant (by him) teenage cellmate, denied accusations of sexual abuse.

Brenda claims to be a changed woman. No longer the girl with red hair and glasses described as "creepy, like someone from a horror flick", she told the parole hearing, "I try every day to make myself a better person".

Learning that she burnt a tattoo into her chest with a hot paperclip following a failed prison romance makes you wonder just how rehabilitated she is.

Whereas I Don't Like Mondays found no difficulty getting people to talk, Gay Muslims had the opposite problem. Most of those willing to admit to being gay and Muslim - a combination their religion doesn't tolerate - were unwilling to be identified on camera.

As the first gay Muslim activist, Adnan Ali was the exception, but the main interest lay with ordinary men and woman trying to reconcile their sexual preferences with a religion that condemns homosexuality.

Most feel guilty about being gay. Farah used to harm herself, feeling killing herself would be less of a sin than being gay. Abdullah had his first gay experience at 15, but agreed to an arranged marriage. Now separated, he's fighting for the right to see his three children.

Parents find it hard to come to terms with gay children. "My mum would rather say I've been hit by a truck than say I'm gay," said Farah.

Shakir's parents did agree to talk - without their faces being shown - eight weeks after their son came out to them. They risk being ostracised by their community if his secret becomes public.

Gay Muslims face a difficult future. Razeem concluded he can never be gay and be happy. His solution is a desperate one. "In five or six years' time I will probably be married happily - to a woman," he said.

Richard Ashcroft,

The Sage Gateshead

I JUST want you all to know that both my grandmothers are alive," proclaimed the Wigan-born former frontman of The Verve.

It was a reference to the inaccurate assumption of a reviewer who said that indie anthem The Drugs Don't Work was about unsuccessful medication for the elderly. Personally, I had assumed it to be about something more illicit anyway but I was glad when he cleared that up.

Ashcroft is one of Britain's foremost singer-songwriters and has produced many head-nodding mellow tunes. The crowd was filled with lookalikes, sporting shaggy hairstyles with sideburns and a 'yeah, what?' attitude. They lapped up his set, which was peppered with classics from his landmark album Urban Hymns, such as Lucky Man, as well as a lot of his newer stuff like Song For The Lovers.

He looked every bit the rock star, dressed in a leather-look coat, with a white T-shirt and jeans. Purple lights illuminated him in the auditorium and every so often a few hundred white lights would flash behind, creating the effect that he was being photographed by an Ashcroft-hungry press pack.

"This one's for Keith Richards," was the cry at the end in a dry reference to the copyright row surrounding the sampling for legendary Bittersweet Symphony, which sounded fantastic.

Ashcroft has weathered a storm recently by claiming that he feels like Jesus because his musical prowess makes him feel like the son of God.

Not a wise move: it did John Lennon no favours.

Richard Ashcroft, you are not the messiah, just a very good song writer.

Gavin Havery

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