Why didn’t the Tories invite Pete Waterman to speak at their conference? The guru behind Kylie Minogue who has become a familiar television face as a judge on ITV’s Pop Idol certainly wouldn’t have felt out of place. He’s used to helping nervous unknowns who want to make it big. And his experience sitting beside the bracingly honest Simon Cowell on the Pop Idol judging panel would have meant that he would instantly have seen the wisdom in Theresa May’s uncompromising insistence that the Tories get their act together. Only when you fully realise how badly you’re performing will you make the effort required to get it right.
The important lesson Waterman could have told the Tories was one he shared with Times readers on Monday. The huge commercial success of his acts, from Dead or Alive to Kylie Minogue, was built on taking classic themes and ruthlessly updating them. His hit tunes, from ‘You Spin Me Round’ to ‘I Should Be So Lucky’, were shamelessly plundered from the classical repertoire.
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