Paul's new book "In The City" is a celebration of the music of the capital connecting the dots between Marie Lloyd and Lily Allen, Steve Marriott and Dizzee Rascal, Gilbert and Sullivan and Joe Strummer, between London's riotous, disreputable past and its riotous, disreputable present. I talked to him about it and the music hall tradition, the blues that came up from Richmond and the grime that still comes up from Bow. You can subscribe to the weekly podcast here or stream the latest one below.

Once again via the miracle of the cocoa tin and the long bit of string we bring you Mark Ellen, Kate Mossman, Caitlin Moran, Andrew Harrison and Fraser Lewry LIVE - or maybe recorded - from Glastonbury 2009. Click below to stream.

A few hours after the death of Elvis Presley in 1977, as his family were sitting around Graceland shocked and weeping, Colonel Tom Parker turned up. He hadn't been closely involved in Presley's affairs at that time, preferring to spend his time gambling. It was Parker who galvanised the shattered family with the words "this changes nothing".

Even he can't have known how right he was. When Presley died there was no etiquette for handling the death of a rock superstar. The media weren't sure if they were dealing with a washed-up has-been or a figure who was still relevant. I don't think Downing Street felt the need to make a statement. "People" magazine, America's foremost title about entertainment and celebrity, could have put his face on the cover but didn't, reasoning that he no longer meant that much to the average American. I happened to be in Memphis that year and visited Graceland to look at the grave. You could just walk into the grounds. There were no conducted tours and very few souvenir shops. The massive resurgence of interest in Elvis took some time to gather. The Elvis impersonators in their white suits took a while to get their act together. Dead Elvis was eventually more popular and more profitable than Live Elvis but it wasn't immediate.

When John Lennon was shot three years later the news organisations were primed by the Presley experience. The wall-to-wall coverage of his death was encouraged by the fact that he was both British and American, therefore both nations claimed some kind of ownership of him, politicians and public moralists could persuade themselves he was a key thinker for our times, his murder threw up all kinds of questions about random violence and the levers of the media were being pulled by people who had grown up adoring the Beatles and everything they stood for. At the end of December 8th 1980, after having gone through a day of hacking out tributes, a remark of Annie Nightingale's on the TV set me bawling. I wasn't crying for John Lennon, of course. I was crying for myself. Lost youth, good times, perspective, all that kind of thing. These things trigger something in us that needs to come out eventually. The Princess of Wales was not a rock star but the reaction to her death was on the scale of Lennon's but this time with a previously unfamiliar hysteria thrown in. Even the people who were flinging roses at her hearse in the Finchley Road on that mad day probably think better of it now. But at that time there was a pent-up desire for an extravagant, apparently un-British show of emotion. It was the kind of thing that used to be sublimated via religion or dancing round the maypole. In the TV age it was delivered via the box.

Judging by the way that Google almost broke yesterday under the strain I think it's fair to say that Michael Jackson's was the first death of a massive star in the internet age. TV and radio suddenly look and sound very quaint, huffing and puffing in the wake of the story, trying to assemble talking heads to say anything meaningful; even as they are talking people are coming up with new angles and implications. What happens to the kids? Where does this leave the London shows? Are his mother and father speaking to each other? Do you think these shows will actually happen in some strange animatronic form? How long will Sony leave it before the TV ads start? Bet they're glad they didn't auction the personal effects a month or two back. Does McCartney get the ATV catalogue back? I hear the funeral is going to be Muslim. What religion was he? Will Neverland be reopened to the public? How many people are working on one-shots right now? And so on.

Is there anything wrong with that? Well, it doesn't represent us at our most worthy but it does represent us at our most human. In the wake of any death in any family human beings have a huge desire to just sit down and talk about it. They may be talking about the deceased. They may be grasping the opportunity to talk about something they rarely talk about, which is life. They may just want to gossip. Thanks to the internet you can now take a seat in the world's largest living room with millions of souls who are similarly fascinated and listen to discussions you might not wish to instigate yourself. Because a lot's changed since Colonel Parker's pronouncement in 1977. Parker was essentially a small-time thinker. Thirty years later, with the technology at the disposal of the entertainment industry, death can be just the beginning. I'm sure there are people working on it right now.

I went to bed early last night and so it wasn't until this morning I heard the news about Michael Jackson. I just turned on my phone and as expected there's a bunch of messages from news organisations asking me to come in and fill air with cliches. I can't imagine a huge outpouring of general grief, but then again you never know. It's difficult to summon the usual feelings of affection that are normally called for in a case like this. And not just because of the scandals. There was something about Michael Jackson that struck you as jarringly cynical in the very instant he was making his greatest attempts to appear pure in heart. Even in his first national TV appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show they had to over-egg the pudding of his extraordinary singing by getting him to do a cute intro.

And then they had to pretend that Diana Ross had discovered him, so that a little of the light would reflect on Motown's biggest star. He was, more than any star before or since, the meal ticket for a whole family, most of whom have spent the last thirty years wondering when they can persuade him back on the road to recreate magic moments like this one.

But by then he'd gone out on his own and done what hardly anyone had done before, which was build a solo career bigger than the one he had in a group. Whether it's to your taste or not, records like this one sparked a whole new genre.

In the world out there, far beyond Western Europe and the United States, the territories that we like to think of as the known world in terms of beat music, he was the inventor of pop music and "Thriller" was Year Zero. In the back country of Ethiopia a few years ago I had to explain to an educated man who Elvis Presley was. I didn't have to do the same for Michael Jackson. And for the whole generation of performers who dominate the charts today his fusion of highly choreographed flash and self-dramatising sentiment is what pop is supposed to be.
As ever there will be ludicrous displays of bogus bereavement. As ever the grief should be left to his family. I'm going to make a cup of tea. But I'll tell you what. Somewhere Steven Wells will be laughing.

Mark Ellen, David Hepworth, Barry McIlheney and Paul Du Noyer gather in the world's hottest room to examine the scorching issues of the day:

* Does Jo Whiley really get £100k *more* than John Humphrys?
* What's it like for 19 year-old Jay Weinberg to deputise for his dad in the E Street Band?
* When the last newspaper goes out of business, will anybody care?
* What's it like for a woman on one of those panel shows?
* What did our dads used to say about pop music?
* How did the ancient pagan calendar get taken over by the greetings card industry?

Usual drill. Subscribe above or stream below.

In the new issue of the magazine Greg Milner, the author of "Perfecting Sound Forever - The Story Of Recorded Music", writes about how our idea of good sound is constantly changing. He gets to talk about it in this week's podcast while Rob Fitzpatrick expands on his argument that popular culture is actually becoming too popular. Plus Fraser Lewry on going to Wembley by bike and trying to scam a fortune out of iTunes and David Hepworth on the trial and execution of Charles I as well as other top pop gossip.

It's all in the expanding world of the Word Podcast which this week was recorded from the comfort of our own homes using Skype.

You can subscribe to the weekly Word podcast here or stream the latest one below.

Al Kooper, the man who played organ on "Like A Rolling Stone", discovered Lynyrd Skynyrd and has worked with nearly everyone worth knowing in rock and roll, is featured in the new issue.

This interview, in which he talks about being a teenage songwriter, his time with Dylan, putting together Blood, Sweat and Tears, discovering Lynyrd Skynyrd, the difficulty of holding a marriage together in the music business and the even greater problem of getting paid, is available as one of our Backstage Podcasts.

A new version of his memoirs, "Backstage Passes and Backstabbing Bastards", is out now.

You can subscribe, for free, via the XML feed or at iTunes or stream the Kooper podcast below.

It took us a while to get a shot of members of the Word team crossing the celebrated Abbey Road zebra. Mark Ellen had to take his shoes off. Fraser had to stand in the middle of the road with his back to the oncoming traffic. We had to hold up the cars a bit. Most of them were very patient, including Martin Fry out of ABC who hooted and waved, which made it all seem like a scene out of an Austin Powers movie. All we needed was a few chimney sweeps with thumbs in their braces to complete the effect.

Anyway that was after we'd recorded a special centenary podcast with contributions from Mark Ellen, Andrew Harrison, Kate Mossman, Fraser Lewry and returning by public demand Matt Hall. We set up our Heath Robinson recording kit in the 72-track splendour of Studio Three at Abbey Road. This is the place where Pink Floyd recorded Dark Side On The Moon. The magnificent steam-driven Bakelite recording desk is still in the control room. We played with the faders, of course, tinkled on the Lady Madonna piano in Studio One, mooched around the Yellow Submarine echo chamber and had our pictures taken in Studio Two (below) where the Beatles made the majority of their records.

Thanks very much to David Holley, Kris Burton and all the people at Abbey Road for making this happen. Among the burning ishoos debated were:
* The names of the bands we made up when we were kids
* Seriously, will Michael Jackson's shows at the 02 ever happen? And if they do will Michael Jackson actually be there?
* They've taken away the Birdsong channel and are replacing it with non-stop unsigned bands. Step forward or step back?
* First look at the Beatles Rock Band. Is this going to be bigger than an actual record?
* Kate and Fraser go Sacred Harp singing in Newcastle.
* The HORA - slite return
* Your taped messages
You can subscribe to the weekly Word podcast here or stream the latest one below.

Whatever happened to the sound of Young Islington?
What item would we contribute to the OGWT museum?
Would we rather be a superstar flash in the pan or an honest plodder?
Which musicians would we vote for?
In Podcast 99 we answer your questions (above) and also pose a few of our own.
Is there a fictional character whose showy musical taste doesn't make him sound like a right tosser?
What's best: watching football at home or in the pub?
Plus: Annie Leibowitz's little local difficulty, Jon Peters's proposed memoirs, Al Kooper, pirate radio and false memory syndrome.
You can subscribe to the weekly Word podcast here or stream the latest one below.

This week we're joined by our TV bod Barry McIlheney and Aris Roussinos, who wrote the terrific article in the current issue about what's wrong with British TV, to talk about how TV programmes get commissioned. Plus: why albums are so-called, the eternal legacy of Officer Dibble (left), Fraser's weekend of sacred harp singing and how *you*can be on our 100th podcast. To leave a message call 07092 050466.
You can subscribe to the weekly Word podcast here or stream the latest one below.

Much like Bunk and McNulty in The Wire, or those crazy Kiwis from Flight Of The Conchords, Word's own dream team double act - Kate Mossman and Mark Ellen - are here with another blockbusting episode in their own ongoing series, this time introducing the June 2009 episode of The Word.

Featured in this issue: Iggy Pop, David Aaronovitch, Mickey Rourke, Lewis Taylor, Graham Coxon, Noisettes, the Best and Worst subjects for songs, Morrissey, Jackie DeShannon, Kevin Sampson, T Bone Burnett, Jane Bussman, Madness, Beyond The Wizard's Sleeve, Eg White, Ed Smith, JG Ballard, Chrissie Hynde, the trouble with British TV, and Luke Haines.

Another two-in-one podcast this week, featuring David Hepworth, Andrew Harrison and Fraser Lewry looking at the relationship between reggae and specialty meats, the return of Danny Baker to 5Live, your favourite football clichés, more groups who were just a laugh and the man who hoaxed the obituary writers via Wikipedia.

Plus a bonus. The last fifteen minutes of this podcast is taken up by the audio side of our new shopcast. We've produced this in association with Universal Music. The last one featured the Kinks. This one's all about fifty glorious years of Motown Number Ones. If you want the whole thing in glorious televisual colour then you can subscribe to the stream for free here or view them on YouTube (in two parts) here.

Otherwise you can subscribe to the weekly Word podcast here or stream the latest one below.

Mark Ellen, David Hepworth and Fraser Lewry present the weekly Word Podcast, in which we mull over the chances of paying $5,000 for dinner with Richard Thompson or $1,500 to get Linda Thompson to record our outgoing answering machine message, attempt to properly answer gunnerboy's question "whatever happened to groups who were justalaff?", pay tribute to the man who used to know all the news in pop and run down how much Brewers Droop would have cost you in 1975.

But there's a bonus. This podcast also features – in audio-only form – our first shopcast. This is a new series we've done with Universal Music. In the first one Mark Ellen and David Hepworth discuss the music, career and legacy of the Kinks as represented in their box set "Picture Book". If you want the whole thing in glorious televisual colour then you can subscribe to the stream for free here or view them on YouTube (in two parts) here.

Otherwise you can subscribe to the weekly Word podcast here or stream the latest one below.

The "is Dylan radically reworking his material or just messing it up?" debate continues on the podcast with Eamonn Forde and Jude Rogers. Jude's fresh from her girls day out with Jackie DeShannon at the Beverly Hills Hotel. In case you don't know Jackie DeShannon wrote the best pop song ever written and played Monopoly with George Harrison (not chess as I mistakenly said on the podcast).

Other topics covered: did ITV really drop a million pounds when they failed to "monetize" Susan Boyle? Will we ever visit a bookshop and see a book printed before our very eyes? What's Audioboo? Will there be art cinemas at HMV? Will we ever stop talking?

You can sign up to get the podcast delivered to your desktop for free here or you can stream it from here.

The podcast panel has been applying itself to a few serious questions this week. The first is - could this be the greatest entrance in the history of television?

The second one is - is it ever acceptable to make your excuses and leave when somebody gets out a karaoke machine?
The third is - is is still OK to like Phil Spector records without liking him?
And which is best - Susan Boyle or Mark Ellen's impression of the entire "Britain's Got Talent" pantomime - with hand gestures?

You can sign up to get the podcast delivered to your desktop for free here or you can stream it from here.