The UK government's new culture man Ben Bradshaw told the music industry they were really great the other day, so that's nice. Presumably that means Ben is quite keen to continue the good relationship his predecessor in the cultcha ministry job, Andy Burnham, had with key execs in the music industry.
Whether he'll follow Andy's strategy of promising lots but delivering little remains to be seen. If Bradshaw's not completely clear on the Burnham appraoch, here's a quick reminder: "Oh you know what, we should really wait for 'Digital Britain' before we actually do anything and then, do you know what, thinking about it, this is really a global issue, tell you what, let's do absolutely nothing but I'll take a few trips to sunny places and mull it over with important looking politicians elsewhere, though not in France, boy let's not talk to them, we might end up doing something about piracy, no no no no, not that". I'm pretty sure that's how it went.
Anyway, Mr Ben invited top blokes (and lady) from the music companies and key trade bodies for drinks in the back yard at number 10 Downing Street and, according to Music Week, told the amassed bods: "When Gordon rang me up about this job I was thrilled. So many people came up to me to say, 'You've got the best job in government'". He went on to commend Andy Heath and Feargal Sharkey, the two heads of cross-sector trade body UK Music - one of the motivations for the sort of industry-wide body, of course, was to enable the music business to present a more united front to government. Responding to the minister's kind words, Sharkey told Mr Ben: "We very much look forward to working with you".
Amongst those on the guest list, apparently, were Sony UK boss Ged Doherty, Warner Music Europe chief John Reid, BPI supremo Geoff Taylor, Association Of Independent Music head honcho Alison Wenham, International Federation Of The Phonographic Industry main man John Kennedy and, Stephen Navin the, erm, I'm running out of alternative ways of saying 'boss', I don't know, the supreme leader of the Music Publishers Association. There were some artists there too: Robin Gibb, Beverley Knight, Yusuf Islam and even Natasha Bedingfield. Though it's possible she was on the catering staff, no one seems certain.