Now is the season, it seems, of live-album stocking-fillers, the most flamboyant of which – and, it must be noted, the most winsome filler of those stockings – is this 2-CD/DVD package of Kylie's Aphrodite Les Folies stage show, recorded at the O2 Arena.

The gowns, the glamour, the glitz and the glory. The only difference? There's no chance of them disappearing at midnight, says Harriet Walker

I loathe London and visit it as little as I can. But on the the other hand, I find it hard to resist the sight of a self-deceiving tool making a spectacle of themselves. So I really do mean to make a special effort to visit the forthcoming V&A exhibition, "The House of Annie Lennox", which runs from next month until the end of February and to which admission is absolutely free. In such cash-strapped times, I foresee many a middle-class Mumsnetter using this outing in lieu of the traditional panto. It will certainly provide the usual prompts for audience debate and participation: "Annie Lennox is a hypocritical cow to criticise Rihanna for prancing around in her scanties when she regularly used to take her top off onstage back in the day!" "O no, she's not!" – "O yes, she is!" – and so on.

"Women of the world, take over," the whimsical Scots bard Ivor Cutler once urged, his advice taken last Friday at a concert featuring women performers from different strata of the musical spectrum.

Grace Jones's unconventionality obviously extends to her choice of maternity wear.

Half-a-million MySpace hits is one modern route to the Cinderella story. It let Birmingham's Clare Maguire sign to a major label at the once unremarkable age of 20. Then she was led through music's corridors of power, drinking with Jay-Z, squired by Rick Rubin to Leonard Cohen's rehearsals, offered a song by an enchanted Jarvis Cocker. Tentatively pushed in 2010, her album (with Ellie Goulding's producer) is finally due next month.

It's pretty embarrassing to admit, but whenever I read the New Year Honours list, there's always a part of me that hopes that – due to a massive clerical cock-up – my name will somehow appear.

Annie Lennox hoarsely bellowing the very bleakest of carols with all the warmth of a stern Victorian materfamilias?