It was sunshine and smiles for The X Factor judges as they arrived for the first of this year's auditions.

Caroline Flack will be joined by comic Matt Richardson on the new series of the X Factor spin-off The Xtra Factor after Olly Murs quit the show to concentrate on his chart career.

Former Westlife star Shane Filan has signed a solo record deal, just months after being declared bankrupt.

Grand National, Channel 4

Simon Cowell looks ready to finally tie the knot - with his Britain's Got Talent pal David Walliams.

Big Brother was the most complained-about television programme of the year, new figures show.

An X Factor win for Christopher Maloney could damage the show's reputation, axed boyband Union J have warned.

Music mogul successful in defamation fight

The Prince of Wales paid tribute to Gary Barlow as the Take That frontman was honoured at a prestigious music industry bash.

Who knew that Louis Walsh says, "The best thing about The X Factor is it's real... nothing is staged"? Blessings upon him, for of course the best thing about The X Factor in its present manifestation – and who knew such words would ever appear in print? – is Louis Walsh.

An unemployed man who accused X Factor judge Louis Walsh of groping him in a nightclub has appeared in court charged with inventing the story.

X Factor supremo Simon Cowell said he will support Louis Walsh "100 per cent" after allegations he indecently assaulted a 24-year-old man.

Muse may have won the Grammy for Best Rock Album, but they'll be sad to hear they've alienated one of their most fervent fans. When the band's latest LP, The Resistance, was released, Fox News host Glenn Beck declared it: "Amazing... Lyrics on target, talent off the charts," he tweeted. "They 'get it'." After watching their performance at the Grammys, however, Beck was put off by the use of video footage, including the now infamous clip of some students shouting at the Prince of Wales and his wife. (Or, as he put it, "trying to beat them and kill them in the streets".) Muse's song "Uprising", said Beck, with some distaste, is "a call for revolution... There are those who are calling for revolution, and they are everywhere... Muslim extremists... Communist revolutionaries... anarchists [... and Muse]." Beck did, at least, cut the band a break on the basis of their nationality. "You have to remember these are Europeans," he went on, and on. "And they have been degraded since the beginning of time. They have had very few glimpses of real freedom."

Will this vile persecution of Andy Coulson never cease? Time and again I have stated here that this Dreyfus du jour knew nothing of the naughtiness committed during his News of the World editorship. He ran the show in the laissez-faire style of his hero Peregrine Worsthorne at The Sunday Telegraph, and was as shocked (shocked!) as anyone by these allegations. Yet with those ignorant of red-top mores continuing to torment him, thank heavens for Ed Balls, who defended Andy after his little chat with the Met last week by insisting that a chap is innocent until proven guilty.