What better way to get heavily into a Seasonal Smoke Scenario than to surprise you with three sneaky spread-out Trivia questions — pop bigheads will know the answers straight away; the rest of us can check the answers at the end of the big grey stripe they do call Smoke, on page 6...

Right. Trivia 1. Which balding one-fingered keyboard 'star' attempted to fly solo around the world but landed in an Indian military zone instead?...

Now hear this true story. Big producer, who we must call only Steven, is told by mega record company they don't like his mix of new single by vastly popular group, who we must call The Cs, and that remix must be done. Steven is driving and hears the new single on radio; phones company immediately to say the remix is awful, take his name off the original, lawyers will be in touch, blah blah blah. Record company think oh dear yes, let's keep big producer happy, we'll check at our end. Ah ha, the remix was never done! Conclusion? Steven thinks his own work sounds awful. Tee hee...

Your first list of 1988 anniversaries: in 988 AD, well known heavy metallist Vladimir of Kiev accepted Christianity — as what, we don't know; in 1488 Bartholomew Diaz rounded the Cape of Good Hope in a sponsored swim for the Portugese Musicians' Union; in 1588 the Spanish Annada was sunk after being loaded with unwanted T'Pau LPs; and in 1888 William II became the first German emperor to use drum machines...

Some bloke with the unlikely sounding name of Morton Subotnik, one-time member of Sigue Sigue Subotnik, has written a "concerto for Yamaha wind controller, alto saxophone, computer and orchestra". Obviously mental. Hear the evidence at Cambridge Corn Exchange (16th Jan) or London's Queen Elizabeth Hall (19th Jan)...

Durutti Column, or The Present Owners Of Bill Nelson's Old Teac Four-track as we like to call them, have a new Factory recording out called "The Guitar And Other Machines". Good title, you say, reasonably, but so what? Well, it's available on vinyl LP, cassette, CD and (can you guess?) Digital Audio Tape. Should up the sales by four or five, we'd estimate...

Wire magazine dished out the British Jazz and New Music Awards last month. Clock these, daddy-oh (jazz talk for 'read this, Kevin'): best instrumentalist was our May cover star Courtney Pine; best album was Loose Tubes' "Delightful Precipice"; and best band were the Jazz Warriors, much rated by our own Honeybone person...

Trivia 2. An 'actress' and her 'husband' went to number one in 1969 with an allegedly dirty romp called 'Je T'aime Moi Non Plus' ('I Love You Myself Not A Lot'). Who were they?...

A Taiwanese person rushes in. "We make Gorilla amps," she says. And leaves again. The phone rings. It is our reader from New Zealand. Do we know a 1970s solo artist called Sayute? Er, no, actually...

Could Hamer Guitars no longer be worked on by Paul Hamer? Apparently it's called 'Doing a Grover Jackson'...

Owners of Korean guitars will have their consciences slightly relieved by the news that the Korean workers' strike in August resulted in wage increases there of up to 30%. Our calculator is having trouble with 30% of less than zero...

Record company spokepersons the BPI are still moaning about the dumping of the blank tape levy. Their Director General John Deacon said, "If the public were able to copy newspapers and books with the ease that they copy records and tapes there would be an immediate outcry from proprietors and publishers which it is difficult to imagine the government would ignore. The record industry, however, is evidently seen as a public benefactor, a kind of cultural soup kitchen in which everyone may eat irrespective of their needs." Yum yum...

BBC Records have released a good trawl of their vast sound effects library on ten CDs — what we might call a sampler's paradise, and what they rather quaintly call "FX CDs". All yours, to have and to sample, for about £230. Expect lots of records with such delights as 'beagle barking, whining and jumping up at door', 'cuckoo struck dumb', or 'dragon burns its fingers' in the charts, v soon...

Trivia 3. That sweetie-pie, top funk bassist and own-wayer Sid Vicious. What was his real name?...

Blimey, did you know the smallest record ever made was a one-and-three-eighths-of-an-inch diameter disc made in 1924 by HMV with a rather short version of 'God Save The King' on it? So now you want to know the biggest records ever made, too? Well hold on. Let's see. Oh yes, it was the 20in diameter Paths Grand series, made in 1906. We don't know what was on them because they won't fit on our record player. Now be good children and go and play your 3in CD singles (with free adaptor, Virgin tell us on our This Way Up three-incher — and how are we supposed to play it otherwise, oh generous ones?)...

Wonder whether Peter Tosh has his real name on the gravestone? Morbid? Us? Anyway, it would be Winston Hubert McIntosh...

It will soon be 20 years ago department: in 1968, a 7in single cost 40p (or 24 groats as they called it then), a 12in LP cost £1.84, and Donald Peers had a record called 'Please Don't Go'. We're pleased to say he did...

"It's like synthesisers with a load of sampled weather over the top." This was how 'top writer' John Morrish attempted to describe some pathetic New Age nonsense to the gathered MM staff. Well, you can imagine...

Good to see Frank Zappa in charge of life, the universe and so on, as ever. The new CD version of his 1970 classic "Hot Rats" (ZAP2) has a cover flash saying "Remixed from the original multitrack masters with added material from the original sessions", and jolly interesting and good-sounding it all is. How unrelated to coincidence it is that such an intelligent attitude to reissues comes from a musician who actually owns all his old master tapes (shriek of disbelief from record company personnel everywhere). Would that it were always so...

And now, at last, for the Trivia answers. 1. Indian forced landing was by Gary Numan. 2. Naughty French type people were Jane Birkin and her husband Serge Gainsbourg. And 3, we can see why Mr Vicious wasn't happy with his original, demure monicker John Simon Beverley. How'd you do? Mmm, us too. Be seeing you.