RANDY NEWMAN ON DESERT ISLAND

Tomorrow, Sunday 19th, the splendid Randy Newman is the person choosing his favourite eight records on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs, a terrific series now that it's no longer fronted by the awful Sue Lawley but by the alert, shrewd and human Kirsty Young.

The Randy Newman edition can only be heard at 11.15am UK time: you can't catch it later on the so-called Listen Again feature on bbc.co.uk because of problems with "rights" (it says here). An odd name for it, by the way: Listen Again, when surely the whole point is you're listening for the first time, having missed the original broadcast.

Granted Randy Newman's musicality and movie scorewriting, which runs in his family, he may well be choosing nothing but Cole Porter songs, but he'll be interesting whatever his selection. And anyone who doubts the merits of Randy Newman's own work need only listen to his songs 'Sail Away', 'Short People' and 'Rednecks' to find a hugely refreshing individualist, disguising deeply mordant moral outrage behind a mask of mischievous provocation. These records and more are a great antidote to the stifling doublespeak of political correctness.