It's difficult to know why MOR has become a term of abuse. Much of it is closer to the popular pretensions of folk music than almost any other form. Hardly a centenary birthday passes in an old folk home without the nurses knocking out a few rounds of Cliff Richard's 1968 eurovision song 'Congratulations'. Slade's 'Merry Christmas' and Robbie Williams's 'Angels' are standards at any seasonal cultural gathering. 'Whiter Shade of Pale' stands alongside any of the more cryptic ballads as a gnomic text.

All songs aspiring to mass popularity and achieving it beyond the normal thrall of tinpan alley product.