British politics would have been much more fun if the first Gang of Four had broken the mould. In 1967 the erratic Labour MP Tom Driberg asked the American beat poet Allen Ginsberg to introduce him to Mick Jagger who Driberg thought could bring in the youth vote. In a series of meetings about forming a new political party Driberg told Jagger, who brought along Marianne Faithfull as his prototype Shirley Williams, that he could be the figurehead of a new movement. Jagger was rightly sceptical, fearing that being a politician might not be as much fun as being a pop star: “I wouldn’t want to have to give any of that up to sit behind a desk ... I mean, I don’t exactly see