Sydney special

IT is a side to chartered surveyors we were hitherto unaware of.

Staff from the Ayr office of Shepherd Chartered Surveyors have joined forces with none other than Scottish crooning legend Sydney Devine to record a Christmas album for charity. Proceeds from the CD will go to the Ayrshire Hospice this festive season. The project was the brainchild of Shepherd client Edd Holloway, an entertainment agent.

In addition to the legendary Sydney, who contributed A Christmas Song, the 18 covers of popular Yuletide songs feature the vocal talents of a Jai McDowell, Craig Ward, Nicola Cassells and The MacDonald Brothers. Community groups and other Ayrshire locals also took part.

Shepherd commercial partner Kevin Bell, who sang Band Aid’s Do They Know It’s Christmas with a host of colleagues for the album, said: “We were delighted to be asked to be part of the group of property agents taking part in this project.

“The Ayrshire Hospice charity is close to the hearts of many of us and we had no hesitation in agreeing to support this worthy cause.”

It is hoped that 5,000 copies will be sold, raising £50,000 for the hospice this Christmas.

Brief breakfast

MARKS & Spencer does not have its troubles to seek, but surely it helps to get the basics right, as this picture shows. We’ll know to go elsewhere next time we fancy an all-day breakfast for lunch.

Dancing beer

THE Bottom Line has learned that the creative brains at Innis & Gunn turned to a rarely tapped cultural well to provide the name for one of its most recent beers.

Chief executive Dougal Sharp revealed during a recent interview with The Herald that Mangoes on the Run, the craft beer firm’s mango-flavoured IPA, was inspired by a dance hit from the early 1990s.

There can’t be too many things to have been directly inspired by the JX club anthem Son of a Gun.

Murder on menu

COULD you murder a crime writing workshop this lunchtime? Look no further than Skypark in Glasgow, where crime writer Claire Duffy will be delivering talks on the inspiration of her Dark of Night series of novels.

Ms Duffy, who is from Glasgow, said: “The format covers how the series has progressed through four books, how it was inspired by an anecdote about a date with Ted Bundy and why Glasgow is the main character.

“I grew up abroad and wrote the first book during the first year I lived back in Glasgow after thirty years, so it was my way of getting to know my home city.

“All of the locations in the books have relevance to me or my family - I have characters drinking in the pub where my parents met, fighting outside my Gran and Granda’s old house, hiding from the killer where I learned to ride a bike. The killer is even chased right past Skypark at one point.”

The free event takes place in the Glass Meeting Room, Skypark 1, today, from 12.30pm to 1.30pm. Spaces will be allocated in 20 minute slots on a first come, first served basis.