NOT so long ago, Coldplay’s Chris Martin admitted he cried after I rang to quiz him about his relationship with Gwyneth Paltrow.

Now it emerges that self-styled Oasis hardman Liam Gallagher’s pasting in Munich came not at the hands of gun-toting mafiosi.

Nein, Liam’s two front teeth were dispatched after he flicked peanuts at a computer geek and four estate agents having a business meeting.

Can someone please tell me, in the name of Keef, what the **** has happened to the spirit of rock ’n’ roll?

Liam seemed to be the standard bearer for rock ’n’ roll rebellion but his battering by a couple of KP-covered German nerds has all but destroyed that myth.

Today’s stars certainly aren’t cut from the same leather as those of legend.

Keith Moon, Sid Vicious, Ozzy Osbourne and Kurt Cobain’s reputations are secure, at least for the time being, because reality TV and lazy record company execs have made music bland, sucking the character out of the industry.

We may not approve of these figures’ drug-taking and alcohol-hazed lifestyles, but rock ’n’ roll is meant to be dirty, dangerous, morally bankrupt, rebellious and exciting.

Now even Busted attempt to portray themselves as fast-living rock ’n’ rollers. Not long ago, they went wild and lobbed a toaster out of their open hotel window. One of them can also drink two lager shandies in a row apparently.

The Who’s Keith Moon and Led Zep’s John Bonham would be choking on their own vomit if they knew of these pale pretenders to their booze-soaked thrones of debauchery.

Don’t forget that, as well as being rock ’n’ roll animals off-stage, these characters could also play better than anyone on it.

I know that may be an alien concept to most of today’s young pop stars, but these animals could actually pick up an instrument and play it (for those who don’t know, a musical instrument is a device used to create sound, usually by the plucking of strings, beating of a stick, blowing, etc).

Conveyor-belt pop has stagnated the British music scene and, with the possible exception of The Libertines and The Streets, it is hard to see where the next generation of angry young men will spring from.

A comfortable society breeds a comfortable music scene. The angst and pain which inspired the birth of rock ’n’ roll, heavy rock and then punk is no more.

When Johnny Rotten sang about No Future he meant it and became a spokesman for Britain’s disillusioned youth. Now he goes on I’m A Celeb and spoils it all.

British music feels safe, respectable and middle class. Today’s young stars rarely say anything of substance, let alone take any. Handlers train them to be bland and to avoid controversy.

Anodyne and faceless, their music sells because it doesn’t offend. The music lacks depth as do the characters miming along to it.

Rock music should provoke and enrage, divide and conquer. Youngsters shouldn’t want to go to see Coldplay and Dido concerts with their mums and dads. Talented artists sure, but where’s the spirit and the aggression?

Parents should detest the music their kids are listening to but, as the offspring of Sixties children grow up, record companies realise they can make a killing by selling music that taps into both generations — Norah Jones, Jamie Cullum, Westlife.

It’s the bland leading the bland.

But here’s raising a vodka, Bailey’s and tequila cocktail and hoping some bitter teenager is being stirred up by the mediocrity, so incensed that he or she picks up a guitar and fights for the spirit of rock ’n’ roll.

And that doesn’t mean buying a packet of Dry Roasted and lobbing them at a table of salesmen.