What Could Possibly Go Wrong. . . (21 page)

You can’t really relax when it’s your daughter’s eighteenth birthday party and your house is rammed to bursting point with a cocktail of rampaging testosterone and vodka. Certainly you can’t just go to bed, partly because of the worry that everyone is going to get pregnant, but mostly because of the noise.

So I didn’t. I stayed up all night, totally forgetting that at eleven o’clock the next morning I was due at the Emirates stadium in the nuclear-free, vegan outreaches of north London. Happily, I had booked a driver. Unhappily, he turned up in the brand-new, second-generation Rolls-Royce Phantom.

At first, all was well. Buoyed by a drink-fuelled contentment that nobody had cut their head off or given birth, I slumped into the vast rear seat in a Ready Brek glow of warm fuzziness.

However, about twenty minutes later this had begun to wear off. And as we reached London, I started to worry that I might die. Ten minutes after that, I was worried I might not.

There was a rolling tide of nausea in my head that manifested itself in waves of great pain and an all-over veneer of perspiration. I desperately wanted to go to sleep but the driver was unfamiliar with Islington – there isn’t much call for Rolls-Royce test drives there – so I needed to help him find the best route. ‘Can you drive as fast as possible,’ I asked, ‘into a lamppost?’

Eventually we arrived and I discovered something interesting. When you step out of a Rolls-Royce into a mooching herd of football fans, they become united in a certain knowledge that you are an onanist. They voice this opinion loudly and often,
and since you are going in the same direction as them, it doesn’t stop.

I arrived at my host’s box in a blizzard of sweat, sickness and abuse, only to discover that one of the other guests was a motoring writer who once told his readers that my opinion was worthless because I was a multi-millionaire tax exile who lived on the Isle of Man.

I’ve wanted for some time to hear him explain why the opinion of a ‘multi-millionaire’ is somehow less relevant than the opinion of, say, a schoolteacher, and how he got it into his head that I was a tax exile. But, sadly, when the moment arrived, I was otherwise engaged, trying to stop myself fainting.

The match was dismal. There were no goals. And then I was faced with the problem of getting through the crowds to the waiting Rolls. And here’s a funny thing. As we all walked along, everyone was jolly friendly. There was some good-natured joshing about my support for Chelsea and a few questions about Richard Hammond’s teeth, and all was well …

Until I stepped into the Rolls, whereupon I suddenly became an onanist again. So there I was, feeling like a skin bag full of sick, in the back of a Phantom that was going nowhere because of a vast horde of Islingtonites who were making hand gestures and chanting. Oh, and one thing you might like to know: if you push the button that draws a curtain over the back window, you make everything ten times worse.

I’m not quite sure why, but today you can be a bank robber or a pugilist or a benefits cheat, and that’s fine. You can be a drug addict or a Peeping Tom. But woe betide anyone who is rich.

Every day the
Daily Mail
finds someone on a high salary and mocks them mercilessly. David Cameron’s ability to lead is questioned simply because he’s perceived as being wealthy.
Autocar
reckons that because my DVDs have been big sellers, I’m no longer capable of rational thought.

A far-left candidate in France’s presidential elections proposed a 100 per cent tax on all earnings above €360,000 (£300,000) a
year, and I bet if such a scheme were introduced here, it would receive almost unanimous support. There’s a sense, and it’s completely wrong-headed, of course, that in these difficult economic times anyone who has a bob or two must have stolen it from a charity box or a nurse.

And naturally there is no statement of wealth that even gets close to a Rolls-Royce Phantom. Which is why Arsenal’s whisper-quiet peace-and-love brigade turned into an army that would have warmed the heart of even Stalin. Top tip, then: if you’re going to buy this latest version of the Phantom, for God’s sake stay away from the mob.

At first glance the new car seems to be pretty much identical to the old one. At the front the headlamps are slightly different and at the back there’s a chrome strip on the bumper. There are some new wheels as well but, really, it’s just a slight change of wardrobe rather than a full liposuction, boob enhancement and tummy tuck.

It’s much the same story on the inside, too. A raft of tiny little cosmetic alterations that caused me to think, Oh no, I’m going to be sick. You, on the other hand, will sit there and wonder, I know the last Phantom was pretty bloody good but surely there was scope for a bit more improvement than this. Well, there has been improvement. It’s just that you can’t see it.

Nine years ago, when the Phantom first slithered out of the factory in Goodwood, West Sussex, Rolls-Royce was at great pains to point out that, although the company was owned by BMW, the car shared only 15 per cent of its components with a 7-series. Never mind that one of the components was ‘the engine’; the manufacturer made a good point: the Phantom didn’t feel, look or drive anything like a Beemer.

However, since the Phantom’s launch, BMW has developed a raft of electronic improvements that are now available on an £18,000 1-series. But not its £350,000 Roller.

So. What to do? Go to all the trouble and expense of designing new electronics for the Rolls? Or simply use BMW items?
That’s what the company has done. The swivelling headlamps. The 3-D satnav. The USB port. It’s a forest of BMW technology in there, and you know what? It’s sacrilege and it’s wrong – and I don’t actually care.

Because even though there is now a rather worrying Dynamic option for those who wish to take their Rolls-Royce around the Nürburgring, the Phantom still feels, drives and looks like nothing else. It is a sublime experience, like getting into a warm bubble bath and then getting out and finding yourself somewhere else.

The quality is unmatched. The eighteen cows, for instance, that donate their skin to make the seats in a single car are kept far away from barbed wire fences and anything else that might make them uneasy. And Rolls has developed a new colouring process in which the dye permeates the entire hide, ensuring it will never crack. You don’t get that attention to detail in even a palace.

The carpets are thicker than anything you have at home, the wood veneer is peerless, the art deco light fittings are wondrous to behold, the V12 engine makes no noise at all, the ride comfort is straight from the pages of
Aladdin
, and while there are many gizmos, they’re all hidden away. We see this with the gear lever, which may have eight speeds at its disposal but offers you a choice of only forwards, backwards or neither.

The new Phantom, then, is an intelligent and discreet step forward for what was – and still is – the only car in the world that completely detaches you from reality. Just remember, though, that if you go to the wrong place in it, it will detach otherwise normal people from their sanity.

6 May 2012

Ever since it minced into the marketplace sixteen years ago, Mercedes’ little SLK has been the world’s only transgender car. Even though it was born with an Adam’s apple, dressed in shorts and trained to use the urinals, it has always been as girlie as a pink bedroom full of soft toys.

If I’d been running Mercedes-Benz, I’d have been quite pleased about this. I’d have accepted that the car was a ladyboy and changed its name immediately to the Fluffy Rabbit or E. L. James. I’d have offered it in a range of pastel colours and employed Stella McCartney to design a range of interior fabrics.

But no. Mercedes could not accept that its child was a bit light in its loafers. So as it grew, the company fitted it with a massive V8 engine and changed its exhaust note from Barbra Streisand to Ted Nugent. This was unwise and unfair – like forcing Freddie Mercury to get a job as a scaffolder.

Undaunted, Mercedes called the new car the SLK 55 AMG and sent it out into the world with a simple message. ‘Now look. We’ve given you an enormous penis. Go and use it.’

It certainly wooed me, because I bought one. Of course, my colleagues thought I’d taken leave of my senses and laughed openly in my face. So did all the nation’s van drivers, and in every petrol station people would point and suggest loudly that my salon must be doing well. The codpiece front and the baritone rear fooled nobody.

But I didn’t care because I like small cars. I like convertibles. And I like big engines. And the SLK was the only car on the market that met all three of those requirements – and a few
more besides. It had an automatic gearbox and, though it was fast and hard and brutal, it came with all the usual Mercedes refinements including a DVD player, a TV, electric seats, cruise control and so on. It was a doddle in town, brilliant on a sunny day, easy to park, as fast as a comet, good-looking, exciting, noisy and enormous fun. Who cared that it enjoyed musicals and went to bed at night in its sister’s knickers? I even ordered mine in black.

Mercedes, though, was still not satisfied. It knew that when it wasn’t looking, its scaffolder was endlessly watching the shower scene from
Top Gun
, so with its replacement the company has gone mental. The car has the haunches of a hyena, the snout of a racer, flaps, ducts and claws. It’s a low-profile, full-fat, high-octane he-man. I’m surprised the advertising slogan isn’t ‘Are you a woman? Well, you can eff off.’

Let’s start with the engine. In essence, it’s the same 5.5-litre unit that you get in other, bigger AMG cars, only without the turbocharging. Do not think, however, that the lack of forced induction means you will be bouncing up and down in your seat when leaving the lights to try to conjure up some extra wallop.

Because of new air-intake ducting, new cylinder heads and a modified valve drive, you are presented with 416 brake horsepower. That is about 60 more than you were given in the old SLK 55, and in a car this size it means the performance is very nearly insane.

However, because the new engine is fitted with a feature that shuts down either two or four of the cylinders when they’re not needed, it produces only 195 carbon dioxides and should be good for more than 33 mpg. The Lord giveth and then the Lord giveth even more.

Handling? Well, now, let’s be clear on this: if you want finesse and delicacy, buy a BMW. In a straight line, an AMG car is an easy match for anything made by BMW’s M – or motor sport – division. But through the corners the Mercedes will be left far behind. This is not a criticism. Because although the Merc may
not be able to tame the laws of physics quite as well as an M car, it will put a much bigger smile on your face. BMWs reward your skill. Fast Mercs make you laugh.

And so it goes with the SLK. Mercedes may have fiddled with the camber and perforated the brake discs. The little convertible may have all the racing paraphernalia, but it’s still a car you have to wrestle if you want to get the most from it. It’s a car that’s happiest when it’s a little bit sideways.

Inside, however, there’s no evidence of this at all. The gearbox is a proper auto. The radio is digital. The headrests are fitted with ducts that feed warm air to your neck. The car I drove was even equipped with a device that suggested when I might like a cup of coffee.

However, while there’s one improvement over the old model – the can-of-pop-holders are no longer located in front of the heater vents – there is one step backwards. If you push the seat all the way back, the leather rubs against the rear bulkhead and squeaks every time you go over a bump. It’s very annoying.

It sounds, then, as if this new car is much the same as the old one, albeit a bit faster and quite a lot more economical. But I’m afraid that’s not strictly accurate. Because where’s the noise? The old car crackled when you started it, roared when it was moving and ticked when it wasn’t. And without this soundtrack the excitement has gone. It means you never feel inclined to put your foot down. I spent my week just pottering about. At one point I found myself doing 60 mph on the motorway. On the Burford road in Oxfordshire the other night I was overtaken by a Fiat 500.

Really, it should come with a cattle prod and a device that tells the driver to pull over and get some bloody Red Bull down his neck. Sometimes I’d try to go a bit faster, but there seemed to be little reward, and as soon as I stopped concentrating I went back into Peugeot mode.

So we’re left with a big question. At £54,965 the new SLK 55 costs less than I was expecting. But why pay this much for a
car that doesn’t raise the hairs on the back of your neck? If you want a pottering-about, top-down cruiser, why not buy one of the much cheaper, smaller-engined versions?

Because they’re for girls? OK, then, why not buy a BMW Z4? This is a much underrated car. At less than £40,000 for a twin-turbo 3-litre, it has the same hard folding roof as the Mercedes but is better looking and much less of a handful. Oh, and there’s one more thing. It’s the only car in the world that was designed by women. I like it very much.

13 May 2012

It is extraordinary how often a room full of well-qualified adults can discuss a subject in their chosen field and arrive at a conclusion that’s completely muddle-headed and stupid.

We see this a lot in politics. Only recently an MP called Keith Vaz went on television to say the immigration desks at Heathrow needed to be ‘personed up’. I actually went back and watched the moment again. But there was no mistaking it. This man – an MP with a first-class degree from Cambridge – had obviously been to a meeting where other sentient beings had convinced him to use words that no one else understands.

Then there was the war in Iraq. Wise, clear-thinking people had access to all the information that the satellites could provide. And yet still they made a decision that was idiotic and wrong.

A few years ago Coca-Cola did the same thing, albeit with less important ramifications, when it decided to make Coke taste like a used swab. BA did it with its tailfins. Gerald Ratner described a product he sold as ‘total crap’, Paul McCartney recorded ‘Ebony and Ivory’. Philips pioneered the laserdisc. Clive Sinclair decided to put his all into an electric slipper. John Prescott invented the M4 bus lane. The
San Francisco Chronicle
turned down the syndication of the Watergate story, saying it would only interest people on the east coast. And
Top Gear
made a film about an art gallery in Middlesbrough.

I’m to blame. I brought it up in a meeting and instead of getting insects to lay eggs in my hair, the production team nodded sagely. We’d take over an art gallery, fill it with automotive-based
art and prove that cars bring in bigger crowds than unmade beds and pickled sharks. Somehow, though, it didn’t occur to any of us that this would be a very long and boring film until after it appeared on the show. ‘That was very long and boring,’ we all said afterwards.

Of course, the motoring world is rammed with more mistakes than almost any other industry. Someone at Pontiac looked at the design for the Aztek and said, ‘Mmm. Yes. Excellent.’ And there were similar noises in the Ford boardroom when the stylists mistakenly unveiled their joke plans for what became the Scorpio.

Daimler really thought it could compete with the Rolls-Royce Phantom by putting some cherry wood in a Mercedes S-class and calling it a Maybach. Toyota launched a car called the MR2 without noticing that when said in French – ‘MR deux’ – it translates as ‘shit’, and Audi decided that it could improve on the airbag by developing a system called ‘procon-ten’, which used a fantastically complicated network of cables to pull the steering wheel forward in any frontal impact.

I could go on, so I will. Austin made a car that was more aerodynamic going backwards than forwards, Ford made a car that blew up if a leaf landed on it and Lancia made a car from Russian steel that was as long-lasting as fruit. And only recently Volkswagen was going to call its new car the Black Up!.

It’s almost as though every single meeting in the car industry is specifically designed to exclude rational thought, which brings me on to a gathering of fine minds that must have happened a few years ago in Audi’s boardroom.

They obviously decided that it would be a good wheeze to create a new type of medium-sized hatchback that looked like it might be able to go off road but couldn’t. ‘Yes,’ someone must have said. ‘That’s a brilliant idea. No one else will have thought of making such a thing.’

And they were right. There are no other so-called ‘soft-roaders’ on the market at all. Apart from the Land Rover Freelander, the
Range Rover Evoque, the Honda CR-V, the Toyota RAV4, the BMW X1, the Nissan Kumquat, the Nissan X-Trail, the Mitsubishi Outlander, the Volkswagen Tiguan, the Citroën Cross-Dresser, the Subaru Forester, the Hyundai Santa Fe, the Volvo XC60, the Kia Sportage, the Vauxhall Antara, the Ford Kuga, the Mazda CX-7, the Kia Sorento and the Jeep Compass.

It’s possible they may have known all along that there are many options in this part of the marketplace. But it’s unlikely. Because if they had, they would have made damn sure their new car was better than all the others. And it isn’t.

Let’s start in the boot, which is very small. And the reason it’s very small is that under the boot floor, apparently, there is a large subwoofer. What kind of hallucinogenic drug were they taking at the meeting where everyone agreed that this was a good idea? Who stood up and said, ‘A good bass sound is more important than an ability to carry dogs, shopping or a spare wheel’?

Further forward, we find the rear seat, which is wide enough for three people but only if they have casters rather than legs. And then up front, at the business end, we find nothing at all, apart from some heater controls that have been designed to be annoying.

My £28,965 quattro SE test car was supplied in loser spec with cruise control as a £225 optional extra and, er, that’s it. Every time I selected some tasty-sounding feature from the onboard computer, I was given a message saying, ‘You couldn’t afford this’ or ‘You really should have worked harder at school’. It didn’t even have satnav.

To drive? Well, it’s hard to say because the wheels weren’t balanced properly, and trying to be rational when viewing the world through wobble vision is like trying to concentrate on the finer points of someone who’s constantly hitting you over the head with an axe.

All I can say is that the engine is rather good. I had the more powerful diesel option that had lots of oomph and the thirst of a bee. It sounded nice, too, in a gravelly, smoky, bluesy kind of way.

However, in the morning, when it had been asleep all night, it did take a second or two to remember what it was and what it’s purpose in life might be. You turn the key … and nothing happens. And then, shortly before it remembers that it’s an engine, you give up and turn the ignition off again. This causes a bit of swearing.

Mind you, for cluelessness, the gearbox is worse. In Sport mode it wouldn’t change gear at all, and in Normal mode did nothing else but. Every few seconds. For no discernible reason.

Then there’s the Efficiency mode facility that disengages the clutch every time you lift off the throttle. In theory, this fuel-saving measure sounds like a good idea. In practice, it means you simply cannot maintain smooth progress on the motorway.

The Q3, then. Not practical. Not nice to drive. And technologically, not thought out well, either. So what’s to be done if you want a car that looks like it could go off road but won’t? Especially if you specify the sports suspension that lowers the ride height to that of a centipede.

Well, the obvious answer is the Range Rover Evoque. But if this is too expensive for your taste and not spacious enough, don’t worry, because there is a better alternative. It’s called a saloon car.

20 May 2012