A McFly in the ointment.

Byline: By Murray Morse

The Chronicle's TV Critic Murray Morse, a 45-year-old father-of-two, last night left the comfort and safety of his couch potato existence in front of the box to take his two children, aged eight and 10, and his wife, aged over 21, to see McFly. This is what he found

Until last night I thought McFly was the name of the latest Scottish sexually-transmitted disease doing the rounds among the 14 to 20-somethings.

Either that or the name of the new diet meal at a well-known burger chain.

It's neither. McFly is the name of the world's newest and most violent hurricane, making hurricanes Ivan, Jean, and Leanne, that recently devastated the far corners of the globe, look like breezy autumn days at Whitley Bay.

Last night the eye of the McFly storm hit Newcastle City Hall and blew Tyneside away.

There to witness it were 2,000 baying fans, wearing too much make-up, too little clothes, coloured hair extensions and badly-toned tummies hanging over low-slung jeans and that was just the boys.

The evening kicked off to a great start with support boy band, V. Led by two Geordie lads, Kevin and Mark, they had the place jumping from the off.

Then we felt the full force of amped-up McFly ( nothing but a decibel-busting noise.

This didn't seem to spoil the enjoyment for the screeching, placard-waving girls who surrounded me, so I can only assume that in their eyes it was a great gig.

The pop question on the tip of everyone's lips (except mine) is: Are McFly the new Busted? Going by the racket that threatened to leave me with permanent and irreversible hearing damage, the answer is: "No obviously."