Busted to switch on Christmas lights

Pop-rock band Busted will be switching on this year's Christmas lights on London's Regent Street today.

14:36 07 November 2004

Pop-rock band Busted will be switching on this year's Christmas lights on London's Regent Street today.

Organisers are hoping to avoid a repeat of last year's embarrassing scenes when it took 20 minutes to switch on the 8,000-bulb display.

Singer Daniel Bedingfield had to keep the crowd entertained by singing a cappella while technicians made frantic efforts to fix the problem behind the scenes.

Managers of the event say this year's lights will be using ground-breaking technology and are promising the most innovative and sophisticated lights the capital has ever seen.

The theme of this year's display is the Disney/Pixar film The Incredibles, a cartoon about a family of superheroes.

Actor Samuel L Jackson, who provides the voice for one of the characters in the film, will also be at the ceremony, which will mark the 50th anniversary of festive lights on Regent Street.

Christmas lanterns were first used to light up the busy shopping district, but this year's display is made up of 12,000 metres of light strings, with a total of 350,000 lights.

Busted - who will be performing three tracks at the ceremony - join a roll call of celebrities who have switched on the famous lights, including Joan Collins, Kylie Minogue, Sir Anthony Hopkins and Will Young.