Originally devised as a way of 'biggin-up' (yes, named after actor Chris Biggins) a person with too much ambition (cf. William the Conqueror, born Bill Gates or Attila the Hun, born Attila the Stockbroker), pseudonyms found widespread use in literary circles as writers with credibility but no cash knocked out pot-boilers, bodice-rippers and sheep-worriers under fanciful names.

They began to be adopted by musicians in the 50s and 60s to get round restrictive recording contracts or to flood the market when their creative juices were too much for one name or label to bear.

The singer-songwriter duo of Peters & Lee are credited with having more songs in the UK top 30 at the same time than any other artist, charting under names ranging from Lea & Perrin to Gallagher & Lyle, Mitchells & Butlers to Simon & Garfunkel.

The Beatles are rumoured to have released songs deemed too weak to be associated with the Beatles name under aliases such as Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr and Jeff Lynne.

Even less well-known are the early Oasis demos, with Elton John providing a suitably Manc accent to win the Gallagher brothers a recording contract long before Liam's voice fully broke and Aled Jones singing on all Yes albums after 'Relayer', once Jon Anderson's finally did.

editor's note: some or all of this might not be true