BONO popped down from his mountain to decree: "I think what is missing is a sense of her being a truly great British artist and England should be fighting for this."

And lo, this has come to pass. The tragically terminated career of Kirsty MacColl - killed by a speedboat in Mexico in December 2000 - is given full justice on a 65-track anthology and sister DVD release overseen by Kirsty's mother, Jean, whose track approval extends to eight previously unreleased studio recordings and home demos.

Tears still well at the thought of her loss, but they can never last when listening to MacColl, the wittiest songwriter of female romantic blues in the face of male inadequacy.

The teenage bubble of first love, 1979's They Don't Know, was to burst quickly: she never made the same mistake about men again.

All her subsequent career peaks would swish her cat's tail at men's fumbling, fickle failings.

She couldn't trust the fake Elvis in There's A Guy Works Down the Chip Shop; Don't Come The Cowboy With Me Sonny Jim said everything in its title; and men were still quivering and withering before her in 2000 in England 2 Columbia 0 and the teasing In These Shoes?

Kirsty was the queen of the cover version too, making Billy Bragg's A New England her own and spotting a fellow candid wit in A House's I Am Afraid, the pick of the unreleased material.

The only notable absence is an example of her backing-singing prowess (perhaps Billy Bragg's Greetings To The New Brunette), but her defining duet, the Christmas spat with Shane MacGowan on The Pogues' Fairytale Of New York, rings out once more.

Updated: 08:49 Thursday, April 14, 2005