My .emacs says:
(custom-set-faces '(mode-line ((nil (:background "yellow")))))
(custom-set-variables '(default-frame-alist '((font . "10x20"))))
but the mode line isn't yellow.
If I remove the 2nd line, the mode line is yellow.
Setting the font shouldn't stop me setting the mode-line face, should it?
This was working fine until a day or two ago, in CVS trunk.
I was a little hasty there - I just switched from GNOME to XFCE4 and my .emacs is working again. I hardly ever use GNOME, so maybe this hasn't changed in the last few days at all.
Evaluating the (custom-set-faces ...) s-_expression_ once inside Emacs does set the mode-line to yellow in GNOME. It just doesn't work from .emacs if I have the other line in my .emacs as well.