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abcnewspr · 3 years ago

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ABC NEWS PRESENTS ‘9/11 TWENTY YEARS LATER: AMERICA REMEMBERS’ – A WEEK OF COVERAGE TO COMMEMORATE THE 20TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE SEPT. 11 TERRORIST ATTACKS

Live Coverage on the 20th Anniversary of 9/11, Beginning Saturday, Sept. 11, at 8:00 A.M. EDT on ABC, Led By Anchors David Muir, Robin Roberts and Diane Sawyer

Three Primetime Specials From Roberts on Wednesday, Sept. 8, and Muir and Sawyer on Friday, Sept. 10, to Air on ABC

George Stephanopoulos Narrates Five-Part Docuseries and Linsey Davis Anchors Hour-Long Special, Both Premiering Monday Night, Sept. 6, on ABC News Live

ABC News Live Dedicates Full 24 Hours to 9/11 Programming on 20-Year Anniversary

ABC News announced today “9/11 Twenty Years Later: America Remembers” — a special week of coverage across the network and streaming news channel ABC News Live to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, including four reflective primetime specials and a five-part documentary series.

On Saturday, Sept. 11, in commemoration of the 20th anniversary, a special edition of “Good Morning America Saturday” will air at 7:00 a.m. EDT and lead into ABC News’ special live coverage “9/11 Twenty Years Later: America Remembers” beginning at 8:00 a.m. EDT. Anchor David Muir will lead the special live coverage alongside “Good Morning America” co-anchor Robin Roberts, with ABC News anchor Diane Sawyer from ABC News headquarters in New York and ABC News’ powerhouse team of anchors and correspondents across downtown Manhattan, Washington, D.C., and Shanksville, Pennsylvania, including “Nightline” co-anchors Byron Pitts and Juju Chang, “ABC News Live Prime” and “World News Tonight Weekend” anchor Linsey Davis, chief global affairs correspondent Martha Raddatz, chief Washington correspondent Jonathan Karl, chief White House correspondent Cecilia Vega, chief justice correspondent Pierre Thomas, congressional correspondent Rachel Scott, senior national correspondent Terry Moran and senior foreign correspondent Ian Pannell. The special coverage will reflect on all that happened since that tragic morning and feature the live ceremony taking place in lower Manhattan, including the reading of the names by family members of those killed, as well as the six pauses for moments of silence commemorating the four attacks and collapse of the two towers, and the ceremonies at the Pentagon, Shanksville and elsewhere.

ABC News Live will dedicate a full 24 hours of rotating 9/11-related programming beginning the morning of Saturday, Sept. 11.

Below are details about the primetime specials and ABC News coverage (subject to change). All programming can be viewed the next day on demand and on Hulu, and throughout the day on Saturday, Sept. 11, on ABC News Live.

“This Week with George Stephanopoulos” kicks off the commemorative week on SUNDAY, Sept. 5, with an in-depth look at the fallout from America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan with insight from Raddatz and her two decades of on-the-ground reporting in Afghanistan.

Anchored by Davis, the hour-long special “9/11 Twenty Years Later: Women of Resilience,” streaming MONDAY, Sept. 6 (7:30-8:30 p.m. EDT), on ABC News Live, features the dramatic stories of four inspiring women who survived trauma and loss on 9/11 to find purpose and peace after two decades. One is the first-ever female FDNY firefighter who, along with her fellow first responders, rushed to ground zero on 9/11. Another is a heroic Army colonel at the Pentagon who narrowly escaped death and saved several lives while jumping from the burning inferno. A mother and a widow share their stories of loss and redemption, ensuring their lost loved ones will never be forgotten.

Narrated by Stephanopoulos, five-part documentary series “9/11 + 20: The Longest Shadow,” streaming on five consecutive nights beginning MONDAY, Sept. 6 (8:30-9:00 p.m. EDT), on ABC News Live, examines a nation and world completely changed by the terrifying moments when al-Qaeda operatives used U.S. jetliners to attack America on Sept. 11, 2001. Returning to the morning of Sept. 11, the series explores what America is and has become in the aftermath of one of the most traumatic events in history. From families still searching for answers, their responses and the failures that allowed terrorists to turn planes into missiles to the fear over an anticipated “second wave” of attacks and a seemingly endless war on terror, each episode navigates viewers through the past twenty years to today. The series, produced by ABC News’ Investigative Unit, will be rebroadcast on ABC News Live in full following the commemoration ceremonies on the anniversary, Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021.

For the first time, after two decades, the women whose lives changed forever on Sept. 11 tell their stories of survival, pain and redemption in a landmark two-hour documentary special, “Women of 9/11: A Special Edition of 20/20 with Robin Roberts,” hosted and executive produced by Roberts, airing WEDNESDAY, Sept. 8 (9:00-11:00 p.m. EDT), on ABC. From the heroic female first responders and workers who risked everything in dangerous jobs at ground zero to the miracle survivors, including Genelle Guzman-McMillan, the last person pulled out alive from the World Trade Center rubble after 27 hours, and the women who suffered heartbreaking loss; all of them bonded in trauma, grief, and after two decades, remarkable strength and resilience. “The Women of 9/11” is produced for ABC News by Rock’n Robin Productions in collaboration with Plimsoll Productions.

“20/20” will present two specials on Friday, Sept. 10:

Two decades after 9/11, anchor David Muir reports on how the day’s tragic events forever changed the world. In the one-hour special event, Muir interviews survivors and family members who lost loved ones in the attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and United Flight 93 in Shanksville. The survivors share their harrowing personal stories of rescue and escape, including Florence Jones, who Muir has followed for years. Muir also spends time with families who lost loved ones, including the family of Flight 93 passenger Tom Burnett who, along with other passengers, helped stop an additional attack on our nation’s capital. “20/20” will also revisit Joseph Pfeifer, the New York City Fire Department chief, who Muir has profiled, who led the command post at the north tower following the initial attack – and firefighters who survived the north tower collapse. Muir’s interviews include personal and moving messages to the American people from survivors and relatives of some of the victims on what they’re hoping Americans will do to honor those who were lost — 20 years later. The special edition of “20/20” airs Friday, Sept. 10 (9:01-10:00 p.m. EDT), on ABC.

Twenty years ago, in the wake of Sept. 11, ABC News anchor Diane Sawyer sat down with young women holding their infants — who were pregnant when their husbands died in the attacks. The mothers she met were fresh in grief, holding new babies who often looked like their dads. Over the years, Sawyer and her team followed these families as they look at the world through their unique lens, with their children’s lives in part shaped before they were even born. Now, as those children approach their 20th birthdays, a special edition of “20/20” brings nearly 40 families together again. Has grief given them new purpose? Are some following in their fathers’ footsteps? A master class in resilience and hope comes from a group forever bonded by a national tragedy. With lessons to teach us after a year of national trauma, they hand us a blueprint for survival. The special edition of “20/20” airs Friday, Sept. 10 (10:00-11:00 p.m. EDT), on ABC.

In the week leading up to Sept. 11, “World News Tonight with David Muir” will feature anchor David Muir’s interviews with the survivors and heroes he’s been following for more than a decade. They open up to Muir about the tragic day, the loved ones they lost, the people they met during the horror and their messages to their fellow Americans on why it’s so important to reflect and remember 20 years later. On Friday, Sept. 10, Muir will anchor “World News Tonight” from ground zero.

“GMA3: What You Need to Know” will feature a wide range of stories and topics, including a panel discussion on Islamophobia and two strangers who met trying to escape the towers and became friends for life. The program will feature interviews with retired FDNY Chief Joe Pfeifer, the first firefighter on the scene at the World Trade Center on 9/11, legacy female firefighter Kelly Fullam, whose father was also a FDNY firefighter who died from 9/11-related illness, and the family of fallen FDNY firefighter Lt. Kevin Dowdell. Ending the week, Amy Robach and T.J. Holmes will anchor from ground zero on Sept. 10 with John Feal, president and chairman of the FealGood Foundation, 15 active and retired firefighters who rode for 40 days across the country with the goal of raising money in honor of the anniversary, and former FDNY chaplain Rev. Chris Keenan will join for “Faith Friday” to discuss his experience and deliver a word of faith in honor of the anniversary.

On FRIDAY, Sept. 10, “The View” revisits the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, as the co-hosts prepared for the live broadcast. They will reflect on the tragic events of the day, including what it was like at the New York City studio as the news unfolded and the important conversations that took place at the table once they returned following the terrorist attack.

In addition to the five-part docuseries narrated by Stephanopoulos, ABC News Live will provide coverage throughout each day in the week leading up to the anniversary. During the day, ABC News Live will carry live streams of 9/11 related events and feature new interviews and roundtable discussions on topics such as how New York City recovered from 9/11 and how that has helped the city recover from a pandemic, and how first responders have dealt with health issues for years. On FRIDAY, Sept. 10 (3:00-3:30 p.m. EDT), “The Breakdown” will be anchored by Diane Macedo live from lower Manhattan.

“ABC News Live Prime” (7:00-8:30 p.m. EDT) will feature a conversation and tell the story of Heather Penney — a female F-16 fighter pilot who was supposed to go on a kamikaze mission and shoot down Flight 93 but didn’t get there in time — and examine the current iteration of the Taliban and look at why the Taliban is still a threat 20 years after 9/11. Plus, ABC News reporters who covered the tragedy 20 years ago will reflect on their experiences at the time of the attacks, including former ABC News White House correspondent Ann Compton who was traveling with former President George W. Bush that day. “ABC News Live Prime” will also feature a report by senior Washington reporter Devin Dwyer on Islamophobia and how Muslims feel 20 years later. On the eve of the anniversary, “ABC News Live Prime” will be anchored by Davis from near the site of the attacks on the twin towers and take a look at the children of 9/11 firefighters who became firefighters themselves.

ABC News Digital will have wide-ranging coverage on ABCNews.com and its apps leading up to the anniversary, including an overview of the 20 years since 9/11, how Islamophobia has evolved in the U.S. since 9/11, what progress has been made with the Victims Compensation Fund and 9/11 victims, coverage of the memorial events held around the country on the day of the anniversary and more. Additionally, two 9/11 related episodes of digital video series VOICES will be released, looking at the 20th anniversary and the “War on Terror.” There will also be a special 9/11-focused episode of “On Location” and video highlights on the day of the anniversary.

ABC News Radio will provide an hour-long special anchored by correspondent Aaron Katersky, which will be available mid-week for affiliates to air on-demand. The special will also be available later as an episode of the “ABC News Radio Specials” podcast, available on major listening platforms. On Saturday, Sept. 11, ABC News Radio will provide live-anchored coverage of the annual commemoration ceremony.

ABC News’ flagship daily podcast “Start Here,” hosted by Brad Mielke, will feature special coverage in the days leading up to the anniversary.

ABC NewsOne, the affiliate news service of ABC News, will be providing a series of reports in the week leading up to the anniversary, looking at how 9/11 changed America. NewsOne will also be providing live coverage from lower Manhattan with multiplatform reporters Ike Ejiochi and Reena Roy on the day before and the day of the anniversary. NewsOne provides news content and services for more than 200 ABC affiliates and international news partners.

For more information, follow ABC News PR on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

-- ABC --

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viceofalice · 3 years ago

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alice fortescue: “you’re a bandit like me...”

the everyman who might or might not crave love and a fancy car

basics

name: alice florence fortescue

korean name: ji-yoon

gender: ciswoman

sexual orientation: bisexual

blood status: pureblood

ethnicity: korean english

birthdate: 17th january 2001

sun sign: capricorn

place of residence: diagon alley, london (more specifically on the third floor of her parents’ popular ice cream shop)

family: florean fortescue (father) & kim chae-young (mother)

specifics

aesthetics: a thermos of unsweetened tea, fog in the morning air, the rustle of coats inside an old closet, the smell of toothpaste, braided black hair, rough hands, the swish of a broom shooting up into the air

personality: daring (alice is always up for a challenge, there seems to be little she is scared of. as a child, she barely ever cries). capricious (hardheaded, her way or no way). swift (exacting, someone who believes in justice and its sharp sword).

house: gryffindor

wand: 12 1/2 inch with unicorn hair core, made out of oak wood, unyielding

patronus: a jack russell terrier dog

boggart: explosions and debris falling onto her

amortentia: the smell of her mother’s homemade soap, grass and sweat, and maybe the lingering cologne of a certain person she’s always had a little bit of a crush on

activities: keeper of the gryffindor quidditch team

aspiration: alice dreams of becoming a professional quidditch player, a great one. she thinks she’d like to play for puddlemere united or the braga broomfleet, spending her time up in the air.

character inspo: gamora from guardians of the galaxy & jessie from toy story

headcanons

- as a little girl, alice barely ever cried. she was the quietest baby, calm and brave. when storms would strike, she would listen to the heavy rain with curiosity instead of fear. her mother would tell her that she was the best baby. everyone was jealous of alice’s quietness.

- she is close to her maternal grandmother who lived with the fortescue family. she writes to her every week. her grandmother is the only one who calls her ji-yoon and the only one she lets call her that. her korean name is a name of sentimental values, of intimacy. only those very very close to her and very very dear to her are allowed to call her ji-yoon.

- truthfully, alice has no interest in school. her only interest is in being up in the sky, flying and catching quaffles.

- she has a scar over her eyebrow from a bludger. it’s been years and the scar is still pronounced. she likes to hide it with makeup.

wanted connections

- the secret crush. the one she’s secretly been in love with since first year. preferably someone who is also on the gryffindor quidditch team. this person has never looked her way though. and they’ve shared locker rooms all these years.

- the best friend. her shoulder to cry on.

- the beater. the one who sent the bludger flying her way, the one that left her her scar.

- the fellow fanatic. her fellow quidditch fanatic.

#ww.intro #biography

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blackkudos · 5 years ago

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Ben Webster

Benjamin Francis Webster (March 27, 1909 – September 20, 1973) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. He is considered one of the three most important "swing tenors" along with Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young. Known affectionately as "The Brute" or "Frog", he had a tough, raspy, and brutal tone on stomps (with growls), yet on ballads he played with warmth and sentiment. He was indebted to alto saxophonist Johnny Hodges, who, he said, taught him to play his instrument.

Early life and career

Born in Kansas City, Missouri, United States, he studied violin in elementary and taught himself piano with the help of his neighbor Pete Johnson, who taught him the blues. In 1927-1928 he played for silent movies in Kansas City and in Amarillo, Texas.

Once Budd Johnson showed him some basics on the saxophone, Webster began to focus on that instrument, playing in the Young Family Band (which at the time included Lester Young), although he did return to the piano from time to time, even recording on the instrument occasionally.

In his first biography (‘Ben Webster / In A mellow Tone’, Van Gennep/The Netherlands, 1992, published as ‘Ben Webster / His Life and Music’ with Berkeley Hills Books/USA in 2001), author Jeroen de Valk (assisted by Ben’s cousin Harley W. Robinson) traces back his ancestry to his great-great grandmother, a woman from Guinea who reportedly was brought to America as a slave in the early 19th century. Her son managed to escape from slavery. Ben’s father, who worked as a porter on Pullman trains, separated from his mother before his son was born. Ben was raised by his grand-aunt, Agnes Johnson, to whom he referred as his ‘grandmother’. His mother Mayme worked as a school teacher. He had to play the violin as a kid but hated the instrument, as other kids called him ‘sissy with the violin’. He had his first piano lessons by his second cousin, Joyce Cockrell. He changed to the tenor saxophone after hearing Frankie Trumbauer’s solo on the C-Melody saxophone in 'Singing The Blues', but soon Coleman Hawkins became a major influence. Webster was married for a couple of years in the early 40s to Eudora Williams. He never had a family of his own and lived with his mother and grand-aunt off and on until their passing in 1963.

Kansas City was a melting pot from which emerged some of the biggest names in 1930s jazz. Webster joined Bennie Moten's band in 1932, a grouping which also included Count Basie, Hot Lips and Walter Page. This era was recreated in Robert Altman's film Kansas City.

Webster spent time with quite a few orchestras in the 1930s, including Andy Kirk, the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra in 1934, then Benny Carter, Willie Bryant, Cab Calloway, and the short-lived Teddy Wilson big band.

With Ellington

Ben Webster played with Duke Ellington's orchestra for the first time in 1935, and by 1940 was performing with it full-time as the band's first major tenor soloist. He credited Johnny Hodges, Ellington's alto soloist, as a major influence on his playing. During the next three years, he played on many recordings, including "Cotton Tail" and "All Too Soon"; his contributions (together with that of bassist Jimmy Blanton) were so important that Ellington's orchestra during that period is known as the Blanton–Webster band. Webster left the band in 1943 after an angry altercation during which he allegedly cut up one of Ellington's suits. Another version of Webster's leaving Ellington came from Clark Terry, a longtime Ellington player, who said that, in a dispute, Webster slapped Ellington, upon which the latter gave him two weeks notice.

After Ellington

After leaving Ellington in 1943, Webster worked on 52nd Street in New York City, where he recorded frequently as both a leader and a sideman. During this time he had short periods with Raymond Scott, John Kirby, Bill DeArango, and Sid Catlett, as well as with Jay McShann's band, which also featured blues shouter Jimmy Witherspoon. For a few months in 1948, he returned briefly to Ellington's orchestra.

In 1953, he recorded King of the Tenors with pianist Oscar Peterson, who would be an important collaborator with Webster throughout the decade in his recordings for the various labels of Norman Granz. Along with Peterson, trumpeter Harry 'Sweets' Edison and others, he was touring and recording with Granz's Jazz at the Philharmonic package. In 1956, he recorded a classic set with pianist Art Tatum, supported by bassist Red Callender and drummer Bill Douglass. Coleman Hawkins Encounters Ben Webster with fellow tenor saxophonist Coleman Hawkins was recorded on December 16, 1957, along with Peterson, Herb Ellis (guitar), Ray Brown (bass), and Alvin Stoller (drums). The Hawkins and Webster recording is a jazz classic, the coming together of two giants of the tenor saxophone, who had first met back in Kansas City.

In the late 1950s, he formed a quintet with Gerry Mulligan and played frequently at a Los Angeles club called Renaissance. It was there that the Webster-Mulligan group backed up blues singer Jimmy Witherspoon on an album recorded live for Hi-Fi Jazz Records. That same year, 1959, the quintet, with pianist Jimmy Rowles, bassist Leroy Vinnegar, and drummer Mel Lewis, also recorded "Gerry Mulligan Meets Ben Webster" for Verve Records (MG V-8343).

In Europe

Webster generally worked steadily, but in late 1964 he moved permanently to Europe, working with other American jazz musicians based there as well as local musicians. He played when he pleased during his last decade. He lived in London and several locations in Scandinavia for one year, followed by three years in Amsterdam and made his last home in Copenhagen in 1969. Webster appeared as a sax player in a low-rent cabaret club in the 1970 Danish blue film titled Quiet Days in Clichy. In 1971, Webster reunited with Duke Ellington and his orchestra for a couple of shows at the Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen; he also recorded "live" in France with Earl Hines. He also recorded or performed with Buck Clayton, Bill Coleman and Teddy Wilson.

Webster suffered a cerebral bleed in Amsterdam in September 1973, following a performance at the Twee Spieghels in Leiden, and died on 20 September. His body was cremated in Copenhagen and his ashes were buried in the Assistens Cemetery in the Nørrebro section of the city.

Legacy

After Webster's death, Billy Moore Jr., together with the trustee of Webster's estate, created the Ben Webster Foundation. Since Webster's only legal heir, Harley Robinson of Los Angeles, gladly assigned his rights to the foundation, the Ben Webster Foundation was confirmed by the Queen of Denmark's Seal in 1976. In the Foundation's trust deed, one of the initial paragraphs reads: "to support the dissemination of jazz in Denmark". The trust is a beneficial foundation which channels Webster's annual royalties to musicians in both Denmark and the U.S. An annual Ben Webster Prize is awarded to a young outstanding musician. The prize is not large, but is considered highly prestigious. Over the years, several American musicians have visited Denmark with the help of the Foundation, and concerts, a few recordings, and other jazz-related events have been supported.

Webster's private collection of jazz recordings and memorabilia is archived in the jazz collections at the University Library of Southern Denmark, Odense.

Ben Webster used the same Saxophone from 1938 until his death in 1973. Ben left instructions that the horn was never to be played again. It is on display in the Jazz Institute at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ.

Ben Webster has a street named after him in southern Copenhagen, "Ben Websters Vej".

On June 25, 2019, The New York Times Magazine listed Ben Webster among hundreds of artists whose material was reportedly destroyed in the 2008 Universal fire.

Discography

As leader / co-leader

King of the Tenors [AKA The Consummate Artistry of Ben Webster] (Norgran, MGN-1001, 1953)

1953: An Exceptional Encounter [live] (The Jazz Factory, 1953) – with Modern Jazz Quartet

Music for Loving (Norgran MGN-1018, 1954) AKA Sophisticated Lady (Verve, 1956), and Music With Feeling (Norgran MGN-1039, 1955) – reissued as a 2-CD set: Ben Webster With Strings (Verve 527774, 1995; which also includes as a bonus: Harry Carney With Strings, Clef MGC-640, 1954)

The Art Tatum - Ben Webster Quartet (Verve, 1956 [1958]) – with Art Tatum

Soulville (Verve, 1957)

The Soul of Ben Webster (Verve, 1958)

Ben Webster and Associates (Verve, 1959)

Gerry Mulligan Meets Ben Webster (Verve, 1959)

Ben Webster Meets Oscar Peterson (Verve, 1959)

Ben Webster at the Renaissance (Contemporary, 1960)

The Warm Moods (Reprise, 1961)

Wanted to Do One Together (Columbia, 1962) – with Harry Edison

Soulmates (Riverside, 1963) – with Joe Zawinul

See You at the Fair (Impulse!, 1964)

Stormy Weather (Black Lion, 1965) – recorded at The Jazzhus Montmartre, Copenhagen

Gone With The Wind (Black Lion, 1965) – recorded at The Jazzhus Montmartre, Copenhagen

Meets Bill Coleman (Black Lion, 1967)

Big Ben Time (Ben Webster in London 1967) (Philips, 1968)

Webster's Dictionary (Philips, 1970)

No Fool, No Fun [The Rehearsal Sessions, 1970 with The Danish Radio Jazz Orchestra] (Storyville Records STCD 8304, 1999)

Ben Webster Plays Ballads [recordings from Danish Radio 1967–1971] (Storyville SLP-4118, 1988)

Autumn Leaves (with Georges Arvanitas trio) (Futura Swing 05, 1972)

Gentle Ben (with Tete Montoliu Trio) (Ensayo, 1973)

My Man: Live at Montmartre 1973 (Steeplechase, 1973)

Ballads by Ben Webster (Verve, Recorded 1953-1959, released 1974, 2xLP)

As a sideman

With Count Basie

String Along with Basie (Roulette, 1960)

With Buddy Bregman

Swinging Kicks (Verve, 1957)

With Benny Carter

Jazz Giant (Contemporary, 1958)

BBB & Co. (Swingville, 1962) with Barney Bigard

With Harry Edison

Sweets (Clef, 1956)

Gee Baby, Ain't I Good to You (Verve, 1957)

With Duke Ellington

Never No Lament: The Blanton-Webster Band (RCA, 1940–1942 [rel. 2003])

With Dizzy Gillespie

The Complete RCA Victor Recordings (Bluebird, 1937–1949 [rel. 1995])

With Lionel Hampton

You Better Know It!!! (Impulse, 1965)

With Coleman Hawkins

Rainbow Mist (Delmark, 1944 [1992]) compilation of Apollo recordings

Coleman Hawkins Encounters Ben Webster (Verve, 1957)

Coleman Hawkins and Confrères (Verve, 1958)

With Woody Herman

Songs for Hip Lovers (Verve, 1957)

With Johnny Hodges

The Blues (Norgran, 1952–1954, [rel. 1955])

Blues-a-Plenty (Verve, 1958)

Not So Dukish (Verve, 1958)

With Richard "Groove" Holmes

"Groove" (Pacific Jazz, 1961) – with Les McCann

Tell It Like It Tis (Pacific Jazz, 1961 [rel. 1966])

With Illinois Jacquet

The Kid and the Brute (Clef, 1955)

With Barney Kessel

Let's Cook! (Contemporary, 1957 [rel. 1962])

With Mundell Lowe

Porgy & Bess (RCA Camden, 1958)

With Les McCann

Les McCann Sings (Pacific Jazz, 1961)

With Carmen McRae

Birds of a Feather (Decca, 1958)

With Oliver Nelson

More Blues and the Abstract Truth (Impulse!, 1964)

With Buddy Rich

The Wailing Buddy Rich (Norgran, 1955)

With Art Tatum

The Tatum Group Masterpieces, Volume Eight (Pablo, 1956)

With Clark Terry

The Happy Horns of Clark Terry (Impulse!, 1964)

With Joe Williams

At Newport '63 (RCA Victor, 1963)

#03/27 #09/20

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harrisonstories · 6 years ago

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George Harrison performing at the Royal Albert Hall (1992)

Guitar World Interviews George Harrison (released Jan. 2001 - original interview from 1992)

George Harrison looks back at the days when he played lead guitar in The Beatles, the greatest rock and roll band the world has ever known.

By Vic Garbarini

“So, you’re a real loony too,” laughs George Harrison, with the familiar droll, nasal Scouse (as they call it in Liverpool) accent. “Remember lying in that room all day, needle in your arm, feeling dazed, staring up at that ugly lime green ceiling?”

Well, yes, actually I do. And no, we weren’t shooting dope together in some dive. The lead guitarist of the most important group in rock history is reminding me of when we met a few years back in Dr. Sharma’s clinic in London. Sharma is an M.D. who is also an internationally recognized expert in alternative medicine - in particular, homeopathic and Indian Ayurvedic medicines - and it was these treatments that appealed to Harrison’s Eastern philosophic bent. Her waiting room looked like backstage Live Aid: Tina Turner and members of the Police, Pink Floyd - and of course an occasional Beatle - were drifting in and out. Through Sharma, I’d been promised an interview with George Harrison, and now 10 years later - we were finally sitting down to talk. It was late 1992, and George was promoting Live in Japan (Warner Bros.), the concert album of his 1991 tour with Eric Clapton and the last album he released to date.

So why is this interview finally finding its way to print eight years after the fact? Simple: it was lost. Parts had appeared in Guitar World and other places, but the body of the tape disappeared when the famous 1994 L.A. earthquake turned my apartment into a cosmic Cuisinart. Recently, while I was cleaning out a closet, the long-lost tape literally fell into my lap. The timing couldn’t have been better: All Things Must Pass, Harrison’s superb 1970 solo album, had just recently been issued in a remastered and expanded format. What’s more, the massive Beatles Anthology (Chronicle Books) has once again put the Fabs back in the limelight; but while the book is crammed with minutiae that will fascinate anyone with any interest in the Beatles, it contains little information on how the group created its music, the source of its internal conflicts or how those two elements interacted over the years.

I found that Harrison needed a little prodding before he would discuss the band’s inner turmoil. Once he opened up, though, he gave a most revealing and candid interview in which he expressed his true feelings for his fellow bandmates. Although Harrison was the first lead guitarist to become an equal in a major band (pre-Beatles guitarists like Scotty Moore, from Elvis Presley’s band, were clearly hired guns), he was sandwiched between the two most towering songwriters in rock history - and they often wanted to control his playing - or even do it for him. And of course, getting a decent hearing of his songs was no picnic either.

Perhaps it is for these reasons that Harrison has a reputation as the most dour of Beatles; yet he was witty and upbeat during our talk. He forgave Paul McCartney’s controlling tendencies and John Lennon’s indifference - but, it was clear, he hasn’t forgotten. He seemed emotionally evenhanded, even when angry, balancing the good with the bad and always seeing the positive dimension to all his struggles.

“I’m a Pisces, you know,” he joked. “One half always going back where the other half has been.”

George was also surprisingly willing to talk about the Beatles from the unique perspective of a guitarist as well as that of a composer. He told how he developed a guitar style that combined the music of the Mississippi Delta with that of India’s Ganges Delta, thereby creating his distinctive sound. He spoke of his relationships with Lennon and McCartney: who was more stimulating - and difficult - to work with, and why. He also described how he sneaked Eric Clapton into the studio to rescue one of Harrison’s greatest songs, “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.” And he answered the long-standing questions about whether he was bored during the making of Sgt. Pepper’s.

This may well be the most comprehensive, free-ranging discussion Harrison has ever granted on his years with the Beatles. So, now, here’s the man from the band you’ve known for all these years: Mr. George Harrison.

Guitar World: John Lennon said, “I grew up in Hamburg - not Liverpool.” Is that also true of the Beatles as a group?

George Harrison: Oh, yeah. Before Hamburg, we didn’t have a clue. [laughs] We’d never really done any gigs. We’d play a few parties, but we’d never had a drummer longer than one night at a time. So we were very ropy, just young kids. I was actually the youngest - I was only 17, and you had to be 18 to play in the clubs - and we had no visas. They wound up deporting me after our second year there. Then Paul and Pete Best [the Beatles’ first permanent drummer GW Ed.] got deported for some silly reason, and John just figured he might as well come home. But when we went there, we weren’t a unit as a band yet. When we arrived in Hamburg, we started playing eight hours a day - like a full workday. We did that for a total of 11 or 12 months, on and off over a two year period. It was pretty intense.

GW: Paul McCartney told me that playing for those drunken German sailors, trying to lure them in to buy a couple of beers so you could keep your gig, was what galvanized the band into a musical form.

HARRISON: That’s true, because we were forced to learn to play everything. At first, we played music of all our heroes - Little Richard, Fats Domino, Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, the Everly Brothers, Ray Charles, Carl Perkins - anything we’d ever liked. But we still needed more to fill those eight-hour sets. Eventually we had to stretch and play a lot of stuff that we didn’t know particulary well. Suddenly, we were even playing movie themes, like “A Taste of Honey” or “Moonglow,” learning new chords, jazz voicings, the whole bit. Eventually, it all combined together to make something new, and we found our own voice as a band.

GW: I can see how all this musical stretching gave you the tools to eventually create your own unique sound. But it’s hard to believe drunken sailors would want to hear movie ballads.

HARRISON: No, we played those things because we got drunk! If you’re coming in at three or four in the afternoon with a massive hangover from playing all night on beer and uppers, and there’s hardly anybody in the club, you’re not going to feel like jumping up and down and playing “Roll Over Beethoven.” You’re going to sit down and playing something like “Moonglow.” And we learned a lot from doing that.

GW: Did those tight, Beatles vocal harmonies also come out of Hamburg?

HARRISON: We always loved those American girls groups, like the Shirelles and the Ronettes. So yeah, we developed our harmonies from trying to come up with an English, male version of their vocal feel. We discovered the option of having three-part harmonies, or lead vocal and two-part backup, from doing that old girl-goup material. We even covered some of those songs, like “Baby, It’s You,” on our first album.

GW: When you broke through in America, Carl Perkins and Scotty Moore, Elvis’ guitarists, were clearly your main influences as a guitarist. And, like them, you were using a Gretsch guitar. What was it about that rocka-billy style that captivated you?

HARRISON: Carl was playing that simple, amazing blend of country, blues and early rock, with these brilliant chordal solos that were very sophisticated. I heard his version of “Blue Suede Shoes” on the radio the other day, and I’ll tell you, they don’t come more perfect than that. Later, when we met Carl, he was such a sweet fellow, a lovely man. I did a TV special with him a couple of years ago and I used the Gretsch Tennessean again for that, the one I like to call the Eddie Cochran/Duane Eddy model. And you have to understand how radical that sound was at the time. Nowadays, we have all this digital stuff, but the records of that period had a certain atmosphere. Part of it was technical: the engineer would have to pot the guitar [adjust its level and tone] up and down or whatever. It was a blend that was affected by the live “slap echo” they were using. I loved that slap bass feel - the combination between the bass, the drum and the slap, and how they would all come together to make that amazing sound. We used to think that the drummer must be drumming on the double bass’ strings to get that slap back - we just couldn’t figure it out.

GW: The other major factor in your playing was Chuck Berry. I remember being a kid and hearing you do “Roll Over Beethoven” and thinking it was a Beatles song. We never heard black artists on the radio in those days.

HARRISON: Oh, that’s still happening. We did a press conference in Japan when I played live there with Eric Clapton [in 1991], and the first question was, “Mr. Harrison, are you going to play ‘Roll Over Beethoven’ in concert?” And when I said yes, the whole hall stood up and applauded! It was such a big thing for them, which seemed so funny. Then I realized they must still think I wrote it.

GW: Going back to the Beatles’ early touring days, Ringo Starr told me that you all gave up on playing live because you literally couldn’t hear each other, due to all the screaming and the primitive amplification.

HARRISON: We couldn’t hear a thing. We were using these 30-watt amps until we played Shea Stadium, at which point we got those really big 100-watt amps. [laughs] And nothing was even miked up through a P.A. system. They had to listen to us just through those tiny amplifiers and the vocal mikes.

GW: Did you ever give up and just mime?

HARRISON: Yeah, sometimes we used to play absolute rubbish. At Shea Stadium, [during “I’m Down,”] John was playing a little Vox organ with his elbow. He and I were howling with laughter when we were supposed to be doing the background vocals. I really couldn’t hear a thing. Nowadays, if you can get a good balance on your monitors, it’s so much easier to hear your vocals and stay in pitch. When you can’t hear your own voice onstage, you tend to go over the top and sing sharp - which we often did back then.

GW: The Beatles stopped touring in 1966 around the time of Revolver. That album was a quantum leap in terms of the band’s playing and songwriting. Rock could now deal with our inner lives, alienation, spirituality and frustration, things which it had never dealt so directly with before. And the guitars and music warped into a new dimension. What kicked that off? Was it Dylan, the Byrds, Indian music and philosophy?

HARRISON: Well, all of those things came together. And I think you’re right, around the time of Rubber Soul and Revolver we just became more conscious of so many things. We even listened deeper, somehow. That’s when I really enjoyed getting creative with the music - not just with my guitar playing and songwriting but with everything we did as a band, including the songs that the others wrote. It all deepened and became more meaningful.

GW: Dylan inspired you guys lyrically to explore deeper subjects, while the Beatles inspired him to expand musically, and to go electric. His first reaction on hearing the Beatles was supposedly, “Those chords!” Did you ever talk to him about the way you influenced each other?

HARRISON: Yes, and it was just like you were saying. I was at Bob’s house and we were trying to write a tune. And I remember saying, “How did you write all those amazing words?” And he shrugged and said, “Well, how about all those chords you use?” So I started playing and said it was just all these funny chords people showed me when I was a kid. Then I played two major sevenths in a row to demonstrate, and I suddenly thought, Ah, this sounds like a tune here. Then we finished the song together. It was called “I’d Have You Anytime,” and it was the first track on All Things Must Pass.

GW: Paul told me that Rubber Soul was just “John doing Dylan.” Do you think Dylan felt that?

HARRISON: Dylan once wrote a song called “Fourth Time Around.” to my mind, it was about how John and Paul, from listening to Bob’s early stuff, had written “Norwegian Wood.” Judging from the title, it seemed as though Bob had listened to that and wrote the same basic song again, calling it “Fourth Time Around.” The title suggests that the same basic tune kept bouncing around over and over again.

GW: The same cross-fertillization seemed to be going on between the Beatles and the Byrds around that time. Your song “If I Needed Someone” has got to be a tip of the hat to Roger McGuinn, right?

HARRISON: We were friends with the Byrds and we certainly liked their records. Roger himself said that the first time he saw a Rickenbacker 12-string was in A Hard Day’s Night, and he certainly stamped his personality onto that sound later. Wait - I’ll tell you what it was. Now that I’m thinking about it, that song actually was inspired by a Byrds song, “The Bells of Rhymney.” Any guitar player knows that, with that open-position D chord, you just move your fingers around and you get all these little maladies…I mean melodies! Well, sometimes maladies [laughs] And that became a thrill, to see how many more tunes you could write around that open D, like “Here Comes the Sun.”

GW: When you did that tour with Eric Clapton in Japan, you opened with “I Want to Tell You,” from Revolver. The song marked a turning point in your playing, and in the history of rock music writing. There’s a weird, jarring chord at the end of every line that mirrors the disturbed feeling of the song. Everybody does that today, but that was the first time we’d heard that in a rock song.

HARRISON: I’m really pleased that you noticed that. That’s an E7th with an F on the top, played on the piano. I’m really proud of that, because I literally invented that chord. The song was about the frustration we all feel about trying to communicate certain things with just words. I realized the chords I knew at the time just didn’t capture that feeling. So after I got the guitar riff, I experimented until I came up with this dissonant chord that really echoed that sense of frustration. John later borrowed it on Abbey Road. If you listen to “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)” it’s right after John sings “it’s driving me mad!” To my knowledge, there’s only been one other song where somebody copped that chord - “Back on the Chain Gang” by the Pretenders.

GW: Around the time of Rubber Soul and Revolver, you met Ravi Shankar and went to India to study Indian classical music, which is full of microtonal slurs and blends. When you came back, your guitar playing became more elastic, yet very precise. You were finding more notes between the cracks, like you can in Indian music - especially on your slide work. Is there a connection there?

HARRISON: Sure, because whatever you listen to has to come out in some way or other. I think Indian music influenced the inflection of how I played, and certain things I play certainly have a feel similar to the Indian style. As for slide, I think most people - Keith Richards for example - play block chords and all those blues fills, which are based on open tunings. My solos are actually like melodic runs, or counter melodies, and sometimes I’ll add a harmony line to it as well.

GW: Like on “My Sweet Lord” and the songs on your first solo album [All Things Must Pass].

HARRISON: Exactly. Actually, now that you’ve got me thinking about my guitar playing Indian music, I remember Ravi Shankar brought an Indian musician to my house who played classical Indian music on a slide guitar. It’s played like a lap steel and set up like a regular guitar, but the nut and bridges are cranked up, and it even has sympathetic drone strings, like a sitar. He played runs that were so precise and in perfect pitch, but so quick! When he was rocking along, doing these really fast runs, it was unbelievable how much precision was involved. So there were various influences. But it would be precocious to compare myself with incredible musicians like that.

GW: When you came back from India, did you intentionally copy on guitar any of the techniques you learned there?

HARRISON: When I got back from this incredible journey to India, we were about to do Sgt. Pepper’s, which I don’t remember much at all. I was into my own little world, and my ears were just all filled up with all this Indian music. So I wasn’t really into sitting there, thrashing through [sings nasally] “I’m fixing a hole…” Not that song, anyway. But if you listen to “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,” you’ll hear me try and play the melody on guitar with John’s voice, which is what the instrumentalist does in Hindustani vocal music.

GW: Paul told me you wanted to do a similar thing on “Hey Jude,” to echo his vocal phrases on the guitar, and that he wouldn’t let you. He admitted that incidents like that were one of the causes of the band’s breakup. And Ringo said you had the toughest job, because Paul in particular and George Martin as well would sometimes try and dictate what you should play, even on your solos.

HARRISON: Well, you know, that’s okay. I don’t remember the specifics on that song. [pauses] Look, the thing is, so much has been said about our disagreements. It’s like…so much time has lapsed, it doesn’t really matter anymore.

GW: Was Paul trying to just hold the band together, or was he just becoming a control freak? Or was it a little of both?

HARRISON: Well…sometimes Paul “dictated” for the better of a song, but at the same time he also pre-empted some good stuff that could have gone in a different direction. George Martin did that too. But they’ve all apologized to me for all that over the years.

GW: But you were pissed off enough about all this to leave the band for a short time during the Let It Be sessions. Reportedly, this problem had been brewing for a while. What was it that upset you about what Paul was doing?

HARRISON: At that point in time, Paul couldn’t see beyond himself. He was so on a roll - but it was a roll encompassing his own self. And in his mind, everything that was going on around him was just there to accompany him. He wasn’t sensitive to stepping on other people’s egos or feelings. Having said that, when it came time to do the occasional song of mine - although it was usually difficult to get to that point - Paul would always be really creative with what he’d contribute. For instance, that galloping piano part on “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” was Paul’s, and it’s brilliant right to this day. On the Live in Japan album, I got our keyboardist to play it note for note. And you just have to listen to the bass line on “Something” to know that, when he wanted to, Paul could give a lot. But, you know, there was a time there when…

GW: I think it’s called being human - and young.

HARRISON: It is…[sighs] It really is.

GW: How difficult was it to squeeze your songs in between the two most famous writers in rock?

HARRISON: To get it straight, if I hadn’t been with John and Paul I probably wouldn’t have thought about writing a song, at least not until much later. They were writing all these songs, many of which I thought were great. Some were just average, but, obviously, a high percentage were quality material. I thought to myself, If they can do it, I’m going to have a go. But it’s true: it wasn’t easy in those days getting up enthusiasm for my songs. We’d be in a recording situation, churning through all this Lennon/McCartney, Lennon/McCartney, Lennon,/McCartney! Then I’d say [meekly] can we do one of these?

GW: Was that true even with an obviously great song like “My..uh.”

HARRISON: "Piggies”? You mean “While My Piggies Gently Weep”? [laughs] When we actually started recording “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” it was just me playing the acoustic guitar and singing it [This solo version appears on the Anthology 3 CD-GW Ed.] and nobody was interested. Well, Ringo probably was, but John and Paul weren’t. When I went home that night, I was really disappointed, because I thought, Well, this is really quite a good song, it’s not as if it’s shitty! The next day, I happened to drive back into London with Eric Clapton, and while we were in the car I suddenly said, “Why don’t you come and play on this track?” And he said, “Oh, I couldn’t do that. The others wouldn’t like it.”

GW: Was that a verboten thing with the Beatles?

HARRISON: Well, it wasn’t so much verboten; it’s just that nobody had ever done it before. We’d had oboe and string players and other session people in for overdubbing, but there hadn’t really been other prominent musicians on our records. So Eric was reluctant, and I finally said, "Well, sod them! It’s my song and I’d like you to come down to the studio.”

GW: So did that cause more tension with the others? How did they treat him?

HARRISON: The same thing occurred that happened during “Get Back,” while we were filming the movie [Let It Be, (Apple Films) 1970]. Billy Preston came into our office and I pulled him into the studio and got him on electric piano. And suddenly, everybody started behaving and not fooling around so much. Same thing happened with Eric, and the song came together nicely.

GW: Yet, rumor has it you weren’t satisfied with your performance on the record. Why?

HARRISON: Actually, what I was really disappointed with was take number one [i.e., the solo version]. I later realized what a shitty job I did singing it. Toilet singing! And that early version has been bootlegged, because Abbey Road Studios used to play it when people took the studio tour. [laughs] But over the years I learned to get more confidence. It wasn’t so much learning the technique of singing as it was just learning not to worry. And my voice has improved. I was happy with the final version with Eric.

GW: Did you give Eric any sense of what you wanted on the solo? He almost sounds as if he’s imitating your style a lot.

HARRISON: You think so? I didn’t feel like he was copying me. To me, the only reason it sounds Beatle-ish is because of the effects we used. We put the “wobbler” on it, as we called ADT. [Invented by a Beatles recording engineer. ADT, or artificial double tracking, was a tape recording technique that made vocals and intruments sound as if they had been double tracked (i.e., recorded twice) to create a fuller sound. The technique also served as the basis for flanging.-GW Ed.] As for my direction I may have given him, it was just, “Play, me boy!” In the rehearsals for the Japanese tour, he did make a conscious effort to recap the solo that was on the original Beatles album. And although the original version in embedded in Beatles’ fans memories, I think the version we captured on the live album is more outstanding.

GW: Want to play rock critic for us and critique his playing?

HARRISON: Ah, well, he started out playing the first couple of fills like the original, and the first solo is kind of similar. But by the end of the solo he just goes off! Which is why I think guitar players like to do that song. It’s got nice chords, but it’s also structured in a way that gives a guitar the greatest excuse just to wail away. Even Eric played it differently every night of the tour. Some nights he played licks that almost sounded like flamenco. But he always played exceptionally well on that song.

GW: You talked about the pluses and minuses of working with Paul. What about John? He was a much looser, more intuitive musician and composer. Did you help him flesh things out?

HARRISON: Basically, most of John’s songs, like Paul’s, were written in the studio. Ringo and me were there all the time. So as the songs were being written, they were being given ideas and structures, particularly by John. As you say, John had a flair for “feel.” But he was very bad at knowing exactly what he wanted to get across. He could play a song and say, “It goes like this.” Then he’d play it again and ask, “How does that go?” Then he’d play it again - totally differently! Also his rhythm was very fluid. He’d miss a beat, or maybe jump a beat…

GW: Like a lot of old blues players.

HARRISON: Exactly like that. And he’d often do something really interesting in an early version of a song. After a while, I used to make an effort to learn exactly what he was doing the very first time he showed a song to me, so if the next time he’d say, “How did that go?” we’d still have the option of trying what he’d originally played.

GW: The melody on side two of Abbey Road is a seamless masterpiece. It would probably take a modern band ages to put together, even with digital technology. How did you manage all that with just four - and eight - track recorders?

HARRISON: We worked it all out carefully in advance. All those mini songs were partly completed tunes; some were written while we were in India a year before. So there was just a bit of chorus here and a verse there. We welded them all together into a routine. Then we actually learned to play that whole thing live. Obviously there were overdubs. Later, when we added the voices, we basically did the same thing. From the best of my memory, we learned all the backing tracks, and as each piece came up on tape, like “Golden Slumbers,” we’d jump in with the vocal parts. Because when you’re working with only four or eight tracks, you have to get as much as possible on each track.

GW: With digital recording today you can also do an infinite number of guitar solos. Back then, did taking another pass at a solo require redoing almost the entire song?

HARRISON: Almost. I remember doing the solo to “Something” and it was dark in the studio and everyone was stoned. But Ringo, I think, was doing a drum overdub on the same track, and I seem to remember the others were all busy playing. And every time I said, “Alright, let’s try another take” - because I was working it out and trying to make it better - they all had to come back and redo whatever they’d just played on the last overdub. It all had to be squeezed onto that one track, because we’d used up the other seven. That’s why, after laying down the basic track, we’d work out the whole routine in advance and get the sound and balance. You’d try and add as much as possible to each track before you ran out of room. On one track we might go, “Okay, here the tambourine comes in, then Paul, you come in at the bridge with the piano and then I’ll add the guitar riff.” And that’s the way we used to work.

GW: “Something” was your most successful song. I think every guitar player wonders, did you get that riff first?

HARRISON: No, I wrote the song on the piano. I don’t really play the piano, which is why certain chords sound brilliant to me - then I translate them onto the guitar, and it’s only C. [laughs] I was playing three-finger chords with my right hand and bass notes with my left hand. And on the piano, it’s easy to hold down one chord and mostly the bass note down. If you did that on the guitar, the note change wouldn’t come in the bass section; it would come somewhere more in the middle of the chord.

GW: But you did play that Beatles-sounding bridge riff in “Badge” on Cream’s Goodbye album, didn’t you?

HARRISON: No, Eric played that! He doesn’t even play on the song before that. We recorded that track in L.A.: it was Eric, plus Ginger Baker and Jack Bruce, and I think the producer, Felix Pappalardi, played the piano part. I was just playing chops on the guitar chords and we went right through the second verse and into the bridge, which is where Eric comes in. Again, it sounds Beatle-ish because we ran it through a Leslie speaker.

GW: Any contemporary bands that strike you as having a bit of the same spark that your early heroes had?

HARRISON: I can’t say I’ve really heard anything that gives me a buzz like some of that stuff we did in the Fifties and Sixties. The last band I really enjoyed was Dire Straits on the Brothers in Arms album. To me, that was good music played well, without any of the bullshit. Now I’m starting to get influenced by my teenage son, who’s into everything and has the attitude. He loves some of the old stuff, like Hendrix, and he’s got a leather jacket with Cream’s Disraeli Gearsalbum painted on the back. As for recent groups, he played me the Black Crowes, and they really sounded okay.

GW: You made music that awoke and changed the world. Could you sense that special dimension of it all while it was happening, or were you lost in the middle of it?

HARRISON: A combination of both, I think. Lost in the middle of it - not knowing a thing - and at the same time somehow knowing everything. Around the time of Rubber Soul and Revolver it was like I had a sudden flash, and it all seemed to be happening for some real purpose. The main thing for me was having the realization that there was definitely some reason for being here. And now the rest of my life as a person and a musician is about finding out what that reason is, and how to build upon it.

GW: Finally, any recent acid flashbacks you care to share?

HARRISON: [laughs] No, no, that doesn’t happen to me anymore. I’ve got my own cosmic lighting conductor now. Nature supports me.

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yoonjimbles · 7 years ago

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Guide to UNB

UNB is a 9 member group from the show “The Unit”, were idols from less known groups showcased their talents and helped promote their groups! UNB is set to promote this year alongside the girl group that also came out of the show, UNI.T.

The Members The group was determined by votes and I will present them here by the order they were chosen:

1. Jun

Birth Name: Lee Jun Young Position: Main Vocalist, Rapper, Lead Dancer, Center (He’s the face of the group as that was the price for the first place winner) Birthday: January 22, 1997 Group: U-Kiss Facts about him: He’s admired by the members as well as other Unit contestants for his ability to rap, sing and dance very well (he’s Golden lol). During the show he juggled his missions with U-Kiss schedules. He got the Super Boot from the audience. meaning 90% of the audience voted for him to move on to the show, and the judges didn’t get a say on that. Tallest member at 6′1″

2. Euijin (My bias, my babe, I love this guy so much)

Birth Name: Lee Eui Jin Position: Main Dancer, Vocalist Birthday: February 15, 1990 Group: BIGFLO (Former member of A.CIan) Facts: He’s considered one of the best dancers that were on the show and specializes in hip hop popping. He and Feeldog were often set against each other to see who was the best dancer which was funny because they like and respect each other very much. He’s the oldest of the group and already did his military service. Other contestants noticed a resemblance to Jimin.

3. Hojung

Birth Name: Ko Ho-jung (고호정) Position: Vocalist, Dancer, Visual Birthday: October 20, 1994 Group: HOTSHOT Facts: Followed the steps of other HotShot members (Sungwoon and Noh Tae Hyun that went to Produce 101). He has a great body from working out and he knows it lol He got the Super Boot from the audience alongside his group mate Timoteo (this was heart wrenching too, Taemin from Shinee cried. It was so sad) 4. FeelDog

Birth Name: Oh Kwang Suk Position: Leader, Main Rapper, Main Dancer, Vocalist Birthday: February 26, 1992 Group: BIGSTAR Facts: He was chosen by the majority of the group. He got first place in The Unit‘s Dance Position Battle and was considered the best dancer in the show. While the audience did not give him a super boot all 6 judges voted for him to be on the show. He’s the shortest at 5′6″

5. Marco

Birth Name: Lee Hyung Geun Position: Lead Rapper Birthday: May 11, 1993 Group: HBY (Hot Blood Youth) Facts: The duality of men in one person.(Seriously...) He was one of the most surprising picks as he was never in the top 10 while the show was airing. Had dread and swag, the judges thought he was American, but he’s actually from Korea. Wanted to become a comedian.

6. Hansol

Birth Name: Ji Han Sol Position: Lead Dancer, Vocalist Birthday: November 21, 1994 Group: Former member of SM Rookies (Was supposed to debut with NCT but left the agency) Facts: He’s a very good contemporary dancer and used to dance back up for Taemin while being a SM trainee. He got the Super Boot from the audience. Reserved and quiet, he’s very shy which is why he’s often asked to do aegyo (and the result’s are hilarious) 7. Daewon (the bias wrecker)

Birth Name: Park Dae Won Position: Lead Dancer, Vocalist Birthday: March 17, 1992 Group: MADTOWN Facts: A ball of sunshine, he and fellow member Lee Geon auditioned together and he only got 1 judge vote (because of his respectful demeanor) and that was enough to continue in the competition. Only person that wanted to help MAS, a band learn choreo during the show and got the nickname of “Angel” because of that. Has 5 dogs.

8. Kijung

Birth Name: Kim Ki-joong Position: Vocalist, Maknae Birthday: January 24, 2001 Group: IM Facts: The Maknae of the group, he gets away with murder lol. He was the center of The Unit‘s “My Turn”, the first mission and music video of the show. He named Jimin his role model. He’s always making funny faces and doing things to make the other members laugh. Literal fetus. His voice was changing during the show and he could not hit the high notes, poor baby.

9.Chan

Birth Name: Kang Yu Chan Position: Main Vocalist Birthday: December 31, 1997 Group: A.C.E Facts: He was also a surprise in the top 9, never being in the top 10 before the finals. He’s the main vocalist for a reason, his voice is amazing! Super funny and loves to joke around. Even though his specialty is singing, he’s a really good hip hop dancer.

MVs (UNB):

Feeling Only One Black Heart

MVs ( The Unit):

Question

All Day

Noteworthy Performances:

Breath

Dancing with the Devil

Stay (Zedd) + Chained Up (Vixx)

Butterfly

That’s What I like Raise me Up

#UNB #The Unit #hope this is helpful #stan my boys they are incredible

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dragoni · 6 years ago

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❤️ the personal stories. This should be apart of the American school curriculum. #ThanksCanada #GlobalCitizens

On Sept. 16, 2001, the last of “the plane people” left Gander.

Basic Facts

Canada’s “Operation Yellow Ribbon” took in 33,000 passengers from 224 flights across Canada

Newfoundland towns: Gander, Lewisporte, Gambo, Glenwood, Appleton and Norris Arm

38 Airliners landed in Gander: 25 American flights, Sabena, Aer Lingus, Lufthansa, Air Italia, Malev, Air France, British Airways, and Virgin Air

Crew and passengers were from 95 countries

Crew and passengers had to stay in their planes for approx. 24 hours

For security reasons, language was not allowed off the planes

When Bush opened up flights into the US, only American carriers were allowed. Foreign airliners had to fly back to their own countries with their American passengers.

Newfoundland Hospitality

Housing: Gander had only 500 hotel rooms. 536 stayed in the Salvation Army and Anglican summer camps, 713 in Lewisporte, 887 in Gambo, 155 in Norris Arm, 542 in Glenwood – a total of 2,833 – and the remaining 3,767 stayed in Gander

When the locals found out one couples were newlyweds, they were given their own room in a house.

Food: Everyone including students cooked meals according to peoples needs: vegetarian, kosher and even making baby formula. Restaurants and residents donated food.

Clothing: Communities donated whatever they had because passengers clothing was stuck on the planes.

Paid for all of the long distance calls - costing $13,000

Setup computers and internet access - for free

When people ran out of toilet paper, people contributed one years worth!

The women of Lewisporte took home towels and washed them every night so people had fresh towels

There were animals too!

A town veterinarian took care of the dogs and cats, and even two bonobos (pygmy chimpanzees) that were en route to the Columbus, Ohio, zoo.

“A few years later, I got a letter from the Columbus Zoo and a picture of a baby chimpanzee, and they’d named it Gander”

"They couldn't understand why we so willing to open up our church and feed them and we were doing this for nothing. We didn't want anything in return for this.”

Passengers Paying it Forward

The people of Newfoundland are very proud people. They refused money when offered. But after everyone had left, they found their guests had left a container full of money. People left donations in their national currencies.

Shirley Brooks-Jones, a retired Ohio State University administrator and fellow passengers on Flight 15 started the LEWISPORTE AREA FLIGHT 15 SCHOLARSHIP FUND. As of 2016, 228 student scholarships have been awarded.

Members of the Rockerfeller Foundation donated $83,000 for a new computer lab in Lewisporte school. Lewisporte residents were originally upset because they didn’t help others for money.

Passengers who stayed at the Gander campus of College of the North Atlantic donated $20,000 for a scholarship fund

The World Trade Center gifted Gander with a piece of steel from the original WTC.

Lufthansa named an Airbus 340, “Gander”

Former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien addressed U.S. Ambassador Paul Cellucci and the world on 9/11

Mr. Ambassador, you have assembled before you, here on Parliament Hill and right across Canada, a people united in outrage, in grief, in compassion, and in resolve. A people of every faith and nationality to be found on earth.

A people who, as a result of the atrocity committed against the United States on September 11, 2001, feel not only like neighbours, but like family.

“Forget what you read about NAFTA negotiations and Twitter wars, that’s not who we are. Sure, it’s business, and it’s important, but Gander is the place that – in a snapshot – illustrates the Canada-U.S. relationship.”

— U.S. Ambassador to Canada Kelly Craft, SEPTEMBER 11, 2018

More personal stories from the CBC

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tolwenjun · 7 years ago

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Who's unb? Educate me

ahHH im happy you asked! let me teach you my child!!

basics: unb (stands for you&boys……and united nation of beagles) is a 9-membered boy group formed from kbs’ survival show The Uni+(Unit) for male and female idols who have debuted before but haven’t become that successful. it’s a chance for them to redebut in a new (temporary) group. the nine members of unb are (in order of rank): jun (U-KISS), euijin (Bigflo), hojung (HOTSHOT), feeldog (BIGSTAR), Marco (Hot Blood Youth), hansol (NewKidd), daewon (Midtown), kijoong (IM), and chan (ACE) . they debuted on April 7, 2018 with the album Boyhood with title songs Feeling and Only One

my biases are hansol, chan, and kijoong if you were wondering but i love all of them especially after watching the unit

below the cut there’s information about the individual members

jun

born: january 22, 1997

v i s u a l s

rapper, singer, and dancer (what a man)

got that gummy smile but don’t let him fool you he’s lethal

a tol

very social, energetic, and friendly

really just a soft baby that needs attention

videos: unit audition, perfect man, rap position battle (got first place), all day, final 36 teaser, intro vid (2), and boyhood teaser

euijin

looks like jimin (kinda?)

born: february 15, 1990

dancer & vocalist

A VERY SKILLED DANCER/POPPING KING (he, feeldog, and seyong on the unit were considered some of the most skilled dancers and competed against each other frequently)

very smiley (literal ray of sunshine)

acts like the mother of the group

very experienced in making choreography and making formations

oldest member

videos: unit audition (with other members of Bigflo, 0:35 is performance and 1:30 he individually dances), dance position battle, heartbeat, stay/chained up remix (MY FAVE PERFORMANCE), question, final 36 teaser, intro vid (2), and boyhood teaser

hojung

another top tier visual (they all are but jun, hojung, and hansol are considered the most popular visuals??)

born: october 20, 1994

vocalist & dancer

BODYBUILDER (formerly)

self proclaimed “gentle guy”

very goofy and entertaining

most fit member

can go from the softest fluff to a dangerous man in 0.2 seconds

videos: unit audition (with timoteo), juliette, kingsman ost + that’s what i like (another one of my faves), all day, final 36 teaser, intro vid (2), and boyhood teaser

feeldog

very powerful dancer

born: february 26, 1992

leader, main dancer, main dancer, & vocalist

a smol (i think he was one of the shortest males on the show?? he’s 5′8″)

dating bora of sistar

very comedic

the dad of the group

like euijin he’s good at making choreography and formations

videos: unit audition (with 3 other BIGSTAR members, 3:40 is feeldog’s individual dance), dance position battle (5:50 is feeldog’s dance but you’ll see the other idols compete), boom boom, kingsman ost + that’s what i like, you’re mine, final 36 teaser, intro vid (2), and boyhood teaser

marco

used to have dreads, but changed his hairstyle during the end of the show

born: may 11, 1993

lead rapper

incredible stage presence and good at performing with expressions and acting

EYE SMILE/ADORABLE SMILE IN GENERAL (rain loves his smile haha)

another goofy member and makes members laugh a lo

very cute despite his cold appearance

former model and previously in an acting agency

videos: unit audition (with 4 other HBY members), juliette, bermuda triangle + red sun, you’re mine, rap position battle, final 36 teaser, intro vid (2), and boyhood teaser

hansol

probably know him from the old sm rookies days

born: november 21, 1994

lead dancer & vocalist

picassol is his nickname

pretty shy and quiet and barely smiles

but he really a cutie and effortlessly funny with his members (euijin says they’ve helped him become more talkative)

don’t be intimidated by him

another talented dancer y’all with graceful limbs

and tol

videos: unit audition (he was the last one, bless his soul), monster, stay + chained up, all day, dance battle position, final 36 teaser, intro vid (2), and boyhood teaser

daewon

unb’s team wings to protect their wellbeing (;u; im not crying)

born: march 17, 1992

lead dancer & vocalist

another dancing king (taught all of MAS on the unit how to dance to “my turn” because they had no dancing experience)

has a very large mouth lmao

mood maker (happy pill!)

specialty is choreographing dances

videos: emotions come with this audition vid unit audition (with fellow MADTOWN member, lee geon), boom boom, kingsman ost + that’s what i like, question, dance battle position, final 36 teaser, intro vid (2), and boyhood teaser

kijoong

p u r e a s h e c k

born: january 24, 2001

vocalist

mAKNAE; he does the role well he’s the floofiest and is always cute (he caught rain and the other judges by surprise by how cute he is)

has a crush on rain

can’t be rude even if he tried

loves to eat

ya boy was the center for “my turn”

shows lots of aegyo and has an adorable laugh

videos: unit audition (performed with 3 IM members), juliette, kingsman ost + that’s what i like, my story, final 36 teaser, intro vid (2), and boyhood teaser

LAST BUT CERTINLY NOT LEAST

chan

idk what to say, he’s beautiful

born: december 31, 1997

vocalist (and he raps and dances)

don’t let his adorable looks fool you, but cute chan is my favorite and more apparent

he’s got abs

he’s just so talented and serving looks

used to have braces

lil weirdo and very playful/beagle-like attitude

videos: unit audition (with ACE member Jun), perfect man, bermuda triangle + red sun, all day, final 36 teaser, intro vid (2), and boyhood teaser

#answered ✨#KFLJILKSG THIS TOOK LIKE 2.5 HOURS BUT IT WAS 10000% WORTH IT BECAUSE I LOVE THEM ALL SM #please stan them #and i hoped this helped you anon!#unb #if u have any more questions about them feel free to just ask

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caveartfair · 7 years ago

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This Photographer Envisioned a Fierce Army of Girls, Forging Their Own Paths

Justine Kurland, The Wall, 2000. © Justine Kurland. Courtesy the artist and Mitchell-Innes & Nash, New York.

Throughout her career, photographer Justine Kurland has trained her lens on divergent subjects both documentary and staged: young girls, nude mothers, men at auto body shops. Across her work, there’s a muted sense of romance, of both gritty desire and desperation. Kurland relishes gravel, fences, dead animals, cell phone towers, broken windows, and car engines. Now a mother herself, she’s ultimately outgrown the label that once reductively described her young, female cohort who captured even younger women on rolls of film: “girl photographers.”

Just over 20 years ago, Kurland began photographing young women both in tough, urban settings and more idyllic, secluded locales. The subjects in this series, simply titled “Girls,” rest against one another outside a bleak Toys ‘R’ Us, sit beneath an underpass, roast an animal over an open flame, and gather along rivers or in wooded clearings. They torture boys, eat ice cream, and play cards. The 69 career-launching images, made between 1997 and 2002, are now on view all together for the first time (as vintage prints)at Mitchell Innes & Nash—they’re only for sale as a complete set, transforming the individual images into a larger event.

Justine Kurland, Bathroom, 1997. © Justine Kurland. Courtesy the artist and Mitchell-Innes & Nash, New York.

Kurland began the series when she was a graduate student at Yale, where she studied under Gregory Crewdson and Laurie Simmons. Her relationship with Simmons extended beyond the classroom: “I remember how thrilling it was to share cigarettes with her on the back staircase, to hear her talk about her work and break the no-smoking rule together,” Kurland tells Artsy via email. “Her attention repaired some of the confidence that had broken during my time in the program.”

Simmons also introduced her to her babysitter, Lily. Kurland began photographing Lily and her friends in staged scenarios around what she calls “interstitial sections of Brooklyn.” Kurland gave them minimal direction, though her shots suggest that they’re runaways, both fierce and independent. Of all the stereotypical roles a teenage girl could occupy, Kurland believed that this was the most hopeful—“there’s a potential to find a world in which they belong,” she explains.

In 1999, a year after Kurland graduated from Yale, Crewdson included her work in a group show at Van Doren Waxter, entitled “Another Girl, Another Planet.” All but one of the 12 exhibited artists were women, and most of the included work featured adolescent girls, simultaneously tough and vulnerable. Along with a few of her co-exhibitors, including Katy Grannan, Dana Hoey, and Malerie Marder (all fellow Yale grads), Kurland earned a reputation as a “girl photographer.”

Justine Kurland, Making Happy, 1998. © Justine Kurland. Courtesy the artist and Mitchell-Innes & Nash, New York.

In one of the “Girls” photographs, Making Happy (1998), Kurland captures a rusty, beat-up car parked near barren trees and a graffiti-laden underpass. A Budweiser billboard looms in the background, while trash and leaves litter the nearby brush. Upon closer inspection, we see two entangled bodies in the back of the vehicle, ostensibly in the middle of “making happy.”

Indeed, a steady undercurrent of sex runs throughout the entire series. Shortly after completing the series, Kurland began dating women as well as men. “For the last three years I’ve been madly in love with a woman I feel lucky to call my partner,” she tells Artsy. “Looking back at the ‘Girl’ pictures it’s hard not to read the homoerotic subtext of these pictures as my optical unconscious.”

Kurland hopped continents in 2001, photographing girls again, but this time, across the New Zealand landscape. The settings there were more lush, the girls often clothed in school uniforms. She returned to the United States and spent the next 12 years on the road, traveling in a green Chevy Astro minivan. Her models were naked women or members of communes. The resulting images often depicted strange feminist utopias.

Justine Kurland, Kung Fu Fighters, 1999. © Justine Kurland. Courtesy the artist and Mitchell-Innes & Nash, New York.

Then, in 2004, Kurland gave birth to a son. She named him Casper, inspired by the painter Caspar David Friedrich, who rendered one of art history’s most famous wanderers, staring out at the fog. Reluctant to abandon her itinerant life, Kurland took her son on the road; sometimes, he even became her subject matter. She captured him in their van, lying on a picnic table, climbing a dusty ledge. Kurland recalls him telling her: “Mama, you’re a photographer so you can go on road trips.” Indeed, her work required a certain bohemian vagrancy, constant movement in order to capture—paradoxically—“stills.” While the photographer’s themes evolved beyond adventure-seeking youth, a certain wildness was still pervasive.

As Kurland adjusted to life as a new mother, she turned her lens on women undergoing the same life-altering experiences. In her series “Mama Baby” (2004–07), pregnant women and young mothers cavort nude in idyllic landscapes: on a misty beach, in a sunlit forest, in snowy mountains.

If Kurland’s van had been integral to her art practice, her son developed an affection for another kind of vehicle: trains. She recalls how, at two years old, his obsession led the pair to visit railroad museums and trespass on railroad property. Her series “This Train is Bound for Glory” (2007–11) captured boxcars and the vagrants who hitched rides on them across the open American landscape. Many of the photographs were shot from a long range, making them more about the scenic environment than the locomotives themselves.

Road Bunnies, 2012, . Justine Kurland Aperture Foundation

280 Coup, 2012. Justine Kurland Mitchell-Innes & Nash

Justine Kurland, Flashlight, 1999. © Justine Kurland. Courtesy the artist and Mitchell-Innes & Nash, New York.

Untitled, Spoon, 2016. Justine Kurland Mitchell-Innes & Nash

Justine Kurland, Girls in Sand, 2002. © Justine Kurland. Courtesy the artist and Mitchell-Innes & Nash, New York.

Justine Kurland, Clothes make the man, Desert scene, 2001. © Justine Kurland. Courtesy the artist and Mitchell-Innes & Nash, New York.

Beginning in 2011, Kurland zoomed in. Her next series, “Sincere Auto Care” (2011–15), focused on cars and the mechanics who fixed them. Many of these shots offer granular detail. She highlights the musculature and tattoos that define a man’s body, or the precise inner workings of an engine. After all those years depicting women, Kurland’s son, in part, inspired her to turn her artistic vision toward American masculinity. She even titled one of these photographs What Casper Might Look Like if He Grew Up to be a Junkie in Tacoma (2013). Her concerns about children’s opportunities and expectations had become deeply personal.

An era, however, was ending. Around 2010, Kurland’s van was totalled. She enrolled Casper in elementary school. Even if her work isn’t autobiographical in the traditional sense, the story she’s written for herself has become a dreamy, though fraught, adventure tale. It ends—as many such narratives do—in her own backyard. Within the past few years, Kurland has turned toward her past. Now, she’s shooting around her hometown of Fulton, New York. “The town’s economic depression underscored a psychological depression I felt growing up there,” she says. “In many ways, my road trips were about putting as much distance between Fulton and myself as I could. I decided to go back to see what I was running from.”

In recent work, Kurland returns to more intimate sites, as well. She photographed her mother à la Gustave Courbet’s L’Origine du monde; her dead father’s artwork (he was a painter); and a series that involves strap-ons (including a self-portrait that shows her wearing one at an ex’s house).

Justine Kurland, Broadway (Joy), 2001. © Justine Kurland. Courtesy the artist and Mitchell-Innes & Nash, New York.

These later pictures meditate on many of the same themes evident, if more quietly, in “Girls”: sexuality; the intersection of mood and place; childhood. The series, though slightly tinged with a late-1990s grunge sensibility, is still haunting. Kurland confides that Lily—whom she photographed decades ago—died 10 years after she took her picture. Kurland found out while she was driving, her son sitting next to her in his carseat. She withholds the particulars of the tragedy, but tells Artsy that “for months afterward I would have panic flashes imagining the horrific last moments of her death. Had she been scared? Had she been in pain? I imagined her fighting to live. Out of pure narcissism I blamed myself for not saving her, that had after all been my mission with these pictures.”

Kurland stresses the importance of revisiting this work in our contemporary political climate. “I pictured a standing army of girls united in solidarity, outside the margins of home or institution, working together to build a community that foregrounded their experience as primary and irrefutable,” she says. “These photographs were a call to action, then as now.”

from Artsy News

#Artsy News

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orbemnews · 4 years ago

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Tony Blair Fast Facts - CNN (CNN) — Here’s a look at the life of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. Birth date: May 6, 1953 Birth place: Edinburgh, Scotland Birth name: Anthony Charles Lynton Blair Father: Leo Charles Blair, a lawyer Mother: Hazel (Corscadden) Blair Marriage: Cherie (Booth) Blair (1980-present) Children: Leo, Kathryn, Nicholas and Euan Education: St. John’s College, Oxford, B.A., 1975 Religion: Roman Catholic Although born in Scotland, Blair spent most of his childhood in Durham, England. His son, Leo, was the first baby born to a serving prime minister in 150 years. In his youth, acted in plays and sang in a rock band. Blair moved the Labour Party to a more centrist position by reducing influence of trade unions and dropping the Party’s goal of “collective ownership.” The Labour Party’s first prime minister to serve two successive terms. READ: The clear lesson of Iraq war 1976-1983 – After finishing his law studies at Oxford, practices as a barrister in London. 1982 – Loses an attempt to win a seat in parliament for the district of Beaconsfield. 1983 – Wins a seat in parliament for Sedgefield, near Durham. 1984-1988 – Front bench spokesman for Labour Party. 1988 – Is promoted to the shadow cabinet as shadow secretary of energy. The shadow party is the main opposition party that monitors and polices the official cabinet. 1992 – Is appointed shadow home secretary. July 21, 1994 – Becomes the youngest leader of the Labour Party after previous leader John Smith dies of a heart attack. May 1997 – Blair leads the Labour Party to win 419 seats in the House of Commons and its first electoral victory since 1979. Blair becomes prime minister, succeeding John Major. June 7, 2001 – Re-elected. October 19, 2003 – Blair is hospitalized after suffering irregular heart rhythms. May 5, 2005 – Re-elected to a third term. December 14, 2006 – Blair becomes the first serving prime minister questioned as part of a criminal inquiry; police speak with Blair regarding a “cash for honors” inquiry, in which political parties are accused of loans from donors in return for political appointments. Blair is questioned as a witness. May 3, 2007 – Blair’s Labour party suffers losses in local elections in England as well as national elections in Scotland and Wales. May 10, 2007 – Blair announces he will tender his resignation to the Queen on June 27, 2007. June 24, 2007 – Blair hands over leadership of the Labour Party to Gordon Brown during a conference of party members. Brown will become prime minister when Blair tenders his resignation to the Queen. June 27, 2007 – Tenders his resignation to Queen Elizabeth. Hours later, Blair is appointed by the Quartet (the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations) as special envoy to the Middle East. His job will require he “mobilize international assistance to the Palestinians;” help gain support in addressing the Palestinians’ governance needs; create plans to help Palestinians develop economically; and work with other countries “as appropriate in support of the agreed Quartet objectives.” 2008 – Establishes the Africa Governance Initiative. March 7, 2008 – Yale University announces that Blair has been named the Howland Distinguished Fellow for the 2008-2009 school year. He will participate in seminars and on-campus activities throughout the year. May 30, 2008 – Blair launches The Tony Blair Faith Foundation. Its goal is to encourage “inter-faith initiatives to tackle global poverty and to improve understanding of the great religions through education at every level.” January 13, 2009 – Is awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by US President George W. Bush. February 2009 – Opens an economic and political consulting firm called Tony Blair Associates (TBA). January 29, 2010 – Blair is questioned by Britain’s Iraq Inquiry about decisions he made leading up to the US-led invasion of Iraq. Blair defends his decision to support the war. September 1, 2010 – Publishes his memoir, “A Journey.” January 21, 2011 – Blair testifies before the Iraq Inquiry for a second time to clear up inconsistencies in his previous testimony. May 27, 2015 – Writes to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to say he will be stepping down from his post with the Quartet. October 25, 2015 – On CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS, Blair says he’s sorry for “mistakes” made in the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, but he doesn’t regret bringing down dictator Saddam Hussein. July 6, 2016 – The results of the UK’s inquiry into the invasion of Iraq are released. The report finds that the war was based on flawed intelligence and was launched before diplomatic options were exhausted. Chairman John Chilcot says Blair was warned of the risks of regional instability and the rise of terrorism before the invasion of Iraq, but pressed on regardless. Source link Orbem News #blair #CNN #Facts #Fast #Tony

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anythingbutbeige · 4 years ago

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The Top 10 Things to See and Do in Southampton, England

Southampton, the cruise capital of Europe, offers something new, exciting and enjoyable for everyone. As a local , or 1 of the 4 million visitors the city receives each year, you’ll have no trouble finding an art gallery, music venue, restaurant or garden that matches your taste and budget. We’ve itemised 10 things to see & do below, that will appeal to the masses…

Solent Sky Museum

The importance of aviation history is showcased at the Solent Sky Museum in Southampton seven days a week, Between 1910 and 1960, local manufacturers produced an incredible variety of machines, including experimental rocket fighters, hovercraft, helicopters and spacecraft. You can take a guided tour of the Sandringham flying boat, or enjoy sitting in the jet fighter cockpits and letting your imagination run wild.

Tudor House and Garden

John Wytegod, Walter and Jane William, Sir John Dawtrey, Lady Isabel Lyster and Sir Richard Lyster, are just a few locals’ stories over the last 800 years that you can re-live at the Tudor House and Garden. The House and Gardens offer many exciting activities, tours and exhibitions to keep every member of the family happy!

Riverside Park

Boasting six football pitches, two cricket pitches, a tennis court, skate park and three play areas, Riverside Park is located along the River Itchen and certainly deserves it’s place on our list. As you stroll down the river you can expect to be greeted by all sorts of wildlife, including salmon, water voles, kingfishers, dragonflies, otter, various warblers and sometimes even cuckoos!

Mayflower Theatre

UK touring musicals, opera, ballet & musicians always stop by The Mayflower – and it’s easy to see why. The theatre offers much more than fantastic performances, including the award-winning restaurant, VIP boxes and meeting rooms for hire, fully-licensed bars, a 2,300 strong crowd, and, if you’re a fan of the paranormal, supposedly the ghost of an old man who sits backstage in a wicker chair.

St Mary’s Stadium

St. Mary’s Stadium has been home to Premier League team Southampton Football Club since 2001. As well as watching a top-flight football match, you can always attend St. Mary’s on a non-matchday Saturday and enjoy one of their guided tours. Stroll around the 32,505 capacity stadium, stand in the dressing rooms, and act a pro as you walk out of the players tunnel.

Sea City Museum

Southampton has a strong and fascinating connection with the sea and in particular with the Titanic. Dive into the history of the tragedy of the Titanic through an interactive 1:25 scale of the Titanic, and discover more about the people who boarded and worked on it as you make your way around various experiences and exhibitions.

Manor Farm Country Park

Help milk the cows and hold baby chicks, rabbits and ducks as you work your way around the beautiful Manor Farm Country Park. Enjoy different daily ‘meet the animal’ sessions, stop off at the outdoor play area, and refuel at the café. The sound of the birds and the beautiful backdrop of bluebells and forest woodland makes for a very pleasant walk for you, the young ones, and the pup too!

Westquay

Spread over three stories, Westquay boasts some of the finest names in retail. Open from 9am-late (11am on Sundays), you can make your way around over 90 major stores including River Island, M&S, Coast and Zara. All of that shopping is thirsty, and hungry, work – treat yourself to a bite to eat at Harry Ramsden’s, Pizza Express, Pret a Manger, Wagamamas or even a ‘cheeky’ Nando’s.

Go Ape Southampton

Hidden within 440-acres of woodland, Go Ape Southampton offers a fun-filled and action-packed day for all the family. At 40 feet high, Go Ape Southampton is the highest course within the South of England. Providing you are over 1.4 metres and 10 years of age, you can choose to follow the Tree Top Adventure or the Tree Top Junior trail and finish with a 250-metre, adrenaline-fuelled zip wire across both fields.

Titanic Engineer Officers Memorial

Back in April 1914, over 100,000 people gathered in Andrews Park to witness the unveiling of the Titanic Engineer Officers Memorial Statue, built in memory of all the engineers who lost their lives two years earlier: 24 engineers, six electrical engineers, two boilermakers, one plumber, one clerk, and Joseph Bell, Chief Engineer Officer of the RMS Titanic. The monument is inscribed with the following:

“GREATER LOVE HATH NO MAN THAN THIS. THAT A MAN LAY DOWN HIS LIFE FOR HIS FRIENDS ST. JOHN 15TH CH. 13TH V TO THE MEMORY OF THE ENGINEER OFFICERS OF THE R.M.S “TITANIC” WHO SHOWED THEIR HIGH CONCEPTION OF DUTY AND THEIR HEROISM BY REMAINING AT THEIR POSTS 15TH APRIL 1912. ERECTED BY THEIR FELLOW ENGINEERS AND FRIENDS THROUGHOUT THE WORLD“ https://theculturetrip.com/europe/united-kingdom/england/articles/the-top-10-things-to-see-and-do-in-southampton-england/

#southampton #cuture #titanic #england #museum #theatre #football #blog

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blackkudos · 6 years ago

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Ashanti

Ashanti Shequoiya Douglas (born October 13, 1980), known simply as Ashanti, is an American singer, songwriter, record producer, dancer and actress. Ashanti is known for her eponymous debut album, which featured the hit song "Foolish", and sold over 503,000 copies in its first week of release throughout the U.S. in April 2002. In 2003, the self-titled debut album won Ashanti her first Grammy Award for Best Contemporary R&B album. Her second release achieved a platinum certification and others top 10 singles.

Ashanti wrote and sang background on Jennifer Lopez's "Ain't It Funny (Murder Remix)", which reached number one on Billboard Hot 100, which was also in the top 10 chart at the same time as "Foolish", "Always on Time" (with Ja Rule), and "What's Luv?" (with Fat Joe). Later that year, she was acclaimed as the "Princess Of Hip-Hop & R&B" by her label and capped off her successful debut by winning eight Billboard awards and two American Music Awards.

Ashanti cites Whitney Houston, Janet Jackson, Prince, Madonna, Tupac Shakur, Mary J. Blige, Ella Fitzgerald, Smokey Robinson, Donna Summer, and Blue Magic as her musical influences. She is currently working on her own publishing company titled Written Entertainment.

Early life

Ashanti Shequoiya Douglas was born on October 13, 1980, in Glen Cove, New York. Her mother, Tina Douglas, is a former dance teacher, and her father, Ken-Kaide Thomas Douglas, is a former singer. Her mother named her after the Ashanti Empire in Ghana; in this nation, women have power and influence, and Tina wanted her daughter to follow that model. Her grandfather, James, was a civil rights activist who associated with Martin Luther King, Jr. in the 1960s. Growing up, Ashanti took dance lessons and joined the church choir. Ashanti went to Bernice Johnson Cultural Arts Center, where she studied different dance styles, including tap, jazz, ballet, African, modern, and hip hop. She danced with the Senior Pro Ensemble at Carnegie Hall, the Apollo Theater, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Avery Fisher Hall, and the Black Spectrum Theater. She also performed at the 1994 Caribbean Awards and dancing with Judith Jamison of the Alvin Ailey Dance Company. With actress and choreographer Debbie Allen at the helm, Ashanti also performed in the Disney television film Polly alongside stars Keshia Knight Pulliam, Jomecia Moore and Phylicia Rashad.

When she was three years old, Ashanti sang in a gospel choir called "Having Some Fun and the Handsome Pigeons," but her mother discovered her full singing potential when she overheard Ashanti singing Mary J. Blige's "Reminisce" at age 12. By the time Ashanti hit puberty, her mother was sending out demo tapes of her singing and dancing. The family could not afford to go to a studio and record a formal demo, so when labels called, Ashanti would have to sing 'I'm a little teapot' in front of the record company executives. While attending high school, she began to write songs. As a teenager, she performed in a local talent show and at the Soul Cafe, China Club, Madison Square Garden, Caroline's Comedy Club, and Greek Fest 2000. In her first major singing performance, Ashanti performed Yolanda Adams's "More Than a Melody". She also appeared in a number of big-name music videos, in addition to other dance work.

Ashanti got her first taste of acting as a child extra in Spike Lee's Malcolm X (1992) and in Who's the Man?. She also started as a dancer in the Disney TV film Polly. She was also one of the students in the 3-2-1 Contact Extra, What Kids Want To Know About Sex and Growing Up. She also had a couple of minor appearances in music videos, such as KRS-One's "MC's Act Like They Don't Know" as well as 8-Off's "Ghetto Girl".

When Ashanti was 16, she was discovered by P.Diddy's Bad Boy Records. Initially, she went to Bad Boy Records and sang one of Mary J. Blige's songs in front of P. Diddy and Biggie Smalls. After being impressed by her singing ability, Diddy had her sign to a development deal. In the end, due to a bad contract, Ashanti did not sign with Diddy. This ultimately led to a record deal with Jive Records in 1997. This relationship soured when Jive tried to make Ashanti into a pop singer. Ashanti subsequently involved herself in schoolwork, cheerleading, and running on her school's track team. She belonged to the English club where she began writing poetry. She was also in the Drama club and performed in a few plays. She put college pursuits aside when Epic Records approached her with a contract in 1998. However, the label's management changes quickly made Ashanti a low priority. She continued to perform at local New York clubs and began hanging out at the Murder Inc. recording studio, hoping for another big break.

Career

2001–03:

Ashanti, Chapter II and Ashanti's Christmas

Ashanti was first noticed by Irv Gotti because of her vocal skills. Ashanti initially asked him to produce a few demo songs for her to record so she could say she had some strong tracks by the big time producer but Gotti had a different idea. He asked her to pen hooks for his rap artists and to perform with them in duets. Ashanti provided the melodic response to their call. Ashanti was first featured as a background vocalist on rapper Big Pun's song "How We Roll". In the same year, Ashanti was featured on fellow labelmate Cadillac Tah's singles "Pov City Anthem" and "Just Like a Thug". She also appeared on the 2001 The Fast and the Furioussoundtrack as a featured artist on Vita's 2001 hip hop remake of Madonna's "Justify My Love" and on the solo track "When a Man Does Wrong". She was featured on Fat Joe's "What's Luv?" and Ja Rule's "Always on Time". "What's Luv?" and "Always on Time" were released simultaneously and became two of the biggest hit songs of 2002. Ashanti became the first female to occupy the top two positions on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart simultaneously when "Always on Time" and "What's Luv?" were at numbers one and two, respectively.

Following the success of her collaborations with Ja Rule and Fat Joe, Ashanti released her debut single, "Foolish", which contains a sample of the 1983 song "Stay with Me" by DeBarge (also utilized by The Notorious B.I.G. in his 1995 single "One More Chance", and by Big L in "MVP"). This is her biggest song to date, spending ten weeks atop the Billboard Hot 100. She became the second artist (after The Beatles) to have their first three chart entries in the top ten of the Hot 100 simultaneously. Ashanti's self-titled debut album,Ashanti, was released on Irv Gotti's Murder Inc. record label in April 2002. It debuted at number one on the U.S. Billboard 200 albums chart. The album has been certified triple platinum in the United States and sold six million copies worldwide. Ashanti wrote the album's twelve tracks, most of which were written on the spot in the studio. 2002 saw the birth of the careers of many new R&B artists and 'rivals' against Ashanti including Amerie, Tweet, and Nivea. Ashanti's dominance of the R&B world was certified as she had a song in the top ten of the R&B/hip-hop charts every week from January to November 2002. Ashanti's follow-up singles, "Happy" and "Baby", were not as successful as her debut single but peaked inside the top ten and top twenty in the U.S., respectively. During mid-2002, Ashanti appeared on Ja Rule's "Down 4 U" with labelmates, female rappers Vita and Charli Baltimore. The song appeared on a Murder Inc. compilation titled Irv Gotti Presents The Inc. Ashanti's debut album earned her many awards, including eight BillboardMusic Awards, two American Music Awards, and a Grammy Award in 2003 for Best Contemporary R&B Album. She was nominated as Best New Artist and "Foolish" was nominated in the Best Female R&B Vocal Performance category. FHM credited her as the "Sexiest Woman in Music" in 2002. She also received a Comet Award and two Soul Train Music Awards that same year.

Ashanti became the subject of controversy when it was announced that she would receive the Soul Train Aretha Franklin Award for "Entertainer of the Year", a high school student took offense and started an on-line petition against her, explaining to The Seattle Times that she was too new to deserve the award. Nearly 30,000 people agreed with him, signing the petition. Many said that established artists such as Mary J. Blige and Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott or critically acclaimed singers like Alicia Keys and India.Arie were more deserving of an award that carries the name of a musical legend. Despite the petition, the Soul Train committee and Don Cornelius stuck by their decision and Ashanti. Ashanti was applauded by her musical peers as she entered the Pasadena Civic Auditorium to accept her award and she was supported onstage by legendary singer Patti LaBelle, who stated "she's a baby and we have to support our babies." In September 2002, Ashanti and her sister Kenashia appeared on the first DisneyMania CD, which was released under Walt Disney Records and features contemporary Disney songs. Ashanti and her sister sang "Colors of the Wind" from the Disney film Pocahontas. By early 2003, Ashanti had performed at every major award show there was: Soul Train Awards, Grammy's, BET Awards, MTV Awards and the American Music Awards. In 2003, Ja Rule and Ashanti collaborated on another hit song, "Mesmerize", the music video for which was a parody of a scene from the film Grease. In February 2003, the self-titled debut album had her win her first Grammy award for Best Contemporary R&B album. On May 2, 2002 Ashanti received the key to the city of Glen Cove, New York (her hometown), and the day was named Ashanti Day; Ashanti also received a key to the city of Atlantic City, New Jersey (she was crowned princess of hip hop and R&B).

In July 2003, Ashanti released her second album, Chapter II, which debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 with first week sales of 326,000 copies in the U.S.. The album went Platinum, selling over 1.5 million copies in U.S. The album's success was somewhat eclipsed, however, by all the negative drama surrounding the Murder Inc. camp at the time (i.e., the FBI investigation and the G-Unit feuding). Chapter II's first single, "Rock wit U (Awww Baby)", became a hit, peaking at number two on the Billboard Hot 100. Its video, which showed Ashanti in a bikini frolicking on a beach and riding an elephant named Bubbles, was nominated for two 2003 MTV Video Music Awards. A remix of the song contains interpolations of Michael Jackson's "Rock with You". The second single, "Rain on Me", reached the number-seven spot on the Hot 100 and number two on the Hot 100 R&B Songs chart. Chapter II was nominated for a 2004 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary R&B Album, and "Rock wit U (Awww Baby)" and "Rain on Me" were nominated in the categories of Best R&B Song and Best Female R&B Vocal Performance, respectively. At the end of 2003 in November, Ashanti performed at The American Music Awards and was nominated in two categories. In the "Rain on Me" mini-movie music video—directed by Hype Williams and co-starring Larenz Tate—Ashanti portrays a troubled young woman in an abusive relationship. Her song and lyrics combined with William's visuals to impart the power and horror of the cycle of domestic violence. Ashanti partnered with LidRock to distribute this mini-movie using LidRock's unique platform. This promotion, in conjunction with heavy rotation on MTV, BET and other music video programs, brought the film and her cause to the attention of millions of fans. It also helped to raise money for the cause, with proceeds from the $5 mini-disc going toward helping to stop domestic violence. She received a Lifetime Channel Achievement Award for her message speaking out against domestic violence. Ashanti was scheduled to join Mariah Carey on the U.S. leg of her Charmbracelet World Tour, but due to scheduling issues, she, instead, became the opening act for R. Kelly's five-date tour in mid-2003 instead. In May 2003, Ashanti appeared on VH1 Divas and performed her single "Rock wit U (Awww Baby)". She also participated in duets with Stevie Wonder (who later gave her the nickname Little Libra) on "Do I Do", and the Isley Brothers on "That Lady". That same year, she began dating rapper Nelly.

In November 2003, Ashanti's Christmas album, Ashanti's Christmas. The album containing 10 Christmas songs, six classic covers and four she wrote herself. To coincide with the release Ashanti premiered a "Christmas Medley" video for the album. While on BET's 106 & Park, Ashanti said the concept of the Christmas Album came from a guest spot she did on Steve Harvey's radio show. While playing a game with Stevie Wonder, he began playing Christmas medleys on the piano and Ashanti began singing them, giving her label head the idea to push for a Christmas album. Ashanti went into the studio to record the album during the summer of 2003. Ashanti's Christmas was released that October and sold just around 100,000 units in the U.S.

2004–07:

Concrete Rose, Collectibles by Ashanti and acting

Before Concrete Rose was released, Ashanti did some major promotion for her single "Only U", when she premiered it at the 2004 Vibe Music Awards. In 2004, Ashanti was invited back to perform at VH1's Divas 2004. She appeared on stage with Patti LaBelle, Gladys Knight, Jessica Simpson, and others. She performed Diana Ross' single "I'm Coming Out", and she performed a soul-influenced rendition of Chaka Khan's funk driven "Ain't Nobody". Later that year Ashanti collaborated with male R&B newcomer and labelmate Lloyd on the song "Southside", which was released as his debut single and was a moderate hit. "Wonderful"—with Ja Rule and R. Kelly—peaked at number five in the U.S. and at number one in the UK, and "Jimmy Choo" with rapper Shyne reached number fifty-five on the Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks chart. Alongside artist such as Wyclef Jean, Mary J. Blige, Eve, Brandy, Fabolous, Jadakiss, Missy Elliott, and many others, Ashanti participated in a cover of "Wake Up Everybody" in support of ACT, the left-leaning political action committee.

In December 2004, Ashanti released her third studio album, Concrete Rose, the title of which took on Tupac Shakur's pseudonym "The Rose That Grew from Concrete". The album debuted at number seven in the U.S with first week sales of 254,000 copies, and eventually became her third platinum certified album. The first single, the gold-certified "Only U", reached number thirteen on theBillboard Hot 100 and became her biggest hit in the United Kingdom, peaking at number two. A second single, the ballad "Don't Let Them", garnered little chart success after Def Jam refused to fund a music video due to Irv Gotti's legal troubles during his money laundering trial. Ashanti used her own money to deliver the second video to her fans, with Gotti acting as director. The single was released only in the U.S., where it failed to chart, and the UK, where it reached the lower end of the top forty. In 2005, Ashanti graced the stage at the MTV Japan Music Awards, where she performed her hit single, Only U. She also won a Style award during the show. She performed alongside huge acts like Mariah Carey and Korean star Rain. After the release of Concrete Rose, Ashanti released the DVD Ashanti: The Making of a Star, which was available only for a limited time. The deluxe DVD includes exclusive photo and video shoot footage, music from the albums Ashanti, Chapter II and Concrete Rose, special concert footage, unreleased childhood school performances and behind-the-scenes interviews with family, friends, and fans. The DVD was also repackaged along with the filmCoach Carter. Later in 2005, Ashanti was invited to Oprah Winfrey's Legends Ball, which honored some of the most influential and legendary African American women of the twentieth century in the fields of art, entertainment, and civil rights. In December 2005, Ashanti released a remix album of Concrete Rose titled Collectables by Ashanti. It features six remixes of previously released tracks and four newly recorded songs, including the single "Still on It", which features rappers Paul Wall and Method Man. The album was an opportunity for her to fulfill her contract with Def Jam (and have the option of working with another label), and did not fare well on the charts.

In January 2005, she made her feature film acting debut in the film Coach Carter alongside Samuel L. Jackson, which debuted at number one opening weekend. She played a pregnant teenager named Kyra who has to decide whether or not to abort her unborn child. The movie opened at number-one at the U.S. box office, eventually grossing $67 million in the U.S. Later in 2005, Ashanti beat out Hilary Duff and Jessica Simpson to star as Dorothy Gale in the made-for-television film The Muppets' Wizard of Oz, which pulled in nearly 8 million viewers. In 2006, she starred in the teen comedy John Tucker Must Die, which opened and peaked at number three at the U.S. box office (competing with Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest and Miami Vice) and grossed $68,818,076 worldwide. Ashanti played Heather, the head cheerleader who participates in a vengeful scheme against John Tucker, her unfaithful boyfriend and the school's biggest heartthrob. Ashanti can also be found on Buffy the Vampire Slayer season 7 episode 14: "First Date" and onSabrina the Teenage Witch season 7 episode 3: "Call Me Crazy". In 2007, Ashanti appeared in the sci-fi horror action Resident Evil: Extinction as a nurse named Betty. The film entered at number one at the box office grossing $53,678,580 in its opening week. To date the movie has grossed $83,648,679 at the US box office and around $197,713,442 worldwide. This was Ashanti's second number one movie, the other being Coach Carter. In 2006, Ashanti announced that she would release a book titled Ashanti Style withJump at the Sun, an imprint of Disney's Hyperion Books for Children. The book, which was being touted as Ashanti's "life and style guide", was a behind-the-scenes look into her style, both in her personal and professional life. The book was originally planned for a late-2007 release, but as of April 2008 no release date had been announced. Another venture Ashanti has enlisted in is her own handbags and pocketbook, revealed in 2007.

2008–10:

The Declaration, departure from The Inc. and The Wiz

Her fourth studio album, The Declaration, was released on June 3, 2008 and sold 86,000 units its first week of release, which were the lowest first week sales for any of Ashanti's studio albums. In mid-2007, MTV News reported that the first single from The Declarationwas "Switch", which was produced by Shy Carter and released digitally in the United States on July 24, 2007. It was later reported that "Switch" may not be included on the album's track listing, and that the first single would be "Hey Baby (After the Club)" it was released to radio and digital outlets on October 16. The song, which does not appear on the U.S. editions of the album, peaked at number eighty-seven on the Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart. "The Way That I Love You", was released to radio and digital outlets in January 2008, was referred to as the "first single" in press material and media reports. It reached number two on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart and number thirty-seven on the Billboard Hot 100, becoming Ashanti's first song to reach the top forty since "Only U" in 2004. "Body On Me" was recorded not only for Ashanti's The Declaration, but also for Nelly's fifth studio album Brass Knuckles. The track is produced by Akon and Giorgio Tuinfort. It went to number one on Billboard's Hot Videoclip Tracks chart in its first week, becoming the first number one single from Nelly's album."Good Good" was released to urban radio stations on July 16, 2008. The song contains elements of Elton John's 1974 single "Bennie and the Jets", and has the same melody arrangement as Michael Jackson's "The Girl Is Mine". In July 2008, Ashanti was named an ambassador of tourism for Nassau County, Long Island.

In May 2009, Irv Gotti announced that he was officially releasing Ashanti from The Inc. Records, stating that "The relationship has run its course. The chemistry of what's needed — we're in two totally different places. You're talking to somebody that took her and shaped and molded her and put her out there for the world, and it blew up. We [hold the record] for the [fastest] selling debut by a female R&B artist — 503 [thousand]. We did it! My views and philosophies and her views and philosophies are not meeting up." Gotti also admitted that he and Ashanti have not spoken to each other in a long time. A rep for Ashanti did not respond. On September 24, 2009, Ashanti announced her fifth studio album would be released from her new label, Written Entertainment.

Ashanti headlined the cast of The Wiz in the New York City Center Encores! Summer Stars staging from June 12 to July 5, 2009. Ashanti's role as Dorothy has since received mixed reviews from critics as most praised her vocals but was less pleased with her acting ability. BET and Entertainment Weekly both praised the singer's performance as The New York Post and New York Times gave lukewarm reviews. Though the first night was sold out, some of the other shows were unable to follow its success. On October 27, 2008, Ashanti took part in The Yellow Brick Road Not Taken, a one night only concert to celebrate the fifth anniversary of Wicked, featuring songs written by Stephen Schwartz, that were cut from the show.

2011–present:

Braveheart, and sixth album

Ashanti confirmed via Twitter that she was currently in the studio working on her fifth album, that is being released through her own record label Written Entertainment. Ashanti was rumored to be working with a slew of producers and artist, thus far this is all that has been verified... LT Hutton, Dr. Dre, Game, Theron Feemster aka Neff-U, Cool & Dre, Warryn Campbell, Carvin & Ivan, Common, Darkchild and Tank who co-wrote and co-produced with her the song Paradise. The release date was initially April 17, 2012, however, the release date got pushed back to June 19, 2012. It was later pushed back yet again, with a new release date of August 28, 2012. The album then got pushed back again to January 29, 2013. In July 2011 a promo picture was released, rap-up revealed she had been in the studio with big names including Dr. Dre, Game, and Lil Wayne, and Ashanti had said that a single was coming "very soon". Single titles include "Paradise" and "She Can't." R. Kelly joins the singer on a track titled "That's What We Do", whilst Keyshia Cole appears on "Woman to Woman". Ashanti released her first song in four years, "Never Too Far Away", which was featured in Morgan Creek's film Dream House starring Daniel Craig, Rachel Weisz with Naomi Watts. Ashanti also confirmed via her Twitter account that the song will be on her upcoming fifth album but is not her first single. Ashanti announced the title of the first single from her fifth studio album, BraveHeart, via NBC Today Show, revealing it to be called 'No Good', however the title was later changed to "The Woman You Love". The lead single from her fifth studio album, "The Woman You Love" featuring American rapper Busta Rhymes, was released online on December 15, 2011. Ashanti said on her official Twitter account that the song would be released onto iTunes on 16 December with a new promo picture. Ashanti released via UStream snippets of some songs from her upcoming 5th studio album which included "The Woman You Love", "Never Too Far Away", "She Can't", "Paradise", "Blow" and "Get Lost Together". Ashanti teamed up with Meek Mill and French Montana for the anticipated second single "No One Greater", which was produced by 7 Aurelius, Irv Gotti and Chink Santana. The track was leaked in June 2012. On October 2, the song "That's What We Do" with R. Kelly was released to iTunes for download. In April 2013 she released another single called "Never Should Have". An music video for the track was also released the same month. In November 2012, it was reported that she had landed her first series regular role in the seventh season of Army Wives in which she played Latasha Montclair. The series was cancelled on September 24, 2013. In the fall of 2013, she appeared in a guest spot on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit alongside Clay Aiken and Taylor Hicks. Additionally, her single "Never Should Have" won "Best Independent R&B/Soul Performance" at the 2013 Soul Train Awards and has also earned an additional nod at the 2013 MCP Music Awards. She starred in the Lifetime film Christmas in the City which premiered on December 7, 2013. Additionally, she released a holiday EP titled A Wonderful Christmas with Ashanti on digital services.

In August 2013, Ashanti announced her plans to work with Ja Rule again, who'd been released from prison in July of that year after a six-year sentence stemming from a gun charge. On January 8, 2014, she revealed the official cover art and release date for Braveheart, which was released March 4, 2014. In January 2014, Ashanti shot the video for the official first single from Bravehearttitled "I Got It" featuring Rick Ross. The video was shot in Miami, Florida and was directed by Eif Rivera. In July, Ashanti announced that the second official single from BraveHeart would be "Early in the Morning" featuring French Montana. The video was shot in August 2014 and directed by Elf Rivera. She released a full-length (deluxe) version of her holiday album A Wonderful Christmas with Ashanti in October 2014. The following month, she starred in the SyFy film Mutant World.

In 2015, she announced that she has been working on new music for her sixth album to be released in 2016. Ashanti also teamed with Michelle Obama and her Let's Move campaign to spread awareness of drinking water with her new video and song "Let's Go". The song and video go from dehydrated to hydrated the more #DrinkUpAshanti is tweeted on Twitter. On December 2, Ashanti released her newly hydrated single "Let's Go" on iTunes. The video is also available at www.drinkupashanti.com.

Artistry

Ashanti is known for her lyric soprano voice type. People magazine referred to her voice as "pretty" and her soprano as "sultry" and "sweet but slight." her unique styling of hip-hop soul earned her the title of The Princess of Hip-Hop and R&B, as stated in her song, "Happy." Jason Birchmeier of AllMusic noted her reputation for using her "swooning voice" in duets with Big Pun, Fat Joe and most notably Ja Rule. As a young girl Ashanti was influenced by legendary artists such as Ella Fitzgerald, Whitney Houston, Michael Jackson, Prince and Tupac Shakur but she cites Mary J. Blige as the main reason she wanted to pursue a singing career. "I didn't want to sing only slow songs and I didn't want to be spittin' rhymes. But Mary [J. Blige] put those concepts together. She cleared the way, and now I'm following my own path."

Philanthropy

In 2003, Ashanti partnered with LidRock and the San Francisco-based Family Violence Prevention Fund (FVPF) to raise awareness about the issue of domestic violence during National Domestic Violence Awareness Month and to distribute the "Rain On Me" mini-movie using LidRock's unique platform. Proceeds from the $5 mini-disc went towards helping to stop domestic violence. Ashanti also recorded a public service announcement that appeared in more than 4,000 film screens and reached millions of people. Ashanti also gives back by raising money for sickle cell research and she is active in helping the Make-A-Wish Foundation stating, "I'll go and do just about anything for them." In 2005, Ashanti helped by recording public service announcement and raising money for the Southeast Asia tsunami disaster. Later that year she helped raise money for the Hurricane Katrina victims and storm evacuees. In 2008, Ashanti, along with others celebrities, taped a PSA to help stop violence and discrimination towards the LGBT community in response to the death of Lawrence King, an eighth-grader at E.O. Green Junior High School who was shot because of his sexual orientation and gender expression. That same year, she launched a special on-line campaign called "I Declare Me..." with Wal-Mart. The campaign's core is a very personal focus on the self-definition and empowerment of women across the United States, with its home base at Ashanti's official website. The campaign creates a safe and inclusive on-line space to for women to share testimonies on the site. Participants are able to openly declare their own breakthroughs, revelations, struggles and victories in every life area they choose: career, birth, death, relationships, and personal situations. "I Declare Me..." also invites women to a virtual discussion with Ashanti on such issues as voter registration, teen obesity, and other concerns facing women today.

In September 2009, Ashanti, along with other artists Mariah Carey, Beyoncé Knowles, Mary J. Blige, Rihanna, Fergie, Sheryl Crow, Miley Cyrus, Melissa Etheridge, Natasha Bedingfield, Keyshia Cole, Ciara, Leona Lewis, LeAnn Rimes, Busta Rhymes, Cheri Oteri, Flavor Flav, Queen Elizabeth and Carrie Underwood, teamed up for the song "Just Stand Up!". The charity tune for cancer was conceived by Antonio "L.A." Reid, who produced it with longtime creative colleague Babyface. All 15 singers (along with Nicole Scherzinger) shared the stage to perform the song live on Sept. 5 2008 during the "Stand Up to Cancer" television special, which aired simultaneously on ABC, NBC and CBS, and helped raise $100 million for cancer research. As a result of SU2C fund raising endeavors, the SU2C scientific advisory committee, overseen by the American Association for Cancer Research was able to award 73.6 million dollars towards novel, groundbreaking cancer research in 2009.

In November 2009, Ashanti joined the crew of ABC's Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. The singer assisted in the rebuilding of the Powell Family home in Buffalo, New York. The efforts from the show expanded significantly to include not just the family home but the entire neighborhood surrounding it. The episode aired January 24, 2010.

Ashanti is featured on the 19-track compilation album "Songs For a Healthier America", a collaborative project by the Partnership for a Healthier America, whose honorary chair First Lady Michelle Obama, and Hip Hop Public Health. Her song "Just Believe" also features Artie Green, Gerry Gunn, Robbie Nova and Chauncey Hawkins.

Ashanti has greatly given back to the community. She has a history of supporting good causes. She is affiliated with the Jumpstart reading program, Tupperware Brand and Boys and Girls Club of America.

Personal life

Ashanti met rapper Nelly at a press conference for the 2003 Grammy Awards on January 1, 2003. Ashanti and Nelly ended their nine-year relationship in December 2012.

Discography

Ashanti (2002)

Chapter II (2003)

Concrete Rose (2004)

The Declaration (2008)

Braveheart (2014)

Chapter VI (2016)

Filmography

Films

Bride and Prejudice (2004)

The Muppets' Wizard of Oz (2005)

Coach Carter (2005)

John Tucker Must Die (2006)

Resident Evil: Extinction (2007)

Christmas in the City (2013)

Mutant World (2014)

Stuck (2015)

Mothers and Daughters (2016)

Television

What Kids Want To Know About Sex and Growing Up (1992)

Sabrina, the Teenage Witch (2002)

Buffy the Vampire Slayer (2003)

WrestleMania XIX (Opening: America the Beautiful) (2003)

The Proud Family (voice) (2003)

Pepsi Smash (Commercial) (2003)

Punk'd (2004)

Oxygen: Custom Concert (2004)

Las Vegas (TV series) (2005)

2007 World Series (Opening: 'God Bless America') (2007)

NFL Thanksgiving Day game CBS (Opening: 'National Anthem') (2007)

BET Awards Nomination Special "I Wanna Thank My Mama" (host) (2008)

Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (2010)

Army Wives (2013)

Law & Order: SVU (2013)

Unforgettable (2015)

Theater

The Wiz (2009)

http://wikipedia.thetimetube.com/?lang=en&q=Ashanti%20(singer)

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bylillian · 7 years ago

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By Gerald Jonas

Jan. 23, 2018

Ursula K. Le Guin, the immensely popular author who brought literary depth and a tough-minded feminine sensibility to science fiction and fantasy with books like “The Left Hand of Darkness” and the Earthsea series, died on Monday at her home in Portland, Ore. She was 88.

Her son, Theo Downes-Le Guin, confirmed the death. He did not specify a cause but said she had been in poor health for several months.

Ms. Le Guin embraced the standard themes of her chosen genres: sorcery and dragons, spaceships and planetary conflict. But even when her protagonists are male, they avoid the macho posturing of so many science fiction and fantasy heroes. The conflicts they face are typically rooted in a clash of cultures and resolved more by conciliation and self-sacrifice than by swordplay or space battles.

Her books have been translated into more than 40 languages and have sold millions of copies worldwide. Several, including “The Left Hand of Darkness” — set on a planet where the customary gender distinctions do not apply — have been in print for almost 50 years. The critic Harold Bloom lauded Ms. Le Guin as “a superbly imaginative creator and major stylist” who “has raised fantasy into high literature for our time.”

In addition to more than 20 novels, she was the author of a dozen books of poetry, more than 100 short stories (collected in multiple volumes), seven collections of essays, 13 books for children and five volumes of translation, including the Tao Te Ching of Lao Tzu and selected poems by the Chilean Nobel Prize winner Gabriela Mistral. She also wrote a guide for writers.

Ms. Le Guin’s fictions range from young-adult adventures to wry philosophical fables. They combine compelling stories, rigorous narrative logic and a lean but lyrical style to draw readers into what she called the “inner lands” of the imagination. Such writing, she believed, could be a moral force.

“If you cannot or will not imagine the results of your actions, there’s no way you can act morally or responsibly,” she told The Guardian in an interview in 2005. “Little kids can’t do it; babies are morally monsters — completely greedy. Their imagination has to be trained into foresight and empathy.”

The writer’s “pleasant duty,” she said, is to ply the reader’s imagination with “the best and purest nourishment that it can absorb.”

She was born Ursula Kroeber in Berkeley, Calif., on Oct. 21, 1929, the youngest of four children and the only daughter of two anthropologists, Alfred L. Kroeber and Theodora Quinn Kroeber. Her father was an expert on the Native Americans of California, and her mother wrote an acclaimed book, “Ishi in Two Worlds” (1960), about the life and death of California’s “last wild Indian.”

At a young age, Ms. Le Guin immersed herself in books about mythology, among them James Frazier’s “The Golden Bough,” classic fantasies like Lord Dunsany’s “A Dreamer’s Tales,” and the science-fiction magazines of the day. But in early adolescence she lost interest in science fiction, because, she recalled, the stories “seemed to be all about hardware and soldiers: White men go forth and conquer the universe.”

She graduated from Radcliffe College in 1951, earned a master’s degree in romance literature of the Middle Ages and Renaissance from Columbia University in 1952, and won a Fulbright fellowship to study in Paris. There she met and married another Fulbright scholar, Charles Le Guin, who survives her.

On their return to the United States, she abandoned her graduate studies to raise a family; the Le Guins eventually settled in Portland, where Mr. Le Guin taught history at Portland State University.

Besides her husband and son, Ms. Le Guin is survived by two daughters, Caroline and Elisabeth Le Guin; two brothers, Theodore and Clifton Kroeber; and four grandchildren.

By the early 1960s Ms. Le Guin had written five unpublished novels, mostly set in an imaginary Central European country called Orsinia. Eager to find a more welcoming market, she decided to try her hand at genre fiction.

Her first science-fiction novel, “Rocannon’s World,” came out in 1966. Two years later she published “A Wizard of Earthsea,” the first in a series about a made-up world where the practice of magic is as precise as any science, and as morally ambiguous.

The first three Earthsea books — the other two were “The Tombs of Atuan” (1971) and “The Farthest Shore” (1972) — were written, at the request of her publisher, for young adults. But their grand scale and elevated style betray no trace of writing down to an audience.

The magic of Earthsea is language-driven: Wizards gain power over people and things by knowing their “true names.” Ms. Le Guin took this discipline seriously in naming her own characters. “I must find the right name or I cannot get on with the story,” she said. “I cannot write the story if the name is wrong.”

The Earthsea series was clearly influenced by J. R. R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy. But instead of a holy war between Good and Evil, Ms. Le Guin’s stories are organized around a search for “balance” among competing forces — a concept she adapted from her lifelong study of Taoist texts.

She returned to Earthsea later in her career, extending and deepening the trilogy with books like “Tehanu” (1990) and “The Other Wind” (2001), written for a general audience.

“The Left Hand of Darkness,” published in 1969, takes place on a planet called Gethen, where people are neither male nor female but assume the attributes of either sex during brief periods of reproductive fervor. Speaking with an anthropological dispassion, Ms. Le Guin later referred to her novel as a “thought experiment” designed to explore the nature of human societies.

“I eliminated gender to find out what was left,” she told The Guardian.

But there is nothing dispassionate about the relationship at the core of the book, between an androgynous native of Gethen and a human male from Earth. The book won the two major prizes in science fiction, the Hugo and Nebula awards, and is widely taught in secondary schools and colleges.

Much of Ms. Le Guin’s science fiction has a common background: a loosely knit confederation of worlds known as the Ekumen. This was founded by an ancient people who seeded humans on habitable planets throughout the galaxy — including Gethen, Earth and the twin worlds of her most ambitious novel, “The Dispossessed,” subtitled “An Ambiguous Utopia” (1974).

As the subtitle implies, “The Dispossessed” contrasts two forms of social organization: a messy but vibrant capitalist society, which oppresses its underclass, and a classless “utopia” (partly based on the ideas of the Russian anarchist Peter Kropotkin), which turns out to be oppressive in its own conformist way. Ms. Le Guin leaves it up to the reader to find a comfortable balance between the two.

“The Lathe of Heaven” (1971) offers a very different take on utopian ambitions. A man whose dreams can alter reality falls under the sway of a psychiatrist, who usurps this power to conjure his own vision of a perfect world, with unfortunate results.

“The Lathe of Heaven” was among the few books by Ms. Le Guin that have been adapted for film or television. There were two made-for-television versions, one on PBS in 1980 and the other on the A&E cable channel in 2002.

Among the other adaptations of her work were the 2006 Japanese animated feature “Tales From Earthsea” and a 2004 mini-series on the Sci Fi channel, “Legend of Earthsea.”

With the exception of the 1980 “Lathe of Heaven,” she had little good to say about any of them.

Ms. Le Guin always considered herself a feminist, even when genre conventions led her to center her books on male heroes. Her later works, like the additions to the Earthsea series and such Ekumen tales as “Four Ways to Forgiveness” (1995) and “The Telling” (2000), are mostly told from a female point of view.

In some of her later books, she gave in to a tendency toward didacticism, as if she were losing patience with humanity for not learning the hard lessons — about the need for balance and compassion — that her best work so astutely embodies.

At the 2014 National Book Awards, Ms. Le Guin was given the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. She accepted the medal on behalf of her fellow writers of fantasy and science fiction, who, she said, had been “excluded from literature for so long” while literary honors went to the “so-called realists.”

She also urged publishers and writers not to put too much emphasis on profits.

“I have had a long career and a good one,” she said, adding, “Here at the end of it, I really don’t want to watch American literature get sold down the river.”

#science fiction #ursula k. le guin #obit

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sushihairjiyong · 7 years ago

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An incomplete list of US achievements by Korean artists.

Korean artists have managed to find success in many international markets. I thought I would compile a series of lists detailing these international achievements, beginning with the United States. I hope to follow up with lists regarding international milestones in other markets.

In 1993, Korean soprano Sumi Jo won the Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording. She went on to become the first Korean artist to be nominated for an Academy Award with her performance of “Simple Song #3” for the film “Youth.”

In 1996, Seo Taiji & Boys became the first Korean artist to win an MTV VMA under the category of International Viewer’s Choice Award for MTV Asia. One year prior to their win, Kim Gun Mo became the first Korean artist nominated in this category. In 1997 and 1998 respectively, Lee Seung Hwan and H.O.T. received nominations. From 1999 to 2001, Korea had its own VMA category, “International Viewer’s Choice Award for MTV Korea.” Winners included H.O.T., Clon, and g.o.d.

In 2012 and 2013, PSY made appearances at a variety of American award shows, including the MTV VMAs and the American Music Awards, where he won a New Media Award. He was also nominated at the People’s Choice Awards for Favorite Music Video and for five Billboard Music Awards (New Artist of the Year, Top Streaming Artist, Top Streaming Song (Video), Top Rap Artist, and Top Rap Song), ultimately winning an award in the category for Top Streaming Song (Video). In 2017, BTS followed in PSY’s footsteps, taking home a Billboard Music Award in the fan-voted category of Top Social Artist.

BTS also won the 2017 Teen Choice Award for Choice International Artist, an award previously won by Super Junior in 2015 and for which 2NE1, SNSD, EXO, SEVENTEEN, and MONSTA X have all been nominated.

In 2006, Rain became the first Korean artist to hold his own concert in the US. He performed two sold out shows in New York as a part of his Rainy Day tour.

Since Rain’s sold out shows in 2006, many Korean artists, such as Epik High, Wonder Girls, JYJ (as well as Junsu as a solo member), SNSD, 2NE1 (as well as CL as a solo artist), BIGBANG (as well as G-Dragon and Taeyang as solo artists), DBSK, Infinite, VIXX, UKISS, CNBLUE, Boyfriend, B.A.P., B1A4, 2PM, F.T. Island, GOT7, BTS, Block B, Ailee, Apink, EXO, Brown Eyed Girls, Dynamic Duo, Teen Top, SHINee, Crush, Hyuna, K.A.R.D., M.Fect, MONSTA X, and SEVENTEEN, have all held their own concerts or tours in the United States.

Many other Korean artists have also performed in the US as participants in multi-act events, such as the Korean Music Festival, KCON, and KPNO.

Rain was also one of the first Korean artists to appear on US television. He featured in a 2008 episode of The Colbert Report.

Subsequent appearances on US television by Korean artists include Wonder Girls on The Wendy Williams Show and So You Think You Can Dance? in 2009, SNSD on Letterman and Live! with Kelly in 2012, PSY on SNL, Live! with Kelly and Michael, Ellen, and Jimmy Kimmel from 2012 onwards, and CL on James Corden.

Songs by Korean artists have also featured in American movies and TV shows, including Rising Sun by DBSK in Fast & Furious 4, songs by BIGBANG and PSY in Glee, Bar Bar Bar by Crayon Pop in Selfie, Nobody by the Wonder Girls in Penguins of Madagascar, songs by Sistar and Hyuna in Family Guy, and Whistle by BLACKPINK in The Bold Type. Korean music has also been used in American ads, such as 2NE1′s I Am The Best in an ad for Microsoft and Fantastic Baby by BIGBANG in the trailer for Pitch Perfect 2.

In 2008, BoA's “Eat You Up” received airplay on KIIS-FM, as well as on Z100, two of the largest radio stations in the US.

The following year “Nobody,” by the Wonder Girls, was added to US Top 40 rotation. In January of 2012, KIIS-FM chose SNSD’s “The Boys” as its first pick of the year. Other groups to have achieved airplay in the US include DBSK, PSY, 2NE1, and BTS.

BoA became the first Korean artist to chart an album on the US Billboard 200 when her eponymous album peaked at #127 on the chart dated April 4th, 2009.

Since BoA’s success on the US album charts, fellow Korean artists BIGBANG (as well as members G-Dragon and Taeyang as solo artists), SNSD (as well as SNSD sub-unit TTS), 2NE1, EXO, and BTS have all charted on the US Billboard 200.

Wonder Girls became the first Korean artist to chart a song on the US Billboard Hot 100 when “Nobody” peaked at #76 on the chart dated October 31st, 2009.

Since Wonder Girls’ success, fellow Korean artists PSY and CL have charted songs on the US Billboard Hot 100.

PSY is the first and only Korean artist to go platinum in the US. Gangnam Style was certified double platinum by the RIAA on November 10th, 2012. It was the 9th best-selling single of 2012 in the US.

This list, as stated, is incomplete. I say that partly because of achievements I have knowingly excluded -- for instance coverage in US print media, which is too extensive to include -- and partly to cover my bases in the event that I’ve left someone out. I tried to be thorough in my research and have not knowingly excluded anyone, but if you notice anything missing, please send me a message so I can update the list, or feel free to reblog with your own additions.

#i'm just so sick of people starting shit over international success #esp. when it involves disregarding the achievements of older artists or pretending gangnam style never happened #and i started with the us even though us centrism annoys the hell out of me #because it seemed like it would be easiest to research #sort of wish i'd included print media bc i could have included bb on forbes #but there's just TOO MUCH #even if i could include it all i'd inevitably miss someone and be accused of deliberate exclusion #anyway #long post #... deliberately made this korean music and not kpop because i wanted to include sumi jo #during gangnam style people kept saying stuff about how psy might become the first korean artist to win a grammy #WHEN SHE HAD ALREADY WON ONE #anyway congrats if you managed to read all of this i know it's long

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akshay123me-blog · 5 years ago

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Here we start 30 days song challenge I special that’s to my friend who challenge me to for this . I wanted to write this blog because it turns out that as I progressed with the challenge, I realized that at the same time it became an experiment and it is about something that many of us are passionate about: Music:

I learned a lot from them through music and I’m glad they shared a lot with me. I learned how human we can be by sharing songs that make us think and feel depending on the song, the melody and its lyrics.

Here I would like to share 30 days song challenge list that encourage you to do the challenge and you can know among all of you new songs:

Day 01 song challenge

Your favourite song Ed sheeran shape of you Is my favourite song released as on 6 January 2017 “Shape of You” peaked at number-one on the singles charts of 34 countries . it has more than 4.5 billion view on youtube the song was written by Ed Sheeran and having a great success in 2017 and also won grammy award for best solo performance . It was the best-selling song of 2017 and the decade in the UK.

Day 02 song challenge: A song that you can dance to

“Cheap Thrills” is a song by Australian singer-songwriter Sia from her seventh studio album. It was written by Sia Furler and Grey kurstin, while solely produced by Kurstin. In Australia, it was eventually certified Quadruple Platinum for shipments of over 280,000 copies, and reached no. 6. In New Zealand, and was certified Double Platinum for sales of over 30,000 copies. The song was awarded Quadruple Platinum in Sweden, Five time Platinum in Spain, and Double Diamond in Poland. In the UK, it peaked at No. 2 for four weeks, and was certified double platinum for shipments of over 1.2 million copies. It has over 106,309,900 views on youtube and the song became the best selling and highest certified single of all time in Italy

Day 03 song challenge: A song that makes you happy

“What Is Love” is a song recorded by Trinidadian-German Eurodance artist Haddaway for his debut album. The song was released on 8 May 1993 as the album’s lead single. It was a massive hit in Europe, becoming a number-one hit in at least 13 countries and reaching number two in Germany, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. Outside Europe, the song was moderately successful, reaching number 11 in the United States, number 12 in Australia, number 17 in Canada, and number 48 in New Zealand. The song which makes you happy while watching video of this song.

Day 4 song challenge:A song from your favorite album

“Baby” is a song by canadian recording artist Justin Bieber alongside rapper ludacrist. It was released as the lead single from the latter half of Bieber’s debut album. It was available for digital download on January 18, 2010. The song received airplay directly after release, officially impacting mainstream and rhythmic radio on January 26, 2010. The song is uptempo R&B, blending together dance and hip-hop elements, while using influences of doo-moo music. The song has received positive reviews from critics who complimented the song’s effective lyrics and chorus, and commended Ludacris’ part and the song’s ability to have an urban twist.

Day 5 song challenge: A song that reminds you of someone you´d rather forget

ALPINE — Damn Baby:

Alpine was released in Australia in 2012 and in the US in 2013. The album was featured on Triple J prior to its release, and debuted at No. 1 on the Australian iTunes. After an extended hiatus, Alpine returned in 2019 with a new single, “Dumb,” on May 1. A week prior, the band had announced that founding member and co-lead vocalist Lou James would be departing from the band.

Day6 song challenge : A song that you want to play at your wedding

“Ring” is a song recorded by American rapper Cardi B for her debut studio album invasion of privacy in 2018 featuring vocals from American singer Kehlani. It was released on August 28 in 2018 as the album’s fifth and final single. On youtube it has around 8,641,355 views and 51.5 k subscribers on the challenge .

Day 7 song challenge: A song that makes you fall asleep

How Soon is Now- In 2007, Marr said “How Soon Is Now?” is “possibly [the Smiths’] most enduring

record. It’s most people’s favourite, I think.Despite its prominent place in the Smiths’ repertoire, it is not generally considered to be representative of the band’s style. Although a club favourite, it did not chart as well as expected. Most commentators put this down to the fact that the song had been out on vinyl in a number of forms before being released as a single in its own right. The original track runs for nearly seven minutes; the 7” single edit cut the length down to under four minutes. The complete version is generally used on compilations. This isn’t to say that this masterpiece is boring. In fact it is one of my favourite Smiths songs. However, if ever I can’t sleep, I stick this on repeat and I’m soon asleep in no time.

Day 08 song challenge: A song that makes you sad

DJ Snake, AlunaGeorge — You Know You Like It

“You Know You Like It” is a song by English electronic music duo AlunaGeorge from their debut studio album, Body Music (2013). The track was released in the United Kingdom on 20 April 2012 as the album’s lead single. The song peaked at number 39 on the UK Singles Chart in April 2013 after being used in a Tesco advert.

Timed with the release of the album, “You Know You Like It” was re-released on 28 July 2013, as a double A-side with “Bad Idea”. It subsequently reached a new peak position of number 39 in the UK Singles Chart on 4 August 2013. A music video to accompany the release of “You Know You Like It” was first released onto YouTube on August 31, 2011 at a total length of three minutes and thirty seconds. The video is shot in black and white and features clips of Francis dancing.

Day 09 song challenge: A song that you wish you could play

. “If You Could See Me Now” is a song by Irish pop rock band The Script, taken from their third studio album, (2012). The song video was released as the album’s third single on 18 February 2013. The song was released on 4 March 2013. The track was written by Danny O’Donoghue, Sheehan, Steve Kipner and Andrew Frampton. The song is an emotional tribute d A music video to accompany the release of “If You Could See Me Now” was first released onto YouTube on 18 February 2013 at a tota l length of three minutes an forty-nine seconds

Sheehan added to O’Donoghue’s late father – and to guitarist Mark Sheehan parents. For the very first time, vocals to a song.

Day 10 song challenge: A song that you want to play at your funeral

Master of Reality is released on 21 July 1971. It is widely regarded as the foundation of doom metal, stoner rock, and sludge metal It was certified double platinum after having sold over 2 million copies. Master of Reality was Black Sabbath’s first and only top 10 album in the US until 13, forty-two years later. The first editions of Master of Reality came in an ‘envelope sleeve’ containing a poster of the band, and with the album’s title embossed in black lettering, visible in relief. Later editions lacking the embossed printing would render the album title in grey. This was the first Black Sabbath sleeve on which the lyrics were reproduced on the back of the sleeve. It has over 2,356,897 views on youtube and around 24k subscribers.

Day 11 song challenge: A song you like with a person´s name on the title

Plain White T’s — Hey There Delilah:

It features the band’s lead singer, Tom Higgenson, singing the song while the band members are in another room behind him. The other band members are not playing in the song. The only other instruments are the strings provided by Eric Remschneider, who does not appear in the video. It was released in May 2006 as the third single from their third studio album All That We Needed. The video was directed by Jay Martin.

In a split screen it shows Delilah, not the backup singer’s girlfriend, played by model Melissa McNelis, who attends college 1000 miles away in New York City. She walks around the city, presumably, from a class to her job.

Day 12 song challenge: A song that moves you forward

Incubus — Drive: It was released in November 2000 as a single from their third album Make Yourself. It is considered the band’s biggest hit and breakthrough single, eventually reaching the top of the US Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart on March 3, 2001, and number nine on the Billboard Hot 100 on July 28. The song has over 145,370,900 views on youtube and around 619k subscriber.

Day 13 song challenge: A song from your childhood

Busted- In November 2013, Willis and Bourne announced plans to tour together with McFly as the “supergroup”

McBusted in 2014, and this continued into 2015. On 10 November 2015, it was revealed that Simpson had rejoined Busted after successful secret writing sessions. The band then embarked on the pigs can fly arena tour in May 2016 and released their third studio album, Night Drive on 25 November 2016.

On 26 October 2018, Busted announced their fourth album Half way there, released on 1 February 2019, as well as a UK arena tour.

During 2003, Charlie met fellow songwriter-guitarist Alex Westaway and drummer Omar Abidi at a party. He was by this stage becoming increasingly frustrated by the music he was performing in Busted and stated he had “all of this creativity pent up inside and I just needed to vent it somewhere, and I was writing a lot of songs but I couldn’t play them, because I didn’t have anyone to play them with”. During the aforementioned party, an impromptu jam session took place.More than !14,345,233 views on youtube .

Day 14 song challenge: A song that no one would expect you to love

Drake — God’s Plan: This song received mostly positive reviews from music critics, who called it a typical Drake song. An accompanying music video for the song was directed by Karena Evans and uploaded onto Drake’s official YouTube channel on February 16, 2018. In the video Drake is giving away nearly one million US dollars to people and institutions in Florida. It received five nominations at the 2018 MTV Video Music Awards, including for Video of the Year and three nominations at the 61st Grammy Awards for Record of the Year, Song of the Year, and Best Rap Song, winning the last one. Commercially the song became the 29th song in history to debut at number one on the US Billboard Hot 100, making it Drake’s fourth chart-topper in that country, and second as a lead artist. The single topped the charts in fourteen countries, including the UK and Canada and reached the top ten in nine others. The song broke first-day streaming records on both Apple Music and Spotify, and was the most streamed song of the year on both services. “God’s Plan” received mostly positive reviews from music critics, who called it a typical Drake song. An accompanying music video for the song was directed by Karena Evans and uploaded onto Drake’s official YouTube channel on February 16, 2018.

Day 15 song challenge: A song that describes you

The League: This song was released on 1982 by Hardcore punk , punk rock. For me, people have to prove they aren’t arseholes before I truly trust them, rather than prove that they arseholes after I have already made the effort to let them into my life.

Day 16 song challenge : A song that no one would expect you to love

“My Heart Will Go On” is a song recorded by Canadian singer Celine Dion. It serves as the main theme song to James Cameron’s blockbuster film Titanic, that is based on an account of the British transatlantic ocean liner of the same name which sank in 1912 after colliding with an iceberg in the middle of the North Atlantic Ocean. The song’s music was composed by Jame Horner, its lyrics were written by Will Jennings, while the production was handled by Walter Afanasieff, Horner and Simon Franglen.

In Germany, “My Heart Will Go On” was certified 4× platinum for selling over two million copies, and was ranked as one of the most popular singles ever released there.It sold over 1.2 million copies in France, being certified Diamond. Additionally, the song was certified 3× Platinum in Belgium, 2× Platinum in Australia, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland, Platinum in Greece, and Gold in Austria. “My Heart Will Go On” was released twice in Japan. The regular edition from January 1998 sold 205,300 and was certified 2× Platinum, for 200,000 copies sold. The remixed edition released in June 1998 sold 111,920 copies and was certified Gold for 100,000 copies sold, due the fact that maxi-singles are treated as an album.

Day 17: A song that makes you think about life

Fiona Apple — Across the Universe:

One night in 1967, the phrase “words are flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup” came to Lennon after hearing his then-wife Cynthia, according to Lennon, “going on and on about something”. Later, after “she’d gone to sleep – and I kept hearing these words over and over, flowing like an endless stream”, Lennon went downstairs and turned it into a song. He began to write the rest of the lyrics and when he was done, he went to bed and forgot about them.I was lying next to my first wife in bed, you know, and I was irritated, and I was thinking. She must have been going on and on about something and she’d gone to sleep and I kept hearing these words over and over, flowing like an endless stream. I went downstairs and it turned into a sort of cosmic song rather than an irritated song, rather than a “Why are you always mouthing off at me?”.The words] were purely inspirational and were given to me as boom! I don’t own it you know; it came through like that.

Day 18 song challenge : A song that reminds you of a certain event

Fire work : This song was released on july 1983 E.G Records. It reached No. 29 in Uk charts.

The album was remastered and reissued in 2008, with eight bonus tracks: the non-album single “Me Or You”, an alternate version of “Dominator” (B-side to ” Let’s All Go (to The Fire dances)an unreleased early version of “The Gathering” and four tracks from a John Peel session from 1983.

Day 19 song challenge : The voice that you like

“Love the Way You Lie” is a song recorded by the American rapper Eminem, featuring Barbadian singer Rihanna, from Eminem’s seventh studio album Recovery (2010). The singer and songwriter Skylar Grey wrote and recorded a demo of the song alongside the producer Alex da Kid when she felt she was in an abusive romantic relationship with the music industry. Eminem wrote the verses and chose Rihanna to sing the chorus, resulting in a collaboration influenced by their past experiences in difficult relationships. Recording sessions were held in Ferndale, Michigan, and Dublin, Ireland. Backed by guitar, piano and violin, the track is a midtempo hip-hop ballad with a pop refrain, sung by Rihanna, and describes two lovers who refuse to separate despite being in a dangerous love–hate relationship.This song has over 1,908,101,273 views on youtube .

Day 20 song challenge: A song that remind something

Teenager Dreame: Musically, “Teenage Dream” is a mid-tempo pop song with a retro sound. It is styled in the genres of power pop and electropop, while taking influence from other genres such as disco and pop rock. Perry starts the song in a high-pitched voice while her vocals grow stronger as the song progresses. Lyrically, “Teenage Dream” discusses being with a lover who makes one feel young again. The song has topped the Billboard Hot 100, becoming Perry’s third number-one single on that chart, and her second consecutive number-one single after “California Gurls”. “Teenage Dream” has been certified seven times platinum in the United States, as well as receiving platinum and multi-platinum certifications in other countries.

Day 21 song challenge: Your favourite song at this time last year

“On My Way”

On 9 March 2019, Alan Walker began teasing the song via his social media.On 14 March 2019, Alan Walker formally announced the song along with its release date.After the announcement of the song, rumours circulated that Sabrina Carpenter and Farruko would feature on the song. Alan Walker confirmed their involvement on the song on 19 March 2019. On 20 March 2019, Walker announced that he partnered with PUBG Mobile for the one-year anniversary of the game, and that the song would be the event’s theme song.

On 10 May 2019, the alternative video was posted on Alan Walker’s YouTube channel, encouraging viewers to “choose their path” of either two video versions of Carpenter and Farruko in the official alternative music video, both were posted on their respective channels that same day. The two versions of the alternative music video indicated different searches, pieces of evidence, and artifacts that the female protagonist was searching (depending on the viewer’s choice) which led to each versions ending with the same outcome, which is the scene where tombstones with stone formations which were laid on the site, that took place a month before the events of the official music video when the artifacts were being unearthed and discovered .The song has 248,161,421 views on youtube channel and 5.5 M likes.

Day 22 song channel: A song from your favorite album

“Faded” is a hit song by Norwegian record producer and DJ Alan Walker. Incorporating vocals provided by Norwegian singer Iselin Solheim, the single was originally set to be released on 25 November 2015, but was delayed to 3 December 2015. The song was highly successful, peaking in the top 10 in most of the countries it charted in, and reached the top spot in more than 10 countries. Most popular song on youtube is has around 2,603.435,671 views and around 18 millions likes.It is currently the 17th most viewed video on YouTube, with over 2.6 billion views, 18 million likes and 489 thousand dislikes as of December 2019 as well as being the 27th most streamed song on Spotify, with over 1 billion streams as of December 2019.

Day 23 song challenge : A song that you know all the words to

Boyzone-Words

The song reached No. 1 in Germany, Canada, Switzerland, and the Netherlands.

“Words” was the Bee Gees third UK top 10 hit, reaching number 8, and in a UK television special on ITV in December 2011 it was voted fourth in “The Nation’s Favourite Bee Gees Song”.The song has been recorded by many other artists, including hit versions by RITA in 1978 and Boyzone in 1996. This was Boyzone’s fifth single and their first number one hit in the UK. Words is a song by the Bee Gees, written by Barry, Robin & Maurice Gibb. It cross around 12,876,555 views on youtube.

Day 24 song challenge: Your least favourite song

“Smack That”

was released as the first single from Konvicted on September 26, 2006. Commercially, the song reached number one on ten record charts and peaked inside the top ten in nine, including the Billboard Hot 100, where it peaked at number two. It received several gold and platinum certifications and sold over 3 million downloads in the United States. The song earned a Grammy nomination for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration.

Day 25 song challenge : if you love someone

“I Wanna Love You” is a song written and recorded by Akon featuring Snoop Dogg. It was released in September 2006 as the second single from his second studio album, Konvicted. It is also featured on Snoop Dogg’s eighth album, Tha Blue Carpet Treatmet. This song was Akon’s first #1 single on the Billboard Hot 100 and was also Snoop’s second #1 on the same chart. It also reached a peak of #3 on the UK Singles Chart. The track originally had Akon as a featured artist and was performed by Plies, then an up-and-coming rapper from Fort Myers, Florida, but his verse was replaced by Snoop’s and his name has been left out from the writers’ credits. This song was #88 on MTV Asia’s list of Top 100 Hits of 2007.The song was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration at the 50th Grammy Awards in 2008.

Day 26 song challenge : A song you never get tired of

Gustavo Cerati — Puente: Very poetic this song and Cerati as a good representative of Rock en Español (Latin Rock), he left us a very beautiful legacy in the world of music. (August 11, 1959 – September 4, 2014) was a guitarist, singer, musician, composer and Argentine record producer of Latin rock. He began his career as the leader of the band Soda Stereo for after developing a solo career.

Day 27 song challenge: A song that you can play on an instrument

Substance

Substance is double CD, double cassette and Digital Audio tape. It sold over one million copies and became New Order’s most popular and critically acclaimed album.

It is the companion to a similar singles compilation by New Order’s predecessor band Joy division also entitled Substance.

Day 28: A song that makes Fun of

Curtain call : – Eminem The song was released on December 6 of 2005 by American Rapper Eminem . The album was certified septuple platinum in the United States and quintuple platinum in New Zealand. It reached number one on several charts, including the US Billboard 200 and UK Albums Chart.

Day 29 song challenge: A song you like with a number on the title

The Smashing Pumpkins — 1979:

The song was released on early years 1988 -1991 .It has around 109,917,324 view on youtube channel and over 499 K likes with 485 k subscribers on youtube channel . On April 26, 2011, Corgan announced that the Smashing Pumpkins would be releasing a new album titled Oceania, which he labeled as “an album within an album” in regards to the Teargarden by Kaleidyscope project, in the fall. As with the previous recording sessions, all four band members contributed to the project. Also, the entire album catalog was to be remastered and reissued with bonus tracks, starting with Gish and Siamese Dream in November 2011.

Day 30: A song that you used to love but now hate

Hybrid Theory I used to like this song along with some other Linkin Park stuff. Now I see the error of my ways. Linkin Park are possibly the most over-rated band in the world. The music that would ultimately become the Hybrid Theory album was first produced by Linkin Park in 1999 as a nine-track demo tape. The band sent this tape to various recording companies and played forty-two different showcases for recording industry representatives, including performances for Los Angeles promoter and impresario, Mike Galaxy’s showcase at The Gig on Melrose.

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