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vintage1981 · 3 months

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY CAROLINE MUNRO!

Caroline Munro (born 16 January 1949 in Windsor, Berkshire) is a British actress and model best known for her many appearances in science fiction and action films of the 1970s and 1980s. According to Munro, her career took off in 1966 when her mother and photographer friend entered some headshots of her to Britain’s The Evening News “Face of the Year” contest.

“I wanted to do art. Art was my love. I went to Art School in Brighton but I was not very good at it. I just did not know what to do. I had a friend at the college who was studying photography and he needed somebody to photograph and he asked me. Unbeknownst to me, he sent the photographs to a big newspaper in London. The famous fashion photographer, David Bailey, was conducting a photo contest and my picture won.”

This led to modelling chores, her first job being for Vogue Magazine at the age of 17. She moved to London to pursue top modelling jobs and became a major cover girl for fashion and TV ads while there. Decorative bit parts came her way in such films as Casino Royale and Where’s Jack? (1969). One of her many photo ads got her a screen test and a one-year contract at Paramount where she won the role of Richard Widmark’s daughter in the comedy/western A Talent for Loving (1969).

1969 proved to be a good year for Munro, because it was then that she began a lucrative 10 year relationship with Lamb’s Navy Rum. Her image was plastered all over the country, and this would eventually lead to her next big break.

Hammer Films CEO Sir James Carreras spotted Munro on a Lamb’s Navy Rum poster/billboard. He asked his right hand man, James Liggett, to find and screen test her. She was immediately signed to a one-year contract. Her first film for Hammer proved to be something of a turning point in her career. It was during the making of Dracula AD 1972 that she decided from this film onward she was a full-fledged actress. Up until then she was always considered a model who did some acting on the side.

A string of fantasy and horror roles followed, including starring turns in Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter (1973), The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1974), At the Earth’s Core (1976), The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), StarCrash (1978), Maniac (1980), The Last Horror Film (1982), Faceless (1988), and The Black Cat (1989).

By the 1990s Munro had decided to focus more on her family, daughters, Georgina and Iona, and husband George Dugdale. However, since 2003 Caroline has renewed her interest in acting and has appeared in a number of film and audio productions. Since 2021 Caroline has been presenting the hit television series The Cellar Club for Talking Pictures TV.

The title First Lady of Fantasy was given to Caroline by journalist Steve Swires, who wrote many Starlog and Fangoria (@FANGORIA) articles on the actress in the 1980s and 1990s.

Happy Birthday Caroline!

Official Website: http://www.CarolineMunro.org

Representation: Thomas Bowington/Bowington Management

Some of her credits include: Dracula AD 1972 (1972), Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter (1973), The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1974), At the Earth’s Core (1976), The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), StarCrash (1978), Maniac (1980), The Last Horror Film (1982), Faceless (1988), The Black Cat (1989), Flesh for the Beast (2003), Turpin (2009), Midsomer Murders (2013), The Landlady (2013), Crying Wolf (2015), Vampyres (2015), Cute Little Buggers (2016), Frankula (2017), End User (2018), House of the Gorgon (2019), The Haunting of Margam Castle (2020), Ulalume - A Ballad (2023), The Pocket Film of Superstitions (2023), and the upcoming The Presence of Snowgood (2024).

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tomorrowusa · 7 days

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A Conservative politician is making millions off of slavery 190 years after slavery was abolished in Britain and its territories.

Tory Richard Drax comes from a filthy rich family notorious for having established the model for slave-based sugar plantations in the Caribbean in the 1620s. Even by the standards of a slave-based economy, the record of the Drax family was appalling.

The Barbados plantation was worked by up to 327 slaves at a time, with the death rate for both adults and children high. Sir Hilary Beckles, chairman of the 20-state Caribbean Community’s (Caricom) Reparations Commission and vice-chancellor of the University of the West Indies, estimates that as many 30,000 slaves died on the Drax plantations in Barbados and Jamaica over 200 years.

Thanks largely to their their ill-gained riches, the Drax family owns a 700 acre walled estate in Dorset which includes a deer park. And apparently they are getting even richer.

Despite threats to make Richard Drax pay reparations and seize his family’s plantation – described by one historian as a “killing field” of enslaved Africans – the government is now planning to pay market value for 21 hectares (about 15 football pitches) of his land for housing. The move has angered many Barbadians, especially those who say the Drax family played a pivotal role in the development of slavery-based sugar production and the Barbados slave code in the 17th century. This denied Black Africans basic human rights, including the right to life. Critics have called the planned deal an “atrocity” and said this is “one plantation that the government should not be paying a cent for”. Trevor Prescod, MP and chair of the Barbados National Taskforce on Reparations, said: “What a bad example this is. Reparations and Drax Hall are now top of the global agenda. How do we explain this to the world? “The government should not be entering into any [commercial] relationship with Richard Drax, especially as we are negotiating with him regarding reparations.”

It's baffling why the Barbadian government would enter into such a deal.

Drax, the MP for South Dorset, travelled to Barbados to meet prime minister Mia Mottley. It is understood he was asked to hand over all or a substantial part of Drax Hall plantation. If he refused, legal action would follow. Mottley’s spokesperson said the current Drax Hall purchase was not linked to reparations and the government “constantly acquires land through this process”. Mottley has pledged to build 10,000 new homes to meet demand on the island, where there are 20,000 applications for housing. A senior valuation surveyor said the market value for agricultural land with an alternative use for housing would be about Bds$150,000 (£60,000) an acre. At this price, the 21 hectares could net Drax Bds$8m (£3.2m). The land would be for 500 low- and middle-income family homes, which would be for sale.

I'd just grab the land and pay Drax a token £1 just so he legally can't claim he wasn't compensated at all for the transfer.

Barbados poet laureate Esther Phillips, who grew up next to Drax Hall, said the planned deal was an “atrocity” and a case of the victims’ descendants now compensating the descendant of the enslaver. “He should be giving us this land as reparations, not further enriching himself … at the expense of Barbadians. As Barbadians, we must speak out against this.”

And with the reported thousands of deaths during the 200+ years of slavery at the Drax plantation, how many people will be comfortable with the idea that their new home is built on what was essentially a forced labor camp which became a model for regional slavery? Isn't the Drax property on Barbados a large cemetery?

#richard drax #barbados #slavery #the caribbean slave economy #drax hall #still profiting from slavery #south dorset #the filthy rich #cluelessness #reparations #mia mottley #esther phillips #trevor prescod

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hirocimacruiser · 6 months

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Indy Racing League FLAT OUT Infiniti

IRL is a new series that started in 1997 after splitting from the CART series, but it has now become America's most popular formula car race. The IRL series is held 13 times a year (2001) on oval courses in North America. The IRL is represented by the world's largest motor sports event, the Indy 500 Mile, which is held as the fourth race in the series.400,000 people attend this race, which has a total prize money of 1 billion yen and a winner's prize of 200 million yen. A large audience gathers.

Currently, the machines used in the IRL combine a 3.5-liter V8 DOHC non-turbo engine with an open-wheel, open-cockpit, single-seat type car body similar to F1 and CART. The engine is equipped with a rev limiter, which limits the maximum rotation speed to 10,700 revolutions per minute, and the maximum output is approximately 650 horsepower. Currently, the car bodies are produced and marketed by Italy's Dallara, Britain's G-Force, and America's Riley & Scott, and engines are supplied by Nissan and Oldsmobile, named Infiniti and Aurora, respectively.

Through IRL high-speed oval track racing, the ultimate performance testing ground, Nissan In order to prove its technological capabilities and reliability as a high-performance car manufacturer, the company has been competing in the IRL since 1997. In 1998, it took the lead against an overwhelming majority of cars equipped with Aurora engines, and finally achieved its first victory in the IRL in June of last year.

Riding on this momentum, Nissan introduced a newly developed engine to the front this year and began dominating the series. The new engine is the ``35A'' type, which is the same type as the Q45 (Cima)'s power plant and is a detuned version of the VRH50 that was entered in the 1999 Le Mans 24 Hour Race. It is the latest weapon that is lightweight and compact, with a lower center of gravity and improved fuel efficiency than last year's model. This engine was supplied to two teams, Cheever Indy Racing and Dreyer & Rhine Bold Racing, and competed in the 2001 season with Eddie Cheever and Robbie Buhl driving.

The new engine spent the first half of the season undergoing initial maturation, and in the fifth race of the series, Cheever recorded the fastest lap time, quickly proving its high potential and becoming a regular contender for the top positions. Then came the eighth round, a race contested over 200 laps around the 1.5-mile Kansas Speedway. This was the first victory for the new engine. Cheever, the winner, said: ``Today I had a powerful weapon in my hands, the most powerful weapon in the form of an Infiniti.This engine is available to everyone, because it is installed in the Infiniti production cars that everyone drives.'' It was developed based on the engine ``Kara''.

After this first victory, he was unable to achieve any results, retiring in the 9th race due to an accident, and in the 10th race he was in the lead until just before the finish, but fell back due to a mistake in refueling, but in the 11th race, Buhl finished 5th. With Cheever finishing 3rd in the 12th race, Infiniti is closing out the season with a bang. Infiniti's goals for next season are, of course, winning the Indy 500 mile race and winning the series championship.

#Infiniti IRL #Indy Racing League #IRL

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hjohn3 · 5 months

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The Tory Migration Catastrophe

How Conservative Immigration Policy Will Destroy Its Thatcherite Model

Source: The Financial Times

By Honest John

LIKE A desperate gambler deciding to bet his shirt on one last turn of the roulette wheel, Rishi Sunak has staked his entire political reputation on the latest iteration of the Tories’ Rwanda bill. This is a piece of legislation which has been declared illegal by the British Supreme Court; which has so far cost the British taxpayer £240m with a further £50m due to be paid to Rwanda next year; which is considered as impractical as it is morally questionable and which has seen precisely zero asylum seekers so far sent to Rwanda to have their claims processed. This sad wheeze is going to be dragged before the House of Commons once more, while Sunak desperately claims black is white and that Rwanda can miraculously become a safe country for asylum seekers by the passing of a law in Westminster. The Prime Minister’s determination to turn Tuesday’s vote on the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill into effectively a vote of confidence in his leadership is simultaneously reckless and absurd. Sunak’s desperation to quieten the increasing insurrectionary noises from his party’s right wing in the wake of the dismissal of Suella Braverman, has led him to to invest all his hopes in a piece of legislation for which there is no evidence will succeed in deterring the “small boats” (its stated claim), which will place the U.K. once again in breach of international law and will succeed only in enriching the government of Rwanda, incredulously receiving millions of pounds of British taxpayers’ money for its civic infrastructure, gifted by a country whose own infrastructure is falling apart. It is actually hard to find anyone outside the fevered confines of Sunak’s inner circle who supports the plan or thinks it will work. Apart perhaps from the government of Rwanda itself that is.

It is easy to laugh at the infantile antics of a government that, in any real sense, has ceased to function and to treat this latest act in the Tory psychodrama as the piece of absurdist political theatre it undoubtedly is, but the Rwanda bill is simply the congealing icing on the top of a poisonous cake that the Conservatives have been serving up for years, masquerading as migration “policy”. This is legislation that is as contradictory as it is cruel; as performative as it is populist. For the Conservatives, migration is their key emergency break glass area of public policy. When everything else that they and the succession of hopeless lightweights they have foisted on the country as Prime Ministers, has turned to dung at their touch, they still believe that the prejudice and hatred of “the British People” toward foreigners and immigrants has no bottom level: for Tories you simply cannot go too low on immigration. The Rwanda scheme - when it was first cooked up in the days of Boris Johnson and Priti Patel - had nothing in reality to do with deterring asylum seekers from trying to cross the Channel to Britain; it was all about trying to appeal to a mythical “Red Wall” voter for whom no amount of cruelty, illegality and contempt was too much when it came to migrants. As their polling figures slumped and by election and council election results confirmed their worst electoral fears, the Conservatives still believed that victimising the victims could yet turn it around for them - no matter the dark forces their racist and bile-filled rhetoric might unleash: if they could just once again gaslight the electorate into believing that all the catastrophes of the last fourteen years of Tory rule are, in fact, the fault of incoming foreigners, all may yet be well.

This dismal flirting with the fascist playbook may have resulted in the headline-catching idiocy of Sunak’s latest Rwanda wheeze, but beneath that blather James Cleverley has announced planned measures that are far more significant, far more damaging, and far more frightening than any amount of ludicrous assertions about the Rwanda scheme. Tired of being taunted by Labour and others about the huge rise in legal migration (its net increase topped 600,000 in 2022) despite all the Tory promises to bring the numbers down over the last fourteen years, the Conservatives’ response is to quite literally attack, and potentially destroy, its own Thatcherite economic model.

For over forty years, Tory politicians have extolled Britain’s “flexible” workforce; its deregulated system; its low wage/low unemployment economy and its marketised society. Indeed, for years we were told by politicians on the right and the left that in a globalised world, mobile and non-unionised workforces, cheap production costs, outsourced supply lines and minimal regulation was essential to the easy access, low price, and plentiful supply digital capitalism that has taken hold in Britain. Key to the success of this model has been migrant labour, first from the EU and now from a swathe of sub-Saharan African, Middle Eastern and South Asian countries whose residents have been offered visas to replace the low wage flexible European workers that post-Brexit Britain apparently no longer wants. The legal migrants that the Conservatives are now in such a lather about are an essential component of the Thatcherite economic model they have all been promoting to us for decades. If, as Cleverley maintains, the government wishes to reduce net migration figures by 300,000 in 2024, then that is 300,000 workers not available to drive lorries, deliver Amazon parcels, pick our crops, clean our offices, valet our cars, serve in our restaurants and, crucially staff our hospitals and care homes. By creating a shortage of deregulated low wage labour, the Tories will simultaneously damage large parts of the service economy and drive up wages, and with it inflation. In their desperate belief that hatred of foreigners will somehow save them from oblivion at the next General Election, the Conservatives are prepared to throw overboard an approach to employment and wages that has sustained them for nearly two generations and was one of the driving ideological impulses on the right that drove Brexit. The revolution has truly begun to eat itself.

Apart from the casual abandonment of what has been the essence of right-wing Toryism for years, Cleverley has also managed to introduce the class-based nastiness of the Sklled Worker minimum salary threshold of £38,700 pa that legal migrants and their dependents must meet. This is a measure that will drive families apart, possibly force British citizens, married to foreigners but earning below the threshold, to emigrate to be with their loved ones and cause untold damage to the university sector (one of the few growth areas of the British economy) and the NHS and care sector, already on its knees after years of austerity and disproportionately reliant on migrant labour. It is as if the Tories are not content with the calamities that austerity, Brexit and Trussonomics have already wrought on British society: with this latest episode of ill-thought through prejudicial nonsense, they seem to want to finish it off altogether. I have predicted for some time the implosion of modern Toryism - its Thatcherite ideology a busted flush and its Brexit nationalist makeover lacking in depth or practical solutions; but what I hadn’t bargained for was that the Tories would try to take the whole country down with them.

Never has a government looked more threadbare, pointless, desperate and unlovable. All they have left to offer is hatred, racism and self-defeating vindictiveness. If Sunak’s absurd posturing over his doomed Rwanda bill results in his resignation before Christmas and a January General Election, the “British People” that this band of charlatans and incompetents keep claiming to speak for, but who in reality they do not understand, will breathe a sigh of relief, because we the people will at last be given the opportunity to cast this catastrophic version of Toryism into an electoral oblivion it so richly deserves and from which it will, hopefully, never emerge.

Migration may yet be modern Conservatism’s epitaph.

10th December 2023

#british politics #conservative government #rishi sunak #migration policy #Rwanda bill #tory collapse #james cleverly #Thatcherite economic model #general election now!

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klc-archive · 18 years

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“I almost cried with laughter when I read the first script and then I met Keith-Lee Castle, who plays the Count and just looks like a rock star, and I knew it was going to be cool.” - Donna Grant (Magda)

Daily Record interview with Donna Grant (Magda) By Samantha Booth.

Sinister, calculating and scheming is how Scots actress Donna Grant describes her character in the BBC’s new kids’ show Young Dracula. In fact, vampire mum Magda sounds quite despicable - but that’s exactly why the 30-year-old actress from Inverness was so desperate to play her.

The mum-of-one said: “I just couldn’t resist playing her because she is such a fantastically nasty character. She is a vampire and like all vampires she thinks she is better than everyone but Magda really does take it to another level. She is just so brilliantly evil.

The show is about Count Dracula’s move to Britain with his two children after his wife, Magda, has run away with a werewolf. And in tonight’s episode Magda returns to her family - although I am not saying if they welcome her back or not because, not only is she not the best mother in the world, she also broke the Count’s heart.

"But he loves her for her evil - so in a way she can do no wrong.”

Donna was intrigued by the role of Magda from the minute she heard about it and as soon as the show’s producers set eyes on the Scot, the role was hers.

She said: “I think it was a combination of me getting into the part and because they thought I had the right look. They offered me the part on the spot.”

Since then Donna has been filming the show in the Brecon Beacons in Wales and has thoroughly enjoyed every minute if it. She said: “I almost cried with laughter when I read the first script and then I met Keith-Lee Castle, who plays the Count and just looks like a rock star, and I knew it was going to be cool”

"And it really has lived up to all of my expectations.

"The show has been great fun to film and some of my outfits have just been fantastic - I have a wedding bouquet with dead bird skulls in it.

"I know it is meant for children but I really think some adults will love it too.

"It is incredibly well written and because the whole Goth thing is pretty cool at the moment I think it could be a huge success.”

Growing up in Inverness with her mum and grandparents, Donna always wanted to act. She had an idyllic childhood, spending a lot of time out riding on her family’s horses, but when she left school as a teenager she was desperate to get out into the world and, in particular, she had her sights set on London.

She said: "I absolutely loved growing up in Inverness and, if I could, I would bring my own daughter Scarlet up in that way too – but I have to be in London just now for my work.

"But when I was 17 I was just desperate to get out and get started living and working. "I didn’t even want to go to university. I just wanted to get stuck right in.”

Luckily for Donna, some photographs she’d had taken by an Inverness photographer found their way into the hands of a London talent scout. The next thing Donna knew, she was being invited down to the city for a meeting with a top agency.

She said: “It was always acting I had wanted to do but modelling found me, so what could I do? The agency liked me and before I knew where I was, I had moved down to London and was thrown into this mad world of modelling.

"At the time it was the easy option but I quickly discovered it also meant I could make lots of money, travel and meet really interesting people so I wasn’t going to walk away from it in a hurry.” Donna did every kind of modelling, from catwalk to billboards.

She worked for a time in Japan and Germany, shot ads for Agent Provocateur and Baileys and appeared in several television commercials. BUT just because she was finding a certain level of success as a model, it didn’t mean Donna had forgotten her dream of becoming an actress.

And in 2001 she finally got her first acting job in a film called Is Harry On The Boat?, following the loves and lives of a group of young holiday reps in Ibiza and co-starring Danny Dyer and Davina Taylor.

Donna said: “It was brilliant fun to film and I’m still friends with a lot of the people I met out there in Ibiza.”

It wasn’t long until Donna found herself having to take time out from acting to have her baby daughter Scarlet, who is now three years old.

A bit of a rock chick at heart, she met Scarlet’s dad Chris McCormack, guitarist in hard rock outfit 3 Colours Red, when his band at the time, Grand Theft Audio, were supporting The Cult in concert at the Brixton Academy in London.

The pair had a whirlwind romance, married and had baby Scarlet. Donna said: “I have always been into my rock music and through modelling I did hang about with a lot of rock types at the time. So I was instantly attracted to Chris and we ended up having a whirlwind romance. Sadly, things just didn’t work out and we are now in the middle of divorce proceedings. But we really are still best friends.”

Donna now lives a much quieter life with Scarlet in north London and loves nothing better than the chance to return to Scotland to see her family and get out into the hills.

She said: “I love coming back up to Scotland and I am so excited because I just booked my tickets for Christmas so I’ll be spending the holidays at home.

"Drinking wine, eating lots of nice food and going for walks in the hills - it will just be wonderful. My life is a lot quieter now than it was a few years ago but that’s the way I like it. Where I live in London is a bit like a village so I do get the best of both worlds down there and I do like it, but nothing beats coming home.

However, I don’t think I would have settled down as well now if I hadn’t had my wild time when I was younger. It was a load of fun at the time and I met loads of amazing people. I even met some of my heroes, such as Joe Strummer from The Clash, although my most star-struck moment came when I met Chris Morris from Brass Eye. I really admire him and think he is so funny and clever but when I met him I just didn’t know what to say. I mean, because of my modelling, I am quite used to meeting famous people but when I came face to face with him all I could do was make a bit of a whimpering sound. I just thought that he is so witty and cutting he’s just going to chew me up and spit me out whatever I say. Can you imagine what he would have said to me if I had said I really liked his work? And I know I said I lead a quieter life now but my uncle has just opened up a new venue in Inverness called The Ironworks and we have Dirty Pretty Things playing there at New Year - so I might not be able to resist digging my rocker gear out once again. Especially as I will have my mum on hand to babysit.” A rock ‘n’ roll loving mum in rocker gear … Magda would be proud.

#Keith Lee Castle #Donna Grant #Magda Young #Young Dracula #Interview #Samantha Booth #Daily Record #TV #2006 #Count Dracula #The Count

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xgoddessoffandomsx · 10 months

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Wrestling's Next Top Model!!! Contestant list written by Violet Giliath and her boyfriend Finn Balor, the casting directors and head of makeovers. Just note they're exhausted from casting and are snarky as fuck

@atiny-angel @swifteforeverandalways @lynsrosegarden @sargentbarxes @axelwolf8109 @retro-rezz-the-est @moxxieswitchblade @the-iridescent-phoenix @katries

Seth Rollins: From Davenport Iowa, this "emo" wannabe model plans to take over the industry. Has long brown hair that leaves him looking like other model Aragorn.

Austin Theory: Youngest person here from Atlanta Georgia who looks like he belongs in a CW show with brown blond hair he has in a man bun.

Rhea Ripley: From Australia, this young woman looks like any other pretty blond girl.

Sammy: I don't know how to spell his last name and he's annoying. Kind of pretty, kind of an ass

TJ Perkins: From California and raised by a Filipino family, covered in tattoos that call way too much attention from his handsome features.

Saraya and Ruby Soho: Twins that look nothing alike except for their long black hair and brown eyes.

Sasha Banks: This woman from Boston has an attitude that will go nowhere in the industry but admittedly is beautiful

Charlotte Flair: This girl from ironically Charlotte North Carolina, is another plain blonde woman.

Bayley: I have nothing to say other than her side ponytail is a crime against humanity.

Elton Prince and Kit Wilson: Boyfriends who scarily remind me of the power couple Aragorn and Legolas Greenleaf, this two hail from Britain.

Jordan Devlin: Another with an attitude problem and a pretty face who happens to be my little brother, help me

Damian Priest: Tall and handsome, yet quite terrifying to look at!

Roman Reigns: Looks like Jason Mamoa with a horrible man bun as well! Is this actually in now or am I going crazy????

Becky Lynch: With mousey hair and a hell of a wardrobe, Steph and Chyna may need more help. Also my little sister CHRIST.

Zachary Wentz: Our last contestant who missed out of last year's competition, he happened to be the boyfriend of previous contestant's Wes Lee and Trey Miguel, his long hair also is basic!

#my writing

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blorbocedes · 11 months

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Couldn't find the post that the previous ask was referring too, but in case it hasn't come up: throughout the entire season of gntm the boyfriend was only referred to as "honey" by everyone. Too this day i don't know his real name.

Also seeing blorbocedes talk about gntm, specifically honey, is not something i would have expected, love the crossover! Can we also talk about how leni klum is the most disappointing nepo baby? How are your parents heidi klum, who has about 18 years of GNTM war crimes to her name, and fucking flavio briatore, and you're still boring??? go girl give us nothing

this is prev post context ^—^

i watched a ton of America's and Britain's next top model. (Allison Harvard should've won!!!!!)

not too familiar with the German version but is Heidi Klum as much of a menace as Tyra Banks??? I'm pretty sure that show violated Geneva conventions.....

flavio and heidi war criminal 4 war criminal... also let's be Real flavio deadbeat dad bc he's too busy his real babygirl fernando alonso. this new crop of nepo baby models aren't just giving like the hadids did...

#germany's next top model #blorbocedes ask

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halfwayt0sanity · 1 year

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I met Andi in 1977 at the Hockey Club THC Mettmann in the Zweite-Herren — men's second division. Andi was also allowed to play in the first division, he was a good striker. I, on the other hand, was a goalkeeper in the second division. I didn't think it was so bad to play in the second division because they drank more alcohol than those in the first division, who took the sport very seriously. After training, the older guys used to buy rounds of beer, the two of us never had to pay for anything. I regularly rode home from the club on a small motorcycle that leaned sideways, which I inherited from my brother Mike. My father was worried that the sport would cause blood circulation problems to his boy.

The motorcycle thing was less dangerous than it sounds. My small Fantic motorcycle only reached 23 km/h since Mini Frielinghaus tried to increase the previous top speed of a dishonorable 45 km/h by improving it. Mini only said: "It's an Italian model. Nothing can be done."

The second problem with the motorcycle was that it wasn't a normal size, but rather it seemed to be made for children. It had very small wheels and was painted in candy color, snail's pace no longer made a big difference. When Andi and I came back from training, he used to ride his bike faster. He lived in Schillerstraße street, less than 500 metres from my house. We visited each other almost every afternoon and I showed him my new vinyls. As I went to school in Düsseldorf, I had an advantage over my friends from Mettmann when it came to music. My trusted salesman, from the Rock On vinyl store on Schadow Street, received new merchandise direct from London every Friday. The tall Wolla would then reach over his counter bar and whisper confidentially: "Hey Andreas, the new Devo stuff arrives in yellow vinyl next Friday, there's only 1000 copies. Shall I reserve one for you?"

The new Devo stuff in yellow? Not bad; on the other hand, I still needed Fulham Fallout by The Lurkers and I only had 20 DM left until next month. I helped my mother at home by picking blackcurrants, increased my budget to 30 DM and bought both vinyls. The very limited yellow copies of Devo remained in the shop for three more years and were soon available at half price.

On the other hand, Andi and I — two kids with acne and spiky hairstyles. We dyed each other's hair with cheap dyes, which we found in the supermarket and always made us look sick. We were never accompanied by girls, but always by our Ramones vinyls in plastic bags. Maybe we were boys to look twice, but Mettmann's girls never looked at you a second time.

For the summer vacations of 1979, we got BritRail tickets, which we used to travel free of charge on every train in Britain. As much as we had been planning the trip for weeks, it wasn't until two hours before departure that I started packing my backpack. Obviously, half of the clothes, which I put in at the last minute, turned out to be useless in the end. Can opener, corkscrew, cutlery, toothpaste — all that I had to borrow from Andi. Anyway, I packed my father's very old four-person tent, which he probably still had from the Second World War. Unfortunately, at the train station in Düsseldorf, the tent turned out to be too heavy, so we left it lying on the platform.

We wanted to travel throughout England at all costs. Our stated goal was to see as many Punk bands in as short a time as possible. After getting off the ferry at Dover and passing through security checkpoint, we went to the nearest newsagent to buy the New Musical Express, which was the best weekly music magazine in England. Unlike German music magazines like BRAVO or Musikexpress, the NME, as it was called, had a serious newspaper format. It was our reliable compass in the sea of new Punk bands constantly emerging from England. You could also get the NME in Düsseldorf at the train station, but the newest issue was always the previous week's edition.

On the train from Dover to London, we opened the most important page for us: Nationwide Gig Guide, to find out which band was playing when and where. The Piranhas in Brighton on Monday, UK Subs in Leeds on Tuesday, The Extras in London on Wednesday, Adam & The Ants in York on Thursday, Sham 69 in London again on Saturday, etc. In the capital, the Punk movement was leaving its peak behind and the first bands, such as the Sex Pistols, had already broken up again. In other cities, things were just getting started.

Punks with their radical attitude to class struggle contrasted staunchly and with vociferous resistance to "Maggie" Thatcher's Britain. Punk was perceived worldwide, but in the late '70s it was a very English and thoroughly political issue. They shouted No future against the Hippie slogan Love & Peace. The concerts weren't meant to be just nice evenings with music, they served as a meeting place for those who were disgruntled. Not only with their lives, but with everything: the lousy job, the shitty flat, the incomprehension of their parents shaking their heads. They wanted to fight against all that, no matter how they sang: No more heroes and Do something. They started occupying buildings and founding organisations such as Rock against Racism and the Anti Nazi League. In 1977, that stance hit me like a bombshell. I felt like a blind man who could suddenly see. I went to the hairdresser, paid 5 DM, got my hair cut and took part.

Our clothes were our uniform and sympathisers recognised each other immediately, even if they had never seen each other before.

Sitting on the London Underground with Andi, we were approached by a group of Punks: "Alright, lads? You got some fags?"

"Sorry, we're not smoking...", Andi replied. We struck up a conversation with the group and one of them asked where we were going. His hair was shaved and dyed leopard print and he wore an angry red leather jacket.

"To the Rainbow to see Sham 69.", I replied.

"To see Sham? Are you crazy? A bunch of Skinheads from the National Front announced their presence tonight and there's going to be a lot of fuss. Come with us. We're going out to Ashford to see the UK Subs. We'll all be there tonight." As intimidated as we were, Andi and I didn't hesitate for too long.

"No, thanks. We have to go there today.", I replied. Another guy shook his head and said: "Don't do it... but it's your decision. We warned you. If you change your mind, just go later. The Subs take the stage at nine p.m."

They got off the train at the next station and Andi and I continued alone to Finsbury Park, where the Rainbow Theatre was. Sham 69 was one of my favourite bands. Unfortunately, they decided to split up. It became impossible for them to do a show without massive violent fights because also the Skinhead scene demanded Sham and their singer Jimmy Pursey for themselves. That's why during the shows there were real battles for the band. Pursey and his musicians tried to pacify the groups and came up with a song called If the Kids are United, but the attempt failed brutally. Before long, Sham 69 had the same problem as English football clubs at the stadiums. This didn't detract from their legend.

"Andi, if they end up killing us over there... We have to see that band once in our lives. I'd never forgive myself if we don't go now because we're cowards."

"I'm going with you.", Andi replied and with that he anticipated the future credo of the Hosen Alle oder keiner (Everyone or no one), and so we hesitantly walked along Seven Sisters Road to the Rainbow Theatre. Originally, this theatre had been a gigantic cinema with a capacity of almost three thousand spectators. There were already a lot of people outside: Skins, Rockers, also ordinary people, but, as the guy in the underground had predicted, unfortunately very few Punks. We picked up our tickets at the pre-sale and passed through the entrance control without any problems. All quiet so far. I thought nothing could happen to us once we were inside. The security at the Rainbow was going to keep an eye on things.

How wrong I was! As much as they had a bunch of tough guys and boxers among them, security guards didn't even stand a chance. The night got off to a quiet start. A band called The Low Numbers put in a lot of effort, but the disinterested people stayed at the beer stands and preferred to sing football chants. Andi and I stood downstairs in the centre of the room, above us was a huge balcony packed with fans and sometimes a glass of beer would fly down. Good mood.

Until Sham 69 took the stage and all hell broke loose. Right in front of the stage everyone was moshing, but only a few metres further back, in the dark part of the hall, wild fights broke out, in which different groups were involved. Sometimes, the ones who were downstairs tried to storm the balcony and the ones who were upstairs jumped to the ground floor and made their way to the stage, punches were flying everywhere.

Escaping to the exit now seemed impossible, all the ways were blocked. The only ones who seemed to remain untouchable in this mess were a group of biker-rockers, who apparently nobody wanted to mess with. Fifteen to twenty people, long hair, leather caps, thick rings on their fingers and easily ten years older than anyone here. They were standing relaxed with their girlfriends in the background against a wall and watching what was going on calmly and in anticipation.

Andi and I stood next to them and struck up a conversation with one of them. He had tattooed neck and arms and was 6'2" tall. We tried to look like we belonged to their group. Surely they must have found it amusing.

"It's a bit of a rough evening, isn't it? We're from Germany, we don't know what's going on." The rocker smiled at us. Big crooked teeth, also some golden ones among them. He inmediately understood what was going on. "You stay with us, mate.", he said and put us behind him and among his friends.

All around us, panic was spreading. After five songs, in the middle of Hersham Boys, the band had to stop their show. Jimmy Pursey shouted into the microphone for them to stop fighting and left the stage with his band. The situation calmed down for a moment, the thugs seemed hesitant: punching or live music? After that pause and a few more messages, Sham 69 tried to continue with their show. Hardly had they reached the second chorus and it was all one big massive battle again.

Jimmy Pursey angrily shouted: "We tried to give you everything. You fucking cunts will never understand! You fucking ruined it all!"

He turned around, ripped the drum off the bottom of the drum kit and threw it into the crowd. Chaos! They pulled down an iron curtain in front of the stage, security guards took cover at the back, the fights in the hall continued and slowly moved outside.

At an opportune moment, Andi and I said goodbye to the rockers and ran through the emergency exits, into the street and to the underground station, but the police had already closed it as a precaution. We kept running down the street until we could get on a bus, which stopped at a traffic light. Behind us, there were still chase scenes, but we had made it. A skinhead, who was also at the concert, got on the bus with us. Apparently, he wanted nothing to do with the trouble.

He gasped: "What a waste. It was Arsenal against Chelsea fans. The gooners won." Apparently, the Arsenal Skins wouldn't tolerate Chelsea fans on their turf. Andi and I looked at each other shaking our heads. Maybe we should have gone with the London Punks to see the UK Subs, but then we had to laugh at ourselves. Sham 69 — we saw them!

However, from now on only Punk shows, no Skinheads, please, because it was always like that, no matter where we went, we always felt part of a group. Among us Punks there was an implicit solidarity, also in this context was Us and them, us against all the others, as I got to know later at away games in football. As soon as a patrol car turned the corner to check on us, the whole group gathered closer together, closing ranks. We knew that if they tried to take just one of us, we would all be in the same bag.

As we wanted to invest all our money in concert tickets and vinyls, unfortunately there was no money planned for accommodation in the budget. We planned to have my father's tent. We had to get a new one in London, an early blow to our travel savings. Over the next few weeks, the new and much lighter tent went into action in various places: on a golf course in Scotland, in the front garden of a house in Brighton or in York City Park — even though the Yorkshire Ripper, the serial killer, supposedly was around at the time.

A good alternative to the tent was to sleep on trains. We once went on the Flying Scotsman to Edinburgh, only to return to London the same night. That way we also went to Liverpool, where we stayed at the station for a few hours. Lime Street Station was the first, and for the moment the only, thing I knew of Liverpool. To explore the city, we lacked the money, and neither talk about having to watch a football match, plus it was summer and football was in recess.

So we took a train back to the south and slept for a few hours. We brushed our teeth and the most important things of personal hygiene in public toilets, that's why we preferred cities on the coast, where the conditions usually were better. Sometimes, we also went to the sea and had breakfast on the beach. Our breakfast was white bread and jam for 14 days, but Andi dropped the jar of jam on the sand on the second day and, as we didn't want to invest two precious pounds to buy another one, from now on it crunched between our teeth when we chewed it. Two pounds could have been two vinyl "Singles" in a Record-&-Tape-Exchange shop. After the trip, I didn't eat any more jam for many years.

There were also days when no band we were interested in was playing in the whole of Britain. On those days, we spent our time with a very special game: In the morning, we would bet on where we would end the night and whoever's bet got closest to the destination train station, which we had chosen by rolling a dice, would win. There were tough negotiations.

Andi: I'll bet my new Single Tommy Gun by The Clash on Exeter. If I win, I get your Buzzcocks."

Me: "Are you crazy? Buzzcocks? It's limited. If you win, I'll give you la Cortinas — that's enough! Anyway, we're going to end up in Ipswich."

So we sat on the platform. Two teenagers from Germany wearing torn t-shirts and carrying heavy backpacks and big bags with vinyls inside. We took two dice, first to sort out the platform we were going to get on and then the number of stops we were going to travel. So, sometimes, we ended up taking the slow, regional train to a suburb of London, nothing more, but it also took us to the north of Scotland, to Inverness. The lightness of simple being.

From Campino's book 'Hope Street: Wie ich einmal englischer Meister wurde' (2020)

#die toten hosen #campino #andi #hope street

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topmodelcentral · 2 years

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Tiffany Pisani

~ Britain and Ireland (6) ~

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scotianostra · 1 year

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On November 15th 1824 Edinburgh’s Great Fire began.

The fire lasted for five days and destroyed many historic buildings on the Royal Mile. Fires were not an uncommon occurrence in early 19th century Edinburgh, thanks to the city’s many wooden buildings – particularly in the overcrowded Old Town. But the Great Fire of 1824 was the worst the city had ever seen, burning for five whole days. The fire broke out on the evening of Monday 15 November 1824, in John Kirkwood’s engraving workshop on Old Assembly Close. The alarm was raised at 10pm, but by midnight the fire had spread to three nearby tenements, engulfing all six stories of the buildings in flames. Despite 10 fire engines (and soldiers from Edinburgh Castle) arriving quickly on the scene, the fire had destroyed much of the south side of the High Street within just a few hours.

The Old Assembly Hall was completely destroyed during the night, and by noon the next day the fire had reached the Tron Kirk on the Royal Mile. The historic spire of the Tron Kirk caught fire and began to pour molten lead onto the street below. When the church’s spire finally collapsed, many citizens were convinced that the fire was a vengeful act from God. A divine punishment

By that evening, a second fire had broken out on the top floor of an 11-storey tenement on the corner of the High Street and Parliament Close. Many saw this second blaze as further proof that Edinburgh’s citizens were experiencing divine punishment from God – but, in reality, it was probably caused by a smouldering ember drifting from the original fire into the building.

Firefighters tried to save Parliament Hall and the Law Courts, but their attempts were largely in vain. This area later had to be rebuilt, and is now known as Parliament Square. Those tackling the blaze did, however, manage to prevent the flames from reaching the iconic St Giles Cathedral. Other buildings destroyed included the shop belong to John Kay (a famous caricaturist and engraver), James Boswell’s birth place, and the offices of the Edinburgh Courant, one of the city’s top newspapers.

Of course you can always rely on it to rain in Scotland and thanks to a heavy downpour of rain on Wednesday evening, the fire was brought largely under control, although small blazes did continue to burn. The final smouldering ashes were not fully extinguished until Friday 21 November – over five days after the fire broke out.

Over 400 homes were thought to have been destroyed, with between 400 and 500 families left homeless and injured. Thirteen people died in the Great Fire of Edinburgh, including two firemen who were attempting to tackle the blaze. Over the following few days, engineers from Edinburgh Castle and the Royal Navy were employed to tear down the burnt remains of all the destroyed buildings along the Royal Mile. The cost of the damage was thought to be around £200,000 – an enormous sum for the time.

Just two months prior to the Great Fire of Edinburgh, the city became the first in the world to have a municipal fire service. It was founded by James Braidwood, who was just 24 years old at the time. Since the fire service was so new, many of the firefighters had not yet received full training, and struggled with the enormous scale and ferocity of the blaze. The young fire master, Braidwood, was heavily criticised by the public, but an enquiry after the disaster found that he and his firemen were not to blame.

Other public officials (such as bailies and law officers) had given contradictory instructions to the firemen, which had caused confusion. As a result of this, a new regulation was passed to state that the city’s fire master was to be given complete control of all firefighting operations during an emergency. Thanks to Braidwood’s pioneering work, this model for a municipal fire service (headed up by a knowledgeable and experienced fire master) was adopted all across Britain.

Braidwood later went on to help establish the London Fire Engine

Establishment, which would eventually become the London Fire Brigade. In 2008, he was honoured with a statue in Edinburgh. Parliament Square was chosen as its location, to pay homage to the work Braidwood and his crew did to save St Giles Cathedral.

Three of the pics are by the noted photographer and artist David Octavious Hill.

More detail about the fire, with a few differing numbers, and about James Braidwood here

https://www.firehouse.com/…/rekindles-hall-of-flame-superin…

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thebadwitch · 10 months

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girls will say they want to live a healthier lifestyle then lay on the sofa watching britains next top model all day

#i love problematic reality tv shows!!!!!!

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it-took-one-bite · 1 year

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I’ve been watching every series of Britain’s next top model on repeat for the last few weeks. I LOVE IT 😍 one of the judges said one of the girls should do swimming to sort out “X”. I think of that whenever I want to cancel swimming.

#disorder eating #disordered eating mention #disordered eating thoughts #3atingdisord3r #an0rex1a #not pr0 just for myself #pr0 ana diary #an0r3xic #ana rant #tw ana related #tw ana thoughts #tw eating issues #tw ed vent #anarecyx #4n4mi4 #ana trigger #3d

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endbuzz · 2 years

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Lore Preview: Corporations

Well before the explosion of technomancy in the witching world, corporate empires towered in the sky. Their power fell over people in waves, with once-in-a-lifetime opportunities plucking young people out of the gutter and bankruptcies sending them straight back. As their long fingers of influence spread across the continent and the world, fueled by the electricity of technomancy’s birth, there emerged three leading cities in the UK: London, Manchester, and Glasgow. The strong devoured the weak, until a few frontrunners found themselves sitting at the very top of the peak, whispering in the ears of politicians and throwing gold (and a quiet ruin) at any problem that might stand in their way.

Continue reading below the cut!

With Britain suddenly a home to new innovation, with new jobs emerging by the day, immigration skyrocketed. Those seeking opportunity flooded into the cities, and housing became a dire issue. With scarcity of most everything, the people living on the streets soon found themselves living off the ground, higher and higher until the sway of the buildings could be seen with the blustery winds of rainy days. Communities have sprung up all over, winding round the city like weeds choked of sunlight.

MANCHESTER’S BIG HITTER: BLISHEN METALWORKS

They began their life right in Manchester, founded by Chistopher Blishen in 1851. The silent cofounder, Xurl, was a highly skilled goblin; when he is mentioned at all, it is said that he is nowhere in the paperwork because the laws at the time prohibited him from business ownership. From humble beginnings in repair work and watchmaking, they made enhancements and innovations that put them - and Manchester - on the map. A longstanding tradition of pocket watch gifting as a witch comes of age has been cemented by their craftsmanship, only made possible by Xurg’s lifetime of study in metal-charming.

After Christopher’s death in 1880, Goblins were no longer welcome to apply to work with them. As one of the few businesses to welcome creatures into their ranks, it was taken as a blow to the wider community. This caused a great deal of tension in Manchester, and it wasn’t until the advent of Tickers, technomancy-infused pocket watches, that they changed this policy again. It is a tense proposition for these Goblins who work within Blishen’s walls; working in the business built on the back of their ancestors’ knowledge, many feeling it has been every bit stolen from them, it is a powderkeg.

This company is widely rumoured to spy on users of Tickers.

One of the few corporations to provide allocated housing, a towering megastructure that was stark white when it first sprang up, Blishen sees witches and Goblins living side by side. The party line is that they do so in harmony, but the reality is much more fraught.

GLASGOW’S BIG HITTER: PROTEGO INC

Though they have been around for a long time and under many names, first conceptualised by Artair McLean sometime in the 1890s, their real start wasn’t until 1920. It was well known that one could barter protective magics and wards from this business, even for a time specialising in bodyguards, but it was Grindelwald’s cut across Europe that saw business booming.

The next witching war brought further business, and the model changed altogether. Sewing discord and damaging competition was more lucrative for them than investing in innovation, and so it was by consuming other businesses that they became the main interest in Glasgow - and across the country.

Technomancy saw further changes to their business, with the PearlDust virus offering a great bright window of opportunity. Their work in wartime defenses is all but forgotten, traditional magical research at a near standstill, as they funnel their time and workforce into securing technomancy’s many conduits.

This company strongly lobbies against legislation regarding technomancy and conduits.

It is telling that many of Protego Inc’s highest paid employees specialise in proprietary law. With their research departments going wildly underfunded as they cannibalise and buy out other companies left, right, and centre, their focus has shifted almost entirely to locking down the products they’ve made or obtained. It is a sad truth then that there is a trickle of skilled programmers and inventors leaving the business - with little to turn to but the many hacker collectives springing up around Glasgow.

LONDON’S BIG HITTER: CHIRON

The youngest of the corporations listed by far, but perhaps the most insidious and streamlined. So named for a renowned healer, established in 1965, this corporation has never strayed from their sleek centaur branding. They have a team hard at work developing new augmentations, and a fleet of technomancy healers, often called Renders, who install them.

With a lack of competition, prices have surged. This has led to a surge of unlicensed Renders, sometimes leading to unforeseen side effects or complete rejection.

Those who take advantage of the services they offer have the choice of opting into a payment plan, with interest. These plans are subject to steep consequences, including but not limited to forceful surrender of the augmentation and loss of any equity offered. For all that people fear losing their homes and their valuables, there is nothing quite like the fear that runs cold across a person when a Collector comes knocking. The augment is claimed back with no replacement offered, and the client is often left with the outstanding balance of this butchery.

Despite this, the company emphasises their healing influence, and makes great efforts to appear charitable. They also heavily lobby for longer sentences for people supplying and receiving unlicensed augmentations based on Chiron technology, and worse for backalley Renders.

The landscape of London has changed drastically for their presence, with the housing situation reaching critical levels and many living in houses shared between several families. Those who seek privacy must seek it above the smog line, in high rises that seem to creak from a breath pulled in too sharply.

A quick note: Goblins are playable characters.

#ENDBUZZ #updates #lore preview #marauders rp #hp rp #Harry Potter rp #cyberpunk rp #Jcink rp #site buzz

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