1. Places I’ve called home….

    Thanks to Google Maps, most of the places I’ve called home over the years now have street views (always lo-fi, sometimes from odd angles, and sometimes obscured by trees). So I thought I’d compile a montage…..

    1. Taibach, Port Talbot, Wales (January 1973 – January 1980)
    2. Aberavon, Port Talbot, Wales (January 1980 – January 1991)
    3. Ynysybwl, Wales [Student Digs] (February 1991 – June 1991)
    4. Treforest, Wales [Student Digs] (September 1991 – June 1992)
    5. Central, Bristol, England (June 1992 – October 1994)
         Including working away at….
         a. Holiday Inn, Toulon, France (June 1993 – December 1993)
         b. Holiday Inn, Brest, France (January 1994 – April 1994)
    6. Stoke Bishop, Bristol, England (September 1994 – October 1995)
         Including working away at….
         a. Royal Norwegian Navy Officers Accommodation, Haakonsvern, Bergen, Norway (November 1994 – May 1995)
    7. Wells, England (October 1995 – July 1996)
    8. Shepton Mallet, England (July 1996 – June 1997) [Aerial view only]
    9. South Horrington Village, Wells, England (June 1997 – June 2001) [Aerial view only]
    10. Wells, England (June 2001 - October 2006) [Aerial view only]
    11. Cheltenham, England (October 2006 – Present)

    At 1 & 2 I was living with my parents, at 3 onwards I was living with the gorgeous love of my life, my partner, soul mate and best friend Victoria (http://hollygomadly.tumblr.com/).

  2. [Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

    Prince - Superfunkycalifragisexy

    From the legendary bootleg The Black Album. Planned for release on 7th December 1987 (apparently to be titled The Funk Bible), it was withdrawn a week before release, apparently after Prince had a bad ecstasy trip and became convinced that the album was evil or represented an ominous portent. This left only 100 promotional copies in circulation, with a black label containing only a song listing and catalog number in a black sleeve, that would be widely bootlegged in the coming years.

    Further evidence that Prince felt The Black Album was a mistake: After the last song on the album Rockhard in a Funky Place, after the album’s fade out, dissonant feedback fades in, followed by Prince saying “What kind of fucking ending was that?” before fading out again. Also, in his first music video Alphabet St. from his next album Lovesexy, Prince can be briefly seen holding an umbrella printed with the words “Don’t buy The Black Album. I’m sorry”.

    The Black Album was legitimately released by Warner Bros. Records in November 1994. It is believed that this release was legitimized so that Prince could get out of his new seven-album contract with the label that he had signed the previous year because he wanted ownership of his master recordings. However, it was later revealed that the release of The Black Album did not count toward the number of albums he owed to Warner Bros. Soon before its release, however, Prince started to appear with the word “slave” written on his face and changed his stage name to an unpronounceable symbol.

    Title
    Superfunkycalifragisexy
    Artist
    Prince
    Album
    Black Album

  3. hollygomadly:

    Stuff That Makes Me Feel Like A Freak Because Most People Like Them And I Don’t

    Ok so…..this post is about stuff most people love and assume (incorrectly) that everyone else does too. I can’t count the amount of times people have said to me “Oh…..so why don’t you like [x] then?” with an expression of “you weirdo” on their faces.

    Coffee
    I don’t passionately hate coffee, in fact, I rather like the smell of freshly ground beans. I’m just not enamoured with the taste of it, the bitterness mainly. I will drink it if there really is nothing else on offer but given the choice, I’d just rather not. I don’t like the ‘badger’s bum’ after-taste it leaves in my mouth and…….I can smell it in my pee.

    What realllllly cheeses me off though is how it’s the assumed (non alcoholic) social lubricant. “Do you want to come round for a coffee”, “Shall we meet for a coffee”, “There’ll be a break in an hour for coffee and biscuits”. Why can’t we meet for a ‘nice pot of tea’ or any other beverage for that matter? Eh?

    On the plus side though, because I don’t drink it I’m not addicted to its caffeine content. Suckaaaaaas :-P Ha Ha.

    Wine
    Flavour-wise I can take it or leave it. Some wines taste alright. Most taste and feel like battery acid to me, especially fizzy ones. I find wine to be very astringent and exceptionally dehydrating. It makes my head throb from lack of liquid before an evening is over and always gives me the hangover from hell. Iiiiiffff….I do drink it, I prefer red over white and never touch rose. It looks too much like your pee when you have cystitis.

    Much like coffee, it’s the assumption that it’s the drink of choice to have with a meal that bugs me. I’d much rather have something refreshing and thirst quenching. I find the snobbery and money associated with fancy bottles pretty disgusting too. It’s just a drink, get a grip people!

    Olive Oil
    In recent years there seems to have been an increasing trend in Britain of drizzling, bathing, and drowning food in olive oil. Yes, it has some nutritional benefits but come on, we don’t need a ton of it on everything, masking the other flavours and making everything…..oily. I’ve never liked olives anyway and if I find them lurking on food they get picked off and discarded like a crawly bug would. Yuck!

    I think there’s an element of snobbery too in having bottles of the stuff lined up on a kitchen shelf like faux cultural mascots.

    Perhaps it’s because all my absolute favourite foods that excite and inspire me are Asian. With wonderful colours, flavours and aromas. To me, French and Italian cuisine is just…..meh. And what flavours there are there, I’d rather taste than being suffocated with oil.

    The Sun
    Most people in Britain crave hot summer weather, but not me. Spring and Autumn are my favourite times of year when the temperatures are a cool but refreshingly pleasant 16-21 degrees centigrade. I like sunny days but not the summer sun.

    I hate being too hot. It makes me headachy and sweaty and grumpy. I don’t like craving shade and air conditioning. I don’t like how tired the hot sun makes me feel. I find sun-bathing incredibly boring and that’s the other thing…..the sun hates my skin. I have Northern European genes so my skin is very pale and so the sun smokes me like a hog roast.

    I actually got badly burned and had severe sunstroke one year after too much sun exposure. I was in agony and puking from both ends. Never felt so sick ever. I do envy people that really enjoy it but this fair maiden isn’t one of them :-)

    And Finally
    So after reading all this, you might think I’m a right grumpy old bastard ha ha :-) I’m actually not at all. I’m just…..um…….different. And I felt like having a rant about those things that set me apart from the majority (which is no bad thing really) :-D

    I totally concur…. the exact same list, the exact same reasons…. with a specific addition for myself of….

    Football/Rugby

    Specific to me, as a male, other males are confused when first you admit to not liking Football – but then, assume as I’m Welsh I must be into Rugby, so get totally freaked out when I also express my hatred of that. In fact, why limit this addition to just Football/Rugby, when it could be expanded to include all intellectually dim ball sports.

  4. The Bourne Legacy

    Not based on Robert Ludlum’s original novels (the Bourne Trilogy), and doesn’t even seem to be based on the fourth Bourne novel with the same name (written by Eric Van Lustbader).

    Not centred around Jason Charles Bourne (portrayed by Matt Damon), instead it is centred around a Operation Outcome (described as “Treadstone, [but] without the inconsistency”) asset called Aaron Cross (portrayed by Jeremy Renner).

    Not directed by Doug Liman (as The Bourne Identity) or by Paul Greengrass (as  The Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Ultimatum), but is directed by Tony Gilroy (screenwriter of the first three films).

    Yet in the current drought of quality films I’m still looking forward to its release in August.

  5. Prince - I Would Die 4 U

    “I’m not a woman, I’m not a man
    I am something that you’ll never understand
    I’ll never beat you, I’ll never lie
    And if you’re evil, I’ll forgive you by and by
    U, I would die 4 u, yeah
    Darling, if you want me to

    You, I would die 4 u

    I’m not your lover, I’m not your friend
    I am something that you’ll never comprehend
    No need to worry, no need to cry
    I’m your messiah and you’re the reason why
    ‘Cause you, I would die 4 u, yeah
    Darling, if you want me to

    You, I would die 4 u

    You’re just a sinner I am told
    Be your fire when you’re cold
    Make you happy when you’re sad
    Make you good when you are bad
    I’m not a human, I am a dove
    I’m your conscience, I am love
    All I really need is to know
    That you believe
    Yeah, I would die 4 u, yeah
    Darling, if you want me to”

  6. James Marshall “Jimi” Hendrix (November 27, 1942 - ∞)

    On this day sixty-nine years ago, the greatest electric guitarist to ever live, Jimi Hendrix, was born. Jimi Hendrix expanded the range and vocabulary of the electric guitar into areas no musician had ever ventured before. His boundless drive, technical ability and creative application of such effects as wah-wah and distortion forever transformed the sound of rock and roll. Hendrix helped usher in the age of psychedelia with his 1967 debut, Are You Experienced?, and the impact of his brief but meteoric career on popular music continues to be felt.

  7. hollygomadly:

    It’s Walter White (Bryan Cranston) from Breaking Bad.
    I love love LOVE this!!! Stunning work :-D

    Real art.
    None of this ‘piss some streaks of colour onto a canvas’ and have the nerve to charge a fortune for it.

  8. hollygomadly:

    Luc Besson - Writer, Director, Producer

    I mentioned in my previous cinema post “Lights, Camera, Action” that I have a huge appreciation for the great writer/director. There a few I admire and hopefully I’ll get around to doing a post for each one of them. I decided to make my first about Luc Besson as I’ve watched and enjoyed more films of his than anyone else’s. I wanted to include 14 films in this posting (not including sequels) but tumblr limits you to 10 images, so I’ve picked my favourite 10.

    I first became aware of Luc Besson when I saw “Leon” in 1994. I thought (and still do think) that it is a masterpiece in storytelling, directing, acting, cinematography, editing and soundtrack. Whilst waiting to make “The Fifth Element”, he wrote Leon for the actor Jean Reno, who had starred in many of his early works. In fact, the character Leon was loosely based on a minor lone hitman character played by Jean Reno in “La Femme Nikita”.

    With the advent of imdb.com in the late 90s I was excited to find out that a longer version had been released in France in 1996 “Leon: Version Integrale” with the extra 26 minutes that had been cut from the original release because of the reaction of US test audiences (grrrr). It took some tracking down but I bought a DVD copy from Canada of the Japanese release (which has the cover art of the photo I posted). Those extra scenes are fantastic and never should have been cut in my opinion. At least now you can see the full version in all its 1080p high def quality on the Blu-Ray release.

    Something quite amazing about Luc Besson’s portfolio is how versatile he his. He’s written some wonderful and quite diverse stories and when he directs, he gets right in there behind the camera and in the faces of the actors. IMDB credits him with 42 titles as writer, 17 as director and 102 as producer.

    I love his work and will watch pretty much anything that he creates. His ‘europeaness’ brings soul and depth to his American films that otherwise would just be bland action fests if driven by someone else.

    So if you’ve never seen Leon (especially the integrale version) I urge you to do it!! Also please watch his French language films with subtitles not dubbed (yuck).

    Next up: Quentin Tarantino

    Ditto - was with you all the way :-)

  9. Some of my favourite Florence pics from several years of NME shoots.

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