Britney Spears and her security staff denied knowledge this week of the pellet-gun shooting of a photographer who was staking out a private baby shower for the singer in Malibu. Paparazzi photographer Brad Diaz said he was struck in the thigh by a pellet on Saturday outside the mansion where the pregnant star was visiting and enjoying a party thrown for her.
A new Rolling Stones' song titled Sweet Neo Con appears to take a swipe at so-called US neo-conservatives, many of whom are well known supporters of US President George W. Bush.
An excerpt from the song was published by Newsweek magazine this week, the magazine describes the Stones' hard-hitting lyrics as "political."
PHOTO: AFP
US Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice are three well-known members of Bush's inner circle considered by political analysts to be leading lights of the neo-conservative movement.
"You call yourself a Christian, I call you a hypocrite/You call yourself a pat-riot, well I think you're full of shit," the song says, according to Newsweek.
Stones' frontman Sir Mick Jagger told Newsweek with a laugh, "It is direct."
PHOTO: REUTERS
Jagger also took a dig at fellow band member Keith Richards, who lives in the US.
"Keith said, `It's not really metaphorical.' I think he's a bit worried because he lives in the US," Jagger reportedly joked.
The song is being released on the Stones' new album, A Bigger Bang which is due out in early September.
Pop-rock group The Magic Numbers, riding high in the charts in Britain this summer, is boycotting Top of The Pops after a presenter remarked in rehearsals how beefy its members are.
The half-male, half-female quartet from west London were looking forward to performing their hit Love Me Like You on this week's edition of the venerable BBC TV chart show, the Guardiannewspaper reported Wedesday.
But they changed their minds after Top of the Pops host Richard Bacon said the band -- who have no interest in shedding their scruffy looks or body fat -- had been put in "a fat melting pot of talent" during rehearsals.
"Due to derogatory, unfunny remarks made during the guest presenter's introduction to our performance, we had to make a stand and leave," the band said in an uncharacteristic angry statement.
"It was an important day for us and should have been special. We didn't take this lightly, but we stand by it."
A spokesman for the BBC said Bacon never intended to suggest The Magic Numbers were overweight, and only used the word "fat" as "a figure of speech re-ferring to the band's status."
The Magic Numbers won over fans with their performance at the Glastonbury festival in June, when their debut album entered the charts at number seven, and this week they feature on the cover of the New Musical Express weekly.
A cartoon which was banned from the BBC for its depiction of the pope as an immature brat is set to cause new controversy after it was confirmed it will be released on DVD in Britain.
Popetown, which features the voices of comedienne Ruby Wax as the pontiff and model Jerry Hall as a fame-hungry nun, was commissioned for digital TV channel BBC Three, but deemed too offensive for broadcast last year.
The 10-part animation, commissioned in 2002 before the death of Pope John Paul II, also features corrupt cardinals, plotlines about bestiality and an elderly pope bouncing around the Vatican on a pogo stick.
Roman Catholic groups campaigned against the US$3.6 million show. They said attempts to belittle the spiritual leader of the worldwide Roman Catholic Church would be unacceptable to vast numbers of the viewing public in Britain, where 6 million people adhere to
Catholicism. Joseph Devine, the Bishop of Motherwell, southeast of Glasgow in Scotland, said, "Many Catholics view this as an irreverent, gratuitous and publicly funded attack on their faith."
"It is impossible to imagine a similar irreverent approach being taken to Islam or Judaism."
Rapper 50 Cent's autobiography is a modern-day version of living the American Dream -- get your start by selling crack cocaine, make your escape through hip-hop music, and once you've made it big, peddle sneakers.
His book "From Pieces to Weight: Once Upon A Time in Southside Queens hit the shelves on Tuesday, and fans were lining up at a New York record store for autographed copies from the 30-year-old whose 2003 debut album Get Rich or Die Tryin has sold more than 12 million copies.
Sept.16 to Sept. 22 The “anti-communist train” with then-president Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) face plastered on the engine puffed along the “sugar railway” (糖業鐵路) in May 1955, drawing enthusiastic crowds at 103 stops covering nearly 1,200km. An estimated 1.58 million spectators were treated to propaganda films, plays and received free sugar products. By this time, the state-run Taiwan Sugar Corporation (台糖, Taisugar) had managed to connect the previously separate east-west lines established by Japanese-era sugar factories, allowing the anti-communist train to travel easily from Taichung to Pingtung’s Donggang Township (東港). Last Sunday’s feature (Taiwan in Time: The sugar express) covered the inauguration of the
The corruption cases surrounding former Taipei Mayor and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) head Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) are just one item in the endless cycle of noise and fuss obscuring Taiwan’s deep and urgent structural and social problems. Even the case itself, as James Baron observed in an excellent piece at the Diplomat last week, is only one manifestation of the greater problem of deep-rooted corruption in land development. Last week the government announced a program to permit 25,000 foreign university students, primarily from the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia, to work in Taiwan after graduation for 2-4 years. That number is a
This year’s Michelin Gourmand Bib sported 16 new entries in the 126-strong Taiwan directory. The fight for the best braised pork rice and the crispiest scallion pancake painstakingly continued, but what stood out in the lineup this year? Pang Taqueria (胖塔可利亞); Taiwan’s first Michelin-recommended Mexican restaurant. Chef Charles Chen (陳治宇) is a self-confessed Americophile, earning his chef whites at a fine-dining Latin-American fusion restaurant. But what makes this Xinyi (信義) spot stand head and shoulders above Taipei’s existing Mexican offerings? The authenticity. The produce. The care. AUTHENTIC EATS In my time on the island, I have caved too many times to
In a stark demonstration of how award-winning breakthroughs can come from the most unlikely directions, researchers have won an Ig Nobel prize for discovering that mammals can breathe through their anuses. After a series of tests on mice, rats and pigs, Japanese scientists found the animals absorb oxygen delivered through the rectum, work that underpins a clinical trial to see whether the procedure can treat respiratory failure. The team is among 10 recognized in this year’s Ig Nobel awards (see below for more), the irreverent accolades given for achievements that “first make people laugh, and then make them think.” They are not
RSS