Choking Allegations - Woman Accuses Eliot Spitzer Of Assault - Fox & Friends The MBTA has recently, though unofficially, indicated that late-night service may soon be a thing of the past. When T drivers most recently picked their shift preferences, the late-night shift was not offered, WHDH reported. That could be a sign that late-night service may soon be eliminated from the schedule altogether. RELATED:MBTA late-night service in trouble Joe Pesaturo, an MBTA spokesman, said in an email to the Boston Globe, that no decision has been made, and spring schedules do not...
Dont you just love receiving a Valentines Day card that reads Be Mine. Maybe not so much, even though its very cute and romantic, it is verypredictable.
via GIPHY
Well, this year you can play with your imagination and spice things up a little bit. Valentines Day cards doesnt have to be boring, especially for the dirty minded people out there, who like to be a little bit more lets just say creative.
7 Tips to Perfect Sounding Vinyl Records: Handling, Cleaning, Playing
In April of 1973, the New York Dolls recorded "Frankenstein," a theatrical number with a pounding beat, gothic overtones, and the crowd-pleasing opening line, "Something must"ve happened / Over Manhattan." When the Dolls released the song on their self-titled debut album that July, they had to append the abbreviation "(Orig.)" to the title, because two months earlier, the Edgar Winter Group had topped the Billboard Hot 100 with a different "Frankenstein" a million-copy selling instrumental with a killer drum solo.
Meanwhile, on a hot night in lower Manhattan, a record executive named Richie Finestra was so electrified by the sound of another monster rock and roll song that he arose from the rubble of a collapsed building like a lumbering, inhuman creature shocked back to life.
The Dolls are real, but Finestra is fictional. He"s the protagonist of Vinyl, the latest HBO period drama from the Boardwalk Empire team of Martin Scorsese and Terence Winter. Like Boardwalk, Vinyl weaves the imaginary into the historical, trying to include as many real people and places as possible. Finestra is the head of a made-up label, American Century, which has a roster of actual pop stars like Donny Osmond and England Dan & John Ford Coley.
In Vinyl"s two-hour premiere, a weakening American Century tries to poach Led Zeppelin from Atlantic Records in order to make the label more attractive for a buyout by worldwide-conglomerate Polygram. Zeppelin"s lead singer, Robert Plant, appears briefly as a character, as does the band"s notoriously volatile manager, Peter Grant. And the pilot is bookended by Richie stumbling into a New York Dolls gig, where he has an epiphany in the middle of a room-shaking performance of "Personality Crisis."
In other words, this show names names. It doesn"t merely allude to bands like Slade, Suicide, or ABBA; characters talk about them as though they could walk into the offices of American Century at any moment, like wacky sitcom neighbors.
Vinyl has been in the works for nearly two decades. It began as Mick Jagger"s idea for a film called The Long Play a Goodfellas/Casinoesque spin through the music industry from the 60s to the 90s. In 2007, Variety reported that Jagger, Scorsese, and journalist Rich Cohen had tapped The Departed screenwriter William Monahan to write the script. But the deal collapsed, so Scorsese and Jagger brought the project to Winter, who"d written the Oscar-nominated screenplay for The Wolf of Wall Street in addition to creating Boardwalk Empire. Winter, a TV veteran who developed his chops on David Chase"s The Sopranos, convinced his partners that this story was best suited for HBO. Last year, they finally shot a pilot for the newly named show, with no guarantee of a series pickup.
The first episode suffers a bit from that uncertainty about the show"s future, as Winter and co-writer George Mastras (a Breaking Bad alum) focus on world-building at the expense of storytelling. Perhaps in an effort to convince HBO of the show"s viability, the pilot loads up on characters and potential plotlines, but just marginally advances a few of them.
In addition to Richie (played by Emmy-winning Boardwalk Empire vet Bobby Cannavale), the premiere introduces Olivia Wilde as his wife, Devon, a former downtown scenestress adjusting to a sober domestic life in Connecticut. Also notable: Juno Temple as Jamie Vine, an American Century executive assistant with a deskful of hard drugs and a valuable connection to the younger generation; James Jagger (Mick"s son) as Kip Stevens, front man for a sloppy proto-punk act called Nasty Bits; Ato Essandoh as Lester Grimes, a gifted bluesman whom Richie groomed for stardom and then abandoned in the 60s; and Bo Dietl as Joe Corso, a mob-connected record promoter hired by American Century to placate angry, unstable radio-station-chain owner Frank "Buck" Rogers (Andrew Dice Clay). Ray Romano, Max Casella, J.C. MacKenzie, and P.J. Byrne fill out the background as Richie"s business partners.
That cast is terrific, though they barely get a chance to make lasting impressions. The female characters are particularly ill-served: Devon comes off as a standard-issue hectoring buzzkill, while Jamie seems to view s*x, drugs, and rock and roll as a means to an end, not as pleasurable activities in and of themselves. The richest supporting player so far is Lester, even if his primary function is to represent the compromises our hero made on the way to the top.
Trim away most of the side characters and Vinyl"s premiere tells a simple story. An ambitious music aficionado works his way up the industry ladder by selling out his taste and principles, and then, in 1973, finds himself on the verge of becoming a multimillionaire. The episode then closes with a bit of magical realism, as Richie takes in a New York Dolls show that literally tears the roof off, leaving him flat on the ground and covered in debris. What happens next should be clear: He"ll scrap the Polygram deal, then try to reinvent American Century as a home for the exciting new sounds of his city. But Winter and Mastras don"t tack on any kind of cliffhanger scene that says this directly, the way most TV creators would.
Some may take issue with that, but Vinyl"s pilot is a stunner anyway and the gutsiness of that ending is a big reason why. At times, this first episode resembles David Chase"s Not Fade Away, in that it"s a rambling hodgepodge made meaningful by a thrillingly poetic final scene. The closing sequence doesn"t come out of nowhere, though. Throughout these two hours, Scorsese, Winter, and Co. punctuate the action with a kind of Greek Chorus of musical interludes. Some are diegetic. Some are more fantastical like when an actress impersonating Ruth Brown sings "Mama He Treats Your Daughter Mean" in the middle of American Century"s Brill Building offices.
Scorsese packs as much style as he can into the production, despite working with a fraction of his usual budget and schedule. Cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto (who shot The Wolf of Wall Street, as well as Brokeback Mountain, 8 Mile, 25th Hour, and Scorsese"s upcoming Silence) keeps the frame moving, often to magnificent effect. The pilot is filled with memorable images, from gender-bending New York Dolls fans stepping over the camera to a jarring push-in on Lester when a mob goon crushes his windpipe. Scorsese also takes advantage of the extended length of this episode, lingering over the musical sequences, and letting the office scenes play out to capture the collegial rhythms of master schmoozers.
More importantly, the pitch of the pilot the "here"s a bunch of stuff we could do" of it all reveals just how well Winter and his team grasp this era. It"s not just the hairstyles, clothes, and graffiti-covered New York streets that Vinyl gets right. It introduces dozens of key details: The influence of the mob on the music business; the rebirth of payola in the form of "promotion"; the first flowerings of punk and disco in low-rent New York neighborhoods; the takeover of rock and roll by corporate-media conglomerates; and so on.
It remains to be seen how well Winter can put all these pieces together. Boardwalk Empire, as enjoyable and artful as it was, sometimes felt like an assortment of well-crafted parts in search of a machine. But it"s encouraging to see that Vinyl already has a point of view, and not one as reductive as "corporate rock sucks." This first episode is as much about Richie realizing that he needs a position of power to spread the gospel of rock and roll as it is about how each contractual concession leads to another. The show seems set to explore a big question: Can a bunch of businessmen reinvent themselves as idealists?
And then there"s the other big question: What is "good music?" A lot of scenes in the premiere have characters tossing the names of their favorite musicians back and forth, and at times, it seems like Vinyl"s writers are trying to establish how much they know. But there"s more to it than that. Those lists are like mantras, repeated as an act of spiritual centering. When Richie describes seeing Blackboard Jungle for the first time, or talks about borrowing his mother"s broom and pretending to be Bo Diddley, he"s reminding himself why he"s in this business.
Some of the episode"s best moments occur while Richie stands stock-still, hearing and seeing something that other people can"t. He does it when he hears ABBA"s first single. ("Three bars and I can tell they"ll be filling football stadiums," he says to his skeptical staff.) He does it when he stands in the wings of an arena, watching Led Zeppelin cover Eddie Cochran"s "Something Else." And he does it when the Dolls launch into "Personality Crisis." Whenever this happens, it"s like he"s hearing pop and rock for the first time. He"s trying to understand why he"s stirred.
Vinyl intends to document a time when rock and roll became sickly and cynical. But it"s also about the visionaries who want to demolish the beast and salvage its best pieces stitching back together the body, the brain, and the heart.
It"s Only Rock and Roll (But I Like It)
When Richie comes into the office at one point, he"s told that he"s missed calls from Lester Bangs and David Geffen. The episode doesn"t say whom he phones back first, but as Vinyl plays out, that choice will be key to the future of American Century. Who"s more important: a critic advocating for the raw poetry of primitive rock and roll or a music executive stoking the star-maker machinery behind popular songs?
The Zeppelin-poaching story line piggybacks on a real piece of rock history. The band"s original Atlantic contract expired in 1973, and other labels scrambled to sign them. Ultimately, as noted in the show, Grant used his leverage to get Atlantic to distribute Led Zep"s own label, Swan Song Records. This was a common story in the early 70s. Labels would lure artists to new homes, then promise them their own imprints. Jagger would know: the Rolling Stones" original Decca deal wrapped up in 1970, at which point they formed Rolling Stones Records, regularly reselling distribution rights and the back catalog to the highest bidder.
Think Nasty Bits sound a little too punk for 1973? Pay heed to Jamie, who compares them to the Neon Boys, the nascent version of the band Television. This episode also drops references to "Iggy" and "Lou," partly to remind sticklers that the Stooges and the Velvet Underground were very much a part of the musical conversation in the early 70s.
As near as I can tell, Lester Grimes"s song "The World Is Yours" (sung by Ty Taylor) is original to this show. And maybe an homage to Scarface?
Apparently, Richie has spent years claiming he went to Woodstock, but he spent that weekend in a hotel room with Devon. But you know who was there? Martin Scorsese, who took notes in his capacity as an assistant editor on the documentary Woodstock, and also helped tell director Michael Wadleigh"s cameramen what to shoot.
The two sequences where Richie"s team meets with Polygram"s German execs are a perfect example of Winter"s skills meshing with Scorsese"s love of improv, as the two groups passive aggressively poke at each other with funny, natural-sounding dialogue. ("No one knows more about hate than you. I mean not you specifically. Not specifically your generation. Thirty years ago. Like your father. But not him specifically.")
I looked at the cast list for upcoming episodes, and it appears that Vinyl will continue to tell this semi-true story with very real characters, such as Andy Warhol, Gram Parsons, Stephen Stills, and David Bowie.
The New York Dolls" debut album consists almost entirely of songs written by David Johansen, Arthur Kane, Sylvain Sylvain, and Johnny Thunders. The lone exception? The song "Pills," which is a cover of a 1961 single by Bo Diddley.
In October of 1973, Victor Erice"s arty coming-of-age drama The Spirit of the Beehive came out in his native Spain. The film follows two young sisters through the immediate aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, as they"re inspired to contemplate the meaning of life, death, and monsters after watching Frankenstein. Man, there was definitely something in the air that year.
Soundtrack to this review:
The Miamis, We Deliver: The Lost Band of the CBGB Era
The Edgar Winter Group, They Only Come Out at Night
Various artists, I Want to Take You Higher: American Soul 1966-1972
Various artists, Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era (1965-1968)
Various artists,The Wild Angels (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
"Reports on boxing for ESPN.co.uk, as well as several national newspapers"Has been reporting on British boxing for over 15 years"Appears on BoxNation"s Boxing Matters show
Jake LaMotta was Sugar Ray Robinson"s b****y Valentine 65 years ago in a savage world middleweight title fight.
"I fought Sugar Ray so often I almost got diabetes," Jake LaMotta has often joked and the most painful of those six fights was at Chicago Stadium on St. Valentine"s Day in 1951. It is one of the most famous fights in boxing history and LaMotta is still alive today to tell the tale.
The pair"s most famous fight ended when Robinson stopped LaMotta in a punishing 13th round to win the undisputed world middleweight title. LaMotta, now 94, has retold his version of events over and over, but the punchlines have never gone flat.
"If the referee had held up another 30 more seconds, Sugar Ray would have collapsed from hitting me," said LaMotta.
They fought six times over nine years and it pitched contrasting styles against each other: LaMotta, known as the Bronx Bull, was a rugged brawler while Robinson was a slick boxing genius based in Harlem.
In their second fight in 1943, Robinson lost on points for his first defeat following 40 professional wins. Robinson got revenge just 21 days later and in 1946 was crowned world welterweight champion.
But it was at middleweight that they met for the sixth and final time. LaMotta"s world middleweight title, which he won from Frenchman Marcel Cerdan in June 1949, was on the line and he was still the only man to have beaten Robinson.
Jake La Motta takes a stinging right from Sugar Ray Robinson in the third round.AP Photo
When they met to sign contracts for the fight, Robinson tried to psyche out his rival by drinking a glass of blood drained from a beef steak.
It did not spook LaMotta, who was his aggressive self on fight night, but he did struggle to make the weight for his third defence -- he was six pounds over the limit the day before.
Knowing this, Robinson"s strategy was to make the champion work in the early rounds and then take advantage as he tired. Robinson, 29, played the part of the matador to LaMotta"s Bronx Bull, but after eight rounds two of the judges had LaMotta ahead.
LaMotta, 28, then faded as Robinson"s stinging, accurate blows began to back him up. Robinson assumed control with his classical boxing skills and threw a dazzling array of punches from all angles in the 11th round.
It was not all Robinson in the 11th and earlier in the round LaMotta troubled the challenger with a barrage of blows on the ropes. However, by the end of the 11th Robinson was well in command of the fight.
LaMotta continued to take a beating in the 12th and finished the savage round wincing in agony from unforgiving blows to his ribs. With LaMotta offering nothing in reply, Robinson mercilessly unloaded a furious assault in the 13th.
LaMotta was a hard man in the ring with astonishing powers of absorbing punishment and told Robinson in between being hit: "You can"t put me down." And LaMotta was still on his feet when the referee stopped the fight in the 13th round following a thudding right and series of uppercuts that jolted his head in all directions.
Robinson landed at will in the 13th and it was a massacre that was sickening at the end. "He"s the toughest guy I ever fought, I never knew anyone who was more aggressive and rough as he," Robinson said years later.
The fight was named The St. Valentine"s Day Massacre after the 1929 shootout involving gangster Al Capone because of the b****y beating LaMotta took in the latter rounds of the fight. It was the last time they met in the ring and while more big fights lay ahead for Robinson, this was the last big bout for LaMotta who retired three years later.
LaMotta won 83 of 106 paid bouts, was world middleweight champion between 1949 and 1951 and made two defences. Robinson finally retired in 1965 after five reigns as world middleweight champion and one as welterweight champion (1946-1950), finishing his career on 173 wins, 19 losses and six draws with 108 knockouts.
Robinson won their six-fight series 5-1, but LaMotta has out-lived his old rival by more than two decades. Robinson, who died in 1989, is remembered as being the best pound-for-pound boxer in history and while LaMotta"s own career did not reach the same giddying heights as His Sugarness, he has had a remarkable life, part of which was portrayed in the 1980 film Raging Bull starring Robert De Niro and in 2012 -- aged 90 -- he married for the seventh time to Denise Baker, who was almost 30 years younger than him.
Nick Parkinson is ESPN UK"s boxing correspondent and the author of "Boxing On This Day".
Thanks so much to the children of the Philippines & @SaveTheChildren who made me this special valentine. #HappyValentinesDay Support @ bit.ly/hearts4kids
Posted by Enrique Iglesias onSunday, February 14, 2016
International singer Enrique Iglesias thanked kindergarten Yolanda survivors from Tacloban City after he received handmade Valentine cards from them for the day of hearts.
I am honored to receive these hopeful messages from children in the Philippines. My fans have embraced this project in more ways than I could have imagined, and their generosity is going to make a big difference for kids in crises, Iglesias said in an interview.
Iglesias is one of the many foreign celebrities who help children that have been affected by calamity in different parts of the world through the #Hearts4Kids T-shirt campaign in partnership with Save the Children, an international non-governmental organization that promotes childrens rights, provides relief and helps support children in developing countries.
The international recording star received the Valentine cards last Friday while he was on tour to promote his 10th studio album called s*x and Love.
Typhoon Yolanda took a tremendous toll on children. I would like to thank Enrique Iglesias for his support to the children of Yolanda and to vulnerable children around the world, said Save the Children Philippines country director Ned Olney.
The plight of the Filipino children is near and dear to the popstars heart as his mother is a Filipina.
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What could be more romantic than candlelight, red roses, the croonings of a barbershop quartet and a half-dozen beef sliders lovingly wrapped and delivered in tiny cardboardboxes?
Welcome to the Castle of Love.
White Castle has been puttingout the red carpetfor Valentines Day celebrations for the past 25 years, dimming the lights, setting up a hostess stand, decorating with red heart balloons and delivering thecheck on plates along withTootsie Rolls.
Robby and Marisa Nicholson of St. Paul went tothe White Castle on University and Lexington avenues in St. Paul on Sunday night for their fifth year in a row. They said they werent going to miss it for anything and were crossing their fingers that their baby due next week waited until after Sunday night.
We even had White Castle at our wedding, Marisa Nicholson said, noting they ordered a few suitcases of sliders delivered to their wedding reception close to midnight from the same White Castle location.
I told everyone, my big thing iscantmiss White Castle on Valentines Day, she said. Although my parents promisedtheyd bring it to the hospital if I went into labor.
This is our last date before the baby comes, Robby Nicholson said. Next year well bring him with us.
Once I have my White Castle, he can come any time, she said looking at her belly.
Each year, thecouple makes reservations for around 7 p.m. because thats when abarbershop quartet shows up and serenades diners.
Its a way to poke fun at a not-so-important holiday, Marisa Nicholson said. We arent fancy people.
It may not be a fancy restaurant, but that doesnt stop people from donning their fancy duds.
Several men wore tuxedos to dinner Sunday night, including Michael Warns.
Warns worea tux and his wife, Benita, worea floor-length skirt. Just like they do every year.
We always joke about things and that derision thing, Youre going to take your date to White Castle for Valentines Day? Benita said. So we came. Its a really camp thing to do. We decided to dress formally the first year, and it created quite a stir. We have fun no matter what we do.
The couple owns Mr. Michael Recycles Bicycles. Benita saidthat one year, when the temperature isa bit warmer and the roads areclear, they are going to rideto the restaurant on a bicycle a vintage red 1964 Schwinn Twinn tandem.
We love it, Benita said. We can really have a lot of fun without spending a lot of money.
Debrah and Tom Betz agree.
Weve been to a number of dinners that easily cost hundreds of dollars, and thats just ridiculous, Debrah Betz said. This is a funky thing to do. Its affordable and fun.
The couple began going to the event in 2007 but missed a few years when they moved to Oregon. Both said they are happy to be back.
We missed it, Tom Betz said.
John Lutgen, normally a kitchen worker but on this day a waiter, photographs Debrah and Tom Betz of St. Paul, celebrating Valentines Day atWhite Castle on University Avenue in St. Paulon Sunday.(Pioneer Press: Scott Takushi)
Debrah Betz collects posters advertising the event each year and brings them out to decorate for Valentines Day, along with a mini light-up White Castle she found on eBay.
Christine Lofton and as many as a dozen family members have reserved the same three to four tables for the past six years.
Its fun to come and be together, she said. Its inexpensive and good food. They do a good job.
Thebarbershop quartet, Noteorious,has been singing at the restaurant on Valentines Day for the past seven years.
We love to sing, said Ron Riley, one of the crooners who showed up Sunday night.
Reserved tables for a romantic interlude atWhite Castle are booked weeks in advance.
Manager Jesse Miller said his restaurant starts taking reservations Jan. 1. If you havent booked by the third week in January, youre usually out of luck.
The Valentines Day activities begin at 3 p.m. and last until 9p.m. During that time, the restaurant has booked up to 80 reservations, each one with between two and three people at the locations 14 tables.
Its sweet, simple and very family friendly, Miller said. Its a happy-go-lucky occasion. When someone says they havereservations at White Castle, that puts a smile on your face.
The fast-food restaurant has dessert covered, too. Diners can satisfy that sweet tooth with a shake, aBrownie-on-a-Stick or Cheesecake-on-a-Stick. Or all three.
People took to Twitter to share snapshots of their date.
One man wrote celebrating Valentines Day at Castle Du Blanc ahem White Castle.
The White Castle in Hopkins featured local pianist Sandy Atlas, who played for six hours for lovers of sliders.
Describing himself as a life-long piano man, Atlas said playing Sunday wastheright thing to do on a day dedicated to love and romance. Why not make it even more lovely with a little music?
Its been great, having Atlas, said manager Christie Tereault. We love having live entertainment. Its been another great Valentines Day. Its something different and special for our team and for our regulars.
Anthony Lenzen and Kendra Lundblad kissed after Lundblad surprised her boyfriend, a Chaska High School student, by inviting him to her Park Cottage Grove High School prom, during the Valentines Day event at White Castle on University Avenue in St. Paulon Sunday. (Pioneer Press: Scott Takushi)
For many couples, White Castle holds a special place in their hearts. Many have fond memories of first dates here, some even met for the first time at a White Castle and then theres the few who shared their wedding vows among friends and family in our dining room, said Jamie Richardson, vice president of White Castle. For a lot of our Cravers, White Castle is where they first met, so enjoying Sliders together on Valentines Day brings back a feeling of nostalgia. This is a wonderful event for many of our guests who have shared memorable moments at our restaurants over the years.
Nobody ordered the suitcase of sliders off the menu called a Crave Crate that contains 100 sliders. In case you are wondering, 100 sliders is equal to 13,960 calories. But whose counting calories on Valentines Day?
