To the uninitiated Fela Kuti may sound suspiciously like some vulgar euphemism, but to music aficionados the name rings a resounding bell or better yet blows a bellowing trumpet, Fela standing firm and proud as one of the greatest artists to have hitherto graced the African or indeed any other of the continents. A multi-instrumentalist equally at home on the…
At the end of the seventh season of The Great British Bake Off, it wasn’t just the scones and quiches of losing finalists Jane and Andrew which were hastily thrown into the trash. The grand finale might have reached a record average audience of 14 million, but many more pounds was the cost of all the baking equipment tossed away…
When so-called football supporters began throwing coins inside the Olympic Stadium on Wednesday, and one of those coins landed smack-dab in a baby’s mouth – present partly because she is her father’s progeny, but also because she longed for a precious glimpse of the arena that housed Olympic heroes from before she was born – and when the baby, the coin…
Until now, UKIP have been the boys who cried wolf while somehow maintaining the whole of a nation in a state of all too credulous suspense. Culturally and financially, as the only group who provide a net contribution to the economy, EU migrants overwhelmingly benefit Britain, and six years of building towards a referendum would have been an almighty waste of…
To the tune: “Li’l baby, don’t say a word: Mama goin’ to buy you a mocking-bird. Bird don’t sing: Mama goin’ to sell it and buy a brass ring.” “Millennium,” yes; “pandemonium”! Roy Campanella leaps high. Dodgerdom crowned, had Johnny Podres on the mound. Buzzie Bavasi and the Press gave ground; the team slapped, mauled, and asked the Yankees’ match,…
As Hillary Clinton convulsed onto the stage in seizures ahead of the debate, followed by her almost erstwhile foe Donald Trump, who sniffled and sputtered the last air from his lungs, what has hitherto been hidden on the tumultuous road to the 2016 United States presidential election at once became eminently clear. For to paraphrase Walter Sobchak, descendant of Polish-Catholic…
Since its first iteration in 1972, the annual meeting of the world’s best female tennis players in what is today known as the WTA Finals has gone through a dozen names and almost as many locations, but it last featured a Brit back in 1984, when Jo Durie climbed as high as number 5 in the rankings. So British tennis fans were…
For most people, the prospect of a speech in front of any given group is enough to get the stomach churning and the butterflies aflutter. But imagine the sort of predicament which befell Theresa May, in real terms still finding her feet as Britain’s Prime Minister, when she found herself compelled to utter a few words in front of a…
Finding themselves in an especially intolerant mood at the moment, the Daily Mail and The Sun have been rounding on child migrants to Britain, accusing the majority of them of lying about their age. Almost 200 arrived amid the clearing of the Calais Jungle, vulnerable or with family connections already in the United Kingdom, but the Mail and the Sun…
It’s peace the sailor asks of the gods, when he’s caught out on the open Aegean, when dark clouds have hidden the moon, and the constellations shine uncertainly: It’s peace for Thrace, so furious in battle, peace for the Parthians, adorned with quivers, and, Grosphus, it can’t be purchased with jewels, or purple or gold. No treasure, no consular attendants,…
