All posts by annaz

Poor Gwen!

Magazines, Music

Exciting news! We bring you part 4 of the fantastic series “Magazines Butchering The Beautiful Visions Of Our Beloved Famous Ladies”. Tonight it is Gwen Stefani on the US version of InStyle. Now Gwen’s a very pretty and stylish lady. She seems to be the kind of girl that women admire and men fancy. And she’s got a lot of cool stuff going right for her at the moment – music, fashion, family and, er, some other stuff too I’m sure.

So why InStyle have decided to shoot her from this unflattering angle is beyond me:

InStyle - Gwen Stefani

Maybe InStyle photographers are like some secretly insanely jealous best friend. “Yeah, just drop your shoulders down a bit more…half close your eyes….point your nose at the camera…and GURN!!  Oh Gwennie you look gorgeous, that’s such a good photo! I’m going to put it up on MySpace so everyone can see how beautiful you look!” *sniggers*

Quick! Someone get this back on telly!

TV

British Comedy Awards 2007 

ITV have apparently dropped their broadcast of the 2007 British Comedy Awards, after finding yet more irregularities with telephone voting. Last year’s awards urged viewers to carry on voting for the People’s Choice awards, despite the fact that the last 30 minutes of the show wasn’t shown live, and lines for the vote had already closed. Honestly, what next? Is nothing sacred? You’ll probably find trouble with Blue Peter or something… Oh.

But the awards absolutely MUST get back on the television. They’re one of the funniest televised nights of the year as all the star guests sit in the audience getting really rather sozzled, leading to completely unpredictable jokes and speeches. Heck, even if Channel 5 picks it up, I’d still watch it.

And clearly the moral of this phone voting scandal saga is: don’t take part in any TV phone voting EVER, apart from maybe the Eurovision Song Contest which is of course highly reputable and deserves to have a very high number of phone voters across the continent. That’s what I do, anyway.

Hot New Artist

Music, TV

I know I’m new at this whole blogging thing, but I’d like to think that perhaps in the future I’ll be uncovering hot new musical talent as I trawl through the delight that is the Internet. And I’d like to start right here, with a young singer I’ve come across recently. Here he is, making his live TV debut, singing This Is The Moment.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUHomRLop7I]

Yeah okay, so it’s actually David Hasselhoff singing on the show on which he’s a judge, America’s Got Talent. Hmm. The Hoff. Singing. On a show called America’s Got Talent. Yep, that all blends together nicely. America sure do got talent.

How to get around the smoking ban

Music

Now, I don’t smoke. I don’t intend to start anytime soon…or ever, in fact. I’m much in favour of the recently introduced smoking ban in England, mainly for selfish reasons – I don’t come out bars/pubs/venues smelling like and ashtray, and my clothes don’t need to be entirely decontaminated the next day. BUT! I could see how smokers may be having some trouble adjusting. Sure, you can step outside for a quick ciggie break, whatver the weather, but what happens when you’re at an indoor venue from which you just can’t make a quick escape?

Easy. Be old. In a band. Full of other wrinklies. Light up on stage. Repeat til relaxed. You’ll get away with it, trust me. At least, that’s what the Rolling Stones’ band members Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood managed to do when they played a gig at London’s O2 Arena on Tuesday night.

Becks is back, alright!

Sport, The Beckhams, Uncategorized

David Beckham 

[The title of this post should be sung to the tune of Backstreet’s Back by The Backstreet Boys, incidentally. Heh. That’ll be in your head all day now.]

So this is Beckham’s first test for his long-haul commute from his new day-job in America back to his home country. After playing in against the New York Red Bulls at the Giants Stadium in New Jersey on Saturday evening, Beckham jetted off back to England to practise with the national team ahead of tonight’s friendly against Germany at the new Wembley Stadium. He’ll then jet back to Los Angeles to play against Chivas USA in a game on Thursday night.

Hey, it’s not so bad. I’m sure he’s flying all over the place in plush, first-class seats. My only worry is jet-lag – how’s he going to cope with that?! Sit him on the bench for the England, and he’ll probably dose off. And then he’ll be wide awake at 1am. Poor lad.

Pete Doherty: Prize Idiot, Lucky Idiot

Crazy, Music, They tried to make me go to rehab

Apparently, Pete Doherty ISN’T in jail. Yeah, who knew?! The number of times this man gets arrested on drug offences, you would’ve thought that at some point he might have received a sentence and be in some prison cell somewhere.

Well, that’s not the case…until this week! Ha ha! Or was it? Appearing in court at the beginning of August, on earlier offences, the judge warned him to kick his drug habit or face jail. But alas, early on Monday morning, after a somewhat shambolic set at the V Festival, Doherty was arrested again in East London, thereby breaching his bail conidtions.

So what do you think happens next? What do you reckon his punishment is? 1) He gets thrown into jail, never to be allowed out again? 2) Gets ordered to rehab forever and ever? 3) Gets forced to listen to one of his own records 4) Is made to read all the incredibly boring coverage of his and Kate Moss’s relationship?

Nope. It’s 5) Gets let off the hook. His case gets thrown out on a technicality – that he wasn’t presented before a judge within 24 hours of Monday’s arrest. Great.

Keira’s advice: become a stockbroker!

Crazy, Fashion, Film, Magazines

Keira Knightley 

Keira Knightley has slammed those seeking to be famous and given them an alternative career possibility instead: to go and work on the stock market. Err, okay. She also criticises those who concentrate too much on her looks. She says:

“Okay, I’m on the cover of a magazine but somebody else does the hair, and the make-up, and airbrushes me. It’s not me, it’s something other people have created.”

Too true! Look at some of the other examples on this blog – SJP, Christina Aguilera, Gwyneth Paltrow…sometimes these magazines turn their cover stars into someone else entirely!

Unless…is this a secret cry for help from Keira? Is there something underhand going on in the magazine industry? Perhaps all these fashion mags are undergoing some vast cloning experiment…and that’s why those on the cover always look a bit “odd”. Hmmm.

Or maybe Keira Knightley is just stunningly beautiful, and the magazines try and perfect her even more. Yeah, whatever. I like my “experiment” theory better.

Sarah Jessica Parker on ELLE UK – Your hair!

Fashion, Magazines

Continuing in the trend of magazines doing freaky things to our lovely celebrities is the UK edition of ELLE magazine. When photographing the cover of their latest issue, they’ve obviously played a nasty, nasty trick Sex and the City actress Sarah Jessica Parker. I can picture the scene – she’s come in, and they’re persuaded her to do some “test” shots. They insist the test shots would be better if she were wearing the dress. And perhaps some make-up. Ohanddidwetellyouthisistheactualcoverphoto:

ELLE - Sarah Jessica Parker

You can tell it by her facial expression: “Wait, guys, what?? But my hair! It’s greasy! I didn’t get a chance to wash it this morning!! Matthew was recreating his Ferris Bueller-talking-in-the-shower bit!”

Poor love. I’d be miffed, for sure. She should have read the latest edition of UK’s InStyle magazine (with another slightly “different” looking celeb – Christina Aguilera) – it has “16 super easy hair makeovers”.

Instyle Magazine - Christina Aguilera