Britney Spears: Bikinis and Boys

Britney Spears: Bikinis and Boys

Pregnant with Twins

First I would like to say to you lovely ladies pregnant with twins, it’s an incredible joy! When I brought my baby girls home from the hospital, they were a dream come true, they never cried. If they wanted a bottle, the would actually make the sound of “hey.” My nine-year-old son and husband and I couldn’t believe our ears. I also thought breastfeeding would be much more difficult than it was, but it wasn’t as hard as I thought it was going to be. It’s been a complete joy taking care of and watching these little angels grow.

On the other side of the coin, I’ve heard some nightmare stories from other mothers with twins. I believe the one thing I did different that most women probably don’t do or are not aware of is pregnancy meditation.

Before getting pregnant, I was a strong advocate and practitioner of daily meditation, even if it was only for 10 to 15 minutes a day. When I got pregnant, I continued to do relaxation meditation daily with music therapy. And once I became about 18 weeks pregnant, I started using prenatal speakers along with my meditation so that my babies, too, could benefit from the extraordinary calming effects of meditation.

Along with proper pregnancy exercise and nutrition, pregnancy meditation is one of the best things you can do for creating calm and healthy babies. Just 15 minutes a day can reduce stress and pregnancy anxiety. It has been clinically proven that meditation reduces the stress hormone, Cortizol, and increases the calming hormone, Melatonin, helping to minimize complications in pregnancy.

The Blonde Flight Attendant

An airline captain was helping a new blonde flight attendant prepare for her first overnight trip. Upon their arrival, the captain showed the flight attendant the best place for airline personnel to eat, shop, and stay overnight. The next morning as the pilot was preparing the crew for the day's route, he noticed the new stewardess was missing. He knew which room she was in at the hotel and called her up to ask what happened to her. She answered the phone, crying, and said, "I can't get out of the room!" "You can't get out of your room?"; the captain asked. "Why not?" She replied, "There are only three doors in here," she sobbed, "one is the bathroom, one is the closet, and one has a sign on it that says 'Do Not Disturb'!"

Remembering Michael Jackson (1958-2009)

Remembering Michael Jackson (1958-2009)

Michael Jackson is reportedly in the hospital after suffering a heart attack.

The "Thriller" superstar's aides frantically called an ambulance to come to Jackson's Holmby Hills mansion in Los Angeles earlier today, according to TMZ.com.

Reports suggest the singer's condition was so bad, medics were forced to administer CPR en-route to a nearby hospital — to keep him alive.

Jackson's worried family members are allegedly rushing to his bedside.

Earlier this month, family insider Arthur Phoenix told WENN the superstar was in a bad way and should not be considering a 50-concert run in London, scheduled to start in July.

He insisted the concerts would not happen, stating, "Michael is not mentally, physically or spiritually ready for these shows. There's something missing in his soul... It's over! There are family members who feel the same way but they're afraid to speak."

Phoenix fears the pressure of the comeback and the upcoming shows have taken their toll on the 50 year old.

2009 MTV Movie Awards Press Room

Taylor Lautner with Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson in the Press Room at the 2009 MTV Movie Awards. Gibson Amphitheatre, Universal City, CA.

HOT CELEB BIOGRAPHY

Secret of a happy married life

Once Banta asked Santa, "What is the secret behind your happy married life?"

Santa said, "You should share responsibilities with due love and respect to each other. Then absolutely there will be no problems."

Banta asked, "Can you explain?"

Santa said, "In my house, I take decisions on bigger issues where as my wife decides on smaller issues. We do not interfere in each other's decisions."

Still not convinced, Banta asked, "Give me some examples" Santa said, "Smaller issues like which car we should buy, how much amount to save, when to visit home town, which Sofa, air conditioner, refrigerator to buy, monthly expenses, whether to keep a maid or not etc are decided by my wife. I just agree to it"

Banta asked, "Then what is your role?"

Santa said, "My decisions are only for very big issues. Like whether America should attack Iraq, whether Britain should lift sanction over Zimbabwe, whether to widen African economy, whether Sachin Tendulkar should retire etc. Do you know one thing, my wife NEVER objects to any of these".

Monitoring Website Popularity

For first time Bloggers, a free Blogging web site is a great entrance to getting started in the Blogosphere. Popular Blogging web sites like 'Blogger' allow users to setup and host a blog for free.


This encourages people to set up a Blog, whereas the fact that one of these sites can insure you with all of the apparatus that you need to get your Blog up and without spending any money means that you have nothing to lose by starting a blog. The fact that it is so easy to find a way to Blog for free is one of the reasons why so many people who have never had any other kind of web experience before find themselves drawn to blogging.

By signing up with a free Blogging site, you may find it easier to get listed in search engines than you would if you were starting your own blog from scratch.
For example, Google runs the free Blog hosting site Blogspot and crawls its pages very often looking for updates, if your site is hosted by 'Blogspot' you are partly guaranteed to be listed on Google's Blog Search Engine. This easy access to search engines can take some of the work out of promoting your Blog, and can help you gain a following with a minimum of marketing effort.

Once your blog takes off, you will probably be able to sell enough advertising space to be able to afford to buy a domain and pay for a hosting package, and still have money left over. However, it does not make sense in most cases to invest in these glossy luxuries before you have a monster readership.

Then You Got Monitoring Website Popularity That Set!

Walks Into a Bar... String Style

A string walks into a bar with a few friends and orders a beer. The bartender says, "I'm sorry, but we don't serve strings here."

The string goes back to his table. He ties himself in a loop and messes up the top of his hair. He walks back up to the bar and orders a beer.

The bartender squints at him and says, "Hey, aren't you a string?"

The string says, "Nope, I'm a frayed knot."


Secret Of Sucess

Aishwarya Rai and Abhishek Bachan Mobbed

Abhishek drove her down to their new abode and Ash seemed very pleased with the way things turned out. After doing a thorough run-through of their house, the Bachchan couple decided to have a high tea together to celebrate. And since their sea-facing view is to die for, they brought out chairs on their first floor balcony and were sipping on their tea. But very soon, they were spotted by a group of bystanders and a huge crowd gathered outside their bungalow and began calling out to the Bachchan couple. Abhiash initially indulged them, by waving out, but as the crowd started growing they disappeared behind the curtains and before anyone could figure it out, they vamoosed through the back entrance.

If the Bachchans are looking for some peace and quiet, they aren’t finding it here for sure. But at least their behavior won them fans with the traffic department unlike Salman, who lives down the road, and puts up a show in his balcony for the onlookers, creating traffic jams.

Jennifer Hudson is engaged for the second time

Jennifer Hudson is engaged for the second time -- the singer/actress proposed to her partner David Otunga eight months after he popped the question himself.


Hudson has now returned the favor with her own romantic gesture -- proposing to her fiancé on his birthday.

The Oscar winner presented Otunga, 29, with a diamond engagement ring last month.

The news was confirmed by jewelry mogul Neil Lane, who designed the band at Hudson's request.

Where the husband?

Three women sit in a beauty parlor talking about their husbands. The first woman says, "Last night my husband said he was going to his office, but when I called they said he wasn't there!"

"I know!" the next woman says, "Last night my husband said he was going to his brother's house, but when I called he wasn't there."

The third woman says, "I always know where my husband is."

"Impossible!" both women exclaim, "He has you completely fooled!"

"Oh no," says the woman. "I'm a widow."


Men/Women Jokes

Vin Diesel

Full Biography
An overnight action film sensation who intrigued audiences when he seemingly emerged from nowhere in the summer of 2001, Vin Diesel actually made his first mark on the movie business as a filmmaker. His first two independent films screened at the Cannes and Sundance Film Festivals after which the hulking, clean-shaven actor was snapped up by Hollywood and transformed into a movie star with high-octane hits “The Fast and the Furious” (2001) and “XXX” (2002). Diesel went on to receive decent reviews for his dramatic performance in “Find me Guilty” (2005), and found box office success with the Disney comedy “The Pacifier” (2005), but audiences were generally reluctant to accept him in anything but sequels to his breakout action films. The super-hype that surrounded the actor’s instant stardom quickly gave way to borderline has-been status, with the Diesel’s steadiest success coming in the form of seemingly endless revivals of his two best-known characters.

Born Mark Sinclair Vincent in New York City, NY on July 18, 1967, Vin Diesel began acting with the Theatre for the New City at the age of seven. After studying English at Hunter College, he began penning screenplays and making films. His short "Multi-Facial" debuted at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival and his first full-length feature, "Strays" (1997) premiered in competition at the Sundance Film Festival. Written, co-produced, directed and starring Diesel, "Strays" was an ensemble drama about male friendships that many compared – sometimes unfavorably – with "Saturday Night Fever" (1977) and "Diner" (1982).

Diesel gave another strong performance in the ensemble of the Wall Street-centered thriller "Boiler Room" (2000), but his true breakout came with his starring role as hard-driving car thief and street gang racer Dominic Toretto in the surprise summer blockbuster, "The Fast and the Furious" (2001), in which The New York Times critic Elvis Mitchell characterized Diesel as a "slacker Robert Mitchum, if that's not redundant." Diesel became an overnight sensation that summer, with the relative unknown fueling curiosity about himself by evading questions about his sexuality and his ethnic background, revealing only that he was part Italian and considered himself “a person of color.”

Appearing in only a brief cameo in the 2005 sequel “The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift,” Diesel tried to explore new territory with the sci-fi thriller “Babylon A.D.” (2008), adapted from the novel Babylon Babies by Maurice Georges Dantec. Diesel received a critical drubbing for the second-rate offering and retreated to a surefire hit territory by finally reprising his role in the fourth sequel “Fast & Furious” (2009), which reunited the cast of the original film. Unsurprisingly, the film broke box office records and reinvigorated Vin Diesel’s reputation as an action star. Meanwhile his distinctive voice continued to be one of his most valuable assets, and he lent it to the animated film “Rockfish” (2009) and video games “The Wheelmen” and “Chronicles of Riddick.”

HOLLYWOOD ACTRESS PROFILE

LATEST MOVIES UPDATE

HOLLYWOOD FILM REVIEW

Lymelife (R) -Movies

Two families fall apart when precarious relationships, real estate problems and Lyme disease converge in suburban Long Island in the late 70s.

Russell Crowe

Blonde in a Barber Shop

A blonde walks into the hairdresser with headphones on. She asks the woman working there for a haircut. The blonde sits down in the chair. The woman takes the blonde's headphones off and cuts her hair. At the end, the woman asks how she likes her hair but, to her surprise the blonde is dead! The woman picks up the headphones and listens.
She hears: “Breathe in...breathe out...breathe in...breathe out."

premiere of hannah montana movie

Premiere of 'Hannah Montana The Movie

Miley Cyrus and Billy Ray Cyrus at the Los Angeles Premiere of 'Hannah Montana The Movie'. El Capitan Theatre, Hollywood.

Movies

Entertainment

Flight Attendant

An airline captain(Mr Bean) was helping a new blonde flight attendant prepare for her first overnight trip. Upon their arrival, the captain showed the flight attendant the best place for airline personnel to eat, shop, and stay overnight.

The next morning as the pilot was preparing the crew for the day's route, he noticed the new stewardess was missing. He knew which room she was in at the hotel and called her up to ask what happened to her. She answered the phone, crying, and said, "I can't get out of the room!" "You can't get out of your room?"; the captain asked. "Why not?" She replied, "There are only three doors in here," she sobbed, "one is the bathroom, one is the closet, and one has a sign on it that says 'Do Not Disturb'!"

Cheating Wife -Jokes

Robert Pattinson-Millions Of Teenaged Girls Around The Globe

In the tried and true nature of all movie magic moments, it only took one film to turn Robert Pattinson from featured player to the idol of millions of teenaged girls around the globe. The British actor, who prior to 2008 was best known as the doomed Cedric Diggory in “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” (2005), was cast as Edward Cullen, the romantic vampire hero of “Twilight” (2008).

Full Biography
In the tried and true nature of all movie magic moments, it only took one film to turn Robert Pattinson from featured player to the idol of millions of teenaged girls around the globe. The British actor, who prior to 2008 was best known as the doomed Cedric Diggory in “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” (2005), was cast as Edward Cullen, the romantic vampire hero of “Twilight” (2008). The news of the casting sent shockwaves through the young adult community that worshiped the novels by Stephanie Meyer on which the film was based, and who quickly elevated Pattinson to favored pin-up status. The buzz around Pattinson seemed to solidify what the British press had ordained him in 2005 – a “Star of Tomorrow.”
Born Robert Thomas-Pattinson on May 13, 1986 in London, England, he was raised in the suburb of Barnes by his parents, Clare and Robert Pattinson. Acting captured his fancy at an early age and soon supplanted schoolwork as his sole focus. As a teenager, he joined the prestigious Barnes Theatre Club, which gave him an education in classic drama. A casting agent saw him in a production of “Tess of the D’urbervilles” and encouraged him to pursue performing as a career. He made his screen debut in 2004 in a German TV production of the epic fantasy “Ring of the Nibelungs,” which aired in the United States as “Dark Kingdom: The Dragon King” in 2006. Pattinson also landed a minor role as a younger version of James Purefoy’s character in Mira Nair’s adaptation of “Vanity Fair” (2004), but his scenes were left on the cutting room floor.

Immediately after returning from the South African set of “Nibelungs,” he was awarded the role of Cedric Diggory in “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” for director Mike Newell. Diggory, the hero of rival wizard school Hufflepuff, was Harry’s opponent on both the Quidditch field and in romance, as he trumped Harry’s two wins at the TriWizard Tournament by squiring the young hero’s beloved, Cho Chang, to the Yule Ball. Diggory’s moment in the sun was short-lived, as both he and Harry faced down the sinister Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes). The villain’s henchman, Peter Pettigrew, dispatched Diggory, who was mourned by the entire school. The press, in its raves over Newell’s film adaptation, singled out Pattinson for his charismatic performance, and some went as far as to name him a “future Jude Law.” The Times Online also bestowed the “Star of Tomorrow” award upon him.

Pattinson’s sudden popularity afforded him some choice roles post-“Potter.” He was top-billed as a shell-shocked World War II airman in the supernatural thriller “The Haunted Airman” for BBC Four, and later played a nerdy student with a crush on his teacher (Catherine Tate) in the highly rated drama, “The Bad Mother’s Handbook” (2007) for ITV. That same year, he returned briefly to the wizard world with a flashback cameo as Diggory in “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.”

Profession(s):
Actor, model

Sometimes Credited As:
Robert Thomas-Pattinson

Family
sister:Lizzy Pattinson
sister:Victoria Pattinson

Education
Barnes Theatre Company London, England

Txtra Celebs Gossip Hare-comic relief s celebrity climbers begin ascent

Cheating Wife

The Policeman had stopped the man for obvious drunken driving, but since the guy had a clean record, he made him park the car and took him home in the patrol car.

"Are you sure this is your house?" the cop asked as they drove into a rather fashionable neighborhood.

"Shertainly!" said the drunk, "and if you'll just open the door f'me, I can prove it to ya."

The police officer followed the man as he shakily negotiated the stairs to the second floor.

The drunk pushed open the first door they came to.

"Thish ish my bedroom," he announced. "Shee the bed there? Thast mine! Shee that woman lying in the bed? Thash my wife. An' see that guy lying next to her?

"Yeah?" the cop replied suspiciously. Beginning at this point to seriously doubt the man's story.

"Well, thash me!"

blond Jokes

Comic Relief's celebrity climbers begin ascent

The intrepid stars started their ascent of Africa's tallest mountain at 0600 local time (0300 GMT), a spokeswoman for the expedition said.

The nine-strong group, including Girls Aloud's Cheryl Cole and Radio 1 DJ Chris Moyles, are raising cash for this year's Red Nose Day Campaign.

It will take them eight days to reach the summit of the 19,340ft mountain.

Speaking before they set off, spokeswoman Kristina Kyriacou said: "They've had a briefing from Jeremy Gane, a tour operator who is leading the climb - it will be the 21st time he has climbed the mountain.

"They've also had briefings from two doctors who will go with them.

"They will trek through the rainforest, where it will be very hot and humid - they won't go any faster than the slowest person. It should take three days to get to base camp."

The celebrity BT Red Nose Climb team boarded a Kenya Airways flight on Friday evening for their 10-day expedition.

Goody in hospital for operation

Terminally ill reality TV star Jade Goody has been admitted to hospital for more surgery to relieve "awful pain", her publicist Max Clifford has said.

The 27-year-old former Big Brother contestant returned to the Royal Marsden Hospital, in south-west London, on Sunday evening.

She had spent the day in agony at an Essex hospice, said Mr Clifford.

The mother-of-two has only weeks to live after her cervical cancer spread to her liver, groin and bowel.

Clifford said he had had a "very emotional" phone call with Goody, who was first diagnosed with cancer last year.

"She has a great deal of pain from her tummy and they don't seem to be able to get it under control," he said.

Goody had been expected to return home from St Clare Hospice, in Hastingwood, Essex, on Monday.
But Mr Clifford said doctors had explained that surgery was likely to be the best option.

"I think it's just to get her out of this awful pain that she is in," said Mr Clifford.

He added: "It's a continuing process but we hope they will be able to get things under control. She wants to go home. She doesn't want to be in hospital.

"She's very frightened. She was sobbing on the phone to me. She said: 'Why can't they get me out of all this pain?' Hopefully that's what they're going to do."

Goody is due to be christened next Saturday at a church close to her home with her sons, Bobby, five, and Freddie, four.

She also plans to record a television interview with Piers Morgan for ITV early next week, Mr Clifford said.

Peru film wins Berlin Golden Bear

The first Peruvian film in the festival's main competition, it tells the story of a young woman who was born of her mother's rape in the 1980s.

It beat hotly-tipped The Messenger, starring Woody Harrelson, and My One and Only, with Renee Zellweger.

The runner-up Silver Bear was shared by Uruguay's Gigante and Germany's Everyone Else.


Hit picker
The Messenger, which sees Harrelson play an army officer assigned to inform the next of kin about soldiers killed in combat, won the Silver Bear for best script for writers Oren Moverman and Alessandro Camon.

Sotigui Kouyate from Mali won the Silver Bear for best actor for his turn in London River as a French Muslim waiting for news of his son after the deadly bombings in London in July 2005.

The film also stars Brenda Blethyn and is directed by French-Algerian Rachid Bouchared.

The best director Silver Bear went to Iranian Asghar Farhadi for About Elly, the story of middle-class Iranians whose trip to the Caspian Sea turns to tragedy as they try to uphold their social customs.

British actress Tilda Swinton was this year's jury president.

The Berlin Film Festival is in its 59th year. Part of its appeal is its reputation for often picking out future hit films.

Last year's winner of the Golden Bear was The Elite Squad, a violent tale of corrupt drug-squad officers in Brazil.

The UK's Sally Hawkins was best actress for Happy-Go-Lucky. Last month she also won the Golden Globe for best comedy actress for the same role.

Iran's Reza Naji won best actor at Berlin last year for The Song of Sparrows.

US film-maker Paul Thomas Anderson took the prize for best director for There Will Be Blood.

Its star Daniel Day-Lewis went on to win an Oscar for best actor.

Narnia series continues voyage

Fox replaces Disney, which bowed out in December citing "budgetary considerations and other logistics".

The second film in the series, Prince Caspian, made $420m (£295m) compared with the $745m (£523m) made by 2005's The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

The next movie is due to be released in 2010, Fox said.

The Narnia movies, which have won an Oscar for make-up, cost Disney and co-producers Walden Media an estimated $180m to $200m (£126m to £140m) to produce, and both films went on to become top DVD sellers.

No information has been released about the production costs for the new film which sees the Pevensie children take another member of the family - cousin Eustace - into Narnia.

Delhi 6-Movie Preview

Cast: Abhishek Bachchan, Sonam Kapoor, Waheeda Rehman, Om Puri, Amitabh Bachchan
Directed by: Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra

Delhi 6 is a black comedy that exposes people's hypocrisy. In today's world, we are often quick to judge people, but if we look at ourselves very closely, we often find that we're not being fair to others.

Delhi 6 revolves around Roshan, a young American boy of Indian origin. He comes to India for the first time, to drop off his ailing grandmother. She wants to die in her own country, and so prepares for the inevitable.

Having led a western lifestyle, an America-born Roshan is unaware of the sights and sounds, the food and culture, the religion and beliefs that make up Indian society.

After arriving in India, he engages with his grandmother's neighbourhood. He soon mixes and becomes part of the community. But little does Roshan know that this jovial and gregarious group of people have another side to them - they have decided to take advantage of Roshan's naive nature.

The story is shown against the backdrop of the ancient city of Delhi (which is totally different from New Delhi). The city is almost a character in itself, representing the chaos of India, the people, their religions and their beliefs.

The pin code of this old city is 110006. With pride and love they call it Delhi 6.

The film puts across a message that we are quick to judge others, without seeing our own weaknesses. Delhi 6 is directed by Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra and could very well prove one of the biggest movies of 2009.

Most Famous Man

One day many years ago at a school in South London a teacher said to the class of 5-year-olds, "I'll give $20 to the child who can tell me who was the most famous man who ever lived."

An Irish boy put his hand up and said, "It was St. Patrick." The teacher said, "Sorry Alan, that's not correct."

Then a Scottish boy put his hand up and said, "It was St. Andrew." The teacher replied, "I'm sorry, Hamish, that's not right either.

Finally, a Gujarati boy raised his hand and said, "It was Jesus Christ." The teacher said, "That's absolutely right, Jayant, come up here and I'll give you the $20."

As the teacher was giving Jayant his money, she said, "You know Jayant, since you are Gujarati, I was very surprised you said Jesus Christ."

Jayant replied, "Yes, in my heart I knew it was Lord Krishna, but business is business!"

Funny Jokes

Ex-Sugababe Mutya Buena on Big Brother

Ex-Sugababe Mutya Buena has walked out of the Celebrity Big Brother house just hours after Tina Malone was evicted.

Mother-of-one Buena, 23, left after saying she did not want to spend another day away from her family.

She had been nominated for eviction, along with outspoken Liverpudlian Malone and had threatened to go anyway if she was not picked.

But the "Shameless" actress was ousted by the public after receiving 39% of the vote.

Family reasons

The pair, along with TV presenter Ulrika Jonsson and former Liberty X singer Michelle Heaton, had faced the chop.

But when they found out Malone was leaving, Buena said: "No way am I staying a day longer, I've already told them I don't care what I lose.

"If they want to fight me they can. I'm not unpacking my suitcase and that's it. I'm going."

Afterwards she went to the Diary Room and said she had been thinking about leaving for several days.

Buena, who has a three-year-old daughter Tahlia-Maya, left at 2338 GMT on Friday.

She said: Thank you for the experience and making me realise what is important!

"I'm after a good night's sleep and want to go home."

Malone, who plays Mimi Maguire in the Channel 4 drama, screamed "Yes!" when her name was announced.

The 46-year-old told presenter Davina McCall the experience had been "cathartic" and she had been brought in to play the role of the "fat bird".

Malone said she was "incredibly relieved" that she was out and admitted she was fond of using strong language - something she gained a reputation for in the house.

She said she had toned down her personality for the show but added: "I use expletives not because I have a lack of vocabulary but because I am very passionate. I actually like them."

'Intimidated'

She had been nominated by Heaton, former A1 singer Ben Adams, and Austin Powers star Verne Troyer.

Heaton said she felt "intimidated" by the outspoken actress and accused her of creating a bad atmosphere in the house, while Troyer said she was "full of herself".

The eviction comes as media watchdog Ofcom confirmed it was investigating complaints about the behaviour of 1990s rap star Coolio on the reality show.

He has been accused of bullying female housemates, including one occasion where he teased Heaton about being in love with fellow contestant Ben Adams - reducing her to tears.

Meanwhile, Terry Christian has moved into second favourite position to win this year's series - with odds of 7-2, according to Ladbrokes.

Austin Powers star Verne Troyer is still the bookmakers' choice to win, on odds of 8-13.

Beautiful Models

Santa and Banta were looking at a catalog and admiring the models.

Santa says to the Banta, "Have you seen the beautiful girls in this catalog?"

Banta replies, "Yes, they are very beautiful. And look at the price!"

Santa says, with wide eyes, "Wow, they aren't very expensive. At this price, I'm buying one."

Banta smiles and pats him on the back, "Good idea! Order one and if she's as beautiful as she is in the catalog, I will get one too."

Three weeks later, Banta asks Santa, "Did you ever receive the girl you ordered from the catalog?"

Santa replies, "No, but it shouldn't be long now. I got her clothes yesterday!"

Stumbleupon

BBC Sound of 2009: White Lies

London rock trio White Lies have come second on the BBC's Sound of 2009 list, which features the best bands and singers to watch in the next 12 months.

One act from the top five is being unveiled every day this week, counting down to Friday, when the number one will be revealed.

While Coldplay and Arcade Fire have been writing and recording albums in churches, White Lies sound like they've recently emerged from a crypt.

Their doom-laden rock is full of references to plane crashes, murders, funerals, kidnappings and nervous breakdowns.

Even their most romantic song - new single To Lose My Life - has the refrain: "Let's grow old together and die at the same time."

And it's taking a toll on the band...

Vocalist Harry McVeigh says performing the group's bleak songs in concert can be "pretty draining".

"It's not always the most uplifting," agrees bassist and lyricist Charles Cave.

Reviewers seem to agree, too. Last October, the Guardian's Maddy Costa said watching the band was like living through "a horror movie in which a pre-pubescent choirboy, radiating innocence, becomes possessed and starts singing in a rumbling bass dredged up from five fathoms deep".

But, counters Cave, White Lies are not "dark people".

"It's really important for us to maintain a level of humour on tour," he says. "Because if we lived through the songs, we'd be basket cases."

Indeed, the trio - completed by drummer Jack Lawrence-Brown - are surprisingly upbeat in person, sharing a relaxed bonhomie that stems from having been childhood friends in west London.

They finish one another's sentences, correct each other's mistakes and joke that Cave should write a song called Butt Out to persuade McVeigh to give up smoking.

But there is no disguising the fact that White Lies take being in a rock band very seriously indeed.

They killed off their previous art-rock incarnation Fear Of Flying in 2006 and chose the name White Lies because, like their new miserablist sound, it represented something "seemingly innocent" with "very dark undertones".

Their conversation is peppered with references to the "integrity" of their lyrics and the importance of "working in isolation".

In fact, the group spent half a year labouring over their first five songs, and practiced for three months before their debut gig.

That sparked a record label bidding war, which eventually led to the band signing to Fiction records - home to Elbow and Snow Patrol.

Almost inevitably, this sparked a backlash before the band had released so much as a guitar riff, with one blogger complaining the group were "contrived" as a "PR man's dream".

As a result, the group are now wary of being tipped as the next big thing.

"I don't think there really should be lists that predict people's success," says Cave.

"I think we'd all rather turn up next year and win a bunch of awards for the album that we've made."

Foreboding

All the same, Cave is "very confident" in the band's debut (also called To Lose My Life), which is a lean, muscular rock album full of stadium-sized guitar lines and deep, foreboding vocals.

It has already been compared to 1980s gloom rockers Echo & The Bunnymen, Joy Division and The Teardrop Explodes.

"I genuinely think that the only real similarity is a foreboding overall sound and the fact that Harry sings in a baritone," protests Cave.

In any case, McVeigh believes the comparison is flawed "because in most of the songs the chorus is up an octave".
"There are some songs which I actually struggle to sing, because they're so high. But people pick up on the fact that a lot of the verses are very low and deep."

If the band have a formula, it consists of dark, portentous verses which build slowly to a euphoric chorus.

But the music does not come easily. "We won't finish a song if we don't think it's going to be really good," says Lawrence-Brown.

"We never write for b-sides. There's only 10 tracks on the album."

The band's writing skills were severely tested when they were forced to come up with "five songs in three weeks" in order to finish their record.

"It was really stressful," says Lawrence-Brown. "But the best songs on the album were written in that period.

"You can hear that nervous energy. To Lose My Life, which is the next single, is really instant and that came together in a few hours, basically."

The group reckon they became "more confident" as a result - but the experience hasn't punctured their perfectionism.

"Eventually, we'll get to the point where we're able to have a couple of months in the studio," says McVeigh.

"I think that'll probably be a massively creative time for us."

By Mark Savage
BBC News entertainment reporter

Film restoration- Mission possible

Spencer Kelly visits the Warner Bros archive in Los Angeles to meet the people painstakingly restoring old films using the latest technology.

All film deteriorates, end of the story. The 1962 epic How the West Was Won is a case in point.

The last 46 years have not been kind to the reels of film making up the multi-Oscar winning epic - the colour has faded, the landscape is marred by dirt and scratches, and there are strange vertical lines in every shot.

Ned Price is part of Warner Bros technical operations team and he said he is usually dealing with films which are turning to "powder".

"I'm dealing with film which is dehydrated, shrunken and buckled," he said. "As that happens the film shrinks and warps at an inconsistent rate.

"We're now working on digital techniques to actually record it as it moves and morphs and then digitally, after the fact, sort of stabilise the image itself."

Rewind time

For all film studios, it is important that old classics look pristine when they are resold on DVD and Blu-ray.

The digital remastering process begins by scanning the reels of film, frame by frame at 2,000 pixels across, about the resolution of high definition TV.
At this resolution the machine can scan 18 frames a second, meaning the film moves through the scanner at about two thirds of the true speed. Every single frame can generate 13MB of data.

Increasingly, the studios are scanning at 4,000 and even 6,000 pixels across, in order to prepare the films for even higher resolution.

Scanning at these resolutions generates immense amounts of data - a typical 4,000 pixel film will take up at least 12TB, before any work is done on it.

Luckily, Warner Bros has a rack of machines which provide one petabyte (1000 terabytes) of storage.

Blemish spotter

One of the first people to see the scanned film is Cathy Quiroz, who spends her days looking for dirt and scratches in every single frame of film.

It is a semi-automated process - she spots the spots and the computer then borrows pixels from the frame before and after to mend the blemish.

Considering what is involved, it may be tempting to program a computer to take over from Ms Quiroz completely.

But Bill Baggelaar, a Warner Bros engineer, said the human touch is still very much needed.

"We can use computers to automate the process of dirt and scratch removal but we find that people tend to do a better job," he said.

"In The Wizard of Oz the computers wound up removing Dorothy's slippers from the shot entirely because they sparkled and were different on every frame. We wound up having to put them back into the shot."

Cinerama bother

How the West Was Won was more difficult than most to restore - three times as difficult in fact.

In order to dazzle audiences with super-wide vistas, the movie was filmed on three cameras positioned side-by-side, and then the resulting three rolls of film were stitched together and run through three adjacent projectors.

It is an effect called Cinerama and it has given colourist Ray Grabowski something to really get his teeth into.

Each frame is 6,000 pixels wide and since the three rolls of film have all aged differently, each third of a frame has faded or warped to a different degree.

Sitting at a desk that could have been ripped out of the Starship Enterprise, Mr Grabowski uses colour curves, scopes, and his keen eye to match the colour and contrast of each part of the frame.

"The first thing we'll do is adjust contrast to even out the blacks and whites so they're not clipped or just a weird colour," he said.

"From there we'll start to enhance the picture with colour saturation. We'll also work on skin tones, because those are very important."

The stitches between the three parts of the image also need to be removed. Using techniques familiar to the photoshoppers among us, he blurs the offending area of the image using a particular shaped mask.

Digital future

Digital restoration is certainly breathing new life into old timers, but will today's films ever need the same treatment?

More and more films are being shot digitally and even though most are still shot on film, these are routinely scanned to digital in order to edit and add CGI.

Carolyn Giardina of The Hollywood Reporter said many in the industry feel "film negative is still the only proven archival medium".

"With digital cameras there are films now which don't have any elements in film," she said.

"So there is enormous concern when they're looking into digital archiving. They feel none of the digital techniques are proven at this stage of the game."

Updated effect

It must be tempting to use computers for more than just clean up - maybe even to improve old special effects that are less than convincing by today's standards?

Chuck Dages, who works in Warners' emerging technologies department, said they were able to remove the strings operating the flying monkeys in the Wizard of Oz.

"Bad special effects are different than correcting or changing the story. In some instances it's just a natural thing: now we can do it, let's do it," he said.

The debate about how much technology should be used to improve on old masters is one that is likely to grow in the future.

Right now, it means that we can meet the Wizard with no strings attached, and Dirty Harry is not quite so dirty.

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