A milkman working his route during the London blitz 1940
Month: April 2022
British Accents: West Country
This series focuses on different accents from the United Kingdom. Many thanks to Tom for providing him fabulous WEST COUNTRY accent. Useful links are below: Want to sound British? Take our Pronunciation course: https://englishlikeanative.co.uk/onli…
Roger Stone claims a “satanic portal” has opened over the White House
Longtime right-wing “dirty trickster” Roger Stone appeared on the program “Elijah Streams”, claiming to have photographic proof that a “satanic portal” has opened over the White House.
Stone—who was convicted by a jury on seven counts of lying to Congress, witness tampering, and obstruction in relation to special counsel Robert Muller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election—claims to have become a dedicated Christian because God used Trump to pardon him for his crimes. In this capacity, Stone claims to have developed a new appreciation for the importance of waging “spiritual warfare” through prayer.
Source: RightWingWatch.org
Cynthia Plaster Caster broke the mold
Cynthia Plaster Caster was one of a kind, whether as an artist, performer, fan, or friend.
Kind. Funny. Genuine. A sweetheart, an artist, a legend. If the true sign of a life well lived is a tidal wave of emotional tributes when you die, then Cynthia Albritton—better known to the whole wide world as Cynthia Plaster Caster—lived a very good life. So much so that writing about her after her passing—she died at age 74 on April 21—poses a daunting problem. How can I adequately reflect the memories of the hundreds if not thousands of friends mourning her around the globe and all over my Facebook feed?
Cynthia adopted her nom d’art in the late 60s when, as a shy UIC art student and rock ’n’ roll fan, she came up with a novel way to fulfill a homework assignment. The task: make a plaster cast of something solid that retains its shape. The solution: create a mold using an erect penis. After lots of experiments with molding materials and a few attempts with male friends, she began her formal body of work in 1968 by casting Jimi Hendrix.
Instantly notorious as Cynthia Plaster Caster, she went on to cast dozens of musicians of the era, including guitarist Harvey Mandel and Wayne Kramer of the MC5. In 1969 she began a stint in Los Angeles as a protege of Frank Zappa, though she stopped making casts in 1971. She got back into plaster in 1980, but from that point onward her output was intermittent. After she returned to Chicago, her subjects were frequently local musicians, including Bill Dolan from 5ive Style and Jon Langford from the Mekons. In 2000 she expanded into casting the breasts of women in indie rock, such as Stereolab vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Laetitia Sadier and cultishly adored outsider singer Jan Terri. By the 2010s, her casting had tapered off to next to nothing.
In the intervening decades Cynthia spoke about her work at the School of the Art Institute, exhibited her “sweet babies” in gallery spaces, and gave interpretive readings of her journals that rivaled the best spoken-word performances. In 2010 she even ran for mayor. And she was a fixture on the local music scene, her infectious enthusiasm for music and musicians undimmed over the years, even as her fortunes waxed and waned.
I first met Cynthia in 1998, when she appeared on all-ages cable-access dance show Chic-a-Go-Go. In a duet with Ratso, the show’s puppet cohost, she crooned the title song from Stanley Donen’s 1967 Swinging London Dudley Moore-as-Faust vehicle Bedazzled. I later interviewed her for the zine I ran with some friends and, a few years after that, for the Reader—the latter on the occasion of her launch of a website selling limited-edition plaster-of-paris replicas of some of her more famous works of art. She hoped to raise funds for her Cynthia P. Caster Foundation, established to help struggling musicians and artists.
But I really got to know Cynthia while working as a bartender at the Hideout, where she would always sip her red wine through a straw so as not to ruin her lipstick.