https://app.portsmouth.co.uk/story/full_page_image/11th-march-2025-page-5_4f3907df/content.html
The News strikes again !!!
Yet another faux pas from the team at The News. Does nobody proofread their articles before publication?
5mm Screen?
25.4mm = 1 inch in old money.
So this new, “big” screen is less than one fifth of an inch!!!
What am I listening to ….
Assassing by Marillion from their 1984 album, Fugazi.
I saw this band live, back in the 80’s, at Portsmouth Guildhall. If my memory serves, they were supported by a local band, Rufus Stone.
What’s your all-time favorite album?
Such a hard question to answer.
My first response is “On The Threshold Of A Dream” by The Moody Blues first released in 1969. I certainly play this a lot so much so that I am on my 2nd vinyl copy, the first having worn out. I still listen to the album, but these days, I stream, using Tidal or Spotify.
A more considered response leads me to offer up “Foxtrot” by Genesis first released in 1972. I still have my original vinyl version but also have it on CD. Genesis are a band that I used to see live every time they visited Portsmouth. Pretty much an annual event, either at Portsmouth Guildhall or South Parade Pier.
Many other albums are jostling for that favourite spot. Amongst them, some of the great classics. “Dark Side Of The Moon” and “Echoes” by Pink Floyd, “Led Zeppelin II” and “IV”, “Aqualung” by Jethro Tull, “Tapestry” by Carole King, and the list goes on and on.
So to truly answer the question, I think “Foxtrot” by Genesis take the honour, but only just.
Music is such an emotive subject, and to nominate a favourite will always be coloured by how one is feeling, ones mood at any given time.
Ask me again tomorrow.
At the age of 96, by anyone’s standard, Tony Bennett had a good innings.
I had the pleasure of attending a Tony Bennett concert at Portsmouth Guildhall. This would have been in the early seventies. Well over forty years ago, when I was in my twenties.
Obviously, I don’t remember a whole lot about the show. I do remember that he only had a small band supporting him. That they opened for him and that I really liked the stuff they did. I also know how when Tony came on stage, he owned the stage, the auditorium, and the audience.
He was the consummate professional showman with a superb voice and his own style.
He will be missed, but he has left behind a huge legacy of recordings. Dip in, give them a listen.
On this day in 1864 a letter appeared in the Hampshire Telegraph drawing attention to ‘the monstrous evil which has been permitted to exist for a considerable time past without any effectual attempt being made to check it’.
The writer was referring to the nightly assembly on the main roads crossing Southsea Common of prostitutes of ‘the most vile and abandoned character’ who ‘assail every passenger, even in the hearing of the guardian policeman, with their filthy invitations, couched in language the most revolting and obscene’.
The preceding text was taken directly from The News. I have highlighted a few words and only suggest that the venue may have changed but you only have to visit Guildhall Walk when some of the noisier clientele spill out of the many hostelries. I am not suggesting that they are prostitutes but the language of some of the “ladies” can leave a lot to be desired and many of them are not wearing any more than the ladies of the night who used to frequent Southsea Common just a short walk away.
The following week the newspaper reported that ‘we understand that the authorities have given instructions to the police to remove these creatures from all places where they are a nuisance to passengers and more particularly from Southsea Common’.
WrAnTz 