Monday, February 06, 2012
Sunday, February 05, 2012
Saturday, February 04, 2012
Santorum To Gay Man: You Don’t Deserve ‘Privilege’ Of Marriage Because Gay Unions Don’t ‘Benefit Society’
Santorum To Gay Man: You Don’t Deserve ‘Privilege’ Of Marriage Because Gay Unions Don’t ‘Benefit Society’: pRick Santorum told a gay man in Fulton, Missouri Friday afternoon that he didn’t deserve the “privilege” of marriage because his same-sex relationship does not “benefit” society in the same way that opposite-sex marriage does. Marriage, Santorum explained is an “intrinsic good” in which gay and lesbian people should not be allowed to partake in: [...]/p
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Sunday, January 01, 2012
Wednesday, June 08, 2011
Long running gay St. Louis nightclub closes
From Stltoday.com: Long-running gay nightclub the Complex, 3511 Chouteau Ave., is closing, confirms owner Howard Meyer.
The nightclub's last day of operation will be June 22, with a special night planned. Also, special events will take place leading up to the closing.
Rumors of the Complex closing have circulated for years, and Meyer has always rebuffed them, but this time it's for real.
"I can't be here because of my health, back surgeries, and when the owner's not here, when the cat's not here, the mice will play. And I'm losing my ass," he says.
He blames the bartenders for giving away 25 percent of his liquor inventory for better tips, something he couldn't manage in his absence.
He decided a month ago to shut down the Complex after 20 years, and says he finally feels relieved.
"I've been miserable," he says.
In later years at the Complex, Meyer has tried becoming more diverse, including the 2009 opening of the Chill lounge downstairs in the same building.
The nightclub's last day of operation will be June 22, with a special night planned. Also, special events will take place leading up to the closing.
Rumors of the Complex closing have circulated for years, and Meyer has always rebuffed them, but this time it's for real.
"I can't be here because of my health, back surgeries, and when the owner's not here, when the cat's not here, the mice will play. And I'm losing my ass," he says.
He blames the bartenders for giving away 25 percent of his liquor inventory for better tips, something he couldn't manage in his absence.
He decided a month ago to shut down the Complex after 20 years, and says he finally feels relieved.
"I've been miserable," he says.
In later years at the Complex, Meyer has tried becoming more diverse, including the 2009 opening of the Chill lounge downstairs in the same building.
Sunday, May 29, 2011
Thursday, May 05, 2011
NYC Beige Party Ends After 15 Year Celebrity Filled Run
From NYT: DOLLY PARTON and Gloria Gaynor singing an impromptu duet. Britney Spears supposedly skipping out on her check. Jocelyne Wildenstein showing off her nip and tuck.
They were all part of the mix at Beige, the fashion-y, mostly-but-not-all-gay party held Tuesdays at the B Bar on the Bowery. Started in 1994 by Erich Conrad, it may well be downtown’s longest-running party, bringing together celebrities, club kids, handsome young strivers and both the up-and-comers and has-beens. The festivities always last late into the night, out in the garden during warmer months.
But next Tuesday, Beige is coming to an end, at least in its current spot. Mr. Conrad blames the new luxury apartment across the street, whose residents have already flooded the local community board with noise complaints. Below, reminiscences from 16 years of groovy Tuesdays.
PARKER POSEY, actress.
I first went to Beige a year or two after the movie “Party Girl” came out in 1995. I’d already met Erich out dancing at the club Don Hill’s. I remember him talking about the concept of Beige: that it was the color of ’70s Halston, off-kilter strange glamour. But also things that were in-between. Like a stew. It’s not a soup and it’s not a meal. Granola is very beige, whereas cereal is not.
Eartha Kitt was there one night. I leaned in next to her so a photographer could take a picture, and as she reached to grab my face, her long fingernail went up my nose and gave me a nosebleed. I had to ask for a dinner napkin and walked around for an hour afterward telling people I’d been scratched by Catwoman. Eartha never realized she did it.
ANDY COHEN, producer, Bravo TV.
I had my 30th birthday party at Beige 13 years ago. Lady Bunny D.J.’d and Ricki Lake came.
One night about three years ago, I brought NeNe Leakes from “Real Housewives of Atlanta” and Vicki Gunvalson from “Real Housewives of Orange County.” They were astounded by how attractive all the guys were. NeNe and Erich really bonded, sitting there whispering, going super-deep. I brought Natasha Richardson there once when she was doing “Cabaret” on Broadway, and she was like: “Who are these people? Where do they come from?”
DEREK NEEN, doorman from 1994 to 2010.
Jocelyne Wildenstein came almost every week for five or six years. She was gracious and lovely, very shy and sweet. “May I come in?” she’d kind of purr. Then she’d sit in Banquette 42, 43 or 44 with Erich, the coveted spots that faced the garden. Alexander McQueen would come. He was always very low-key and sweet, unlike our good friend Boy George, who was there quite often.
On many nights the line for Beige would snake all the way around the corner to Marion’s restaurant. I’d fast-track the right people up the little steps, always keeping in mind who was a regular through the long, cold winter. We had a code word: Wreck Beach. That’s a famous nude beach in Vancouver where I live now. Erich would tell anyone fabulous to just say to me at the door, “Wreck Beach.” That’s how I knew they were a friend of Erich’s.
BOY GEORGE, performer
When you’re in New York, it’s the first port of call to locate people because you know everyone cool will be there.
Five years ago, I discovered this Brooklyn electro band, Avenue D. I was looking everywhere to find the lead singer, Debbie D. And lo and behold, she was a waitress at Beige.
Another time, I was cornered by Jocelyne Wildenstein trying to kiss me. She’ll deny it, but she was quite forward. I told her, “No tongue!”
It’s that kind of club: it’s so cool it hurts. It was a temple of gorgeous freakdom.
CHRISTIAN GIACOMETTI, maître d’hôtel.
Charo came one night. She asked the D.J., Jon Jon Battles, to play a CD of her music and then she cootchy-cooed around the room performing, lip-syncing. I followed her with a flashlight for a spotlight.
JON JON BATTLES, waiter turned D.J.
One night Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake came in when they were dating, with a table of people. Jocelyne Wildenstein and Joan Collins were also there, at separate tables.
Britney’s table orders a round of drinks, then gets up to leave without paying. I asked Erich, “Is Britney comped?” He said, “No, she has to pay.” So I run down the street and knock on the window of her S.U.V. and say, “You didn’t pay.” She was very aloof, said nothing. “How much is it?” one of her friends asked. I hadn’t brought the check, so I made up a figure, $300. It was in all the papers that the poor waiter got stiffed, but what annoyed me is they didn’t even use my name!
Justin was nice, though. He touched my hand.
MICHAEL MUSTO, night-life columnist, The Village Voice.
Celebrity drop-ins were pretty frequent, and I was always amazed to spot people like Kirstie Alley and Lucy Lawless there, and less shocked when I’d find Calvin Klein, Rupert Everett or a Pet Shop Boy.
But since Beige brimmed with attitude, so many of the cute guys there ended up going home alone. The craziest the crowd got at Beige was putting a little extra mousse in their faux hawks, or popping the collars on their Marc Jacobs shirts.
I likened it to Liz Taylor because you thought it would always be there.
SOPHIA LAMAR, transsexual Beige hostess.
I was at Beige from the beginning. It just worked organically, the right mix of fashion people, straight, gay, rockers, metrosexuals, editors. Patti LaBelle used to come and sit with P. Diddy’s mother. They loved the scene. Beige was a party but also a restaurant, so people who denied that they went to nightclubs could say, “Oh, I’m just having dinner.”
ERICH CONRAD, founder of Beige.
Calling it Beige was my idea. Beige was everyone’s least favorite color during the early ’90s, so it was tongue in cheek. I wanted to have a fun clubhouse, a canteen with a mix of all kinds of people, after the heaviness of AIDS in the ’80s.
Then it became hyper-chic and the supermodels started coming: Linda Evangelista, Amber Valletta, Naomi Campbell. People didn’t want press in the ’90s when they went out, unlike today, so we were a safe place for them because we had a no-cameras policy.
One night I was sitting in a banquette between Dolly Parton and Gloria Gaynor. They started reminiscing about a duet they were supposed to do once long ago and then started to sing it. ...
I feel quite sad, but I hope somehow I can retranslate it somewhere else.
Interviews have been edited and condensed.
They were all part of the mix at Beige, the fashion-y, mostly-but-not-all-gay party held Tuesdays at the B Bar on the Bowery. Started in 1994 by Erich Conrad, it may well be downtown’s longest-running party, bringing together celebrities, club kids, handsome young strivers and both the up-and-comers and has-beens. The festivities always last late into the night, out in the garden during warmer months.
But next Tuesday, Beige is coming to an end, at least in its current spot. Mr. Conrad blames the new luxury apartment across the street, whose residents have already flooded the local community board with noise complaints. Below, reminiscences from 16 years of groovy Tuesdays.
PARKER POSEY, actress.
I first went to Beige a year or two after the movie “Party Girl” came out in 1995. I’d already met Erich out dancing at the club Don Hill’s. I remember him talking about the concept of Beige: that it was the color of ’70s Halston, off-kilter strange glamour. But also things that were in-between. Like a stew. It’s not a soup and it’s not a meal. Granola is very beige, whereas cereal is not.
Eartha Kitt was there one night. I leaned in next to her so a photographer could take a picture, and as she reached to grab my face, her long fingernail went up my nose and gave me a nosebleed. I had to ask for a dinner napkin and walked around for an hour afterward telling people I’d been scratched by Catwoman. Eartha never realized she did it.
ANDY COHEN, producer, Bravo TV.
I had my 30th birthday party at Beige 13 years ago. Lady Bunny D.J.’d and Ricki Lake came.
One night about three years ago, I brought NeNe Leakes from “Real Housewives of Atlanta” and Vicki Gunvalson from “Real Housewives of Orange County.” They were astounded by how attractive all the guys were. NeNe and Erich really bonded, sitting there whispering, going super-deep. I brought Natasha Richardson there once when she was doing “Cabaret” on Broadway, and she was like: “Who are these people? Where do they come from?”
DEREK NEEN, doorman from 1994 to 2010.
Jocelyne Wildenstein came almost every week for five or six years. She was gracious and lovely, very shy and sweet. “May I come in?” she’d kind of purr. Then she’d sit in Banquette 42, 43 or 44 with Erich, the coveted spots that faced the garden. Alexander McQueen would come. He was always very low-key and sweet, unlike our good friend Boy George, who was there quite often.
On many nights the line for Beige would snake all the way around the corner to Marion’s restaurant. I’d fast-track the right people up the little steps, always keeping in mind who was a regular through the long, cold winter. We had a code word: Wreck Beach. That’s a famous nude beach in Vancouver where I live now. Erich would tell anyone fabulous to just say to me at the door, “Wreck Beach.” That’s how I knew they were a friend of Erich’s.
BOY GEORGE, performer
When you’re in New York, it’s the first port of call to locate people because you know everyone cool will be there.
Five years ago, I discovered this Brooklyn electro band, Avenue D. I was looking everywhere to find the lead singer, Debbie D. And lo and behold, she was a waitress at Beige.
Another time, I was cornered by Jocelyne Wildenstein trying to kiss me. She’ll deny it, but she was quite forward. I told her, “No tongue!”
It’s that kind of club: it’s so cool it hurts. It was a temple of gorgeous freakdom.
CHRISTIAN GIACOMETTI, maître d’hôtel.
Charo came one night. She asked the D.J., Jon Jon Battles, to play a CD of her music and then she cootchy-cooed around the room performing, lip-syncing. I followed her with a flashlight for a spotlight.
JON JON BATTLES, waiter turned D.J.
One night Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake came in when they were dating, with a table of people. Jocelyne Wildenstein and Joan Collins were also there, at separate tables.
Britney’s table orders a round of drinks, then gets up to leave without paying. I asked Erich, “Is Britney comped?” He said, “No, she has to pay.” So I run down the street and knock on the window of her S.U.V. and say, “You didn’t pay.” She was very aloof, said nothing. “How much is it?” one of her friends asked. I hadn’t brought the check, so I made up a figure, $300. It was in all the papers that the poor waiter got stiffed, but what annoyed me is they didn’t even use my name!
Justin was nice, though. He touched my hand.
MICHAEL MUSTO, night-life columnist, The Village Voice.
Celebrity drop-ins were pretty frequent, and I was always amazed to spot people like Kirstie Alley and Lucy Lawless there, and less shocked when I’d find Calvin Klein, Rupert Everett or a Pet Shop Boy.
But since Beige brimmed with attitude, so many of the cute guys there ended up going home alone. The craziest the crowd got at Beige was putting a little extra mousse in their faux hawks, or popping the collars on their Marc Jacobs shirts.
I likened it to Liz Taylor because you thought it would always be there.
SOPHIA LAMAR, transsexual Beige hostess.
I was at Beige from the beginning. It just worked organically, the right mix of fashion people, straight, gay, rockers, metrosexuals, editors. Patti LaBelle used to come and sit with P. Diddy’s mother. They loved the scene. Beige was a party but also a restaurant, so people who denied that they went to nightclubs could say, “Oh, I’m just having dinner.”
ERICH CONRAD, founder of Beige.
Calling it Beige was my idea. Beige was everyone’s least favorite color during the early ’90s, so it was tongue in cheek. I wanted to have a fun clubhouse, a canteen with a mix of all kinds of people, after the heaviness of AIDS in the ’80s.
Then it became hyper-chic and the supermodels started coming: Linda Evangelista, Amber Valletta, Naomi Campbell. People didn’t want press in the ’90s when they went out, unlike today, so we were a safe place for them because we had a no-cameras policy.
One night I was sitting in a banquette between Dolly Parton and Gloria Gaynor. They started reminiscing about a duet they were supposed to do once long ago and then started to sing it. ...
I feel quite sad, but I hope somehow I can retranslate it somewhere else.
Interviews have been edited and condensed.
New York’s Most Fabulous Gay Party Closes Next Week
From Gawker.com: "If you were a young, attractive, in-the-know Manhattan homosexual in the past 15 years, you've probably—no, definitely—been to Beige, the popular, swanky Tuesday night Gay-list party. Hate to break it to you, boys, but it's closing.
You will no longer be able to hob nob with celebrities, air kiss fashion people, or pose in your polo shirts pretending like you're too pretty to talk to anyone. The party, which started in 1994, is finally coming to an end after this coming Tuesday.
Promoter Erich Conrad, who has been throwing the party for longer than most of its attendees have been out of the closet, blames the closure on a condo building next door whose tenants have been complaining that the whispers, cackles, and cat calls from the open-air garden at B Bar are far too loud. "
You will no longer be able to hob nob with celebrities, air kiss fashion people, or pose in your polo shirts pretending like you're too pretty to talk to anyone. The party, which started in 1994, is finally coming to an end after this coming Tuesday.
Promoter Erich Conrad, who has been throwing the party for longer than most of its attendees have been out of the closet, blames the closure on a condo building next door whose tenants have been complaining that the whispers, cackles, and cat calls from the open-air garden at B Bar are far too loud. "
Monday, May 02, 2011
Historic San Francisco gay bar shuts its doors
From San Francisco Examiner: Historic San Francisco gay bar shuts its doors — at least for now.
Saturday marked the last night of the landmark Eagle Tavern, a SoMa leather bar and institution for the neighborhood’s gay community. San Francisco artist Jim Leff, left, takes one last picture of the place. (Dan Schreiber/The Examiner)Mike Talley said his family back home in Tulsa, Okla., disowned him, and it wasn’t just because he was gay. He was also into leather. “Leather was over the line,” he recalled. “Thirty days later, I was living in San Francisco, and I had found home.”
And like many gay men who sought refuge in The City in the ’80s, he wound up at the Eagle Tavern, a quintessential leather bar that shut its doors — at least for now — on Saturday night, after 30 years as an institution.
Out on the back porch Saturday afternoon, the final-day crowd was in a nostalgic mood. Final pictures and videos were being captured and chalked messages on the walls said things like, “I broke my jaw here in 1993,” and “I left my heart at the Eagle.”
“If we hadn’t seen our friends in a while, they would always end up here on Sundays,” said patron Scott Van Hyde. “You didn’t have to be anything, or wear anything special. Just show up. Just easy.”
Sundays were when the bar held its famous beer bust fundraisers benefiting all kinds of charities, including those for AIDS research.
The disease was the bane of the gay community in the ’80s, which was the heyday of SoMa leather bars that have since — and now perhaps officially — faded into history.
There was a time when many American cities had “Eagle” bars, a sort of label for gay-friendly. A few remain, including one in Dallas, where owner Mark Frazier contemplated buying the San Francisco outpost from its two owners, John Gardiner and Joe Banks.
But negotiations with the building’s landlord faltered after rent was increased by 20 percent, and Frazier backed out. Bar manager Ron Hennis also expressed interest in ownership but declined requests for an interview and said in a Facebook message that he won’t discuss ongoing negotiations.
San Francisco Supervisors Jane Kim, Scott Wiener, and David Campos sent a letter to San Francisco police in mid-April that highlights the cultural importance of the Eagle and calls for the department to “closely scrutinize” any liquor license transfer that changes the business.
Wiener, who along with Campos is openly gay, said he has been to the Eagle many times as a patron.
“It would be a big loss to The City,” Wiener said. “It looked like it was completely dead, but at least the landlord might be negotiating again.”
Patron Richard Olivia said the bar, at its core, represents all that is “San Fransexual.”
“You don’t feel like you’re in the Castro with the clones, or in the Tenderloin with the trannies,” Olivia said. “You can come here, and it’s everyone.”
Saturday marked the last night of the landmark Eagle Tavern, a SoMa leather bar and institution for the neighborhood’s gay community. San Francisco artist Jim Leff, left, takes one last picture of the place. (Dan Schreiber/The Examiner)Mike Talley said his family back home in Tulsa, Okla., disowned him, and it wasn’t just because he was gay. He was also into leather. “Leather was over the line,” he recalled. “Thirty days later, I was living in San Francisco, and I had found home.”
And like many gay men who sought refuge in The City in the ’80s, he wound up at the Eagle Tavern, a quintessential leather bar that shut its doors — at least for now — on Saturday night, after 30 years as an institution.
Out on the back porch Saturday afternoon, the final-day crowd was in a nostalgic mood. Final pictures and videos were being captured and chalked messages on the walls said things like, “I broke my jaw here in 1993,” and “I left my heart at the Eagle.”
“If we hadn’t seen our friends in a while, they would always end up here on Sundays,” said patron Scott Van Hyde. “You didn’t have to be anything, or wear anything special. Just show up. Just easy.”
Sundays were when the bar held its famous beer bust fundraisers benefiting all kinds of charities, including those for AIDS research.
The disease was the bane of the gay community in the ’80s, which was the heyday of SoMa leather bars that have since — and now perhaps officially — faded into history.
There was a time when many American cities had “Eagle” bars, a sort of label for gay-friendly. A few remain, including one in Dallas, where owner Mark Frazier contemplated buying the San Francisco outpost from its two owners, John Gardiner and Joe Banks.
But negotiations with the building’s landlord faltered after rent was increased by 20 percent, and Frazier backed out. Bar manager Ron Hennis also expressed interest in ownership but declined requests for an interview and said in a Facebook message that he won’t discuss ongoing negotiations.
San Francisco Supervisors Jane Kim, Scott Wiener, and David Campos sent a letter to San Francisco police in mid-April that highlights the cultural importance of the Eagle and calls for the department to “closely scrutinize” any liquor license transfer that changes the business.
Wiener, who along with Campos is openly gay, said he has been to the Eagle many times as a patron.
“It would be a big loss to The City,” Wiener said. “It looked like it was completely dead, but at least the landlord might be negotiating again.”
Patron Richard Olivia said the bar, at its core, represents all that is “San Fransexual.”
“You don’t feel like you’re in the Castro with the clones, or in the Tenderloin with the trannies,” Olivia said. “You can come here, and it’s everyone.”
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Disco Recording Artist Loleatta Holloway Dies
From NYT: Loleatta Holloway, a gospel-charged disco singer whose 1980 hit “Love Sensation” had a long afterlife when fragments of it were used in later hits, died Monday in a suburban Chicago hospital. She was 64 and lived in Chicago.
She died after slipping into a coma after a brief illness, her manager, Ron Richardson, said in a statement.
Ms. Holloway was born in 1946 and grew up singing in gospel groups, including her mother’s Holloway Community Singers choir. From 1967 to 1971 she sang in one of gospel’s most respected groups, the Caravans, led by Albertina Walker. She then turned to secular music, bringing the raspy fervor and airborne whoops of her gospel performances to songs about desire.
Her rhythm-and-blues career began with the single “Rainbow ’71,” produced by her future husband, the guitarist Floyd Smith. Mr. Smith went on to produce her first two albums, “Loleatta” in 1973 and “Cry to Me” in 1975. He died in 1982; Ms. Holloway is survived by four children and nine grandchildren.
Her 1975 remake of the Solomon Burke hit “Cry to Me” reached No. 10 on the R&B chart. But Ms. Holloway’s label, Aware, closed down, and disco was on the rise in 1976 when she signed with the Philadelphia-based Gold Mind label, a subsidiary of Salsoul Records. She recorded with the producer and singer Bunny Sigler, and “Only You,” a duet with him, reached No. 11 on the R&B chart. In 1977 two of her dance tracks, “"Dreamin’ ” and “Hit and Run,” both reached No. 3 on the dance chart, where she would have most of her hits.
In the late 1970s Ms. Holloway began working with the singer Dan Hartman. She can be heard on his 1979 dance-club hit “Relight My Fire,” and he wrote and produced “Love Sensation” for her. Those sessions, Ms. Holloway recalled in a 2009 interview with discomusic.com, required 29 vocal takes over two days of recording. On the second day, she said, she lost her voice, but she put some Vicks VapoRub in her coffee to keep singing. “That’s how I was able to hold that note for so long,” she recalled.
“Love Sensation” reached No. 1 on the dance chart. Four years later her “Crash Goes Love” reached No. 5.
But “Love Sensation” proved durable. Samples of her vocal were used by the Italian dance-music group Black Box for “Ride on Time,” a No. 1 hit in Britain, at first without crediting Ms. Holloway; the video clip showed another woman lip-synching Ms. Holloway’s sampled vocals. She successfully sued Black Box, in a case settled out of court. Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch, led by Mark Wahlberg, also drew on “Love Sensation” — this time giving Ms. Holloway prominent credit — for “Good Vibrations,” which became a No. 1 pop hit in the United States in 1991.
The song was also sampled on dance tracks by Cappella and Cevin Fisher, and Ms. Holloway remade it herself in 2006, as she continued to perform on the dance-club circuit.
“I never thought of myself as a good singer,” Ms. Holloway said in 2009. “When I was 5 years old I started singing in church and I hated my voice because I sounded like a grown woman, not a child. I was ashamed of it.”
She died after slipping into a coma after a brief illness, her manager, Ron Richardson, said in a statement.
Ms. Holloway was born in 1946 and grew up singing in gospel groups, including her mother’s Holloway Community Singers choir. From 1967 to 1971 she sang in one of gospel’s most respected groups, the Caravans, led by Albertina Walker. She then turned to secular music, bringing the raspy fervor and airborne whoops of her gospel performances to songs about desire.
Her rhythm-and-blues career began with the single “Rainbow ’71,” produced by her future husband, the guitarist Floyd Smith. Mr. Smith went on to produce her first two albums, “Loleatta” in 1973 and “Cry to Me” in 1975. He died in 1982; Ms. Holloway is survived by four children and nine grandchildren.
Her 1975 remake of the Solomon Burke hit “Cry to Me” reached No. 10 on the R&B chart. But Ms. Holloway’s label, Aware, closed down, and disco was on the rise in 1976 when she signed with the Philadelphia-based Gold Mind label, a subsidiary of Salsoul Records. She recorded with the producer and singer Bunny Sigler, and “Only You,” a duet with him, reached No. 11 on the R&B chart. In 1977 two of her dance tracks, “"Dreamin’ ” and “Hit and Run,” both reached No. 3 on the dance chart, where she would have most of her hits.
In the late 1970s Ms. Holloway began working with the singer Dan Hartman. She can be heard on his 1979 dance-club hit “Relight My Fire,” and he wrote and produced “Love Sensation” for her. Those sessions, Ms. Holloway recalled in a 2009 interview with discomusic.com, required 29 vocal takes over two days of recording. On the second day, she said, she lost her voice, but she put some Vicks VapoRub in her coffee to keep singing. “That’s how I was able to hold that note for so long,” she recalled.
“Love Sensation” reached No. 1 on the dance chart. Four years later her “Crash Goes Love” reached No. 5.
But “Love Sensation” proved durable. Samples of her vocal were used by the Italian dance-music group Black Box for “Ride on Time,” a No. 1 hit in Britain, at first without crediting Ms. Holloway; the video clip showed another woman lip-synching Ms. Holloway’s sampled vocals. She successfully sued Black Box, in a case settled out of court. Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch, led by Mark Wahlberg, also drew on “Love Sensation” — this time giving Ms. Holloway prominent credit — for “Good Vibrations,” which became a No. 1 pop hit in the United States in 1991.
The song was also sampled on dance tracks by Cappella and Cevin Fisher, and Ms. Holloway remade it herself in 2006, as she continued to perform on the dance-club circuit.
“I never thought of myself as a good singer,” Ms. Holloway said in 2009. “When I was 5 years old I started singing in church and I hated my voice because I sounded like a grown woman, not a child. I was ashamed of it.”
Saturday, March 19, 2011
70 year old Pennsylvania gay man stoned to death by Bible quoting "friend"
From sfgate.com: A 70-year-old man was stoned to death with a rock stuffed in a sock by a younger friend who alleged the victim made unwanted sexual advances, authorities said.
According to the criminal complaint, John Thomas, 28, of Upper Darby, a Philadelphia suburb, told police he killed Murray Seidman of nearby Lansdowne because the Bible refers to stoning homosexuals.
"I stoned Murray with a rock in a sock," Thomas told police, according to the criminal complaint. Thomas was arrested and charged with murder Friday.
According to the complaint, "John Thomas stated that he read in the Old Testament that homosexuals should be stoned in certain situations. The answer John Thomas received from his prayers was to put an end to the victim's life. John Thomas stated that he struck the victim approximately 10 times in the head. After the final blow, John Thomas made sure the victim was dead."
"He is a deeply religious man. Or so he says," said Lansdowne Police Chief Dan Kortan.
Delaware County Medical Examiner Fredric Hellman ruled that Seidman had been dead for five to 10 days before Thomas started banging on doors in the hallway of Seidman's apartment building on Jan. 12.
Police said Thomas, who is the executor and sole beneficiary of Seidman's will, returned to the apartment and pretended that he had just discovered Seidman's body.
Thomas had no comment as he was led out of the Delaware County Courthouse on Friday. Seidman was a longtime worker in the laundry department at Mercy Fitzgerald Hospital, where he was "very popular," Kortan said.
"As far as we are concerned, he was a model citizen," Kortan said.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2011/03/18/state/n094345D97.DTL
According to the criminal complaint, John Thomas, 28, of Upper Darby, a Philadelphia suburb, told police he killed Murray Seidman of nearby Lansdowne because the Bible refers to stoning homosexuals.
"I stoned Murray with a rock in a sock," Thomas told police, according to the criminal complaint. Thomas was arrested and charged with murder Friday.
According to the complaint, "John Thomas stated that he read in the Old Testament that homosexuals should be stoned in certain situations. The answer John Thomas received from his prayers was to put an end to the victim's life. John Thomas stated that he struck the victim approximately 10 times in the head. After the final blow, John Thomas made sure the victim was dead."
"He is a deeply religious man. Or so he says," said Lansdowne Police Chief Dan Kortan.
Delaware County Medical Examiner Fredric Hellman ruled that Seidman had been dead for five to 10 days before Thomas started banging on doors in the hallway of Seidman's apartment building on Jan. 12.
Police said Thomas, who is the executor and sole beneficiary of Seidman's will, returned to the apartment and pretended that he had just discovered Seidman's body.
Thomas had no comment as he was led out of the Delaware County Courthouse on Friday. Seidman was a longtime worker in the laundry department at Mercy Fitzgerald Hospital, where he was "very popular," Kortan said.
"As far as we are concerned, he was a model citizen," Kortan said.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2011/03/18/state/n094345D97.DTL
Friday, March 11, 2011
As Web Flourishes, Gay Groups Watch Enrollments Dwindle
From NYT: By SCOTT JAMES
The lobby of San Francisco’s stylish Parc 55 Hotel was packed with bears. Not beasts from the forest, but large, hirsute gay men in jeans and hoodies.
The men gathered for the International Bear Rendezvous last month, lounging on red Barcelona chairs and hugging near the elevators. Over the last 17 years, the event has attracted thousands of grizzly men and their admirers from around the world.
But this year’s festivities marked a bittersweet finale — the bear event is now extinct.
“I’m sad,” said Darwin Bebo, an event organizer for the past nine years, noting a lack of volunteers and a decline in registrations — to 550 this year from nearly 1,000 in 2006. “They’re already talking online, so they don’t need a club.”
Mr. Bebo blamed the Internet. As online social networks have surged in popularity with gay men and lesbians, many social groups have been in decline.
The tug of war between the virtual and physical worlds is happening in every strata of society, but in the gay community the shift has been especially poignant and with significant implications. Social groups helped start the gay civil rights movement, and in recent decades they have raised millions of dollars for causes like same-sex marriage and the battle against H.I.V./AIDS.
This has left some wondering, as social groups wane, who or what will pick up the rainbow flag.
The Men’s Associated Exchange, a club of professional gay men, disbanded in 2009 after 21 years and a membership that had once reached about 1,000. A final statement on the group’s Web site read, “As the Internet grew and provided other avenues for socializing, it was time to give in to the new social networking that had become so popular.”
Last month another social group, the Academy of Friends, scaled back its annual Oscar Night fund-raiser, which had once attracted an upscale crowd of 2,500. This year’s event was moved to a smaller venue with 1,500 attendees.
“It has been very challenging for us,” said Jon Finck, an Academy of Friends board member. In the last 31 years the group has raised more than $8.5 million for H.I.V./AIDS charities, but the downsizing of Oscar Night meant less money for those groups. “It has made those payments not as robust as we would like,” Mr. Finck said.
The recession played a role (tickets for the Oscar event start at $250), but Alan Keith, the group’s chairman, said that in recent years the group has also struggled to attract new participants, especially younger ones: The board of directors has dropped to 19 members from 29, with only 2 under 30 years old.
Mr. Keith said many gay and lesbian groups were currently reassessing, asking, “What are the needs of our community?”
The roots of many gay and lesbian social groups date to when homosexuality was a crime and gatherings were illegal.
“Social groups and networks founded the G.L.B.T. community as early as the 1950s,” said Paul Boneberg, executive director of the GLBT Historical Society. “It represented an ability to find each other.”
“Their newsletters were the first gay publications,” Mr. Boneberg added, citing groups like the Daughters of Bilitis, founded in San Francisco in 1955.
New technologies have usurped that role, sometimes serving remarkably narrow niches. The bear community, for example, has Scruff, an iPhone application that instantly locates others nearby, using GPS. There is also the new Web-based start-up Bearbook, which works like Facebook except that a membership fee allows bears to see each other, uh, bare.
“You see a lot of proving grounds disappear with the advent of the Internet,” said Don Romesburg, assistant professor of women’s and gender studies at Sonoma State University. In addition to social groups, Dr. Romesburg said, gay bars and neighborhoods across the nation have also diminished.
But Dr. Romesburg warned against judging the trend as generational, noting that as a gay man, “people my age — I’m 40 — are opting out of these too.” Additionally, he said, more welcoming attitudes toward gay men and lesbians had reduced the need for cliques.
But struggles involving same-sex marriage, discrimination and AIDS continue. The bears raised more than $600,000 over the years for those causes, and it is unclear what will replace their effort.
Mr. Boneberg said he thought such efforts would continue, just “in a different way.”
“I don’t see the transition as a weakening of the community,” he said.After all, people might be meeting these days in the cloud, but they do eventually come back down to earth.
Scott James is an Emmy-winning television journalist and novelist who lives in San Francisco.
sjames@baycitizen.org
The lobby of San Francisco’s stylish Parc 55 Hotel was packed with bears. Not beasts from the forest, but large, hirsute gay men in jeans and hoodies.
The men gathered for the International Bear Rendezvous last month, lounging on red Barcelona chairs and hugging near the elevators. Over the last 17 years, the event has attracted thousands of grizzly men and their admirers from around the world.
But this year’s festivities marked a bittersweet finale — the bear event is now extinct.
“I’m sad,” said Darwin Bebo, an event organizer for the past nine years, noting a lack of volunteers and a decline in registrations — to 550 this year from nearly 1,000 in 2006. “They’re already talking online, so they don’t need a club.”
Mr. Bebo blamed the Internet. As online social networks have surged in popularity with gay men and lesbians, many social groups have been in decline.
The tug of war between the virtual and physical worlds is happening in every strata of society, but in the gay community the shift has been especially poignant and with significant implications. Social groups helped start the gay civil rights movement, and in recent decades they have raised millions of dollars for causes like same-sex marriage and the battle against H.I.V./AIDS.
This has left some wondering, as social groups wane, who or what will pick up the rainbow flag.
The Men’s Associated Exchange, a club of professional gay men, disbanded in 2009 after 21 years and a membership that had once reached about 1,000. A final statement on the group’s Web site read, “As the Internet grew and provided other avenues for socializing, it was time to give in to the new social networking that had become so popular.”
Last month another social group, the Academy of Friends, scaled back its annual Oscar Night fund-raiser, which had once attracted an upscale crowd of 2,500. This year’s event was moved to a smaller venue with 1,500 attendees.
“It has been very challenging for us,” said Jon Finck, an Academy of Friends board member. In the last 31 years the group has raised more than $8.5 million for H.I.V./AIDS charities, but the downsizing of Oscar Night meant less money for those groups. “It has made those payments not as robust as we would like,” Mr. Finck said.
The recession played a role (tickets for the Oscar event start at $250), but Alan Keith, the group’s chairman, said that in recent years the group has also struggled to attract new participants, especially younger ones: The board of directors has dropped to 19 members from 29, with only 2 under 30 years old.
Mr. Keith said many gay and lesbian groups were currently reassessing, asking, “What are the needs of our community?”
The roots of many gay and lesbian social groups date to when homosexuality was a crime and gatherings were illegal.
“Social groups and networks founded the G.L.B.T. community as early as the 1950s,” said Paul Boneberg, executive director of the GLBT Historical Society. “It represented an ability to find each other.”
“Their newsletters were the first gay publications,” Mr. Boneberg added, citing groups like the Daughters of Bilitis, founded in San Francisco in 1955.
New technologies have usurped that role, sometimes serving remarkably narrow niches. The bear community, for example, has Scruff, an iPhone application that instantly locates others nearby, using GPS. There is also the new Web-based start-up Bearbook, which works like Facebook except that a membership fee allows bears to see each other, uh, bare.
“You see a lot of proving grounds disappear with the advent of the Internet,” said Don Romesburg, assistant professor of women’s and gender studies at Sonoma State University. In addition to social groups, Dr. Romesburg said, gay bars and neighborhoods across the nation have also diminished.
But Dr. Romesburg warned against judging the trend as generational, noting that as a gay man, “people my age — I’m 40 — are opting out of these too.” Additionally, he said, more welcoming attitudes toward gay men and lesbians had reduced the need for cliques.
But struggles involving same-sex marriage, discrimination and AIDS continue. The bears raised more than $600,000 over the years for those causes, and it is unclear what will replace their effort.
Mr. Boneberg said he thought such efforts would continue, just “in a different way.”
“I don’t see the transition as a weakening of the community,” he said.After all, people might be meeting these days in the cloud, but they do eventually come back down to earth.
Scott James is an Emmy-winning television journalist and novelist who lives in San Francisco.
sjames@baycitizen.org
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