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The Independent
an hour ago
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Ozzy Osbourne's cortege makes touching detour past his childhood home
The cortege carrying Ozzy Osbourne and his loved ones made a poignant detour down the road where he grew up – and where the star's name is still etched into brickwork beside his old front door. Two police outriders led the procession into Lodge Road, Aston – a side street less than a third of a mile from Villa Park's Trinity Road stand – during its journey into central Birmingham. The hearse and the following funeral cars slowed as they passed the property, adorned with a picture of Osbourne and numerous other tributes including a balloon, as a handful of fans and well-wishers paid their respects from the pavement. Speaking to the media before the cortege arrived, Mohabbat Ali Zaman, the owner of the terraced house where the then John Michael Osbourne was raised, paid tribute to the late music star as a 'legend' who was a 'true Brummie'. Clutching letters from countries including America and Germany sent to the house by Black Sabbath fans in recent days, Mr Zaman told how he was only thee months old when his parents bought the property from the Osbournes in the autumn of 1972. He also recalled how Osbourne – who was 'funny and good company' – sometimes phoned his family and asked to visit the property to reminisce. Mr Zaman, 53, said: 'My parents actually lived next door for a few years and they knew of the Osbournes and they did know that the child was into music because they used to hear music coming out of the house all the time. 'The house went up for sale at the time and my parents bought it.' Mr Zaman said he and his family were obviously not aware that Osbourne would 'become the legend that he is today' but were contacted in 1995 when the BBC was making a documentary. 'Then we thought wow – we did buy this house from his parents,' he said. 'And that's when the journey started. From that point on we started getting messages.' After pointing out the words 'John' and 'Iron Void' – the latter thought to be a potential band name – carved in the brickwork near the front door of the house, Mr Zaman added: ' People come here as tourists with candles and plaques.' Messages sent to the house's email – ozzyhousetribute@ – and letters delivered there are being passed on to the Osbourne family to ensure they receive any condolences directed to the property. Mr Zaman told reporters: 'For us it's quite important because we are trying to capture the final messages for Ozzy Osbourne that his family can have as part of condolences messages. 'Only last year we've had people from China, Russia and America and they do knock the door and then we talk to them about the house. 'It's been a journey. Whether the journey is going to continue or not we don't know. 'This year obviously because of his passing we've seen a lot of people actually come to the address and leave lots of beautiful messages and poems. 'Some of the messages you read make you think – he has actually changed people's lives through his songs and all the charity work he has done.'
Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
Gwyneth Paltrow's son Moses, 19, reveals if he is following in his dad Chris Martin's footsteps
Gwyneth Paltrow and ex-husband Chris Martin 's son Moses Martin gave his Instagram followers a rare look at his life as a touring musician. Following in his famous father's — who is the longtime frontman of the band Coldplay — footsteps, the 19-year-old star is part of a three-piece band called Dancer. On Monday he took to social media to post a carousel of images taken while on the road with the musical act. The upload included shots of him playing guitar with a microphone set in front of him, and an artsy black and white snap of the band standing in front a brick wall. He captioned the post, 'music music music music,' and tagged @dancerdancerdancer. Another artful, pink-tinted outtake showed the nepo baby strumming his guitar with an earpiece in place. Moses uploaded other assorted photos, including one of him on a couch and a playful one of him wearing two pairs of glasses. The music artist enjoyed a coffee with a friend in one picture, and a scenic shot captured horses with a mountainous sunset in the backdrop. In addition to their son, 52-year-old Gwyneth and 48-year-old Chris also share 21-year-old daughter Apple Martin. To mark Moses' birthday this past April, the proud mom used her social media platform to pay tribute. She shared three FaceTime screenshots of her son with her nine million Instagram followers, and added a heartfelt caption. 'Happy birthday @mosesmartin ❤️,' she began, 'Honestly, you are a dream come true. You are deeply kind and brilliant. You have an incredible intellect and you are so gifted, so talented.' Gwyneth added, 'I listen to your music on repeat and miss you so much at college. And today more than ever. I love you my boy. ❤️mama.' The upload included shots of him playing guitar with a microphone set in front of him, and an artsy black and white snap of the band standing in front a brick wall There was also a snapshot of the nepo baby sitting on a couch A scenic shot captured horses with a mountainous sunset in the backdrop Last December Chris opened up about life as an empty nester in an interview with Rolling Stone. Reflecting on his children moving out for college, he admitted: 'It's sad. That's the only word.' Putting things in perspective, he noted, 'But of course, it'd be weirder if they were still like, "I can't leave." Then you'd be more worried.' Both Apple and Moses are college students, with the former attending Vanderbilt University and the latter a freshman at Brown. Apple told Interview magazine earlier this year that she is 'a law, history and society major.'
Times
an hour ago
- Entertainment
- Times
Blur's Alex James: my 6 favourite cheese recipes (including Dairylea)
It's hard to believe that for two entire centuries Britain was 'the land without music', but it's true. After the death of Henry Purcell in 1695, nothing deemed worthy of note was written by anyone born in Britain until the 20th century. At which point we immediately started to make up for lost time: Edward Elgar, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Gustav Holst, a whole bunch of others and then, with the Beatles, Britain went full supernova musically and has pretty much stayed that way ever since. It's also fair to say that in the not too distant past Britain was 'the land without food', because at some point between 1939 and 1945 we ran out. When my mum was my eldest daughter's age, bacon was still rationed. The rationing system devastated our culinary heritage. For decades, the French and their Mediterranean neighbours poked fun at what they considered our brown, stodgy and boring food. But hang on a minute. British farmers helped shape the eating and drinking habits of the entire planet. And we are still setting the pace. On our honeymoon in 2003, my wife and I bought a farm in the Cotswolds. It was a turning point, and not just for the two of us. Over the past 20 years, British food culture has gone from strength to strength. In the war years only one type of cheese was made in Britain. When we hosted the British Cheese Awards here on the farm in 2008 there were 906 entries — more types than France. The great British cheese explosion preceded the champagne supernova — England has gone from nought to light speed in winemaking terms, particularly sparkling wine, since I was my eldest daughter's age. Here are just a handful of my favourite things to do with cheese. They all taste even better with English sparkling wine. • Read more restaurant reviews and recipes from our food experts I had a letter recently from someone saying he wasn't totally sure but he thought he'd most probably been born in my bedroom, and asking if he could come over for a chat. I said, 'No problem.' And it was true. He grew up here on the farm and told me it had been bombed during the war. Fritz was likely looking for Coventry, he said, but had got lost. When he saw the railway line, he thought he'd go for that instead. The bomb missed the railway line but blew a big hole in the field where they used to graze the shorthorn cattle. And shorthorn cattle from this farm, he said, were exported to all corners of the globe, from Texas to New Zealand. I think beef is the ultimate foodie treat, especially when it's been aged. At Big Feastival — our annual music and food extravaganza — we use sirloin that has been matured for the same length of time as our blue cheese: 90 days. Blue cheese and beef connect incredibly well. If you've never tried it, just have a little bowl of shredded blue on the table next time you're cooking steaks. This recipe is a Feastival favourite. We serve it with leaves from Claire's market garden, while our Britpop sparkling wine is the perfect summer accompaniment. Serves 1-2 • 1 sirloin steak• Mix of salad leaves such as radicchio, butter lettuce and frisée• 100g blue cheese Cook your steak. While it's resting, arrange your salad leaves on a platter and chop up your cheese. Top the salad with the steak, then garnish with the cheese. Serve immediately. • Mud, floods and tears: festival disasters with Blur's Alex James Soufflés date from the early 18th century but came into their own in the 1820s, when new ovens using air-draught systems rather than hot coals made it possible to achieve the constant cooking heat you need. Now, I reckon there are precisely as many soufflé recipes as there are chefs in the world. I've never seen one done the same way twice. My favourite method comes from 1955's Little Cheese Dishes by Ambrose Heath: think of it as a really fluffy cheese omelette — it uses exactly the same ingredients. 'Beat the yolks of four eggs with two tablespoons of cream and add half a pound of grated gruyère cheese,' Heath writes. 'Then mix well with the whites of the eggs stiffly whisked, pour into a well-buttered soufflé dish and bake in a hot oven for a quarter of an hour.' It's really quick and it's never failed me. If you want to go for a sweet soufflé instead of a cheese one, this is quicker and easier still. Stuff a chunk of chocolate right into the middle of a giant marshmallow, pop it in a ramekin and microwave it until it swells up. Sprinkle with chopped nuts and fresh mint to serve. Makes 4 soufflés • 30g unsalted melted butter, plus extra for brushing• Handful of breadcrumbs• 35g plain flour• 160ml milk• 4 egg yolks• 70g grated gruyère• 1 tsp mustard powder• Salt and pepper• 5 egg whites, whisked to stiff peaks• Finely chopped chives, to serve 1. Preheat the oven to 200C fan/gas 7. Brush 4 soufflé pots with melted butter and add a sprinkling of breadcrumbs.2. Melt 30g butter in a saucepan over a low heat. Add the flour and cook for 1 minute, then gradually add the milk. Bring to the boil for 2 minutes, stirring, until the mixture has thickened, then remove from the heat. Stir in the egg yolks, cheese, mustard powder, salt and pepper.3. Fold in the whisked egg whites. Pour the mixture into the prepared dishes and bake for 15 minutes. Don't open the oven door until they have risen and set. Serve with chopped chives. I don't think I'll ever stop loving the music I loved when I was a teenager or the food I loved when I was a kid. And even back then, when British food was derided as brown and stodgy and boring, we had the best crisps on the planet. Crisps are just like tiny, extra snappy, intensely flavoured crackers really. Their texture particularly makes for a wondrous counterpoint to the unctuous delights of the cheeseboard. I must confess to a slight weakness for Dairylea with crisps, but that's just the beginning. A packet of ready salted and a tub of crème fraîche is like an instant summer fondue. If you're a fan, you may find pickled onion flavour Monster Munch benefit from a good smear of cream cheese too. Blue cheese and Frazzles work surprisingly well — we served them with the fizz as the canapé on arrival at my wife's birthday party this year. They would also go nicely alongside digestifs and cigars as a dainty modern alternative to cheese and crackers now that everyone is full of Mounjaro. Serves 4 as nibbles • 1 packet of pickled onion Monster Munch• 1 packet of Frazzles• 2 Dairylea triangles, foil peeled back• 50g blue cheese, chopped• Small handful of fresh chives, chopped Arrange both packets of crisps on a large plate around the Dairylea triangles. Dot some of the crisps with the blue cheese. Sprinkle the chives on the Dairylea and serve. Sauces make all the difference to a meal. It's remarkably easy to rustle up quick cheese sauces that will liven up anything from baked spuds to broccoli. Melting pure cheese is the culinary equivalent of cranking the volume right up to 11, so you really need something substantial to soak up the flavour. The texture of floury potatoes is a great foil for molten cheddar — one of the all-time great melters. Zapping a cup of grated mild supermarket cheddar in the microwave until it is oozing and then slathering it on a piping hot jacket spud gives quite miraculous results — like a raclette but without the faff. It only takes slightly longer to gently warm some cream in a small saucepan and chuck in a handful of chopped cheese and other flavourings, stirring until the cheese melts. The cream magically binds it all together. Great on new potatoes. I prefer blue cheese, but usually end up using whatever odd lumps are knocking around at the back of the fridge. You can pour this on anything, even a roast — the bit where the cheese sauce hits the gravy is the sweet spot. Knee-tremblingly good. Serves 4 • 500ml milk• 1 bay leaf• 10 peppercorns• Half a small onion, halved• 30g butter • 30g flour• Salt and pepper• 100g grated cheese• 3 tbsp double cream 1. Gently heat the milk with the bay leaf, peppercorns and onion. Strain and discard the flavourings.2. Melt the butter over a medium heat. Add the flour and cook for a couple of minutes, stirring constantly. Gradually add the warmed milk, then simmer for 20 minutes. Season and add the cheese, stirring until melted.3. Whisk in the cream, remove from the heat and pour over potatoes. My grandad was a chef and I absolutely loved watching him work. The rest of the world was boring compared with his kitchen. They literally couldn't keep me out. So my first job, when I was about seven, was working for him and usually involved picking mint from the garden — I suspect to keep me out of the way while he cooked. Mint grows like a weed. It requires no attention whatsoever but brings so much to the table in summer, especially when picked fresh. Strawberries are more of a faff because birds and wasps all love them, but there's nothing like a really good, perfectly ripe fresh strawberry. We usually just spread some mascarpone on a plate, sprinkle with chopped fresh mint leaves, drizzle with olive oil and serve with a big bowl of strawberries for people to dunk, but you could chop the strawberries and run them through the mascarpone, then serve in bowls and garnish with the mint. Either way, I'd have a bowl of icing sugar on the table as well, because some like their strawberries sweeter than others. Mascarpone occupies an interesting cheese/yoghurt/cream grey area — it's like clotted cream but less cloying. Serves 2 • 200g mascarpone• Freshly chopped mint leaves• Olive oil• 100g icing sugar in a bowl• 1 punnet strawberries, hulled Dollop the mascarpone on a plate and top with mint. Drizzle with olive oil or dust with icing sugar, depending on preference, and serve with strawberries on the side. If you like pizza (and who doesn't?), it is worth learning how to make pizza dough. The method below is so simple — it never fails, and I do it every week. And if you really, really like pizza, I cannot recommend a pizza oven strongly enough. I bought a commercial one online for less than £250 during lockdown and it paid for itself in no time at all, because homemade pizzas cost pennies. And the stone base and the high temperature (pizza ovens go about 100C hotter than standard ovens) give truly mouthwatering results. Pizza-making is a great family activity as everyone has their own favourite toppings and can't help getting involved. Makes enough dough for 4 pizzas • 500g type-00 flour• 30g table salt• 2g fresh yeast• Semolina flour, for dusting• Jar of passata• Handful of dried oregano• 250g grated cheese, such as mozzarella• Fresh basil 1. Add the flour, salt and yeast to a mixer bowl and attach the dough hook. Turn on to a slow speed. Add 600ml water gradually until the dough forms a ball and then keep kneading for 5 minutes. Divide into 250g balls and leave them to rise for a few hours. Freeze the balls you won't be using.2. On a flat surface dusted with semolina flour, roll out the pizza balls to the desired size. Add the passata. Sprinkle with dried oregano and top with cheese and any other toppings. Bake in a pizza oven or an oven preheated to 200C fan/gas 7 until the edges are golden brown. Serve with fresh basil scattered on top. Alex James's Big Feastival runs from August 22-24 on his farm near Kingham in Oxfordshire. Tickets from Buy his cheese and wine at
South China Morning Post
2 hours ago
- Entertainment
- South China Morning Post
Thousands of Ozzy Osbourne fans line Birmingham streets to honour Black Sabbath star
Thousands of heavy metal fans lined the streets of Birmingham on Wednesday for the funeral procession of Black Sabbath frontman Ozzy Osbourne, who died earlier this month at the age of 76. The cortege of the singer known as 'The Prince of Darkness' and the 'Godfather of Heavy Metal' was driven through his home city in central England before a private funeral. It stopped at a bench dedicated to the musical pioneers, and Osbourne's wife, Sharon, and their family looked at some of the thousands of flowers and tributes left by fans. The family waved and made peace signs to the crowd, many of whom chanted 'Ozzy, Ozzy'. Osbourne had said he did not want his funeral to be a 'mope-fest', and celebration was mixed with sadness on the streets, with a New Orleans-style brass band leading the procession. Fans queue to view and leave tributes to musician Osbourne in Birmingham, England on Wednesday. Photo: AP Graham Croucher, a 58-year-old train driver from Northampton, said Osbourne was an 'absolute legend'.
LBCI
2 hours ago
- Entertainment
- LBCI
Guy Manoukian is taking the stage at the Byblos International Festival! Grab your tickets 🎟 now
On August 5, Guy Manoukian is taking the stage at the Byblos International Festival! Grab your tickets 🎟 now at and don't miss out!
