Andrew's 'UpToSpeed' News

The day that commemorated the blood of the fallen in the fields of Flanders has also seen the rise, yet again, of a beast that never quite dies.

Black Sabbath, on Friday, November 11, 2011, announced they would be making an appearance at next year’s Download Donington Festival.

They also plan to record a new album with producer Rick Rubin, who incidentally had been involved with previous aborted efforts with the group a few years ago.

This also comes about 18 months after the passing of Ronnie James Dio, the last man to perform with Black Sabbath, under the guise of Heaven & Hell.

‘The Devil You Know’ proved to be Dio’s last album, yet seemed to show Tony Iommi’s (no spring chicken, himself) abilities as the ultimate guitar-riff writer as far from receding.

Iommi, at the conference in California, said:  “It’s now or never.  We get along great.  Everything’s really good.”

Some may actually recall Iommi’s legal troubles with a certain Ozzy Osbourne over merchandising rights in recent times.

Others might remember Ozzy’s flippant comments rubbishing the possibility of a reunion, too:

“I had girlfriends when I was younger and I would go, ‘Oh, I would really like to go back with Shirley,’ and then you do and you go to yourself, ‘What the fuck was I thinking?’”

The question, though, is if all is well; or if issues in the past haven’t really been swept under the carpet properly.

Even drummer Bill Ward, who for the most part is rather quiet and unassuming, made cryptic remarks regarding musical differences between himself and “a couple of the other band members” during the early days of Heaven & Hell.

Although if all this doesn’t quite bode well in the cynical eyes of the heavy metal community, bassist Geezer Butler certainly tried his hardest to get the fans salivating, saying the new material sounds like the “old Sabbath style and sound.”

No, I don’t talk like this in real life; but even my modified, as-posh-as-I-can voice would apparently cause problems for Apple’s latest application.

The new iPhone 4S, and its ‘Siri’ feature, whereby the user uses voice-recognition to take down diary commitments, etc, has posed many problems for Apple fans north of the border.

Such questions as “Can you dance with me?” (why on Earth would someone ask an inanimate object such a question?!) are translated, laughably, as “Can you Dutch women?”.  Also, when booking 12 o’clock appointments, Scots have been told, and I’m sure left rather dumbfounded, that Siri doesn’t understand this “treblecock” business, neither!

The crux of this story, however, is that Apple had marketed this fancy new gadget as being able to ‘recognise the specific accents and dialects of the supported countries listed [UK English, US English and AUS English]’.

I’m in two worlds about the issues that such problems pose.  I can’t decide if learning how to speak ‘properly’ (!) is the most sensible solution; or if that those, and there are many, with that sense of ‘never forgetting where they came from’, should lobby Apple to do their homework on such an island as diverse, accent-wise, as the Great British Isles.  It may be a small place, but the variety of dialects here were probably far too disconcerting, and time-consuming, for Apple to bother their arses about it.

This general point, though, of modifying your accent is the issue that attracts me most to this nice little piece, originally in The Independent, because it’s a rather thorny topic that usually draws in class warriors from all corners of the UK - aswell as academic linguist-types, etc.  BBC’s Andrew Marr modified his accent to be better understood by the general British public, as did Gordon Brown, so why can’t the rest of us proles do the same?

Principles, people.  Principles.  These people, in the eyes of the many, have sold their souls for wider acceptance and, in the eyes of cynics, for snide mutterings behind their back in place of face-to-face piss-taking.

Criticise her all you like, but the now deceased Lynda-Lee Potter, of Daily Mail notoriety, despaired of the opposite end of the spectrum; those turncoats of the regional accent world, like the nation’s beloved Scouser, Cilla Black.  At least Lynda was openly snobby, a miner’s daughter on a quest for self-improvement and Received Pronounciation, whose accent only ever rose to the fore when exasperated by her own children!

Cilla Black, however, prior to the onslaught of Beatlemania, hid her accent, and now feels at liberty to deliver a hammed-up caricature of her phonic-self every time she’s on the telly.

If anyone, and that includes those part of the phenomenon called the Mockney, persisted in that, then Apple will have problems with Estuary English – let alone genuine regional accents – for years to come.

…..and don’t get me started on Lulu…

Thousands of tickets have already been sold for a Bournemouth concert just days after Steps announced their reunion tour.

Fans can expect the glitzy costumes, lighting and dance steps for which they were famous on Monday, April 16 at the Bournemouth International Centre.

Event Sales & Marketing Manager Gail Collins, said:  “We sold a lot of tickets over the weekend.  They only went on sale this past Friday and yet almost half the 6,200 capacity has been sold already.”

Steps have sold an astonishing 15 million records worldwide and embarked on an extensive tour of the US in 1999.

They appeal to people of all ages across the board with both parents and their children desperate to see them in April.

Mrs Collins said:  “It’s strange because there are almost three generations of people coming in for tickets.

“You have the kids today desperate to see them for the first time, then those in their twenties who saw them when they were 8-12 years old.

“On top of all that there are the parents who remember their kids being avid fans of them at the time.”

The BIC is also due to have older acts gracing their stage with both Duran Duran and Adam Ant due to make appearances.

“They certainly aren’t the first pop group to make a comeback of this sort either.  Even as recently as the latest Spice Girls and Take That tours.”

Steps, known for their hits singles ‘5, 6, 7, 8’ and ‘Tragedy’ are supporting ‘The Ultimate Tour’ with a greatest hits package that has already shot to number one in the charts.

Doors will open at 7.30pm with all tickets standing and sitting at £35.