Wesley Snipes sentenced to three years in Jail…?Who would have imagined that a movie star of the stature of Snipes would have been imprisoned for non payment of taxes as happened last week in the United States. Letters and pleas made on his behalf from his high profile friends fell on deaf ears as the judge made an “example” of “Blade” that would be an effective deterrent to any star thinking of doing the same.Do you think Wesley Snipes being jailed is one of those things that would only happen to a black star? If it were Tom Cruise or Brad Pitt do you envision they might have been served the same penalty?

I guess there was no “example” which needed to be made there….

Sean’s Fiancee Nicole Bell leaving the court room in tears with Al Sharpton after not guilty verdict was given

These CNN presenters look so good then, they look like “bakes”

Have you ever noticed how beautiful female news anchors are when you are watching international TV news shows?
It’s freaking amazing, almost every single woman reading news that I have ever seen whether it’s on CNN, ABC or NBC looks like the best looking woman you have ever seen in your life.
Some times you don’t give a rat’s ass about what the content of the news is because you are so mesmerized by the woman reading it.
You know how many boring financial news programs about something called a “dow”I have watched because of beauty of the female presenter.
I am not saying that we don’t have attractive female presenters here but the international ones are something else.
I would be hard press to identify a time I was watching CNN and saw an “ugly” female presenter; it appears that it is a requirement that to land the job you must be beautiful and sexy in addition to being articulate and intelligent.
Is that being sexist? Some people would say hiring a females based on their looks is demeaning to the women.
 May be its about keeping people with shallow minds and short attention spans such as my self watching the news regardless of its content and keeping the ratings up. Plus these women are paid quite handsomely for their beautiful news reading.
Regardless of the state of the war in Iraq or the rising price of oil I will receive it more readily when it’s in news delivered by a sexy news woman…

One of the innovations which was announced at the recent Crop Over Breakfast launch was the addition of another kadooment route.

What do you think about the splitting of the route?
 A friend of mine who regularly goes down to Trinidad carnival expressed this concern.
He said that unlike Trinidad, Barbados does not have massive costume bands and to split them on the route would even more diminish their visual impact and take away from the Spectacle of Kadooment.

On the other hand splitting the bands might lead to a more manageable and safer event where the police might be happy and revelers have more fun.

What do you think? One route or Two?

Bakes by Rico 

For those of you who do not know or play you don’t know…The item of food you see above is the old time bajan delicacy known as bakes!
I recently spoke to the issue of bakes being missing from the breakfast menu of the official  Crop Over launch recently staged by the NCF,
They were some disparaging remarks dropped some people (would not call Asiba name to embarrass him) talking bout “bakes got in cholesterol”.

For years we bajan children were raised up eating bakes as a staple meal, all of a sudden we look at them and scoff and talk bout “cholesterol”.
As far as I know bakes are made with flour water sugar and salt, cholesterol is not one of the ingredients.

What has in more cholesterol than Kentucky Fried Chicken but we eat that and “skin we teet” and say it is “finger licking good”. Well we need to start eating bakes and licking we fingers too. 

The problem with we is that we have no respect for we own, that is why our food import bill is so damn high. Case in point, tamarinds! When I was growing up you would just go under a tree and pick up tamarinds.
Nowadays if we want tamarinds we go in price mart and pick them up, imported from Hong Kong complete with Chinese writing on the box.
We will start appreciating bakes when they are imported in a fancy box from Japan and available at Price Mart.

The bakes you see above were made for me by my son Rico, his grandmother taught him how to make them, he does ”Food and Nutrition” at Alexandra school they did not teach him how to make them there. Bakes need to be placed on the cooking syllabus of Bajan schools.

This is one of the reasons for the constant decline of the good old time bajan morals of our society. We need to go back looking out for our neighbors, we need to go back to roasting breadfruit and for crying out loud, we need to go back to eating bakes!

P.S; I ate the bakes above and they were delicious!

Boyce is leaving the computer licking his fingers…

As we previously said the Sponsors Breakfast stage at Sherbourne Center on Tuesday by NCF while “bakeless’ was other wise an impressive launching of Crop Over 2008.
The Chairman of the NCF spoke, Minister of Culture spoke but I was especially impressed with the speech given by Prime Minister David Thompson.

In his speech the PM stated “I fully endorse the work that the National Cultural Foundation is doing, but I am hoping that over time they can hand over some of those activities to the management of new players who can truly make it a national festival,”

I have already stated my “Euphoric” joy in hearing of this new policy of the current government in contrast to the exploitive agenda which existed before.

Of course as commented by P’ Oui any one can say any thing but you must wait and see if they will follow through with action. What impressed me with the speech was not just the content, but the knowledge that what was being stated was already being put into practice.
Example; my involvement working with the NCF coordinating Cavalcades, one year ago would you have guessed that the culturally nefarious Peter Boyce would be the point person for the government’s inaugural Crop Over event? That’s an example of private enterprise being utilized.
Another Example “Cohobblopot” the premiere revenue generating gem of our national festival, I happen to know NCF is right now reviewing tenders to give out a concession for that event to be done by a private promoter. That is something that would never have happen before. “Give away we biggest money earner? Wuh You is a idiot?” That talk done, new policy in place!
This opens the door that fledging young promoter talent like Ronnie Morris, Chris Harper, Andy John and more can get involve with the festival.

So in the case of PM David he is not just doing the talk but “walking the walk”,

The prestigious Sherbourne Center

Where were the bakes?      That is the question I asked when I attended the “Sponsors breakfast” yesterday morning at Sherbourne Center hosted by the Government and NCF.

In case you don’t know, the “Sponsors Breakfast” is an annual event where the National Cultural Foundation (NCF) invites sponsors to breakfast with the objectives of wooing them with highlights of the coming Crop Over season and hopefully acquire their financial support through sponsorship.Or the government gives sponsors some hot tea in an effort to help them “brek de air” and “brek some money” at the same time…

The presentation of the ‘Breakfast event” was impressive, the entertainment was excellent especially the multimedia piece performed by Merle Niles and Jennifer Walker. Prime Minister David Thompson was there along with Minister of Culture Steve Blackette, the NCF Chairman, CEO and a cadre of government ministers.

NCF Corporate Communications officer Wayne Simmons performed M.C duties and along with media specialist Doug Hoyte presented the 2008 Crop Over theme for this year “We Ready”.

Will go into what the Prime Minister said tomorrow but today I want to focus on a more important point. The food served at the event was excellent with eggs, fried plantain, fruit and other breakfast gastronomical delicacies. Except for one thing, look as I may I could not find any bakes….! Fish cakes were there, but no “bakes” that popular bajan delicacy from years ago made with flour and water.

Come to think about it I have never been to a function and been served “bakes”, that needs to change. NCF being the vanguard of our culture needs to take the lead in this indigenous food matter. Next time we have a traditional Bajan breakfast, I want to see some bakes…!

Otherwise Great Event, Can’t wait for Crop Over 2008!

Tomorrow; The PM say dat…….. (to be continued)

Ancient Al amazed that pictures can now be taken in colour 

My Name feature prominently in Al Gilkes Nation newspaper column last weekend,
Al wrote that Peter Boyce was one of the first people to publicly state he had to be close to be 100 years old based on the length of time he had been around.
Al is so amazing I dedicated a whole post to him last year entitled “Al Gilkes eats Conch”.
At Al’s age to be using a computer and still having the alacrity of mind to write a weekly column is pretty amazing. He should be in Ripley’s Believe It or Not…

One of the things that is amazing about Al is he still continues to be a significant player in the entertainment business as a promoter.
He is partner in F.A.S Entertainment which produces the phenomenally successful “Barbados Reggae Festival” which comes off here later this month.
This festival features a series of events with some of the biggest Jamaican acts which people pack venues at phenomenal prices to see.

Big names like Taurus Riley, Capelton, Jah Cure, Sizzla Kololji, TOK, Baby Sham and more.
Quite an impressive line up being put together by a man who also promoted shows with Jackie Opel and buddy boy Vic Brewster, I am surprised Al doesn’t think a “Jah Cure” is some sort of bush tea.

Even in his column last week Al gave a list of his favorite movies that he actually saw in the cinema when they first came out, and they were a list of ancient ones we now see on Turner Classics TV channel…
Al does not let the challenges of age deter him as he continues to set a set a positive example for current promoters like my self, Richard Haynes, Phil Philips and others to follow.
I hope I can be just as active when I get to Al’s age, in fact I would settle just to GET to his age…

P.S; I am not forgetting the role Freddie Hill plays in organizing the Reggae Festival, Al needs some one to remind him to take his pills…

Wow! Talk about lucky, I went to the beach yesterday for my daily run, and happened to butt up on a photo shoot featuring not one, not two, but five beautiful curvaceous female models.
The photographer was there clicking away and the make up guy was running in “happily” adding finishing touches to the girls.
The make up guy is my subject here; he seemed to be gay, as usual.
Why do make up men always seem to be gay? All the productions I have been involved in when ever a make up person is involved and it’s a man it always seems to be a gay man.
Even when you are watching an international modeling show on TV, and the make up man is featured he always seem to be a bubbly happy “gay” kinda girl …. Sorry I meant guy.

I know you will start saying how I can look at some body and say they are Gay, if you can’t observe when a person seems to have an extra gay pep in their step and touch of femininity in their vocal variety that’s your business.
I don’t get the impression they are trying to hide it any way.

Is it that when you fill out a form to do a cosmetic course there is a question asking “are you gay?” And if you tick no they turn you down?

How do they go about enforcing a criteria where mostly gay people end up in a profession then?

Notice the bangle the make up guy is wearing? I rest my case

To summarize my point for the purposes of clarity; I am not saying ALL make up men are gay; I am just saying that MOST SEEM to be…
I get the impression they prefer gay people around the models so the girls would be safe… maybe that’s so…

I am not telling you to go out and start attacking make up people either and talk bout Boyce Voice encourage you cause you would be an ass, oops that might attract some people…. But really you would be a major jack ass! What people do in the privacy of their bedroom home and M.L cars is their own business.

I simply made an observation, I hope the cosmetic people out there reading this don’t get offended, next time you see me on TV and face looks off, it will be the make up guy getting back at me..

P.S: you always put on make up when you go on TV so don’t think nothing funny…

.

Comment by Dude;”I support them but I also wonder how persons not involved in the music creation stage can earn an equal amount the artists. A CD is sold to records stores between $20 and $25 and then they retail $45… this huge markup policy needs addressing”

Dude made a very pertinent comment to my Music shop article below and I wish to address the “huge mark up policy” as he has requested.

Dude’s comment is reflective of a line of thought which also exists in the entertainment industry, music shops take their cds make so much money off them while they get paltry scraps in return.

Of the $45 selling price which was correctly quoted, 15% of that is Value Added Tax, VAT that goes to the government. Lets also consider that apart from VAT shops also pay regular taxes on revenue generated which means out of the remaining balance more still goes to the government, that why I could never understand it when our previous PM Arthur complained we sold cds so high when what helps to contributes to that is duties and taxes, that would be something PM David needs to address.

The normal practice is for shops to add on a 50% mark up on any thing they sell; Do you think that is too much?
Well I don’t think so and I will tell you why.
From 1993 to 1998 Madd operated retail shop “Rue Rue” upstairs Mall 34 for “Music fashion and U”.
Between the high rents, NIS payments, advertising costs, staff costs, utility costs, theifing etc IT WAS FINANCIAL HELL.
My challenge to any entertainer who thinks music shops make SO MUCH money, well you open an outlet and make the money then,.
There’s a reason why they don’t and there is a reason why I HAD a music store and don’t have it any more.
When you look at the proliferation of operating expenses a shop incurs that must be recouped from a cd sale it more than justifies the mark up.

Thanks for making your comment Dude….

Boyce left the computer….

Well it has made a significant change in the way music can now be acquired by collectors. Music is now absolutely free and especially to the young demographic, purchasing music is no longer in their spending patterns.

In the 90’s when Madd operated a music store in Bridgetown called “Rue Rue”, it was the usual practice that every Saturday morning we had teenagers who would faithfully come and buy cds to their favorite artistes. Beres Hammond, Garnet Silk, Boyz to Men and Krosfyah sold like hot sugar cakes.
There were no cd burners in computers facilitating pirate activity and nothing called ADSL, so if you wanted music on cd you had to get it from a store.

Now the young people of today just stay home punch the name of their favorite song into the computer download it into their mp3 collection and enjoy it on their ipods and phones with out paying a cent. Damn wunnah internet people then, you should be shame!
There are teenagers out there who don’t know what a music shop looks like furtherless why you would take $50 to buy a cd

So that’s why we should take your hat off and admire the following; John Edwards of Power Station, Valerie Greaves of Number One Record Shop and Norman Barrow of A& B Music, for continuing to survive against overwhelming technological theifing odds and continual support of the music industry.
If you are not going to take your hat off, at least cut your hair…

Boyce is leaving the “theifing music” computer

Theifing blank cd