Wednesday, 1 June 2011

Professional Pigskin Passer Troy Aikman Puts Dallas Pad Up For Sale

SELLER: Troy Aikman
LOCATION: Dallas, TX
PRICE: $24,000,000
SIZE: 10,520 square feet, 5 bedrooms, 6 full and 2 half bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Listen chickens, Your Mama knows as much about football as former child actress Lindsay Lohan knows about keeping the po-po out of her business so when we first heard from our Lonestar State-based real estate gossip pal Candy Evans that some Cowboy named Troy Aikmen put his hoity-toity house in Dallas's uppity and gorgeous Highland Park 'hood on the market we said, "Who?"

Natch, we took to the interweb and within minutes discovered California-born Mister Aikman passed the professional pigskin for 12 long seasons in Dallas, led his Cowboys to three Super Bowl wins and was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2006. He was, it seems and without question, a beloved football force to be reckoned with.

Since retiring in 2000, Mister Aikman has operated as a color commentator for Fox sports programs, hosts a weekly radio show and is a part-owner of the San Diego Padres, whoever they are. About the time he hung up his cleats and uniform he married the Cowboys' publicist Rhonda Worthey and the newlyweds quickly popped out two daughters to add to the one Miz Worthey already had from a previous betrothal.

Alas, as all good things often come to an end, earlier in the year the Aikmans announced they are headed for the court of divorce. Divorce amongst the rich and famous often demands the liquidation of assets and the sale of posh properties so it's really no surprise to real estate watchers that the parting pair recently heaved their marital mansion on the market this week with an asking price of $24,000,000. It's believed by those in the Dallas real estate know that the Aikman's chunky 10,520 square foot Mediterranean crib is the most expensive private residence currently on the market in the Dallas Metro area.

Mister and Missus Aikman acquired the first parcel of their two-lot compound in April of 2004. A few minutes research did not turn up a sale price but public records Your Mama peeped show the purchase price was high enough they took a seven million dollar mortgage on the property. According to Our Miss Candy?who pens the Second Shelters blog?Mister Aikman "sweet talked" the previous owner into selling him her home. No doubt much to her chagrin, shortly after buying the .54 acre property Mister Aikman and the Missus razed the house and replaced it with the mansion that now stands stately on the corner lot.

Listing information indicates the staunch and regal residence contains 5 bedrooms, 6 full and 2 (or maybe 3) half bathrooms, three living areas including a nearly 800 square foot family room on the finished basement level, a dining room with fireplace, study with coffered ceiling and a main floor family room with fireplace, hand-hewn beamed ceiling and triple-glazed glass doors that open to one of the home's several terraces.

A mosaic tile-lined swimming pool sits in a courtyard setting with the main house on one side and a guest house/pool pavilion with fireplace and outdoor grill station with pizza oven on the other. The two structures are linked by a columned loggia and a sturdy and voluminous dining gazebo.

At the tail end of 2008 Mister and Missus Aikman coughed up an unknown amount of additional funds for the .9 acre property next door, which they bought from a well-known but scandalized property developer recently sentenced to 14 months in prison for bribing a city official. As with their previous purchase the Aikmans demolished the existing 7,411 square foot manse to make way for more grand grounds that now include a second circular drive, flat expanses of unnaturally green grass, manicured flower beds shaded by mature trees, a fenced sport court, sunken trampoline and a guest house.

Over the years the Aikmans have owned a fair number of investment properties in places like Irving and Roanoke, TX. Hopefully they've done better with their investment properties than they have with some of their personal properties. In September 2002 they sold a .42 acre vacant residential parcel behind the gates of the Ironwood Country Club in Palm Desert, CA for $1,500,000, $195,000 less than they paid for the property just two years prior. In November 2007 Mister Aikman sold a 10,971 square foot mansion with 6 bedrooms and 7 full and 3 half bathrooms in Plano, TX for $1,330,000, a painful to the pocketbook $665,000 less than he paid for the property in May 1996.

Property records show that Mister Aikman still owns a 4,134 square foot house at the tail end of a quiet cul-de-sac, just a few miles from the Dallas/Forth Worth International Airportwith 4 bedrooms and 4.5 bathrooms in suburban Coppell, TX that he purchased in September 1997 for $383,904.

Interestingly and somewhat inexplicably, word on the real estate street in Dallas, according to Our Miss Candy, is that Mister Aikman has expressed interest in?but not yet made an offer on?a slightly more modest and more manageable property next door to the one he's trying to sell. Such are the weird real estate ways of the rich and famous.

listing photos: Allie Beth Allman & Associates

Source: http://realestalker.blogspot.com/2011/05/professional-pigskin-passer-troy-aikman.html

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Gil Scott-Heron: share your memories

There's something especially heartbreaking about the passing of the godfather of rap

There's perhaps something especially heartbreaking about the passing of Gil Scott-Heron now when, after years of drug problems and jail spells, his career had been put back on track thanks to I'm New Here, his stunning collaboration with XL Recordings boss Richard Russell. In fact, Gil was only just back from touring Europe when years of bad living finally caught up with him.

Still, at least the man whose influence on the music world is immeasurable (especially that of hip hop, rap and neo soul) had one final chance to remind a new generation that his was a voice like no other.

Who could possibly claim to hear On Coming From A Broken Home, the opening track on I'm New Here, without their body freezing on the spot as that voice cut its way towards what Gil himself described as "the absolute marrow" of your bones?

Even without paying attention to the lyrics ? a moving tribute to the female figures that shaped his, or any man's, life ? Gil's voice was as devastating an instrument as you're likely to ever hear. Rather than showing signs of damage after all those years of abuse, it seemed to have aged instead like the finest cask of rye. The album looked away from the swing of Gil's early jazz and soul-tinged releases towards a more skittish, trip hop backdrop, but that didn't mean the record lacked soul. After all, Gil's voice was soul.

You could gauge the vast influence of Gil Scott-Heron without even having to listen to a note of his music. When LCD Soundsystem's James Murphy starts rattling through his list of the most important, underrated figures in music on Losing My Edge (a list that stretches from This Heat to the Sonics) only one figure is worthy of the full on exclamation treatment: "Gil! Scott! Heron!"

Gil will be remembered most, of course, for The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, the 1970 spoken word track still regarded as one of the greatest pieces of political music ever put to tape.

You will doubtless hear more about that, along with other tributes to Gil, on guardian.co.uk/music over the coming days (Richard Russell has already blogged about the last time he spoke to Gil), but for now we'd love for you to share your memories of how this most unique musical voice moved you?


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Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2011/may/28/gil-scott-heron

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Why Adam Ant is not the first pop star who likes to be beside the seaside

Adam Ant's decision to tour Britain's coastal towns marks a welcome revival of a historic pop tradition

In June, Adam Ant will embark on a five-date tour of seaside towns ? and revive a long lost tradition in the process. As an astute observer of pop culture, the Antman must know that British coastal towns provide the quintessential homegrown music experience, what with the fading Victoriana and the licence for blustery fun and ? even better ? anarchy.

The big cities might think they're at the cutting edge, but it's the seaside where British pop first thrived ? from postwar gigs to seaside brawls between mods and rockers. The mix of showbiz, cheap pills and even cheaper thrills combined to forge an English pop vision far more vivid than that created by art schools.

Growing up in Blackpool, I felt cut off from the epicentre of pop action. But if I had been a teenager in the 60s I could have seen endless Beatles gigs, watched Jethro Tull, or witness Jimi Hendrix set fire to his guitar on stage (one of only two occasions this actually happened).

The 60s was the last decade that Blackpool could be considered the second city of showbiz; even Frank Sinatra would think nothing of playing there. A few decades earlier, George Formby, the UK's biggest homegrown star, would happily live in Blackpool and perform there for months on end. He even recorded songs about the place, such as the lascivious and censor-baffling Little Stick of Blackpool Rock.

Back then, seaside towns captivated the public imagination. The Beatles would dress up for pantomime pictures on the beach in Margate and play residencies in coastal townssuch as Bournemouth. It was a huge part of the pop conveyer belt and probably a cheap thrill in the days before LSD and touring America. The Beatles never left behind the inspiration of the seaside, though. Paul McCartney is believed to have thought up Magical Mystery Tour while looking at one of Blackpool's illumination trams.

Unfortunately, by the time the Specials fell apart on their own seaside tour, the tradition was dying along with the towns themselves. Perhaps they were too old fashioned for the amphetamine-driven cynicism of the era. Morrissey, of course, wrote one of his best songs, Everyday Is Like Sunday, about a visit to Borth in Wales.

Since then, Brighton has become a hip enclave and Blackpool has bravely soldiered on as a piss-up paradise. Elsewhere, other seaside towns have become fascinating curios ignored by the showbiz and entertainment culture that was once part of their DNA. Maybe Adam Ant's jaunt will revive this tradition and more artists will feel the need to be beside the seaside.


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Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2011/may/30/adam-ant-british-seaside-gigs

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Tuesday, 31 May 2011

Country King Alan Jackson Flips Out in Franklin

SELLER: Alan and Denise Jackson
LOCATION: Franklin, TN
PRICE: $3,995,000
SIZE: 14,040 square feet, 8 bedrooms, 8 full and 2 half bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: The Nashville, TN real estate community was electrified last year with mustachioed country music king Alan Jackson and his Christian book-writing wife Denise sold Sweetbriar, their super-luxe 135-acre estate with its 19,000 square foot mansion in rural Franklin, TN, to Willis and Reba Johnson for a teeth-chattering and record-busting $28,000,000. Mister Willis may not be a household name for most folks but he's a wildly wealthy man who made his three and some hundred million dollar fortune thanks to a publicly traded company called Copart that auctions wrecked cars for insurance companies.

According to Your Mama's southern real estate sources, specifically a gal we'll call Frankie N. Franklin, we've learned that when Mister and Missus Jackson decamped Sweetbriar they settled into another large but slightly smaller mansion in Franklin that property records reveal was acquired in June 2010 for $3,675,000. The towering three-story faux-Tuscan mansion was purchased through a business entity that links back to the same Brentwood, TN address where Mister Jackson's production company Real World Tours is located. Mister and Missus Jackson recently flipped their mansion back on the market less than one year after buying the damn thing with an asking price of $3,995,000.

Mister and Missus Jackson's new digs sit high on a rise in the 600-ish acre guard-gated community of LaurelBrooke about 12 miles south of downtown Nashville. The upscale enclave offers rich residents a 4,000 square foot clubhouse with fitness center and media room, a swimming pavilion with two heated pools (one for adults, one for toddlers), tennis facilities, basketball court, multi-purpose play field, miles of hiking and biking trails and several ponds stocked with fish.

Listing information shows Mister and Missus Jackson's mini-estate spans 2.05 rolling acres and includes a 14,040 square foot "villa" with 8 bedrooms, 8 full and 2 half bathrooms and garaging for six cars plus an attached workshop. According to Miz Franklin, the house was built on spec just prior to the recent economic slump in 2007 by a well-known local builder and sat vacant until Mister and Missus Jackson came along and snatched it up as a very temporary crib.

Electronic gates open to a stone-paved driveway that curves and climbs up the gentle slope to the front of the imposing stone-built house that rises three daunting stories with staircases and terraces lined with tightly-set stone balustrades. The front door is, technically, on the second level but a ground floor entrance makes it easy for the lazy to enter the house on the lowest level where they can ascend to the upper levels by way of an elevator.

The voluminous piazza-esque entry has stone floors, double-height ceiling, a dramatic curved floating staircase that any diva or divo would love to glide down. A glittery chandelier gives the grand but all-beige space a smidgen of necessary sparkle. The primary public spaces include a formal dining room and formal living room with massive carved stone fireplace, double-height ceiling and a second floor gallery that wraps around the earth tone bathed space.

More family friendly areas of the mansion include a colossal chef-equipped kitchen with wood-beamed ceiling and a lot of carved detailing on the cabinets. An adjacent breakfast room opens to a family room with fireplace. A series of tall windows and French doors open out to a loggia that stretches along the back of the house and a heated and cooled veranda with fireplace, outdoor kitchen and swimming pool facilities. The loggia and veranda both connect the house to the wide flagstone terrace that surrounds the salt water swimming pool and spa. The tree-ringed back yard also has a nice patch of perfectly-groomed lawn that Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter's long-bodied bitches Linda and Beverly would love to get their paws on.

The humongous house also includes a large lower-level games room with built-in bar, a fitness room full of state-of-art body torture equipment, a wine cellar and a home theater with leather recliners and tiered seating for optimal viewing.

We're not quite sure where Mister and Missus Jackson will move when they leave their short-term villa in Franklin but somewhere along the way Your Mama recalls we were told by someone?we don't recall who?that the real estate size queens only settled her in this tall Tuscan in Franklin while they completed building another no doubt gigantic house. Now kids, we have no direct knowledge of or details about this house the Jacksons are allegedly building so for now that is just a bit of rumor and gossip. Got that?

What is not rumor and gossip is that Mister and Missus Jackson have been on a bit of a real estate roll lately. Not only did they sell Sweetbriar in 2010 and buy the Franklin mansion they now have on the market they also listed their four bedroom Key West-style cottage on the Intracoastal Waterway in Tequesta, FL with an asking price of $1,275,000, just five thousand more than property records show they paid for the place in June of 2004. The property remains on the market without a reduction in the asking price.

The Jacksons continue to own an ocean front estate at the southern tip of Jupiter Island, FL. The property was originally purchased in 2002 for about $3,500,000 and several years later the Jacksons razed the existing house to make way for an 8,724 square foot Mediterranean mansion with 7 bedrooms and 6.5 bathrooms.

Your Mama would like the children to note that while all this celebrity real estate bizness is fun and games, devastating floods have ravaged dozens of communities and cities along the Mississippi River and its tributaries, including Nashville and the surrounding suburbs. Your Mama urges concerned citizen-children to donate a few pennies to the Red Cross relief efforts. Visit www.redcross.org or call 1-800-RED-CROSS; you can also text the word "REDCROSS" to 90999 to make a $10 donation. Contributions may also be sent to local American Red Cross chapters or to the American Red Cross, P.O. Box 37243, Washington, D.C. 20013.

listing photos: Sotheby?s International Realty / Lipman Group

Source: http://realestalker.blogspot.com/2011/05/country-king-alan-jackson-flips-out-in_13.html

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Seasick Steve live in 360 degrees

The blues singer played a gig in aid of homeless charity The Connection at St Martin's ? now watch it from every angle


On Thursday 26 May, Seasick Steve headlined the annual Streets of London Concert for Homelessness at the Electric Ballroom in Camden. All proceeds went to The Connection at St Martin's, a specialist centre that provides support to more than 200 homeless people each day. Below you can watch a stream of the show, filmed using Mativision 360-degree technology allowing you to select camera angles, pan across the stage (and crowd) or just leave static to enjoy an intimate set from Seasick Steve, including tracks from his new album, You Can't Teach An Old Dog New Tricks. Enjoy!

? For more information about Streets of London and how you can help the homeless, please click here. You can make a �2 donation by simply texting 'GIVE00 �2' to 70070. Alternatively, you can make the donation online.


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Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2011/may/31/seasick-steve-live-3d

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Nicki Minaj's 'Did It On 'Em' Video Reveals Backstage High Jinks

Video director DJ Scoob Doo tells MTV News he wanted fans to see another side of Pink Friday star in brand-new clip.
By D.L. Chandler


Nicki Minaj
Photo: Jason LaVeris/ Getty Images

Nicki Minaj's blistering track "Did It On 'Em" gets the video treatment in a guerilla-style clip highlighting some of the diva's backstage exploits and performances during the I Am Still Music Tour alongside Young Money honcho Lil Wayne earlier this year. MTV News caught up with the director of the brand-new clip, DJ Scoob Doo.

A hip-hop renaissance man, Scoob Doo has brushed elbows with some of rap's elite for some time now as a longtime fixture on the mixtape scene, gaining a name on the DVD scene, as well. Scoob's latest gives Minaj fans an intimate look into the superstar's life on the road. Scoob revealed quite a bit during a quick phone chat and gave the lowdown on how the video came to fruition.

"She's family to me and I'm family to her, but this is the first time us working together was a priority on both of our lists. So we just had to dig in and put everything to the side and really work on something ... [and] we had no idea that it would turn out as good as it did. It was a great experience," the video director told us.

Scoob also revealed that the plan all along was to shoot the clip in the rugged style seen in the clip. "It took me about a good two weeks to put all of the ideas that we had together. The good thing about the video is that we went in knowing we were gonna shoot the video onstage a few times. I was actually able to get my camera crew onstage," Scoob shared.

Although the style of video isn't like many of the other starlet's big-budget affairs, Scoob Doo shared why Nicki Minaj agreed to go with the more underground feel this time around: "Did It On 'Em" was the #1 song in the country without a video and only dropped a few spots when Nicki's glossy "Super Bass" video was released. After a brief convo and an agreement between Scoob and Nicki, they pieced together the video in two weeks in an effort to bump up interest and chart position for the still popular but dwindling "Did It On 'Em" single.

DJ Scoob Doo is already working on other projects and says he's "stepping it up" as a director. His goal is to bring quality music videos back to the forefront.

Still riding high off the success of her debut album, Pink Friday, Nicki is set to join pop diva Britney Spears on tour this summer.

What do you hope to see from Nicki's "Did It On 'Em" video? Tell us in the comments!

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Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MTVNewsLatest/~3/7KUtB8s2hdI/nicki-minaj-did-it-on-em.jhtml

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Denise Welch: 'I chose to start drinking again'

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Denise Welch spent years battling addiction to drink and drugs but in recent weeks the 52-year-old seems to have fallen back into old habits.

Now the Loose Women star has admitted to enjoying the odd drink again but insists she made a conscious decision to do so.

Welch confessed that at one stage, her boozing and drug-taking got so bad that her Corrie co-star Kevin Kennedy took her to Alcoholics Anonymous.

She told Woman magazine: "I stopped drinking completely but I chose to start drinking again. I didn't fall off the wagon, I stepped off it.

"I drink at parties, I drink at awards dos, I drink when I am out with my mates and that's when you get all the pap snaps of drunk Denise."

We know Denise... we've seen the results.

Ms Welch insisted she's (almost) never late for work and said: "I am my own worst enemy because I play up to the image, but people make assumptions about me that are so totally off the mark."

However, Denise admitted that she might need to tone her behaviour down a bit in future.

"I want to get some discipline in my life," she went on. "I don't want to be the old drunk staggering round Soho House in 10 years' time...

"After a night out, my first thought in the morning is: 'Oh God, Denise what did you do?' I am mortified when I see pictures of me flashing my knickers...

"It embarrasses my kids. I am an embarrassment."

And there we have it... straight from the horse's mouth.

What do you think of Denise's 'decision' to start drinking again? Leave a comment below...

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We're far from prudes here at Eleven. If you've got it, flaunt it we say - but there are certain celebs who are such blatant repeat flaunters that - to be honest - we just feel like saying "put it away love"...

 

 

Source: http://celebrity.aol.co.uk/2011/05/31/denise-welch-drinking/

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