
What’s it like to catch a gig so great it goes down in history? Our writers relive incredible performances by everyone from Amy Winehouse at the North Sea jazz festival to Kanye West at Glastonbury
Talking Heads, the Rock Garden, London, 13 May 1977
Continue reading...From the World Cup fan park in Manchester, supporters cheer through the night as England beat Mexico to advance to the quarter-finals
Manchester is up there with the greatest footballing cities in the world. But even here, the fans had hardly seen a game like it.
In the early hours of Monday morning, at Europe’s biggest World Cup fan park, as the final whistle blew after an agonising 11 minutes of injury time, the crowd cheered with a roar loud enough to wake anyone in Manchester still asleep.
Continue reading...Quite aside from all the convolutions, it’s clear the government is ignorant of the reality for young people like me hoping to get on the property ladder
I need to talk about money. Specifically my finances and trying to buy a house as a young person. I hope you’ll forgive me if I sound like I don’t know what I’m talking about, but that’s because I’m going to try to make sense of the government’s reforms to personal savings accounts, known as Isas.
These products have become significantly overcomplicated in recent years, with the government continually refreshing what were conceived of as simple tax-free savings accounts with new rules, allowances, products and age restrictions. I’m not alone in feeling overwhelmed and frustrated. As the deputy money editor of the i newspaper, Callum Mason, put it: “It’s hard enough to understand if you cover money for a living – I don’t know how the general public is supposed to do so.”
Jason Okundaye is a Guardian Opinion assistant editor
Continue reading...The actor spent almost a decade fighting monsters – and making friends – on the hit Netflix show. Then, last year, it all came to an end. How’s he adjusting?
Finn Wolfhard is remembering his first experience of celebrity. It was 2016 and he was 13. The first season of Stranger Things had aired that summer, and he returned to his high school in Vancouver as if nothing had changed. But things had changed. “People didn’t know how to treat me, especially the teachers. Kids that didn’t even look at me before were paying attention to me or wanting to hang out.” He remembers a girl in the year above who really wanted a photo with him. “And I was like: ‘Oh, I can’t really take photos at school.’ And she wasn’t listening to me and pulled me into, like, a side hug. I remember thinking: ‘Shit, man. I have no control over this. This seems crazy.’ So, it was definitely weird at first, and something I still haven’t totally grasped.”
How strange it must be to have spent such a large part of your life playing a character that half the world knows, and has watched grow up on screen, turning from a wide-eyed, gawky, nerdy kid to a sharp-cheekboned (but still quite gawky) action hero. Nobody could have predicted how huge Stranger Things would become or how long it would last, fuelled by popular demand, then stalled by the pandemic. It concluded a decade later, at the end of last year, having reached the point where it was no longer sustainable for twentysomethings like Wolfhard to pass as high schoolers.
Continue reading...Race to develop ‘embodied AI’ focuses on creating dextrous hands to transform humanoid robots from gimmicks into useful products
Human hands – nimble, nerve-filled appendages that are the most flexible part of the human skeleton – are exceptionally complex. Many tasks that most people can do largely without thinking, from tying a pair of shoelaces to buttoning up a shirt, in fact require a complex set of neurological instructions and precise choreography. In thousands of years of human history, no machine has been able to truly replicate human’s greatest tool.
But now, as artificial intelligence (AI) races forwards, some companies think they are close to surpassing this final but most difficult hurdle in robotics. Most of them are in China.
Continue reading...Little-known abroad, Andy Burnham has a chance to define a new era of US-UK relations. Should he seek to charm or bargain with the bully in the White House – or treat him ‘like a poorly informed constituent’?
If, as expected, Andy Burnham becomes the British prime minister later this month, one of his first telephone calls is likely to be with Donald Trump.
Trump’s mother was Scottish and he has a nostalgic fascination with Britain. But managing a relationship with the erratic, transactional and demanding US president has been a diplomatic minefield for Burnham’s predecessors.
Continue reading...Fresh row erupts over Duke of Sussex’s trip, the buildup to which has been overshadowed by security dispute
Just as it seemed there might be a period of peace, yet another row has broken out between Prince Harry and his family, with one party saying he had accepted an invitation to stay at Buckingham Palace and the other countering within minutes that he would no longer be welcomed.
The Duke of Sussex is to visit London and Birmingham for a series of charity engagements including promoting the Invictus Games. The buildup to the trip has been overshadowed by a dispute with the government over security, and a spokesperson for the prince saying on Sunday that the Duchess of Sussex and the couple’s children would not join him in London, but could do later when he visited Birmingham.
Continue reading...Reform UK leader claims he is victim of ‘hit job’ as parliamentary standards commissioner investigates £5m donation
On the subject of Andy Burnham, the Financial Times is running a story today saying the access talks his team is holding with senior civil servants, intended to help Whitehall departments get ready to implement the new PM’s policy agenda, are being hindered by the fact that Burnham has not decided who will do the top cabinet jobs.
In the story, Lucy Fisher, George Parker and Anna Gross say:
Talks have not yet formally started with the Treasury and Burnham’s refusal to nominate a chancellor has complicated transition planning.
One Labour figure complained Burnham’s operation was “skeletal”, adding: “Access talks require a shadow cabinet. Burnham needs to nominate key people in advance or he cannot have meaningful talks” ….
Yes. And look – I’m not going to go into what we discussed privately, but everything I’ve seen from Andy publicly suggests that he knows that welfare reform is absolutely necessary … [because] it’s fundamentally about the life chances of a whole generation of young people.
And if we think the best option and best opportunity that we can gift as a country to a generation of young people is a life on benefits – are we serious?
My sense is that the appetite, both within the parliamentary Labour party and the new administration, will be absolutely up for doing this.
One of those is how we support young people. I will not defend an education system that is overly focused on the university route and does not lay out paths to technical qualifications for our young people. Too many young people get to year 10 at school, and they can’t see where school is taking them, because the system isn’t focusing on those young people.
And then, at 16, I believe we need the guarantee of a work placement for 16 to 18-year-olds, apprenticeships for every 16 to 18-year-old who wants one, and what I’ve done in Great Manchester is something that might be looked at more broadly, free bus travel for 16 to 18-year-olds, so that they can access those opportunities.
Continue reading...US ambassador to Nato has called for all allies who are ‘lagging behind’ to step up immediately
Keir Starmer is likely to face a diplomatic row at his final major international summit this week after Washington’s ambassador to Nato called for alliance members who are “lagging behind” on defence spending to step up.
The prime minister is due to arrive in Ankara on Tuesday for the annual Nato summit, where the UK commitment will be under scrutiny following the release of the government’s defence investment plan (Dip) last week.
Continue reading...⚽️ World Cup news and reaction as the last 16 continues
⚽️ Uefa accuses Fifa of ‘crossing red line’ over Balogun
⚽️ Mexico 2-3 England | Player guide | And email us
We haven’t even mentioned Balogun-gate yet. The Belgian FA, and you can assume a large proportion of the football world, has been left “astonished” by Fifa’s decision after lobbying by Donald Trump to reverse the suspension given to the striker for his red card in the team’s win over Bosnia and Herzegovina. He is now free to play in the last-16 game against Belgium.
Sources have told the Guardian that Trump made three calls to Fifa, starting from Wednesday, to ensure that the change was made.
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