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bridgeportbritt · 7 days

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Chapter 12 Summary

READ THE CHAPTER HERE OR READ THE SUMMARY BELOW

In Chapter 12, we follow all of our characters as we lead up to the wedding of the century!

In the beginning of the chapter, we find Diana getting back into horse riding, Gianni and Jennifer getting closer, and Olivia and Grayson excited to be engaged.

No one, of course, more excited than Bria who has already started planning but makes sure to try and include the couple. Ella tries to get used to the new royal dress code. While out with friends, Jennifer is questioned about their relationship status.

After meeting with Olivia, Bria, Olivia's mom, Grayson and Olivia meet to start discussing wedding planning in depth. They decide on Creeksbrey Palace as the venue.

Diana reconnects with her best friend, Arabella, and they worry about their absent friend, Alexandra, who hasn't been seen much since her relationship with Alex Goth Jr.

In a meeting with her Monarchy Advisor, Diana also wants to reconnect with Bria (who's enjoying her new joint office with Emmitt) by giving her son a title upon his marriage. Bria refuses it and sees it as a sign of control from Diana.

Bria coordinates a dress fitting and engagement photos. Grayson and Olivia start planning by choosing their bridal parties. While asking Gianni to be his best man, he sparks a conversation between Gianni and Jennifer. In the end, they decide to be official! They host a Spooky Day party at Gianni's house where he meets her brother.

They hang out the next day at Jennifer's house where Gianni invites Jennifer to the wedding. Jennifer decides that she wants to take their relationship to the next level and the couple woohoo.

Ella and her friends talk about Prom specifically dates. Ella is reluctantly going with Luka, of course. Eric reveals that he's going with his friend. Chanel asks some guy in their gym class while Victoria worries if her crush will ask her.

Arabella finds their friend, Alexandra. Her parents had her put in rehab after her partying spiraled after her relationship with Alex Goth Jr. She's doing better and even met someone.

Gerhard is preparing for the Victory Games, his first large solo project where countries compete in sports for charity. Shortly after the games, Diana gives birth to a baby girl, Princess Mia. The couple celebrate with a quick vacation to Simovia with Spencer and Elizabeth. They also celebrate their birthdays.

Gianni meets Jennifer's family and reveals some of his past with women. The dinner goes well. Gianni asks Bria if he can bring a plus one to the wedding finally revealing his girlfriend to his all-knowing mother. Jennifer is nervous about meeting his royal family but he reassures her. The family loves her upon their arrival.

Family starts to pour in as we get closer to the big day. Many events to be had. Esther hosts the bridal shower at her home. Bria flies everyone out to Sulani for a spa bachorette party where Grayson's Simerican cousins convince Olivia to go out.

Grayson is nervous about his mysterious bachelor party plans from Gianni. Olivia enjoys a fun night out at a nightclub with her friends and Grayson's family. Surprisingly, Gianni takes the men camping. Gianni and Grayson have a heart to heart. On their last night, Gustavo calls Grayson from jail so congratulate him and apologize for being a bad dad.

The museum where the couple first officially met is where the rehearsal dinner is held. Donovan shows up to the party uninvited to apologize to his Olivia. She accepts only is he apologizes to Grayson which he does. Emmitt gives a heartwarming toast.

The ladies get ready in Bria's closet while the men get ready in the family room. Bria leaves heartfelt letter to both Olivia and Grayson. The guest list is intimate and has many high-profile people. The bridal party included close friends and family. The couple exchanged beautiful vow then celebrated the happy union with their guests at the reception.

Gianni met with an old friend, Nick Wilkinson, who he hadn't seen since he was an embarrassed teen as Nick's movie premiere. They had a heart to heart. Soon after, Gianni ended the night telling Jennifer he loved her which she returned!

After the beautiful event, the family left and the happy couple went to their Selvadoradian honeymoon leaving Bria and Emmitt to reflect on their kids growing up.

#chapter summary #chap 12 #blog stuff

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freakingoutthesquares · 11 months

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Mojo Britpop Special 2009 This Year’s Model. Transcription: Me.

A mix of Celtic yobs and art school wits, Pulp created a culturally momentous update of old school glam. But joining London's glitterati fragmented them. By Roy Wilkinson.

At the 96 BRITS, whilst Jarvis Cocker was making himself known to Michael Jackson via a stage invasion, bandmate Russell Senior was making another acquaintance. ‘I met Chris Eubank,’ says Russell of the monocle wearing former boxer. ‘We were getting on famously, but after the Jackson incident he folded his arms and turned away because he was a huge Jackson fan. I'd been having this interesting conversation, about art, philosophy... But Jarvis ruined it!’ [Laughs] ‘Though he had a point, of course.’

A phenomenon as chummy as Britpop was never likely to produce seditious acts similar to self-immolating monks or suffragettes throwing themselves under horses. Cocker's BRITS incursion was perfect - a commando raid as envisaged by Charlie Chaplin. If the Britpop was a national Jubilee, Cocker’s assault was the feat of bravado that marked the party at its peak - before dawn revealed the broken glass and trampled flower beds.

With nothing but a stylised posterior display and glare full of silent movie distain Cocker derailed Jackson’s plan to recast himself as a mix of Jesus, David Attenborough and Doctor Bernardo. Surrounded by children, images of wildlife and actors done up as representatives of the world's key religions, Jacko sang on through Earth Song, oblivious to Cocker’s presence. But the rest of the world noticed, and there were consequences.

Jarvis was locked up at Kensington police station, Brian Eno took out a pro-Cocker advert in industry paper Music Week, while Simon and Yasmin Le Bon appeared in the Daily Mirror wearing ‘Justice for Jarvis’ T-shirts. An act that united the ex-Roxy Music pop sage with the Duran Duran singer was an appropriately odd reflection of the way Pulp’s uneven career embraced both high and low art. By the time Cocker gatecrashed Jackson's performance, Pulp had been going 18 years. Jarvis, a single minded fellow, was the only surviving original member.

Russell Senior left Pulp after ‘Jacksongate’ in January 1997. He'd been with the band since 1983, effectively operating as Jarvis, his right-hand man. When I spoke to Russell, he was attempting to create a nesting site for kingfishers in the garden of his three-bedroom family home in Sheffield. Conversation ranged from Suede and Oasis to Russell’s fascination for central Europe. He recently visited Criona, a Serb enclave in Croatia. The band's guitarist and multi-instrumentalist, Russell quit Pulp, citing artistic frustration and the desire to spend more time with his family. He'd been part of Pulp’s slow ascent to 1995’s Different Class album, the band's commercial and critical peak, cut by a line up completed by keyboard player Candida Doyle, drummer Nick Banks and bassist Steve Mackey.

Jarvis wasn't the only member of Pulp to trespass at the BRITS. Cocker was accompanied by Peter Mansell, Pulp bassist, from 84 to 87. Mansell’s presence at the BRITS was a subtle reminder of the bands long torturous history. They survived years on the dole and lived through the Miners’ Strike, during which Russell served on the picket lines. Pulp finally reached the masses during Britpop's commercial peak in 95. But for Senior. Britpop began earlier, on a night in Paris in October 1991. Pulp were third on the bill to Blur and Lush.

‘My first experience of Blur,’ says Russell,’ was walking into their dressing room in Paris and seeing them smashing this mirrored wall. The floor was covered in glass and Alex (James) was pouring champagne out of the window onto the people below. Damon (Albarn) was flicking spoonfuls of caviar out of a window. The first thing Graham (Coxon) said to me was, ‘We like your band. We're going to copy you.’ I used to do this kind of Pete Townsend arm fling. Next time I saw Blur, Graham was doing it but making it look more like a Nazi salute.’

‘Later I thought their Girls and Boys single was very Pulp. (Blur producer) Stephen Steet did say, ‘I know we've nicked your clothes a bit.’ But I'm not griping at Blur because they had the balls to do it bigger. For me, that night in Paris was the start of Britpop. It's not something I'm going to knock. I mean, there was a period little later when I started wearing Union Jack socks.’

Prior to Senior’s Britpop flashpoint in Paris, he is band had a 13 year pre-history - unlucky for some including, it seems, Pulp. The band came into being in 78, formed by Jarvis at school in Sheffield. They were known as Arabicus Pulp, the Arabicus coming from a copy of the Financial Times. It alluded to a commodities index featuring coffee arabica, found in Ethiopia and Yemen. Spiritually cursed by such obtuseness, Pulp spent the next 15 years plagued by tragicomic levels of ill omen and commercial failure. There were rehearsals in the building shared with table tennis clubs and model railway enthusiasts. According to Jarvis, these hobbyist sects were at daggers-drawn and expressed their antipathy by crapping outside each other’s doors. Jarvis said in 1993 that he devoted much of ‘It’ Pulp’s 83 debut to ‘writing all these songs about girls when I'd never had a proper girlfriend.’ When he did secure female attention, Cocker had unconventional ways of making an impression. He attempted to walk along a second-floor window ledge outside a Sheffield bookshop. He fell, breaking a wrist and ankle and fracturing his pelvis.

Subsequent shows saw Jarvis singing from a wheelchair - a sight some interpreted as grotesque take on the kind of ‘disability chic’ launched by a hearing-aid-adorned Morrissey. Pulp made an album for £600. The sales figure wasn't of a dissimilar magnitude. Pulp made three albums in these wilderness years. It was followed by Freaks (1987) and Separations (1991) [Actually 1992!]. Freaks’ subtitle - Ten Songs About Power, Claustrophobia, Suffocation and Holding Hands – said Pulp were still some way from the matily exuberant dimensions of, say, Blurs beery, Britpop totem Girls and Boys.

I first interviewed Jarvis and Russell in 87 around Freaks. They were genuinely amazed that then record company Fire had stretched to some chocolate biscuits to go with tea. The resulting article compared Pulp to Ian McEwan, Bertold Brecht and Carry On actor Charles Hawtrey.

‘It wasn't all about me and Jarvis by any means,’ says Russell of Freaks. ‘There was also this Celtic yob element which was (Belfast born) Candida Doyle, Magnus (Doyle, Candida’s brother and Pulp drummer at that point) and Pete Mansell. If it was just me and Jarvis, it would have all been very art school. The other three liked Sham 69… Actually, we all liked Sham 69. Perhaps that was the only thing we all had in common. In fact, we sometimes played Sham 69s Hurry up, Harry live.

After Freaks, Jarvis moved to London, studying at Central St. Martins College of Art and Design. Steve Mackey had joined Pulp on bass and was also in the capital studying film at the Royal College of Art. Soon Pulp were exhibiting a more playful mood and an unknowingly pop-art retrospection. There were concert flyers advocating ‘Pulp-ish’ things to do, such as ‘doing a wheelie on a Raleigh Chopper’ and ‘Going to the supermarket wearing a lurex jumper.’

This increasing friskiness - and references to the kind of 70s bicycling design that would soon turn up in the video for Supergrass’, Alright single - began to manifest itself in Pulp’s records. In the early 1990s they released a string of singles full of a new vivacity. In title, at least one single could hardly have given clearer indication that Pulp were now ready for revelry. It was called Razzamatazz.

Pulp left Fire for Island Records. The band's first album proper for Island was His’n’Hers in 1994. Now Pulp finally reached the Top 10 of the UK Albums Chart. The sleeve featured an airbrushed portrait of the band by Philip Castle, the artist best known for his poster image for the film A Clockwork Orange in 1971 - Pulp were a vision of sci-fi second-hand chic. The music included the same pop art reconfiguration of the past.

‘Glam rock was a big part of the picture,’ says Russell. ‘I'd written this mission statement for the band - about making the fairground music of the future. The music of dodgem cars and girls with love bites - the modern version of Sugar Baby Love by the Rubettes, anything by Slade and Sweet. In the dour time we were experiencing, there was a wistfulness for the exuberance of glam rock. We believed in glamour. We absolutely wanted to be pop stars - on our own terms, but pop stars nonetheless.’

With its vandals, acrylics and tales of sexual initiation His’n’Hers was a critical and commercial success. The next 16 months saw Pulp - Jarvis in particular - become a national treasure. Where once Cocker had occupied the mildewed margins, now he seemed to be permanently addressing the nation with wit, charm and the ability to correctly answer every question that Mike Read [it was Chris ‘Talent’ Tarrant actually!] asked in the quick fire round on BBC 1's Pop Quiz.

Pulp’s years lurking in the backwaters could now be seen as advantageous, their own prolonged version of the way The Beatles had honed their craft hidden away in Hamburg. If Britpop was about taking age-old strands of British culture and re-styling them for the contemporary era, Pulp were masters of the moment. The Sheffield years weren't far removed from the formative grind endured by any traditional Northern stand-up comedian.

Russel: ‘On stage, Jarvis is always great at talking to people. But before Britpop, he kind of had them in his hand and then turned it into a joke. That used to drive me mad because I wanted him to keep hold of them and make it all really euphoric. Coming into the 90s he became a full-on master of ceremonies and it was great. The Pulp shows in that period was so exciting. That was the best of it for me. I don't think we ever truly captured it on record.’

When Pulp stood in for an injury-stricken Stone Roses at Glastonbury in 1995, they were greeted with the kind of open-armed gratitude Allied troops experienced while liberating Paris in 1944. These latter-day saviours brought with them a whiff of sex and nylons, but also Common People, a song that for the summer of 1995 became a universal anthem to match Lily Marlene or The White Cliffs of Dover.

When Jarvis guest presented Top of the Pops in 1994, he was met with a wave of communal good will. Even more so than when Chris U band appeared two years later, gamey lisping through ‘Suggs at six with Cecilia.’ Then Pulp became Top of the Pops themselves, their Different Class album hitting Number 1. It wasn't difficult to account for its success. The likes of Mis-Shapes and Something Changed have show-tune vigour that could have been as successful for Tommy Steele or Jesus Christ Superstar. There were also more left field inclinations. Common People was partly inspired by the drones of American minimalist composers Steve Reich and La Monte Young. But at its core, the album dealt in ancient methodology: narrative writing set to music everyone could understand.

While Britpop groups occasionally mined British music hall, Pulp surveyed the eternal verities of popular song less self-consciously than their peers. Here was a new folk music, but one that always felt like pop music. Musically, the album touched on The Beatles’ Revolution 9, drum and bass, the soundtrack to 1966 French film Un Homme et une Femme by Claude Lelouch and Gloria the 1982 hit from Laura Branigan. It amounted to a remarkable piece of populist art. However, the band have mixed memories of this period.

‘It did feel like vindication,’ says Nick Banks. ‘We were always confident that if only the masses could hear what we were doing, then they'd like it. When people did hear it, quite a few thought it was good enough to shell out for a record or two.’

‘At the time,’ says Candida Doyle, ‘We fought against the Britpop label. I thought we were the best band and there was no way we should be grouped with these other bands, but looking back, we were part of it and I'm glad we were. It was only in 2000 that I actually began to enjoy playing with the band. Before that, I was petrified on stage. Headlining Glastonbury, that was really fucking scary. But when we played Common People and they turned the lights on the crowd singing for miles into the distance, I'll never forget that.’

Russell has a more challenging version of events. ‘It had become a travesty,’ he says. Different Class was a kind of last gasp. It was over by then, but we still managed to get it down as a document. I rather hated Jarvis when he was in the studio singing Common People. He'd become so far removed. He was the villain of the piece because he was wearing trousers he'd been given by some designer. He wasn't wearing his jumble sale trousers. We were surrounded by coked-up knobheads.’

Senior also talks about an attitudinal North-South divide in the band at this point. In the Southern corner were London residents Jarvis and Steve. For the North, Russell, Nick and Candida, (though Candida was actually living in London by this point.) It's a perspective partly shared by Nick. ‘There was a North-South divide,’ says Russell, ‘Abso-fucking-lutely. I like living in Sheffield and one does have a chip on one’s shoulder about being patronised by poncy Southern bastards. To find there was a couple of members of the band who were doing the patronising was rather irksome! (laughs) The more they go all Kate Moss and London, the more I'd be, ‘By heck, where's me whippet?’ There was definitely a divide within the band.’

Russell left Pulp as they began to work on what would become 1998’s This is Hardcore album. By this time narcotics had become part of the picture, appearing in the lyrics of This is Hardcore and becoming a staple topic in Pulp interviews.

‘I thought that was a distorted image,’ says Steve Mackey. ‘I've never known Jarvis have a problem with narcotics. Ever. I was taking a lot more drugs than he was, but I didn't think I was taking that many. With Pulp no one ever went to rehab, no one was taking heroin. I don't recall Jarvis ever regularly taking drugs. But it did become a fairly regular part of the studio experience during This is Hardcore, and that's a dangerous thing. It became a bit of a self-indulgent record. But in a way that's also its finest hour, because something glorious came out of that. I feel very affectionate about that record. I think we really reached something with that.’

And the alleged north-south divide?

‘I never felt that,’ says Mackey, ‘My recollection of why Russell left is that after Different Class, it was clear he wanted to make a record that followed on in that vein. Me and Jarvis made it clear we weren't going to make that kind of record. Russell made it clear he didn't want to make our kind of record. The split was pretty amicable - we didn't fall out, but it cast a shadow over the band. I missed Russell - he was the person I loved watching when I saw them live before I joined.’

Before Pulp played their last show in 2002, they made one more album, the nature oriented We Love Life, released in 2001. There was also an underperforming greatest hits compilation in 2002, a record Jarvis has described as ‘the real whimper, the real silent fart’ of Pulp’s career. It charted Number 71, then disappeared. But if Pulp’s last years can read as forlorn times, that wasn't really the case. Recorded with Scott Walker, We Love Life has some of Pulp’s finest material, particularly the wonderfully elegiac, spoken word piece, Wickerman.

Nowadays, Pulp’s ex-members have a healthy view on all the past dramas, perhaps because Pulp isn't the only thing in their lives anymore. Jarvis was unavailable for interview because he was in America mastering his second solo LP. He also guest-edited BBC Radio 4’s Today programme and collaborated with Nancy Sinatra and Marianne Faithful. I spoke to Candida Doyle as she was visiting Disneyland Paris with six Shetland cousins and their ten children. She’s started a counselling course in London. Steve Mackey just finished producing Florence and the Machine’s debut album. He's produced and co-written for MIA and has remixed the likes of Kelis and Arcade Fire. While overseeing London's Frieze Art Fair’s musical programme, Mackey booked Karlheinz Stockhausen for one of his last engagements before he died. Nick Banks plays at private parties with The Big Shambles, knocking out covers of songs by The Damned, David Bowie and Amy Whitehouse. More typically, he runs Banks' pottery, a Rotherham based crockery business – ‘Crock’n’roll, as we like to call it.’

Of all the former members, Russell Senior has strayed furthest from music. He's written 50,000 words of a debut novel and has been setting up a ‘wild-foods processing plant.’ An avid lover of wild mushrooms, Russell has been furthering this. Rather than reducing trees to a pulp, he's utilised woodland in a more sustainable manner. ‘What I've been doing,’ he says, ‘is drilling little holes in Birch trees to collect sap – I’d highly recommend it.”

Scans from PulpWiki

#russell senior #jarvis cocker #steve mackey #candida doyle #nick banks #mark webber #pulp #britpop #90s #interview

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