Housey Rock

[marty]

these are crazy, crazy, crazy nights !!!

[Hendrik]

'detriot rock city' is way better. doesn't pun so well though.

[Ian Stannard]

According to RDF, "Rock School" will go out on the Friday night 9pm slot in 3 one hour programmes. The date is probably going to be May, but that may change during the post production process. The media coverage will probably be substantial and make the admissions job alot harder when 100s of wannabe rock stars apply to CH in 2006!

[Tammytd2]

This is hillarious! I hate rock music but wish I was there to see the palaver! I hope someone can record it as we wont see it out here in Dubai!

[Ian Stannard]

If you are who I quess you are then hi! You seem to have come a long way from Brighton and Horsham. I hope you are happy and enjoying life in the Middle East. By the way, if you want a copy of Rock School I am sure that someone here will send you a DVD copy if you write and ask for one.

Ps If you are not Tamara Tinawi (sp?) then I apologise!

[Hobbit]

hmmm, well les just hope this press goes the right way for the school, in teh years i was there lets just say not all otgether good press occured and especially on my 3rd/LE a daily mail article absolutley riped the school, so what did teh HM do, send the senior grecian tot eh county times.......my what a come back, now i now we shouldnt rise to the occasion but just the whole general article was full of great BS!!!!

[Ian Stannard]

I agree with your comments about publicity - to be fair RDF 'say' they want to make an programme that is positive and not negative. It will not be 'wife swapping' in its stance. Who knows how the media will react. I hope, for CH' sake, that they are positive and emphasis the ethos of the school. We wait and see!

[DavebytheSea]

Well - here we are, April.

These programmes were scheduled to be shown in the spring! Does anybody have inside information? I should hate to miss this one!

[Ian Stannard]

Rumour has it that it will now be broadcast in August.

[Great Plum]

Rumour has it that it will now be broadcast in August.

Maybe it won't be broadcast at all at this rate...

[Richard Ruck]

From the Grauniad......


Rock star's crazy, crazy nights at Christ's

Donald MacLeod
Friday June 10, 2005

Guardian Unlimited

Rock school in a posh English boarding school, taken by a real live heavy metal legend - how cool is that? Not terribly, according to some of the young ladies and gentlemen of Christ's Hospital, who get a privileged education at the 450-year-old charitable school at the cost of having to wear 16th century garb.
The arrival of Gene Simmons, bassist of glam rockers Kiss, to make a TV series was greeted with sneers on the student-run Christ's Hospital blog - less Destroyer than desperate has been, it seems.

Founded in 1552, Christ's Hospital, in West Sussex, is able to fund bright children from poor backgrounds from its foundation. Pupils still wear dark blue gowns and white puritan collars - an ideal contrast with rock star leathers for the TV cameras.

In an entry, called the Barrel is Duly Scraped, a student critic treated the rocker as if he were 450 years old. "His tired looking face spoke volumes of his burnt out career and his desperation for some limelight." His trademark dark glasses were less a fashion accessory than an attempt to "hide the aged, wizened holes that used to be eyes."

"Yevgeni" goes on: "Poor Gene. In a school debate, he extolled the virtues of money worship and boasted of his '4,136 sexual conquests', and you could tell that even his PA hated his saggy chin and implanted hair. His own mother probably doesn't even like him. Thanks to the cast-iron self belief that the man actually had something interesting to preach from Stateside, the posturing continued for hours in a constant stream of verbose twaddle. Yes Gene, we have people like you in Britain too. They are locked away and given a healthy dose of medication."

The ranter lays into the RDF Media team making the film. "The most irritating of them all was the camerawoman, her hair a worrying shade of puce, jabbering incessantly into her mobile and getting in the way of anything meaningful at Christ's Hospital."

The blogger adds: "Even the lucky young people done the favour of getting to meet old Gene seemed to hate him by the end of their stint. 'The Class', as they were dubbed, were nothing more than 'puppets for the TV peeps'. This escalated matters to a head at the Motorhead concert The Class supported. The whole 10 of them rebelled after Gene Simmons, preposterous clown extraordinaire, made one of the girls cry by telling her how deficient her swagger was, and why couldn't she just emulate Mr Simmons?"

It concludes: "You have to wonder about the sorts of oafs who drive the market for this drivel. Which braying, wide-eyed simpletons watch this stuff, and who finds it entertaining except for the bosses of RDF media, watching the money tot up? The peoples of Christ's Hospital should be outraged. The school have whored our good name to the media, and it only remains to count the cost to our dignity when the show airs over this summer."

But the bitchy blog provoked an outraged defence from "Zoe" who said her friend took part in the programme. "Ok, it may of [sic] not been that fun but it was a great experience! And the camera people were really nice so before you write this rubbish check your facts! You just have no life and have to interfere and make up rumours and stuff so just grow up! You are just jealous that you never got this opportunity!" But even she admitted: "Yes, Gene Simmons is a prick, arrogant and ugly!"

Another posting by "Emily", an associate producer with RDF Media and a former pupil at Christ's Hospital, said she had suggested the school as a good place to film because of its "excellent music facilities and lively young people". She also took the blogger to task for describing other RDF programmes like Ladette to Lady as "tat". She says: "I also worked on Ladette to Lady. I'm curious as to how you know it's 'tat' when you wrote the piece before transmission!! Why don't you try sticking with it and see what the girls actually learn about themselves by taking part. Similarly with rock school."

A spokeswoman for Channel 4, which is showing the seven-part series in the autumn, said there had been an "interesting clash" between students who were classically trained musicians and Simmons who was trying to make them into rock gods.

Simmons, who trained as a teacher before turning to music, was trying to "bring out the inner rock demon in them," so they could take the stage at London's Hammersmith Apollo in support of Motörhead in front of thousands of heavy metal fans, she added.

Next month the 10 students in the band - who acquired rock names to go with their new roles - will travel to the US to play with Simmons again .

"Everyone had an exciting experience and lots of fun," she said.

Well, not quite everyone.

What are these "rock names", then? Sounds amusing.....

[Great Plum]

Also, where's the Christ's Hospital blog??

[Richard Ruck]

Also, where's the Christ's Hospital blog??

It seems that it's here.....

http://www.20six.co.uk/housey

Should highlight it on a separate thread I suppose.

[DavebytheSea]

It was going to be the Spring, then the summer and now the Grauniad predicts the autumn. Is there something not quite right? Shouldn't we be told?

One of those involved claims to have seen the first two episodes. Only two??? Does that mean that the rest have somehow got lost, and that they are still looking for them? Perhaps they may have fallen down the chapel gratings into the tube?? Then they would be hard to find! Apparently nobody is allowed down there ..............................?

[Great Plum]

Maybe it won't happen!

Here's hoping!