Chris Stanley's Bazaar

With it being Christmas Day tomorrow, and with the two years we’ve all had, nostalgia might well be the key ingredient gracing the dinner table in people’s houses. Christmas is a time for creating memories, good or bad, and you can guarantee that whatever the weather there will be smiles, tears, arguments and people going over the top about that Nando’s gift set which will be next seen in the window of the local Blue Cross . After having a lovely memory of Christmas 1990 published in Museum Of Jerseys , it dusted off a few memories of the next few Yuletides, and so I thought I’d put all my nineties Christmases together to see if there was a thread - a Christmas ribbon, if you will. If you won’t, well, sod you - you’re the one reading when you ought to be wrapping. Enjoy! 1991 - Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves Action Figures I think I grew up in the Golden Age of action figures. At the age of ten I had caught the tail-end of Star Wars merchandising, which was such a big money-spinner ...

Life is full of curiosities, and it’s inevitable that you’ll come across the odd coincidence here and there. I guess it’s a small one that within days of one Prince passing , it’s the anniversary of the death of a much more colourful one. Today marks five short years since Prince Rogers Nelson was found dead at his Paisley Park home, in circumstances that seem ill-fitting with both his lyrical themes and his beliefs. Personally, at the time, Prince’s death was far more of a rider to that of David Bowie . I liked some Prince stuff, but in the same way that I enjoyed, say, Belinda Carlisle . I hadn’t grown up with Prince in the same way that I’d grown up with Bowie, and neither had he been a touchstone in any aspect of my musical education. Nobody at school was a Prince nut; nobody at university walked about in a purple knee length frock coat and ruffles . You didn’t even hear ‘ 1999 ’ played at the student disco. Not that that’s an excuse; you didn’t hear Gay Dad either, but I bought...