"I'm tired of being misunderstood. I will open my heart. I want to tell it like it is."
When the 42-year-old R&B star R Kelly announced last week that he was planning to write his memoirs, it made headlines around the world. While it's hardly unusual for a musician to pen an autobiography - or at least, have one penned for them - R Kelly's promises to be juicier than most.
The R&B star, who was acquitted last year of 14 charges of child pornography, promised he would be writing at length about the six-year legal ordeal that, his publishers say, almost ruined his life.
As well as detailing his acquittal, the book will also cover the death of his mother, how he wrote famous songs including the Michael Jackson hit You Are Not Alone and his annulled marriage to the R&B star Aaliyah. She was 15 when they wed in 1994. The then 27-year-old Kelly had met her while working on her debut album, Age Ain't Nuthin' But a Number.
Kelly's memoir will be published in 2011 by Smiley Books, an imprint owned by the radio talk show host Tavis Smiley, and will be co-written by David Ritz, who has worked on books with Aretha Franklin and Marvin Gaye.
While no one is doubting Robert Sylvester Kelly's musical credentials - "Even a routine R Kelly track outshines much of the competition," said The New York Times, reviewing his latest CD, Untitled, last month - can he cut it as a memoirist? Will he discuss his arrest after his 1996 brawl outside a health club or the claims against him of false imprisonment by his former employee Henry Vaughan? Will he open up about the repeated rumours concerning his personal life? Will the book be any good?
According to the editor of Q magazine, Paul Rees, the answer is a definite yes. R Kelly's life has all the elements essential to a good rock 'n' roll memoir and in this instance it turns out that rock 'n' roll cliché is the readers' friend.
"Rock 'n' roll lives should read like the bawdiest fictions," says Rees, "including a surfeit of generally monstrous behaviour with the odd near-death experience thrown in. More than one trip to rehab and a resultant terrible back slide into old ways also drives momentum. Falling out terribly with former colleagues and using the book to put one over on them, even decades on, can only be an enhancement."
The best rock 'n' roll memoirs, says Rees, include Mötley Crüe's The Dirt ("The truth may be more unpalatable than this fabulously entertaining story," he says), Bob Geldof's Is That It (especially good on his early years in The Boomtown Rats), Take It Like a Man by Boy George ("unblinkingly honest," said The Guardian in its review) and I'll Sleep When I'm Dead, the unsparing portrait of the alcoholic songwriter and performer Warren Zevron by his ex-wife. Rolling Stone called it "one of the most unflinching examinations of the rock 'n' roll life ever".
This has been a vintage year for the rock memoir. Bob Dylan finally published Chronicles, his idiosyncratic recollection on being a spokesman for a generation, and Mackenzie Phillips dropped a bombshell when she revealed in her autobiography, High on Arrival, that she endured a 10-year incestuous affair with her father, John Phillips, of the Mamas and the Papas.
In those two instances, the stars penned the titles themselves and, despite its rough edges, the prose is all part of the package. But, says Rees, books such as the Blur bassist Alex James's elegant, self-penned memoir, Bit of a Blur, are very much the rock 'n' roll exception rather than the rule.
"Most pop stars have faltering memories and the attention spans of goldfish," he says. "The chances that they would research anything - including their own life - and spend months putting it into a coherent order are slim indeed."
But if they don't write them and can barely recall many of the events within them, why do so many pop stars - everyone from Rick Wakeman to Ray Davies - publish memoirs at all?
"If not for the money, then the king-size egos that allow them to do what they do is usually a clincher," says Rees. "Since many spend most of their time talking about themselves, it's a natural progression."
R Kelly has an advantage: there's no shortage of material to work from. But, says Rees, that is not always a guarantee of a thumping good read. The Rolling Stone Bill Wyman's 1991 memoir, Stone Alone, is for Rees the worst rock memoir ever written. "It promised much and delivered little," he says. "He was forever on the outside looking in."
Not a problem for R Kelly, one would imagine.
The specs: 2018 Chevrolet Trailblazer
Price, base / as tested Dh99,000 / Dh132,000
Engine 3.6L V6
Transmission: Six-speed automatic
Power 275hp @ 6,000rpm
Torque 350Nm @ 3,700rpm
Fuel economy combined 12.2L / 100km
The Sand Castle
Director: Matty Brown
Stars: Nadine Labaki, Ziad Bakri, Zain Al Rafeea, Riman Al Rafeea
Rating: 2.5/5
Specs
Engine: Duel electric motors
Power: 659hp
Torque: 1075Nm
On sale: Available for pre-order now
Price: On request
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
Ms Yang's top tips for parents new to the UAE
- Join parent networks
- Look beyond school fees
- Keep an open mind
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Is it worth it? We put cheesecake frap to the test.
The verdict from the nutritionists is damning. But does a cheesecake frappuccino taste good enough to merit the indulgence?
My advice is to only go there if you have unusually sweet tooth. I like my puddings, but this was a bit much even for me. The first hit is a winner, but it's downhill, slowly, from there. Each sip is a little less satisfying than the last, and maybe it was just all that sugar, but it isn't long before the rush is replaced by a creeping remorse. And half of the thing is still left.
The caramel version is far superior to the blueberry, too. If someone put a full caramel cheesecake through a liquidiser and scooped out the contents, it would probably taste something like this. Blueberry, on the other hand, has more of an artificial taste. It's like someone has tried to invent this drink in a lab, and while early results were promising, they're still in the testing phase. It isn't terrible, but something isn't quite right either.
So if you want an experience, go for a small, and opt for the caramel. But if you want a cheesecake, it's probably more satisfying, and not quite as unhealthy, to just order the real thing.
Meatless Days
Sara Suleri, with an introduction by Kamila Shamsie
Penguin
Election pledges on migration
CDU: "Now is the time to control the German borders and enforce strict border rejections"
SPD: "Border closures and blanket rejections at internal borders contradict the spirit of a common area of freedom"
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
Singham Again
Director: Rohit Shetty
Stars: Ajay Devgn, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Ranveer Singh, Akshay Kumar, Tiger Shroff, Deepika Padukone
Rating: 3/5
Teaching in coronavirus times
KILLING OF QASSEM SULEIMANI
Skewed figures
In the village of Mevagissey in southwest England the housing stock has doubled in the last century while the number of residents is half the historic high. The village's Neighbourhood Development Plan states that 26% of homes are holiday retreats. Prices are high, averaging around £300,000, £50,000 more than the Cornish average of £250,000. The local average wage is £15,458.
Farasan Boat: 128km Away from Anchorage
Director: Mowaffaq Alobaid
Stars: Abdulaziz Almadhi, Mohammed Al Akkasi, Ali Al Suhaibani
Rating: 4/5
The specs
Engine: 2-litre or 3-litre 4Motion all-wheel-drive Power: 250Nm (2-litre); 340 (3-litre) Torque: 450Nm Transmission: 8-speed automatic Starting price: From Dh212,000 On sale: Now
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
Profile
Name: Carzaty
Founders: Marwan Chaar and Hassan Jaffar
Launched: 2017
Employees: 22
Based: Dubai and Muscat
Sector: Automobile retail
Funding to date: $5.5 million
Game Changer
Director: Shankar
Stars: Ram Charan, Kiara Advani, Anjali, S J Suryah, Jayaram
Rating: 2/5
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Porsche Taycan Turbo specs
Engine: Two permanent-magnet synchronous AC motors
Transmission: two-speed
Power: 671hp
Torque: 1050Nm
Range: 450km
Price: Dh601,800
On sale: now
MATCH INFO
Uefa Champions League, last-16. first leg
Atletico Madrid v Juventus, midnight (Thursday), BeIN Sports
Test
Director: S Sashikanth
Cast: Nayanthara, Siddharth, Meera Jasmine, R Madhavan
Star rating: 2/5
Essentials
The flights
Emirates, Etihad and Malaysia Airlines all fly direct from the UAE to Kuala Lumpur and on to Penang from about Dh2,300 return, including taxes.
Where to stay
In Kuala Lumpur, Element is a recently opened, futuristic hotel high up in a Norman Foster-designed skyscraper. Rooms cost from Dh400 per night, including taxes. Hotel Stripes, also in KL, is a great value design hotel, with an infinity rooftop pool. Rooms cost from Dh310, including taxes.
In Penang, Ren i Tang is a boutique b&b in what was once an ancient Chinese Medicine Hall in the centre of Little India. Rooms cost from Dh220, including taxes.
23 Love Lane in Penang is a luxury boutique heritage hotel in a converted mansion, with private tropical gardens. Rooms cost from Dh400, including taxes.
In Langkawi, Temple Tree is a unique architectural villa hotel consisting of antique houses from all across Malaysia. Rooms cost from Dh350, including taxes.
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Essentials
The flights
Return flights from Dubai to Windhoek, with a combination of Emirates and Air Namibia, cost from US$790 (Dh2,902) via Johannesburg.
The trip
A 10-day self-drive in Namibia staying at a combination of the safari camps mentioned – Okonjima AfriCat, Little Kulala, Desert Rhino/Damaraland, Ongava – costs from $7,000 (Dh25,711) per person, including car hire (Toyota 4x4 or similar), but excluding international flights, with The Luxury Safari Company.
When to go
The cooler winter months, from June to September, are best, especially for game viewing.