Brilliant! “Win, lose or draw, it was always Arsenal!”

If I can find a video of it I’ll definitely slap it up here for ya.

Also, what’s the deal with Nick Geber leaving that show to work in poker full time? Is he mad?

“When I came over and made Robin Hood I got a chance to go see a football game and it happened to be Arsenal.
They invited me as their guest and I didn’t know what to expect, and I was blown away. I didn’t realize how emotional it can be in the stands. I didn’t realize that people sang and did all that and I was moved by it.
I thought that we are missing an opportunity, in America, even though we are fans, and we love our teams and we root hysterically loud, there is something communal about the way that they sing in British football.”

Okay, so he probably doesn’t have Tony Adams’ mug tattooed on his arse, but that’ll do.

The summer break is nearly over and the Arsenal Celebrity Supporter Series is nearly ready to hibernate for the season. In the meantime, what’s your favorite Costner flick? (Correct answer: JFK.)

I bring that up not to show causation between the come-from-ahead loss to the Scousers, in that all true fans actually died that day. (Although Adams was in fact a Gooner.) Rather, it reminds me of this exchange, from Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy:

“Going to watch the match this afternoon then?”
“No, no point”
“What’s that? Foregone conclusion then you reckon, sir? Arsenal without a chance?”
“No no! It’s just that the world’s about to end.”
“Oh yes sir, you said. Lucky escape for Arsenal if it did.”

Heh.

Earle is an American singer-songwriter, born in Hampton, Virginia in 1955. Legend has it that Earle’s grandfather sent a box of dirt from Texas to the delivery room so that that would be the first soil Earle’s feet ever touched. Just to be safe, Earle spent a lot of his formative days in Texas proper, where he eventually dropped out of the eighth grade to move to Houston and pursue a music career. From there it was on to Nashville, prompted by some sage advice from Ronnie van Zant of Lynyrd Skynryd. Which is not something you hear about just every day mind you.

Not seeing the Arsenal connection yet? Check out this interview from BBC Radio 2:

I spend a good part of my life here [in the UK] – my very first production gigs as a producer were in England. The first one was The Bible, Boo Hewerdine’s and Neil MacColl’s band, and that was kind of a life changing thing. That was back in the 80s when Arsenal really sucked and I got dragged out to matches all the time. I’ve been an Arsenal supporter ever since so that was sort of the negative effect.

That’s pretty good cred for a Yank, right?

Earle’s also a bit of a political dissenter these days, which influences his music as well. Here’s a taste of recent Steve Earle for the uninitiated.

For more folky and country music goodness, be sure to check out City Girl, Country Girl.

And you can always check out these previous entries in the Arsenal Celebrity Supporter Series: Prince Harry, Johnny Rotten, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Michael Moore, Jo Guest, Nick Hornby and Dido.

Have a great weekend!

Our Dido, you see, is an English singer of some renown. Her breakthrough album was “No Angel” and the song “Thank You.” Although somewhat oddly, “Thank You” received fame first as a sample in the Eminem tune “Stan”. Which last sentence, you long-time reders might note, is the first reference to Eminem at The Arsenal Offside.

Anywho, for those who doubt her Gunnerdom, check out Dido at the 2006 Champions League final in the photos on her official site. Hardcore. A preview after the jump.

Hornby, born in Redhill, Surrey in 1957, has of course written several other notables works, including High Fidelity and About a Boy, each of which was made into a movie.

Fever Pitch (1992) is an account of the author’s life and relationships viewed through the prism of football. Arsenal football that is. The book covers several decades’ worth of Arsenal matches, with particular emphasis on games that meant the most to Hornby.

And if you’re missing Highbury these days, Fever Pitch is full of memories of the old ground.

Fever Pitch itself has been made into two films. One, released in 1997, starred Colin Firth in a fictionalized retelling of the book, penned by Hornby himself. The second, improbably, was an American version where the protagonist follows the Boston Red Sox baseball team. This 2005 version featured Jimmy Fallon and Drew Barrymore.

If for some reason you’ve yet to run into Fever Pitch, head immediately to your local library or buy a copy today. You damn Philistine.

As you may have already guessed from the photo, Ms. Guest is a lecturer at the Institute of Social and cultural Anthropology at the University of Oxford. /checks notes/ Sorry, Ms. Guest is actually an English glamour model. You may see (a lot) more of Ms. Guest’s work here, but let me warn you that such destination will almost assuredly be NSFW.

Although from Derbyshire, Guest supports the Arsenal. Thus her inclusion here. But who knows, maybe she’ll come out as a Derby supporter now that they’ve made it to the Prem.

Jo has yet to weigh in on the Thierry Henry departure as far as I know. But the Times has weighed in on Jo, recently wondering aloud if the Laddism boom that began in the 1990s, and which propelled Jo into the mainstream consciousness, is not only dead but was all just middle class posturing. Don’t worry–if that’s not your cup of tea, you can always just pop back up to the first link.

Have a great weekend!

Moore’s first big splash as a documentary filmmaker was 1989’s “Roger & Me”, examining the effects on his hometown of Flint, Michigan stemming from General Motors’ decision to ship manufacturing jobs overseas. This flick set the tone for Moore’s gadfly approach to polemical commentary.

The work which helped Moore win the 2002 Academy Award for feature-length documentary was “Bowling for Columbine”. That’s Moore with his Oscar, at left. The movie explored violence and America’s gun culture. The director’s anti-George W. Bush rant during his acceptance speech predictably earned him both supporters and detractors.

In 2004, which was a Presidential election year in the United States, Moore released “Fahrenheit 9/11″ a look at the 2000 election, the 2001 terrorist attacks on the U.S., and the war in Iraq. The film remains the highest-grossing documentary of all time, and it also was awarded the prestigious Ballon Palme d’Or at the Cannavaro Cannes Film Festival. Despite it’s commercial and critical success, for plenty of Moore’s fellow Americans this movie cemented the director as a reprehensible troublemaker. And his detractors had the last laugh of course, as everything in Iraq has turned out just fine.

Opening today is Moore’s latest documentary, “Sicko“, which takes a look at the state of health care in the United States. Here’s an early review of the film if you’re interested.

And finally, the promised video evidence.

Previous entries in the Arsenal Celebrity Supporters Series: Prince Harry, Johnny Rotten, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Gellar, married to fellow Arsenal fan and general lameass Freddie Prinze, Jr., is a New Yorker by birth. She got her start in showbiz in, well, some TV tripe called “An Invasion of Privacy”, but first became known for her role as Kendall Hart Lang on American soap opera “All My Children”. Which I’ve also never seen, so moving right along…. In fact, let’s jump past “I Know What You Did Last Summer” and even, um, “I Still Know What You Did Last Summer” and head straight for “Buffy the Vampire Slayer.”

“Buffy” was of course a spin off of sorts from the 1992 movie of the same name starring what’s her name and Luke Perry. (And as soon as I find out a way to work in a post on “Beveral Hills 90201″, you’ll be the first to know.) Luckily, the “Buffy” TV series was far superior to the earlier film. Here’s the opening number from what may be the series’ most famous episode, the sublime “Once More With Feeling”:

Anyone seen SMG in an Arsenal strip? Let us know!

Johnny Rotten (née Lydon) was born in North London 51 years ago to Irish parents. Rotten is most famous of course for being the frontman for the legendary punk band Sex Pistols, and later for legendary post-punk band PiL. But as you can see from this video, he was a Gooner before all of that business.

Besides the aforementioned “God Save the Queen”, the Sex Pistols are best known for the 1977 Album “Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols”. It would prove to be the Pistols’ only studio album (at least during their initial iteration). In naming the album the 41st best of all time, Rolling Stone Magazine opined:

“Packed with disgust, nihilism and raw guitar, the Pistols’ only studio album sounds like a rejection of everything rock & roll, and the world itself, had to offer. True, the music was less shocking than Rotten himself, who sang about abortions, anarchy and hatred in general on “Bodies” and “Anarchy in the U.K.” But Never Mind . . . is the Sermon on the Mount of English punk — and the echoes are everywhere.”

I’ll leave you with the following, a little “Anarchy in the UK” to get your weekend started right.