Linkin Park
Linkin Park is an American rock band from Agoura Hills, California. The band's current lineup comprises vocalist/rhythm guitarist Mike Shinoda, lead guitarist Brad Delson, bassist Dave Farrell, turntablist/keyboardist Joe Hahn and drummer Rob Bourdon, all of whom are founding members. Vocalists Mark Wakefield and Chester Bennington and bassist Kyle Christner are former members of the band. Formed in 1996, Linkin Park rose to international fame with its debut studio album, Hybrid Theory, certified diamond by the RIAA in 2005, multi-platinum in several other countries, its second album, continued the band's success, topping the Billboard 200 album chart in 2003, was followed by extensive touring and charity work. Having adapted nu metal and rap metal to a radio-friendly yet densely layered style in its first two albums, the band explored other genres on its third album, Minutes to Midnight; the album had the third-best debut week of any album that year. Linkin Park continued to explore a wider variation of musical types in its fourth album, A Thousand Suns, layering their music with more electronic sounds.
The band's fifth album, Living Things, combined musical elements from all of its previous records. Its sixth album, The Hunting Party, returned to a heavier rock sound, its seventh album, One More Light, was a more electronic and pop-oriented record. In 2003, MTV2 named Linkin Park the sixth-greatest band of the music video era and the third-best of the new millennium. Billboard ranked Linkin Park No. 19 on the Best Artists of the Decade chart. In 2012, the band was voted as the greatest artist of the 2000s in a Bracket Madness poll on VH1. In 2014, the band was declared as the Biggest Rock Band in the World Right Now by Kerrang!. As the best-selling band of the 21st century and one of the world's best-selling music artists overall, Linkin Park has sold more than 70 million albums worldwide and has won two Grammy Awards. Linkin Park went into an indefinite hiatus after longtime lead vocalist Bennington died from suicide by hanging on July 20, 2017; the other members of the band have yet to decide.
Linkin Park was founded by three high school friends: Mike Shinoda, Rob Bourdon, Brad Delson. The three attended Agoura High School in California, a suburb of Los Angeles. After graduating from high school, the three began to take their musical interests more recruiting Joe Hahn, Dave "Phoenix" Farrell, Mark Wakefield to perform in their band called Xero. Though limited in resources, the band began recording and producing songs within Shinoda's makeshift bedroom studio in 1996, resulting in a four-track demo tape, entitled Xero. Tensions and frustration within the band grew however; the lack of success and stalemate in progress prompted Wakefield, at that time the band's vocalist, to leave the band in search of other projects. Farrell left to tour with Tasty Snax, a Christian punk and ska band. After spending a considerable time searching for Wakefield's replacement, Xero recruited Arizona vocalist Chester Bennington, recommended by Jeff Blue, the vice president of Zomba Music in March 1999. Bennington of a post-grunge band by the name of Grey Daze, became a standout among applicants because of the dynamic in his singing style.
The band agreed on changing its name from Xero to Hybrid Theory. In 1999 the band released a self-titled extended play, which they circulated across internet chat-rooms and forums with the help of an online'street team'; the band's renaissance culminated with another change in name, this time to Linkin Park, a play on and homage to Santa Monica's Lincoln Park, now called Christine Emerson Reed Park. The band wanted to use the name "Lincoln Park", however they changed it to "Linkin" to acquire the internet domain "linkinpark.com". The band still struggled to sign a record deal. Linkin Park turned to Jeff Blue for additional help after facing numerous rejections from several major record labels. After failing to catch Warner Bros. Records on three previous reviews, Jeff Blue, who had negotiated his employment contract with Warner Brothers to include signing Linkin Park, was now the vice president of Warner Bros. Records, helped the band sign a deal with the company in 1999. Farrell returned the band released its breakthrough album, Hybrid Theory.
Linkin Park released Hybrid Theory on October 24, 2000. The album, which represented half a decade's worth of the band's work, was edited by Don Gilmore. Hybrid Theory was a massive commercial success. Additionally, other singles from the album were featured in films such as Dracula 2000, Little Nicky, Valentine. Hybrid Theory won a Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock Performance for the song "Crawling" and was nominated for two other Grammy Awards: Best New Artist and Best Rock Album. MTV awarded the band their Best Rock Video and Best Direction awards for "In the End". Through the winning of the Grammy for Best Hard Rock Performance, Hybrid Theory's overall success had catapulted the band into mainstream success. During this time, Linkin Park received many invitations to perform on many high-profile tours and concerts including Ozzfest, Family Values Tour, KROQ Almost Acoustic Christmas; the band worked with Jessica Sklar to found their official fan club and street
Jhené Aiko
Jhené Aiko Efuru Chilombo is an American recording artist who embarked on her music career contributing vocals and appearing in several music videos for R&B group B2K. At the time, she was known as B2K member Lil' Fizz's "cousin", though she is not related to him, it was used as a marketing tool, suggested by Sony and Epic Records, to promote Aiko through B2K and attract an audience. In 2003, Aiko was set to release her debut album, My Name Is Jhené, through her labels Sony, The Ultimate Group and Epic, however the album was never released, with Aiko asking to be released from the label in order to continue her education. In March 2011, Aiko made her return to music with the release of her first full-length project, a mixtape titled Sailing Soul. On December 16, 2011, Aiko signed a recording contract with American record producer No I. D.'s record label ARTium, distributed through Def Jam Recordings. In 2013, Aiko appeared on Big Sean's single "Beware" featuring Lil Wayne, which became her first top 40 single on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart.
In November 2013, she released her first project for Artium and Def Jam, an extended play, titled Sail Out. The EP was supported by the singles "3:16AM", "Bed Peace" and "The Worst", the latter of which went on to become certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America. Aiko released her major-label debut album, Souled Out, on September 9, 2014. On September 22, 2017, she released her second studio album Trip. Aiko grew up in Ladera Heights, California, she was homeschooled. Aiko is Karamo Chilombo, a pediatrician, her parents divorced. Her sister is R&B singer Mila J, her mother is of Spanish and Japanese descent and her father is of Native American, African American and Jewish descent. She quit when she unexpectedly got pregnant. Aiko embarked on her musical career contributing vocals to several B2K releases, as well a song on The Master of Disguise soundtrack in 2002, while signed to The Ultimate Group and managed by Chris Stokes. During this time she was known as the cousin of B2K's rapper, Lil' Fizz, though she is not related to him.
It was used as a marketing tool, suggested by her labels Sony, The Ultimate Group and Epic Records, to promote Aiko through B2K and attract an audience. She featured on tracks five through eight of the R&B group's remix album B2K: The Remixes – Volume 1. "Santa Baby", a cover she recorded, was featured on their album Santa Hooked Me Up and she appeared as a guest vocalist on the song "Tease" from Pandemonium!. Her song "Dog" appeared as a bonus track. Aiko appeared in numerous music videos including O'Ryan's debut video, "Take It Slow", B2K's debut video "Uh Huh" and "Why I Love You", P. Y. T.'s "Same Ol' Same Ol'" featuring Sarai, Play's "M. A. S. T. E. R." Featuring Lil' Fizz video and Morgan Smith's 2004 video "Blow Ya Whistle". Jhené has songs featured on the soundtracks of Barbershop, The Master of Disguise, You Got Served, The Proud Family and Byou, she released a video for her single "NO L. O. V. E", which debuted on BET's Park when she was 15 years old. Aiko was set to release her debut album, then-titled My Name Is Jhené in 2003 through Sony, The Ultimate Group, however the album was never released due to tension at the record label Epic, which led to Aiko asking to be released from the label.
Aiko left the aforementioned labels in order to continue her education. In 2007, she made a return to music, in an interview she spoke on the choice saying "Shortly before I conceived my daughter, I stepped back into the field and took a meeting with a label head. In this meeting, I was innocently told, to ` sell' myself. "That's when I decided I would'sail' myself rather than sell myself." Aiko released a mixtape on March 16, 2011 entitled Sailing Soul via her official website, JheneAiko.com. All the songs on the mixtape were written by her, except "July"; the mixtape featured collaborations from Miguel and Kanye West as well as others. To promote the mixtape Aiko was joined by R&B singer Miguel on a one off free secret tour on Sunday, July 15. On October 21, 2012 Aiko released a music video for the song "My Mine". Jhene released a video for the mixtape's second track, "Stranger". In 2011, she began working with artists from Carson-based independent record label Top Dawg Entertainment such as Schoolboy Q and Ab-Soul, featured on her EP released November 12, 2013 titled "Sail Out".
In 2012, Aiko met with No I. D. record producer and vice president of A&R at Def Jam, who ended up signing Aiko to his Artium Records imprint through Def Jam. Aiko released the track "3:16AM", made available for digital download on iTunes September 4, 2012; the song was released as the first single from Sail Out. In 2012, Aiko was the opening act on the anticipated "Life Is Good/Black Rage" concert tour headlined by fellow American artists, rapper Nas and singer-songwriter Lauryn Hill. In June 2013, Aiko was featured on the Big Sean song "Beware", which became her first song to chart on the US Billboard Hot 100. In October 2013, it was revealed Jhené Aiko would open for Canadian rapper Drake on his Would You like a Tour? Concert tour. Aiko released her debut EP Sail Out, on November 12, 2013; the EP debuted at number eight on the US Billboard 200 chart, with first-week sales of 34,000 copies. On January 14, 2014, "The Worst" was serviced to rhythmic contemporary radio in the United States as the album's third single.
On May 2, 2014 "The Worst" rose fro
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the capital city and most populous municipality of the Netherlands. Its status as the capital is mandated by the Constitution of the Netherlands, although it is not the seat of the government, The Hague. Amsterdam has a population of 854,047 within the city proper, 1,357,675 in the urban area and 2,410,960 in the metropolitan area; the city is located in the province of North Holland in the west of the country but is not its capital, Haarlem. The Amsterdam metropolitan area comprises much of the northern part of the Randstad, one of the larger conurbations in Europe, which has a population of 8.1 million. Amsterdam's name derives from Amstelredamme, indicative of the city's origin around a dam in the river Amstel. Originating as a small fishing village in the late 12th century, Amsterdam became one of the most important ports in the world during the Dutch Golden Age, as a result of its innovative developments in trade. During that time, the city was the leading centre for trade. In the 19th and 20th centuries the city expanded, many new neighbourhoods and suburbs were planned and built.
The 17th-century canals of Amsterdam and the 19–20th century Defence Line of Amsterdam are on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Since the annexation of the municipality of Sloten in 1921 by the municipality of Amsterdam, the oldest historic part of the city lies in Sloten, dating to the 9th century; as the commercial capital of the Netherlands and one of the top financial centres in Europe, Amsterdam is considered an alpha- world city by the Globalization and World Cities study group. The city is the cultural capital of the Netherlands. Many large Dutch institutions have their headquarters there, including Philips, AkzoNobel, TomTom and ING. Many of the world's largest companies are based in Amsterdam or established their European headquarters in the city, such as leading technology companies Uber and Tesla. In 2012, Amsterdam was ranked the second best city to live in by the Economist Intelligence Unit and 12th globally on quality of living for environment and infrastructure by Mercer; the city was ranked 4th place globally as top tech hub in the Savills Tech Cities 2019 report, 3rd in innovation by Australian innovation agency 2thinknow in their Innovation Cities Index 2009.
The Port of Amsterdam to this day remains the second in the country, the fifth largest seaport in Europe. Famous Amsterdam residents include the diarist Anne Frank, artists Rembrandt van Rijn and Vincent van Gogh, philosopher Baruch Spinoza; the Amsterdam Stock Exchange, the oldest stock exchange in the world, is located in the city centre. Amsterdam's main attractions include its historic canals, the Rijksmuseum, the Van Gogh Museum, the Stedelijk Museum, Hermitage Amsterdam, the Anne Frank House, the Scheepvaartmuseum, the Amsterdam Museum, the Heineken Experience, the Royal Palace of Amsterdam, Natura Artis Magistra, Hortus Botanicus Amsterdam, NEMO, the red-light district and many cannabis coffee shops, they draw more than 5 million international visitors annually. The city is well known for its nightlife and festival activity, it is one of the world's most multicultural cities, with at least 177 nationalities represented. After the floods of 1170 and 1173, locals near the river Amstel built a bridge over the river and a dam across it, giving its name to the village: "Aemstelredamme".
The earliest recorded use of that name is in a document dated 27 October 1275, which exempted inhabitants of the village from paying bridge tolls to Count Floris V. This allowed the inhabitants of the village of Aemstelredamme to travel through the County of Holland, paying no tolls at bridges and dams; the certificate describes the inhabitants. By 1327, the name had developed into Aemsterdam. Amsterdam is much younger than Dutch cities such as Nijmegen and Utrecht. In October 2008, historical geographer Chris de Bont suggested that the land around Amsterdam was being reclaimed as early as the late 10th century; this does not mean that there was a settlement since reclamation of land may not have been for farming—it may have been for peat, for use as fuel. Amsterdam was granted city rights in either 1300 or 1306. From the 14th century on, Amsterdam flourished from trade with the Hanseatic League. In 1345, an alleged Eucharistic miracle in the Kalverstraat rendered the city an important place of pilgrimage until the adoption of the Protestant faith.
The Miracle devotion was kept alive. In the 19th century after the jubilee of 1845, the devotion was revitalized and became an important national point of reference for Dutch Catholics; the Stille Omgang—a silent walk or procession in civil attire—is the expression of the pilgrimage within the Protestant Netherlands since the late 19th century. In the heyday of the Silent Walk, up to 90,000 pilgrims came to Amsterdam. In the 21st century this has reduced to about 5000. In the 16th century, the Dutch rebelled against Philip II of his successors; the main reasons for the uprising were the imposition of new taxes, the tenth penny, the religious persecution of Protestants by the newly introduced Inquisition. The revolt escalated into the Eighty Years' War, which led to Dutch independence. Pushed by Dutch Revolt leader William the Silent, the Dutch Republic became known for its relative religious tolerance. Jews from the Iberian Peninsula, Huguenots from France, prosperous merchants and printers from Flanders, economic and religious refugees
Chester Bennington
Chester Charles Bennington was an American singer, songwriter and actor. He was best known as the lead vocalist for Linkin Park, he was lead vocalist for the bands Dead by Sunrise, Grey Daze, Stone Temple Pilots. Bennington is regarded as one of the top rock musicians of the 2000s. Hit Parader magazine placed him at number 46 on their list of the "100 Metal Vocalists of All Time". Bennington first gained prominence as a vocalist following the release of Linkin Park's debut album, Hybrid Theory, in 2000, which became a commercial success; the album was certified Diamond by the Recording Industry Association of America in 2005, making it the best-selling debut album of the decade, as well as one of the few albums to hit that many sales. Linkin Park's following studio albums, from Meteora to One More Light, continued the band's success. Linkin Park has sold over 100 million records worldwide making them the best-selling band of the 21st century and one of the best-selling artists of all time. Bennington formed his own band, Dead by Sunrise, as a side project in 2005.
The band's debut album, Out of Ashes, was released on October 13, 2009. He became the lead singer of Stone Temple Pilots in 2013 to release the extended play record High Rise on October 8, 2013, via their own record label, Play Pen, but left in 2015 to focus on Linkin Park, he appeared in cameo roles in several films, including Crank, Crank: High Voltage and Saw 3D. On July 20, 2017, Bennington was found dead at his home in California, his death was ruled a suicide by hanging. Chester Charles Bennington was born on March 1976, in Phoenix, Arizona, his mother was a nurse, while his father was a police detective who worked on child sexual abuse cases. Bennington took an interest in music at a young age, citing the bands Depeche Mode and Stone Temple Pilots as his earliest inspirations, dreamed of becoming a member of Stone Temple Pilots, which he achieved when he became their lead singer. Bennington suffered sexual abuse from an older male friend, he was afraid to ask for help because he did not want people to think he was gay or lying, the abuse continued until he was 13 years old.
Years he revealed the abuser's identity to his father, but chose not to pursue him after he realized the abuser was a victim himself. Bennington's parents divorced; the abuse and his situation at home affected him so much that he felt the urge to kill people and run away. To comfort himself, he wrote poetry and songs. After the divorce, Bennington's father gained custody of him. Bennington started abusing alcohol, opium, meth, LSD, he was physically bullied in high school. In an interview, he said that he was "knocked around like a rag doll at school, for being skinny and looking different". At the age of 17, Bennington moved in with his mother, he was banned from leaving the house for a time. He worked at a Burger King before starting his career as a professional musician. Bennington first began singing with a band called Sean Dowdell and His Friends? They released an eponymous three-track cassette in 1993. Dowdell and Bennington moved on to form a new band, Grey Daze, a post-grunge band from Phoenix, Arizona.
The band recorded three albums: Demo in 1993, Wake/Me in 1994, and...no sun today in 1997. Bennington struggled to find another band. Bennington was frustrated and ready to quit his musical career altogether when Jeff Blue, the vice president of artists and repertoire at Zomba Music in Los Angeles, offered him an audition with the future members of Linkin Park. Bennington quit his day job at a digital services firm and took his family to California, where he had a successful audition with Linkin Park, who were called Xero, he managed to record the song for his audition in a day, missing his own birthday celebration in the process. Bennington and Mike Shinoda, the band's other vocalist, made significant progress together, but failed to find a record deal. After facing numerous rejections, now a vice president of artists and repertoire at Warner Bros. intervened again to help the band sign with Warner Bros. Records. On October 24, 2000, Linkin Park released Hybrid Theory, through Warner Bros.. Records.
Bennington and Shinoda wrote the lyrics to Hybrid Theory based on some early material. Shinoda characterized the lyrics as interpretations of universal feelings and experiences, as "everyday emotions you talk about and think about." Bennington described the songwriting experience to Rolling Stone magazine in early 2002, "It's easy to fall into that thing –'poor, poor me', that's where songs like'Crawling' come from: I can't take myself. But that song is about taking responsibility for your actions. I don't say'you' at any point. It's about. There's something inside me that pulls me down."Bennington served as Linkin Park's lead vocalist, but shared the role with Shinoda. All Music Guide described Bennington's vocals as "higher-pitched" and "emotional", in contrast to Shinoda's hip-hop-style delivery. Both members worked together to write lyrics for the band's songs. Bennington co-founded Dead by Sunrise, an electronic rock band from Los Angeles, with Orgy and Julien-K members Amir Derakh and Ryan Shuck in 2005.
Dead by Sunrise made their live debut in May 2008, performing four songs at the 13th anniversary party for Club Tattoo in Tempe, Arizona. The band released their debut album Out of Ashes on October 13, 2009. In February 2013, Stone Temple Pilots parted ways with long-time lead singer Scott Weiland. Th
Allen Ginsberg
Irwin Allen Ginsberg was an American poet and writer. He is considered to be one of the leading figures of both the Beat Generation during the 1950s and the counterculture that soon followed, he vigorously opposed militarism, economic materialism, sexual repression and was known as embodying various aspects of this counterculture, such as his views on drugs, hostility to bureaucracy and openness to Eastern religions. He was one of many influential American writers of his time known as the Beat Generation, which included famous writers such as Jack Kerouac and William S. Burroughs. Ginsberg is best known for his poem "Howl", in which he denounced what he saw as the destructive forces of capitalism and conformity in the United States. In 1956, "Howl" was seized by US Customs. In 1957, it attracted widespread publicity when it became the subject of an obscenity trial, as it described heterosexual and homosexual sex at a time when sodomy laws made homosexual acts a crime in every U. S. state. "Howl" reflected Ginsberg's own bisexuality and his relationships with a number of men, including Peter Orlovsky, his lifelong partner.
Judge Clayton W. Horn ruled that "Howl" was not obscene, adding, "Would there be any freedom of press or speech if one must reduce his vocabulary to vapid innocuous euphemisms?"Ginsberg was a practicing Buddhist who studied Eastern religious disciplines extensively. He lived modestly, buying his clothing in second-hand stores and residing in downscale apartments in New York's East Village. One of his most influential teachers was the Tibetan Buddhist Chögyam Trungpa, the founder of the Naropa Institute in Boulder, Colorado. At Trungpa's urging and poet Anne Waldman started The Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics there in 1974. Ginsberg took part in decades of non-violent political protest against everything from the Vietnam War to the War on Drugs, his poem "September on Jessore Road", calling attention to the plight of Bangladeshi refugees, exemplifies what the literary critic Helen Vendler described as Ginsberg's tireless persistence in protesting against "imperial politics, persecution of the powerless."His collection The Fall of America shared the annual U.
S. National Book Award for Poetry in 1974. In 1979, he received the National Arts Club gold medal and was inducted into the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. Ginsberg was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 1995 for his book Cosmopolitan Greetings: Poems 1986–1992. Ginsberg was born into a Jewish family in Newark, New Jersey, grew up in nearby Paterson; as a young teenager, Ginsberg began to write letters to The New York Times about political issues, such as World War II and workers' rights. While in high school, Ginsberg began reading Walt Whitman, inspired by his teacher's passionate reading. In 1943, Ginsberg graduated from Eastside High School and attended Montclair State College before entering Columbia University on a scholarship from the Young Men's Hebrew Association of Paterson. In 1945, he joined the Merchant Marine to earn money to continue his education at Columbia. While at Columbia, Ginsberg contributed to the Columbia Review literary journal, the Jester humor magazine, won the Woodberry Poetry Prize, served as president of the Philolexian Society, joined Boar's Head Society.
Ginsberg has stated that he considered his required freshman seminar in Great Books, taught by Lionel Trilling, to be his favorite Columbia course. According to The Poetry Foundation, Ginsberg spent several months in a mental institution after he pleaded insanity during a hearing, he was being prosecuted for harboring stolen goods in his dorm room. It belonged to an acquaintance. Ginsberg referred to his parents, in a 1985 interview, as "old-fashioned delicatessen philosophers", his father, Louis Ginsberg, was a high school teacher. Ginsberg's mother, Naomi Livergant Ginsberg, was affected by a psychological illness, never properly diagnosed, she was an active member of the Communist Party and took Ginsberg and his brother Eugene to party meetings. Ginsberg said that his mother "made up bedtime stories that all went something like:'The good king rode forth from his castle, saw the suffering workers and healed them.'" Of his father Ginsberg said "My father would go around the house either reciting Emily Dickinson and Longfellow under his breath or attacking T. S. Eliot for ruining poetry with his'obscurantism.'
I grew suspicious of both sides."Naomi Ginsberg's mental illness manifested as paranoid delusions. She would claim, for example, that the president had implanted listening devices in their home and that her mother-in-law was trying to kill her, her suspicion of those around her caused Naomi to draw closer to young Allen, "her little pet", as Bill Morgan says in his biography of Ginsberg, titled, I Celebrate Myself: The Somewhat Private Life of Allen Ginsberg. She tried to kill herself by slitting her wrists and was soon taken to Greystone, a mental hospital, his experiences with his mother and her mental illness were a major inspiration for his two major works, "Howl" and his long autobiographical poem "Kaddish for Naomi Ginsberg". When he was in junior high school, he accompanied his mother by bus to her therapist; the trip disturbed Ginsberg – he mentioned it and other moments from his childhood in "Kaddish". His experiences with his mother's mental illness and her institutionalization are frequently referred to in "Howl".
For example, "Pilgrim State and Grey Stone's foetid halls" is a reference to institutions frequented by his mother and Carl Solomon
Hilton Amsterdam
The Hilton Amsterdam is a hotel in Apollobuurt, Amsterdam, in the Netherlands. It is located at Apollolaan 138 along the Noorder Amstelkanaal, a canal connected to the Amstel river; the hotel opened in 1962 and is a branch of the Hilton Hotels chain. It is known for John Lennon and Yoko Ono's "Bed-In" for peace, staged in 1969 to protest the Vietnam War; the Hilton Amsterdam is located at Apollolaan 138 in the Oud-Zuid district of Amsterdam. The Hilton Hotel opened May 9, 1962 as the first hotel in the Netherlands from an international hotel chain, it was designed by Hugh Aart Maaskant in a V-shape, to emphasize the two major urban axes that intersect the Apollolaan and Minerva Avenue. It was renovated between 1996 and 1998 with a lobby design by Peter Ellis. A number of notable deaths have occurred in the hotel area, such as the murder of the drug lord Klaas Bruinsma in 1991, in the Breitnerstraat, next to the hotel. In 2001 musician and artist Herman Brood committed suicide by jumping off the roof of the hotel at the age of 54.
Extensively covered by the national media in the Netherlands, Brood's casket was driven from the Hilton hotel to Paradiso and the streets were lined with thousands of spectators. Knowing their March 20, 1969 marriage in Gibraltar would be a major press event and Yoko used the publicity to promote world peace, they spent their honeymoon in the presidential suite at the hotel in a "Bed-In" between March 25 and 31, 1969, inviting the world's press into their hotel room daily between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. Amsterdam art dealer Nico Koster was invited by Lennon himself for a solo shoot. Koster unearthed the lost negatives of these historic pictures in March 2009; the couple were sitting in bed in Room 702 of the hotel in Lennon's words "like Angels", discussing peace with signs over their bed reading "Hair Peace" and "Bed Peace". After seven days, they flew to Vienna, where they held a Bagism press conference; the hotel and event is mentioned in the song The Ballad of John and Yoko where he mentions Hilton Amsterdam by name and uses the following words: "…the news people said: Hey, what you doin' in bed?
I said: We're only tryin' to get us some peace!". The Hilton Amsterdam contains 271 rooms; the interior of the newly refurbished rooms is designed by Nobilis Paris. The hotels facilities include a bar area and several terraces; the rooms are divided between the deluxe and executive rooms. Notable suites include the John and Yoko suite, the King Hilton Junior suite, the King Neptune suite, the Presidential suite, the Queen Hilton Junior suite, the twin Hilton Junior suite, the Royal suite; the John and Yoko suite is a luxury 50 square metres suite featuring a king-sized bed with Egyptian linen, is decorated with memorabilia related to the couple. Official website
Acorn
The acorn, or oaknut, is the nut of the oaks and their close relatives. It contains a single seed, enclosed in a tough, leathery shell, borne in a cup-shaped cupule. Acorns are 1 -- 0.8 -- 4 cm broad. Acorns take between 24 months to mature. Acorns are plentiful; the volume of the acorn crop may vary creating great abundance or great stress on the many animals dependent on acorns and the predators of those animals. Acorns, along with other nuts, are termed mast. Wildlife that consume acorns as an important part of their diets include birds, such as jays, some ducks, several species of woodpeckers. Small mammals that feed on acorns include mice and several other rodents. Large mammals such as pigs and deer consume large amounts of acorns. In Spain and the New Forest region of southern England, pigs are still turned loose in dehesas in the autumn, to fill and fatten themselves on acorns. Heavy consumption of acorns can, on the other hand, be toxic to other animals that cannot detoxify their tannins, such as horses and cattle.
The larvae of some moths and weevils live in young acorns, consuming the kernels as they develop. Acorns are attractive to animals because they are thus efficiently consumed or cached. Acorns are rich in nutrients. Percentages vary from species to species, but all acorns contain large amounts of protein and fats, as well as the minerals calcium and potassium, the vitamin niacin. Total food energy in an acorn varies by species, but all compare well with other wild foods and with other nuts. Acorns contain bitter tannins, the amount varying with the species. Since tannins, which are plant polyphenols, interfere with an animal's ability to metabolize protein, creatures must adapt in different ways to use the nutritional value acorns contain. Animals may preferentially select acorns; when the tannins are metabolized in cattle, the tannic acid produced can cause ulceration and kidney failure. Animals that cache acorns, such as jays and squirrels, may wait to consume some of these acorns until sufficient groundwater has percolated through them to leach out the tannins.
Other animals buffer their acorn diet with other foods. Many insects and mammals metabolize tannins with fewer ill effects than do humans. Species of acorn that contain large amounts of tannins are bitter and irritating if eaten raw; this is true of the acorns of American red oaks and English oaks. The acorns of white oaks, being much lower in tannins, are nutty in flavor. Tannins can be removed by soaking chopped acorns in several changes of water, until the water no longer turns brown. Cold water leaching can take several days, but three to four changes of boiling water can leach the tannins in under an hour. Hot water leaching cooks the starch of the acorn, which would otherwise act like gluten in flour, helping it bind to itself. For this reason, if the acorns will be used to make flour cold water leaching is preferred. Being rich in fat, acorn flour can spoil or molder and must be stored. Acorns are sometimes prepared as a massage oil. Acorns of the white oak group, Leucobalanus start rooting as soon as they are in contact with the soil send up the leaf shoot in the spring.
Acorns are too heavy for wind dispersal, so they require other ways to spread. Oaks therefore depend on biological seed dispersal agents to move the acorns beyond the mother tree and into a suitable area for germination, ideally a minimum of 20–30 m from the parent tree. Many animals eat unripe acorns on the tree or ripe acorns from the ground, with no reproductive benefit to the oak, but some animals, such as squirrels and jays serve as seed dispersal agents. Jays and squirrels that scatter-hoard acorns in caches for future use plant acorns in a variety of locations in which it is possible for them to germinate and thrive. Though jays and squirrels retain remarkably large mental maps of cache locations and return to consume them, the odd acorn may be lost, or a jay or squirrel may die before consuming all of its stores. A small number of acorns manage producing the next generation of oaks. Scatter-hoarding behavior depends on jays and squirrels associating with plants that provide good packets of food that are nutritionally valuable, but not too big for the dispersal agent to handle.
The beak sizes of jays determine. Acorns germinate depending on their place in the oak family. Once acorns sprout, they are less nutritious, as the seed tissue converts to the indigestible lignins that form the root. In some cultures, acorns once constituted a dietary staple, though they have been replaced by grains and are now considered a unimportant food, except in some Native American and Korean communities. Several cultures have devised traditional acorn-leaching methods, sometimes involving specialized tools, that were traditionally passed on to their children by word of mouth. Acorns served an important role in early human history and were a
