But I was able to come back. Well, I want to just before I ask Ed to just give us a little bit of an introduction. I know he's got this great bio that I looked up at on Hampshire's website. He's done a lot of really impressive things. And I want maybe him to share a little bit about his story with you. But I want to remind folks in the room, but feel free to raise your hand if you have a question you want to make a comment. I can use the q&a function within zoom and I can read your question or comment doesn't have to be specific to Hampshire but feel free to share those questions with us at any point. So Ed, could you give us a little bit of introduction on yourself and you know what the last years been like and how you came to Hampshire. Sure. So, you know, I'm an academic by training my, my doctoral degree is in political philosophy. So I study democracy and, you know, how democracy should work ideally and how we think about conflict particularly deep emotional unresolvable conflict within democratic institutions so this is a interesting time for someone who studies the kind of things that I studied as a professor. But you know I went to, I went to Lake Forest College near Chicago, and I went there primarily because as I was looking at colleges from as a rural Ohio, I had a sense like there was these things that I wanted to do and none of the colleges offered precisely what I wanted to do and Lake Forest had this program called the independent scholars program, right, where I would be allowed to design my own major and take whatever I wanted. Right and Lake Forest didn't have any distribution requirements at the time and like, that's what I want to do. Right, so I went there, because I should have gone to Hampshire. Right. And I was you know, a rural Ohio kid I didn't know Hampshire thinking about that the Northeast was way too far away. But I should have gone to Hampshire right and then I you know my first job out of out of graduate school. First full time job was at the University of Maryland Southern California, which has a center called the Johnson Center for integrative studies which was founded about the same time as Hampshire. And that's about 200 students sort of a college within the university that again is modeled on the kind of self designed contract based design your own curriculum education that Hampshire is. I had my intellectual home for most of my time at Redlands and realize at that point like, you know, what Hampshire does is the model for what the ideal of a liberal arts education and undergraduate education should be it's what, you know, I think everybody would do if they have the kind of the courage and the resources and the commitment that you would, you would help students figure out what questions matter to them, what projects matter to them what, what they care and are passionate about and then you would support them with resources and mentorship to do that and to do those projects as their education. So when it came became, you know, when I got the opportunity to come to Hampshire as, you know, to lead the institution but also to more importantly, make sure that this model for what undergraduate education should be because survive, you know, I jumped on it right away. So now I feel a little jealous that I didn't go to Hampshire college. It just gave me the warm fuzzy feelings of you know supporting students and asking them those questions rather than saying you know pick which box you want to check to start your education so that's really that's an interesting concept. So how is Hampshire doing now. You know there's been some changes over the last few years and not to mention a pandemic so what's what's what's the state of the college today. Well I think there's two ways to answer that one is right now and one is where we're headed. So maybe start with the second part of that which is, you know Hampshire is on a good trajectory to be a sustainable institution financially. You know I think Hampshire is an exciting and sustainable institution educationally and always has been but it has had some challenges in balancing its incoming revenue with its expenses. And that's, that's a common challenge that most, almost all small colleges in the country except for a small handful that have very very large endowments face right and find different ways to resolve that. And in the midst of the second year of a multi year plan that we've, you know, worked very carefully within our community and with external stakeholders like the Department of Higher Education and our creditors and everybody's on board on this, where by 2425 as our as our enrollment recovers, you know a bit by bit each year, and we maintain a stable and slowly growing budget. And the revenue should match right so and that's where you need to be in any kind of, you know, any kind of business any kind of private organization even a nonprofit, you've got to be roughly in balance there. And so we're on trajectory to do that, where we are right now is maintaining a level of operations that is in that is technically in deficit right we're spending more than we're bringing into our normal revenue. And we have this huge amount of support from our community, who are providing lots of, you know, lots of support to our annual fund through fundraising, and providing support that is directly designed to help us bridge that gap. And so we've raised since, since, you know, right before I got here, year and a half ago, we've raised $24 million in cash and pledges, all of that directly to support this transition over the next few years. And then another 6 million addition to that 24 that is for more restricted purposes right things that that are that can't be used for daily operations but help us build our other kinds of resources so that's, you know, and then finally we have access to parts of our endowment we have access to the endowment relative to you know, Emerson Smith and Holyoke, but we have access to enough of it that that's kind of a nice emergency cushion that, you know, can help us smooth this transition. So I would say we are stable now. And headed towards sustainability and doing a great job of attracting students and maintaining what we, what is the important mission of Hampshire. And what I've heard you speak at alumni gatherings at what I've appreciated I think others alums have appreciated is that you don't sugarcoat the stuff, you know, you sort of say what it is. And at some times you're saying it's difficult, but you have sort of a real sort of rational approach to saying here's where we need to go. We're not, we're not like rolling in the dough, but we're okay, you know, and we can do better and all that kind of so I always think that it was sort of a measured answer to the financial questions. I think it's really important to be honest and transparent with people, particularly with stakeholders and, you know, as far as I'm concerned the town of Amherst and the Pioneer Valley or stakeholders in Hampshire college. We, we depend on the region and people around here depend on us and, you know, it's important that that that people will understand what our situation is but also can understand and trust us that we are managing it responsibly. Because people need to be confident that that Hampshire is here it will be here, and we are, you know, we're a thriving place. So if you're in the room I'm going to welcome in our friend Ken Rosenthal so Ken if you could introduce yourself. Your predecessor, first employee of Hampshire I think. And the most recent president so yes. Yeah. Paul the fifth. The fifth. Chuck Longsworth was the first. A couple of things and I don't want to monopolize this conversation because I know the people in Amherst need to hear from Ed, but we're very lucky that Ed chose to come to Hampshire college because he came at a really difficult time he gave up a thriving career, a young man who had a whole career ahead of him to take on a college that was troubled. And we're lucky because he's credible not only to alumni Paul but to faculty students and staff he makes sense to every one of these communities and that's a remarkable characteristic for a college president. I want to say one more thing about the situation that Hampshire is in now, and looking down the road at Amherst College which has an endowment of over $2 billion in thousands of alumni. When Amherst was as old as Hampshire is now it was in serious serious trouble. And Amherst College president named Stanley King wrote a book about the endowment of Amherst College and he used that word serious trouble for when Amherst was this old Emily Dickinson's brother. Austin was the treasurer of Amherst College and he was writing checks for Amherst College out of his own pocket and he almost went into personal financial bankruptcy because he was doing it. One of Hampshire's fascinating problems is its alumni aren't dying yet. I don't wish that on anybody, but we know that colleges get a lot of money from the voted alumni who leave them funds in their wills and this is not happening at Hampshire College because Hampshire is so young. So, we need to put this in a context of understanding how colleges mature and Hampshire is still a very young place. And thanks to Ed, it's going to mature very nicely and we have a good future ahead of us we Hampshire folks. And again, thank you, Ed for for being here and thank you for getting up this hour and letting folks hear from you this morning and thank you Paul and Brianna. Thank you, Ken. Thanks, we should thank Ken for stepping in a year and a half ago and doing this job for the generous compensation of $1. I think I think we have the dollar bill sitting over there in that desk somewhere. You know, and, and also for your support kind of the institution so, but you're right we've been around 50 years. We're going to be around for the next 50 years and, you know, this is a this is always a difficult kind of transition period for colleges. But, you know, we make it through this, make it through this transition successfully, and continue to attract the kind of students who off who want and need what we offer, right which we've always been able to do right there's kind of a self selected group of students looking around like this is this kind of education is what I want more than anything else. But there's a whole bunch of other students who would want what we do, and would thrive in what we do, if they knew we existed, and we were we were, in their consciousness and so part of what we're trying to do over the this year next year and in the years going forward is to kind of find a better way to communicate the core of what Hampshire does and adapt it to the really important needs of the future that are ways that are compelling to students into their families. Thank you for your comments can feel free to raise your hand at any point again. I do see that we have got another hand in the room and this person's name is number so you're ending in 1364 if you could on you and introduce yourself that would be great. I'm Alice Lara I generally follow can at these events.  You have a huge solar panel array. How does that impact you economically your electrical use. What's happening there and I think you also have some solar big things at your house. So could you talk about that and thank you for being here. Thank you. Yes, there's a couple things about that that Hampshire was, I believe the first college in the country to to offset its entire electrical use with solar. I think there's been some others have done that sense but so we have enough capacity here to essentially to be fully solar. Solar dependence not the right word it's dependent not the word you want to use the solar but that we are some self sufficient average over the course of the year. You know that that what that does is it keeps some of our electoral costs down. You know it's probably doesn't save us as much money as people might expect, given that you know you have to pay for the installation and you know that that takes some time to pay that off over the course of years but it's certainly cheaper that it would be to pay for electrical coming off the grid but more importantly, it's doing the right thing, which is, you know trying to contribute to a better future. So Hampshire also is a was one of the first college to the best from investing in South Africa Hampshire was a founder of the intentional endowment network, which is in the group of colleges that only invest in their their funds in socially just and businesses and organizations or avoid, you know, investing in things that make the world worse right and try to be really conscious and aware of that and trying to be a an environmentally friendly and sustainable place as part of that. We also have I don't people on this side looking at the people to call people will call know this right but people watch the recording later, you know we also have the current center here which is the most recent building at Hampshire college which is one of, you know, about 25 living buildings across the world, and a living building is a building that is entirely self sustainable is completely doesn't doesn't draw anything out of the grid is built only with sustainable safe locally sourced materials. It is not just carbon neutral what sort of contributes back right now the Hitchcock Center is also a living building right so we have to here in our, in our campus. And I think those are just core to the kind of commitments that Hampshire has to the community into the world. Hey fellas, do you have solar panels in your house. Absolutely yes, you do. Right. Do you save money. I have to tell, because I have the kind, I do not own them. The company owns them so when I generate the power in the summer. Sorry major, I don't have a bill from ever source, but in January February and March, I do have a bill. So I have to add that all up. But I also hang out my clothes outside. I don't use my dryer. I have my own compost heap I grow some food as you know. So I try to do my best, and I keep my microwave unplugged unless I'm using it. That's a good tip I didn't think about that. Yeah, because think about it if you go to bed at night, you won't use it all night so why keep it plugged in. That's my, my action item for today fellas thank you. But thank you I really appreciate your being here and Susan as well. Thank you very much. Thank you fellas feel free at any point to raise your hand again. I do have a question in the room from Jeff. Jeff Lee what challenges has Hampshire face during the pandemic and do you see a clear path back to normality. That's a great question. Well, the challenges, you know, there are some ways in which the one virtue of having been in something of an enrollment crisis was that we were already de densified right so the, you know, when we come thinking about this last the current year as a residential institution the big challenge for any college that is primarily residential was how do you bring students to campus and spread them out widely enough that you can maintain a safe environment. Combined with masking and testing but the sort of the basic social distancing challenge is really hard. We were able to bring back all of our students, because we have the capacity to house, you know, 12 1300 students in our residential enrollment right now is you know, 500 or so so we didn't have to, we can offer everybody spots and spread people out everybody you know in Hampshire for some people don't know this already we everybody here a single room so we were able to spread people out even a little bit farther. The child the bigger challenges were one, we're securing regular testing and contact tracing services because you cannot have people living in close proximity without doing that. And we were really fortunate that the Broad Institute at MIT and Harvard worked closely with the private colleges association that Hampshire is a part of over the last summer to shift their, their, the people who sequence the human genome, right, to shift all of their expertise into into testing for COVID. And by the time the fall hit, we had this nice network where we were everyone on the state and then broader broader region New England were able to use the Broad Institute for very quick testing and turnaround. UMass has now got testing capacity as well. So that was really important that that was available. It was expensive, even at a great discount. So we were lucky that that the federal government and the state of Massachusetts allocated some funds for higher education to offset some of those expenses. But you know that's been that's been a challenge right to create a safe environment. The second big challenge that not the financial and planning and testing one was figuring out how to deliver quality education to students. In a place that is primarily about face to face individualized contact. And, you know, our faculty and our staff and our administration I think did huge amounts of work last summer, figuring out the best ways to take advantage of this kind of technology that we're talking about this morning, in order to provide as close as possible to the kind of experience our students would normally have, and then combine that with some in person activities so we're not all in person but we're personally in person. And why wouldn't, you know, want us to have that model for a long time. I think it's been, I think it's gotten us through this year. It's been a day that kept most of our students on track. The other party question and then I'll stop is path back to normality. Yeah, I think that we're, I think I think I see a pretty clear path back to something like normality and in fact, we announced two weeks ago that it's our expectation that the fall will be in person residential with, you know, the full range of activities and supports and classroom teaching environment. So that we will be largely like we were prior to the pandemic now that probably will include still wearing face masks and other kinds of you know safety measures that are that we didn't have before. But it's very much our expectation that we can, we can resume, largely normal operations by the fall. Great question and great answer. Thank you, Jeff. Got another question in here and I just want to remind it a couple of the new attendees who came in, please feel free to raise your hand, or add a question into the q amp a function for for Ed. Oh, Jeff says thanks. So, thank you. Thanks for joining by phone you can press star nine to raise your hand. One question that that I kind of had is that you didn't come here alone you came here with with a family and presumably just slightly before this pandemic hit so what has that been like for you for yourself and for your family to kind of come to a new place but also have to be home and not experience it. That's that has been a very bizarre experience. You're right we moved and we moved very quickly. You know we basically over the course the last week of July first week of August, we decided that we would come to that I would take the job at Hampshire college and then we decided as a family to move here. And you know maybe that that's kind of an unusual unusual thing for a family with kids to do at least that quickly. So we moved here early in early August and of course, the pandemic shut everything down and more than a year ago in March so we've been here in the pandemic longer than we were here prior to the pandemic. I want to say a couple things about that one is that, you know, not knowing a pandemic was coming that first you know six or seven months were really the focus on getting to know Hampshire college getting things in place. Like I was saying like oh there's some interesting things I should be doing around here. I'm really looking forward to, you know, may or June we can do X or Y. But I do came and we couldn't go anywhere do anything. So I'm really there's a lot of things around in Amherst and North Hampton and the Pioneer Valley there's indoor activities that I'm really looking forward to exploring and and visiting with my family, once we start to get a little bit more back normal hopefully over the summer. So the challenge, you know, for is just to be, you know, a little more personal by the time the challenge for the for the family and particularly for my kids has been, you know, being here for a little bit of time and then going to fully remote learning. You know, so you know I have, I have one child who was this is this is our first year of high school, you know and another who's in middle school right. So it's hard to make those transitions hard to make those transitions. When you're not actually at school. It's even harder and so that's been difficult, but, but we're getting there and you know what is and I will say it's been the amount of support from the school and from the teachers and the efforts that the Amherst teachers have made to be accessible and available. To our kids, I think our experience is this has been they're doing really everything they possibly can to to to create a positive educational environment, but it also just shows that the limitations of that of that mode is just it's not, it's not ideal. It's a daily don't you breathe. Yes, at a different different stage elementary school stage but I think a lot of people are in that very same same boat as you add here in town and across the country looking forward to, to a spring of sorts where maybe that's not an automatic fix but we get to be outside and do a little bit more. Um, I want to acknowledge that we do have our council president Lynn grease mayor in the room and I, if she does want to pop in and say hello or have a question for Ed I just welcome her to raise her hand. As well but no pressure Lynn. You try on her first cup of coffee. Oh no she's. She's always there. Okay Lynn if you could unmute. Welcome. Hi, Ed. First of all, thank you for taking over the leadership. I'm sure it's a, you know, a piece of our economic of present or Amherst, and it's great to have your energetic leadership at this particular time. And so we fully support you in that effort. I'm sorry I really can't stay for the rest of the meeting, but hello to all the residents that have joined as well. I have another meeting at 830. Thank you Lynn. Thank you for joining. So I think one question you know when we think about our area. We're a five college community and what what's the interaction been with the other institutions. Maybe pre pandemic when you first got here and how does that changed in response to this crisis over the last year. Well, I mean the five colleges are really essential to Hampshire as an institution. People probably most people on this call probably know this Hampshire was founded by the four colleges. We became the five colleges with Hampshire. And so the Hampshire exists in part because of the, the commitment of the other four colleges and in the valley to have and support and experimenting institution to have the vision to say look, we need both here in western Massachusetts but in higher education broadly, we need some college whose job is to try to invent the future to take those risks and you know figure out what what nobody else is doing, try to do it and if it works, you know the rest of us will adopt it. That's that's really the origin story of Hampshire College right, and that has continued I think to be a strong relationship over the last 50 years, and we'll continue to be one and so, you know, we, when, when Hampshire ran into or you want to be careful and describe what happened in the spring of 2019 because I wasn't here but you know that when when the troubles emerged or were recognized or were provoked depending on which story you're hearing about this right. The five colleges were were incredibly supportive. And one of the things that they did was create space for a lot of our, a lot of our long term faculty members to go and teach as visitors and short term faculty at the other colleges right which is no good deal because we had these great faculty who were who are now, you know, teaching it in her store at Holyoke or UMass, but it means that our students continue to have access to them as well through the five colleges system, and they've continued to do that to kind of help support us as we move through this transition. The other five colleges have continued to, you know, allow and and encourage our students to take courses across the other five colleges to supplement what we do here and that's part of the great thing about being a student Hampshire right that you're, you're building your own curriculum you're pursuing your own project and it turns out that, oh, in order to do this project, I really need this very specialized piece of knowledge. So if somebody at UMass or Amherst or Smith or Holyoke has that knowledge, and you can go talk to them, right, and bring that back to your to the work you're doing in Hampshire. So that's so that's essential they've been very supportive. During the pandemic, we have been coordinating really closely in our planning and trying to, you know, figure out ways for our students to cross register in the remote mode. And, you know, sharing strategies and sharing stories and, you know, all of the various levels of the organizations at each college have their own groups that meet regularly to share and understand what's working and what's not and how to coordinate. So it's, you know, it's been a different kind of collaborations and again we're doing it all this way on screens, but it remains a very strong organization. I'm going to give another call to our room. Feel free to raise your hand or use the Q&A to pop in your question. I have a question because I'm going to pretend that I'm regular Amherst community member and not at work. So, for example, my daughter will go to tennis lessons on at Hampshire College using your facilities goes to summer camp and I just wonder, you know, what are some ways that the broader community interacts with Hampshire College, maybe in the past or maybe what do you see in the future different ways of that that kind of commingling happening. Harder for me to speak to the past since I my by experience with the past is a little bit limited and mostly mostly not pre pandemic. But let me say a couple things here one is, you know, we were it was really important to us and we've continued to do this to keep the campus open during the pandemic. People use our, you know, our close to 900 acres for recreation and, you know, place to get out and so we've kind of, you know, talk coordinated with Paul a little bit about this to find out you know what is Amherst doing we want to kind of be consistent with Amherst's expectations for how to use public spaces. In fact, we just spoke about this day and like our tennis courts we had, we closed our tennis courts off when the town sort of close some of the recreational spots where we've now we've now decided we're now going to reopen them because you know they're those sort of things are open in town as well and you know so we're allowing access to that again. And so that's been and people have been really, you know, good about that they've used our campus, following our rules people wear masks but they enjoy themselves and so that's important. You know we also have that remind people about the cultural village institutions that are within and or adjacent to our campus so the Eric Carl museum, the Yiddish Book Center, the Hitchcock Center, all of which are also places that you know where people have access to come to the to Hampshire the Hampshire area here and engage in different kinds of intellectual and artistic activities and you know the Carl is is now reopening by you know you can they have, you know, 50 50 slots in the morning in the afternoon that you can sign up for and go online, the Hitchcock's programs will be resuming again fairly soon. So that's another way in which you know there are opportunities here and around us. And one of the things it's really that I really miss during the pandemic and am excited to be to get past is being part of a college one of the great things about being part of a college community are all of the events that are hosted at a college that people in the community come to me so lectures and plays and dance performances and art exhibits and you know it's it's so much harder to have the community participate in those activities when we're when we're finding, you know, new ways to mediate that experience through technology and new ways to get the word out on that. You know I was a great experience this week of Tuesday we had our the Ahmed Akbar or Ekba Ahmed lecture, which brought together three scholars and activists internationally one from Columbia, one from the United States one from Palestine to speak and we had just 200 people in at on the zoom call, you know from all over the all over the world, all over the country, and all over the area had this moment of like this almost felt like, you know, even though virtual it almost felt like okay we're actually doing, we're having one of these things where the community is here again. And I just, that's one of the things I miss more than anything else about this, this pandemic. It's interesting because I know we hear a lot from the folks who live at Applewood, which is right across Bay Road, and they love walking through campus and appreciate that it's available to be walked to walk through campus and. In fact, they, they advocated, you know, advocated quite vigorously to get a good crosswalk there, because it was, you know, people come steaming up Bay Road, and they're like, you know, we need protection and so now we have a little refuge island so you can cross the way and they can rest and then cross the rest of the way. But that's been a really important thing because in that community really appreciates that the campus is open that the cultural institutions are there. And it's nice, you know, I noticed that just when I have out of town friends like we'll go to the Eric Carl museum, just for a couple hours and it's just fun to walk around it's such a beautiful space. I know we got a lot of thank yous and letters and photos when that crosswalk went in so. That was a couple years ago but people really made a big impact. Okay we've got another question in the room. From Tammy. Does the Chamber of Commerce or Town of Amherst have a list of Amherst businesses that are open with details about their hours and whether or not you can go into the spaces I'm thinking of how Hampshire students might purchase goods and services in town. So I think that I think that the Chamber does and the Business Improvement District does they keep that pretty available. The Chamber I think has the most robust list on their website. And they really focus on the restaurants and most of the restaurants have some kind of, many are open. Some of them have indoor seating. And all of them have takeout. And I think we're starting to see more and more about that so starting next week our DPW will be out there, coordinating off roads like we did last fall, so we can have outdoor dining. And we're looking at like Johnny's is looking at having taken a few parking spaces there to have additional outdoor dining on the Boltwood parking lot and that's a beautiful space for it in utilizing some of the space that they own. And I think the restaurants sort of figured it out last year. And so we're going to help them get started as early as possible. We already own the heaters that people need and the tents that people want. And so we'll just sort of start to reassemble that and hope that we get through and maybe some of those changes will be permanent. You know, that's one of the things that we're looking at is what are these outdoor seating opportunities that might be worth keeping. Is there a start date an official start date for outdoor dining or is it kind of incremental as we I think it's it's up to the businesses starting around in our minds we have like April 1, it's been the opportunity zone. Some businesses will just be open on Thursday, Friday, Saturday, or on warm weather weekends and things like that but you know as soon as the warm weather hits everybody's outside. So the businesses want to be ready to go. So we want to help help them be ready to go. So Tammy's question, both and Paul mentioned this but both the bid and the chamber have this ongoing list with really great details, open hours take out pick up only or dine in. So I would navigate to both both sides and their newsletters their weekly newsletters also have a lot of updates in terms of, you know, restaurants and different openings so always good to check there and I guess the other part of Tammy's question that might be more for Ed is you know how to Hampshire college students interact with local businesses or do you have any kind of anecdotes around that. That's a really good question I think that, you know again this is this is mediated through the pandemic.   It's a real it's a tension right. I do think that our students do do want to and content and use to I certainly certainly know you take advantage of the opportunities to to be in Amherst and to have this a town that has, you know, such a disproportionately large amount of cultural institutions and excellent restaurants and wonderful shops right one of the great things about being here is having all of that available in in a really accessible manageable. Beautiful small town. And so I think you know as as again as we could have opened up out of the pandemic and people are feeling safer. And I'm really excited to see that that be less for there to be less sort of ambiguity about, you know how comfortable we are with that like I really do want our students to be engaged with the town, but as part of means like no just just just don't leave campus. You know, stay safe. Yeah, I think you're right at because you know where we're seeing cases in the town is in the 1824 age range. There's very few cases and over 50 year old range, one or two at a, you know, at a time but it really is, you know, clearly because of small group gatherings. I would not have any at Hampshire as far as I know. And, you know, there's so it's it is that age range where people are socializing and feeling invulnerable and, and that's that's been our biggest challenge. Yeah, we haven't had any we haven't had any big gatherings. We've had cases this this year since January, I think we've had five, five positive tests between, you know, staff and students are in it. And that includes some asymptomatic or some symptomatic tests outside of our testing program. But right now we have one active case on campus that, you know, so it's been, it's been, you know, here and there and, and mostly it's been, we haven't seen, you know, what we haven't seen is what doesn't look like what we've seen are sort of spread amongst people on our campus that it's sort of somebody who's they've gone out and gone somewhere and then come back and then our testing program has caught it pretty quickly. Hopefully, you know, fingers crossed we will continue to have the drips and drabs or not at all. So do you have plans for the opening the red barn I mean that's that's always such a popular venue for I mean we would have our town employee holiday event there. So employee recognition event. That's right. I'm sorry. Yes, yes, the red barn is, you know, is is working with people on taking reservations and planning. You know, where we obviously are going to follow the state and town guidelines on this to make sure that that it's any events that we host there or allow people to use their follow those guidelines. But it is available we do have reservations in place and you know, people should should use the red barn they should contact us about it. We did the, I know you saw this with the Chamber of Commerce annual meeting is usually in there has been in the red bar and we couldn't have it this year in the red barn but we did a bunch of filmed a bunch of the people's speeches there. So that was sort of kind of from the red barn. And that was kind of a nice, a nice event. Are you thinking about commencement at all. So right now our, and I don't think we're going to change this. We announced early in the semester, in part because we just wanted to get people information about travel and something that what we were going to do is a virtual commencement. And then we're we're going to we are planning some events for people who are on our campus and in our testing program, sort of celebrations adjacent to the commencement, but we're not going to have an in person commencement on campus.  There's also a kind of a kind of the issue of responsibility here, from my point of view that, you know, we don't want to send students home with COVID-19. Right. So, last year, you know, as everybody exited we set up, you know, we had testing every couple of days and as students leave there, we tested them, and then, you know, within 72 hours of them leaving campus so that they, and if they got there positive they would need to do them stay or quarantine, because we don't want to be a source of them of spreading the disease. So we're going to be doing that again, you know, in May we're testing people before they leave and the kind of, and this is sort of like, well, we're going to test all of our students who are on campus before they leave but then the day before they leave we're going to bring a bunch of people in and mix them together. This doesn't feel like like a, like a wise thing to do at this point so what we will be trying to try to try to think about it and we this question from last year looks we didn't have we had a remote commencement last year are what are some ways that we that we can make up for that in the future. In some kind of in person event for those two classes. So how do we figure that out right now. I think a lot of institutions of higher education or university Amherst College are all thinking along the same lines what can we do in person that's responsible. And then how do we make it up for folks and try to do something later in the year around, you know, a homecoming or from other event you know you have your 50th anniversary delayed. Yeah, do you have celebrations for that. 50th anniversary we we are planning right now for that to be a full in person on campus event. That's in mid October. You know, we recognize there may be reason that maybe things go sideways that we might have to pull back from that but we're planning right now that to be able to do that event. In the way that we initially intended to do it and lots of people come back to celebrate the first 51 years of and really hope we don't have to fall back and continue to see plans on that because it's it's going to be a fabulous event.  Everybody except children basically, you know, if we can get that done through the summer, you know, might be might be in good shape. Well I hope so.  We've got about, you know, 10 more minutes left, but I wanted to invite you to ask any last minute questions of, of Ed or Paul or just in general. Please use your hand and zoom or use the Q&A function. And while we wait for that. I wondered if if Ed had anything to share with us that he didn't get specifically asked or any, any news or anything like that that you wanted to share that you haven't been asked about yet. Yeah, you know, I'm always happy to talk about, you know, how we are thinking about Hampshire's evolution. I mentioned earlier in passing here but you know that Hampshire's job, its mission in a sense is to, you know, invent the future of higher education. And what it says in our mission statement is that, you know, Hampshire is Hampshire's goal is to transform higher education right. And you can't transform it without innovating and trying new things. And so, you know, one of the things that we're really focused on right now. Is, is that we spent a pre pandemic we spent a lot of time working together our faculty staff students community alums trustees to try to conceptualize what should be the next step for what how Hampshire college lives its vision and and events the future. And what we've been trying to build over the last year and a half and it's, you know, it's been a little slower than I would have liked because we had to spend a lot of energy last summer, figuring out how to teach during a pandemic. But we've still been really good progress here is to orient Hampshire college really directly around the challenges and problems and questions that our students undergraduates coming to college will face in coming years and century, and try to get them to provide them with the opportunities and resources to begin engaging those questions in multiple ways using the tools of disciplines and knowledge from across the spectrum of the liberal arts to get some traction on those questions to do the work. Now that they would otherwise go to college in order to kind of partially get prepared for to do later. And that's, that's having real impacts on how we think about our curriculum how we think about the role of faculty, how we design courses, how they relate to one of the even like like our organizational structure. I think it will be, you know, really exciting and compelling way to speak to populations of students who in the past may not have considered Hampshire college, but should. Right. You know, so that's, but I noticed looking at the call there's a lot of people on the call here who who know what we're doing here and involved in those conversations but that's a really exciting thing. And I really appreciate the amount of work that that people have done to make that happen. Great. Thank you. Paul, do you have anything you want to add to that. It's funny, because one of the things that he knows when I came back here become town manager is that how many, you know, you talk about the, the poster behind you the entrepreneurial spirit. The Amherst books, you know, Black Sheep Cafe, just our insurance company contracted with the company called Berkshire Naturals, and their wellness program and now they're delivering a book, a box of healthy snacks to everyone. All of our different departments, once a week at once every two weeks something like that. And it's, and I, and there's no, you know, there, this is another person just started this business, David Starr and, you know, I was walking on the street yesterday and a fire department captain came running out and said, we really appreciate that we were always eating the wrong things and now they're giving us healthy snacks, plantain chips and, you know, kind bars and all kinds of, you know, things that we should be eating and fruit and vegetables and people really appreciate it. So it's just night as a nice feel good thing and a good thing and that's where some of these, I think some of our folks, you know, the Iron Horse Cafe started by Hampshire alum. But, you know, and those are just the sort of high profile things that people see the retail type things but there's a lot of other things happening. Obviously, I'm a big champion of Hampshire. I make sure I always wear the right hat when I'm talking about it whether I'm talking about something that we're angry about or not but also when I wear my other hat I'm very supportive of that so I do recognize that as well. Well, I do not see any, let's see any hands or any questions in the queue. So I would really like to thank President Ed Wingenback for taking his time today. I know it's early. You had a couple coffees under your belt already but we appreciate you sharing one with us. And if anybody has follow up questions for for Ed or for us, please email us at info at AmherstMA.gov we can get anything over to the President's office if it's related to Hampshire we'll get that over to them. Thank you so much Ed for giving us your time we really appreciate it. Thanks for the opportunity because it's a great way to reach out to the community I'm glad that I'm glad that you do it. Yeah, it is. Thanks everybody. Thank you.


The president's budget proposal eliminates public media funding. Learn how you can help at lptv.org slash action. While in the charges against Bemidji Middle School Assistant Principal Brandon Bjerknis, law enforcement alleges that he created aliases on social media to solicit illicit photos from his victims. Reporter Mel Meyer talked to area experts about how parents can talk to their children about the hidden dangers on their smartphones. It's easier than ever to send and receive illicit texts, photos and videos through apps. Apps change so quickly that there's not really an app that's in all the time. Which is why parents need to know of the different types of apps, like anonymous ones, which use their location.  Some children might be lured into sending sexual photos over the app because they believe no one else will know who they are. But there are ways that people can figure it out, which puts them in danger. It's a lot easier to give out any information when you think that you're anonymous. Another type of app are the temporary ones. Let's take Snapchat for example. I open up the app, I take a photo, set the timer and send it off. Yes, you put the timer on for that Snapchat, but someone else can have Snap save and save that snap. Beyond having someone save them forever, in cases where naked photos or videos are being sent around by classmates, there can be some serious consequences, even for minors. You can be charged with production, dissemination, possession, all of those from pictures. Which is why parents should be proactive. There are some warning signs that your child may be involved in this type of behavior or that they're being abused. Change in appetite, change in school performance, peer groups, behaviors that are becoming more aggressive. The advocates at support within reach say the best way to open the door to conversation is letting the child know that you believe them. Be mindful that they might really love this person that also really hurt them and they're going to be confused. But tell them thank you that they trusted you enough to tell them. In Bemidji, I'm Mel Meyer, Lakeland News. Both the Bemidji Police Department and support within reach have additional resources for parents and children. More information can be found on our website at lptv.org slash news. If you've enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News, please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to Lakeland Public Television.


Hi everyone, Sean with jaspyscasebrakes.com here doing a team random for 2020-2021 certified pick your team number one where we have nine customers and nine teams. We're gonna randomize the customer list and pair it next to or copy and paste it right next to this list here and whatever team you land next to is the team you get. Everyone's guaranteed a team so only nine customers in the break and there you go and that break pick your team number one is coming up next so like I said only randomizing the list of customer names whatever team you match up with is the team you get. So here is our list of customers from Mike Grosinski with the first spot purchased down to David Boros and last spot Mojo. Dice roll randomize the list five and one six times. Good luck. Six in final time from Adam Rosenstein down to Rick Thomas. You can see six times on the randomizer six times on the dice. There you go. Let's make this large enough for everybody to see. So Adam Rosenstein with the Knicks, David Boros, last spot Mojo with the Pistons, David Baker with the Mavs, Robert Runkel with the Nets, Shannon Rex with the 76ers, Taylor Dwyer with the Wizards, Mike Grosinski with the Cavs and the Blazers, and Rick Thomas with the Raptors. There you go guys. That was the team random randomizer for certified pick your team number one 2020-2021 certified. There you go. The break itself, pick your team number one certified coming up next. I'm Sean, jaspyscasebrakes.com. Thanks for hanging out. See you next time.


Okay, so this one's a lat hang with the balloon. So, Cody's gonna set up the balloon in his mouth. He's gonna grab the bar just like that. He's gonna bring his feet up a little bit. So this takes the slack out of the quads so that he can relax his back. He turns his hips underneath him, which he's already done, okay? And then what he does is he breathes in through his nose, out through his mouth. Get all the air out. He's basically ripping his pecs and his lats. That's a joke. There we go. Exhale, hold that. Find your heels in the ground. Breathe in. Good job. Exhale all the way. So when he breathes in, I'm looking for air to come into his back because that means he's got a good rib cage position and he's getting it. That breath was even better than the last one. Pause, let's do one more inhale, Cody. All right, relax. That's just another way to inhibit the lats. It inhibits the quads and it positions his back.


So this is now the fifth level of the defense in-depth concept applicable in operation, that is emergency preparedness. So plant operators and public authorities should be prepared to face emergency situations that could imply counter-measures such as home confinement or neighborhood evacuation. This organization includes a crisis team at the local level, that is at the plant level and at national levels. And there are four types of control center involved in this organization, a level center of action, which is mainly on the plant, a level of expertise, a level of decision, and a level of communication. These four elements of the organizations are organized here in the four circles. And you can see here the utility level, in that case this is the French organization. And the public authority with the local level and the national level, mainly the regulators and also public authority. So at each level there are the various center, communicate between them along these circles. This is the action level on the plant, basically the control room and the person in charge of taking care of the workers not affected by the accident. Then there is the decision line, which involves people first of all at the plant, the plant director and at the national level the CEO. But also the representative of the regulator on site. And of course here the level of the ASN, the authority on the nuclear, the national regulator. In order to be able to manage and to make some prediction of the potential evolution of the accident, there is another circle of experts, first at the plant level, but also at the national level. And also for the authorities. Last but not least, the communication between the operator at the local and national level and the authority. So all these various centers communicate between them and between the different level in order to be able to take the best decision and to be as clear as possible on the consequences of the accidents and to inform the public on what's going on and what could be the future evolution of the situation. So this organization involves about 100 people. They are on cold 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. These emergency plans and all the organization are regularly exercised at the local and national level. And sometimes even with some public participation and also in some cases with neighboring countries because you may have some nuclear plants close to a border and the neighbor country could be involved and has to take decision and potential measure. So this organization was upgraded after Fukushima on the operator level to allow the deployment of what we call a quick action tax force within 24 hours able to bring on site additional equipment such as power sources, water capacity and also to take over control of the plant because if several units are affected on the plant there will be the need for additional operators to come in to be able to operate the plant and to try to protect in a safe condition.


Are you ready to join the fight against single-use plastic? The Student Center is the largest generator of waste on campus. So here are some tips and tricks to reduce your waste. Bro, bro, what are you doing? I'm trying to throw them away. You can actually recycle them just by placing them here. Oh, okay. You don't need plastic or green. Would you like a bag? No, thank you. I have my own bag. Why pay for water when you can just get it for free? Thank you for being part of the A.S. Sustainability Movement. Don't forget to follow our Instagram. Don't forget the website. And check out our website.


And here we go, we are, here we are, we're live, live, live with the one and only, Alan O'Reilly. The man who is infamous in the metal voice history is being our very first interview of all time. We had the pleasure of interviewing Biff on numerous occasions and here he is today. With a new album launch, Inspiration. Wait a second, a plug on the old album, look at this. Beautiful, if you wanna pick this up, I love it. Three CD set, there you go, live. A quick little plug there, all right.  We're all over it like a rush. Inspirations, March 19th, 2021 on Silver Lining Music. 11 tracks that contain some of the most superb classic rock songs that influence Biff Beiford and the rest of the band, Alan. Yeah, just some really surprised, I mean Sax in the right Biff, you've always done a few covers throughout the years, like Ride Like The Wind. Not many, only three, four maybe. And now you've got a whole album's worth and some surprises, that's my concern, yeah. So tell us about it. Life's full of surprises. There's no point being too predictable where they wanted a few surprises, you know. Tell us about, how did you make the song selection? Like the band decision, one person, how was the song selection? No, no, no, it was, I asked the band to pick two songs. And we made a list of songs that people picked, some of them were really weird, so we didn't bother. But yeah, I think I picked about five of the songs, but we had more songs on the list than were recorded. But so I waited until we actually were playing them live and see what they sounded like, because some songs don't transpose. And yeah, so that's what we did really. I wanted a song from Sabbath Purple and Zeppelin. And we didn't really go with the easy ones on Sabbath or Zeppelin or Purple. I mean, the Black Sabbath ones are not choice, but I didn't really know what to do with Sabbath. So I went with the Crow's song, Evil Woman. Yeah, that's not an obvious choice there. And then you got some Beatles influence, Paperback Writer and the Stones. So going back to the 60s with Hendrix as well. Yeah, well, I mean, you've got to have a, I was born in the 50s, so the 60s was a big time for us growing up in the music, being surrounded by that type of music world. I mean, there's a lot of other bands that we could have done. But I wanted the big three in there. And the thing with the Beatles, and I saw the Beatles when they played on TV the very first time, in 1963. So I was like 12, 13 years old. So seeing a band on TV in my living room was a big first for me. So it did influence me a lot musically. And then obviously the Stones came a little later. But all that sort of, all that thing that was happening in the 60s was very sort of, we could have done, I can Tina Turner or something like that, but you know, I thought the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, and particularly Hendrix were very sort of, you know, they're very quite, I mean, Hendrix and the Stones are quite rocky. So I think it influences definitely. I got a Def Leppard album here that's yay. And they try to stay as close as possible to the originals. What's your take on the inspirations? Is it you wanted to saxonize it or you wanted to kind of keep it the spirit true to the originals? Well, some things, some things we sort of changed a bit. Pepeback Riser, obviously. You know, see my friends, the Kinks. But other things, I thought it would be a bit of a travesty to start messing with them too much. So I wanted to keep them fairly, fairly simple to the original, but with a heavier, you know, we're able to give it heavier sounds now because obviously it's, you know, it's 50 years, 40 years further on, 60 years in some of the cases. But yeah, so, you know, give it an heavier angle. And obviously my voice is not, you know, it's completely sort of different to their voices. So I think my voice gives it a different angle anyway. So yeah, keep it fairly straightforward for most of the song, but just give it a powerful performance. For instance, Speed King, we played it faster than Purple did. Just because we, you know, we can.  And then, it's got Speed 6, Speed King. So I thought, you know, it's more like Motorcycle Man or one of those early saxon songs were definitely influenced by Highway Star and Speed King. I mean, people wanted us to do Highway Star where I said, no, it's been done too many times. I want to do Speed King. It's more my influence that singing was. Well, and another one, one of my favorite groups of all times, then Lizzie, you know, are there vast collections? You decided to go way back to their early days in The Rocker, one of my favorite songs from that. Yeah, again, I'll sort of one, I mean, I remember, you know, seeing that Lizzie back in the day was doing whiskey in the jar with Eric Bell. And, you know, I loved, I mean, a new pill quite well and some of the other guys in the band. And I think The Rocker for me, you know, because The Rocker for me is just like great chorus. Because that more rocker as opposed to a mod, right?  So that's the sort of gist behind the song. Lyrically, it's a bit wacky these days, but I know exactly where it's, I know exactly where it's coming from, because I used to be a rocker, so it appeals to me, you know. The machismo of the time. ACDC problem trial, then, you know, I guess it's, you know, it's, it's one of those classics, those deep, I don't know if we'd call it a deep track, but yeah, it's not one of their popular ones, but one of their popular ones. They don't play, well, they don't play it very often, problem child, I think, I think they played it, I think they played it on the show where, you know, Robbo wasn't on, they're going from Rose Scout was on there, saying, I think they played problem child then, but I took, back in the 70s, must have been on the very early tour, must have been Dirty D's done, Dirt Sheep tour, I'd heard that album and I bought that album, and I took the band to see them at Sheffield University in a little bar, about 100 people in there, and I took them to see ACDC, and they played that song, and I thought that's a cool connection, because every one of the songs has a connection, you know, that we put on the album, and that's the connection with problem child, I took the band to the ACDC, and that's the song that I really liked. That's pretty cool, I mean, I guess this album is an album of bridging the gap, right, between the new album and, you know, the whole COVID-19 thing, right? Is that, was that the whole goal? Let's bridge that gap between the new studio album and sort of the pandemic, was that, is that the goal or?  So, yeah, I mean, I mean, if people like it, we'll probably do another one next year, it's very, and it's good fun to do because there's no pressure, you know, somebody's already written the song, so we don't have to change, I don't have to write any lyrics or anything, so it's all about performance, really, you know, making the song sound great, like they did originally, but not trying to compete with the original version, you know, just doing our version.  Like, yeah, most of the drums and guitars are done, some of the vocals are done, but the thing is I can't do the vocals, you know, I have to do the vocals all at once, so the vocals, I've already done, we'll probably trash them, and I'll start again. So I think probably Christmas, I'll be starting to do a fourth blues again on it. I mean, I might be writing, doing an album with my son, the next album I'm recording, but again, we'll be doing that pretty quick, you know, me and my son, Sebastian, written some songs together, so we might do an album, you know, a 7th, because our videos on YouTube are pretty popular, so I think people might like to hear it, you know. Is it going to be acoustic? Is that what you're looking for, an acoustic sound, you and your son? Oh, now it'll be full on rock. Oh, okay. Oh, now, full on band. Okay, all right, it's not, okay, great. Okay, that's cool, it's a nice project. But, I mean, you haven't stopped, right? You had your solo album this year, School of Hard Knocks, now we've got the covers album, we've got one with your son, an eventual Saxon album, but man, when do you get the time, you're busier than ever?  So, yeah, you've got to, you know, keep yourself fit and active, really, and music. If you can't play live, then go in the studio, that's the, you know, I mean, there's, I think there's a lot of music being written now in this period, by, you know, established bands and by new bands, you know. I wish somebody'd write a Christmas song, I'm sick of hearing all those same Christmas songs over and over and over again. Well, a lot of bands do, a lot of bands do, a lot of metal bands, I don't tire of them, if you ask me, I'm just, I don't know. Yes. Well, how far has he done, he's done, what, two or three, so he's maybe due for a third, so. Yeah, maybe, yeah, maybe. How many times can you reinvent Santa Claus, that's what I'm trying, I don't know, I just, I don't know. Unfortunately, a good Christmas song has to be very catchy and poppy, otherwise it doesn't send it. I mean, my favorite is the slave, I love the slave song. Yeah, all right, came in and wants to know, do you have any particular favorite track off the inspiration sound? Like, if there's one track that you really enjoy doing, which one was it? I like doing, funnily enough, I like doing the immigrant song because I didn't think there'd be any way I could sing that. So, yeah, it was my choice, I mean, we had a lot of different suggestions, but I thought, let's go for the most difficult one. Yeah, you did hold back on that one, yeah. Because it's good fun, and yeah, I mean, we had a backup song in case I couldn't sing it, but yeah, I like doing the immigrant song. It's a style, I've never really been a, you know, I've never really been a, I've never really studied Robert Plant's style. You know, it's not in my sort of style. It's more of a, well, it's more like Janice Joplin type thing, very, very bluesy. And, you know, it bends a lot of notes in there now, but, you know, I've not really studied his style, if you know what I'm saying. So it was very new for me to sing that. So yeah, I got fun with that. I mean, I did all the vocals with, my son was in the studio with me, so I did all the vocals with him. So, you know, it was quite hard.  You know, you can do it better than that, you know. I'm like, okay, okay. Yeah, exactly.  This is Robert Plant we're talking about here.  And then the nepotism continues because your daughter did the video, right? For Paint It Black. Yeah, my daughter does a lot of stuff for my son, and for us. I mean, she was there at the session, you know, so they'll be making an old video coming out with the album, I think. So there's a lot of, we've got a lot of footage of us, you know, climbing around in there and doing little interviews and things. So that should be interesting when that comes out. What about where you recorded it? Okay, it's a spooky house with full of paintings. Is that what it was? It was the Brockfield Hall. Was that what it was? Brockfield, yeah. Brockfield Hall. Yeah, I just wanted to add this mad idea. Yeah, because when we were younger, we used to see all these pictures in the, you know, in the magazines and in the newspapers about, you know, deep purple, renting a chateau down in Montreux that burnt down things. And the Zeppelin recording in a big house, you know, and different people, Rush used to record. So I thought, well, you know, let's try and do it. And a friend of mine, his family had this huge stately home that's been renovated and they took all the furniture out and there was like a two week break before the builders went in. So they let us go in there and record in there. And it was fantastic, actually. It was really great. Then the sounds were great.  So it's a big, a big drum sound, you know. So yeah. I think that's really cool. So there's no ghost or anything like it. Just painting. Well, we didn't see him. Yeah, I think a few paintings fell off the wall. But I think that was probably due to the volume rather than the ghost. Yeah, I mean, we were playing in the library and he was playing in the hallway and we had headphones connected to each other, a microphone. So yeah, it was really good fun. I mean, I think it's probably unique. I don't think we'll ever be able to do that again. Did you film? Because he just like, you know. I guess paint and black, right? That was the filming of it, right? Yeah, I mean, yeah, well, the planets all came together at the right time. So we were able to do it, you know what I mean? Yeah, Stephanie, Steph, my daughter filmed everything. So, you know, there's everything in there, loading the gear in, loading the gear out, talking about this, talking about that, different interviews about why we show certain tracks and things, because every track really has a story, you know? What about like a live stream, like a Saxon live stream, has the band looked into that? It's a very popular thing now because of a pandemic? Yeah, people keep asking us to do it. Whether we will or not, I don't know. I don't know. The thing is, I like audiences, you know? I like to be live, if you know what I mean. So, yeah, we might do it.  But I don't think a full production, you know, running around on stage, you know, in front of like cameras with nobody in the room, that really doesn't appeal to me. But you know, never say never. Yeah, yeah, you never know, Alan. And don't forget, a lot of people, you know, are holding tickets for our big production shows. This year. So, you know, I think if we did something with the production online, people would think, well, you know, I might as well throw my ticket away now then. You know, we've already seen it. So, yeah, I mean, what's great news for me is ever since the call to arms, that was the test, the test album for the North American market. And we've had the pleasure of seeing you every, every album since almost. So I'm really glad that the finally, North America has woken up to the Saxon experience. So, yeah, I mean, you know, a lot of people, a lot of people knew about Saxon. A lot of people saw Saxon back in the day. But I think you have to be there really, you know, getting people's faces and get the reviews and the promotion going. So, yeah, I mean, we will be coming back. I think we're doing a cruise, actually. At some point, maybe next year, I don't know, see how the COVID thing goes. But usually, usually when we do a cruise, you know, one of the big rock cruisers, we usually do a tour at the same time because it's because we're already there basically. So that might work out. I think maybe they're looking at just touring America. I don't know, maybe early next year, I think. So we'll have to see.  You know, see what happens with that. Are you guys going to get the vaccinations?  Yeah, I think I might be getting mine in January because, you know, I'm sort of obviously with my heart thing and everything. That's what I mean, yeah. It's a bit higher. But everybody above, everybody eight is already getting it there. I think they've already done about a quarter of a million people already in England and Scotland and Wales. So, yeah, so they're on it now. They're just waiting for this cheaper vaccine to come out. So they can function at the masses like me, you know, the working class. We get the working class vaccine on the cost of 50p, you know, on the dollar shop. Alan? No, I just hope your voice and the infection clears up and you'll be back at it soon enough. So. Yeah, it's not really a voice changing infection. It's more of a gland than, you know, what are my glands? So I was an antibiotic, so it should be all right. It just flared up today. It's probably because I knew you guys were coming on. Yes. I'm excited. I didn't know it was your reaction. Oh, I gotta talk. I have to talk to Canadians. My gland started swelling. Yeah, exactly, yeah. You can look at Canadians, man. My gland started swelling. Bloody colonists. Straight away, exactly. Any thoughts on that? I hope you think you are. I know this is a big question that all the rock stars are asked. Thoughts on Eddie Van Halen, you know, the passing, you were such a... Oh, as terrible as it was, really. You know, he went through a lot of... You know, he went through this once and then we thought he was cured and then he came back again. When I saw Van Halen a few times, I saw them... First time I saw them was at the Rainbow. They must have been 1978. 1979, when the first album. I think they just toured with Sabbath and then they came back and did a one-off show at the Rainbow in London. I saw that. And then I saw them again on the Tora Tora tour in Manchester.  They were total... Total good time. Good time. Good time. Rock, metal. Definitely. You couldn't really go and see Van Halen and not like them, actually. It's true. It's true. Do you know what I mean? There was something there for everybody, really. Did you consider a Van Halen song for the inspirations? We did consider a Van Halen song. I wanted to do Running With The Devil. I love that. You know, you've got to be careful, really. But I don't know if... I suppose they did... I suppose they did influence the guitarists, in a way, because, you know, that style, one of the people, so Eddie playing in that style, you know, Paul and particularly Paul, you know, started hammering things, you know, hammering the fingerboard. So I suppose it might be... We are signed up to do another album, actually. So they do have an option. So that might be... I mean, we could really do a massively heavy version of Running With The Devil. Got down, got, be great. Make it more like a Sabbath version of Running With The Devil. You know, I've been trying to get, like, the Zoom link on the chat, and it just... People are saying, well, where's the link? And she's not going in there. It's not... Oh, maybe now it's working? I don't know, but it's just something... Technology. I just was trying something different. I thought I was bringing a few fans on to talk to you, but, you know, it is what it is, right? I know there's... Well, listen, guys, I'm very sorry, but with these two guys, what do you expect, you know what I mean? I mean... Because... They're not technically minded, man. They're just rock fans. We're just, you know... We're just... Can't you post the links in the chat I get? Hey, I did a great apology for you there, man, you should have gone with it. Yeah, yeah. Well, you're hit the nail on the head. What more is there to say? What other Saxon news is there in the camp? OK, so we have the new album, Inspirations, coming out in March. You have the studio album going to come out, I guess, in 2022, I guess. Is that... I don't know. They're talking about 2021, but it could come out. I mean, I don't know yet. The thing is, the whole music industry, in fact, the whole entertainment industry is like sort of, you know, gone and forgotten as far as the governments are concerned. But they don't even mention anything. I mean, they might mention ballet or the theatre, but nobody mentions anything about anything, you know? So we're all waiting to see if we have... Big shows lined up in May. They've not been rescheduled yet. So let's keep our fingers crossed. But, you know, if the vaccine starts to work, and people are able to mix together, then, you know, the album will come out. It's ready to go, you know? Yeah. Alan, do you have any... But we don't like putting albums out. We don't want to put the album out and not tour, because we like to tour on the albums. That's the thing. And that's what we've come to expect. So, yeah, hopefully we can get through this and then witness Saxon Live. It's one of the greatest shows I've ever seen. So just the power that comes off the stage, it's amazing. Thank you very much. Yeah, we do work hard at that, you know? How are the rest of the guys doing? How's Nigel? Good? Oh, there we go. Yeah, they're doing good. Okay, so we have Khalil. Okay, I think I got the link going here. We're going to bring him on here. Let's see what happens. Ready for this? Ready for this, Biff? I'm ready. I'm ready. I'm a little square in the corner breaking. And there's the man. There he is. Hello. Hey, you all right, mate? It's nice to speak to you, though. Yeah, what's going on? What's your question, then? I just wanted to say that would you ever consider covering any maiden stuff or priests or any bands that are like your contemporaries, you know? Well, yeah, the problem is, if you're doing an album like Inspirations and Influencers, I mean, maiden started the same time as we did.  So I don't think really maiden influencers or inspired us. But I think Judas Priest, you maybe get away with that because I used to go to see Judas Priest in the 70s. You know, my favorite Judas Priest album is Stain Class. So, you know, that's beyond the realms of death, you know, that type of stuff. I love that early priest. So that might be possible on the next album.  But, you know, the thing is with priests, they're very heavy. I don't know if we could get any heavier than them.  I would just say that the last time I saw Saks, I thought you were heavier than priests. I couldn't believe it. Yeah, well, we work on it, you know, we just, you know, the boys of a lot of it comes from the guys on stage, you know, that we don't have any, we don't use any samples or any sort of, you know, anything running on behind us. So everything here is absolute massive volume.  I mean, I wear in here headphones on stage, you know, for the volume. If I take them out, if I take them out while we're playing, they're about 10 times louder than they are in my headphones. So, you know, they just love it to Nigel's an animal. So when we all get together, I think, I think we're sacks and I don't think there's any sort of pacing going on. I don't think we hold back. It's like full on, it's full on all the time. Why we don't do, this is why we don't really do many ballads because, you know, we're not really a ballad band. We're more of a full on metal band, really.  So, you know, we can't, we can't get away from it. It's just our style. I think you made Kimman's day today. I just, I think it's so cool. That's what's so great about the internet. You know what I mean? It's like growing up in Western here in Saxon songs all over the place. And then to be able to have a conversation with someone that you've seen on stage is just, it's great. But when did you see his live? I see, I've seen you a couple of times in Glasgow. I've seen you say in Donington. I always tell everyone, I didn't grow up with Saxon. You know what I mean? I discovered Saxon quite later on. And I've always like, I've known, known you for that. Like the hits. But I think what's more impressive is how you're able to stay so fresh and current. And you've really, I think it's so impressive the force that you use to have and the new material is unbelievable. Stuff like Night of the Wolf and Queen of Hearts and stuff like that is a sacrifice. It's just, it's brilliant. Like good on use for being able to kind of adapt and modify what you're doing. It's great. Yeah, that's great. Thank you very much. Not only that, like the classics are classic for a reason, but the fact you're able to stay really relevant is what it's all about. It really is, it's brilliant. I can't replace that enough. I think to summarize, you guys in Saxon have gone through multiple generations. You know, you had my generation, me and Alan's, right? And then K-man's generation. So I think the music speaks for itself as it transcends all generations. Yep. I think it's pretty impressive. Very impressive. Yeah, I think we worked hard at that over the last 10 years. And we have brought a lot of younger newer fans to the band. And a lot of these guys go backwards. If somebody got into the band in, say, 2000 or 1999, they tend to go backwards then back to the 80s, which is great, it's a great thing for them because they obviously they got into Saxon, say on sacrifice or call to arms. And there's so much legacy before that. And most of it's great. There's a couple of bombers in there, but you know, what can you say? For me, what it is, it's the production of the really early stuff like Motorcycle Man and Frozen Rainbow and stuff, like the songs themselves are great songs, but the time has moved on so much that they sit, they sound of the era, you know what I mean? They sound of the time. Well, I mean, they're done on a 24 track, totally live basically, you know, we back in those days, we used to just play the song live and we used to play and play and play until we got a great take. So we'd have like, you know, these big two inch tape, we'd have about 40 of them on the floor in the studio.  These tapes were about two tons of magnetic tape on the studio and we had to pick the best take, you know, because you couldn't go in and sort of replace anything. So you had to get the best take and then I'd do the vocals and a couple of guitar over jobs and that was it, out the door, finished, bye, see you later, next tour, you know, so. How do you get that? But what you do get with the other things is the music. It's sort of, you know, night, our first album, you know. What was always more important back then, Biff, was it getting the technical, the notes correct, or was it the feel of the song that you went with? Oh, we just got for a great take.  So there's a lot of pressure. A lot of pressure on, you know, the guys in the band get it right, but the more you do it, the better you get, but there's a point when you go over, gain it right, where it just sounds too sort of, you know, stagnant because you're bored with the song by then. So you have to capture the moment when you're actually, everybody's on 100% sort of efficiency playing the song and that's the one you take, you know, because after that, you can get really bad.  So you have to try and capture that moment really quickly.   I mean, I don't know. We can go on for a bit longer. Okay, because I came in, I'm going to let you go. All right? I know what it is. Thank you for making your debut on the Metal Voice. Hi, how you doing, man? How can you, yeah, I'm the Humphrey. Hi. I'm going to, hold on, there we go. I got to remove him, sorry. All right, so solid ball of rock. Why, and this is, I got like all these tons of questions coming in. Why don't you play solid ball of rock live? We do, we do play solid ball of rock live. In fact, we're playing it on this 40th anniversary tour that started and then stopped. We're playing solid ball of rock. So we do play solid ball of rock. Maybe is it from America? Well, which country are they from? Does, okay, I'm going to ask you right now, where are you from? Roberto Soto. I have a question for Biff. Why do you guys barely play solid ball of rock? Well, we got a question for you, Roberto. Where are you from? What country are you from? And as we wait for his answer, thank you, Biff. You rule. Thank you for doing this. I'm just reading the other stuff. Witchcross released acts of the grind. I don't know what that does. Biff have a favorite Saxon record and that's from Cecil. So many to choose from. So that's a favorite Saxon record. I mean, it's difficult to choose really. You know, it changes.  Because you get memories from making those albums. You have great memories. I mean, one of my favorites for a long time was Metalhead. Oh yeah, great album. Because we sort of moved, we moved to a more darker sort of songwriting stage. You know, it's the Saxon dark stage, that one. You know, it's our dark period. It's like Van Gogh, you know. So we have a dark period. You know, I like that because it's, you know, a lot of sort of guys that were into the heavy have still got into it with that album actually. Yeah, I agree. He's from Costa Rica, by the way, Costa Rica. He's from Costa Rica. Well, yeah, we've never played Costa Rica. So next, when we do come, we'll play a song in Baltimore for you. Okay, let's see what else. I'm just going through all these questions that I've ignored.  It's always fresh material and it sounds as relevant today. And plus you got all the classics to fall back on. So it's just a great situation to be in, I would think. Yeah, well, also as well, you know, the way we play those songs have moved on as well. So the wheels of steel and plus things like that, they're all much heavier now, you know, because of the way we play and the voice of the equipment we use, everything's much heavier now. So, you know, those songs sound different to the way we play them in the ages. Chris says, how is the song writing different from your solo work then with Saxon? So I guess the question would be, how do you write differently between your solo album and a Saxon album? I mean, what's that? I guess, what's the difference? Well, I think with the solo album, because I'm singing everything with me or my lyrics very quickly, it's all about me, basically. And a lot of the songs are personal songs about my life. Not all of them, because they did a couple of songs with Fred from Opeth, but most of them are about me and my life. And so I think if you're gonna do things like that in a Saxon album, I don't think it's really fair because, you know, you're singing about yourself, what about the other guys? So yeah, I think, and I'm able to do a material that's probably considered too soft for Saxon, you know? I mean, I did- That's a great album, by the way, your solo album. Yeah, I love the album, it's very diverse and it actually just sums me up because that's how I am. I like all different styles of music, you know? I'm very sort of, you know, I'm not stuck in one pigeon hole.  And I think that comes through on the solo album and that's what I wanted it to be. You know, there's a folk song on there, Scarborough Fair.  You know, so there's a lot of different styles in there. I probably wouldn't write those lyrics on a Saxon song. Yeah, yeah. And again, like, you know, you're talking about all different types of music. On this Inspirations album, you also have Toto Hold the Line. There's one that makes the best guitar. Toto Hold the Line. Well, there's two reasons we put that in. One, we've made it heavier, obviously. And Doug really loves Steve Lukitha.  Steve Lukitha sort of really inspired and influenced Doug's guitar playing. And also, the way that he plays that riff, we should have ripped that off. And we used the same style and bands played on. Okay, there you go. And the bands played on riff and Hold the Line riff, although they're not the same musically, stylistically, they're very similar. And we did that.  He went, well, I'm very pleased to have given it to you. So it was very, because they didn't ask for any money, so that was fine. That's always a good thing, yeah. I got from, I'm going to leave everybody off with this one here. No No says, no Saxon CD in Greece. I guess that would be more of a label thing than anything. It's not really a Biff question. That's more of a- Oh, for the inspiration, you mean? Yeah, I think so. Well, no, he's saying, yeah, that's what he's saying. No Saxon CD in Greece, but I actually have a question for you. What's with the Christmas card? Are you still doing that? Like a Christmas card? The cut-off. No, it's all finished now. Okay. So yeah, you can only get a Christmas card if you ordered the Special Vinyl in that, I think it was 38 hours, I think, of the original list. The album's not out for March anyway, so there wouldn't be any CDs of the album in Greece yet. Oh, yeah. So I'm sure in March. Yeah, you can pre-order it. Maybe it's saying there's no pre-order in Greece. Maybe. Okay, I'll tell you what, I'll ask the record company. As soon as we're off air, I'll give them some grace. Well, he's saying no all CDs. No all CDs. I guess he's meaning maybe there's no CDs in general. Okay, okay, well, I'll definitely look into that then. We'll get your people on that. I'm sure, and we do play lots of shows in Greece, quite big shows. So there must be some CDs from somewhere, but I'll talk the record company about that. All right, that's perfect on that note. Yes. March 19th, 2021, Silver Lining Music. You can pre-order now. You can pre-order inspirations now. Right, Ben? Yeah, you can. And you just go. You can pre-order the vinyl, the cymbal, you know, the single you can buy, obviously, the painted black, you can pre-order the album. You can get it on CD, coming out on cassette as well, special limited edition that I'm assigned. So yeah, I mean, we did have some test pressings, but they went in like two hours of test pressing. So yeah, it's all coming out in March. So there'll be another single, I think, coming out after Christmas. So yeah, we did a mountain song. Yeah, yeah. Mountain, everly influenced. I used to be a big fan of, because I was a bass player back in the day. So, Felix Papallari for me was a great bass player and singer. So we did a mountain song. And I think that's gonna be the best side of the next single. Corky Lange, a fellow Canadian, drawn drums for Mountain, right? Definitely, a fantastic drummer. And actually that, going back to Nonos, he's saying he can't get any CDs in Greece. And I don't mean to make fun. I'm just kidding around. And that's what he's saying. He's just saying in general, he can't find CDs of Saxon in Greece. I guess it depends where he lives too, right? You don't know. I'll look into it. It could well be that, you know, I don't know. I mean, I'd have to have a list of CDs that he can't get. I mean, I don't know if he's meaning all CDs for every band or just those, or, you know, or just he can't get the newest stuff. I don't know. Biff, it's been a pleasure. Always a pleasure. Yes, we wish you a speedy recovery and they can't wait to get this behind us so we can witness the Saxon experience live and listen to the album when it comes out. Yeah, yeah. Everybody pick one. Yeah, sounds great. I listen to it all the time in the car. In fact, I'm already fed up with it. I want to be the next one. Biff, it's a pleasure. We'll see you on tour. Yeah, brilliant. See you all there. Lovely. It's vaccinated, man.  Oh, it's your arm. Get it in your arm. Come on. All right. Have a nice day. Thank you.


Twice the night before Christmas, when all through the house, not a creature was sleeping, not even a mouse. The cell phones were out, as everyone was there, in hopes that a price surge was on its way near. The adults were not nestled, all snuck in their beds, just visions of lambos dancing their heads. And mama in her kerchief and eye in my cap, our unsettled brains keep begging to nap. When out of the lawn there arose such a clatter, no one sprang from bed, since it just didn't matter. The window was closed, along with the shatter. About peer-to-peer cash, I heard my mutter. The moon on the breast of the new fallen snow, China is awake, and the market will grow. When, what, to my wondering eyes should appear, a flickering down, a great flood of fear. The goddamn formal, so lively and quick, I knew in a moment I must make a pick. More rapid than eagles the price it became, that whistle and shouted and called them by name. Now Dash, now Latcoin, now Riklin, iota, on Cardano, on Eos, on on Ethereum and Bitcoin, to the top of the porch, to the top of the wall. Now moon away, moon away, moon away all. As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly, when they meet with a obstacle, mount to the sky. So up to the moon the prices they flew, with thongel and fog, but with hobblers too. And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof, nothing. I heard nothing on the roof. I moved not my head, not turned yet around, as the price of Bitcoin jumped with a leap and a bound. The Santa's dude dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot, and his clothes were all tarnished.  My father did cry, Santa Claus frowned, but didn't, as why? My mother screamed too, but not with poor words. Bitcoin's pride had surged, and boy did it surge. My father turned and couldn't help but just stare. Santa waited, looked to me for some care, but I noticed Nia beginning to fight, and barely heard Santa simply saying goodnight. Happy holidays and if you want to give us a gift, subscribe to our channel and don't forget to ring our Christmas bell.


Hi, this is Helena Hart from commitmentconnection.com and in this video I wanted to answer a question I received from a woman in our community who wanted to know some signs that a man is Interested in her but he's too afraid to pursue her or make the first move or ask her out for whatever reason Or may even want her to be the one to do those things. This is actually a pretty common situation these days Believe it or not. So hopefully this will be really helpful for you. Maybe you've experienced this I know I definitely have but before I get started if you're ready to attract the man you want into a committed Relationship or you're with a man and you want to strengthen the connection and bring him closer than ever Be sure to click the button to subscribe to our YouTube channel to stay up to date on all of our latest videos So the first sign that a man is interested But he's too afraid to make the first move or maybe he wants you to be the one to Move things forward or ask him out for the first time is that he always Finds reasons to be around you and to talk to you But he doesn't pursue you for a relationship for whatever reason he just stops short of asking you out There could be many reasons for this and I've just been hearing this from so many women Lately so maybe you're in this situation there's things you can do to sort of encourage him to Step up and make the first move without having to like chase him and pursue him for a committed Relationship because in my experience when you chase a guy or when you're the one trying to move things forward That will push a man away if he's a masculine energy man so I'm all about encouraging men and being an invitation for them to step into their masculine energy and Make a move or ask you out without you having to jump into your masculine energy and do those things yourself So one way to do that is to sort of steer the conversation Towards you know dating or love or something like that. So let's say you work together for example You know try talking about some non-work related topics Like you know what you did over the weekend or what you're planning to do next weekend And of course you want to use feminine energy language when you're talking to him So be sure to talk about how things feel to you. That's very Attractive and magnetic especially if he's a masculine energy man So if you're friends like if you're just in the same circle of friends and you get the sense that he's interested Try steering the conversation away from just platonic topics and more towards Maybe what you're looking for in a man or dating or love or sex or something like that To sort of indicate to him that you see him as someone that you could possibly date So that's the first sign the second one is that he tells you how he feels about things But he doesn't ask you out or again. He stops short of making that first move So if a man shares things with you that he doesn't necessarily share with anyone else in his life or everyone else That's a great sign. It really indicates that he feels safe with you Which men absolutely need to feel in order to come close They need to feel that from a woman, you know for a potential relationship They have to feel safe opening up and they have to feel that you're just gonna accept him For who he is and what he's sharing. So that's fantastic if a man opens up to you I would just have all the acceptance in the world for him and just really let him know that you're that safe Space that you know he can come close to and you know reveal things about himself And of course you want to be doing that as well and see how he responds You know does he accept you does he like you for who you are or does he dismiss your feelings or you know Does he seem to be judgmental of you? You know, these are really important things to take a look at when you're you know Trying to figure out whether this man can be a good relationship partner So this the third sign is that he shares his feelings about you, but he stops short of confessing his love This is a pretty common situation these days. I hear from women all the time, you know, who are experiencing this So, you know this this could indicate that he's kind of waiting for the right time or the right setting in Order to ask you out and just like the second sign What you want to do is just you know rather than being the one to jump into your masculine energy and move things forward Or ask him why he hasn't asked you out yet, you know really being patient with him and Leaning back into your feminine energy and just you know creating a safe space for him to walk into And if he's the right man for you He's gonna want to step into that space and move things forward all on his own But timing is such an important factor when it comes to dating and the early stages of a relationship So he may just be waiting for the right time or the right setting because he doesn't want things to be awkward Or maybe he's in a period in his life where he's really focused on work or Something else is going on he may be moving or taking a trip soon And he wants to just wait for the right time. No, of course I never suggest just waiting around for a man You want to have a full complete life for yourself, you know every second you spend just waiting on a man in my Experience, you know his attraction for you can start to fade if he knows you're just gonna always be waiting around for him So there's sort of a fine line between being in your feminine energy and being an invitation and encouraging of him When he does open up to you that will hopefully give him the courage to open up more about how he actually feels about you So that's the third sign the fourth one is that he actually does tell you how he feels about you But then he leaves or he doesn't take the next step and ask you out You know if that's the case he might sense that you don't reciprocate his feelings And he had enough courage to go ahead and confess them to you But if he doesn't get the sense that you feel the same way Then he might retreat and back off, you know men are really sensitive to rejection Just like we are in a lot of ways, you know and if let's say your friends or your co-workers He he probably doesn't want to like sabotage things in that sense just like we would so if he actually does You know confess his feelings for you I would say then absolutely if you feel the same way you can let him know and you're just Responding to him by letting him know that you feel that way to Responding is a very feminine energy quality So you want to think of yourself as just constantly responding to a man and being encouraging of him Without again leaning forward and jumping into your masculine energy and trying to like push things along or move things forward because even if a man is Sort of afraid to make the first move if he's a masculine energy man You know if you're the one trying to chase him or pursue a committed relationship with him You will sense him start to pull away and back off It's just the natural energy exchange in dating and relationships So you want to again be in your feminine energy, but be warm and open and receptive to him And then if he's the right man for you that will hopefully encourage him to step up and Ask you out because he's not going to be afraid that you're going to shoot him down or reject him So I hope that was helpful for you. I'd love to hear your thoughts and Experiences with this feel free to type those into the comment section and I will see you in the next video Thanks for watching and if you'd like to discover exactly what to say and do to get the man and relationship You've always wanted click the button on the right side of this video to visit our website and I will talk to you soon