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Gary ‘Mani’ Mounfield’s neighbours speak out after star’s sudden death

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Gary “Mani” Mounsfield passed away at the age of 63 after a decades-long musical career, including playing for Stone Roses, was announced today.

After the music star’s sudden passing today, Gary “Mani” Mounfield’s neighbors have spoken out. The musician’s death at the age of 63 was revealed today.

The Stone Roses bass player was most well known for his roles in Primal Scream and Stone Roses in music. His neighbors have since spoken with him about the star and what he was like when he was not in the spotlight.

His wife passed away as well, but his sudden death occurred just two years later. According to reports, emergency services were called to Mani’s home in Heaton Moor, Stockport.

READ MORE: Gary ‘Mani’ Mounfield obituary – Stone Roses and Primal Scream icon dies aged 63READ MORE: Gary ‘Mani’ Mounfield seen at Ricky Hatton’s funeral in last public appearance

A neighbor told The MEN that she once said, “I only saw him occasionally, and I occasionally collected a parcel for him.” On this street, I don’t know anyone who had a good relationship with him. He stayed away from his family and himself.

When emergency services arrived, no patient was taken to the hospital, but on arrival, residents noticed an ambulance outside around 11 a.m.

I passed by the ambulance about 11 a.m., according to another resident who saw it on the street. I witnessed two ambulances outside. Because the entire staff was inside, I was unable to inquire what had happened.

I can’t recall when they left, but they were there for a while. I didn’t get to know or interact with him because he’s always been a quiet neighbor. Although we weren’t in the same social circles, I was aware that he lived quite close by.

Announcing the sad news of his death, Mani’s family shared a post on Facebook today which read: “IT IS WITH THE HEAVIEST OF HEARTS THAT I HAVE TO ANNOUNCE THE SAD PASSING OF MY BROTHER GARY MANI MOUNFIELD. RIP RKID.”

Ian Brown, Roses bandmate, posted the message “Remain in peace, Mani x.” on X. On the day of Mani’s announcement, Oasis frontman Liam, who is on a tour in South America, said: “In total shock and devastated. My hero, RKid, RIP. LG. “

Shaun Ryder, the frontman of Happy Mondays, wrote, “RIP Mani, my heartfelt condolences to his twin boys and all of his family.” A Manchester music legend and devoted Red, as Manchester United once said on “X.” The family of Gary “Mani” Mounfield receives our sincere condolences.

Mani had just announced his plans for a speaking tour of the UK starting in September 2026, which would feature recollections of pivotal career moments like the Stone Roses’ 1990 performance at Spike Island and their follow-up performance in 2011.

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Mani was born in Crumpsall, a suburb of Manchester, in November 1962, and graduated from Rusholme College when she was 16 years old. In Greater Manchester at the beginning of the 1980s, Mani and John Squire and Andy Couzens co-founded the band the Fireside Chaps.

The Stone Roses band changed their name and lineup several times before becoming The Stone Roses. Singer Brown, guitarist John Squire, and drummer Alan “Reni’ Wren” were then a part of The Stone Roses’ classic lineup.

North Carolina officials say US Border Patrol has ended Charlotte operation

Five days of immigration raids and protests have come to an end thanks to official North Carolina immigration officials’ signal that the city of Charlotte has recovered from its five-day crackdown.

Mayor of Charlotte Vi Lyles claimed on Thursday that the Democrat-led city’s border patrol appeared to have ended its crackdown.

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The U.S. Border Patrol’s operations in Charlotte appear to have ended. She wrote on social media, “I’m relieved for our community, the residents, businesses, and all those who were targeted and impacted by this intrusion.”

It is crucial that we come together as we move forward, not as separate groups divided by recent events but as a single Charlotte community.

Federal officials assured Sheriff Garry McFadden that “Operation Charlotte’s Web” had been completed and that no further operations would take place on Thursday, according to the Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office.

In Mecklenburg County, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) will continue to operate as they have always, according to a statement from the sheriff’s department.

According to federal law, “ICE has full authority to detain, apprehend, and take into custody any undocumented immigrant.”

The operation began on November 15 when US President Donald Trump made the announcement that Charlotte would receive “surging resources.”

By praising local officials for adopting “sanctuary” laws that let undocumented people “roam free on American streets,” it justified the upsurge.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced on Wednesday that it had made more than 250 arrests as of Tuesday night during an update.

During the operation, immigration efforts expanded to Raleigh, the state capital, and other nearby cities.

However, Charlotte, the state’s largest city and a hub for tech businesses, had received a lot of resistance from residents. 300 people call Charlotte home, compared to 911.

For instance, hundreds of protesters gathered outside Manolo’s Bakery to protest raids that temporarily shut its doors to customers and employees. Another protest occurred outside a Border Patrol headquarters where Border Patrol agents had gathered.

In show of support for the immigrant community, students from East Mecklenburg High School, Northwest School of the Arts, and other schools also staged a walkout.

Local media reported a drop in school attendance of nearly 15% on Monday, but it was not known how many of those absences were caused by protests, concerns about immigration enforcement practices, or seasonal trends like the flu.

Locals in the Charlotte area recorded instances of car windows being smashed and people being hit to the ground and left bloody as a result of the rise in immigration operations.

A new wave of Border Patrol operations is anticipated in another southern city, New Orleans, as Charlotte’s surge of federal immigration enforcement operations settles. The “Swamp Sweep” is how that operation is referred to.

In addition, more immigration enforcement operations have been conducted in other Democratic-controlled cities, raising questions about the methods being used and the respectability of the laws being upheld.

Los Angeles, Chicago, Memphis, and Washington, DC are among those cities.

Sony, Warner and Universal sign AI music licensing deals with startup Klay

The world’s biggest music labels have struck AI licensing deals with a little-known startup named Klay Vision, the companies have said, the latest in a series of deals that underlines how the technology is shaking up the music industry’s business model.

Warner Music Group, Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment, and their publishing arms, all signed separate agreements with Klay, according to an announcement posted on Warner’s website on Thursday.

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It comes a day after Warner inked two other deals involving artificial intelligence, with startups Udio and Stability AI.

There were few details released about the agreements or about Klay, which is based in Los Angeles, and what it does.

The deal terms will help Klay “further evolve music experiences for fans, leveraging the potential of AI, while fully respecting the rights of artists, songwriters, and rightsholders”, the announcement said. Klay has been working with the music industry on a licensing “framework for an AI-driven music experience” and has built a “large music model” trained only on licensed music.

AI-generated music has been flooding streaming services amid the rise of chatbot-like song generators that instantly spit out new tunes based on prompts typed by users without any musical knowledge. The synthetic music boom has also resulted in a wave of AI singers and bands that have climbed the charts after racking up millions of streams, even though they don’t exist in real life.

Warner, Universal and Sony had last year sued Suno and Udio, makers of two popular AI song generation tools, accusing them of exploiting the recorded works of artists without compensating them. But there are signs that the disputes are being resolved through negotiation.

Warner, which represents artists including Ed Sheeran and Dua Lipa, said Wednesday that it resolved its copyright infringement litigation against Udio. The two companies said they’re teaming up to develop Udio’s licensed AI music creation service set to launch in 2026 that will allow users to remix tunes by established artists.

They provided no financial details on their agreement, which includes Warner’s recording and publishing businesses, but it will create “new revenue streams for artists and songwriters, while ensuring their work remains protected”.

It’s similar to an agreement that Universal Music Group signed last month with Udio, which triggered a backlash because Udio stopped users from downloading the songs they created.

Udio said it will remain a “closed-system” as it prepares to launch the new service next year. If artists and songwriters choose to let their works be used, they’ll be credited and paid when users remix or cover their songs, or make new tunes with their voices and compositions, the companies said.

Warner announced this week that it was working with Stability AI to create “professional-grade tools” for musicians, songwriters, and producers.

I was kicked off school team, now girls can play football – Smith

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Former Arsenal and England forward Kelly Smith says it gives her “goosebumps” to see schoolgirls given the opportunity to play football she craved growing up.

The Football Association (FA) announced on Thursday that their target of 90% of schools in England offering girls equal access to football in PE lessons had been achieved three years ahead of schedule.

The figure was originally set for 2028 and forms part of the FA’s strategy to provide equal opportunities for women and girls to play football.

The Barclays Girls’ Football in Schools network, which began six years ago with 3,000 participating schools, now has 20,202 schools signed up.

The FA also said that 2.6m girls now have equal access to football in PE – a 31% increase since the 2020-21 season.

“I was kicked off a boys team for being the wrong sex,” Smith told the BBC.

“So it gives me goosebumps thinking about it because now so many girls have the opportunity to play football if they want. In PE, I never had that. I had to fight my way to try and play on a team.

The FA credited the Lionesses’ home success at Euro 2022 as key in “shaping government discussions and driving forward policy change”.

Sarina Wiegman’s winning side signed an open letter to then Conservative party leadership candidates Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak, asking for “every young girl” to be able to play football at school.

The FA says 90% of schools now offer girls equal access to football through PE lessons at Key Stages 2 (aged 7-11) and 3 (aged 11-14).

“This was never about girls becoming the next Lionesses, it was about normalising girls playing football, just like boys do. It’s about equality,” said former England and Arsenal striker Ian Wright, who is an ambassador for Barclays Football.

After winning the Euros at Wembley in 2022, England reached the Women’s World Cup final the following year, losing to Spain. But they then beat Spain to retain their European crown in July.

“No girl should ever face barriers to playing football in school,” said Stacey Mullock, the head of development at the FA.

“That belief drove us to set ambitious targets and push for a cultural shift where girls have the same access and opportunities as boys.”

However, the FA said there is “more work to be done” for Key Stage 4 (aged 14-16), where “many teenage girls stop participating in team sports due to barriers like confidence, body image, and negative perceptions”.

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MAFS UK’s Leisha breaks protocol and shares secret scenes that didn’t air

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EXCLUSIVE: Married at First Sight UK’s Leisha Lightbody reveals the moments with ‘husband’ Reiss Boyce that never made it to air sharing that he broke up with her just weeks after the pair filmed their final vows for the E4 dating show

Leisha Lightbody believes there’s still “unanswered questions” surrounding her split from Married at First Sight UK groom Reiss Boyce.

The couple broke up weeks after filming their emotional final vows where viewers saw Essex-based Reiss, 33 and the 31-year-old Scottish beauty choose to commit to continue their relationship outside of the experiment.

Their whirlwind romance, which was plagued with uncertainty during their time on the E4 reality show, saw Reiss concerned about “drama” in the marriage and Leisha not knowing how her husband really felt despite her declaring she loved him on their final date.

Reiss ended their relationship when he visited Leisha in Scotland before filming the dramatic Reunion show which aired last week but she’s not convinced he was ever emotionally available…

Speaking about her time on the show, Leisha admitted: “I went into it bit naive and it was quite hard watching it back but it’s actually made me heal a little bit quicker.

“When we left after final vows I genuinely thought that we were in this fairytale and thought we were going to watch it back and it was going to be a magical thing, but actually he didn’t like me as much as I thought.

“I honestly thought that he really did like me, and I’m not saying he didn’t, but obviously they picked up things that he said on camera that he didn’t necessarily say too much to me.”

Leisha and Reiss were paired by the show’s experts Paul C Brunson, Charlene Douglas and Mel Schilling and tied the knot at the altar after meeting for the first time on their wedding day.

However, the cracks in their relationship begun to show quite early on in their marriage but they both continued to stay in the experiment and were one of only five couples who made it to the final vows at the end of the series.

Leisha said: “He knew who I was from the minute he met me. I told him everything about me and I was a very open book with him and I told him my deepest, darkest secrets but I just couldn’t quite figure him out. The whole time we were there he could have left he didn’t have to stay.”

While some fans were left doubting their romance after what was shown on-screen, Leisha went on to lift the lid on what was really going on between her and Reiss when the cameras stopped rolling.

“We were very intimate every single night,” she said. “I just think when you’re intimate with people every single day and you’re spooning them and very tactile I think that’s kind of giving mixed messages because he was then saying ‘oh, I’m happy to be intimate with you but when you ask me for reassurance or to hold my hand, you’re too much’.

“I’m not a body, I’m a human being, I’ve got feelings, I’ve got emotions and I feel like there was just a lot of mixed emotions and I think looking back he probably just wasn’t emotionally available.

“Obviously what is put out on TV is a quarter of what actually happened. Me and Reece were always in the apartments together when everybody else would go out. We stayed in all cosied up, watching documentaries with our little snacks. We would be cuddled up and honestly we were so smitten, well, I definitely was smitten. I cooked for him every night.”

Things stared to change for Leisha after they left the experiment when his ex started liking her photos on social media despite the show not airing yet and therefore the public weren’t aware of who was starring on the current series.

She raised her concerns with Reiss and he reassured there was nothing going on between him and his ex but her nearest and dearest weren’t convinced.

“When we left the show everybody else could see it. My friends and family were like ‘do you really think this is it though?’ and I was like ‘yeah’ but I was so delusional, I was so blinded,” she said.

“Reiss then came up to Scotland and we went for a meal with my mum, my dad, my sister and my friends and they were all like ‘oh my God we actually think he likes you’ and ‘I can see it’s working now’ but then that night he split up with me.

“I just wish that he would have made that a little bit more clearer to me just so that I can protect myself because I think I was quite vulnerable and I think I was probably a bit naive,” she said during the emotional chat.

Leisha had to face Reiss just weeks after their split to film the MAFS UK reunion which she said was “a bit of a disaster” because she “was so emotional and drained”.

“I probably did go back thinking he was maybe going to look at me and maybe want to rekindle something I’m not going to lie to you that was going through my head but logistically I knew that it wasn’t ever going to happen,” she admitted.

“I’m completely over Reiss now but I think there’s a little part of me that’s still a bit upset over the way it ended and things have come out of the woodwork with him and his ex.

“I just feel like there’s lots of unanswered questions. I think he was probably just done before he finished it but I don’t think he was ever really in it.”

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Leisha also added that she has no bad blood towards her ex but they no longer communicate and she’s at peace with the fact she may never know the truth. R

Reiss has since admitted he did get back with his ex after splitting with Leisha but they are no longer together.