Month: November 2020

This Thanksgiving is going to be… a bit different. But just because COVID-19 is forcing us to spend much of Thanksgiving pretty much the same way we’ve been spending the past eight months — alone, without pants, and eating way too much food — doesn’t mean the tradition of lying to your less hip family members about going on a “walk” with your cousins has to end. You might not get to make an excuse straight to grandma’s face, venture out to the closest park, stand in a circle, and get baked out of your mind in anticipation of the Thanksgiving feast this year, but you can definitely still smoke.

In celebration of this year’s Turkey Day, we rounded up all our favorite munchie-inducing strains. Pick one of these up to ensure that your Thanksgiving dinner — whether you’re having an at-home feast or just grabbing some fast food — is the best meal of the year. Let’s dive in!

Blue Dream

THC: 22.7%
CBD: 2%
Strain: Sativa

Is Blue Dream played out? That’s like asking a soda drinker if Coke or Pepsi are played out.

Sure, Blue Dream is so popular it was mentioned in a Justin Timberlake song, but we wouldn’t call the strain played out (can’t be as kind to Justin), we’d call it reliable. This sativa strain boasts 2% CBD content with a THC level hovering around 20%, combining for an ultra chill euphoric high that won’t weigh you down or put you into a couch-lock like the heavier indica strains.

This legend of the game is still a fun strain to smoke before you prepare a dish or do some work in the kitchen, but given its tendency to compel you to indulge your weirdest whims, it may lead you to believe pancakes should be the new Thanksgiving staple.

(Also, maybe they should???)

The Bottom Line

Blue Dream has a fruity and fragrant flavor that will smoke well before and after your meal, with a high that instantly brings a smile to your face as you devolve into a giggling idiot.

Vader OG

Strain: Hybrid
THC: 22%

Vader OG was included on our Spooky Halloween-Themed Strains list and, almost a month later, we’re still smoking it pretty frequently. While this strain is billed as a hybrid, it’s heavily indica leaning — so maybe light this one up right before you sit down to eat rather than before preparing any complicated dishes.

Be warned, this is very much an outside strain. It’s gassy, skunky, and dank so don’t try to light up indoors unless you like the idea of eating among the smell of smoke. The munchies will kick almost immediately with this strain, as well as the cottonmouth — so we suggest a half bowl before your meal and another half as you’re chilling out.

Just be prepared to knock out.

The Bottom Line

Stinky and dank, but a powerful hunger inducer. Smoke it outside.

Skywalker OG

THC: 20%
Strain: Hybrid

Two Star Wars-themed weed strains in a single post?

Yeah, I’m a nerd. But honestly, this hybrid strain is so good, you might as well serve it on the table alongside other Thanksgiving staples like cranberry sauce and gravy. Not only will it get you hella high thanks to Skywalker’s 20% THC average, but its strong earthy aroma and blueberry notes on the palate act as the perfect pre-dinner appetizer. It smells great, which means you can smoke it indoors without it ruining your meal and it’s genetics make it an ideal strain for morning, noon, or night.

The Bottom Line

A great smelling and tasting hybrid strain for your Thanksgiving dinner and the next day’s leftovers.

Banana OG

THC: 29.4%
Strain: Indica

Banana OG sounds like a summer strain and that’s probably because the best place to smoke it is outdoors, away from everyone. Seriously, this is the stinkiest strain we’ve ever smoked — with a pine-meets-citrus flavor that is enough to make you gag. Not selling it for you? Well, if you like to getting high out of your mind, Banana OG will take you to another dimension, it’s the strongest strain on this roundup with a THC level hovering near 30%.

That likely makes the strongest strain you’ve ever smoked, no matter how big of a self-proclaimed stoner you are. Seriously, this will absolutely derail whatever your routine is as your goals will instantly shift to 1). Getting food ASAP and 2). Falling asleep.

The Bottom Line

An indulgent strain for stoner kings and queens. This strain is guaranteed to enhance your meal, just be careful you don’t fall into an instant food coma and land face-first in the sweet potatoes.

Venom OG

THC: 16-27%
Strain: Hybrid

Venom OG is a hybrid strain with Rare Dankness and Poison OG genetics, resulting in a skunky woodsy flavor and smell that shares a lot of properties with heavy indica strains, but won’t weigh you down quite as severely. Venom OG is a bit inconsistent when it comes to average THC levels, but don’t treat that as some kind of knock on the quality of the strain, instead use that as an opportunity to zero in on the level that works best with your tolerance and just how high you want to get from a single bowl.

The Bottom Line

A great strain for lower tolerance smokers who still want all the appetite enhancing benefits of a strong high.

Gelato

THC: 18-25%
CBD: <1%
Strain: Hybrid

Well, this roundup is certainly turning into a greatest hits list of my favorite personal strains. Which should tell you that I love to eat and get really, really high. Gelato is a hybrid strain with genetics from Sunset Sherbet and Thin Mint Girl Scout Cookies, which both sound as delicious as they smoke, and Gelato is no different.

Featuring a peppery almost hoppy mouthfeel, Gelato is well balanced in both its indica and sativa properties making this one of the best strains to smoke no matter the occasion. Smoke it before Thanksgiving dinner. Hell, light it up during the meal before the pie!

The Bottom Line

One of the best strains you will ever smoke, no matter the occasion.

Amnesia Haze

THC: 19%
CBD: 1%
Strain: Sativa

I want to apologize for how many of these strains stink. What can I say though? The strains that smell the worst happen to induce the munchies stronger than the more pleasant varieties. Let’s get the bad out of the way first: Amnesia Haze is incredibly pungent, with an aroma that recalls burnt lemon skins.

Aside from that though, this is a great strain with a decent THC level and a complex flavor that combines berries and earthy coffee tones.

The Bottom Line

Don’t let its unsightly appearance and off-putting smell drive you away, Amnesia Haze’s terpenes are something you’ll remember vividly. Plus it’ll make your meal better, and that’s what it’s all about.

Wedding Cake

Strain: Hybrid
THC: 23-25%

One of the newest and best-tasting strains on the weed scene, Wedding Cake is an indica-dominant hybrid strain that will chill you out and enhance your senses. This makes it a great choice for hardcore stoners who want to recall that heightened rush they experienced when they first started smoking. It’ll make music better, turn bad movies watchable, give you the best sex of your life, and, yes, it’ll make food taste better.

Do that in any order and you’ll probably leave this Thanksgiving thinking it was the best you’ve had in years.

Wedding Cake boasts piney herbal notes with a noticeable hint of sweet vanilla. It’s delicious and best enjoyed through a vaporizer or bong where the flavors will truly come alive.

The Bottom Line

A special occasion strain for hardcore stoners looking to relive their earliest days of getting high. A true experience enhancer.

While Zion Williamson entered the 2019-20 season as the main reason for excitement in New Orleans, Brandon Ingram ended up having a monster year while his rookie running mate waited to make his debut. As a result, the former No. 2 overall pick in the 2016 NBA Draft received a big money extension from the Pelicans.

Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN brings word of the deal, which was confirmed by Ingram’s agents. The 2020 NBA All-Star Game selection came to terms with the team on a five-year max extension that will pay him $158 million.

Ingram came to New Orleans as one of several major pieces in the trade that sent Anthony Davis to the Los Angeles Lakers. Instead of agreeing to an extension last summer — which Wojnarowski noted was “more modest” than what he received — Ingram opted to wait it out and bet on getting a bigger deal. It was a bit of a risk, particularly because his previous season ended in March due to a deep vein thrombosis in his arm, but Ingram responded with the best season of his career en route to being named the NBA’s Most Improved Player. The former Duke standout averaged 23.8 points, 6.1 rebounds, and 4.2 assists per game in New Orleans last year.

Williamson has been viewed as the centerpiece of the Pelicans’ current era, but Ingram’s breakout campaign showed that the team has a potential 1-2 punch that can take them to new heights. As a result, Ingram is the latest member of his Draft class to get paid.

If you recently realized that Dave Chappelle’s Comedy Central series Chappelle’s Show was missing from your queue, we now know the reason why. It’s because Chappelle doesn’t want you watching it.

The legendary comedy dropped a surprise clip from a recent stand-up on Instagram today where he recounted some dirty deals he’d been the victim of during his long career and apparently ViacomCBS is one of the main villains. The parent company owns Comedy Central, thus owning Chappelle’s Show, and they licensed out the series to Netflix earlier this month. While Netflix paid for the rights to stream the show, it was Viacom’s job to compensate Chappelle, something the company failed to do.

“People think I made a lot of money from Chappelle’s Show,” Chappelle says in the video he posted to his social media account. “When I left that show I never got paid. They (ViacomCBS) didn’t have to pay me because I signed the contract. But is that right? I found out that these people were streaming my work and they never had to ask me or they never have to tell me. Perfectly legal ‘cause I signed the contract. But is that right? I didn’t think so either.”

After relaying a story about signing a contract with ViacomCBS early in his career, he went on to call out Comedy Central for licensing his work to multiple streamers, including HBO Max and CBS All Access, before revealing why Netflix — a streamer that has dropped a handful of Chappelle comedy specials over the years — pulled the series from their lineup.

“That’s why I like working for Netflix,” Chappelle went on. “I like working for Netflix because when all those bad things happened to me, that company didn’t even exist. And when I found out they were streaming Chappelle’s Show, I was furious. How could they not– how could they not know? So you know what I did? I called them and I told them that this makes me feel bad. And you want to know what they did? They agreed that they would take it off their platform just so I could feel better. That’s why I f*ck with Netflix. Because they paid me my money, they do what they say they’re going to do, and they went above and beyond what you could expect from a businessman. They did something just because they thought that I might think that they were wrong. And I do — I think that if you are f*cking streaming that show you’re fencing stolen goods.”

Chappelle ended the set by making an impassioned plea to fans regarding his past work.

“I’m begging you, please don’t watch that show,” he said. “I’m not asking you to boycott any network — boycott me. Boycott Chappelle’s Show. Do not watch it unless they pay me.”

You can watch the full video below:

Every year after the Recording Academy announces its extensive list of Grammy nominations (which it did this morning), music fans take to the internet to point out the artists and works they feel should have been up for certain awards. One thing that doesn’t usually happen, though, is the Academy addressing those snubs, but interim president/CEO Harvey Mason Jr. has done so this year.

The Weeknd didn’t earn a single nomination despite having one of the year’s most successful and beloved albums in After Hours, and Harry Styles’ Fine Line and accompanying singles were also excluded from the Big Four categories (Record Of The Year, Album Of The Year, Song Of The Year, and Best New Artist). Mason was asked about that in a new Billboard interview, as the publication’s Paul Grein said, “I was shocked that The Weeknd wasn’t nominated at all, and that Harry Styles wasn’t nominated in any of the Big Four categories. Why do you think they weren’t nominated?” Mason responded:

“For The Weeknd, in every year you only have a certain amount of people you can nominate for each category. As for Harry, he has some great nominations this year [even though he wasn’t nominated in the top categories]. We are excited about some of the other categories where he was nominated. It’s never easy to tell where people are going to land.”

The interviewer then continued, “There was a day where both of these artists would have been nominated for album, record and song of the year. The Grammys have shifted in terms of what they value. Now they seem to value championing newer and less well-known artists over reinforcing things that have already been rewarded in the marketplace.” Mason “hesitantly” (as the publication put it) responded, “Yeah, it’s interesting.”

It was later pointed out to Mason that country artists weren’t well-represented in the Big Four categories, to which he responded, “There are a certain amount of nominations that we can give out. The voting body really determines where those nominations go. We take it very seriously. We review every bit of music that is submitted. From year to year, it is really hard to predict who is going to be nominated and who’s not. I personally wish we could give everybody a nomination, but there are only a certain amount of slots. There were some amazing records that did not get nominated.”

Mason was then pressed, “There doesn’t seem to be a high priority given to making sure country is represented, like there is to making sure the nominations are diverse.” He replied, “We don’t sit down and decide we have to have this person and we have to have that person; We have to have that genre; and we have to have this race. We really are trying to land on quality. In my experience, it’s not really been about trying to even the playing field for every different group and make sure that everyone’s included. It’s really about trying to highlight quality and excellence. We really hope that is a diverse group; that it represents a lot of genres. I think this year if you look at the overall nominations, we have represented more genres than we generally do in our Big Four categories. They’re very diverse across the board in gender, age, and genre.”

Read the full interview here.

Is it weird to anyone else that macarons exist in Star Wars? Maybe they’re not actually “macarons” — they could be called some Star Wars-y thing, like “round treat” — but come on, they’re macarons. It’s like when the lizard shows up in The Empire Strikes Back: it breaks the reality of a universe otherwise filled with weird aliens and wacky droids. This is not a complaint, mind you, because if macarons didn’t exist, then we wouldn’t have gotten the adorable scene in last week’s episode of The Mandalorian, “Chapter 12: The Siege,” where Baby Yoda uses the Force to steal the space-cookies from a kid… and pukes blue on himself. It’s disgusting but adorable, and it’s for sale.

Williams-Sonoma is selling an officially-licensed 12-pack of “Nevarro Nummies Macarons” for $49.95, plus shipping (this will be a fine edition to the annual Hater’s Guide). “Inspired by a sweet moment when a young Nevarro student debated sharing his treats with the Child, 21st-century artisans in California have created these ethereal French-style almond macarons capturing the essence of this scene with Nevarro Nummies. For authentic galactic flavor, each exquisite treat is artfully hand-piped with a rich, creamy vanilla filling,” the description reads. It’s the perfect gift for your Star Wars fan in your life (that you can also make at home for like 20 bucks).

Be sure to pair the blue macarons with blue milk and blue water eggs.

(Via Williams-Sonoma via CBR)

While there are a number of music awards ceremonies in a given year, none are as closely followed as the Grammys. That’s why fans were in an uproar on Tuesday after seeing that The Weeknd had not been nominated for a single 2021 Grammy Award despite his album After Hours being one of the most commercially successful records of the year.

The Weeknd was awarded for his album at nearly every other music awards ceremony this year so many of the singer’s listeners were surprised to learn that After Hours was snubbed for a Grammy nomination. After the full list of nominations was unveiled, fans flooded Twitter with their disappointment.

Despite fans’ disappointment, the Recording Academy interim president Harvey Mason Jr. stood by the Grammy nominations in an interview with Billboard. When asked about The Weeknd not being nominated, he responded, “For The Weeknd, in every year you only have a certain amount of people you can nominate for each category,” he said.

The Weeknd’s snub is particularly surprising seeing how successful After Hours was upon its release. Just this week, the singer broke Post Malone’s previous record for the most time spent in the top 10 of Billboard‘s Hot 100 chart, as “Blinding Lights” has appeared in that range for an impressive 40 weeks total. The feat arrived just after the singer had set the record for the most weeks spent in the top five spots of the Hot 100.

See how fans reacted to The Weeknd not receiving any Grammy nominations above.

After Hours is out now via Republic. Get it here.

For the fourth time this offseason, a member of the 2017 NBA Draft class has gotten paid. After the Sacramento Kings paid De’Aaron Fox, the Utah Jazz agreed to terms with Donovan Mitchell, and Jayson Tatum cashed in on his ascent to stardom with the Boston Celtics, Miami Heat big man Bam Adebayo reportedly received a rookie maximum contract.

According to Shams Charania of The Athletic, Adebayo and the team agreed to a five-year extension worth $163 million that could potentially go as high as $195.6 million.

The No. 14 pick in the 2017 Draft and a one-time NBA All-Star Game collection, Adebayo has rapidly become one of the NBA’s most uniquely skilled big men. He showed flashes of potentially being a two-way nightmare during his first two seasons in the league, and during the 2019-20 campaign, Adebayo broke out, averaging 15.9 points, 10.2 rebounds, 5.1 assists, 1.3 blocks, and 1.1 skills per game. His performance during the postseason in the NBA’s Orlando Bubble was even better, and he played a major role in the Heat’s surprising run to the Finals, although a shoulder injury hampered him from being at 100 percent when he was on the floor against the Los Angeles Lakers.

Much of the discourse around the Heat has been about what they can achieve in the future, as they’re expected to try and go star hunting during the 2021 offseason. Before that, though, Pat Riley and co. wanted to make sure their 23-year-old big man is taken care of in Miami for the foreseeable future.

The full list of nominees for the 2021 Grammys was announced starting at noon ET this morning, which means the inevitable criticisms of the list began at approximately 12:01 p.m. ET this morning. One important piece of information to remember during these trying times, though, is the eligibility window: Only works released between September 1, 2019 and August 31, 2020 are eligible to be nominated at the 63rd Annual Grammy Awards. Even with that in mind, however, there were some head-scratching omissions this year.

The most immediately obvious and profoundly confusing is The Weeknd not earning a single nomination for After Hours, “Blinding Lights,” and other related works. Both the album and single topped the charts (“Blinding Lights” actually just set a longevity record) and were critically beloved. It’s possible The Weeknd didn’t submit any of his work for consideration this year, but if he did, the confusion of fans on Twitter is justified.

Similarly, some people are wondering why Harry Styles’ Fine Line and Fiona Apple’s Fetch The Bolt Cutters, two of the year’s most acclaimed releases, didn’t earn Album Of The Year nods.

Meanwhile, hip-hop heads wondered why women didn’t have a significant presence in the rap categories: Of the 20 works nominated for Best Rap Performance, Best Melodic Rap Performance, Best Rap Album, and Best Rap Song, only two were by women, and they were both the Beyonce remix of Megan Thee Stallion’s “Savage.” On the bright side, though, women dominated the Best Rock Performance category.

Check out some tweets about other snubs below and find the full list of 2021 Grammy nominations here.

Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Although he was no longer around to campaign on his own behalf, late Brooklyn rapper Pop Smoke was able to secure a posthumous 2021 Grammy Award nomination for his summer single “Dior.” Pop Smoke was killed in February of this year during a home invasion as he rode the success of his summer 2019 hit “Welcome To The Party” and prepared for the release of his debut album. That album, Shoot For The Stars, Aim For The Moon, was released posthumously and contained “Dior” as a bonus track, although the song had previously served as the single for Pop Smoke’s mixtape Meet the Woo 2 after originally appearing on the tape’s predecessor six months before.

The song oddly became an unofficial protest anthem, despite not addressing police brutality or racism, as protestors played the song during demonstrations in Seattle and New York City. It also appears on the soundtrack of the recently released NBA 2K21. The beat was used during the 2020 BET Hip-Hop Awards Cypher.

In the wake of his death, Pop Smoke became an icon around which the burgeoning New York drill scene began to rally, as the gruff-voiced 20-year-old’s last few recorded verses turned into a hot commodity for clout-seeking majors. Young Thug and Pusha T exchanged heated words over a song both appeared on after Pusha used his verse to continue dissing Drake, while Pop’s final verses appeared on projects from the likes of Nav, French Montana, and more.

Megan Thee Stallion proved she is a force to be reckoned with after releasing a number of breakout hits like “WAP” and “Savage” this year, which preceded her anticipated debut album Good News. So it’s only right that the rapper be recognized by the Recording Academy for her achievements in the music industry. For the first time ever, Megan is nominated for a number of Grammys this year — and she found out about making the list live on air.

The rapper was tapped to give a live reading of Grammy nominations for a handful of categories on Tuesday. Since Megan was preparing for the announcement, the rapper had not yet learned that she had been nominated for Record Of The Year, Best New Artist, Best Rap Performance, and Best Rap Song.

Recording Academy interim president Harvey Mason Jr. joined Megan to personally congratulate her for her achievements — and she was completely over the moon upon hearing the exciting news. “Who, me?” she exclaimed.

Watch a clip of Megan Thee Stallion reacting to her Grammy nominations above and see the full list of 2021 nominations here.

Good News is out now via 1501 Entertainment. Get it here.

Megan Thee Stallion is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.