Month: December 2020

It’s easy to forget just how far we’ve come in terms of technology over the past 20 years. What was once so earth-shatteringly sophisticated now seems primitive, and the idea of photo-realistic VFX is so commonplace that we barely take a second glance at its majesty. Across pop culture, special effects have evolved to a degree of such detail that the fantastical now feels grounded in our real lives — think of the dragons in Game of Thrones or Rocket Raccoon in Guardians of the Galaxy, creatures that would have been considered impossible to recreate only two decades prior. Such sights are now so omnipresent in every blockbuster or prestige drama we binge watch that they no longer feel special. We have become spoiled.

The same applies to the world of video games. As we move into a new generation of the console wars, the promise of ever-more realistic gameplay and true-to-life graphics is louder and more conceivable than ever. Games like the Call of Duty franchise are praised for how accurately they capture the grimy freneticism of war, while The Last of Us series, which utilized motion and voice capture for its characters, felt so steeped in emotional and stylistic reality that players were left sobbing by the end. There are moments when you play some of these titles and the sights on offer are truly indistinguishable from what we see every day or the sights of the biggest tentpoles of Hollywood. As noted in a 2015 piece in The Guardian, this is the future of video game visuals, a world of photo-realistic details and subtleties, the full extent of which has yet to be fully tapped into.

It’s a bright future, to be sure, but it would be a limited one for the medium of video games. In fact, a decision to tilt entirely in favor of photo-realism would ignore the things that make gaming so unique.

Procedurally generated titles like No Man’s Sky promise infinite possibilities, a true chance for a player to stumble across something that nobody else will see, something that wasn’t even planned as such by the developers. You can’t do that with a movie. (Sorry, Scorsese.) Designer Keita Takahashi, the man behind titles like Katamari Damacy and Wattam, uses games to redefine logic in ways that film would never allow, all while drawing attention to the true beauty in life’s more mundane aspects — only in games could you be so excited to play as a smiley-faced poo who holds hands with a toilet to help create a new utopia. Even so-called walking simulators like Gone Home and Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture offer deeply personal interactive narratives that film struggles to convey in such purely languid terms.

Anti-realism is a term that originated in philosophy. The basic idea is that realism cannot and will never provide all the answers to life, so adhering to it is a waste of time as well as a limiting way to look at the world. Applying this to art and video games opens up a lot of ideas: If we spend so much of our creative energy trying to recreate realism in this medium, what do we lose when we reject the alternative? And what if an unrealistic point-of-view is the best way to look at games?
Ash Darrow, a writer and academic behind the podcast Horror Vanguard, explained this stance.

“It’s easy to capitalize on a realistic-looking game,” Darrow remarked. “That is a metric that can be quickly measured and sold. This, and the demand that creates for better and better technology, is one of the main driving factors for how we talk about realism in games. On the other hand, games like Pokémon are still wildly successful and eschew crude realism for engaging experiences. If we broaden the conversation about what “realism” is, we can learn to discover our reality inside the games we play.”

Video games are one of the few mediums in modern art and pop culture that can offer truly limitless visuals, and it’s arguably the only one that can do so in a participatory manner. It offers a kind of escapism that is far more tangible than the abstract ideas offered by, say, reading a book. The player is put into a whole new perspective, one that they can guide freely (within the limitations of the game) and embody something completely oppositional to your regular life. You can play with people half the world away, a notion so commonplace nowadays that we forget how truly astounding it is to do so. Even the most surreal tales can be imbued with endless emotional resonance and the player will be fully invested in what the game has to offer, whether they’re playing as an enslaved alien, a gust of wind carrying a bunch of petals, or as a very naughty goose.

Even talking about “realism in gaming” feels like a double-edged sword. By design, the medium can’t fully be anything truly rooted in the realistic, as Darrow noted.

“Things like liquids, cloth, and facial features are still lightyears beyond what even cutting-edge gaming can handle realistically,” Darrow said. “If major Hollywood studios can barely handle this for infamous flops of photorealism like Henry Cavill’s mustache-removal in Justice League or the bizarre CGI Peter Cushing in Rogue One, gaming is that much further away. And this only covers so-called ‘photorealism.’ Realism extends beyond mere ‘photorealism.’ A ‘realism’ is more than just looking like a 4k video. It’s about creating an experience that is ‘real,’ but the reality is too multifaceted to remap.”

Realism and its opposition can exist alongside one another in perfect harmony. Hell, video games may be the perfect place for this. Gaming allows for the elasticity of truth that movies would never get away with. We notice when someone jumps in a film and it’s clearly aided by wirework, but we relish the chance to play characters who can leap across buildings or jump in a perfectly controlled manner and its verisimilitude is never questioned. We want to have our ailments be fully healed by a random burger or first aid kit left sitting in the corner of a random abandoned room. Frankly, gaming would be a lot less fun if it embraced realism in these ways. Where’s the excitement in jumping like a normal person?

Visual storytelling works well with this blend. Katie Hallahan, CCO and PR Director of Post Studios explained how cinematic framing can help to elevate an unreal stylistic approach in gaming.

“Our games are 2.5D or 3D, and we’ve made it our style to include different camera angles to add to conversations and close-ups, to give more of the feel of a movie when you’re playing,” Hallahan said. “Whether the game is set in a well-known city or a fantasy land made of fairy tales and puns, the narrative needs to feel real enough to draw the player in, to make them invested in what was going and in solving the mysteries at hand.”

The power of video games and its technology has yet to be fully explored, which makes its future incredibly exciting. For the perfect example of this, look no further than the glorious chaos of the McElroy brothers and their hit YouTube series Monster Factory. The show sees the brother use built-in character creation tools as well as take advantage of glitches and bugs to exploit a game’s engine for all its creative and comedic worth. Aside from being a laugh-out-loud riff-fest, Monster Factory is a striking and hugely entertaining reminder of what games can, should, and seldom do. As cinema seeks to use VFX to add more realism – dust on the “lens,” microscopic animal hairs, photorealistic lions that talk like Beyonce – Monster Factory takes the opposite route. The McElroys dive into the tools of a game and see what it’s capable of beyond its intentions, crafting hilariously spontaneous stories – or what video essayist Kyle Kallgren called “discovered narratives” – well beyond anything the developers could have hoped for (or hoped to avoid). Imagine if that could be deliberately applied to games for everyone to enjoy and discover.

In these ways, film is light years behind gaming in understanding what VFX can do. Our quest for evermore realistic images is one of great merit and technical mastery but it shouldn’t be the only one we take. Let’s ensure that the future of gaming is as limitless as the technology it utilizes.

Juice WRLD’s tragic passing last December left the hip-hop community in mourning. The 21-year-old also left fans large catalog of music to cry to — and they did. Per Spotify’s annual report, Juice WRLD beat out every other American musician as the most-streamed US artist of the year.

The late Chicago rapper’s numbers were supported by the release of his posthumous LP Legends Never Die, which debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart and ended up being the most-streamed album of the year on the platform. While the album was released in July, it managed to surpass over two billion streams this past October.

Securing the title of Spotify’s most-streamed artist, Juice WRLD beat out several other big-name US musicians this year. The rapper’s streaming numbers topped those of Post Malone, Taylor Swift, Billie Eilish, and Lil Uzi Vert.

While Juice WRLD’s Legends Never Die received the most Spotify listens, a different rapper holds the title for the most-streamed song. Roddy Ricch’s “The Box” received the most listens on Spotify out of any other song, which checks out as it had an impressive eleven-week stint at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

Juice WRLD was Spotify’s most-streamed US artist, but another musician saw the most streams globally. Bad Bunny managed to secure the top slot for global streams, amassing more than 8.3 billion streams this year from fans around the globe.

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

Time moves differently in 2020.

For instance, Tiger King, the wildly popular docu-series from Netflix, actually aired just a few months ago. That show — about a redneck, gun-toting, gay lion-tamer and his feud with a professed animal-rights activist — changed the cultural zeitgeist at the beginning of our collective quarantine, but it might as well have aired 20 years ago after all of the political turmoil and social unrest that’s happened since.

We’re saying this because we’d like to give Georgia Senator Kelly Loeffler some benefit of the doubt. The Republican Congresswoman is currently in the midst of a contentious run-off with Democratic challenger Reverend Raphael Warnock. Loeffler is in danger of losing her seat in the Senate, which could, in turn, give Democrats the majority if fellow Democratic hopeful Jon Ossoff wins his run-off against Republican incumbent David Perdue. The stakes are high, Loeffler’s under immense pressure — especially after allegations that she profited in the stock market thanks to her pre-pandemic insider knowledge — and all of this should be taken into account. But really, if you’re going to invoke the name of the Tiger King in order to clap back at your political opponent on social media, you need to do your research.

Loeffler apparently didn’t appreciate a Tweet from Rev. Warnock that accused her of withholding aid from families and individuals in need in her home state, so she responded in kind, accusing Democratic leaders Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi of focusing on legalizing marijuana and imploring Warnock to “spare us the gaslighting.” But aside from her misunderstanding of what “gaslighting” means, Loeffler also made a strange reference to Joe Exotic, the star of Netflix’s Tiger King, that … well, see for yourself.

Now, anyone who’s watched the show knows that it begins and ends with Joe Exotic in prison. He’s telling his story on a prison call and we hear actual dialogue from those conversations throughout the series. And yes, Don Jr. once teased that his father might pardon the Tiger King — apparently, Melania enjoyed memes from the show enough to get Trump interested in the guy — but as of now, he’s still in prison, so we’re not sure what Loeffler means when she references “outlawing” the Tiger King? Outlawing binge-watching the show, perhaps? Whatever the case, Twitter had some fun dragging her for the slip-up.

Look, we’ve all watched a show, loved a show even, and yet failed to remember key events of said show, but it’s a safe bet than when murder-for-hire and illegally selling tiger cubs are in the series description, the villain ends up behind bars. Reality TV 101, Kelly.

It’s the 25th anniversary of Foo Fighters this year, and the band had big plans to celebrate that milestone. The pandemic forced the band to cancel most of those, but they’ve still had a big 2020. Dave Grohl had a viral drum battle, the group announced a new album, and now, Foo Fighters have their own taco.

The group has teamed up with Casa Vega Restaurant in Sherman Oaks, California to launch the limited-time-only Foo Fighters taco, which is available starting today, December 1. The specialty taco features smoked brisket, BBQ sauce drizzle, Mexican cole slaw, red pickled onion, and chopped cilantro, all in a homemade flour tortilla. There’s also a new Los Luchadores Foo tequila beer cocktail, which features La Gritona Reposado, fresh lime juice, and Modelo Especial beer.

The band and restaurant also made a video to promote the partnership, which starts with Dave Grohl pulling up to a restaurant drive-through. He tries to order a Foo Fighters taco, which doesn’t go well because that’s not a menu item anywhere. He tries multiple restaurants before getting frustrated and learning that Casa Vega does in fact serve a Foo Fighters taco.

It’s not clear how long the taco will be offered beyond “a limited time,” so people in the Sherman Oaks area can place a to-go order online or by phone now. Profits from each taco and drink will be donated to No Us Without You, an LA-based charity that “provides food security for ridiculously hardworking, undocumented, back-of-house restaurant workers that are unemployed due to COVID-19.”

Revisit our 2018 interview with Grohl about his passion for BBQ here.

For many, this year has been a chance to dive into video games as we look for a way to pass the time at home and escape the world, even if ever-so briefly. Across the spectrum of gamers, from the casual to the hyper-competitive, we’ve seen more and more people diving into the world of gaming this year, and the release of next-gen consoles this holiday season has only further opened up the opportunities for immersing ones self into a game.

Olivia Munn is among the few that’s probably played fewer games this year than normal, as she typically gets her gaming done from her trailer on set as she passes the time between shoots, but she’s recently gotten the chance to dive into Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla as part of LG’s “Zero In” series.

We got a chance to talk with Munn, who happily admits to being in the casual gamer category, through LG last week about representation in gaming, loving video games for the escape and storytelling, getting through this year, and much more.

What have been some of your favorite games you’ve played this year?

This year? Well, do you know the game Hearthstone? I mean, I love Hearthstone. That has been a game that has been really easy to keep in my life, because you can just pick up your iPad at any point and play a quick game. It’s quick and you get taken out pretty quick, as I can often see myself doing. But this whole year … see I usually get most of my game playing on set. I’ll put a console in my trailer and so I have not been on set this year, but being able to play Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla was the first time I’ve really been able to sit down and play a game. It was the best. It’s been Hearthstone all year and then Valhalla.

It’s funny because being in quarantine — I’m just now putting the math together — it’s funny how it’s now Thanksgiving, and I remember when we had to go on lockdown. And I remember in February when we were talking about the pandemic and how many months have gone by, and I guess I could’ve been playing the whole time. But you’re just kind of on alert the whole time, like what’s going to happen? I guess I’m just now I’m putting the math together on how much of the year we’ve lost. So, thanks, Robby.

Sorry. I didn’t mean for this to become so existential.

It’s crazy to think about how much you didn’t do. Remember at the beginning of quarantine when people would talk about, “You know what, take this time to be creative. Write this script. Do this, do that.” I just want to survive. Can I just do that?

I feel the same way, because people were like, “Oh, back in the day people wrote great novels.” And I’m like, look, man, if I stay sane, like, I’m good. I don’t need to do something great. We’re all just trying to make it.

[Laughs] I love that, I don’t know why that made me laugh so hard. “Back in the day,” any of this is the same as back in the day, guys. Nobody in this lifetime has survived this. I’m like, everyone expected us to come out of this with East of Eden, and I’m like, you’ll be lucky if I learn to do a reel. That’s what I got. If you get a reel out of me, it’s been a good year. Don’t even think of East of Eden out of me.

[Laughs] I guess we should get back to the topic at hand. With Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla and this partnership with LG, what have you enjoyed about that game? And when you do look for games to bring on set, what are things that draw you into games and are your favorite genres?

Well my favorite genres have been the fantasy first-person shooter. The Assassin’s Creed games I’ve loved, but I think Ubisoft has done a great job of making it user-friendly. You know, I’m not the best gamer. I never have been, but I really do love it. And games that make it easy for you to pick up and have fun at the drop of the hat without having to spend hours and hours to get into it are the games I gravitate towards and always have. But Assassin’s Creed, WoW, Call of Duty, Zelda on Switch has been really fun, [Super] Smash [Bros.], but being able to play the new Assassin’s Creed has truly been such a light in my life during this quarantine. My brother-in-law and I, we get together and play Assassin’s Creed over the holidays and stuff like that. So I was able to tell him I was getting Valhalla ahead of time and he was just so excited and able to live vicariously through me.

But it’s just really cool because for this one, specifically, for Valhalla you get to become a viking raider and, you know, you’re part of a viking raiding party, which is pretty epic. And there’s so many qualities to the game that you’re learning and being able to play it on this new LG OLED TV was truly an experience. Cause, electronics have just increased in their abilities, like every month there’s a new iPhone or new something and you start to have a hard time, at least for me, seeing the differences. You’re like, why is this better? Why am I upgrading? But as soon as they flipped on the TV and I got the game going it was so clear how immersive you get to be, because it truly is the best experience with the LG OLED TV. It’s like these 8 million self-lit pixels — and no, I don’t know what it means to be self-lit — but I do know that I was like, this looks really, really crisp and rich and you could really tell there were very deep black levels. Which you really need doing viking stuff like going through the waters, you can really see the different depths of water and stuff like that.

I remember pointing that out, like, wow that is so rich and look at that deep black, and you see how crisp it is. And they’re like, well that’s because there’s all the self-lit pixels, and I was like, “Mmhmm. You did it! Like, you did it!” Whatever LG did it really was a huge difference in how I’m seeing my TVs, but it’s like when all of the HD came in everyone was like, “Oh, ok” and there was a huge step up. This is a huge step up and it has that 4K resolution, right. Again, the numbers and letters always kind of go through one ear and out the other, but this experience was so good I was like, “OK, let me clock what that means,” and I still don’t really know what it means, I just know it looks really amazing.

Something I thought was interesting and I relate to a lot is like, I’m pretty terrible at a lot of games. I’m good at sports games and that’s where I lean on, but I like to dabble in stuff but I’m not a great gamer. And on top of that, for women in the gaming space, I feel like there’s a lot of gatekeeping that happens and it’s similar to how women are treated in the sports world and you are asked to be some historian of sports to prove your knowledge and people are always challenging you. But we need to be accepting of people who just kind of want to come into the space. And I wanted to know what you think of the importance of being able to say, there are a lot of people who enjoy gaming and we need to be representing them and targeting them as well as the super avid gamer.

I think there are so many more people who are below-average at gaming than there are people who are making huge livings at gaming. So the majority are more like me, and representation matters. Being an Asian woman in Hollywood is very isolating at times, and it has been, but at the same time it’s a path that I have to keep walking down to forge forward because representation matters. So the more you talk about things and show things that are reflective in other people’s lives, that’s how they can see themselves and see this is possible. Sometimes you don’t know something’s possible until you see someone else doing it — sometimes you don’t know something’s OK. Sometimes you don’t really know that you’re more normal than the world might make you believe. There are so many women who game and girls who game.

Like, last year, there was a woman who won the Hearthstone championship, VKLiooon, and I died. I couldn’t believe it. It was just so exciting to see her get to that level, and I just think there’s going to be so many more women coming to the forefront and so many more girls coming up and being real competitors on that big level. I won’t be one of them — it is a dream to become a Hearthstone champion. It’s on the list, but I’m well aware that I’m going to die before that happens. But I do … I see myself. I saw VKLiooon win the Hearthstone championship and I was so inspired. She’s an Asian women, I’m an Asian women. It inspired me. I thought, I should first spend more time playing Hearthstone, maybe I could do it. This is actually so cool that someone else who I feel close with or I think looks similar to me is getting to high levels on something I love so much. It was just super validating, and I think that’s what we’re going to see more and more. The more people who talk about it and get to really high levels, it will inspire more people to keep breaking boundaries and going those lengths.

And of course, there are going to be a lot of people who aren’t the best gamers. Like, I, whenever I play, I have to invert my Y-axis and even then it’s a little wonky for me. Every, maybe, 20 minutes I’ve got to be like, “wait, hold on, let me get my brain back around what I’m seeing.” And it’s hard, but I love it. It doesn’t really make for me to be the best gamer, but if more people just talk about how fun gaming is — because really gaming is for the masses. You don’t have to be the best. It’s made for us to become our own storytellers, especially games like Valhalla, where you get to choose your own adventure. It’s escapism at its best. It really allows us to delve into another world, another character, and just pretend for however long we have, and that is the essence of gaming. It’s not about being in eSports or an Overwatch team and being paid tons of money to play video games — I mean, that is really special. But I do believe that gaming is for mostly people who are just trying to escape.

And being part of a partnership with LG on the Zero In series, for you what it means to be part of that and be part of that representation of women in gaming, saying, I might not be the best but this is still something I love to do?

Yeah, it was really fun to have them reach out and to hear about the other people who were involved in it. And I was very clear, like, I love gaming but if you’re looking for someone who’s going to be able to compete at a high level, I’m not your girl. But they were like, no, this is just about people who love the experience. So that was a really fun thing to be able to be brought into this group of people.

Two years ago, at the age of 45, Zak Powers did what so many daydreamers and dad band members wished they could: he quit his corporate job to pursue a career in music.

Living in Portland, Oregon at the time, he left behind his work as a commercial filmmaker, maxed out his credit cards to buy equipment, and spent months woodshedding a modern take on folk-blues, his rough-hewn guitar work and voice backed by programmed drum beats. In early 2020, after he’d stockpiled a healthy amount of material, a close friend who had made a similar leap of faith offered him a spot opening for Dirtwire, the side project of Beats Antique member David Satori.

What happened next was the stuff of every musician’s nightmares. At the very first stop of the tour in Crested Butte, Colorado, Powers went to strum the opening chord of his second song when the bolt holding the neck of his guitar in place popped out and the instrument came apart in his hands. Less than a week later, when the coronavirus pandemic became a reality, the rest of the tour was canceled.

At first, it felt like another part of the adventure. He had already let go of the lease on his place in Portland and bought an RV so his family could join him on tour. The clan cruised around the Western US for a stretch, visiting national parks as he vaguely looked for work. But as the pandemic started shutting down all the employment options for him and his wife, things looked dire and he was forced to sell off his instruments and gear to survive.

What saved Powers was an email he received from MusicPortland, a nonprofit trade organization and advocacy group that he joined as he began to pursue his creative dreams.

“I was getting their regular newsletter and one of them said, ‘Have you received your PUA?’” Powers remembers, referring to the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance that was being offered to self-employed people who lost work due to the coronavirus. “At the time, I didn’t realize that someone who was trying to make money off of touring could apply.”

The process wasn’t easy. MusicPortland’s executive director Meara McLaughlin leaned on Oregon’s Unemployment Department and her contacts in Congress to get Powers and dozens of musicians and gig workers like him paid. Four months and a few phone calls to Senator Jeff Merkley’s office later, Powers had $13,500 deposited into his bank account — about six months’ worth of unemployment assistance.

Even two months later, Powers’ voice still carries hints of overwhelmed emotion when talking about it. “We settled our debts, we made arrangements,” he says, “and we took a breath. We were able to take a couple of weeks and be without panic so we could make a real concerted set of decisions about how to proceed.”

MusicPortland has been responsible for dozens of stories much like Powers’ in the months since the pandemic stopped all live performances around the country, putting not only the people on stage, but sound engineers, DJs, bouncers, booking agents, and hundreds of others out of work. And much of the organization’s success in securing benefits for those people in the music industry has been due to the indefatigable efforts of McLaughlin.

“There’s easily 30,000 people that make some or all of their money from performance and recording,” McLaughlin says, speaking on a Zoom call in front of two bookcases stuffed with titles. “When I talk about this to city leaders or economic development people, the common response is always, ‘I had no idea!’ We’re a huge industry here!”

McLaughlin has been beating this drum for years, even well before she, much like Powers, decided to quit the corporate grind in 2015 to start MusicPortland. After spending two decades in Massachusetts where she helped book bands at fabled Boston nightclub T.T. The Bear’s Place, she and her family returned to Portland and she threw herself into the local music scene. But as she did, McLaughlin became more and more frustrated with what she saw.

“As my daughter would describe it,” she says, “every time I’d get a couple of whiskies in me, I’d start ranting about how the Portland music scene was being diluted and crumbling and couldn’t be supported in a city that was growing fast. They all got really sick of me.”

Following the lead of her husband, Philip Graham, who gave up his career as a software engineer to chase his dream of making high-end microphones under the name Ear Trumpet Labs, McLaughlin left her job as VP of business development for a flight status app and made MusicPortland a reality.

The most visible work that the organization had been doing over the past few years was in connecting people within the Portland music community with one another through monthly networking meetups and last year’s Gear Fest that allowed local equipment manufacturers to showcase their wares. But they’ve also started to wield some substantial political power.

Their MusicPortland Policy Council has successfully lobbied the city to create sixteen Musician Loading Zones throughout the city for artists to safely get their gear into and out of a nearby venue. And McLaughlin and her MusicPortland team are some of the loudest voices crying out against a program to require unreinforced masonry buildings to undergo costly renovations to protect against earthquakes — a move that would have crippled a number of Portland clubs and performance spaces.

Over the past eight months or so, MusicPortland has pivoted to support the cause of social justice in the music scene and to lend a hand to help artists and industry workers survive the pandemic. For the former, the group’s website features an in-depth history of Portland’s racist past and present, and actions to support racial equity in the city. To the latter, MusicPortland has been collecting data on the impact of COVID and engaged in, as McLaughlin puts it, “many, many, many hours of individual case advocacy” for musicians and workers denied unemployment benefits.

“We found out what they did and got all their background documentation and presented that to Senator Merkley’s team,” McLaughlin says. “They had a special accelerated backchannel but it still took sometimes three or four times to get through to them.”

As well, McLaughlin and MusicPortland, along with the Independent Venue Coalition, have been in touch regularly with the governor’s office and the Portland City Council to make sure that music venues were getting their fair share of funds from federal and statewide stimulus packages. The result: $2.5 million, a bigger amount than even the governments of Nashville and Los Angeles doled out to their local performance spaces.

That said, that will likely only help many venues keep their lights on until the end of the year — a serious concern as the pandemic shows no signs of slowing down any time soon. And McLaughlin is starting to worry about the recent turnover in the city council. One of MusicPortland’s biggest supporters, Commissioner Nick Fish, passed away in January, and their other advocate, Commissioner Chloe Eudaly lost her seat in the recent election.

McLaughlin isn’t about to give up the fight, though. Her organization is about to launch a spinoff, MusicPortland Bridge, that will allow them to apply for grants and be a conduit for independent artists to seek out similar funding. They also plan on continuing their focus on issues of racial equity in the music community. And most of all, they want to make sure that those hundreds of artists and workers who don’t have the cultural cachet of The Decemberists or Aminé or Laura Veirs still have a seat at the table.

“Nobody I’ve talked to is like, ‘Shit, I gotta give this up. I’m gonna go work in insurance,’” McLaughlin says. “That, I think, is because we have stood together and gone, ‘We’re many, and we’re mighty. And damn, we’ve made some changes, and we can do more.’”

Drake is taking this Certified Lover Boy thing to its absolute limit. While he’s always kind of leaned into the sensitive heartthrob image he cultivated over the years, the rollout for his upcoming album has included heart-embroidered Nike jackets and a heart shape shaved into his hair. His next move might take the cheese factor to a whole new level though; he recently announced the release of his own line of “Drake-scented” candles in partnership with online fashion boutique Revolve and Better World Fragrance House.

Drake’s offering five scents: Carby Musk, Good Thoughts, Muskoka, Sweeter Tings, and Williamsburg Sleepover. According to Revolve, Drake was listening to roots reggae band Midnite’s Live In Eugene album when he conceived the project and he recommends listening to it the first time fans light one of the candles. Drake and Revolve previewed the candles ahead of the holiday season, and all appear to be sold out at the moment. They’re priced at $48, except for Carby Musk, which is $80.

With Certified Lover Boy due to drop sometime in 2021, Drake is taking it easy and rehabbing his injured knee while continuing to pop up as a hot feature on other artists’ projects. We’ll have to wait until the release of the album to find out how he injured himself, but at least we’ll have something to remember him by until then.

It’s officially December, which means that no one can be told it’s too early to listen to Christmas music. Thankfully, pop musicians have already gotten a head-start on the holiday cheer by offering up some original holiday tunes. Carly Rae Jepsen and the Jonas Brothers shared their Christmas songs several weeks ago, but now, Finneas is throwing his own tune into the mix.

Finneas shared the forlorn ballad “Another Year” today. Over delicate piano keys, Finneas sings of spending the holidays surrounding by loving friends and family.

In a statement alongside the track, Finneas said he actually penned the song last December, but says it has taken on a new meaning in light of the events that have unfolded in 2020. “I wrote this song last Christmas, with a year of uncertainty ahead of us, had I known, anything I know now about how 2020 would go, I don’t think I would have changed a word,” he said.

“Another Year” is the latest in a handful of singles the singer has released as of late. Along with recording the upcoming James Bond theme song “No Time To Die” with Billie Eilish, Finneas has also shared the poignant singles “Where The Poison Is,” “Can’t Wait To Be Dead,” and “What They’ll Say About Us.”

Listen to “Another Year” above.

Because questionable legal moves are his bread and butter these days, Rudy Giuliani has reportedly approached Donald Trump with a request for a “preemptive pardon,” which would effectively shield him charges after the president leaves office. According to two sources for The New York Times, Giuliani floated the idea as recently as last week, and it wasn’t the first time the subject has been broached. As for what future charges Giuliani is attempting to duck is unknown, but a likely scenario is the ongoing investigation into his activities in Ukraine, which ultimately lead to Trump’s impeachment.

While a preemptive pardon is unusual, it has happened before, but in extremely rare and extenuating circumstances. Via the Times:

Such a broad pardon pre-empting any charge or conviction is highly unusual but does have precedent. George Washington pardoned plotters of the Whiskey Rebellion, shielding them from treason prosecutions. In the most famous example, Gerald R. Ford pardoned Richard M. Nixon for all of his actions as president. Jimmy Carter pardoned thousands of American men who illegally avoided the draft for the Vietnam War.

Taking a page from Trump’s playbook, Giuliani denied requesting a pardon and accused the Times of being “#FakeNews” on Twitter. “NYT lies again. Never had the discussion they falsely attribute to an anonymous source,” Giuliani wrote. “Hard to keep up with all their lies.”

Of course, Giuliani securing a pardon from Trump wouldn’t exactly come as a shock. The president recently pardoned his former National Security Advisor Mike Flynn, and in 2017, he pardoned Sheriff Joe Arpaio before he was even sentenced for contempt of court. Like Giuliani, both men are loyal Trump supporters.

(Via New York Times)

Elliot Page, once publicly known as Ellen Page, has announced he is transgender. The announcement makes the Oscar-nominated actor one of the most high-profile celebrities to come out as transgender.

The actor currently stars in Netflix’s “The Umbrella Academy” and has acted in films such as “Juno,” “Inception,” and the “X-Men” franchise.

Page made the announcement on social media where he celebrated the joy of coming out while taking the opportunity to discuss the issues faced by the transgender community.

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“I feel overwhelming gratitude for the incredible people who have supported me along this journey. I can’t begin to express how remarkable it feels to finally love who I am enough to pursue my authentic self,” Page wrote.

“I’ve been endlessly inspired by so many in the trans community,” he continued. “Thank you for your courage, your generosity and ceaselessly working to make this world a more inclusive and compassionate place. I will offer whatever support I can and continue to strive for a more loving and equal society.”

Page’s announcement is powerful because he acknowledges the joy and hope of living as his authentic self while understanding his road will be difficult and that countless transgender people face life-threatening discrimination.

“I love that I am trans. And I love that I am queer. And the more I hold myself close and fully embrace who I am, the more I dream, the more my heart grows and the more I thrive. To all the trans people who deal with harassment, self-loathing, abuse, and the threat of violence every day: I see you, I love you, and I will do everything I can to change this world for the better,” Page continued.

“The truth is, despite feeling profoundly happy right now and knowing how much privilege I carry, I am also scared. I’m scared of the invasiveness, the hate, ‘the jokes,’ and of the violence…” Page wrote.

“The discrimination towards trans people is rife, insidious, and cruel, resulting in horrific consequences,” he continued. “In 2020 alone, it has reported that at least 40 transgender people have been murdered, the majority of which were Black and Latinx trans women.”

Page’s announcement was celebrated on Instagram by his spouse, Emma Portner. The couple married in 2018.

via Emma Portner / Instagram

Page’s pronouns are he/they and he identifies as transgender and non-binary. A non-binary person’s gender identity is neither man nor woman and can be fluid.

The announcement was celebrated by Nick Adams, GLAAD’s Director of Transgender Media. “Elliot Page has given us fantastic characters on-screen, and has been an outspoken advocate for all LGBTQ people,” Adams said in a statement.

“He will now be an inspiration to countless trans and non-binary people,” Adams continued. “All transgender people deserve the chance to be ourselves and to be accepted for who we are. We celebrate the remarkable Elliot Page today.”

Page’s decision to come out is brave and will hopefully broaden the conversation surrounding transgender issues and inspire greater tolerance among mainstream society.

Celebrities like Page are in a unique position to change people’s opinions on controversial matters such as gender. When people are comfortable having you in their homes through the magic of television they are more likely to accept others of the same identity.

Back in the ’90s, Ellen DeGeneres suffered career setbacks and public outrage for coming out as a lesbian. But her visibility was a major factor in turning the tide of public opinion on LGBTQ issues among mainstream Americans.

Hopefully, Page’s announcement can do the same by shining a light on the issues facing transgender individuals and promote their inclusion.