Month: January 2021

After Verzuz kicked off their season with a highly-anticipated matchup between Gucci Mane and Jeezy, they were set to bring things back to the R&B world with a battle between Keyshia Cole and Ashanti. But then Ashanti tested positive for coronavirus on the day of the battle, forcing it to be delayed. A second date was revealed shortly thereafter, but that was also be postponed as the show sought to revert back to its old format of having its participants livestream from separate locations. The second delay came after COVID-19 cases started spiking again, leading the show’s producers to say they wanted to “protect the artists and everyone who works with us in putting the shows together.” Finally, for the third time, Keyshia Cole and Ashanti’s Verzuz battle has a new date.

The R&B battle will commence on Thursday, January 21, just a day after the presidential inauguration, meaning the matchup could serve as a well-needed break from the political world. Verzuz shared the news in a post to their Instagram page, where they dropped a quick message of gratitude to their supporters. “RAIN, SLEET, HAIL, SNOW LET’S GO,” the post’s caption read. “Thank you everyone for being patient with us. We can’t wait for this magical night with Keyshia and Ashanti!” This time around, the two singers will sit from the comfort of their own homes on the livestream as they run through their many classics.

You can check out the flyer above. Tune in on 1/21 at 5pm PST/ 8pm EST to watch Keyshia Cole and Ashanti battle it out.

Last week an army of whipped-up Trump supporters stormed the Capitol, armed with guns and even zip ties (and, on a lighter note, horns), hell-bent on overturning the 2020 election. It didn’t work, and six people died. But some lawmakers, all Republican, are not happy with the modest safety procedures put in place in the wake of the violent insurrection. In fact, they’re throwing epic hissy fits.

As per NBC News, at least six representatives were either seen not complying with the police at checkpoints outside the House or simply complained. They are: Louie Gohmert, of Texas; Steve Stivers, of Ohio; Van Taylor, of Texas; Debbie Lesko, of Arizona, Larry Bucshon, of Indiana, and Lauren Boebert, of Colorado.

While Gohmert gained attention a few weeks back for losing a tooth mid-press conference speech, it’s Boebert who’s the most notorious of the group. Only sworn in last week, she’s made a name for herself by swearing that she wanted to carry a weapon on Capitol Hill. She also made the waves among the metal detector-hating scrum, actually getting into a stand-off with the officers who demanded she forfeit her bag after it set off alarms, as per CNN correspondent Ryan Nobles.

Meanwhile, Lesko simply took to Twitter, railing against what she called “Pelosi’s communist America.”

She then got ratioed.

And so it was that the party of Blue Lives Matter made the lives of the police even more difficult than it is.

(Via NBC News)

Due to injuries and players excluded by the NBA’s health and safety protocols, the Philadelphia 76ers are operating in short-handed fashion. That was evident in a blowout loss to the Atlanta Hawks on Monday evening and, even with 24 points and 10 rebounds in the first half against Atlanta, there was only so much Joel Embiid could do to prevent a lopsided result. On the second night of a back-to-back, the 76ers returned home to face the Miami Heat and, despite a limited roster once again, Embiid was able to put on quite the show in leading Philadelphia to what became an overtime victory.

For the most part, the first half was standard operating procedure for Embiid. The All-NBA center produced ten points and nine rebounds against a Heat team without Jimmy Butler, Bam Adebayo, Goran Dragic, and others, but Philadelphia trailed by a 63-55 margin.

After halftime, however, Embiid decided to take the game over. As part of a 20-point onslaught in the third quarter, he threw down a big dunk and put the Heat in a spin cycle with movements that a player of his size should not be able to execute.

Later, he was even initiating the offense as something of a “point center.”

All told, Embiid made all eight of his field goal attempts and all four of his free throw attempts in the third period, throwing in three rebounds and three assists for good measure. When the dust settled, the Sixers took a one-point lead, but there was still work to do. In fact, Philadelphia needed Embiid to tie the game at the end of regulation, and the big man obliged with a pretty jumper.

Then, in the extra frame, Embiid continued to be the most dominating force on the court. On the offensive end, he produced a circus layup to put Philadelphia in front.

He also got back to basics with ridiculous rim protection at a pivotal moment.

Ultimately, Embiid finished the night with 45 points on 16-for-23 shooting and 13-for-13 from the free throw line, and Philadelphia needed every bit of his contributions to get the win. He also added 16 rebounds, five steals, four assists, and a blocked shot in 39 minutes, and it was truly a full-fledged display of his brilliance. There is something to be said for the weirdness of an overtime game that featured only 16 total players taking the floor and limited rosters on both sides, but Embiid stole the show and it was a showing to remember.

As he awaits word from the NBA league office over footage of him at a birthday celebration without a mask and remains away from the Brooklyn Nets due to “personal reasons,” Kyrie Irving was spotted on a Zoom call to launch the campaign of progressive New York City district attorney candidate Tahanie Aboushi.

A screenshot of Irving along with former gubernatorial candidate and Sex and the City star Cynthia Nixon was posted to Twitter by Waleed Shahid, the spokesperson for the Democratic political action committee Justice Democrats.

It begs noting that Irving is in the midst of an absence from the Nets, one which includes an investigation into him possibly breaking the NBA’s COVID-19 protocols, and that this tweet hit the timeline as the Nets were playing the Denver Nuggets, so even while his intentions are noble and this was not meant to be something that went public, it’s not hard to foresee this becoming the latest whirlwind involving him. Still, as a person who has long been involved in politics ranging from Native American issues to supporting the women of the WNBA who stepped aside from their Bubble season last summer, it’s no surprise to see Irving engage in local activism this way and to support a woman of color for a position of power.

Republican politicians who helped stoke last week’s failed MAGA coup may be trying to return to normal, but it’s clear that’s not happening. There continue to be impassioned calls for congresspeople like Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley, Matt Gaetz, Jim Jordan and more to resign — or, failing that, be expelled. (Or at least return their Hallmark dough.) And now they can add this to their list of worries: Disney has joined the growing list of companies who now refuse to make political contributions to those who spread cries of baseless voter fraud and whipped up Trump supporters into a violent and deadly mob.

This comes from Bloomberg, who reports that the planet’s largest entertainment company will not be giving money to any of the many lawmakers who voted to reject last week’s certification of the Electoral College votes. They join Wal-Mart, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Coca-Cola Co., General Motors Co., and more.

“The insurrection at our nation’s Capitol was a direct assault on one of our country’s most revered tenets: the peaceful transition of power,” Disney saidin a released statement. “In the immediate aftermath of that appalling siege, members of Congress had an opportunity to unite — an opportunity that some sadly refused to embrace.”

But there’s more. Journalist Judd Legum dug up some intel on the public record, namely that last year Disney donated money to Senator Rick Scott, who voted against the certification, as well as Hawley, who, along with Ted Cruz, has become something like the public face of the disgraced band of congress people. Hawley also lost a book deal due to his involvement in the failed coup, then got trashed after trying to make himself the victim of all that’s transpired. Then again, unlike Matt Gaetz and Jim Jordan, at least he didn’t get compared to MTV’s most notoriously dumb duo.

(Via Bloomberg)

Most people were already trying to write 2020 off as an abysmal year before the news hit on New Year’s Eve that one of hip-hop’s legends, MF Doom, had passed away a few months earlier. Rappers, producers, songwriters and journalist alike mourned the passing of such an iconic force, and the underground artist’s catalogue was celebrated by everyone from TDE’s Reason sampling a track, to Yasiin Bey (formerly Mos Def) sharing a cover.

And though rappers may be in the unique position to perform or incorporate Doom’s songs out of respect to the late rapper, the main way most fans have been celebrating his life’s work is by listening to it. In fact, people have been listening to MF Doom’s music so much in the wake of his passing that Billboard reports his streams increased 870% since then. Almost a 900% increase by listeners is a massive gain, and it’s such a shame that it was a tragedy that spurred this. The data showed that during the week of December 31 through January 5, listens rose to 25.4 million streams, a huge leap over the 2.6 million streams he achieved the week before the news broke.

One of Doom’s side projects, Madvillain, also entered the Billboard 200 with the album Madvillainy appearing at No. 73. Streaming 11,000 equivalent album units, that number is

Concurrently, one MF Doom-related release re-enters the Billboard 200 dated Jan. 16, which covered the tracking week of Jan. 1-7. Madvillain’s Madvillainy appears at No. 73 with 11,000 equivalent album units, a new peak for the album and its first Billboard 200 appearance since reaching No. 117 in September 2014.

Rap Snacks has provided been putting the genre’s most popular faces on its bags since its formation in 1994. After the chip line was revamped and relaunched in 2016, Cardi B, Migos, Notorious B.I.G., Lil Yachty, and others received their own flavors. Now Rick Ross is joining them.

Starting this summer, fans will be able to find Rick Ross’ Sweet Chilli Lemon Pepper flavored potato chips in stores. The announcement was made on Tuesday, with the brand also revealing plans of a multi-product brand partnership with the Florida rapper. James Lindsay, the CEO of Rap Snacks, spoke about the new partnership in a statement, saying, “Rick Ross’ business acumen and contribution to the culture is the perfect recipe for what we’re developing next, as we introduce new flavor profiles and innovative products.”

Ross shared the news with his Instagram followers in a post that showed the design of his new Rap Snacks flavor and a caption that read in part, “Rozy Drizzle hitting the streets ASAP.” He also has a new album from him arriving later this year, called Richer Than Ever Before, which will serve as the follow up to Port Of Miami 2, which Ross released in 2019 to celebrate the 10th anniversary of his debut album, Port Of Miami.

The last week has seen the United States dealing with various forms of fallout from numbers of Trump supporters storming the United States Capitol with the hopes of, among other things, overturning the 2020 presidential election. Politically, this has meant a looming attempt by the House of Representatives to impeach the president for the second time, but beyond that, there have been ongoing efforts to identify those who participated in the whole thing.

Of course, this is a gigantic undertaking, so while it’s a necessary part of this whole process, that does not mean it will be easy. The good news is that some of the people made it easy for them, which was apparently the case with Olympic swimmer Klete Keller.

According to SwimSwam, Keller, who won five medals as an Olympian for the United States in his career, was captured as appearing in the Capitol Rotunda in videos of the riot last week. If you look at the 21 second mark of the following video, you can see a tall, maskless man in what appears to be a U.S. Olympic jacket.

SwimSwam did some digging and cited “at least a dozen people within the sport” who identified the man as Keller. There is no word on whether he’s confirmed it is him, because he does not have social media accounts, although SwimSwam noted that he was a vocal Trump supporter. In his Olympic career, Keller won golds as a member of the United States’ 4 x 200 freestyle relay team in 2004 and 2008, along with a silver in that race in 2000. His individual medals came in 2000 and 2004 in the 400 meter freestyle.

The relationship between outgoing president Donald Trump and soon-to-be-ex-vice president Mike Pence has always seemed like a peculiar one, to put it mildly. The former is a brash, seedy trash mouth who had to pay off a porn star with he once slept. The latter is a deeply religious old school conservative who has barely said a public word in four years. Pence has often joked about their odd couple pairing, but any tension festering over a long administration finally came to a head in the last week, according to The New York Times.

What prompted the rift? A mob of MAGA rioters whipped up by Trump’s lies about voter fraud storming the Capitol during a joint session of congress, with some hoping to actually hang Pence, didn’t help. As the Times put it, “Evacuated to the basement, Mr. Pence huddled for hours while Mr. Trump tweeted out an attack on him rather than call to check on his safety.”

It was then, the Times reports, that Pence had a decision to make: do Trump’s bidding and overturn an about-to-be-ratified election, naming Joe Biden the 46th president, or do the right thing. Pence did the right thing.

Mind you, it seems Pence was planning to do the right thing — that is, ratifying the election for Biden — anyway, having reportedly reminded the president the night before that he couldn’t overturn the results anyway. But surely his decision wasn’t helped by a president who had all but abandoned him to men with zip ties and pitchforks, decked out in what one commentator memorably put it “Chewbacca bikini.”

And there was one more detail, which surely made his decision not to disobey the will of the people all the easier. As Pence was headed over to the Capitol, Trump called him one last time. “You can either go down in history as a patriot,” Mr. Trump allegedy told him, “or you can go down in history as a p*ssy.”

Perhaps Trump’s swearing finally got to Pence — or simply fearing for his life as the president’s base raised some Cain.

(Via The New York Times)

YFN Lucci’s 2020 ended on a high note, with the release of Wish Me Well 3. However, according to Atlanta police, he’s been up to more than releasing records. Lucci, born Rayshawn Bennett, is wanted on a murder charge in connection with the shooting of 28-year-old James Adams. The news was first reported by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and confirmed to Variety by Atlanta police.

Adams was discovered with a gunshot wound to his head on December 10 and later died as a result of his injuries. According to a statement given to the AJC by Atlanta police spokesperson Sgt. John Chafee, a second gunshot victim arrived at a nearby fire station on the same night. Luckily, the second victim survived their injuries. It was later determined by investigators that the two incidents were connected. A police report reveals that Adams was shot on the 900 block of Dimmock Street in Atlanta before his body was dropped off on the 900 block of Peeples Street. Multiple shell casings were also discovered at the former scene.

According to an Atlanta police news release, Bennett also faces additional charges of aggravated assault, participating in criminal street gang activity, and weapons charges. Two other individuals, Ra’von Boyd, 23, and Leroy Pitts, 17, were arrested in Miami on similar charges for allegedly participating in the shooting. Atlanta police are offering a $5,000 reward for information that leads to the rapper’s arrest.

(via Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

YFN Lucci is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.