Month: January 2021

Andrew Wiggins has never managed to live up to the hype that surrounded him as a prospect coming into the 2014 NBA Draft when he was taken first overall. Wiggins was, briefly, a member of the Cleveland Cavaliers before being traded that same summer to the Minnesota Timberwolves as a centerpiece of the Kevin Love trade after LeBron James returned home.

In the years since, Wiggins has been solid if unspectacular, but most importantly, even when paired with fellow top pick Karl-Anthony Towns, the winning never came consistently in Minnesota. Wiggins was dealt to the Warriors last season in the D’Angelo Russell trade, partially as a reclamation project and partially as a salary dump from Minnesota. Thus far this season, Wiggins isn’t producing at the raw level he did in his best years in Minnesota, averaging 17.8 points, 5.1 rebounds, and 2.2 assists per game, but his efficiency has seen a jump — most notably shooting 40 percent from three — and he’s embraced his role as a secondary weapon alongside Stephen Curry.

On Monday night, Wiggins had 23 points in a win over his old squad, and after the game was asked about the emotions of facing Minnesota as well as why he seems to feel so comfortable in Golden State — during which he illuminated some things he seemed to think were differences in the team cultures.

Wiggins citing the Warriors “winning culture” over and over, as well as noting how they’re “organized” and “straightforward” with players certainly seemed like a bit more than just fawning praise on his new club. It also seemed to be a point about the problems the Timberwolves have as an organization, and why they haven’t been able to establish a winning culture of their own. While many saw this as Wiggins burying his old team, the fact of the matter is, he’s not wrong. These aren’t new critiques of what goes on in Minnesota, and while Wiggins was once considered part of the problem there, we have heard all of these things before when Jimmy Butler was pushing his way out.

It surely won’t endear Wiggins to the Wolves fanbase, but it’s also pretty much an accurate assessment of the uphill climb still facing Minnesota to try and establish an identity and a culture. For Wiggins, he’s gotten to see what that looks like now in Golden State, where roles are more defined and there’s an expectation of accountability across the board, including from players in the locker room. It’s clear that’s left an imprint on Wiggins and has him excited about his new digs.

Chris Hemsworth shared a photo commemorating the first day of shooting on the highly anticipated Thor: Love and Thunder, but the actor did more than just build up hype for his latest Marvel adventure. In a heartfelt post, Hemsworth endorsed efforts to change the date for “Australia Day,” which coincided with the start of filming on Love and Thunder. The national holiday was enacted in 1994 but has faced significant pushback from indigenous communities who have dubbed the event “Invasion Day” due to its celebration of the arrival of the British First Fleet. Using his Marvel clout, Hemsworth endorsed efforts to find a day that all Australians can join together and honor their country without condoning the evils of colonization. Via Instagram:

Many see January 26th as a date signifying the beginning of dispossession, disease epidemics, frontier violence, destruction of culture, exploitation, abuse, separation of families and subjection to policies of extreme social control. Let’s begin the healing and stand together in unity and support with our First Nations people with solidarity and compassion. Let’s find a date where all Australians can celebrate this beautiful country together.

In the photos shared the Thor star, he’s joined by Love and Thunder director Taika Waititi as the two take place in a “Welcome to Country” ceremony performed by aboriginal dancers.

You can see Hemsworth’s Instagram post below:

Chris Pratt is also in country to reprise his role of Star-Lord and keep his hilarious rivalry with Thor going following the events of Avengers: Endgame, and there are reports that even more cast members from the Guardians of the Galaxy are quarantining in Australia to shoot cameos for the film.

(Via Chris Hemsworth on Instagram)

No one is enjoying the arrival of the Biden administration more than Dr. Anthony Fauci.

After a year of serving under Trump’s regime, Fauci’s once again making press appearances where he seems practically giddy at the thought of a Commander-in-Chief who believes in science and values facts over propaganda. The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has advised seven U.S. presidents during various health crises, but now, with Trump out of office, he’s getting candid about how difficult it was to manage the COVID-19 outbreak under the reality TV star’s administration.

Fauci, who received death threats from Trump supporters and seemed to constantly be in President Trump’s crosshairs for refusing to downplay the pandemic, told the New York Times that his “anxiety” started to escalate when New York City was hit with an onslaught of cases and Trump wanted to downplay the numbers:

“It coincided very much with the rapid escalation of cases in the northeastern part of the country, particularly the New York metropolitan area. I would try to express the gravity of the situation, and the response of the president was always leaning toward, ‘Well, it’s not that bad, right?’ And I would say, ‘Yes, it is that bad.’ It was almost a reflex response, trying to coax you to minimize it. Not saying, ‘I want you to minimize it,’ but, ‘Oh, really, was it that bad?”

Fauci began to grow even more concerned over Trump’s tendency to believe anecdotes from his business partners rather than the scientifically-proven data Fauci was giving him:

“The other thing that made me really concerned was, it was clear that he was getting input from people who were calling him up, I don’t know who, people he knew from business, saying, ‘Hey, I heard about this drug, isn’t it great?’ or, ‘Boy, this convalescent plasma is really phenomenal’ And I would try to, you know, calmly explain that you find out if something works by doing an appropriate clinical trial; you get the information, you give it a peer review. And he’d say, ‘Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, this stuff really works.’ He would take just as seriously their opinion — based on no data, just anecdote — that something might really be important. It wasn’t just hydroxychloroquine, it was a variety of alternative-medicine-type approaches. It was always, ‘A guy called me up, a friend of mine from blah, blah, blah.’ That’s when my anxiety started to escalate.”

Basically, Trump sounds like everyone’s conservative suburban aunt who spends too much time on Facebook and WebMD, but instead of just spewing eye-rolling nonsense over your family’s monthly Zoom call, he was telling millions of American’s to inject bleach into their veins or to start taking drugs with dangerous side effects. That’s when Fauci knew things were bad.

“I just said, ‘Oh my goodness gracious.’ I could just see what’s going to happen,” Fauci told CNN about Trump’s suggestion that disinfectant might fight the virus. “You’re going to have people who hear that from the President and they’re going to start doing dangerous and foolish things, which is the reason why, immediately, those of us who were not there said, ‘This is something you should not do.’ Be very explicit. The (US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) came out, I think, the next day and put in one of their publications, ‘Do not do this.’”

The good news? Now that Biden is in office, things seem to be looking up for Fauci and the virology experts that work for him. He’s already admitted how “liberating” it’s been to give White House press briefings that focus solely on facts and data, and the new administration seems intent on ramping up the government’s response to the pandemic, which continues to ravage nearly every part of the country.

We’ve all been suffering, but we’ll give Fauci this win. He deserves it.

(Via New York Times & CNN)

Considering last year was a curveball that no one expected, 2021 seems destined to deliver double the music we hoped for in 2020. That is, if pop stars who are happy to do it themselves have anything to do with it. Yes, pop has traditionally been the genre of sold-out stadium shows and producer-packed studio sessions, but with the rise of laptop production, TikTok fanbases, and an eager young audience stuck at home and looking for distraction, bedroom pop is back in a big way. And just because it was made at home doesn’t mean some of these stars aren’t headed for massive stages, either.

As we all navigate the transition between pandemic life and post-quarantine bliss, there’s going to be a sweet spot for artists who aren’t quite supernovas but were never meant for the world of indie after all. Expect the barriers that Billie Eilish broke down to change a lot about what we expect from female stars, whether that’s how they sing or how they look, act, and dress, and there’s lots of other changes on the horizon, too. Like self-correction for diversity and inclusion of all genders and races, and a creeping hint of rock and other forgotten sounds making their way back into the mainstream. So whether they’re collaborating with established icons, blowing up on social media, or changing the way we think about a trip to the DMV, here are our picks for rising pop stars to watch this year.

Olivia Rodrigo

Olivia Rodrigo barely needs an introduction anymore. In just a few short weeks, Olivia Rodrigo went from a well-known Disney+ actress in High School Musical: The Series: The Musical to one of the most exciting voices pop music has heard in years. With her debut single “Drivers License,” Olivia broke Spotify records, earned co-signs from other massive stars like Taylor Swift, Halsey, and Cardi B, and ignited the kind of music industry gossip that only fuels the fire when it comes to new stars. With her first EP slated for sometime in the next few months and a dedicated following on TikTok that’s growing by the minute, Olivia isn’t just a rising pop star to watch, she’s the one to watch.

Jessia

This Vancouver songwriter who is breaking out in a big way thanks to streaming, and thanks to the TikTok-first snippet of a frustrated declaration “I’m Not Pretty,” that rejected the impossible beauty standards women are expected to conform to. When Jessia turned those viral snippets into a full-length track, it became the kind of hit that turned heads at Spotify. Spotify Canada senior editor Gregg Henderson told Hits Daily Double that his team had a close eye on the unsigned artist. “We were instantly blown away by ‘I’m Not Pretty,’” he said. “We added it to various Canadian pop playlists upon the song’s release on 1/8 and quickly saw that it was reacting with fans and had big potential. We worked closely with our Global Hits team, who then added the song to our biggest playlist, Today’s Top Hits, as well as putting Jessia on the cover of Pop Rising. We always strive to spotlight local emerging artists on a global level and are excited for fans around the world to discover Jessia through Spotify’s worldwide reach.”

Ashnikko

What if Suicide Squad was a pop star? Then it would be Ashnikko, a twenty-something musician raised in North Carolina on a steady diet of country music, Slipknot, and M.I.A who moved to Estonia with her family during high school. Speaking of Suicide Squad, one of Ashnikko’s first big industry looks was when a song she co-wrote for Doja Cat, “Boss Bitch,” was included on the all-female Birds Of Prey soundtrack in early 2020. Before that, she was going viral on her own in with the Yung Baby Tate-featuring standout single “Stupid” in 2019, while opening for Danny Brown and appearing on Brooke Candy’s debut album, Sexorcism. More recently, she collaborated with Grimes on the bubblegum electroclash track “Cry,” which appears on her early January 2021 released Demidevil. That project also includes Kelis and Princess Nokia, if you needed any more convincing. With her colorful, Tokyo-influenced hair, raunchy rap lyrics, and lots of bubblegum giggling, Ashnikko is poised to be pop’s next anti-heroine. Deal with it.

Ingrid Andress

Country’s latest crossover star is a Colorado songwriting sensation who took Nashville by storm — and didn’t stop there. Her breakout hit “More Hearts Than Mine” went to No. 3 on the Country Airplay charts and also hit No. 30 on the Billboard Hot 100, establishing it as the kind brilliant story-song that supersedes genre. Andress’ Atlantic records debut, Lady Like, went on to break streaming records as the biggest debut by a female country artist, doubling down on her potential as the next country artist to break into the mainstream, walking in the footsteps of other pop-leaning artists like Kacey Musgraves and Taylor Swift. And when your name is getting mentioned in that company, who cares about genre anyway?

Joshua Bassett

One of the after-effects of Olivia Rodrigo’s sensational songwriting is that the person the song is rumored to be about — her High School Musical: The Musical: The Series co-star, Joshua Bassett — has been drawn into the spotlight as well. Not like he wanted to be anywhere else! Bassett is now rumored to be dating another Disney+ star, Sabrina Carpenter, but the gist of his own 2021 single is that somebody isn’t telling the truth about him. “Lie Lie Lie” might not totally make sense as a response to “Drivers License” (and let’s hope for his sake that it’s not because none of us can look into Olivia’s misty eyes and believe she’s lying), but it’s got a killer hook and the kind of bouncy, golden melody that is working for male pop stars these days. If he can give us a couple more tracks as good as this new one, Josh is well on his way to a solo career of his own.

Jensen McRae

Jensen McRae has been on the radar of LA tastemakers for quite some time now, even is she’s not big enough to have her own Wikipedia page yet. But if she did, the first entry would probably be this uber viral “cover” she made of a Phoebe Bridgers song summing up a very 2021 experience of hooking up in a car, in line to get a COVID-19 vaccine at Dodger Stadium. Please don’t stop at the hilarious social media content though, McRae’s own original music is just as stellar, particularly the standout “Wolves,” which has over a million streams on Spotify since release last spring. The song is about the psychic violence women face at the hands of men, a chilling reflection set against a beautiful melody, with devastating lines like “I was 19, still fun at parties.” McRae’s songwriting doesn’t just evoke Phoebe, but elements of other greats — the pathos of Mitski, the deadpan blues of Soccer Mommy — to let us into her universe. If I had a label in 2021, this is who I would sign. She’s said on Twitter that an album is coming this year, so keep an eye out for more music.

Sasha Sloan

At 19, Sasha Sloan moved to Los Angeles to be a songwriter. A few short years later, she was on national television performing “Older” on The Late Show With Steven Colbert. Working with DJs like Kaskade and Kygo as a featured vocalist, Sloan co-wrote tracks for Camila Cabello (“OMG” and “Never Be The Same”) and worked with Charli XCX (“Track 10” off Pop 2), before releasing her own debut EPs Sad Girl and Loser in 2018, and disrupted the self-deprecating theme in 2019 with a third EP called Self Portrait. With one foot in the EDM world and another in the realm of soft songwriting, on her debut full-length, last year’s Only Child, she finally began to meld the two, bringing whispers of a drop and other energy-shifting elements to sparse, acoustic tracks. Recently, she’s collaborated with Charlie Puth on a remix of Only Child‘s cheeky standout “Is It Just Me?” and the vocal chemistry between these two might finally land Sloan a hit of her own. In the meantime, if you’re looking for 2020 gems that got overlooked, her debut is definitely one — and it’s more than likely the follow-up will be even better.

Alaina Castillo

When I interviewed Alaina Castillo last March, she was already becoming a global superstar off the strength of her moody, mesmerizing songs, influenced by hymns and Latin music. Hearing Alaina’s voice and her penchant for mixing R&B with both trap and vocal runs, it’s impossible not to see her as the natural heir to Ariana Grande’s throne, and she’s just continued building her in the last year, releasing her mostly acoustic EP The Voicenotes in English and Spanish, Mensajes De Voz, and slowly tackling more adult themes in more recent singles. Plenty of emerging artists decided to put most of their plans on hold last year, and odds are Alaina will have a lot of new music dropping in 2021.

Holly Humberstone

Nobody does haunting like the British, and Holly Humberstone nails bluesy, end-of-the-road ballads like Adele before her, with a touch of Lorde’s itchy midnight percussion thrown in for good measure. Though Humberstone came up performing during intermissions at Lewis Capaldi shows, she’s heads and shoulders above him in both material and delivery, and her debut EP, last summer’s Falling Asleep At The Wheel, hit like a ton of glass bricks. The songs are both blocky and iridescent, lightweight but strong enough to build a career upon. “Overkill” has enough indie rock in it to perk up fans who have been missing guitars in the pop world, but my enthusiasm for the title track, “Falling Asleep At The Wheel,” hasn’t diminished at all since I heard it last August. Add in a Radiohead cover, and a self-deprecating Instagram presence, and Holly’s future success is all but clinched. While I hope we get more new music from her soon, I have a feeling this is the kind of artist who will make us all remember why live shows are so essential to this business.

Remi Wolf

Last summer, Remi Wolf’s “Monte Carlo” became an inescapable earworm — a song about driving around and flexing for no reason was the perfect soundtrack for a time when most people had little to do but drive around. Game recognize game, and fellow high-pitched, glitterati-pop connoisseur Tune-Yards hopped on a remix to show her appreciation for the song’s brilliance. With a history as a former American Idol contestant, a remix of her track “Hello Hello Hello” appearing in an iPhone commercial, and with her latest EP, I’m Allergic To Dogs! released through Island Records, it’s only a matter of time until Remi is a household name. And I’m looking forward to plenty more I Love Lucy references in her subsequent hits.

Claud (Formerly Toast)

Endorsed by Phoebe Bridgers and friends with Clairo, what more does a rising indie songwriter need? How about dreamy hooks, conversational verses, and a vulnerability that so many artists try to reach but never really achieve? Fans of King Princess will love these sad subjects done up in sparkling pop melodies, and the chance to hear from a queer artist grappling with issues of identity, isolation, rejection, and, eventually, self-sufficiency. Their debut album Super Monster is the first release on Bridgers’ new label imprint, Saddest Factory Records, and is already shaping up to be one of 2021’s early gems. Look for it dropping in mid-February, right before Valentine’s Day, and get used to hearing about Claud Mintz — their unassuming songwriting just grows and grows with every listen.

Tate McRae

It’s going to be impossible to talk about incoming pop stars for a few years without mentioning Billie Eilish, and Tate McRae is the entry on this list that is the most directly connected to Billie and her crew. The 17-year-old Canadian star has been in the entertainment industry for years now, dancing on Justin Bieber’s Purpose tour, appearing on So You Think You Can Dance (and placing third!) at the tender age of 12, all while populating her own Youtube channel with dance videos and songs since 2011. One of those songs, “One Day,” broke out in a big way in 2017, and eventually led to RCA Records signing her in 2019. She released the All the Things I Never Said EP in late 2019, featuring lead single “Tear Myself Apart,” co-written with Billie and Finneas. But things are moving so fast for Tate now that her 2020 material — even the TikTok hit “You Broke Me First” — is already being eclipsed by her latest material, namely “Rubberband,” which only came out five days ago and already hit well over a million views. Since Tate came up as a dancer first, expect that to tie into her songwriting and music videos in a way that sets her apart from most modern pop stars.

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

After the cast of Stranger Things received breakout success for their roles in the popular Netflix series, many of them went on to release music. Joe Keery, who portrays Steve Harrington in the show, is currently making music under the moniker Djo and is a former member of Post Animal. Maya Hawke, who portrays Robin, released her debut album Blush last year. And after his previous band Calpurnia broke up, Finn Wolfhard (aka Mike Wheeler on Stranger Things) has been releasing music with his childhood friend under the band name The Aubreys.

The Aubreys released their debut EP Soda & Pie back in 2020, but it didn’t take long for them to share even more playful tunes. They teamed up with indie band Lunar Vacation earlier this month for the chilled-out track “No Offerings” and they’ve now returned with a cutesy video.

Speaking about the visual’s creation, Wolfhard, who edited the animation, described its creation process:

“We were looking for a way to do a video for the song without being in the same room all together. So I did some research on animated videos in the public domain. I found this video, and thought it was really great. Clay Frankel of the band Twin Peaks was the person to tell me to invert the colors and make it look trippy and weird to make it a little more interesting. I’m excited for people to see it!”

Watch The Aubreys’ “No Offerings” video above.

LA’s Cecil Hotel is an ominous place for historically established reasons, all of which receive the spotlight in Netflix’s upcoming true crime series, Crime Scene: The Vanishing At The Cecil Hotel. The project hails from Ted Bundy-obsessed director Joe Berlinger — he directed Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile starring Zac Efron as Ted Bundy and created Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes — who’s now tackling a different and also sinister mythology. His new project hopes to launch a documentary franchise that will dive into mysteries surrounding locations where infamous crimes took place. In this first season, the Cecil Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles gets profiled for its many untimely deaths and being a refuge of sorts for serial killers (including Richard Ramirez, who recently got the deep dive treatment in Netflix’s Night Stalker).

In particular, this series digs into the 2013 disappearance of a college student, Elisa Lam, at the notorious building, which is surrounded by Skid Row. Internet sleuths mobilized and stirred up a media frenzy, and what’s even more chilling is that this is only one of the hotel’s countless sinister happenings over the years. From the synopsis:

For nearly a century the Cecil Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles has been linked to some of the city’s most notorious activity, from untimely deaths to housing serial killers. In 2013 college student Elisa Lam was staying at the Cecil when she vanished, igniting a media frenzy and mobilizing a global community of internet sleuths eager to solve the case. Lam’s disappearance, the latest chapter in the hotel’s complex history, offers a chilling and captivating lens into one of LA’s most nefarious settings.

Crime Scene: The Vanishing At The Cecil Hotel streams on February 10.

When Snoop Dogg expressed his concerns about Cardi B’s “WAP” lyrics, he was rightfully called out by fans for evoking a double standard that has persisted in hip-hop and society as a whole for far too long. However, judging from a recent interview Snoop gave to Fatman Scoop, it wasn’t motivated by maliciousness but rather it possibly stemmed from his own experiences in changing his lyrics after realizing the power of his words in the wake of his 1993 murder case.

As he explained during the stream, “On my second album, Tha Doggfather, when I beat my murder case, I redirected my pen to write life because I felt like I had wrote death all up until that point.” This was seen most strongly in his 1993 single “Murder Was The Case,” which preceded his actually being charged with murder when he was accused of committing a drive-by on a rival gang member alongside his bodyguard.

“Around that time, me, Tupac, Biggie, [Ice] Cube—all of the rappers that was rapping around that time, we was writing what we was living,” he elaborated. Some of us was writing life, and some of us was writing death, but that’s what we was living.” He says switching up his style cost him fans but that he was willing to accept the loss if it meant turning his career around.

““When I started writing Tha Doggfather, I lost a lot of fans, I lost a lot of homies, because they wanted me to keep it gangsta after beating the murder case,” he said. “They wanted me to glamorize and glorify, but I was like, somebody’s life was lost. My life was changed. This is a real situation.”

Snoop not only turned around his lyrics but his life as well, becoming more of a role model and using his positive influence to make more of a difference, including in getting Death Row Records co-founder Michael “Harry-O” Harris pardoned after almost 30 years in prison.

Watch Snoop’s interview with Fatman Scoop below.

Jake Paul tried valiantly to goad Conor McGregor into a boxing match over the past few months, but after McGregor’s loss to Dustin Poirier — and with McGregor looking for his next boxing fight to be with Manny Pacquiao — the YouTube star turned boxer has found another former UFC fighter to step in the ring with him.

ESPN’s Ariel Helwani reported on Tuesday morning that recently retired Ben Askren has agreed to fight Paul on Triller Fight Club pay-per-view on April 17, with a card that, much like the Mike Tyson-Roy Jones Jr. card from late last year, will feature a mixture of celebrity fights and actual fighters from boxing and MMA. It will be an 8-round fight with the anticipated weight class being 185-190 pounds — which isn’t a real boxing weight class, but, then again, that’s never stopped Paul before. Paul, of course, gained more notoriety for his knockout of Nate Robinson on the Tyson-Jones Jr. undercard, and has decided after two bouts against non-fighters he’s ready to take on the real thing.

As for Askren, he retired in late 2019 after two consecutive losses, citing a hip injury among other things, but UFC allowed him to take this fight despite remaining under contract. Askren told Helwani that he plans on putting Paul’s boxing “dreams to an end,” in this fight.

“I know Jake Paul is enjoying pretending he is a fighter,” Askren said. “I think on April 17 he is going to have a rude awakening to what being a fighter is really like. Jake has led a privileged life and doesn’t really know what the meaning of being a fighter is. I’m going to put his dreams to an end.”

The full card will be unveiled in the coming weeks, and given Paul’s status as a villain you can be sure plenty will tune in hoping to see Askren come through on his promise to deliver a rude awakening.

The vaccination effort is ramping up in states across the country and soon, there will need to be large-scale vaccination centers. That’s where the live music industry comes in. In a recent letter penned to Joe Biden, venue organizations and associations across the country offered their locations and services as vaccination centers in the coming months.

Twelve live entertainment organizations, including Live Nation and the National Independent Venue Association (NIVA), wrote Biden to say they share his “vision of expedient, equitable, and widespread vaccine distribution.” Since the live music industry is currently shut down, venues have offered their empty spaces, unemployed staff, and expertise in crowd control to assist vaccinations:

“Dear Mr. President, Congratulations to you and Vice President Harris on an inauguration signifying the unity and hope necessary to move America forward. As you set about achieving the ambitious goal of vaccinating 100 million Americans in 100 days, we wish to offer the full support and resources of the live event industry. We share your vision of expedient, equitable, and widespread vaccine distribution. It is our duty, as businesses rooted in communities across the nation, to do our part to set America on a positive path during this time of crisis. We stand ready to work with Federal and State governments to save lives and get America back to work and school.

We represent businesses, workers and entertainers that make up the majority of the live event industry. While we have been effectively shuttered by the pandemic, we have vast resources that, if fully utilized, could provide invaluable mechanisms in our country’s vaccine distribution. In fact because we are shuttered, we are able to offer the full weight of our industry to support vaccine distribution beginning immediately.

We are here to help. In fact, many venues are already working on the State and Local level to implement vaccine programs. Our industry has thousands of venues throughout America that are under mandated closures and sitting empty. Event venues make ideal community vaccination sites: they are located in most urban, suburban and rural communities, often near transit lines and with easy access to parking. Our interiors are clear span with bright work lights and empty standard refrigeration systems. Due to the nature of our business, our buildings and workforce are accustomed to patron queuing and crowd management.”

The letter continued to say that venues are the “best prepared, best equipped” to handle the vaccination effort:

“Live events is one of the best prepared, best equipped, most experienced industries in America to manage and control large crowds in a rapid, organized fashion. Moving people in, out, and around a public gathering space swiftly and safely is the foundation of our industry. Additionally, our familiarity using ticketing systems for advanced notification, timed entry and crowd management can greatly improve patient experience before and during vaccination as well as on-site management. There are several thousand companies in the live event industry which own the equipment and infrastructure required to build vaccination sites. An estimated 95% of live events industry businesses and workers have lost nearly 100% of their revenue, and are ready and willing to get to work immediately. These organizations can design, deliver, and manage the infrastructure as well as the people needed to staff them.”

In a statement attached to the letter, board President of NIVA Dayna Frank said: “Since the pandemic shuttered our industry almost a year ago, our buildings and our co-workers have been paused, unutilized, and struggling. These vaccines are our best chance at putting COVID-19 behind us, and our experiences organizing events and managing crowds now put us in the unique position of being the best prepared and most qualified industry to support the vaccination effort and get this country on the road to recovery.”

Read the full letter here.

Oh, this has been a long past year since the U.S. officially detected its first COVID-19 case. Last March, a bizarre twist came from Jared Leto, who revealed on social media that he was probably one of the last people to know that the virus had been declared a pandemic. He had recounted how he emerged from a “silent meditation” retreat to find that the world had essentially shut down. While speaking with Jimmy Kimmel (to promote The Little Things, a crime drama that will stream on HBO Max), the Oscar winner and rocker reflected more upon his stark reentry to Los Angeles.

As Leto told it, the retreat was literally designed to be a silent affair, which lasted about two weeks. No TVs or phones were in use, but apparently, the teachers were aware of what was happening and didn’t wish to disturb the attendees’ experiences. The My So-Called Life actor didn’t even know what was happening until he’d almost arrived home because he purposely didn’t turn on his phone to enjoy a peaceful, zen-like drive to civilization. As it turns out, two weeks can change the world:

“When I went away, there were about 150 cases. And just in that short amount of time, when I came out, there was a shutdown, a state of emergency and the whole world had changed… The idea is that you go away, you get rid of your phone, you get rid of distractions, you get rid of everything and you just meditate… But when we were in there, they didn’t tell us.”

Leto then remarked that his “great tool to deal with stress and things and life” had taken a “shocking” twist because no one could have truly prepared for the scale of this pandemic, which has brought great suffering to many millions of people. It sounds like Leto, who previously described the situation as “mind blowing,” wouldn’t mind another silent retreat when all of this is finally over. But first, we’ll see him return as The Joker for Zack Snyder’s Justice League director’s cut in March. And that’s guaranteed to be a performance that’s either silent nor retreating.