According to Complex, the film follows Gibbs’ Mercury Maxwell, a rapper who wants to leave hip-hop behind to become… a farmer. After being sent to the rural Berkshires of Massachusetts, Mercury decides to drop his Money Merc persona and announces his retirement. However, his manager isn’t ready to let his client walk away so easily. While those ingredients have all the hallmarks of a comedy — and Gibbs’ certainly has the chops for one — Complex reports the film’s a drama.
Produced by Breaker Studios, written and directed by Diego Ongaro, and co-starring Bob Tarasuk, David Krumholtz, Jamie Neumann, and Sharon Washington, Complex notes that Down With The King will appear at festivals later this year, where the creators hope to pick up a distributor. Gibbs, who wrote and performed original music for the film, “worked intimately together” with Ongaro “to craft Mercury’s character and backstory” according to the director, who wanted to combine two of his seemingly opposing passions.
“Many films that feature the hip-hop community tell underdog ‘success stories,’ whereas Down with the King does the contrary,” he says. “Mercury is at the top of the hip-hop world but desperately seeks a simpler life… It was an absolute thrill working with someone as sharp and multi-talented as Freddie in this collaborative way.”
Freddie Gibbs is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
On Thursday, the Magic finally decided it was time to tear it all down. Orlando has spent the last five years attempting to build a competitive team from the core of Nikola Vucevic, Aaron Gordon, and Evan Fournier. However, the team is extremely injured this season and has lost 11 of their last 13 entering the NBA trade deadline. With Gordon requesting a trade, and rumors of trades surrounding the team, the writing was on the wall. A firesale was on the way.
Orlando delivered by trading all three players before 1 p.m. Vucevic went to Chicago, Fournier to Boston, and Gordon to Denver. For many in Orlando, this must have felt chaotic, but for one Magic player, it was just an opportunity to have some fun on the internet. Terrence Ross kept basketball fans entertained as he live-tweeted his responses to the Magic’s deals as they happened.
First Vucevic went and Ross had some emojis in response. He also told a fan that he had a feeling of what was coming next.
This is one of the sadder parts of the NBA trade deadline. While it’s exciting to think about what everyone is going to do in a new location it’s also a breakup of a team that has been together for quite some time. Friendships and locker rooms are torn apart for the future. While everyone knows it’s a business, it can still hurt the people who are actually involved. Of course, sometimes the best way to deal with it all is just to laugh.
Ross has been around the NBA long enough to know how it works. You can’t control it so the only thing you can do is laugh, tweet through it, and enjoy the fireworks.
The Toronto Raptors have been pegged as a team to watch during the lead-up to the NBA trade deadline, as both Kyle Lowry and Norman Powell’s names keep popping up as ones to watch. With just over two hours before the 3 p.m. EST deadline, the first of those dominos have fallen.
According to Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN, Powell is the first big name to get moved. Powell is on his way to Portland, while the Trail Blazers are sending promising young wing Gary Trent Jr. and veteran swingman Rodney Hood to the Raptors.
Toronto has traded Norm Powell to Portland for Gary Trent and Rodney Hood, sources tell ESPN.
Powell, who is an unrestricted free agent at the end of this season, is in the midst of a career-best year, as he’s averaging 19.6 points per game while connecting on 43.9 percent of his attempts from three. He should fit snugly as a high-scoring third option alongside Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum, and while his scoring is his calling card, he competes on the defensive end of the floor, something Portland will need with Trent leaving town.
As for the Raptors, Hood has a team option after this season, while Trent is the headliner of the deal. He’s also out of contract at the end of this year, but he will be a restricted free agent. Trent exploded onto the scene for Portland in the NBA’s Orlando Bubble, and this year, he’s averaging 15 points per game and hitting 39.7 percent of his threes.
The Philadelphia 76ers were always going to add a point guard at the trade deadline, but the question was which one. They, along with the Miami Heat, were the two frontrunners for Kyle Lowry as the Raptors were expected to trade their franchise legend to allow him to play on a contender ahead of free agency this summer. However, Toronto’s asking price was reportedly steep, as they pushed for young players and picks back, and as had been the case in the James Harden sweepstakes, Tyrese Maxey was a young player Philly didn’t want to part with.
On Thursday afternoon, the Sixers appeared to bow out of the Lowry sweepstakes by making a trade for George Hill, first reported by Shams Charania of The Athletic, with ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski providing the details of what ended up being a three-team deal with the Knicks.
The Oklahoma City Thunder are finalizing trading George Hill to the Philadelphia 76ers, sources tell @TheAthletic@Stadium.
It doesn’t fully preclude the Sixers from also adding Lowry, as it’s possible Hill comes in as insurance for having to deal Danny Green in such a deal, but it certainly makes it easier for Philly to move on from the pursuit of the hometown star should they not have been comfortable dealing any of their bets young players or assets. Hill hasn’t played much due to a hand injury in the last two months, but should be back and healthy in the near future. With Philly having all eyes on the postseason, their main concern will be working him into the rotation and getting him comfortable by the playoffs, when they will want his shooting and another veteran ball-handling presence.
The Thunder get more draft assets and a big man in Tony Bradley who has played well this season, along with Austin Rivers to give them some point guard help in the immediate while Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is out with planter fasciitis. The Knicks get a young wing in Ferguson who hasn’t quite found a firm landing spot in the NBA, but will bring them some athleticism as Rivers hadn’t been a factor in their rotation for some time.
The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.
It’s a formula we’ve all seen before; one rapper, one producer, 10 tracks. There’s a reason for this: It works.
The latest example proving this aphorism is To Kill A Sunrise, the concise collaborative project from burgeoning Brooklyn rapper Kota The Friend and veteran Boston producer Statik Selektah. Released just two months removed from Kota’s last project, the quick and dirty Lyrics To Go, Vol. 2, this latest effort makes an ironclad case for the aforementioned recipe with crisp, inventive rhymes over inviting instrumentals that show what traditionalist hip-hop can be at its absolute best.
Over the course of his surprisingly productive five-year career, Kota has proven to be one of the genre’s foremost advocates of the bars-first mentality endemic to his hometown’s musical philosophy throughout the mid-’90s. To put it bluntly, whenever someone shouts out “real hip-hop,” they usually mean rap in the vein of jazz-sampling, puffer jacket-wearing, Timberland boot-stomping, cerebral rappers from the lyrical bloodline of acts like Gang Starr, Pete Rock & CL Smooth, and A Tribe Called Quest.
Kota has this, yes, but he also adds his own unique, plainspoken perspective to the simile-ridden rhyme style of his forebears, leavening their rugged machismo with a vulnerable, confessional, emotionally intelligent bent to his raps. He displayed as much on his breakout 2019 album Foto and on its 2020 follow-up Everything, but whereas on those albums, he displayed that honest tendency over beats that toed the line between modernism and his natural, jazz-rap instincts, on To Kill A Sunrise, he fully indulges the latter, partnering with their perfect foil in Statik Selektah.
For instance on “Hate,” Statik laces Kota with a stripped-down, hand-clap-and-key-stab sample pack over which Kota can “have some fun,” as he says on the song’s introductory instrumental bars. On the song’s opposite, “The Love,” Statik scratches in over a tinkling piano sample, throws hella swing on the drum kit, and channels the spirit of 1991. Kota dives in headfirst, ruminating on intergenerational responsibilities and working at mediocre jobs before attaining his dream of supporting himself through his music.
The combination of Statik’s throwback beats and Kota’s straightfoward, lyrics-focused rhyme style certainly evokes nostalgia for a certain era and place in hip-hop history but they’re not stuck in the past, as so many rhyme-first rap conservatives can be. They don’t thumb their noses at modern trends so much as eschew them entirely; they aren’t here to scold rappers for humming or diss their gold-chain-flexing, trap-praising peers. The endeavor comes across more self-contained, as if to say, “This is us, in our element, doing what we like to do.” In short, it’s a rapper and producer having fun making music, which can sometimes feel rare these days.
Ever since Jay-Z first uttered that fateful phrase “I’m not a rapper,” it can seem as though many folks who do the job are only doing it to get their feet in the door at the places they really want to work, like waitstaff at the local diner who are really actors or web designers or CEOs in casual conversations. Within the past month, I’ve written about no less seven major rap stars securing their first acting roles, while a number of others have jumped into tech or become restauranteurs.
These are all good things! We’ve seen enough rappers go from rags to riches back to rags over the past four decades to understand that rap money doesn’t always last. “LLC Twitter” is quick to remind anyone unfortunate enough to stumble across their condescending messages that you should have multiple streams of income to ensure a comfortable lifestyle and we’ve both praised and criticized Jay-Z for his capitalistic ambitions. Entertainment’s a fickle mistress, so it’s best to make sure there’s a plan B, C, D, E, F, and G for the day the winds change and fans’ taste does too.
But it’s so refreshing to listen to someone make hip-hop because they enjoy making hip-hop. Kota raps about hustling his way out of poverty, yes, but not through socially destructive means. And now that he’s reached his level of comfort, there’s no castigation or roasting of his listeners or taunting of his enemies and haters. Kota raps like the money is assured on tracks like “Live & Direct,” but also secondary to things like fatherhood, community, health, and sharing his wisdom rather than lording it over the plebians who keep him in business.
Nor does he waste time berating anyone for making or enjoying that type of rap. He’s not a snob or an elitist. He’s not above employing a trappish beat himself, as he displayed on prior releases like Everything. But he’s a rapper’s rapper who truly enjoys the craft, working with an established producer who knows how to tap into his strongest impulses. The result is just like the sunrise: Enjoyable to experience, invigorating and easygoing at the same time, and full of promise for a new day.
To Kill A Sunrise Is Out Now via FLTBYS. Get it here.
St. Vincent first announced her return with a vague commercial that teased something titled Daddy’s Home. Shortly thereafter, the musician announced that it was actually the title of her next album, which pulls from ’70s “post-flower child” music. So far, the singer has previewed the project with her towering single “Pay Your Way In Pain.” Now, St. Vincent teases even more new music in a cheeky commercial for Daddy’s Home.
In an infomercial-style preview, St. Vincent runs around a dimly-lit New York City apartment while snippets of unreleased songs play softly in the background. The preview’s voice over reads: “She’s back, in a new role like you’ve never seen her before. Grammy Award-winning artist St. Vincent brings you an album of all new songs. Featuring the new single, ‘Pay Your Way In Pain.’ Nobody expected it, nobody believed it, and nobody could stop it… Daddy’s Home.”
Ahead of the commercial, St. Vincent said she almost made a Tool-sounding album instead of the ’70s-inspired Daddy’s Home. Speaking to Radio.com’s Bryce Segall on his New Arrivals show, the singer said:
“The crazy thing about music is, you can plan and plan and think you’re gonna go one way, and then you start writing and the music just takes you wherever the music takes you. That was certainly the experience with this. I was dead set in my mind that after Masseduction I was just gonna make this like, heavy record. Like just heavy the whole time — like, ‘Hey kids, you like TOOL? Well, you’ll love the St. Vincent record,’ you know? I got sort of down a road with that, but I kept finding that I didn’t have anything to say there. It didn’t feel anything, to go more angular and harder after Masseduction, but where it did feel like something, and felt free and fun and fresh and a lot of other ‘f’ words, was to just go back to the music I’ve listened to more than anything else, which is stuff made in New York from ’71 to ’76 — post flower child, pre-disco, pre-punk — and just sit in that space for a bit. And that’s where the music ended up taking me.”
Watch St. Vincent’s Daddy’s Home teaser above.
Daddy’s Home is out 5/14 via Loma Vista. Pre-order it here.
After weeks of rumors and pretty public negotiations, Aaron Gordon has finally been traded, as the Orlando Magic dealt the seven-year pro to the Denver Nuggets for Gary Harris, rookie RJ Hampton and a first-round pick. Magic swingman Gary Clark is also headed to Denver in the deal.
Gary Harris, RJ Hampton and a first-round pick to the Magic for Aaron Gordon, source tells ESPN. https://t.co/VWMUVCokeS
Gordon has been a mainstay in the NBA rumor mill for years, and this trade finally ends the partnership between he and the Magic. Earlier this week, Gordon reportedly asked the Orlando front office for a trade, and told reporters “there’s been times when I’ve expressed my frustration to management.”
After signing a team-friendly second contract, Gordon has seen his name pop up in trade rumors for years. This year is one of his best, especially on the offensive end, with a career-best 38 percent shooting from deep and a career-high in free throw rate.
Since losing Jerami Grant in free agency, the Nuggets have sorely lacked consistent defensive energy next to MVP candidate Nikola Jokic in the frontcourt, as 35-year-old Paul Millsap bares a smaller load and with free agent signing JaMychal Green playing more of a backup center role.
That led star guard Jamal Murray to publicly say that the Nuggets needed a rim protector earlier this season, and likely also was the impetus behind Denver’s trade for JaVale McGee earlier on deadline day. In Gordon, they get a fierce individual and team defender who should give them an option against the murderer’s row of wing scorers they could face in the Western Conference playoffs, from LeBron James to Kawhi Leonard to Luka Doncic.
Last August, Sun Kil Moon’s Mark Kozelek was accused of sexual harassment, coercion, and assault by three separate women who bravely shared their stories in an exposé. Their stories took place from 2014 to 2017, and Kozelek denied their claims shortly after they were made public. But now, seven more women have come forward to detail decades of similarly horrific stories of Kozelek’s harassment.
The new allegations are detailed in another exposé published by Pitchfork, which notes that the victims’ friends and family members were interviewed to corroborate the stories. These new claims are very similar to the ones made by the first three women, alleging instances of nonconsensual masturbation, unwanted touching, and one claim of rape.
One woman’s story took place in 2014 after she introduced herself to Kozelek at a Sun Kil Moon show. He walked her back to her hotel and asked to use her bathroom, but when he emerged, his pants were off and he tried to force himself on her. “It was the most excruciating period of time between when I called the cab and when the cab finally arrived, because it was like, nonstop him trying to force me to touch him,” she said, continuing that Kozelek seemed to feel entitled to have sex because she was a fan. “Like, he bought me dinner, and he’s doing me a favor because I’m this big fan.”
In a statement through his lawyer, Kozelek once again denied the allegations of all seven women, now ten in total. “Apparently an effort is being made by those with an agenda to renew and recirculate the same kinds of false allegations and innuendo that were the subject of my prior statement in August 2020,” the statement reads. “I continue to categorically deny that I engaged in the inappropriate incidents falsely depicted in the media. I intend to vigorously defend myself against these untruthful allegations and to pursue and protect my rights in the event that false and defamatory statements are disseminated or published.”
Blxst‘s new video for “Chosen” from the deluxe version of his No Love Lost EP takes inspiration from historically Black colleges and universities, with a heavy emphasis on fraternity life as displayed in movies like Spike Lee’s School Daze. Blxst plays the big man on campus, bumping into his romantic lead early in the video and spending time with her on the yard and at a house party.
The song’s featured artists, Tyga and Ty Dolla Sign, also appear as fellow members of Blxst’s frat, throwing a parking lot party and staging a performance backed by cheerleaders on the football field. Meanwhile, the cheerleaders put on a private twerk show of their own in the locker room.
The “Chosen” video follows “Got It All” with Dom Kennedy as the latest visual releases from No Love Lost, while the LA-based rapper and singer followed-up the project with a two-song double single release, Just For Clarity, earlier this month. That single included appearances from the recently released Drakeo The Ruler and indie rap evangelist Russ.
Watch Blxst, Tyga, and Ty Dolla Sign’s “Chosen” video above.
Ty Dolla Sign is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow, and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.
Well before you hear her delicate, soaring voice, an admirable aspect of Joyce Wrice’s career is her ability to be a highlight in a room full of undeniable talents. After landing collaborations with Dom Kennedy, Blu, Jay Prince, and others in the early to mid-2010s, Wrice’s light would soon brighten. In recent years, she’s landed tracks with Devin Morrison (“With You”), Free Nationals (“The Rivington”), and Westside Gunn (“French Toast”). Her contributions were always the sweet icing on an already tasty cake, a delicacy that slowly drew more interest towards the supporting act with each release.
Finally, Wrice has delivered her main course to the world with her debut album, Overgrown. Unlike most love-focused R&B debuts, which often present youth and naivety as accompanying attributes in relationships, the LA singer’s body of work seemingly arrives after this stage in life. Experience and the wisdom to learn from it all find Wrice more prepared to begin the trek towards a committed lover who’s just as mature as she is.
While the end goal on Overgrown is indeed a partner who meets her standards, that’s only half of it. On the album’s title track, which doubles as the project’s outro, Wrice shares what could be documented as her “above all else” mantra. “But don’t you lose all that makes you you,” she sings. “You will be scared, unprepared sometimes.” The heart will always want what it wants but altering its best and most foundational aspects to attain that will bring a result that’s not nearly as satisfying as one imagined.
This very thought process is why on “Losing” she makes her insufficient lover not only aware of their sub-par contributions to their growing relationship, but her irreversible decision to find something better. The song’s swift-moving drums and giddy guitar strings capture her nimble sidestep in dodging the bullet of an unsatisfying love. “Must Be Nice” also echoes the mantra she introduced on the album’s outro, and despite a counter for Masego to continue to flow, Wrice stands firm on placing a pause on their nighttime fun for the betterment of herself. “But it’s just something about the things you do to me / You keep me places I know I ain’t supposed to be,” she sings, adding, “I’ve got rules when I’m with you I don’t follow / I’m wishing you were a phase.’”
Wrice’s insistence for a companion that checks off all her desired boxes stems from being deprived from her close encounters of just that. This picture-perfect partner who absorbs her attention by simply breathing is her muse on “Addicted” and “Think About You.” The once too-good-for-you singer finds herself swept up on a love cloud that unfortunately fails to bring her to her desired location. The former accounts for her inability to turn her dream lover into a reality over an electric ballad while the latter is a dreamy affair that sees her putting the ball in their court with the hope that they make the easy layup.
Overgrown is the LA singer’s way of letting both new and old interests know that immaturity and indecisiveness are not welcomed in her world. It’s clear Wrice has had her fair share of that in the past and its return is the last thing she needs. While some might use their debut to document their growth, Wrice takes her opportunity to show that she is grown. Whether it’s falling in love, falling out of it, or just avoiding it altogether, Overgrown tells and shows listeners that through it all, she’ll present her best self and push forward with it as nobly as possible. If you’re going to wear your heart on your sleeve as she does, the least you can do is protect it from heinous outside forces. For Wrice, this protection not only comes in the form of self-preservation but also through strict warnings that promise undesirable consequences if ignored
Overgrown is out now via Joyce Wrice Music. Get it here.
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