Month: March 2021

During the lead-up to this year’s Grammys, Bruno Mars and Anderson .Paak made it clear that they wanted their new supergroup, Silk Sonic, to perform during the broadcast. They made a big stink about it on Twitter, trying to convince the Recording Academy to give them a performance slot during the 2021 ceremony. As many surely suspected, it seemed the pair’s faux-bellyaching seemed to have been a ploy to drum up attention for their performance, which the Academy announced days later was locked in.

So, Mars and .Paak took the stage tonight and busted out a rendition of their sole single so far, “Leave The Door Open.” The duo was joined by a pair of background singers and they all made perfect use of the stage, with .Paak and Mars joining their backing cohorts towards the back of the space when they weren’t on lead vocals.

Mars has been relatively quiet over the past few years and consequently, he doesn’t have any Grammy nominations this year. .Paak has a couple of nods for 2021, though: “Lockdown” was nominated for for Best Melodic Rap Performance while that song’s visual is up for Best Music Video.

Watch Silk Sonic’s Grammy performance above and find the full list of this year’s Grammy winners and nominees here.

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

Dua Lipa’s 2020 record Future Nostalgia was a beacon of light in what shaped up to be a pretty dark year, and the songs off her sophomore album are still echoing through pop music even a year later. One of the album’s early singles, “Levitating” got an upbeat, rollicking verse from North Carolina rapper DaBaby on a worthy remix, and tonight the pair united on the Grammys stage to deliver a live rendition.

Although another remixed version of the track includes Madonna and Missy Elliott, as part of Dua’s Club Nostalgia remix album that doubles as a love letter to the classic electronic music and club scene, DaBaby’s version is still the one that fans gravitate toward the most. She’s up for six nominations this year, including Album Of The Year, Best Pop Vocal Album, Best Pop Solo Performance and Song Of The Year and Record Of The Year for “Don’t Start Now.”

For tonight’s performance she sported a massive, fluffy pink princess dress replete with sparkles and massive sleeves, matched with pink eyeshadow and a pink mic, before ditching it for a sparkling pink blazer when DaBaby casually strolled back onstage to deliver his verse. After rejoining him, she pulled off yet another outfit change, stripping down to a pink sparkling bikini to launch into “Don’t Start Now.” A fitting medley for a star who should’ve been performing in arenas all year, Dua proved she earned that Best New Artist Grammy last year over and over again. Watch below.

A year ago, a lot of movies that were due for theaters suddenly found themselves delayed indefinitely, from the new Bond to the next Marvel. Another was In the Heights, Warner Bros.’ splashy adaptation of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first musical. In a different, better timeline, it would have come out last June. Instead it’s coming out this June, and a new trailer not only promises a much-delayed blockbuster but also the idea that this summer will almost certainly be far better than the last.

The movie, like the show — which first hit Broadway in 2008, seven years before Hamilton — is set in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan, up near the top of the island, amidst a largely Dominican neighborhood. The trailer is also largely set outside, with throngs of people packed together, singing and dancing in unison, in a world that does not yet know the pandemic coming for them. Watching it is, to be frank, extremely emotional, especially after President Joe Biden vowed to make sure everyone’s eligible for vaccines by May, with things returning to something like normal, perhaps even as early as the film’s June 18 release date.

And so this trailer for a movie shot well before the idea of a global health crisis was even a glint in anyone’s eye is more like a glimpse into our future — a time when we can get back to theaters, yes, but when we can once again gallivant about a big, vibrant city, no longer afraid of our fellow humans. And if things are still hairy by the time In the Heights comes out, then at least the finish line isn’t that far off. So watch this trailer, have a happy cry for the joy that’s just over the horizon, and let’s get this done safely.

In the Heights hits theaters and HBO Max on June 18.

DaBaby is a rapper with a gift for puns, but his performance of “Rockstar” at the 2021 Grammys gave host Trevor Noah such a good setup, it’s almost shocking they didn’t shut the whole thing down immediately after. Backed by a choir of silver-haired, elder singers — comparisons were made to the Supreme Court, which still runs overwhelmingly old and white — DaBaby was joined by Roddy Ricch and Anthony Hamilton for a blown-out performance, with Noah dubbing the backup singers “The Baby Boomers” when all was said and done.

DaBaby and Roddy share three nominations this year for “Rockstar,” which has them both anticipating potential wins for Best Rap Song, Best Rap/Sung Performance, and Record Of The Year. DaBaby’s “Bop” was also nominated for Best Rap Performance, although Megan Thee Stallion secured that award for herself earlier in the evening in the non-televised portion of the proceedings for her Beyonce-featuring song “Savage.” Meanwhile, Roddy himself is nominated for Best Rap/Sung Performance, Best Rap Song, and Song Of The Year for his TikTok-favorite solo single “The Box.”

After his performance, DaBaby barely had time to remove his sparkly driving gloves before returning to the stage to support Dua Lipa on her “Levitating” performance, still shining in his all-white suit.

Watch DaBaby’s glorious performance of “Rockstar” above.

Bad Bunny is a veteran of the Grammys at this point, as he has racked up a total of five nominations over the last few years. Two of those nods came in 2021: “Un Dia (One Day)” — his collaboration with Dua Lipa, J Balvin, and Tainy — is up for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance, while his album YHLQMDLG is nominated for Best Latin Pop Or Urban Album. To celebrate, he and Jhay Cortez took the stage during this year’s ceremony to perform their single “Dákiti,” a performance that featured colorful and visually striking lighting.

Bad Bunny previously told Apple Music of working with Cortez, “We’ve collaborated on remixes, [but] we had never come up with a song from scratch, [from] the both of us, I don’t know. We’re making music to last a long time.” Cortez also said of the song [translated via Google], “‘Dákiti’ is a nightclub in Puerto Rico, in the capital, in Old San Juan, and it is also a beach in Culebra, which is a small island near Puerto Rico. We called it ‘Dákiti’ because obviously it is a world theme, but I wanted it to have something cultural from Puerto Rico. Apart from that, every time I listened to the song, the only thing I could think of was the beach, the clubs… what better than a name that has both names: it is a beach and also a disco.”

Watch Bad Bunny and Cortez’s Grammy performance above and find the full list of this year’s Grammy winners and nominees here.

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

Last week, Piers Morgan landed in hot water after his vociferous and relentless attacks on Megyn Markle (and to a lesser extent Prince Harry) over allegations she made about the royal family. His infamy was such that he even took down friends. On Wednesday, longtime pal Sharon Osbourne snapped at her co-hosts on The Talk during a discussion of Morgan’s statements. She later apologized, but the spat was such that CBS is briefly putting the daytime talk show on hiatus.

As per Deadline, the show’s shows on Monday and Tuesday have been yanked as the network launches an investigation into the controversial exchange. It will return on Wednesday the 17th.

The instigating incident started when co-host Sheryl Underwood took umbrage with Osbourne, telling her that “while you are standing by you your friend, it appears that you are giving validation or safe haven to something that he has uttered that is racist.”

Osbourne then went into defense mode. “I feel like I’m about to be put in the electric chair because I have a friend who many people think is racist, so that makes me a racist,” she said, then demanded Underwood explain what was racist about what he said. She issues an apology afterwards, claiming that she “panicked, felt blindsided [and] got defensive.” Osbourne has been on The Talk since 2010.

(Via Deadline)

While there are always complaints about who gets nominated for what at the Grammy Awards, there’s no denying that this year’s set of nominees for Best New Artist is a stacked group. Somebody had to win though, and it has now been revealed that Megan Thee Stallion is taking home the Grammy for Best New Artist at the 2021 awards.

The artists who were nominated for the award this year were Ingrid Andress, Phoebe Bridgers, Chika, Noah Cyrus, D Smoke, Doja Cat, Kaytranada, and Megan.

This year’s field is one of the more stacked list of Best New Artist nominees in recent memory. Both Doja and Megan had No. 1 singles in 2020: “Say So” for Doja and “Savage” and “WAP” for Meg. The first two of those three aforementioned songs are up for Record Of The Year, too. Bridgers had a standout year in terms of Grammy nominations outside of Best New Artist, as she also earned nods for Best Rock Performance, Best Rock Song, and Best Alternative Music Album. The same is true for Kaytranada, who picked up wins in the Best Dance Recording category, for his Kali Uchis collaboration “10%,” and in Best Dance/Electronic Album, for Bubba.

Find the full list of this year’s Grammy winners and nominees here.

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

It’s been a few years since Haim were Grammy contenders. Following their 2013 debut album Days Are Gone, Haim were nominated for Best New Artist at the 2015 Grammys. Six years and two more albums later, Haim are once again Grammy-nominated, this time for two awards. To celebrate, Haim put on a stunning rendition of their Women In Music Pt. III track “The Steps” for the 2021 Grammys.

The sister trio are nominated for Album Of The Year for Women In Music Pt. III, as well as Best Rock Performance for “The Steps.” This year’s Best Rock Performance category has only women artists nominated, a fact that Haim told People has been a long time coming. “It’s about time that happened,” Danielle Haim said. “There’s always been women in rock, and it’s a bummer they’re not recognized in that category every year. It’s cool. All the women nominated are amazing; I can’t believe we’re in the same category as the other women.”

While Haim was not able to tour behind Women In Music Pt. III, they still managed to stay connected with fans. Along with appearing on several Zoom-recorded performances on late-night television, the band began offering weekly Zoom dance classes and shared a number of videos to their songs. More recently, Haim teamed up with Taylor Swift for a highly-anticipated remix of their song “Gasoline.” Swift wasn’t the only musician to take on one of their songs. The sister trio also tapped Toro Y Moi to share a chilled-out remix to their R&B-inspired track “3 AM.”

Watch Haim perform “The Steps” at the 2021 Grammys above and find the full list of this year’s Grammy winners and nominees here.

Women In Music Pt. III is out now via Columbia. Get it here.

Last year, Billie Eilish made Grammys history as the youngest musician to ever win Grammys in all four major categories. Eilish had big plans for her Grammy-winning year, which included a massive sold-out world tour. The pandemic shook Eilish’s original plans, but she still managed to have a wildly successful year. Now, one year later, Eilish returns to the Grammy stage to give a performance of “Everything I Wanted” alongside her brother/producer Finneas.

While Eilish had some major Grammy wins in 2020, she’s once again nominated for a handful of awards. This year, Eilish is up for Song Of The Year, Record Of The Year, and Best Pop Solo Performance for her subdued track “Everything I Wanted.” She was also nominated for Best Song Written For Visual Media Category for her James Bond theme song “No Time To Die,” which she ended up winning the award for.

Ahead of her stunning Grammys performance, Eilish starred in a revealing documentary chronicling her debut album When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? and subsequent rise to fame. Titled The World’s A Little Blurry, the R.J. Cutler-directed documentary got into some of the creative differences Eilish and Finneas faced, as well as the deterioration of Eilish’s relationship with her then-boyfriend.

Watch Eilish perform “Everything I Wanted” at the 2021 Grammys above and find the full list of this year’s Grammy winners and nominees here.

Harry Styles may have released his acclaimed sophomore solo album Fine Line at the end of 2019, but it was submitted for Grammy nods this award season. The album, which debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 Albums chart, ended up earning the singer a few Grammy nominations. So to celebrate, Styles gave a shimmering rendition of “Watermelon Sugar” at the 2021 Grammy Awards.

Taking the stage sporting a sparkling outfit complete with a feather boa, the singer passionately delivered his lyrics to “Watermelon Sugar.” The performance was made to commemorate the singer three Grammy nominations. He is up for Best Pop Solo Performance for “Watermelon Sugar,” Best Music Video for “Adore You,” and Best Pop Vocal Album for Fine Line as a whole.

In other Styles news, the singer recently made headlines for non-music reasons. Styles ended up scoring a lead role in the Olivia Wilde-directed film Don’t Worry Darling. Dating rumors between Wilde and Styles were ignited after the two were seen on set and though neither one has confirmed the relationship, Wilde did recently praise Styles’ acting skills. “He infused every scene with a nuanced sense of humanity,” she wrote about Styles in a heartfelt post. “He didn’t have to join our circus, but he jumped on board with humility and grace, and blew us away every day with his talent, warmth, and ability to drive backwards.”

Watch Harry Styles’ showstopping performance of “Watermelon Sugar” at the 2021 Grammys above and find the full list of this year’s Grammy winners and nominees here.

Fine Line is out now via Columbia. Get it here.