Month: June 2021

Lil Baby has formed an era of his own thanks to the release of his 2020 album, My Turn. Despite being more than a year removed from dropping that project, the Atlanta rapper is still enjoying moments that are rooted in the album’s arrival. He was crowned Songwriter Of The Year at this year’s ASCAP Rhythm & Soul Awards and the showed credited “Emotionally Scarred” and “The Bigger Picture” as some of Baby’s best work. Now, the rapper finds himself onstage at the 2021 BET Awards where he performed “We Win” alongside Kirk Franklin. The duo was backed by a group of dancing backup singers as they shared a fiery performance the song, which serves as the lead single for the upcoming Space Jam: A New Legacy soundtrack.

In addition to performing at the show, Baby also received three nominations at the BET Awards. “The Bigger Picture” was nominated in the Coca-Cola Viewers’ Choice Award category while “For The Night,” which finds the rapper alongside DaBaby and the late Pop Smoke, can be found in the Best Collaboration category. Lastly, Lil Baby himself was nominated in the Best Male Hip-Hop Artist.

As for what’s next, Lil Baby will begin a string of festival and concert appearances now that the world has reopened for live shows. He slated to appear at the following festivals: Lyrical Lemonade’s Summer Smash, Rolling Loud’s Miami and New York shows, Made In America, and Brocolli City. He will also hit the road with Lil Durk for their Back Outside tour.

Scroll up to see a clip of Lil Baby’s performance at the 2021 BET Awards.

Supernatural ran a whopping 15 seasons, and over that time it was one of the most reliable shows on television. But on Friday there was some rare real-life drama. Recently co-lead Jensen Ackles announced he and his wife were launching a prequel to the show, which would follow the parents of brothers Sam and Dean Winchester. Ackles said he would narrate the show. Great news! But there was one snag: He evidently forgot to inform co-star Jared Padalecki, who took that to mean he wouldn’t be involved. And Padalecki was pissed.

If you were worried that one of TV’s great sibling non-rivalries was kaput, then fret no more. On Sunday, Padalecki took to Twitter to reassure fans that they’d patched things up.

“@JensenAckles and I had a great talk, as we do often, and things are good,” the actor wrote. “The show is early in the process with miles to go. We’ve travelled a lot of roads together, and sometimes those damn roads have bumps. Bumps don’t stop us. Once brothers, always brothers.”

Even though Padalecki’s post was unmistakably forgiving, it was also a bit cryptic. Why didn’t Ackles inform his longtime on-screen bro, with whom he chats “often,” that he was moving ahead with a prequel? Do the words “early in the process” mean there’s still a chance Padalecki could be involved in some fashion? But whatever, he says they’re cool, so they must be cool. Carry on, everyone.

(Via IGN)

As everyone anticipates the release of Madden 22, we’re also waiting for news on another football game that is on the way. 2K Games, the developers of the dormant but never forgotten NFL 2K franchise, have their own NFL game on the way. Announced back in 2020, 2K has been working on an arcade-style football game with the NFL license. When it releases it will be the first game to use the NFL license not developed by EA since ESPN NFL 2K5.

For fans of the NFL 2K series, don’t get too excited. The major label here is “arcade” as opposed to the “simulation” style games that Madden is known for. Basically, 2K can’t make their game a realistic sim the same way EA Sports develops their Madden games. This is partially why EA Sports executive producer, Sean Graddy, isn’t too concerned about a competitor having the license. In fact, he welcomes the addition of more NFL games and says it’s good for the industry as a whole, via Gamespot.

“As far as the other products that [the NFL is] working with, I honestly think it’s a good thing for the industry and the market because you’re seeing more players engaging with with the NFL and getting excited about the league, getting excited about players,” he told GameSpot. “And when they want to get the simulation experience, they come to Madden. So I think it’s a good thing.”

What Graddy is saying does have a lot of truth to it. For fans of sports games, there is a notable lack of the arcade-style games that many of us grew to love during the PS2/GameCube/Xbox generation of consoles. Games like NFL Street were beloved for the wacky and unrealistic ways the game was played, and seeing games like that come back is a definite plus for video games as a whole. It brings in not only sports fans, but people who maybe don’t enjoy realistic sports but like the arcade game versions of them.

If 2K’s NFL game can capture the spirit of some of those arcade classics, and Madden can become the best simulation game out there, then NFL fans could be in for two must-get purchases every year. If that happens then Graddy would be correct, it would be good for the industry as a whole. But it’s hard to not think that some part of him wishes EA Sports was also developing the arcade game. Why aren’t they? We’ll never know for certain.

So far, Olivia Rodrigo has received no real pushback for constantly referencing and incorporating pop culture totems from the past few decades into her own work. She’s used a melody from a Taylor Swift song, earned comparisons to Paramore’s “Misery Business” in the single “Good 4 U,” and diehard Lorde fans would swear the bridge from “Drivers License” sounds familiar. But imitation is the highest form of flattery, right? Well, not if you’re Courtney Love, apparently.

The Hole frontwoman took umbrage with Olivia’s new press photo for her Sour prom concert film, below:

Love posted the pic to her own Instagram account on Friday with the following caption: “Spot the difference! #twinning! @oliviarodrigo ”

For reference, Hole is alluding to her Live Through This artwork from 1994.

“Love u and live through this sooooo much,” Rodrigo commented in reply. To which Courtney responded: “Olivia — you’re welcome. My favorite florist is in Notting Hill, London! Dm me for deets. I look forward to reading your note.”

She also shared the same post on Facebook, and made a few more comments there in response to fan reactions, including the idea that the prom photos was a reference to Stephen King’s Carrie. “As stated in another comment “Carrie” is an entirely different concept to my original idea. I made that so clear at the time. Don’t dare gate keep my life. Especially as I’m luckily still alive to correct your presumption. Based on ? Pigs blood ? I don’t copy.”

She further noted that she expects flowers and a note, and will be done with it.

“I’ve asked her for flowers and a note, your [sic] right. It’s rude not to be asked. I know Ellen von unwerth isn’t amused. And just to clarify? The Brian de Palma classic “Carrie“ is another thing. My cover was my original idea. A thing you maybe have to actually live life to acquire ? I don’t know. Anyway. Disney? Yes it’s rude. X”

And finally, that she doesn’t consider her call out to be bullying because stealing an original idea without asking permission “is rude.”

“Your version isn’t mine. Stealing an original idea and not asking permission is rude. There’s no way to be elegant about it. I’m not angry. It happens all the time to me. And really I’m very gracious or say nothing. But this was bad form. That’s not bullying or bomb throwing . This persons music has nothing to do with my life. Possibly never will. It was rude And I have every right to stick up for my work. Don’t gatekeep me ! I’m honorable as f*ck to my fellow artists, and I expect the same.”

Check out the full Facebook post here.

It’s been less than two days since Tyler The Creator shared his sixth album, Call Me If You Get Lost, which arrives two years after the Grammy-winning Igor. But unlike that album, this newest release found him heading back to his old brash rap sound, thanks to DJ Drama, who appeared as the album’s host. After reading through some of the new album’s positive reviews, Tyler hopped on Instagram Live to share some words about his latest release.

“Shoutout rap music, I love it,” Tyler said. “DJ Drama, I love you. What you did for rap — phenomenal. From all the Waynes, all the Dedications, from P the In My Mind Prequel mixtape, to Clipse for the We Got It For Cheaps, from Lupe mixtape run all the Farenheits, the Revenge Of The Nerds, to JAY-Z, to Andre [3000] … to Westside Gunn for making me wanna just rap again.” He added, “I love it. I love rap. It changed n****s lives.”

Recently Drama explained what made working with Tyler unique from other artists. “Normally in these types of situations, if I do a Gangsta Grillz with somebody, they compile their music together and hand it over to me, and then I’ll go in on my own without them and do my thing and return the finished product,” he said. “With Tyler, it was a little different: I came in, gave him an abundance of things—even more than what I had originally placed—and just gave him enough material to choose from and layer it out.”

You can watch Tyler’s livestream in the video above.

Call Me If You Get Lost is out now via A Boy Is a Gun/Columbia. Get it here.

The Orlando Magic are officially entering a youth movement and as such are in need of a coach who is ready to work and grow with a young team. After shipping Evan Fournier and Nikola Vucevic off at the trade deadline, the Magic made their intentions clear for a rebuild and unsurprisingly that led to Steve Clifford and the Magic parting ways after the season.

With the need to connect to a young squad, the Magic are apparently looking to the college ranks — and a former franchise legend — for their next head coach. According to Shams Charania of The Athletic, Penny Hardaway recently interviewed with Orlando and is a “serious candidate” to leave Memphis for the NBA and take over as coach of the team that drafted him.

Hardaway has been at Memphis since 2018, getting that job for his abilities as a developer of talent and how he can connect with the current generation of young stars at the high school and college level. Both of those are skills the Magic are looking for as they enter a rebuild around key pieces like Jonathan Isaac, Markelle Fultz, Cole Anthony, and others, so Hardaway makes sense from a skill perspective and from a fan interest standpoint.

As for other candidates, Josh Robbins and Charania offered a look at a complete list of potential candidates beyond Hardaway.

According to The Athletic’s Josh Robbins, the Magic also requested permission to interview Suns assistant Willie Green and Bucks assistant Charles Lee, and are expected to interview Denver Nuggets assistant coach Wes Unseld Jr. as well as three assistants on ex-coach Steve Clifford’s staff: Tyrone Corbin, Pat Delany and Steve Hetzel. Spurs assistant Becky Hammon, who was a finalist for the Blazers opening, has already interviewed with Orlando.

If nothing else, Hardaway would bring some intrigue to an Orlando franchise that could use it.

There are many arguments to be had about which artist is having the best year so far. One possibility is Olivia Rodrigo. The pop star earned her breakout moment at the beginning of the year thanks to her debut single, “Drivers License,” which smashed Spotify records and spent ample time atop the Billboard album charts. Her success continued with the release of additional singles, such as “Good 4 U” and “Deja Vu,” as well as the arrival of her debut album, Sour, which debuted at No. 1. Now, a little over a month after it dropped, it’s back at the top.

In the last week, Sour tallied a total of 105,000 album units. As a result, it joins Morgan Wallen’s Dangerous: The Double Album as the only full-length efforts in 2021 to sell more than 100,000 units in each of its first five weeks on the chart. Sour made its debut last month on the Billboard 200 with 295,000 albums units sold. That number was comprised of 218,000 streaming equivalent album units that came from 300.73 million on-demand streams of the album’s songs. It made for the largest overall week for an album in 2021 and the second-largest streaming week ever by a female artist behind Ariana Grande’s 2018 album Thank U, Next.

Revisit our review of Sour here.

The next time you see a Fantastic Beasts movie, things will be a bit different. For one thing, you may spent some of your time pretending that it has nothing to do with disgraced creator J.K. Rowling. For another, there will be either no or very little Johnny Depp. Last year, the actor was removed from the threequel due to the accusations lodged against him by ex-wife Amber Heard. And his replacement feels bad that the two didn’t at least get to have a chat before he took over.

In an interview with The Sunday Times, Mads Mikkelsen — who was hired to assume the role of foe Grindelwald in the Harry Potter spin-off/prequel — discussed the awkward nature of taking a role intended for a colleague.

“I mean, obviously, they were going to do the film, and obviously he was not involved any more,” Mikkelsen said. “But I didn’t have a dog in that fight. And I don’t know what happened [in his private life], and I don’t know if it was fair, him losing the job, but I just knew that the show was going on, and I would’ve loved to have talked to him about it if I had the chance, but I just don’t know him in that sense.

He added, “But they called me and they were obviously in a hurry, and I loved the script and so said yes. And I know it was controversial for many people, but that’s just the way it plays out once in a while.”

The Hannibal alum also talked about making the role his own. “I didn’t want to copy what Johnny had done. I think he’s a masterful actor, so copying him would’ve been creative suicide,” Mikkelsen said. “I had to figure out something that was definitely my own, and yet also act as a bridge to what he had done. My take is different, and the look is a little different, but we’ll have to wait for the film’s release [next year] to find out.”

The as-yet-untitled third Fantastic Beasts film is set to arrive in theaters on July 15, 2022.

(Via The Sunday Times and EW)

As usual, it was Chris Wallace who held Republicans accountable on the Sunday morning news shows. The Fox News anchor has been long the voice of reason on his network, arguably braver than most journalists because he’ll dismantle their arguments on what is supposed to be their turf. Wallace’s latest coup had him confronting a GOP lawmaker with one argument: It’s his side, not the Democrats, who are actually “defunding the police.”

Indiana representative Jim Banks went on Wallace’s show Sunday, hoping to pin the blame for an uprise in violent crime across the nation’s cities on Democrats’ critiques of how policing works in 2021. It’s a dubious claim; there are many reasons why crime is up, among them that people are finally out in the streets again, after over a year of quarantine. (Also, the GOP has made sure guns are very easy to obtain.) But Wallace flipped the tables on him and his colleagues.

“Let me push back on that a little bit,” Wallace told Banks, because in the program that he announced this week, the president said that the central part in his anti-crime package is the $350 billion in the American Rescue Plan, the COVID relief plan that was passed.”

Wallace then dug up one crucial, damning factoid. “Congressman Banks, you voted against that package, against the $350 billion, just like every other Republican in the House and Senate,” he said, “so can’t you make the argument that it’s you and the Republicans who are defunding the police?”

Banks tried to dodge the issue, parroting Republican talking points about anti-police rhetoric on the left. But Wallace kept pressing.

“The president is saying cities and states can use this money to hire more police officers, invest in new technologies and develop summer job training and recreation programs for young people,” he said. “Respectfully, I’ve heard your point about the last year, but you and every other republican voted against this $350 billion.”

But Banks continued to hem and haw, name-dropping the likes of Ilhan Omar, then claiming the “defund the police” talk is keeping people from signing up. Ergo, in his logic, what’s the use in giving them more money? It’s a questionable claim, to say the least, which should mean his base will buy it, hook, line, and stinker.

You can watch Wallace’s exchange with Banks in the video above.

(Via The Daily Beast)

Last month, Nicki Minaj made her grand return to the music world by uploading her 2009 mixtape, Beam Me Up Scotty, to streaming services. It featured most of the project’s original songs as well as three new additions that included “Seeing Green” with Drake and Lil Wayne as well as “Fractions.” While the release was certainly appreciated, her supporters’ true desire is a new album from the rapper as her last one, Queen, arrived back in 2018. As the wait continues for her upcoming fifth album, Nicki shared a promising update about it and previewed a new song that has fans very excited.

Speaking about her next album during an Instagram Live session, Nicki said, “This album will be definitely my best album thus far.” She also previewed a track titled “Big Barbie” that features a guest verse from Future and production from LondonOnDaTrack. According to Nicki, the song was supposed to appear on Queen, however, it was left off the album for reasons she did not share. In addition to previewing the track, she also teased something special for her supporters that would arrive soon.

“I got a surprise for y’all. Maybe you’ll find out in a few days,” she said, adding that she has a “major announcement to make.”

Shortly after she uploaded Beam Me Up Scotty to DSPs, Nicki joined Polo G on “For The Love Of New York” off his chart-topping album, Hall Of Fame.

You can listen to the “Big Barbie” preview in the video above.