Month: March 2022

One of our favorite rising pop stars, Faouzia, has a much more jaded anthem to contribute. Last night she dropped “RIP Love,” a Moroccan-inflected bop that brings some of Faouzia’s own Arabic cultural influences into the mix. “Said you’d die for love / But I never loved you / Sorry,” she sings, before launching into a

“My earliest experiences with music date back to family road trips when I was a kid,” Faouzia said in a press release. “My mom and dad would play these incredible Moroccan songs full of big percussive elements and Arabic trills. I was introduced to pop music soon after and instantly fell in love. I feel like the production, melodies, and powerful narrative in “RIP, Love” encompass so many parts of my musical heritage – it feels like me.”

The song, which follows up her previous singles like “Puppet,” “The Eye,” and “Born Without A Heart” was co-written and produced with Jakke Erixsen and Tor Eimon. “Writing this song felt like a turning point in my creativity,” the pop star continued. “Working with Fran and Jakke on this song was more than a dream come true I left the studio being so in love with the song and couldn’t wait to share it with the world.”

Along with her latest single, Faouzia has announced a new EP, Citizens, will be released in May. Keep an ear to the ground of more info on that release, and check out her searing new single up top.

Ever since getting slapped on live television by someone who soon thereafter won an Oscar, Chris Rock has stayed quiet. The comic has not addressed the incident, in which he told a joke about Jada Pinkett Smith at this year’s Academy Awards, prompting a violent outburst by her husband, Will Smith. But he did have some stand-up shows already lined up, meaning he was forced to address it — which he did as minimally as possible.

As per Variety, Rock made his first post-slap appearance at a show in Boston, and he started off by addressing the elephant in the room — and then quickly shooing it off-stage.

“How was your weekend?” Rock told the crowd after getting a huge standing ovation. He then admitted the hilarious set about a shocking thing that occurred only three days before will have to wait. “I don’t have a bunch of s*it about what happened, so if you came to hear that, I have a whole show I wrote before this weekend. I’m still kind of processing what happened. So, at some point I’ll talk about that shit. And it will be serious and funny.”

The audience proceeded to chant “F*ck Will Smith,” but Rock tried to move on. “I’m going to tell some jokes,” Rock told everyone. “It’s nice to just be out.”

On Sunday, Rock appeared late in the show to present the award to Best Documentary. That trophy eventually went to Summer of Soul. Before that, though, Rock made a joke about a Pinkett Smith’s shaved head. Her husband then stormed the stage, smacked Rock across the face, then shouted obscenities at him. Rock tried his best to handle the incident with aplomb, not fighting back and quickly getting things back to the award.

Rock’s poise amidst the unexpected attack has been widely applauded, and sales to his stand-up shows have skyrocketed ever since. (Smith’s actions, meanwhile, has been condemned by many.) Pretty soon, though, paying audiences will get to hear what will no doubt be a hilarious breakdown of what may wind up being the most shocking thing to happen in almost a century of Academy Awards.

(Via Variety)

Over the last year or so EST Gee and 42 Dugg have grown to be two of rap’s newest and most promising names. Gee’s Bigger Than Life Or Death and Dugg’s Free Dem Boyz projects, which both arrived last year, helped to give them a strong boost in their respective careers. They’ve also collaborated on several occasions on tracks like “5500 Degrees” and “Rose Gold,” and it’s most likely a result of them both being signed to Yo Gotti’s Collective Music Group imprint. That connection aled to last month’s announcement of a joint album between Gee and Dugg, which is set to arrive sooner or later.

The rappers initially said their project, titled Last Ones Left, would touch down on February 18, but that day came and went without the project. However, the duo didn’t leave their fans high and dry and an example of that comes with their latest song, “Everybody Shooters Too.” The new track arrives with a focused video that captures Gee and Dugg rapping beside their crew as they flex their diamonds, cars, and high-end clothing.

The new song and video arrive after Gee and Dugg dropped off “Free The Shiners” to kick off the campaign for Last Ones Left.

You can watch the video for “Everybody Shooters Too” above.

42 Dugg is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Bruce Arians, who coached the Tampa Buccaneers to a Super Bowl LV win just over a year ago, is stepping down as the team’s head coach. Todd Bowles, the ex-New York Jets head coach and current Tampa Bay defensive coordinator, is going to take over for Arians.

Arians’ decision, first reported by NBC’s Peter King, means he’s going to move into into what he told King was a “senior consultant for football” in the Buccaneers organization. He told King he was stepping away now because he wanted a clean line of succession with the job.

“I’d rather see Todd in position to be successful and not have to take some [crappy] job,” Arians said. “I’m probably retiring next year anyway, in February. So, I control the narrative right now. I don’t control it next February because [Tom] Brady gets hurt, we go 10-7, and it’s an open interview for the job … I got 31 [coaches and their] families that depend on me. My wife is big on not letting all those families down.”

The 69-year-old Arians also said that Brady’s decision to unretire did not have an impact on his decision.

“No,” Arians said, per King. “No. Tom was very in favor of what I’m doing. I mean, I had conflicts with every player I coached because I cussed them all out, including him. Great relationship off the field.”

Bowles, 58, becomes the sixth NFL head coach of color along with Pittsburgh’s Mike Tomlin, Washington’s Ron Rivera, New York’s Robert Saleh, Miami’s Mike McDaniel and and Houston’s Lovie Smith. He was 24-40 as the New York Jets’ head coach, but was considered among the top candidates for jobs this offseason around the NFL before returning to Tampa as defensive coordinator.

In the days since Will Smith slapped and cursed at Chris Rock at Sunday’s Oscar ceremony, many have expressed their distaste with what the former did to the latter. Among them was one of the night’s three hosts. Amy Schumer, who tried to milk jokes out of the incident shortly after it happened, said she’s “still triggered and traumatized” by it. Now another host not only agrees with her but shared a strange and endearing story about her run-in with Rock himself.

On Wednesday, Wanda Sykes appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show. There, she discussed how she “felt so awful for my friend Chris.” (Sykes first gained recognition for her work as a writer on The Chris Rock Show in the ‘90s, even winning an Emmy.) She also told a story about running into him and finding him weirdly, if predictably self-deprecating about it:

“I hope he doesn’t mind me saying this, but I saw Chris at [Guy Oseary’s after party] and as soon as I walked up to him, the first thing he said is, ‘I’m so sorry.’ I was like, ‘Why are you apologizing?’ He was like, ‘It was supposed to be your night. You and Amy and Regina were doing such a great job. I’m so sorry this is now gonna be about this.’ ”

Sykes added, “Because that’s who Chris is.”

The performer also took time to slam Smith for his behavior. “It was sickening. It was absolutely— I physically felt ill, and I’m still a little traumatized by it,” Sykes said. “And for them to let [Will] stay in that room and enjoy the rest of the show and accept his award, I was like, ‘How gross is this?’ This sends the wrong message. If you assault somebody, you get escorted out the building and that’s it. But for them to let him continue, I thought it was gross.”

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, who puts on the Oscars, announced Wednesday that they’ve begun a formal investigation into the incident. They also claimed that after his attack, they asked Smith to leave but he “refused.”

You can watch Sykes’ Ellen appearance in the video above.

(Via People)

It’s unfortunate that humans are wired to notice everything bad going on in the world and to ignore the things that are going right. Our collective negativity bias was illustrated in a 2016 survey that asked people in 17 countries “Do you think the world is getting better or worse, or neither getting better nor worse?”

Fifty‐eight percent of respondents thought that the world is getting worse, and 30% said that it is doing neither. Only 11% thought that things are getting better.

However, there is a wealth of data to support the idea that the world is only improving when it comes to the hallmarks of human progress: education, freedom, poverty and health.

In a recent interview with Upworthy, Chelsea Follett, the managing editor at Human Progress, explained why humans have a bias toward negativity, and the media isn’t doing us any favors.

---

“Historically, obviously our ancestors in a primitive environment who overreacted to danger were more likely to survive than those who underreacted,” Follett told Upworthy. “But there is a point where unwarranted panic can actually be detrimental to your survival if you abandon policies or institutions that are actually working, or that have allowed you to make tremendous progress in the past.

“There’s also the nature of the media,” she added. “Obviously sudden, noteworthy and rare events are the ones that make headlines, whereas long-term slow, steady, incremental progress is just not as interesting.”

Our World in Data, an organization that performs “research and data to make progress against the world’s largest problems” has created a revealing document that shows just how far humanity has come over the past 200 years. The graphs show how life has changed for a random sampling of 100 people over the past two centuries.

The graph covers six topics that are cornerstones of human progress: poverty, basic education, literacy, democracy, vaccination and child mortality.

Poverty

In 1820, 84 out of 100 people lived in extreme poverty, and over 200 years that number has dropped more than nine times to just 9 in 100. “The headline could be ‘The number of people in extreme poverty fell by 130,000 since yesterday’ and they wouldn’t have this headline once, but every single day since 1990, since, on average, there were 130,000 people fewer in extreme poverty every day,” Our World in Data wrote.

Basic Education

Two hundred years ago, 83 out of 100 people had no education at all. That number has been reduced to just 14 over the past 200 years.

Our World In Data says that number is only going to get better. “Focusing on the educational breakdown the projection suggests that by 2100, there will be almost no one without formal education and there will be more than 7 billion minds who will have received at least secondary education,” Our World in Data said.

Literacy

In 1820, only 12 people out of 100 could read. In 2019, that number has risen more than seven times to 86. These numbers will continue to rise because a large portion of the world’s illiterate population is older.

Democracy

Only 1 out of 100 people lived in a democracy back in 1820. Now, 56 out of 100 people live in a country where they can select their elected officials. This was a big change that came after World War II.

“In the second half of the 20th century, the world has changed significantly: Colonial empires ended, and more and more countries turned democratic,” Our World in Data wrote. “The share of the world population living in democracies increased continuously–particularly important was the breakdown of the Soviet Union which allowed more countries to democratize.”

Vaccination

Over the past 60 years, the number of people out of 100 that would have been vaccinated against diphtheria, whooping cough and tetanus has risen from 0 to 86.

Child Mortality

Can you imagine living at a time when almost half of all children born never lived to kindergarten age? “In 1800 the health conditions were such that around 43% of the world’s newborns died before their 5th birthday,” Our World In Data wrote. “In 2017 child mortality was down to 3.9% – 10-fold lower than 2 centuries ago.”

The influence of both Future Classic and PC Music labels on electronic music and pop is undeniable. Now Flume and Caroline Polachek’s latest track, “Sirens,” co-written and produced by PC Music’s Danny L.Harle, represents the glorious union of the two. Polacheck indeed sounds like a siren, humming through Flume’s thumping progression that feels nothing short of heavenly; the type of music that’d be playing while you relax on a pillowy cloud.

“I was living by myself in London, and it was the darkest time in the pandemic,” Polachek said in a statement. “I was really going through it, feeling so small, unable to control anything in the world, and the lyric ‘sirens’ was in reference to constant ambulances I was hearing.” Polachek soon left London, but the lyric stayed with her when she moved to L.A. and bumped into Flume, who she already knew, but was now living down the street from.

Now the song will appear on Flume’s upcoming album, Palaces, out on May 20th. “We started playing weekly games of Magic The Gathering with A.G. Cook and a few friends,” Flume explains of his new neighborly activities. “We started doing a session, and Danny L Harle showed me a voice note from Caroline with some very early stages of vocals. I loved it and went back in on it during the pandemic.”

Listen to “Sirens” above and check out Flume’s newly announced tour dates below.

Palaces comes out on 05/20 via Future Classic/Transgressive. Pre-order it here.

Pusha T’s been having a great 2022 year so far. He kicked it off by releasing “Diet Coke,” his first official single since the summer of 2019. The track was co-produced by Kanye West and 88 Keys and it also arrived with a black and white video that featured Pusha and Kanye dancing together. The song was the presumed lead single from his upcoming fourth solo album It’s Not Dry Yet, but before giving us more music from that project, Pusha teamed up with DJ and fashion designer Nigo for their song “Hear Me Clearly,” which they just released a music video for.

The new visual for “Hear Me Clearly” is led by Pusha and it kicks off with him walking onto what seems like a normal construction site. Soon, we see that the site is actually a drug operation center and it’s one that Pusha seems to be in charge of. For the remainder of the video, Pusha stacks his collections of drugs high while enjoying his time with friends and a cast of women.

“Hear Me Clearly” was one of four singles that was released prior to the arrival of Nigo’s sophomore album I Know Nigo! The project dropped with 11 songs and features from Tyler The Creator, ASAP Rocky, Gunna, Pharrell, Lil Uzi Vert, Kid Cudi, and more.

You can watch the video for “Hear Me Clearly” above.

I Know NIGO! is out now via Republic Records. You can stream it here.

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

There have been a number of medically dubious “alternatives” in the fight against COVID, some of them touted by a certain former American president. But one was perhaps more infamous than them all. That would be ivermectin, an antiparasitic drug used on humans and livestock alike. Its professed ability to combat a virus that has killed millions has been touted by far right commentators and belittled by others. And now, after a major study, it appears that, when it comes to the novel coronavirus, it doesn’t really do diddly-squat.

As per The New York Times, a large clinical study published on Wednesday revealed that it showed “no sign of alleviating the disease,” effectively ruling it out as a form of COVID treatment. The study looked at more than 1,300 people infected with the virus in Brazil, leading experts to conclude that there’s “really no sign of any benefit” of taking the drug, often used to de-worm horses, to treat humans suffering from the highly transmissible disease.

In the early days of the pandemic, ivermectin was one of thousands of drugs researchers experimented on to combat COVID, and some studies suggested it might block the coronavirus. Some of those tests proved to be flawed and the Food and Drug Administration never claimed it could be used to treat those afflicted. Some doctors began prescribing it anyway and, by last summer, it was gaining steam among vaccine skeptics. Among them was Rogan, who casually mentioned using ivermectin among a dense cocktail of drugs he took after testing positive, leading to much backlash.

Even with the new study’s findings, testing into ivermectin’s COVID efficacy remains ongoing. But one infectious-disease expert isn’t holding his breath. “I welcome the results of the other clinical trials and will view them with an open mind,” Dr. Paul Sax, of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, told NYT, “but at some point it will become a waste of resources to continue studying an unpromising approach.”

In other words, if you still somehow haven’t gotten your free, safe, and effective COVID vaccine — to say nothing of a booster — maybe now’s the time to do so before the next wave hits.

(Via NYT)

The fallout from Will Smith’s Oscars slap continues apace, and there’s word that it may take weeks, if not longer, for the Academy of Motion Arts and Sciences to figure how to reprimand the star, if at all. But while the Board of Governors on Wednesday revealed they’ve “initiated disciplinary proceedings” against Smith, they also claimed they tried, and failed, to take steps earlier.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the Academy released a statement in which they tried to clarify something about Sunday night’s proceedings. Earlier it was claimed that by the time that ceremony administrators tried to do something after Smith struck presenter Chris Rock, who had made a joke about his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, Smith had already won his Oscar and started giving his speech.

But now they’re claiming that’s not true. Now they’re saying Smith was “asked to leave the ceremony and refused.” They added that they “could have handled the situation differently.”

In the days since the incident, many have come out against Smith’s actions. Co-host Amy Schumer has said she’s “still triggered and traumatized” by the sudden outburst, while Zoë Kravitz, who was present, joked, with deep and angry sarcasm, that people at the Oscars are “apparently assaulting people on stage now.” Others, like Joe Rogan, are worried about how Smith’s antics could inspire others to attack comedians for jokes.

(Via THR)