The Northman starring Alexander Skarsgard as a super ripped Viking is already racking up rave reviews ahead of its theatrical release, and director Robert Eggers couldn’t be more thrilled to deliver his first blockbuster film after an intense production. Known for his exacting detail, the action-filled Viking epic is a bit of departure from his earlier work, which included the more cerebral indie hits The Witch and The Lighthouse. In fact, Eggers recently revealed that, after The Northman, he now knows “how to make a movie” and admits he has trouble watching his breakout film, The Witch, because of how unsure he was as a director.
“Honestly, I can’t stand watching The Witch now,” he sighs. “It’s not that it’s bad, and the performances are great, but I was not skilled enough as a film-maker to get what was in my brain on to the screen. In The Lighthouse, I was able to do that. And The Northman, I’m proud of the movie, but not everything is quite what I hoped it would be. So I would like to do something with the scope and scale that I can actually get what’s in my imagination on to the screen.”
Armed with his experience on The Northman, and his first time navigating the studio system, Eggers hopes to go back to making smaller films like The Lighthouse and The Witch, but more finely tuned. Considering both of those movies are great, and The Northman is thrilling critics, we’ll definitely be keeping an eye on Eggers’ next project.
In November, hyperpop troublemakers 100 Gecs released “Mememe” and announced that they’d be releasing their sophomore album 10000 Gecs this year. The track moved between pop-punk, ska, industrial, and electronic sounds, and this new song, “Doritos & Fritos,” out today, does the same.
In typical 100 Gecs fashion, “Doritos & Fritos” is glitchy and frantic, made weirder by a heavy bassline and autotuned vocals singing in a disorienting deadpan. “Cheetos, Doritos and Fritos, mosquitos / I’m eating burritos with Danny DeVito,” drawls Dylan Brady. It is somewhat more melodic than their old material, but still as sensory and chaotic.
The album title and release date are still yet to be announced, but the duo will probably just drop it whenever they feel like it.
100 Gecs’ debut album 1000 Gecs is known for blending eccentric music styles from the past couple decades: crunkcore group brokeNCYDE, the cheerleader noise-pop of Sleigh Bells, the pitch-shifted euphoria of nightcore remixes. As if the bombast of their first record wasn’t enough, they took it to the next level by inviting big names onto a remix of it: Emo heroes Fall Out Boy joined them on a newer version of “Hand Crushed By A Mallet” with Craig Owns and Nicole Dollganger.
Once obscure from the bright lights of mainstream rap, the name and profile of Baby Keem has risen the past year with the release of his debut album, The Melodic Blue, elevating him from an underground treasure to one of the genre’s most promising young stars.
Off the heels of sleeper-hit “Orange Soda” in 2019, the 21-year-old artist has scaled the Billboard charts with songs like “Range Brothers” and “Family Ties,” both assisted by his Pullitzer Prize-winning cousin Kendrick Lamar. His freshman album drew critical praise and some hardware to show for his musical ascension.
The Vegas-raised artist, born Hykeem Jamaal Carter Jr., was named Billboard’s first 2021 R&B/Hip-Hop Rookie of the Year and received three nods for the 64th Grammy Awards, including Best New Artist. He didn’t take home that coveted award — bested by Olivia Rodrigo — but was still able to take the Grammys stage for a win in the Best Rap Performance category.
Keem, the once faceless artist who hid behind palette-styled cover arts early in his career, has stepped firmly into his place as a transcendent musical talent, expanding from his enigmatic underground status to a known product of today’s sound. But even before his freshman debut and his signing to Kendrick Lamar’s pgLang media company, Keem started rapping at age 13, eventually honing his skittish flow and charismatic delivery over a cheap microphone.
“When I really started, I was 13 and I had Apple studio sh*t on my computer,” Keem said in an interview with Lamar for the 40th Anniversary Issue of i-D Magazine. “I had borrowed $300 from my grandma and I got my stuff on Craigslist. I was probably 15. I got a mic for $50. It was sh*t but it worked. So, I just started learning on that. I made it work.”
From the point his music developed, he landed a few production credits on Kendrick Lamar’s Black Panther soundtrack and the albums of Top Dawg Entertainment associates Jay Rock and ScHoolBoy Q. Keem gained some traction from his first mixtape The Sound Of Bad Habit in 2018, which set the stage for his stop-and-go flow to shine, rapping “Dare I say it / B*tch, I’m Baby Keem, I don’t have time for trends” on the opener “Wolves.”
His name flashed to the masses with Die For My B*tch a vivacious and stylishly moodish project, with the standout track “Orange Soda” becoming a platinum-certified hit because of the song’s pulsating beat, hilariously cheeky lyrics, and outward brashness. Despite the buzz from Keem’s first two mixtapes, much about him was still a mystery.
Back then, an image or interview with the California-born artist could barely be found. But things changed once rumors about Keem’s affiliation with Lamar began to swirl, and soon, the cloak of invisibility surrounding him would shed as their kinship was revealed. As an artist, Keem didn’t lean on their relationship at first. Instead, he revealed in an interview with The Rap Pack that he worked on his music without the “Alright” artist knowing. That way, he could come into form on his own and leave any thoughts of nepotism to the wayside. “He didn’t even know I made music for a while,” Keem said. “He was on some, ‘What do you want to do?’ And I was like, ‘Man, I just want to go to college, bro. I’m going to figure it out.’ I wasn’t even 100 percent sure I was even good at music.”
Keem later added: “If I wasn’t ready to like do what I’m doing now, then it wouldn’t be happening, you know what I’m saying? Even in the process […] I wouldn’t even ask for anything. I didn’t send him my music until later, later. I just wanted to make sure it was from me personally; I wanted to make sure it was owned.”
That was then, but now, Keem has doubled down on his relationship with Lamar and squared his focus on refining his creative process and broadening his sound. As Keem highlighted in an interview with Ebro Darden in October, everything he does is in service of the music. No matter the occasion, he’s always searching for things that spark inspiration and lead to his evolution as an artist, songwriter, and record producer:
“I don’t really leave that mold. I feel like when I go home, everything I do is for the sake of the music. If I watch a movie, or if a play a video game, I’m studying something. There’s something in there I can use, especially a movie for sure. If I watch Netflix right now, I’m watching the way it’s shot because I want to shoot a music video, or I’m looking at the actors and studying them in their gestures because I might want to mimic or take inspiration from it.
I try to have my moment, but I be bored. Like, people go on vacations and things like that and I’m not there yet. I don’t know how to go on vacation yet.”
From his first project to this year’s Grammy, Keem has carved out a lane all his own, using his frenetic and experimental sound to pierce through the guards of hip-hop circles. Once overlooked, he’s now recognized as one of the industry’s young musical supernovas. On “Trademark USA,” he declares his placement in rap, “I took the torch / I quit being nice.”
His Grammy win only serves as affirmation for his current spot, and the one he’ll be in the future. But for now, he’ll enjoy the ride, and in time, learn to take the proper vacation he deserves.
On the heels of the release of her latest single, “Treat Me,” Chloe Bailey, who performs solo mononymously as Chloe, took some time to answer a few questions from fans. During her impromptu Q&A session, the Chloe x Halle half spilled some tea about her upcoming solo debut album.
When asked about her influences for her album, Chloe revealed “kanye, kelis, imogen heap, donna summer” were the ones “doing it” for her “in this very moment.”
This isn’t the first time Chloe has cited Heap or Kelis as influences. Last year, during a livestream on Instagram, she called Imogen Heap her “number one inspiration.”
“She a bad b*tch,” Bailey said of the “Hide And Seek” singer. “She produces and she writes all of her stuff.” Of Kelis, she said, “Every time I put on Kelis, I feel like the baddest b*tch.”
The Cutdescribes “big d*ck energy” (or BDE) as “a quiet confidence and ease with oneself that comes from knowing you have an enormous penis and you know what to do with it. It’s not cockiness, it’s not a power trip — it’s the opposite: a healthy, satisfied, low-key way you feel yourself.” The term was popularized after Ariana Grande revealed that her then-fiancé, Pete Davidson, has a larger than average… Dick is my favorite Kristen Dunst movie from the 1990s. (I’m just stealing a bit from Austin Powers here.)
In an interview with the Not Skinny But Not Fat podcast, Davidson’s new romantic partner, Kim Kardashian, was asked about his supposed BDE. She replied, “When we kissed, I was just like, hmm!” Their first kiss was during a sketch on SNL, which Kardashian referred to as a “a stage kiss, but it was still a little zing. It wasn’t anything like a super, crazy feeling.” But a few days later, she realized something.
“I was like, ‘Hmm, there is some BDE action,” she remembered, adding she was a bit bummed after finding out that Pete had missed her after-party following the show. “I thought about it later. I was like, ‘Damn, he’s the only person who didn’t come.’”
So, there you go: “very nice guy” Pete Davidson has a big… Willie Nelson is my favorite country music legend. (Again, apologies to Austin Powers.)
The horror movie-inspired season will begin to answer questions about the Upside Down and, hopefully, why anyone in their right mind would want to live in Hawkins, Indiana. “This season, we really wanted to really get into it and [reveal] some of those answers. But to do that properly, we needed time, so it just became bigger and bigger,” Stranger Things co-creator Ross Duffer said, adding that season four is about “revelations, in that we really wanted to start giving the audience some answers.”
After watching the trailer above, I need answers to some questions, including:
1. What’s the deal with the creepy Creel house?
2. What is the “war” that can’t be won without Eleven’s help?
3. How will Hopper escape his Russian prison and make it back to Hawkins?
4. How is Steve’s hair still so perfect?
5. Is this guy shredding a guitar on a rooftop during an end of the world-looking storm immediately my new favorite character?
netflix
I can answer that last one: yes.
Stranger Things, which stars Millie Bobby Brown, Winona Ryder, David Harbour, Finn Wolfhard, Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Noah Schnapp, Sadie Sink, Natalia Dyer, Charlie Heaton, Joe Keery, Maya Hawke, and Brett Gelman, along with new cast members Robert Englund (Freddy Krueger!), Amybeth McNulty, and Eduardo Franco, premieres on May 27, followed by the second half of the season on July 1.
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Seven Rings star Simu Liu has watched Disney+’s Moon Knight, and let’s just say that he’s not thrilled with the film’s accent work. He’s not alone (Oscar Isaac found himself defending the choice to portray Steven Grant with an English accent, and Isaac apparently made that call), but it’s notable that an MCU star is making this criticism. That’s particularly the case because Shang-Chi took great pains to be authentic and inclusive, from the cast (which was 98% Asian) to the crew.
To that end, Liu finds himself calling out the Mandarin spoken by Ethan Hawke’s cult-leading villain. The Shang-Chi star tweeted, “Alright Arthur Harrow needs to fire his Mandarin teacher.”
Alright Arthur Harrow needs to fire his Mandarin teacher
It’s an awkward development, especially since Moon Knight director Mohamed Diab pointedly aimed to nail the show’s Egyptian representation. In the lead up to streaming time, Diab called out Wonder Woman 1984 for what he deemed “orientalism” (which Diab condemned as “dehumanizing”) particularly the DCEU sequel’s rendering of Cairo. Diab stressed that Moon Knight would portray Egypt “as authentic[ally] as possible, in the realm of being fantastical,” and Diab declared that “[r]epresentation opportunities shouldn’t be wasted” while speaking of the upcoming Black Adam and its casting practices. And especially given that Liu’s an MCU lead, his criticism of Harrow’s dialogue is more than relevant and worth watching for followup.
Someone might want to check on David Mamet. The Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright behind Glengarry Glen Ross, Speed-the-Plow, and American Buffalo shared some pretty shocking opinions about what he believes are the unconscious motives of the people who dedicate their lives to teaching our kids—and with Fox News of all places.
As NBC News reports, Mamet sat down with Fox News’ Mark Levin on Sunday, presumably to push his new book, Recessional: The Death of Free Speech and the Cost of a Free Lunch, in which (according to the publisher) the celebrated writer “calls out, skewers, mocks, and, most importantly, dissects the virus of conformity which is now an existential threat to the West.” And if going against the norm is what Mamet thinks is most needed right now, he certainly chose a bold hill on which to prove his point when he claimed that, whether they know it or not, all teachers have a natural predisposition toward pedophilia.
(No, that’s not a typo.)
“We have to take back control,” Mamet said. “If there’s no community control of the schools, what we have is kids being—not only indoctrinated, but groomed, in a very real sense, by people who are, whether they know it or not, sexual predators. Are they abusing the kids physically? No, I don’t think so. But they’re abusing them mentally and using sex to do so.”
“This has always been the problem with education,” Mamet continued, digging an even deeper hole for himself. “Is that teachers are inclined—particularly men, because men are predators—to pedophilia.”
Come again?
But really: What in the actual f*ck?
While Mamet laid out these accusations as seeming facts, he neither cited any sources nor provided any other proof for just how he came to these conclusions. Of course, it didn’t help that Levin just sat there sort of nodding his head as if all of this made perfect sense and was in no way inflammatory—or insane.
NBC News spoke with Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, who described Mamet’s comments as “a repulsive demonization of the very people who have been the lifeline to our kids.” NBC also reached out to Mamet via his lawyer, but had not received a response.
David Mamet on Fox News: “Teachers are inclined, particularly men because men are predators, to pedophilia” pic.twitter.com/azAlXPWRUc
Move over, Mark Wahlberg. Step aside, The Rock. Legendary singer/songwriter/actor/ philanthropist/all-around badass Dolly Parton has let the world in on her daily routine, and it’s the kind of schedule that would make some of the world’s biggest action stars sweat.
Insider’s Anneta Konstantinides recently sat down with Parton, who shared that at approximately 3 a.m., while the rest of us mere mortals are likely still fast asleep, the 76-year-old 9 to 5 star is busy getting sh*t done.
“I don’t need a whole lot of sleep,” Parton said. “I go to bed pretty early, but even if I’ve been up late—it’s just kind of like a little clock inside of me that says ‘it’s 3 o’clock!’” Parton assured Konstantinides that she gets enough sleep, she just doesn’t need as much of it as the typical person, which is likely a trait she inherited from her father. “I’m like my daddy,” she said. “He was always up early, even if he had to go to bed late.”
But don’t for a second think that the two-time Oscar nominee is just sitting around sipping coffee. She’s working—even if she’s still lounging in bed. “I do some of my best work there,” Parton says.
On the weekends, Parton—who just launched a new line of Southern-style desserts with Duncan Hines—can often be found in the kitchen, where she loves to cook up a big breakfast to enjoy with Carl Dean, her husband of 55 years. While Wahlberg is throwing back protein bars or sitting in cryo chamber recovery, whatever that is, Dolly and Carl are feasting on scrambled eggs, French toast and bacon, or biscuits and gravy.
The always down-to-Earth star also shared that she doesn’t waste time or money on any exhaustive or expensive skincare routines. (She credits her flawless skin to never having spent much time in the sun in the past.) And that when she’s not at home writing soon-to-be-iconic songs, funding COVID vaccines, or fostering a love of reading in kids around the world through her Imagination Library charity, you might just find her and Carl headed for the border; they’re suckers for a Taco Bell meal, and Dolly has made it clear that she’d love to see their pizza make a comeback. If anyone can make it happen, it’s Dolly.
While it’s been a good long while since Rihanna dropped her last album, 2016’s Anti, but in recent years, she has regularly offered brief updates on it. Now, she’s back with another as she noted her approach to the project has changed.
In a new Vogue profile, Rihanna noted, “I’m looking at my next project completely differently from the way I had wanted to put it out before. I think this way suits me better, a lot better. It’s authentic, it’ll be fun for me, and it takes a lot of the pressure off.”
For Vogue’s May issue, Rihanna opens up about fashion, romance, and what it’s like to carry the bump seen around the world. Plus, a small update on that long-awaited record. https://t.co/xJpLOrsGT4
As for balancing that album with everything else she always has going on, Rihanna said, “Balance is one of my biggest challenges and always has been. And now there’s another human being coming into play, it changes what that means again. Still, I have businesses that aren’t going to run themselves. My mom handled the three of us with not even close to the amount of resources that I have, so I can absolutely do it. What it looks like? I’m not sure.”
Elsewhere in the conversation, she also revealed that Anti is her favorite album of hers, calling it her “best album to this day.”
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