Month: April 2022

There’s been this odd attempt by a certain group of people, right-wingers especially, to create a new narrative behind Twisted Sister’s highlight song, “We’re Gonna Take It.” One attempt came earlier this year when Dee Snider, the band’s lead vocalist, allowed Ukrainian supporters to use “We’re Gonna Take It” as a theme song of sorts for their fight against Russia, who invaded the country earlier this year. Some questioned why Snider allowed Ukrainian supporters to use it and not anti-maskers, to which he replied, “Well, one use is for a righteous battle against oppression; the other is infantile feet stomping against an inconvenience.”

As the saying goes, history repeats itself, and Snider once again found himself defending the meaning and intention behind “We’re Gonna Take It.” This time, it came after Jerrod Sessler, a former NASCAR driver running against Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-WA) in the GOP primary spoke about the song and Snider in a tweet. “Bummed to learn that @deesnider, the man with the perfect song written decades ago about the attack on traditional, conservative American values,” Sessler wrote. “‘We’re Not Gonna Take It’ is riding the train in the wrong direction. How could it be that he sang for us but now fights for them?”

Snider got an absolute laugh out of Sessler’s comment and he made sure to let Sessler know how funny he found his tweet. “You think i wrote a song in support of “traditional American values”? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!! You funny,” Snider replied. Later on, Snider returned to Sessler’s tweet with another response. “The first line of my song is WE’VE GOT THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE!” he wrote. “Can I count you amongst us pro-choice people? Now that’s a Republican I can support!”

You can see the exchange between Snider and Sessler above.

There is a long list of things that Mike Lindell doesn’t understand, including: How murder works, what the past tense of “steal” is, and why a pillow maker’s powers don’t extend to imprisoning all Americans. Now it looks as if we can add orgies to the list of concepts that confuse the Pillow Man, as well as why the press is interested in talking about him at all (sorry, Mike, it’s purely for entertainment value).

On Saturday, as The Daily Beast reported, Lindell and Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake were in Selma, North Carolina for a Trump rally, because of course they were. Still, they made sure to set aside time to chat with—or, really, at—conservative, Trump-loving Right Side Broadcasting Network, where Lindell talked excitedly about the members of the media who regularly attack his batshit conspiracy theories and how he likes to “just embrace it! It’s like having a family of friends every day”… as opposed to, you know, having a regular family or friends.

But Lindell had a special shout-out for embattled North Carolina congressman Madison Cawthorn (“I think it’s Cawthorn?”):

“I told him in back: Remember a week ago, everybody, they were attacking him for, umm, he said something about, ahh, pornos things or whatever with the Republicans, right? So they’re attacking him and I told him, I said, ‘Thanks, Madison.’ I said, ‘For three days you were at the top of the news, so I could get stuff done.”

Just exactly what sort of “stuff” Lindell was able to get done remains unknown, mostly because nobody cares. Much like Madison “I think it’s Cawthorn” Cawthorn’s bizarre boasting about being a guy every geriatric Republican wants to have at their coke-fueled “sexual get-togethers,” Lindell doesn’t seem to understand that the public’s interest in him—and therefore the media’s—is largely because he’s a human sideshow attraction who is just as likely to accuse a politician of cold-blooded murder while spouting off as he is to claim to have found an 850-year-old woman who voted in the 2020 election.

(Via The Daily Beast)

The New Orleans Pelicans have nothing to play for on Sunday night when the Warriors come to town, as they are locked into the 9-seed in the West and will host the San Antonio Spurs in Tuesday’s first play-in game.

Like a number of teams around the league who are locked into position (or don’t care if they move up or down in the standings), that means a lot of rest for the top players, but unlike some of those teams, not everyone will be sitting out in totality. While the Bucks, for instance, have announced Giannis Antetokounmpo, Khris Middleton, and Brook Lopez are among the players sitting against Cleveland, New Orleans will still run the likes of CJ McCollum out there to start the game.

However, when an inquiring fan asked why McCollum wasn’t on the injury report for some rest, he explained the plan is to play some minutes to stay sharp and then park it on the bench for the remainder. As such, he provided a PSA to fans not to put him “in your parlays tonight.”

https://twitter.com/CJMcCollum/status/1513224226991398915

This is why CJ is a pro, because he knows that if he didn’t say this, some idiots would bombard his mentions complaining about lost bets on his point total and now he can, at least, point to this as him having given them ample warning not to do that.

For the first time in a little over two years, Camila Cabello has a new album out for people to enjoy. The ex-Fifth Harmony singer released her third solo effort Familia on Friday and the project arrives with 12 songs and the previously-released singles “Bam Bam” and “Don’t Go Yet.” The project also features contributions from Willow, Ed Sheeran, and Maria Becerra. So far, Cabello has celebrated the album’s release with performances of “Bam Bam” and “Pyschofreak” on Saturday Night Live. Elsewhere, she took a moment to talk to fans about the album and share how much it means to her.

“Wowzer! Familia is finally out,” Cabello said to start a TikTok she recently posted before adding that “this album means so much to me.“ She continued, “The journey to making it completely changed (me) and, not to be dramatic, saved my life. Y’know, I started this album at a really shitty mental health point and the process of making it, and being vulnerable and being honest about my experiences and leaning on other people changed my life.”

Cabello concluded her message by saying, “I’m so proud of it and I’m so happy you guys get to hear it now.”

You can watch Cabello speak about the importance of Familia in the video above.

Familia is out now via Epic Records. You can stream it here.

Ed Sheeran is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

As the husband of two-time Oscar nominee Scarlett Johansson, SNL writer and “Weekend Update” co-anchor Colin Jost knows a thing or two about what it’s really like to sit through an Oscars ceremony in-person. Which is why he isn’t so sure that being banned from attending the awards-giving portion of the evening itself isn’t really the worst thing in the world.

One week after declaring Will Smith slapping Chris Rock at the Oscars as “one of the craziest things we will ever see in our lives” and lamenting that it set “a terrible precedent for having to defend your wife at awards shows,” Jost had some thoughts about the Academy’s decision to ban Smith from The Oscars ceremony for the next 10 years—but only the ceremony: “Is that a punishment?”

Jost went on to explain that the “ban” doesn’t prevent Smith from being nominated or even winning an Oscar—or from getting jiggy with it (again) at any Oscar parties. “He just doesn’t have to attend the four-hour ceremony where someone is definitely going to make fun of his wife again.”

If Jost were the one doling out the penances, he thinks forcing Smith to host next year’s Oscars would be more befitting.

You can watch Jost’s thoughts above, beginning around the 2:35 mark.

Donald Trump has done some pretty vile things in his life. Among them? Bragging about grabbing women by the p***y; ogling his adult daughter Ivanka; joking about wanting to abort his youngest daughter Tiffany; bringing Don Jr. into the world; inciting a deadly riot on the Capitol; and, oh yeah, attempting to overturn a presidential election because he didn’t win. And that’s just for starters. Yet the former president’s red hat-wearing supporters have stuck by their leader… possibly until now.

On Saturday, as CNN shared, Trump went ahead and gave quack TV doc Mehmet Oz, who is running for senator in Pennsylvania, his full endorsement. For many MAGA-ites, this was a total slap in the face (unlike, say, the more than two dozen women who have accused Trump of sexual misconduct, leading up to and including rape—because they’re all reportedly just liars). As Raw Story reports, the backlash against Trump for throwing his support behind Oz—whom Jimmy Kimmel once dubbed a “serial testicle fondler”—has been swift and severe. So much so that Breitbart senior editor-at-large Joel Pollack believes the former-and-wannabe-again president could actually lose his base over this single bad decision.

Speaking of bad decisions: Even Alabama congressman Mo Brooks—a longtime pro-Trumper who was a featured speaker at the “Stop the Steal” rally on January 6, and who Trump both endorsed, then unendorsed, for senator—had some sh*t-talk for his former idol, in which he claimed that Trump has allowed himself to be swallowed up by The Swamp.

While Republicans flip-flopping, backstabbing, and publicly condemning each other is nothing new, Raw Story noted, as did the New York Times’ Maggie Haberman, that Brooks taking Trump to task for endorsing Oz was particularly surprising.

Given that un-endorsing a candidate wouldn’t be an unprecedented move for Trump, that he might revoke his praise of Dr. Oz is still a possibility. However, as Mediaite reported, Trump embarrassingly noted in his official endorsement of the fake TV doctor, part of the reason the former president is a fan is because Oz “said that I was in extraordinary health, which made me like him even more (although he also said I should lose a couple of pounds!).” And we all know how Trump feels about flattery!

(Via Raw Story)

Last month, YK Osiris committed to doing a good deed by saying he would pay for the funeral of 14-year-old Tyre Sampson who fell to his death after getting on a ride at ICON amusement park in Orlando, Florida. Last week, during an interview with TMZ, he said that was in touch with Sampson’s family in order to go through with his plan of covering funeral costs. “I feel like it was just a devastating thing for the parents, for everybody in his family, so I had to make it happen,” he said. “Somebody had to make it happen. In the celebrity world, we got too much power and we got [too] big [of a] platform to not help with things like that.”

Despite Osiris’ promises, Sampson’s family came forward to accuse the rapper of lying about Tyre’s funeral. “YK Osiri or whatever dude name is cancelled,” Sampson’s brother said in a Facebook post. “Used lil bro for pure clout. Didn’t pay a dime but told the world otherwise. Even posted a fake screenshot of a GoFundMe donation. Stop pretending you about giving back to the community just to get your sales up. Lame as hell.” Tyre’s mother Nekia Dodd chimed in and added, “And he blocked me on IG too!”

YK Osiris caught wind of the comments and took to his Instagram page to respond. “Why me? I’m not even that type of person fr,” he wrote on his Instagram Story. “I will never play around like that NEVER.” He then shared a screenshot of private messages between him and Dodd where he asks to call her and make things right. After Dodd agreed that a GoFundMe donation from Osiris would work, he shared a screenshot of a $15,000 donation that he made in his name.

“It’s a difference doing something from the heart and doing something for clout,” Osiris wrote in a separate Instagram Story post. “When u do something genuine, u don’t care what comes with it.”

You can view the posts and screenshots regarding the funeral matter above.

Kingdom Hearts is now a 20-year-old franchise. As hard as it is to believe, it’s been two decades since a Final Fantasy island boy teamed up with Donald and Goofy to save the universe from impending doom. Of course, any fan of the franchise knows it has grown well beyond its humble beginnings and evolved from a Final Fantasy x Disney crossover into something far bigger.

On Sunday, Square Enix gave everyone a glimpse into what the future of the franchise might look like. It celebrated 20 years of Kingdom Hearts with the announcement of two mobile games, and a surprise unveiling of Kingdom Hearts IV. Alongside this announcement was a trailer revealing a new look for Sora and the game’s setting. Gone are the cartoonish worlds from the previous games and its place is a realistic city setting. Even Sora himself has lost many of his cartoonish features in favor of a look that is more fitting to this new universe.

As odd as this all looks, anyone that played through Kingdom Hearts III is aware that this appears to be picking up right where the previous game left off. Even then, the realistic setting is a surprising choice and may represent a sort of soft reboot for the franchise. Kingdom Hearts III did a lot to wrap up any loose ends that were left from previous games so it would make sense to see them take it in a new direction. We’ll just have to wait for more information whenever the game goes further into development.

Following up her performance of “Psychofreak” with Willow, Camila returned to the Saturday Night Live stage to perform another song from her most recent album, Familia. After releasing one of the album’s earliest singles, “La Buena Vida,” late last year, which came with a tiny desk concert complete with a mariachi band, Camila collaborated with Ed Sheeran on a slightly more carefree single, “Bam Bam.”

The song is a reflection on a recent breakup, which most people will assume is based on Camila’s own split from her fellow pop star ex-boyfriend, Shawn Mendes. But instead of going down a road that’s sad or bitter, the song is more of an existentially carefree, accepting the bad with the good as life goes on, a surprisingly refreshing twist on the genre. Of course, songs like that are only capable after healing from a breakup, so it seems like Camila is well on her way to moving on.

For her second Saturday Night Live performance of the night, Camila brought out a slew of dancers in colorful outfits, and rocked a tie-dye blazer and cutoff shorts herself. Bordering on cheerfully boisterous, the song is definitely a polar opposite of her “Psychofreak” feelings, illustrating Cabello’s range. Watch the performance up top.

Lately, Willow Smith has been a secret weapon for pop star who want to add an influx of punk energy to their sound. Since she started coming up as an adult artist, Willow has evolved far past “Whip My Hair” and has become a full-fledged “Emo Girl” — or so her recent collaboration with Machine Gun Kelly asserts. Since Camila Cabello has never been edgy or punk at all, this is the perfect chance for her to explore what a song with those undertones would be like, and “Psychofreak,” her recent collab with Willow, does not disappoint.

The track is off Camila’s third album, Familia, which she just released this past Friday. Of course, Camila has been on a press blitz promoting the record, and she was lucky enough to get an appearance on Saturday Night Live as part of that. As collaborations become more and more popular, it’s not necessarily surprising that Willow joined her, but kicking off her set with this recent collab is definitely a pivot from the earlier sounds of the record, including “Bam Bam” featuring Ed Sheeran, and one of the record’s earliest singles, “La Buena Vida.”

Check out the high-energy performance of “Psychofreak” up top, and look out for Camila’s second performance of the night, “Bam Bam” as well.