Month: July 2022

Thanks to Donald Trump‘s White House infamously leaking like a sieve, it was no secret that Steve Bannon and Jared Kushner absolutely hated each other. The two were locked in an all-out war to oust the other from Trump’s administration, and in the end, Kushner ended up winning as Bannon was eventually fired. Wasting no time capitalizing on his nepotistic jaunt through Washington, Kushner has written a new book, Breaking History: A White House Memoir, where he naturally gloats about his victory over Bannon.

Setting himself up as the plucky underdog, despite being Trump’s son-in-law, Kushner writes that he was “woefully unprepared” for dealing with Bannon, “a black belt in the dark arts of media manipulation.” According to Kushner, the whole thing started after senior economic adviser Gary Cohn asked him to do something about Bannon leaking to the press. Trump had already had several meltdowns over leak, so naturally, Bannon didn’t take the accusation well. Via CNN:

“Steve, you gotta stop leaking on Gary,” Kushner said he told Bannon. “We’re trying to build a team here.”

Kushner writes that Bannon responded: “‘Cohn’s the one leaking on me. … Jared, right now, you’re the one undermining the President’s agenda,’ he continued, his eyes intense and voice escalating into a yell. ‘And if you go against me, I will break you in half. Don’t f— with me.’”

After Bannon got fired in August 2017, Kushner reveals he gloated to a friend that it was one of his “greatest accomplishments.” However, Kushner is now in a similar position. According to reports, he and wife Ivanka have been replaced in Trump’s inner circle by Mike Lindell. As in Mike Lindell, the MyPillow Guy who recently blurted out on camera that he spent the past 30 years on crack. That’s the new Jared now.

(Via CNN)

Theaters have slowly been roaring back to life, but there’s still not been an experience that’s anything like Avengers: Endgame. That scene on the battlefield where Cap faces off, seemingly in the face of imminent defeat, against Thanos before Black Panther leads the way with the resurrected Avengers coming back to help? Unbeatable. Cap plucked up Thor’s hammer, Mjölnir, which performed some enormous fan service by answering a long-standing question that’s hung in the air since Age of Ultron. Then all hell broke loose in the best way. As it turns out, though, Iron Man director Jon Favreau was staunchly against the resolution of this scene, which involved Tony Stark giving his life to activate the Infinity Gauntlet, thereby saving the universe.

Favreau (who also portrays Happy in the MCU) was staunchly against killing off Iron Man. Even though Robert Downey Jr.’s contract was, by all accounts, about to expire with Endgame, Favreau was dead set against the Russo Bros. killing off such a beloved mainstay in the MCU. As the Russos told Vanity Fair (within a video interview), they got the call from Jon, and he made his case: by saying that Tony Stark’s death would cause theater walkouts and people walking, dazed, into harm’s way.

Granted, this may have been some exaggeration (and that’s fair, given the emotional heft of Iron Man within the MCU), but via Indiewire, here’s how it went down:

“Part of the pressure came from Jon Favreau, who called us up after he read the script. And said to us, ‘Are you guys really going to kill Iron Man?’” Anthony Russo explained.

Joe Russo added, “He did. And I remember pacing on the corner of a stage on the phone with Favreau trying to talk him off a ledge. Because he’s like, ‘You can’t do this. It’s going to devastate people and you don’t want them walking out of the theater and into traffic.’”

And then the Russos said this: “We did it anyway.” Well, they did! Watch the full Vanity Fair interview below.

(Via Indiewire & Vanity Fair)

In August of 2021, a woman filed a lawsuit in New York against Bob Dylan, claiming that the singer sexually abused her in 1965, when she was 12 years old. The woman, named only as “J.C.,” stated in the suit that Dylan used “his status as a musician by grooming J.C. to gain her trust and to obtain control over her as part of his plan to sexually molest and abuse J.C.” When the claim went to court in January of this year, Dylan’s lawyers called it “a brazen shakedown masquerading as a lawsuit.” But as of yesterday, the claim has been withdrawn by the plaintiff.

Per a Billboard report, this comes a day after Dylan’s attorneys said she destroyed evidence surrounding the case, which they claimed “irretrievably” compromised the case.

“This case is over,” Dylan’s lead attorney Orin Snyder told Billboard. “It is outrageous that it was ever brought in the first place. We are pleased that the plaintiff has dropped this lawyer-driven sham and that the case has been dismissed with prejudice.”

The case had a lot of holes from the get-go, with the plaintiff alleging that the sexual abuse happened at the Chelsea Hotel between April and May of 1965. Dylan scholars and historians compared historical documents that showed Dylan was not in New York at the time. When the plaintiff changed her time frame to say that the alleged abuse happened in “early Spring,” the timeline was once again refuted this claim, stating that Dylan was not in New York for the specified amount of time that would have lined up with the plaintiff’s claim.

The plaintiff had fired her attorneys amid a request for evidence by Dylan’s representatives this month. The suit was spiraling backwards in the lead up to it being dropped and more details can be found in the initial Billboard report here.

When people find out what I do for a living, they usually ask me what they should watch. My first answer is usually, “well, if you just read my writing, we wouldn’t have to talk about this right now” but my second answer always takes a while. Even though I consume, critique, and analyze film and television for a living, it’s tough to find something worthy of recommendation, especially to a stranger in the Peak TV era. And it’s even tougher to recommend anything definitively because, for every five shows I watch, there are twenty I simply don’t have time to see. What if one of those twenty shows I missed is better, and more suited to someone’s taste? Sometimes, I honestly have to look at what I’ve written recently to even remember what I’ve liked and what I’ve watched. In an era in which we watch so much television that we often forget what television we watched, the details are fleeting memories only weeks, even days after we’ve watched them. And if it’s a Netflix show, I most likely watched it but forgot it so much that I would tell you I didn’t watch it.

Television went from the Golden Age of the late 90s/2000s and straight to Peak TV. TV got so good that everyone wanted to make it, and streaming opened the doors for an unfathomable amount of content. Deeper into the Peak TV era, which has certainly felt longer than it’s actually been, it’s finally peaking, with tv shows that actually resonate, that feel wholly unique and inspiring, the kind of tv shows you can confidently recommend, the kind that will stick with you for the rest of your life.

In 2022, TV became very good again. Right now, there are more hits than misses – a first for the peak tv era, and the hits seem to hit harder. Television has gotten artistic again, just as it did with the arrival of The Sopranos in 1999. This is not to say that there hasn’t been excellent, groundbreaking shows over the years: there’s Succession, Barry, The Righteous Gemstones, I May Destroy You, and Better Call Saul to name a few. Succession’s climb to appointment viewing in its three seasons perhaps inspired many of these shows to create a similar effect and to create something genuinely new rather than a regurgitation of Golden Age shows. Barry’s startling, riveting third season shifted the series’ tone, making it even more singular than the dark comedy already was.

Showtime’s Yellowjackets, which began its first season in late 2021, picked up steam and a devoted audience as its first season was wrapping up in January. The series has powerhouse performances from beloved actors (a Peak TV era signature is bringing back some old faves). It’s also a bold, gripping story that unpacks decades of trauma among a group of Gen X women that presents the nostalgic 1990s as a cruel and violent, but still, ever so slightly nostalgic, nightmare.

Other shows that have made a mark and an impact include Apple TV’s Severance, a visually stunning and intellectually challenging sci-fi series with one of the best season finales ever made, and Hulu’s The Dropout, which turned the dark true story of Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes into a deep character study that felt both fun, serious, and fresh, unlike so many televised retellings of recent scammer events.

This spring, HBO Max’s The Staircase – a series I was personally dreading as I was expecting more of the same true crime adaptation that tries to make it right but doesn’t – revolutionized the genre. The series (which is another featuring a deep cast of old faves) presents a murder from multiple perspectives and explores the complex dynamic of marriage and life in the American south. More than being about a crime and a flawed trial, The Staircase is about relationships: how they shape you, and how they can end you.

Most recently, FX’s The Bear transformed the workplace comedy. It also transformed an entire generation into Jeremy Allen White stans. The Chicago-set series captures the absolute, never-ending, high-anxiety chaos of working in a restaurant: like if the Safdie brothers directed Top Chef. But the heart of The Bear is what’s made it resonate, and that heart represents why all these other shows resonate, too. While The Bear has a splashy, enticing setting most people want to learn about (or reminisce about if you’re crazy like me), it’s about people. The Bear, like all of the most compelling shows of the Peak TV era including Succession, Yellowjackets, The Dropout, The Staircase, I May Destroy You, and Barry is unpacking what it’s like to be human. In comparison, other shows of the Peak TV era that have long disappeared from our memory felt more like content presented to entice us into subscribing to streaming services or sticking with a network than art. Now, for the first time in years, when somebody asks me what they should watch, I have a list of recommendations in my head I can regurgitate to them. And unfortunately, for each show, I have a twenty-minute monologue prepared.

Things are nyet going well for Vladimir Putin or his botched invasion of Ukraine. Given that he’s built his life and reputation around never-ending propaganda, it’s likely that the Russian leader assumed it would take his fierce army of soldiers just a couple of days, if not hours, to strike so much fear into all of Ukraine that they would simply give up and bend the knee to Putin. But here we are, five months later, and Russian soldiers are desperate for food, clothing, protective gear, weapons—and even bandages. Now, according to the latest numbers reported by Yahoo! News, it appears that a shocking 75,000 Russian soldiers have been either wounded or killed since initially invading Ukraine on February 24th.

To put that number into better perspective: Half of Putin’s army has been injured or killed.

These latest stats came courtesy of Michigan congresswoman ​​Elissa Slotkin, who spoke with CNN’s Melanie Zanona earlier this week. “We were briefed that over 75,000 Russians have either been killed or wounded [in Ukraine], which is huge,” Slotkin said. “Over 80 percent of their land forces are bogged down, and they’re tired.”

They’re also desperate. In May, The Daily Beast reported that Russian soldiers were calling their parents to beg for money so that they could purchase the protective gear so desperately needed, but not being provided to them by the Russian government. Earlier this week, Russian officials were reportedly attempting to turn the invasion into a crowdfunded event as they asked citizens for donations in order to help purchase such basic necessities as binoculars, bandages, and tourniquets. And today CNN reported that Russia is desperately stealing African gold in an effort to fund operations.

As Yahoo! reports, the numbers Slotkin shared seem to line up with the tally CIA Director William Burns shared last week when asked about Russian casualties. “I think the latest estimates from the U.S. intelligence community would be, you know, something in the vicinity of 15,000 killed and maybe three times that wounded,” he said, “so a quite significant set of losses.”

Ukraine has faced its fair share of loss of life, too, with one top adviser to Volodymyr Zelensky estimating that they are dealing with 100 to 200 casualties per day.

Yet calling or truce or otherwise solving their differences amicably does not appear to be a move you’re likely to find in Putin’s playbook. This morning, CNN reported that Russia’s newest fundraising tactic involves stealing gold from Sudan under the guise of exporting cookies? Putin, meanwhile, seems more concerned with making sure he’s got enough Botox to take him through the rest of the war—however long it may be.

(Via Yahoo! News)

Mozzy has been on quite a run over the last few years, both individually and as part of Yo Gotti’s CMG imprint. Unfortunately, the Sacramento rapper’s momentum will be coming to a halt as he turned himself in yesterday (July 28) and will serve a one-year sentence in prison for a federal gun charge.

The “Famous” artist was originally arrested during a traffic stop back in January 2021. The police then caught the scent of marijuana and went on to search the car, discovering a Glock 26, 16 rounds of 9mm ammunition, and marijuana. Mozzy was then taken in before posting his $35,000 bail.

The case was rejected by the District Attorney’s office and passed on to a local US Attorney. Mozzy was picked up by US Marshals in Las Vegas at an unrelated court appearance, upon which he and his wife split a $1 million appearance bond and he went free from his federal charge. Mozzy pled guilty this past January and aimed for just probation, which was denied. Prosecutors sought a 10-month sentence and drug counseling after he tested positive for marijuana while on pretrial release.

It is clearly an unfortunate series of events for Mozzy and he will now have to sit for a year.

Big Freedia’s 2014 track “Explode” is one of many songs sampled on Beyoncé’s new album Renaissance. She was excited from the beginning, making a post on Instagram once “Break My Soul” was out: “It feels surreal to be on the track with the Queen Beyoncé once again I’m so honored to be apart of this special moment I’m forever grateful lord. someone please catch me,” she wrote.

Today, she went on CBS Mornings to discuss the experience. When asked if she cared how “Explode” would be used, she said, “Not at all! It’s Beyoncé. You can use whatever you need, honey.” She was also asked if she would have wanted to re-record the “Explode” vocals for “Break My Soul.” She said, “Of course. If I’m there, I can do a whole lot more.”

She also touched on the what it was like writing that song initially. “At the time when I wrote ‘Explode,’ I was thinking about all of those things I wanted to release, and the things I do release when I get onstage,” she said. “All those things, I try to forget about those things and get into my zone. Sometimes you want to explode, all the things that you’re going through. So I wanted to release all those things.”

This reaction is the polar opposite of Kelis’, who is upset that no one notified her that she was sampled on Renaissance. “My mind is blown too because the level of disrespect and utter ignorance of all 3 parties involved is astounding,” she wrote.

Beyonce’s new album, Renaissance, has arrived and while the Beyhive is celebrating the long-awaited return of their Queen, not everyone is as enthused to hear the house and techno-influenced project. In particular, Kelis, the singer best known for her early 2000s run including tracks like “Caught Out There,” “Milkshake” and “Bossy,” has a bone or two to pick with Beyonce over one song specifically: “Energy,” which features short interpolations of her songs “Get Along with You” and “Milkshake.”

Taking to Instagram, Kelis said she felt insulted by the samples, calling them “theft” and asserting “the level of disrespect and utter ignorance of all three parties involved is astounding.” Her frustration appears to stem from the fact that she wasn’t contacted prior to the release to approve the samples, writing, “I heard about this the same way everyone else did. Nothing is ever as it seems, some of the people in this business have no soul or integrity and they have everyone fooled.”

In a later video, she elaborated, “She can contact, right? Ashnikko, who’s what, 20? She’s a young white girl, she reached out… It’s common decency.” She clarified that “it’s not about me being mad about Beyoncé,” and reiterated her arguments stemming from a few years ago when she called out Pharrell and Chad Hugo, The Neptunes, for not crediting her as a songwriter for her first two albums with them. In her view, Pharrell and Chad tricked her out of her publishing rights and the associated royalties that come with them.

Now, whether or not you agree with Kelis, her comments make one thing crystal clear and practically undeniable: The recording industry as we know it is desperately in need of an overhaul. In fact, it could be argued that reform of the current business model is decades overdue; after all, the internet nearly killed the major label system over twenty years ago when downloading .mp3s on Napster was the preferred method of music consumption for a relatively small sector of the market. Now, with the advent of streaming, blockchain, and computerized algorithms driving music discovery — and keeping track of every transaction automatically, there’s no excuse not to implement some big changes when it comes to things like attributing credits and royalties to artists.

To be fair, Beyonce did give credits to the required parties, clearing the samples and getting permission from the rights holders. Publishing administration is handled by the business people; I’m not so sure how much of a hand Beyonce personally has in that end of the creation process (probably very little, considering the seeming 1 billion other details she personally oversees, from choreography to costuming). And Kelis did sign those contracts — or neglected to sign the split sheets — that abdicated her share of publishing to Star Trak.

But that might be the biggest part of the problem. How many artists have we seen come forward over the past few years about regrettable terms they didn’t understand in contracts they signed as teenagers? What does a 17-year-old know about the masters rights or publishing rights or how an advance works? And for what it’s worth, we’ve seen how supposed industry veterans like Kanye West, who was in his mid-20s when he signed with Def Jam after working with the label for years on multiple hits, clearly don’t get how these things work. Who’s to say, without looking at the contracts in question, that Pharrell himself even knows what he signed Kelis to?

If we’re going to point fingers, we’ve got to point them at the powers that be, the folks who set up the system and profit the most from it — and who refuse to change it to keep with the times. With so many new technologies available, wouldn’t it make sense to review some of these “industry standard” contracts and revise the industry standards to fit modern conditions? Thanks to technology, labels have new avenues to market and promote music and turn a profit on their investments, wouldn’t it behoove them to share those profits with the people generating the product? If the industry is a house, archaic practices are the termites destroying it from the inside while the changing times are the weather, slowly stripping away the paint and wearing down the roof.

I get why they wouldn’t want to perform a top-down overhaul. It’d be costly, it’d be time-consuming, and it’d take a lot more work than they’re already putting in to generate record revenues. But just like with a house, if you don’t do the maintenance, eventually all those little problems add up to bigger problems and you find yourself looking for a new place to live. The near collapse of the industry in the early 2000s should have been a warning; while the labels narrowly escaped their demise then, it was by innovating and challenging the status quo. Unfortunately, some seemed to have missed the lesson. The next epochal shift in music technology could be right around the corner, and next time, they might not be able to save themselves.

The first scene on Better Call Saul — before we meet Kim Wexler or Chuck McGill, before Jimmy McGill / Saul Goodman / Gene Takovic scams his first schmuck, before Lalo Salamanca becomes the best villain on TV — is a montage of Cinnabon employees making cinnamon rolls set to “Address Unknown” by the Ink Spots.

It’s the first of many music-assisted montages on the Breaking Bad prequel series, most of which have been compiled by Twitter user @otherthandead in a useful thread.

Here’s Jimmy wearing a cowboy hat:

Here’s Jimmy and Chuck singing “The Winner Takes It All” by ABBA at karaoke, which technically isn’t a montage, but it’s too good to not include:

And here’s the one from the most recent episode, sung by Lalo (not that one) Schifrin:

“With [co-creator Peter Gould] on the show, it’s always good because we generally don’t do much music when we’re cutting, and it gives us the opportunity to make the picture work. Then when you add the music, it just enhances everything,” editor Skip MacDonald told the Hollywood Reporter about putting together montages. “On a lot of other shows you work on, they like to have a lot of temp music in it, so this is a pleasure, to not worry about the music and what people are going to respond to about the music. This is always responding to the images they’re seeing and it’s a great way to work.”

It’s not too late to get a “Major Tom (Coming Home)” montage in there.

Earlier this month, Marcus Mumford of Mumford & Sons announced his grand plan to go solo. His debut album called simply, Self-Titled, is due out on September 16th and while the song “Cannibal” came out two weeks ago, it’s actually not considered the lead single. That would be “Grace,” Mumford’s latest song that came out today along with a new music video.

Where with the “Cannibal” video, Mumford only revealed after the fact that it was directed by Stephen Spielberg, we know quite a bit about “Grace” from the get-go. It was written by Mumford, along with producer Blake Mills, and features singer Danielle Ponder on backing vocals and prolific bassist Pino Palladino. The song touches on themes of recovery and the powerful video was directed by Diane Martel, whose incredible music video directing credits include Mariah Carey’s “Dreamlover” and Robin Thicke, Pharrell, and T.I.’s “Blurred Lines.”

In the new clip, Mumford sits on a lonely leather couch in a small box of a room with a single light bulb dangling overhead. The theme of recovery and cleansing your soul is felt visually, just as it is lyrically, where Mumford holds dizzying drawn out notes singing, “Grace is like a river… Yeah, see there will come a time, when it won’t feel just like living it over and over, with the weight of the shadow on your shoulder. And I hear there’s healing just around this corner.”

Watch the video for “Grace” above.

Self-Titled is out 9/16 via Capitol. Pre-order it here.