Month: July 2023

Meet Me @ The Altar dropped their poignant debut album, Past // Present // Future, in March.

“Even if it’s bad in the moment, life is so fluctuating,” bassist Téa Campbell told Uproxx at the time, “and it will get better and there’s some peace in knowing that when you’re in those tough moments.”

That sentiment extends to “Give It Up,” the first of four new tracks included on Meet Me @ The Altar’s forthcoming Past // Present // Future (Deluxe) album. The single and album announcement were simultaneously revealed on Friday, July 21.

“‘Give It Up’ is a song about frustration,” Meet Me @ The Altar said in a collective statement. “It’s about feeling lost, confused, and indecisive about which way to go. A big takeaway from this song is that sometimes you need help figuring it out. Even though we love this song so much, we didn’t think it fit sonically with the initial tracklist of Past // Present // Future. We wanted the deluxe release to be a glimpse into another side of us, giving you a sound that’s fresh, new, and different.”

Past // Present // Future (Deluxe) will also include a cover of “Take Me Away” from 2003’s Freaky Friday starring Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan. Before Past // Present // Future (Deluxe)‘s September 29 arrival, Meet Me @ The Altar will open for 5 Seconds Of Summer on tour.

Listen to “Give It Up” above, and check out the Past // Present // Future (Deluxe) tracklist as well as the band’s upcoming dates.

1. “Say It (To My Face)”
2. “Try”
3. “Kool”
4. “T.M.I”
5. “Same Language”
6. “A Few Tomorrows”
7. “Need Me”
8. “It’s Over For Me”
9. “Thx 4 Nothin’”
10. “Rocket Science”
11. “King Of Everything”
12. “Give It Up”
13. “Take Me Away (Freaky Friday Cover)”
14. “Strangers”
15. “Changes”

08/10 — Uncasville, CT @ Mohegan Sun Arena
08/12 — Boston, MA @ MGM Music Hall at Fenway
08/13 — Boston, MA @ MGM Music Hall at Fenway
08/15 — Toronto, CA @ Budweiser Stage
08/16 —Clarkston, MI @ Pine Knob Music Theatre
08/18 — Bristow, VA @ Jiffy Lube Live
08/19 — Philadelphia, PA @ TD Pavilion at The Mann
08/21 — New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden
08/23 — Chicago, IL @ Huntington Bank Pavilion at Northerly Island
08/25 — Cuyahoga Falls, OH @ Blossom Music Center
08/26 — Cincinnati, OH @ Riverbend Music Center
08/28 — Minneapolis, MN @ Armory
08/30 — Indianapolis, IN @ TCU Amphitheater at White River State Park
09/01 — Franklin, TN @ Firstbank Amphitheater
09/02 — Alpharetta, GA @ Ameris Bank Amphitheater
09/03 — Raleigh, NC @ Red Hat Amphitheater
09/06 — David Zell Trailer Park, FL @ Hard Rock Live
09/09 — The Woodlands, TX @ The Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion
09/10 — Irving, TX @ The Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory
09/13 — Phoenix, AZ @ Talking Stick Resort Amphitheatre
09/14 — Inglewood, CA @ Kia Forum
10/01 — Columbia, MD @ All Things Go*

*Festival appearance

Past // Present // Future (Deluxe) is out 09/29 via Fueled By Ramen. Find more information here.

Meet Me @ The Altar is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Lionel Messi’s debut for Inter Miami ended the only way it possibly could, with Messi providing a moment of magic that only he could create. After coming on in the second half of the club’s Leagues Cup game against Mexican side Cruz Azul, Messi was nothing short of magnetic, with the crowd at DRV PNK Stadium cheering any time he got on the ball.

Cruz Azul’s players struggled to take the ball off of him — which, in fairness, happens to just about everyone who has to try and take the ball off of Messi — and with the game tied up at 1-1 in injury time, a crunching tackle on Messi gave him a free kick just at the top of the box. There was no doubt that he would take it, he got it up over the wall, and there was absolutely nothing that Cruz Azul goalkeeper Andres Gudino could do, as Messi placed the ball perfectly into the top corner.

Messi has a penchant for doing this sort of thing, as he’s shown time and time again in his professional career that his sense of the moment is unparalleled in the sport. Now, he’s doing it in the United States, and as a result, Miami was able to pick up a 2-1 win.

Whether you’re a horror aficionado or your scary threshold is at a level 2, you’re bound to be familiar with at least a couple of iconic horror movies. The horror genre is a huge part of our culture, allowing us to explore the darkest depths of the human psyche within the safety and comfort of home—or a theater, if you dare.

As counterintuitive as it might sound, watching horror movies can be more than stimulating entertainment for some people. It can act as a form of exposure therapy, helping reduce anxiety levels. Of course, this is not the case for everyone, but it certainly helps explain why the genre is so well loved and continues gaining popularity. Even in 2020—arguably an anxiety-inducing year for everyone—horror movies were the only ones to actually see a surge in ticket sales. Sometimes it’s just more cathartic to see an actual monster wreaking havoc in a fictional world than it is to think about all real-world worries that haunt our imaginations.

Still, not everyone can shake off that scary feeling that a horror movie elicits, and therefore might not partake in watching. Nonetheless, they might enjoy seeing the edge taken off with a bit of lighthearted humor. After all, it’s often recommended to watch a little comedy after a horror flick to clean out the heebie jeebies.

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Jimmy Fallon asked folks to “take a horror movie and add one word to change the plot and tag it with #AddAWordRuinAHorrorMovie for his ever-popular Hashtags segment on “The Tonight Show.” Granted, some people took liberties with the rules—occasionally replacing a word in the title, for example—but nonetheless, grammatical fun was had. And well-known horror movie plots did undergo hilariously drastic changes.

Below are 23 of the best ones. Enjoy, because even those who can’t handle anything too scary deserve a little spooky entertainment.

1. “The Blair Witch Project Manager” – @ ite_mumma

2. “House of Brazilian Wax” – @omg_is_oscar

3. “Awkward Smile” – @jimmyfallon

via GIPHY

4. “Zoom Interview With A Vampire” – @Sohnzie

via GIPHY

5. “The Snore Ring (you’ll never sleep again)” – @Janasvox

6. “The Hills Have Googly Eyes” – @DunLahfAtMae

7. “Freddy vs Jason Bateman” – @richg6

via GIPHY

8. “The Craft Room” – @EvelynRobinson

9. “See SAW” – @BruceCountyGal

10. “Silence of the Lamb Chops” – @EfrainRSosa

pic.twitter.com/x33wU72EsY

— Stephen Poplar (@spoppy74) October 6, 2022

11. “Children of the Candy Corn” – @DjDubay

12. “Man-childs Play” – @DantheDad87

13. “The Amityville Hoarder” – @PamelaMelnick

The Amityville Hoarder pic.twitter.com/nNEwyGCnZ9

— Pamela Melnick (@PamelaMelnick) October 5, 2022

14. “Carrie Groceries” – @mitchbytes

15. “Hellraiser Burn” – @blumspew

16. “Invasion of the Body Shapers” – @LaughOutLander

Invasion Of The Body Shapers #AddAWordRuinAHorrorMovie pic.twitter.com/7M5IeIOOwA

— LaughOutLander (@LaughOutLander) October 6, 2022

17. “Final Destination Wedding” – @EmWilsonMartin

18. “The Invisible Man Bun” – @ryanBartholomee

19. “The Babadook Ellington” – @taradublinrocks

The Babadook Ellington #AddAWordRuinAHorrorMovie pic.twitter.com/7nUrGnHpLN

— 🧛‍♀️☠️ The Terror Of Dublin 🎃👻 (@taradublinrocks) October 5, 2022

20. “Beetlejuice Cleanse” – @Sohnzie

21. “Rosemary’s Baby Shark…doo,doo,doo, doo, doo, doo, doo.” – @seamirac

22. “Nightmare on Elmo Street.” – @elise_milsssss

via GIPHY

@Cantabrana_ added:

“Somehow, this is much scarier.”

23. “The Shoe Shining” – @LauraLizVids

This article originally appeared on 10.25.22

Maisie Peters is Uproxx’s July 2023 cover star, and she lit up when discussing her “The Band And I” track from her freshly released album, The Good Witch.

“Immortalized forever are all these little things. I literally describe exactly what we were all doing [in March 2022], and we all are still doing it,” the surging UK-bred pop star said, in part.

Peters’ lyricism is vivid, but her fans don’t just have to take her word for it anymore. The video for “The Band And I” arrived on Friday, July 21, and it’s loaded with endearing, camcorder-style footage.

Peters further explained its significance in an Instagram caption, which can be read below:

“last year, the band and i went on our first big american tour and i wrote a song about it <3 dom made all these tour diaries so i asked her if she’d want to edit her favourite footage + the best unseen stuff from it into a special music video for the song, and luckily for us all she’s on summer break from juliard [sp] so she was down and look how wonderful it came out :’)

it just makes me so so excited for round 2 with the good witch north american tour that starts NEXT MONTH can u BELIEVE it – there are still some tickets left so make sure u get them asap (link in my bio!!!!) and come make new core memories with us all”

Peters’ headlining North American tour begins on August 7 in Minneapolis, Minnesota and wraps on October 11 in Boston, Massachusetts. Sandwiched between, she will serve as an opener on Ed Sheeran’s North American leg of his Mathematics Tour — a role she also held last year across Europe, UK, Australia, and New Zealand.

Watch “The Band And I” video above, and see her forthcoming North American dates below.

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

There’s still time for this to be the summer of Snoh Aalegra, whose last album was 2021’s Temporary Highs In The Violet Skies. She supported it with a subsequent headlining tour across North America in early 2022 but has largely kept quiet.

Aalegra awakened her fans on July 19, posting a cinematic teaser video for “Be My Summer” on Instagram. Someone in the comments correctly assessed, “It’s giving 90s rnb and I’m READY.” Formula 1 legend Lewis Hamilton left a heart and praising hand emojis, and Omar Apollo and Stormzy also couldn’t contain their excitement.

The slow-burning single arrived in all its glory on Friday, July 21, with an accompanying lyric video and visualizer that presumably sets the initial aesthetic for a forthcoming project.

“Be my summer / Protect me from the rain,” Aalegra sings. The first verse finds her coming to terms with how far she’s fallen (“I tried to run away / There’s no escape, you’ve taken tenure in my heart”). By the second verse, Aalegra is feeling abandoned but won’t be discouraged by “all these walls that you’ve built” because “I know you’ve tried but you couldn’t forget me.”

“Be My Summer” is Aalegra’s first drop since “Do 4 Love” in late 2021.

Listen to “Be My Summer” above.

Omar Apollo is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

The greatest to ever step on a soccer field and arguably the greatest to ever step on the hardwood met up on Friday night in Florida. Lionel Messi, the highest-profile player to ever join a Major League Soccer team, made his debut for Inter Miami CF on Friday in a League Cup game against Mexican side Cruz Azul.

Messi, whose move to Miami became official earlier this week after he announced he’d join the team following his contract with Paris Saint-Germain coming to its conclusion, started the bench on the game. This was announced in the lead-up to the game, and LeBron James managed to take advantage of this. James made his way down to area next to the team’s bench at DRV PNK Stadium in Fort Lauderdale and went right over to Messi, making it a point to show him some love before the game.

James, of course, knows what it’s like to make a highly publicized move to a team in Miami, as his first stint with the Cleveland Cavaliers came to an end when he decided to join the Miami Heat back in 2010. There’s no word on whether James used this meeting as an opportunity to try and convince Messi to join Liverpool, the Premier League side in which he owns a stake, but unfortunately for James, that ship has probably sailed.

Ozuna is slated to headline Baja Beach Fest 2023 at Rosarito Beach in Mexico next month. Hopefully, he’s considering putting his “Soso” remix with Omah Lay on his setlist. Lay released the deluxe version of his 2022 Boy Alone album last month, and the Ozuna-boosted “Soso” received the video treatment this week.

The three-minute visual begins with Lay walking up to a luxurious villa at night. A woman stands out in the dark. We see Ozuna approaching a different woman. She’s tending to her horses before Ozuna (literally) sweeps her off her feet, and they start dancing. Later, Lay has his chance to impress his romantic interest. They slow dance atop a building overlooking a lush, tropical landscape.

As described in a press release, “The visual stands out as his most stunning and cinematic yet. … Balancing two extremes, it combines intimate vignettes and expansive vistas. Most importantly, it illuminates the chemistry between these two global superstars, uniting styles and cultures all at once.”

Uproxx named Lay’s Boy Alone among “The Best Afrobeats Albums of 2022,” lauding, “It takes a certain kind of strength to be as openly vulnerable as Omah Lay is, and to his benefit, his will to do so helped him to create a great body of work.”

Watch the “Soso” video above.

Omah Lay is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Cheerleading is supposed to be a team activity. Most squads have anywhere from 10 to 20 cheerleaders and some have even more than that. But one squad in Nebraska had just four girls, and less than two weeks before the Nebraska State Cheer and Dance Championships, all but one cheerleader had quit.

Most kids would’ve followed suit so close to a big competition and without teammates, but Katrina Kohel, a senior at Morrill High School, decided she was still going to compete—even if it meant she would have to do it alone. Talk about being brave in the face of disappointment. This girl decided she was going to cheer in the competition and she did, without much care for what others thought.

The competition wasn’t just the next town over. It was five hours away, so Kohel and her coach, April Ott, really had to mull it over before committing to making that drive, according to Business Insider. In the end, the teen decided that she didn’t want to just sit in the crowd or stay home; she wanted to perform the routine she spent so much time learning. But the routine required the entire squad, so before they could make the trip, they had to figure out how to make it a one-person routine.

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“I’ve put a lot of time into cheer. It’s just always been a part of who I am, so I didn’t want to end on that note. I wanted to go out on a high one. For that to come true, I didn’t want to end it just by going to watch state. I wanted to compete.” Kohel told Business Insider. So the lone cheerleader and her coach got to work redoing the routine so it made sense with just one person cheering.

The pair told the Omaha World-Herald that they had to rework the whole performance in a week and a half. It was really a battle of sheer will since Kohel was determined to do her best on the mat without her team. Kohel admitted to the outlet that she was nervous, but no one would have known it.

“She was completely confident the whole week that we practiced,” Ott told Business Insider. “It was just 100% confidence, and she just owned it.”

This cheerleader was absolutely unstoppable and she had her family’s full support. Even Ott’s daughter, who was previously a cheerleader at the same high school, tagged along to cheer her on. Kohel’s grandparents stood in for her parents because her brother had a state wrestling tournament and her parents are the coaches. But don’t worry, they were able to see her cheer through Facebook Live.

Support didn’t only come from her family and coach, as other cheerleaders piled into her section and cheered for the brave solo cheerleader. Darin Boysen, executive director of the Nebraska Coaches Association, told the Omaha World-Herald that this was the first time a cheerleader competed alone.

But she didn’t just compete—she placed 8th out of 12 squads, which is the highest Morrill High School has placed in the last three years.

“It’s almost overwhelming, the amount of support I got from all of them,” Kohel explained to Business Insider. “The whole arena was cheering me on. It wasn’t just one little section—it was the whole arena.”

This article originally appeared on 3.2.23

Drake is two weeks into his It’s All A Blur Tour with 21 Savage. He welcomed J. Cole to the stage for a surprise performance in Montreal, and he shouted out Stephen Curry during his show at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.

Drake’s collaborative spirit isn’t reserved for tour.

On Friday, July 21, On The Radar shared a freestyle between Drake and UK up-and-comer Central Cee. Drake had been teasing the video on Instagram, writing, “A little exercise on a off day…me and Cench @ontheradarradio loading [“up” emoji, cold face emoji].”

In the nearly five-minute video, Drake starts off.

“If I take flicks with the guys / I gotta put emojis over like three faces / ‘Cause the fans can’t see those eyes / People I shouldn’t be beside,” the OVO boss raps. “When I was an actor, they would go Stratford / Just to sell food on Bieber’s side.”

Within his flow, Drake explains why he’s hard to read and even harder to tie down. He admits to keeping an eye out while performing (“Seen you from the stage in the 100s / These must be eagle eyes”) and even likens himself to Jesus and Julius Caesar.

Drake finishes out by boasting about his longevity and continued dominance (“Cench might need vaccine when he see how this vid start going viral”) before handing the mic off to Central Cee.

Cee seamlessly jumps in and piles on the flexing — “Now I can sell out the O2 Arena twice / Don’t ask what the fee looks like” — and touches on the isolating feelings involved when elevating above his peers. The finishing touch was Drake throwing his arm around Cee and sipping from his red Solo cup.

Watch the full freestyle above.

LinkedIn is primarily a platform for working professionals to connect and find employment that aligns with their skills and values. With company layoffs continuing (even increasing in some industries) people have also used the website to courageously share their layoff experiences.

While the main intent behind this is, of course, finding a new job, there have also been some lovely displays of humanity that not only challenge the stigma of being laid off but show the power of a supportive community.

Take this heartwarming story, for example.

Patrick McCarthy, Communications Management & Marketing Leader, recently posted about a layoff that quickly went viral on the platform. Not for himself—for his father.

“This is Pete. He’s my dad,” his post began. “My dad lost his job yesterday. I would tag him here, but he doesn’t have a LinkedIn.”

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Pete, who has had a “starkly different professional journey” than his son, spent most of his life working in the service industry and absolutely loved interacting with customers. His empathy and knack for listening made him perfect for the role. Over his career, Pete had collected thousands of interactions from working at Walgreens, Fry’s, and (most recently) Winco, often being the reason folks came back.

And then, Pete was laid off. His job as a cashier, one that he loved and was good at, was gone.

“As anyone would be, he’s shocked. Overwhelmed. Scared. Emotional,” Patrick wrote.

Knowing his dad didn’t have the same network to easily find a new job, Patrick reached out on his behalf, wholeheartedly believing in the “magic” of the LinkedIn Community. He implored that anyone looking for a candidate with “a LOT of customer-facing, customer service, and service industry experience” send him a message so that he could put them in touch with Pete.

Patrick’s faith paid off—way more than he thought it would. In less than a week, the post was shared over 500 times, with over 600 comments from people wanting to help.

A manager at a nearby Sprouts grocery store said Pete sounded like a perfect match for a clerk position that could even pay his daily wage ahead of time. Another suggested he could be an excellent outdoor tour guide for REI. Someone else referred them to a weekly meetup group led by a career coach.

Even LinkedIn responded, writing, “Pete sounds like a top-tier employee! 💙 Keep us posted as he progresses on his journey, as well as any tips or insights either of you learn along the way—it may help those in a similar situation.”

Truly, Pete’s story already provides some helpful insight. While he might still be in the job-seeking phase, things certainly look more optimistic. And all it took (besides Pete being a lovely human being) was one simple, honest post. As Patrick told Upworthy, “Clearly something about his story connected with others. Humanity. Vulnerability. Empathy.”

The words “social media” and “job market” can elicit some pretty negative visceral responses. Of course, this viewpoint has some merit, but it’s refreshing to see the power of human connection break through the disheartening headlines. Here’s to Patrick and his father Pete, for reminding us that even when things seem bleak or uncertain, the world is full of people trying to help out one another.

This article originally appeared on 2.28.23