The notoriously cranky Chevy Chase appeared on Marc Maron’s WTF podcast this week to, among other things, bitch about his time on Community. “I honestly felt the show wasn’t funny enough for me, ultimately. I felt a little bit constrained,” the actor said. “Everybody had their bits, and I thought they were all good. It just wasn’t hard-hitting enough for me.”
Community lacked the scathing satire of Cops & Robbersons or Hot Tub Time Machine, but it’s still pretty good.
Asked specifically about his character, wealthy curmudgeon Pierce Hawthorne, Chase replied, “I didn’t mind the character. I just felt that it was… I felt happier being alone. I just didn’t want to be surrounded by that table, every day, with those people. It was too much.”
Chase was fired from Community — one of the best sitcoms of the 2010s — after feuding with creator Don Harmon and using a racial slur on the set. “I don’t think people really felt that way,” he told Maron when asked whether he thinks he’s difficult to deal with. “I don’t know what my reputation was among people. I just always assumed I was okay.”
Community co-star Yvette Nicole Brown respectfully disagrees:
From the whiskey we drink to the music we consume to the photos we engage with on social media, creativity drives culture. So it’s no huge surprise to see the title of “creative director” splashed across the IG bios of everyone to ever hold a camera. But what does it actually mean to be a creative director? And who excels in this field that so many people seem so intrigued by?
It’s as if you almost need a judging body to celebrate leaders in this nebulous creative direction landscape, right? Well… awaywe go!
To celebrate and champion the field of creative direction, Uproxx has joined forces with the Original Creative Agency (OCA) to launch the Sound + Vision Awards. The awards show, coming this winter, will highlight the best in the field — where photography, art, and design intersect with music. Awards will span categories like “Best Album Design,” “Best Festival Show,” and “Best Tour Merch,” among others. It’s a chance to celebrate the minds behind your favorite stage shows, Coachella acts, album covers, gear, and photo campaigns, which are often every bit as evocative as the music they support.
To begin the Sound + Vision rollout, Uproxx and OCA teamed up with Michter’s American Whiskeys to host a kickoff dinner and whiskey tasting. Musical acts Vince Staples, Bonobo, Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs, Jesse Boykins III, Melo-X, and Ric Wilson joined creatives Adrian Martinez, Jesse Lee Stout, Patrick Krause, Julian Gross, Candice Lawler, Tino Schaedler, and more to form a steering committee that will begin the award-nomination process.
As guests arrived, Uproxx’s head sprits writer, Zach Johnston, poured Michter’s elite whiskeys in an atmospheric library while cocktail legend Iain Griffith created a series of unforgettable drinks with various Michter’s expressions, Farmer’s Organic Gin, and Mezcal Los Siete Misterios as building blocks.
Glen Han / @glenjamn
Uproxx’s Zach Johnston hosted guests throughout the night in the Michter’s Tasting Library.
The welcome drink, a French 75 riff with a jello shot posing as an ice cube, was tough to top but the highlight of the night was a beeswax-aged old fashioned made with Michter’s US*1 Small Batch Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey. The drink was delivered to guests inside of a wax egg which they then “cracked” over a large ice cube waiting in a rocks glass. It was an impactful moment that Griffith had been plotting for decades and was finally able to pull off for this special evening — a fitting capper to a night based around creativity.
Chef Sophie Dalah, of Sophie’s Table, deftly paired flavors and aesthetics in a series of high concept dishes, creating a bespoke five-course menu that conjured Michter’s whiskey with sly winks. “Corn butter” made with corn husk broth and served with focaccia and scallops swimming in heritage grains both resonated deeply with guests and aligned perfectly with Griffith’s cocktails. The short rib was another standout — it was rich and umami-forward but balanced by delicate five spice and star anise notes. Those who didn’t drink chose from NON non-alcoholic wine and Visitor Beer.
After an explanation of the awards themselves by Uproxx founder Jarret Myer and OCA co-founder Jesse Rogg and a breakdown of the nomination process by Uproxx Editorial Director of Music, Phil Cosores, Johnston shared more Michter’s whiskey pours with the unofficial after-party revelers. Bomberger’s Declaration (the night’s favorite among attendees), Shenk’s Homestead, the iconic 10-year-old rye and bourbon bottles, and the brand-new Toasted Barrel Finish Rye Whiskey were all sampled widely. Seeing that it was an Uproxx bash, naturally the night concluded with some bold attendees stepping up to the mezcal ice luge.
The biggest question for the Brooklyn Nets this season is what kind of role and impact can Ben Simmons have. The three-time All-Star played 42 games for the Nets last year, averaging 6.9 points, 6.3 rebounds, and 6.1 assists per game, but didn’t play with the level of force or assertiveness that defined his All-Star campaigns to start his career in Philadelphia.
That lack of force was something that frustrated Nets coach Jacque Vaughn last year, but as he’s come to learn a lot of that was because of physical limitations Simmons was still dealing with as he recovered from his back injury. Throughout his absence over the past two years, no one has quite been able to figure out where the line is between the mental and physical side of Simmons’ recovery, and as such the lines get blurred when it comes to what is keeping him from being his old self on the floor.
On Tuesday, Vaughn spoke with the media and was asked about Simmons, and explained that he had a “revelation” this offseason watching Simmons work and feels like he’s been able to build a great relationship with the Australian star going into this season that will allow him to better understand Simmons and put him in positions to succeed by only asking him to do things he can physically do — while also noting he’s playing 5-on-5 with no restrictions.
Jacque Vaughn said he later came to realize Ben Simmons was physically incapable of doing the things he was asking last season:
“My relationship with Ben is in such a good place right now… I expected him to do things that I’ve come to understand physically he just couldn’t… pic.twitter.com/QPCqLcA1wA
We won’t know exactly what that means until the Nets get out on the floor, but Simmons has spoken this offseason about feeling better and hopefully improved physical health can also work to his advantage in terms of getting a mental edge back on the court. Still, it seems the Nets will look to have Simmons play a role that is more tailored to his current state, which could bode well for him having a larger impact this season.
Brooklyn’s lack of top-level facilitators leaves a clear need for someone with Simmons’ passing acumen, and Simmons has stated he wants to get back to being a point guard. That figures to be where Simmons can have the greatest positive impact on this Nets team, and it’s just a matter of how much of the other stuff he can add that will determine how large his role could be — particularly when it comes to whether he can become anything close to the defensive presence he was at his peak in Philly. Understandably, most NBA fans will take a wait and see approach with Simmons, as this isn’t the first summer filled with chatter about his offseason work, but hopefully he can enjoy a bounceback season as the Nets look to re-establish an identity in their first full year post-Kyrie/KD.
When Celebrity Jeopardy! premieres this week, fans are going to notice the show has made a (hopefully) welcomed change to the way categories are presented. If they react strongly enough, the changes could make their way to the regular version of Jeopardy!, which has already kicked off its season.
According to showrunner Michael Davies, the change came about from his longtime goal of somehow keeping “the category on the screen when the clues are shown.” Unfortunately, that’s not easy to do without distracting from the clue itself, but now, Davies thinks they may have finally found a solution.
“Sometimes the show moves so fast that you lose track of the category we’re in… so we’ve tried a new thing,” Davies said on the latest episode of the Inside Jeopardy! podcast. “I’m not gonna try to describe it too much because describing it, when you see it, you’ll instantly understand, but it’s a way that you get to focus much more on the individual categories every single time that a category is being chosen.”
He added that this new addition will give viewers a better sense of “what the experience is for the actual contestants and for the producers in the studio watching the show.”
Should the new category changes prove popular with fans, it could be implemented on regular Jeopardy! down the road. However, in an effort to stave off testy fans, Davies reiterated that the traditional Jeopardy! has not been altered. The category change is only happening on Celebrity Jeopardy! for the time being, and it could very easily stop there.
“We by no means are committed to go and do this on the regular show,” Davies said. “We’ve actually debuted the regular Monday-through-Friday Jeopardy! and we haven’t included this change. But we’re interested, as we try to make the show more engaging and more easy to follow for a broader audience, as well as to satisfy our very top-notch, most-experienced viewers who have been watching the show and enjoying it for years.”
Festival season continues this weekend with a slew of smaller fests including Ohana Festival in Dana Point, California, All Things Go in Columbia, Maryland, and Sound On Sound in Bridgeport, Connecticut. The latter takes place this weekend at Seaside Park with headliners Red Hot Chili Peppers, John Mayer, and Alanis Morissette.
The festival’s lineup also features the Trey Anastasio Band, Hozier, Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats, Dispatch, Lord Huron, Mt. Joy, Ben Harper & The Innocent Criminals, Steel Pulse, Joy Oladokun, Margo Price, Sammy Rae & The Friends, Gin Blossoms, Cautious Clay, Deep Banana Blackout, Briscoe, Calder Allen, Snacktime, Kieran Rhodes, and Julai And The Serotones. You can see the set times below.
According to The Alternative, the festival has revamped its layout and increased its festival grounds in response to attendee feedback from last year’s fest, while keeping the entire thing to just one stage with no overlapping sets. This makes it easier for attendees to see every act, or time out their visits to other attractions so they don’t miss a thing.
Saturday, September 30
Julai And The Serotones (12:00 – 12:30), Kieran Rhodes (12:40 – 1:10), Briscoe (1:20 – 1:50), Deep Banana Blackout (2:00 – 2:45), Sammy Rae & The Friends (2:55 – 3:40), Joy Oladokun (3:50 – 4:35), Steel Pulse (4:45 – 5:30), Lord Huron (5:40 – 6:40), Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats (6:50 – 7:50), Trey Anastasio Band (8:00 – 9:15), Red Hot Chili Peppers (9:45).
According to the Associated Press, Shakira has been charged with tax fraud in Spain, after failing to pay 6.7 million euros ($7.1 million) on her 2018 taxes. According to the prosecutors in Barcelona, they claim that the singer used an offshore account “based in a tax haven” to attempt to avoid paying. She has since been alerted of the charges, as she is in Miami, according to the publication.
However, this isn’t Shakira’s first run. She is set to be tried in Barcelona on November 20 for a separate case, where she allegedly failed to pay 14.5 million euros ($13.9 million) in taxes between her 2012-2014 earnings.
Back in July, a Spanish judge had granted prosecutors to “probe two possible cases of tax fraud” from 2018. At the time, her PR firm responded that she had “always acted in concordance with the law and on the advice of her financial advisers.”
“(Shakira) is now focused on her artistic career in Miami and is calm and confident that she will receive a favorable resolution of her fiscal issues,” they added, according to another article from AP.
Recently, Spain has also started to be more strict about celebrities not paying taxes. Other stars, including soccer player Lionel Messi, were found guilty of evasion. However, because Messi was also on a first-time offense, the judge allowed him to avoid prison time.
The world’s biggest Afrobeats festival, Afro Nation, is heading home. Throughout the year, the multi-day event has had stops in Detroit, Miami, and Portugal. But come this December, the live performance movement will make its highly-awaked return to the continent of Africa. The dates for Afro Nation Nigeria 2023 have been revealed, and Burna Boy will be one of the featured headliners.
In a posting on Instagram, the organization revealed that the festival will take place on December 19 and 20 in Lagos at the Tafawa Balewa Square. J Hus, as well as Black Sherif, are also slated to perform at the festival.
Afro Nation became an international hit due to its incorporation of music genres across the diaspora, including Afrobeats, Afro-fusion, Amapiano, R&B, hip-hop, and more. Although the full lineup hasn’t been shared, judging by the melting pot of entertainers that appeared at the festival’s other installment earlier this year, Afro Nation Nigeria 2023 should be equally as diverse.
On the event’s website, organizers did reveal a tidbit about what ticketholders should expect. According to a note on the main webpage, due to the predicted influx of attendees, there will be a bevy of viewing areas to ensure everyone can glance at the main stage performances.
Afro Nation Nigeria 2023 has begun VIP pre-sales for users subscribed to their email newsletter. General sales will begin soon. Find more information here.
The mystery of why some songs endure forever while others are quickly forgotten is commonly believed to have two explanations. The first explanation is that in order to stand the test of time a song must reach the cultural zeitgeist, a magical level of popularity that transcends mere chart success to attain near-universal adoration. (Think almost everything by The Beatles or Thriller.) The second explanation is that a song is so artistically brilliant that even if isn’t popular in its time future generations will come to affirm its excellence. (Think the Velvet Underground or almost every once-obscure shoegaze and slowcore band from the ’90s.)
But what if there is also a third way? And what if that third way somehow violates the first two explanations for musical immortality? I refer to a song that didn’t transcend mere chart success to reach a commonly recognized pop-culture zenith, nor was even remotely artistically notable or critically acclaimed in its time or in retrospect. A song that is ordinary in every way, and yet has achieved extraordinary streaming numbers. A tune we all thought we forgot about but can, when prompted, instantly remember, word for freaking word, whether we like it or not? (At least the chorus, anyway.)
I refer to “Rude,” the (lone) hit by the Canadian pop-reggae band Magic!, originally released 10 years ago this fall.
Just by typing that sentence, I have instantly inserted “Rude” into your head and my head and all the other heads that made the mistake of reading this column. I can preemptively sense the hostility that is bound to come my way from the masses. To which I can only reply: Why you gotta be so rude? Don’t you know I’m human, too?
There are many things I could say about “Rude.” It is a gently rocking ditty about asking your girlfriend’s father for his daughter’s hand in marriage. In the context of the music video, it is also a song about interracial romance and an endorsement of doing the Watusi as your first wedding dance. Musically, it is a handy tool for explaining the difference between “catchy” and “good.” It boasts possibly the most incompetent guitar solo in an ostensibly “professional” musical context ever. It makes Canada’s other famous reggae-tinged export, 1992’s “Informer” by the pop-rapper Snow, sound like Desmond Dekker.
To understand “Rude” you must hold two thoughts in your head simultaneously: It stinks, but it’s also weirdly difficult to hate. I can’t be mad at it, no matter how much it annoys me. You can love “Rude” because it makes you happy, and you can also love “Rude” because it’s very enjoyable to make fun of. Either way, you’re completely chillaxed when this song is on.
Which is why, for me, “Rude” is the best worst song of the 21st century so far. It’s the kind of harmlessly silly one-off that we once took for granted, and now seems like a rarity in pop.
Here’s another thing about “Rude”: It has crazy legs. Way crazier than you probably imagine. If I may speak in the parlance of “Rude”: The streaming numbers truly put the song in “another galax-saay!” On Spotify, “Rude” has been streamed 1.2 billion times. The figures on YouTube are even more astronomical — people have watched the music video for “Rude” 2.4 billion times, and left more than 251,000 comments.
It makes sense that fans of “Rude” most often enjoy it with the (unintentionally hilarious and unexpectedly charming) video, which really takes the song to the next level. Taking it in as “just” an audio experience makes those streaming numbers much harder to comprehend.
The debut single by a group fronted by the journeyman songwriter and producer Nasri Atweh (Justin Bieber, Chris Brown), “Rude” was meant to introduce the world to what Atweh described as his “modern-day Police” sound. That was the nice way to put it; the not-nice classification for Magic! would be “cod reggae,” a derogatory term coined in England back in the ’70s to describe a slick and pop-friendly form of reggae typified by Eric Clapton’s mild cover of Bob Marley’s “I Shot The Sheriff.” The Police is one of the more credible bands to garner the “cod reggae” tag; it’s also been applied to The Clash’s “Guns Of Brixton,” Culture Club’s “Do You Really Want To Hurt Me,” and the many “reggae-ified” covers of ’60s pop classics by UB40.
By the mid-2010s. the “soft-rock steady” of “Rude” was also associated with more recent precedents like the patois-heavy pop-punk of Sublime, the well-groomed jam band O.A.R., and the sandy-sandaled singer-songwriter Jack Johnson. It’s not a sound that was trendy at the time, nor was it trendy at any time in music history. But it is, paradoxically, always at least a little bit popular. Like I said, this kind of music makes people feel good, even if they’re embarrassed to exclaim “say yes say yes” when it comes on in a crowded room.
But it’s in the video that “Rude” becomes something else entirely. We see Atweh doing some awkward quasi-skanking as the rest of Magic! jams out to “Rude” in a garage. This is intercut with a straightforward depiction of the song’s narrative: Atweh sets out to visit his girlfriend’s parents in order to make his proposal. He claims to have put on “my best suit,” but we can plainly see that he’s wearing a leather jacket and T-shirt, which immediately establishes him as an unreliable narrator. (I’m tempted to call Atweh the “Randy Newman of cod reggae,” but that would be too idiotic even in the context of this column.)
What’s more crucial is that we can also see that Atweh is Palestinian, and his girlfriend is a Caucasian blonde, and that the dad looks like Mitt Romney. While the lyrics to “Rude” never spell out the reason why the dad rejects Atweh as a suitor for his daughter, the video subtly implies that race might play a factor. This is reiterated later in the video when the dad encourages his daughter to date a straight-laced white guy, which she rejects. Ultimately, after the dad shoots down one more request from Atweh for his blessing, he follows through on his threat to “marry her anyway.”
(It’s also possible that I’m reading too much into this and the dad simply has a prejudice against pop-reggae singers, which might be the only acceptable form of prejudice.)
When I wrote about “Rude” in the summer of 2014 — when it finally became a slow-burn smash after being re-released that winter, eventually peaking at No. 1 for six weeks — I never thought that people would still care about this song well into the next decade. What could possibly explain the enduring popularity of this dopey little tune? I headed to the YouTube comments section of the “Rude” video to search for clues that might explain the phenomenon. I expected to find viewers paying tribute in half-serious, half-snarky fashion. (Kind of like what I’m doing right now.) What I actually found were shockingly earnest expressions of longing.
Can we bring this back? This feeling? This music? This vibe. The world needs more of this.
After 9 years, still one of the best songs out there, wish we could go back to the 2010’s.
I miss the days when this song could be played on the radio more than 100 times every 5 minutes. Could we please bring this back?
No matter how many times i listen to it never get old forever a masterpiece.
The sentiment I saw the most — aside from the inevitable “Can we bring this back?” nostalgia — was “This song does not get old.” There are two ways to interpret this statement. The first is: This song does not sound dated. And I think that’s right. “Rude” does not sound like a typical hit from the summer of 2014, and it doesn’t sound like a typical hit now. And that plays to its advantage, especially when you compare to other hits from that time like Meghan Trainor’s “All About That Bass” and Iggy Azalea’s “Fancy,” which scan as “extremely mid-2010s” in a way that “Rude” doesn’t. All cod reggae hits pretty much sound the same no matter what decade they come from, which gives them a surprising timelessness.
The second way to interpret “This song does not get old” is: I never get sick of this song. This one is harder for me to fathom, but I think I get it. “Rude” came out of arguably the last great era of one-hit wonders, when acts like Gotye, Foster The People, Passenger, Walk The Moon, and scores of others came out of nowhere, dropped a massively impactful earworm, and then disappeared off the face of the planet. These artists were different in every way save one: They were unpretentious fodder for ubiquitous spins on mainstream pop radio stations. They demanded nothing of the audience other than their superficial enjoyment. If you are inclined to view this era via a nostalgic lens, it seems like the last moment of innocence before the arrival of Donald Trump and a new era of extreme seriousness in pop, when even Katy Perry felt compelled to comment on the state of the world. Magic! is the purest manifestation of this frivolous time. The exclamation point says it all — this was exuberance for the sake of exuberance, evincing a shameless naïveté that once was standard in pop and now seems refreshing.
These days, one-hit wonders are increasingly rare as the charts are dominated by the most entrenched pop-star nation-states. The obvious exception in 2023 is Oliver Anthony, the lightning-rod Americana singer who came out of nowhere, dropped a massively impactful earworm, and may or may not disappear off the face of the planet in the near future. Only Anthony is a hit for the same reason that seemingly everything breaks through now — he’s a tool of the culture war whose song “Rich Men North Of Richmond” can either be enjoyed or hated as a means of inflaming the emotions of whomever you’re opposed politically.
If “Rude” came out today it would be immediately interpreted by one side as an important statement about identity and by the other side as a “woke” anthem. The dad’s resemblance to Mitt Romney in the music video would be celebrated as cutting satire by some and cruelly divisive by others. “Rude” wouldn’t be allowed to just be a dumb pop hit that everybody has heard way too many times. It would have to mean something. And that is the kind of song you get sick of very quickly.
Thankfully, this was not the fate of “Rude.” It remains frozen in ember, a stupidly beautiful butterfly caught in mid-flight from a distant time too pure for the bitter modern world.
The new season of Wheel of Fortune already has a blunder for the ages. During Monday night’s episode, iconic and outgoing host Pat Sajak had to inform a contestant that they just missed a puzzle letter with their brutally incorrect answer. It was pretty rough
After Vanna White turned over all but one of the letters, the board read, “DINING IN THE DINING _ AR” for the category “What Are You Doing?” That category name would prove to be wildly prescient as contestant Jessica Washington went for the solve and whiffed it.
According to TV Insider, Washington guessed, “Dining in the dining jar,” which was obviously not correct as the next contestant went right for the “C” and nailed the correct answer, “Dining in the dining car.”
Over on social media, Wheel Watchers couldn’t believe what they just saw. The shocked reactions and jokes started flying after watching Jackson miss such an easy clue. Although, at least one Wheel of Fortune fan came to Jackson’s aid.
“To be fair, I’m pretty sure the last time anyone dined in the dining car was 1954,” Flannery O’Gooner tweeted.
You can see more reactions below:
New season of Wheel of Fortune but still some unfathomable responses.
When have you ever heard the term “dining in the dining jar” before tonight?
Please!!! Do not approach me, or otherwise bother me while I am dining in the dining jar #WheelofFortune#DiningJar with my shirt inside out, apparently
With only one letter left in the puzzle, Jackson’s blunder seemingly tops a missed guess back in March where a contestant failed to win a million dollars and a European vacation when the board read, “A ROARING FIRE IN THE FIRE _ _ A _ E.”
There’s a new Spotify feature in town: Jam. So, what is it?
Spotify introduced Jam in a blog post today (September 26) and described it as “a personalized, real-time listening session for your group to tune into together,” adding, “Jam builds on some of our popular social features and combines them with our personalization technology to take real-time listening with pals to the next level.”
Head here for specifics on how to use Jam, but broadly speaking, it works like this: One user (who must have a Premium account) sets up a Jam and invites other users (Premium or not) to join it. Then, all users can add new songs to the queue, allowing people to come together and craft a shared playlist as a team. The user who created the Jam has a bit more control, though, as they’re able to decide what users are allowed into the jam, change the order of songs, and remove songs from the queue.
Spotify explains in the blog post, “There are few things more powerful than connecting over a shared love of music. So over the past few years, Spotify has unveiled a wide range of new features, including Collaborative Playlists and Blend, that make sharing the music you love easier than ever. […] Today we’re introducing Jam, a personalized, real-time listening session for your group to tune into together. Jam builds on some of our popular social features and combines them with our personalization technology to take real-time listening with pals to the next level. […] Get ready for a deeper way to connect through the artists, songs, and albums that unite you — and to discover some unexpected gems with those around you.”
Check out Spotify’s promo video about Jam above and learn more about Jam here.
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