Category: News

It’s a shitty time to be a GOP lawmaker in Ohio. At least that seems to be the message some unknown critic of the state’s 25 Republican senators was trying to convey when they mailed out more than two dozen bits of fecal matter from a Cleveland post office.

As The Columbus Dispatch reports, the poop-filled packages never made it to their intended recipients as they were intercepted by the postal pros at the Ohio Statehouse and post offices in Akron and Columbus. The U.S. Postal Inspector is investigating the incident, which is being treated as a federal crime.

You might be giggling about the idea of it all, but senator Jay Hottinger—who literally had a pile of shit with his name on it—is not. “It’s gross and stupid,” he said. “Immaturity at its highest level.”

Ohio House spokesman John Fortney called whoever sent the caca “pathetic, little cowards,” then suggested they step outside in the most Ohio way possible: “They should’ve just sent a selfie, because it’s the same thing. I’d be more than happy to explain it to them in a parking lot or cornfield of their choice.”

All Ohio senators and congresspeople have been warned to be careful when opening any packages at home.

(Via The Columbus Dispatch)

Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill” peaked at #30 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart when it was released in 1985. Nearly 40 years later, it’s the number six song in the country and reached number one in Australia, Belgium, Ireland, New Zealand, and the UK, all thanks to it being a) a great track, and b) prominently featured in season four of Stranger Things. Not everyone is thrilled by the success of “Running Up That Hill,” however.

Taika Waititi spoke to NME about the use of Guns ‘N Roses in Thor: Love and Thunder, which used “Sweet Child O’ Mine” in the trailer. When asked if he hopes for a Kate Bush-style resurgence in popularity for Axl & Co., the filmmaker replied:

“You mean how they ruined Kate Bush? I love that show, but as someone who feels a real ownership of Kate Bush music… I’m really annoyed! I’ve become one of those old arseholes who’s like: ‘These kids never listened to Kate Bush, they’ve heard one song on a TV show! They don’t know Kate Bush! I know Kate Bush!’”

Metallica might disagree with Waititi’s gatekeeping. And Bush definitely disagrees, considering that “one song” has introduced millions of younger Stranger Things fans to her music — and added millions of dollars to her bank account.

(Via NME)

Mark Ronson is one of the most accomplished musicians and producers of the past couple decades, and throughout his career, he’s worked with some of the best vocalists we have. Now, he has made his picks for which of them he thinks are the most naturally gifted when it comes to singing.

In a new Variety interview, he said:

“Yebba, definitely. Adele, Amy [Winehouse], Bruno [Mars], [Lady] Gaga — I’m not just listing them because they’re the famous ones. They all have this gift, whether it’s intentional or not, this precipice in their voice where it’s just breaking and they know how much it brings you in. Like, obviously I haven’t worked with Bruno on every song, but he knows how to write a song on this part of his voice where it’s gonna break, where there’s that urgency. When I worked with Adele, she was so happy to do 16, 17, 18 takes — not because she didn’t sing it perfectly the first time, but she knew there’s a part where her voice starts to get worn in a little bit, and then there’s that pain in it that makes us all just melt, you know? They’re all fantastic.”

He also explained why, as a producer, he likes to take bits and pieces from multiple vocal takes to use in a song:

“One of the things I really love doing is comping a vocal. I will sit and go through 15 takes of the same vocal, most of them near-perfect, and sometimes just steal an ad-lib from this one or a breath from that one — the idiosyncrasies and the nuances of those moments, where the voice breaks, or where instead of singing that word at the end of the phrase, they decided to speak it instead. And then that’s a whole other level of intimacy.

It’s this wonderful process of, yes, they sang it perfectly 40 times, but now I get to make this ransom note-type [collage] of bringing this beautiful performance that will sit as the definitive performance of this song. It’s not an ego thing on my part — I just love that people trust me to do it. I love laboring over these things, because for one person or maybe a thousand people, that one little take is gonna be their favorite moment of the song.”

Check out the full interview here.

Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

While most of the world is fixated on the decades-long episodes of Stranger Things, something just as strange is happening in Middle Earth, and we have just gotten our first look.

The Rings Of Power is the upcoming Amazon series based on the uber-popular Lord Of The Rings franchise that dominated the early 2000s. Amazon is seemingly trying to get that momentum back but rebuilding the hype, and this sneak peek at the first trailer sure does inspire some anticipation!

We’ve got elves, creepy skies, cryptic old elf men telling us about the creepy skies, and, of course, some beautifully impressive Tolkien imagery. The show is expected to have some overlapping storylines and themes, covering everything “from deep within the dwarf mines of the Misty Mountains to the high politics of the elven kingdom of Lindon and the humans’ powerful, Atlantis-like island, Númenor,” according to the official description.

Rings Of Power has a gigantic ensemble cast, featuring Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Robert Aramayo, Owain Arthur, Maxim Baldry, Nazanin Boniadi, Morfydd Clark, Ismael Cruz Córdova, Charles Edwards, Trystan Gravelle, Sir Lenny Henry, and many more.

The official trailer will drop next week. The series is expected to debut on Amazon Prime on September 2nd. Check out the teaser above.

It’s hard to imagine anyone but Chris Hemsworth as God of Thunder, but the actor wasn’t even in the top five when Marvel Studios was looking to add Thor to its burgeoning Avengers team in the very early days of the MCU. In a new interview, the actor reveals that his brother, Liam Hemsworth, was extremely close to wielding the mythical Mjolnir hammer alongside Iron Man and Captain America. Because of that close call, the elder Hemsworth would love to square off against his younger sibling as a multiversal variant of his Marvel character.

“My little brother (Liam Hemsworth) almost got cast as Thor,” Hemsworth told MensXP. “He was one of the first people who got right down to the wire on getting the part so I don’t know I could cross paths with him. That will be fun.”

As for how Chris ended up getting the part, the actor told Wired‘s Autocomplete last month that his younger brother was a little too young, which opened the door for the older Hemsworth who had already read for the role. “I think my audition sucked,” Chris admitted, which is why he was surprised to get pulled back in after Liam just missed the cut. Via IndieWire:

“They were like, ‘Look, he’s great, but he’s a bit young.’ My manager then said, ‘Well, he does have an older brother,’ which was me. I came back in, re-auditioned a few times, and just had a different attitude. Maybe I had a little more sort of motivation that my little brother got a look in and I hadn’t. I also had done a couple of films in between those two auditions, so I had a bit more experience and confidence in what I was going to do.”

With that kind of backstory, obviously, these two brothers need to settle their sibling rivalry on the big screen. The universe practically demands it.

Thor: Love and Thunder is now playing in theaters.

(Via MensXP, IndieWire)

Trey Songz made many headlines over the last two years for sexual assault and rape allegations. However, MyNewsLA reports that the anonymous accuser filed papers to dismiss the $20 million lawsuit and the judge granted her wish earlier this week.

Initially, the “Slow Motion” artist was accused of assaulting Jane Doe at a Los Angeles house party in 2016. The lawsuit, filed back in February, also mentioned rape, gender violence, intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress, and false imprisonment.

TMZ reported that a representative for 37-year-old denied the allegations, specifically stating, “Earlier today, the attorney who drafted this suit was credibly accused of trying to pay a woman to falsely accuse Trey. Hours later, that same attorney has filed this suit on behalf of an anonymous client. It isn’t hard to see what’s happening here, and it is a shame for genuine victims of sexual assault.”

Back in April, Songz had a similar experience, evading sexual assault allegations filed back in November 2021.

“The LVMPD has concluded the investigation into the sexual assault allegations against Tremaine Neverson and determined that no criminal charges will be filed,” police shared with TMZ. “If any new evidence comes to light, the case will be reopened for further investigation.”

(Spoilers from Amazon’s The Boys will be found below.)

The Boys wrapped up its third season with a bang (on behalf of nuclear Soldier Boy), and the show left plenty of unfinished business to be cleaned up on The Boys’ end. Butcher had lost sight of the true goal, and Ryan’s now going to be a mini-Homelander, it seems, and although Maeve’s headed off toward private life (and good for her), the show has long since been renewed for a fourth season.

In other words, Homelander will be back and worse than ever, and it’s likely that this next season should arrive quicker than the last round, which was slowed down by Covid. When will we see this happen, though?

Karl Urban recently revealed to Collider that he’s gearing up for Season 4 filming (which means that the scripts should be close to set), which is set to begin on August 22. He kept things close to the sleeve on what will happen, only declaring, “I’m getting back, getting my Butcher back on, and I can’t wait…. I can’t wait to see where they take the characters from where we leave them at the end of this season.”

As for a formal Season 4 release date, there’s nothing official yet. However, it’s worth noting that showrunner Eric Kripke ran an efficient ship between Seasons 1 (July 2019) and 2 (September 2020), which arrived about a year apart from each other. Yes, Season 3 (June 2022) took longer, but Mother’s Milk actor Laz Alonso confirmed that this was due to the pandemic, so it doesn’t sound like we’ll be in for a two-year wait again.

So, hopefully this means that we’ll see the continuation of Annie January’s Supe-free lifestyle in 2023, probably fall-ish? Ideally, there will be some followup there on what Homelander did to Black Noir, but once again, expect that weekly rollout to continue because it’s really working for this show.

The Boys‘ first three seasons are currently streaming on Amazon Prime.

Young Thug has been in the news a lot lately, mostly for being scooped up in the wide-ranging RICO indictment alongside other members of the YSL label. Today, Variety broke the news that Alex Gibney’s Jigsaw Productions and Rolling Stone Films are working together on a documentary series and podcast about Young Thug.

The companies describe it as a tale set against “the larger Atlanta hip-hop boom, and the ongoing RICO case against YSL that accuses Young Thug and 27 other alleged collaborators of crimes ranging from racketeering to murder. The projects seek to separate the fact from the fiction of the criminal charges against YSL members, while also interrogating the controversial practice of prosecutors using rap lyrics as evidence of criminal activity. The result will be a wild, enthralling story of music, money, crime and hip-hop on trial.”

Executive producer Gus Wenner, the CEO of Rolling Stone, added, “We’re thrilled to partner with the talented team at Jigsaw to tell this ambitious and important story about one of the most compelling and controversial music scenes of the moment.”

This announcement has been met with mixed reactions on Twitter, with most fans wondering how these projects can begin when the legal issues remain very much unresolved.

Young Thug is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

No one thinks highly of police officers when they’re sitting handcuffed in the back of a cruiser, but for the Miami officer who arrested Polo G for assault in 2021, his experience was a hardcore exercise in patience considering the eloquence involved when the detainee happens to be a world-class rapper. Recently, body cam footage from the aftermath of the arrest surfaced online, revealing that Polo gave the dressing down of a lifetime to the officer, questioning all the life choices that led him to pursue his present career path.

“I’m just sayin’, do you got $10,000 in your bank account right now?” Polo inquests. “‘Cause if you die right now, what could you give your kids? If you die right now, what could you give the lady that you in bed with? What could you give to your mama? Have you ever bought yo mama anything? Did you buy yo mama a car? Did you buy yo mama a house? I did that.” The officer humbly replies, “Good for you, bro. I’m glad you did that… I would love to do that one day.” In his own fiery response, Polo posits that it’s unlikely as a police officer — something Polo seems very disdainful about.

Fortunately for the Chicago rapper, a pair of felony charges were dropped shortly after the incident, and the remaining misdemeanors were dropped earlier this year after he completed an anger management course. Hopefully, he can avoid any future run-ins with the police, but woe be unto any officers thinking they can flex on this rapper — they might end up being on the receiving end of one anti-motivational speech.

Fire Of Love is an eye-popping documentary feature now playing select theaters, about a life-long romance between two volcanologists who spent their lives chasing lava flows and each other. The film, directed by Sara Dosa, is built mostly out of footage the two dowdy scientists shot themselves, and if you enjoy gratuitous lava footage and tales of lifelong love, it’s easily worth the watch

For me it was fascinating for those reasons, but also because it feels like an origin story for Wes Anderson’s entire aesthetic. It’s a bit cute to note the parallel, and I’m far from the first critic to point it out (I imagine Dosa played it up a bit herself) but the experience of watching it is downright uncanny.

The film is about Katia and Maurice Krafft, narrated huskily by beloved indie auteur Miranda July (who I frequently found myself wishing would have a glass of water or something), but mostly it had me wondering: Are the Kraffts Wes Anderson’s parents? Did he know them somehow? How do their lives feel so much like an unscripted Wes Anderson movie? With every scene, Fire Of Love seems to reveal new, more uncanny layers of Andersoniana.

First of all, the Kraffts are French, Wes Anderson’s favorite nationality. Wes Anderson (who it surprises some to learn is from Texas) is such a Francofile that when he finally set a movie there, in The French Dispatch, people were shocked that it was his first, like it was some kind of Mandela effect. Probably because he’s always had at least one character in a beret, usually with raccoonish eye makeup and sometimes dancing to French music on the beach. But I digress.

Secondly, the Kraffts are volcanologists. Which is to say, they study volcanos, and have dedicated their entire lives to the discipline, referring often to themselves as “volcanologists” and frequently postulating about what action would most benefit the field of “volcanology.” It’s precisely the kind of niche discipline-turned-entire-personal-identity Wes Anderson would and has put in a movie — a kind of showman’s academia where the characters project an air of being doggedly in pursuit of knowledge but are also secretly in it for the glamour and the fame.

As noted above, Fire of Love is also a love story between dowdy academics, exactly the dynamic Wes Anderson has spent an entire career exploring, whether it’s Danny Glover and Etheline Tenenbaum, Steve and Eleanor Zissou, Bill Murray and Frances McDormand in Moonrise Kingdom, or half the characters in The French Dispatch. Naturally, the Kraffts are also usually depicted running around exotic landscapes wearing matching, goofy normcore costumes (and holy shit does Wes Anderson ever love him some costumes and uniforms). Even the Krafft’s outfits themselves look like they were lifted from The Life Aquatic, or vice versa:

It’s even the same color scheme!

The Kraffts met in the late sixties and, disillusioned with the Vietnam War, spent most of their working volcanology life and relationship in the seventies, eighties, and just into the early nineties. It isn’t a spoiler to say that they died together at Mount Unzen in 1991, partly because it’s a real thing that happened, but also because the movie doesn’t withhold this information either. The rub is that their entire working life took place during the heyday of mid-century mod fashion and bulky, chunky analog tech — exactly the kind of shit Wes Anderson fucking loves, to an almost obnoxious degree.

Think: Margot Tenenbaum’s boxy record player. Suzy from Moonrise Kingdom‘s Polaroid camera. Basically every scientific doodad and doohicky from The Life Aquatic. It’s hard to find a scene in Fire Of Love where at least one of the Kraffts doesn’t have a giant SLR camera or binoculars around their neck, or isn’t fiddling with some instrument built out of wires and giant antennae.

The Kraffts spend the entire movie hopping around the globe, chasing volcanic eruptions while lugging around giant, clunky, presumably homemade protective gear — notably these giant silver, metal and asbestos full-body condoms:

Through it all, the Kraffts photograph and film everything they do. Even their shooting style feels Andersonian, center framed in perfect focus with the subjects frequently darting from behind a tripod into the frame to smile kitchily before doing something charmingly eccentric.

Meanwhile, the footage in Fire Of Love not shot by the Kraffts tends to come from obscure, probably publicly-funded news magazine shows, hosted by chuffed pipe smoking men whom the Kraffts regale with tales of their latest adventure.

The Kraffts are sort of pseudo-famous in an eccentric, academia kind of way, like Eli Cash or Raleigh St. Clair or Steve Zissou. They have volcanology friends, volcanologist rivals, get drawn into volcanology drama.

The story they tell themselves and their pipe-smoking admirers is that they’re in it for the pursuit of human knowledge. Quickly though, it becomes clear that they’re thrill-seekers and performers as much as they are scientists, frequently taking risks that have more to do with the search for personal fulfillment and out of sheer horniness than with the quest for scientific knowledge. And those “flaws,” of course, only serve to make them seem more human.

If you always had a vague sense Wes Anderson’s real-life inspirations, watching Fire Of Love is like seeing them suddenly rack into focus. It’s like the Kraffts sprung directly from his psyche. And if Anderson’s twee bullshit never worked on you before, this time it just might, because this eccentric love story with the bittersweet ending is more than just a style choice.

‘Fire Of Love’ plays in select theaters starting July 6th. Vince Mancini is on Twitter. You can access his archive of reviews here.