Category: News

Few beverages are more refreshing on a hot summer’s day than a glass of ice-cold, fizzy lemonade. Beer is in the running though, that’s for sure. This is why the shandy (or radler) is so beloved this time of year. To put it simply, the drink is a beer mixed with lemon-lime soda pop. It’s summer in a glass.

Brass tacks: Across Europe (where this is from and enjoyed endlessly this time of year), it’s literally just local beer cut with Sprite or 7-Up (and sometimes Orange Fanta, Coke, or any other cold, fizzy drink on hand). The two terms for this drink are strictly regional. “Shandy” is from the U.K. while “radler” is from Germany and refers to the bike riders (“radlers”) who’d stop for a refreshing beverage on long summer rides. They’re both concoctions of beer and lemon-lime soda with a 50/50 pour of each in a beer glass. Historically, all of them were made on the spot by the folks pulling the beer with various regional deviations.

More recently, big brands started selling pre-made radlers or shandies which cut beer with sweetened fruit and/or citrus sodas before bottling or canning. That’s where the current American craft beer versions stem from.

To sort through the seemingly endless options of crafty radlers and shandies hitting the shelves as the summer heats up, we reached out to some bartenders for advice. The eight options below are great introductions to the style. That being said, we’re not stopping you from going old school and just cutting your favorite beer with your favorite lemon-lime or grapefruit soda.

Burgkopf Grapefruit

Craig Schoettler, executive director of beverage and corporate mixologist for MGM Resorts

ABV: 5.5%

Average Price: $7 (16-oz. can)

Why This Beer?

Most radlers and shandies are pretty low alcohol, Burgkopf comes in at 7.5 percent ABV. You get the refreshing grapefruit flavor along with a good value for your spend.

Leinenkugel’s Summer Shandy

Hadi Ktiri, beverage manager at Four Seasons Hotel and Private Residences in New Orleans

ABV: 4.2%

Average Price: $9 (six-pack)

Why This Beer?

It’s hard to beat the crisp, refreshing flavors of Leinenkugel’s Summer Shandy. It’s thirst-quenching, crushable, and filled with lemon and lime flavors. I also like to mix up my own with Paradise Park Lager from Urban South Brewery and some freshly mixed lemonade. It’s an easy way to seriously elevate your day drinking beverage game.

Narragansett Del’s Watermelon Shandy

Daniel Yang, lead bartender at Rosina inside The Venetian Resort in Las Vegas

ABV: 4.7%

Average Price: $11 (six-pack, 16-oz. cans)

Why This Beer?

I don’t drink too many radlers or shandies. But if I had to choose, it would be the tasty Del’s Watermelon Shandy from Narragansett. I love watermelon anything, so it stands out for that reason alone. It’s extremely refreshing and easy to drink, which makes it a great shandy to enjoy poolside during the summer.

Left Hand Peach Beerlini

Evan Hosaka, lead bartender at Electra Cocktail Club inside The Venetian Resort in Las Vegas

ABV: 4.1%

Average Price: $11 (six-pack)

Why This Beer?

I’m not the biggest fan of the radler and shandy styles in general. But a very approachable radler for someone just starting is Left Hand Brewing Co.’s Peach Beerlini. It’s light, fruity, and filled with peach flavor.

Stiegl Radler Grapefruit

Slava Borisov, mixologist at Travelle at The Langham in Chicago

ABV: 2.5%

Average Price: $13 (six-pack)

Why This Beer?

My favorite choice is Stiegl Radler Grapefruit. This radler has bright pink grapefruit and orange notes with an outstanding malt aftertaste. It is not only a great refreshing drink but also a delightful component for your cocktails. Using Stiegl Radler Grapefruit in your paloma (instead of grapefruit soda) will enrich the cocktail recipe and make it shine.

Owl’s Brew The Blondie Radler

Juyoung Kang, lead bartender at The Dorsey inside The Venetian Resort in Las Vegas

ABV: 3.8%

Average Price: $12 (six-pack)

Why This Beer?

Owl’s Brew Radler The Blondie has this dusting of sweetness that balances out the tart and bitterness most radlers have. The Blondie has tea and citrus flavors on a wheat beer base. It’s like an Arnold Palmer made with beer instead of water.

Boulevard Ginger Lemon Radler

Ethan Skaggs, bar manager at Gris-Gris in New Orleans

ABV: 4.1%

Average Price: $10 (six-pack)

Why This Beer?

I would recommend Boulevard Ginger Lemon Radler because of its thirst-quenching qualities and impeccable lemon zest that can almost read as lemon candy. This product has a super-strong ginger aroma with honey and breadiness pervading through the palate.

I think what makes this radler stand out is its subdued crispness when considering the acidity of the lemon and the spice of ginger.

Great Divide Roadie

Hayden Miller, head bartender of Bodega Taqueria y Tequila in Miami

ABV: 4.2%

Average Price: $9 (six-pack)

Why This Beer?

Great Divide Roadie is an awesome, light grapefruit radler without overbearing sweetness. With a lower ABV, it also is more crushable for bike ride cheers from coast to coast.

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As a Drizly affiliate, Uproxx may receive a commission pursuant to certain items on this list.

Before Fargo season four premiered, Chris Rock described his crime syndicate leader and businessman character as being “Tony Soprano-esque.” Now, it’s become a cliché to compare an anti-hero in a prestige drama — which Loy Cannon was — to James Gandolfini’s role on The Sopranos. But we’ll let it slide with Rock because he was offered a role on the HBO series, which he turned down multiple times.

“I thought he wanted me to host his wife’s charity event or something. [Fargo] is a big job. And sometimes you can respect something so much, you don’t even want to be a part of it,” Rock said in a roundtable interview for the Hollywood Reporter about meeting Fargo creator Noah Hawley. “Years ago, when I had my own show on HBO, it was at the height of The Sopranos, and I got a couple of offers to be on The Sopranos, and I was like, “I like it too much, I don’t want to spoil it.” But I was such a fan [of Fargo], I took the meeting anyway.” Rock accepted the offer because he loved how Hawley wrote for Mike Milligan, Bokeem Woodbine’s “Jabberwocky”-reciting character from season two.

The Chris Rock Show aired from 1997 and 2000, meaning it overlapped with seasons one and two of The Sopranos. It’s a good thing Rock declined the invitation. Otherwise, one of the biggest scenes in the show’s history would have been spoiled for him. I’m, of course, referring to when [cut to black].

(Via the Hollywood Reporter)

Biden is wrapping up his G7 Summit trip which consisted of a grueling schedule filled with awkward group photos and hours-long sitdowns with world leaders. That might be why the typically jovial president appeared to snap at a CNN reporter just doing her job during a recent press conference.

After a three-hour chat with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Biden gave a recap of what the two talked about to the press. In his speech, Biden laid out his stance on the human rights violations happening in the country and revealed he had broached the topic of political cyberattacks with Putin. but he didn’t offer any concrete plans on how the U.S. would respond if Putin ignores his warnings about interfering with our electoral process or executing Russian anti-corruption activist and opposition leader Alexei Navalny. (Navalny is currently in prison, and Putin has gone on record suggesting he might not make it out alive.) Basically, there could be a lot of posturing going on and not much else.

So, when CNN reporter Kaitlan Collins asked why President Biden seemed so confident that Putin would change his behavior following their meeting, it felt like a pretty fair question that deserved a direct answer. Instead, Biden chided Collins for being “in the wrong business” if she couldn’t understand the unstated threat of sanctions Biden had alluded to — but never actually deployed — during their chat.

And it wasn’t just Collins who earned the president’s ire during the summit. Before Biden boarded Air Force One, another reporter asked about his outburst after Collins’ question, and he used the opportunity to drag journalism, as a whole, for being a very pessimistic occupation.

(Just like film criticism doesn’t mean you completely hate a film, asking relevant and balanced questions of a president doesn’t mean you have “a negative view of life.”)

Just a few minutes after that interview though, Biden returned to the press corps and delivered Collins a personal apology for how he reacted to her statement. “I apologize for having been short before,” Biden told the press before detailing why he was choosing to remain positive about his meeting with Putin and the changes it might bring. And Collins, in talking with her colleagues on air, graciously accepted the apology, insisting that as president, Biden didn’t need to make one but that she appreciated it all the same.

We guess the moral of the story here is that even world leaders get snippy sometimes?

In a sign of the ever-growing prevalence of non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, CNN will soon be selling collectible tokens of its historic news coverage from over the decades. The collection is called “Vault by CNN,” and it will launch later this month with an assortment of “moments” that will be revealed at a later date.

While NFTs are notoriously complicated and mostly center around bragging rights to owning a digital item, CNN is clearing both of those hurdles. Right off the bat, Vault by CNN users will be able to pay by credit card instead of going through the convoluted process of obtaining cryptocurrency, which is typically how NFTs are purchased. On top of that, Vault will also offer users the option to physically own their CNN moment and actually display it offline. Via THR:

In a FAQ about the service, CNN explains the rationale to launch the “Vault”: “Until now, there has been no way to ‘collect’ these moments. Users can often find old footage online, or packaged up in documentaries, but they cannot ‘own’ them or display them in the way they can with a print newspaper or magazine.”

While some users questioned the ethics of selling off historic moments like, for example, the falling of the Berlin Wall (and, man, the concerns about a 9/11 NFT are racking up), other people on social media chimed in with the “classic” CNN moments they’d loved to see converted into a non-fungible token. For posterity.

(Via The Hollywood Reporter)

Penguin Town: Season 1 (Netflix series) — Don’t even try to resist this one. Patton Oswalt’s narrating this series about the (arguably) most adorable animals on earth. That would be a boisterous colony of African penguins that decide to hit some sunny beaches near Cape Town alongside surfers. What on earth is going on? Apparently, these generally cool dudes are now used to the heat, and it’s a real-life group of penguins who did this, so don’t even try to stop their enjoyment of tropical paradise. They’re only trying to survive and get a little love and maybe, hopefully, god willing, not go extinct. Also, penguin drama must be the best drama, hands down.

Dave (FX, 10:00 & 10:30pm) — One of the most absurd shows on TV is back (for Season 2), and rapper and comedian Dave Burd, a.k.a. Lil Dicky (based upon his own life), has got an anteater in tow. Let’s hope the taco truck is just fine, but of course, expect Dave to keep shooting for rap superstardom while recording his debut album. He might have to give up everything that’s truly important to him (love, friendship, his sense of self) up in the process. Last season brought Justin Bieber in as a guest star, so let’s see if the show can up the ante. This week, Dave makes a video that’s designed for global success, but an implosion might be imminent, which would spark an international incident. He’s also highly distracted from his creative process.

Loki: Episode 2 (Disney+ series) — Tom Hiddleston has an absolute blast playing the mercurial trickster of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and we shall reap the benefits while he helps (or hinders) the Time Variance Authority during the process of cleaning up the timeline. This week, the talk of Variants grows both clearer and murkier, if that makes any sense at all, while Owen Wilson’s suddenly apparent gift of exposition really gets a chance to shine. Seriously, can we just hand the guy an Emmy right now? He and Hiddleston are remarkable in their conversations together this week, and you may need to watch it twice to savor all the wordplay.

Crime Scene Kitchen (FOX, 9:00pm) — Joel McHale’s the host of this bizarro cooking-focused reality-competition show, which sees chef teams attempt to figure out what was baked after a dessert disappears, leaving only ingredients in the aftermath. Seriously, give this show a whirl because it is oddly meditative to watch the clues come together. Also, McHale is one of the best famous-types at the art of the interview, and I’ll stand by that claim no matter what.

Jimmy Kimmel Live — Zooey Deschanel, Sam Richardson, Kodak Black

The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon — Seth Meyers, Annie Murphy, Coldplay

Late Night With Seth Meyers — Terry Crews, Ann-Margret, Stevie Nistor

The Late Late Show With James Corden — Margot Robbie, Rose Byrne, Polo G

In case you missed this pick from last week:

Fresh, Fried & Crispy: Season 1 (Netflix series) — You might gain 10 pounds while watching this show, which would fit right in with Guy Fieri’s adventures. The so-called Grandfather of Food Reviews on YouTube, Daym Drops, takes a cross-country trip across the United States to find the most decadent fried foods possible. There’s deep-fried Oreos (in San Diego), extra-crispy pork chops (in Birmingham), and more on the menu, and not only does he pop into actual restaurants, but home kitchens and food trucks are also part of the hunt. Get your appetites ready.

Fresh off her appearance on XXL’s 2021 Freshman Class, Flo Milli turns around to lend a lyrical assist to GoldLink, providing a catchy hook on his new song “Raindrops.” Over a Bossa Nova-influenced guitar loop with a distorted sample of Tamia’s “Officially Missing You,” GoldLink expresses his wistful appreciation for an inaccessible paramour who gets plenty of attention and spends too much time away. Meanwhile, Flo Milli’s chorus swings from braggadocious to aspiring as she boasts “If I post my nudes, I / Have the world like, ‘Ooo ahh.’”

“Raindrops” is the latest single from GoldLink’s upcoming album Haram, the follow-up to his 2019 project Diaspora. Although the album was critically hailed, GoldLink believed that he was snubbed for the 2020 Grammy Awards, and the album peaked at No. 77 on the Billboard 200. A controversial Instagram post referring to Mac Miller caused a minor backlash against him, so with Haram, he appears to be refocusing on the forward-facing, genre-hopping music that first endeared him to a broad range of fans.

Lead single “White Walls” displayed more bombastic, mosh pit-inspiring energy, while with “Raindrops,” it’s clear that GoldLink’s attachment to smoother, R&B-influenced sounds remains intact.

Listen to “Raindrops” above.

Haram is due 6/18. Pre-save it here.

(SPOILERS for Disney+’s Loki and the MCU will be found below.)

We don’t usually think of the second episode of a series as being one filled with intensity and revelation, but then again, not every second episode of the show hits the same way Marvel’s Loki just did. By the time Loki‘s second episode comes to a close, Loki has effectively escaped the TVA and is now in hot pursuit of a devious Loki variant, Lady Loki. Now, for those unfamiliar with Lady Loki, she is a very real Marvel character who spells out trouble for Loki and was speculated to be in the show, so it makes sense why so many would be so quick to identify this character as her. However, I think that’s exactly what Marvel hoped would happen and hides who she truly is.

Rather than Lady Loki, it would appear that this woman could actually be Enchantress, a character from the Thor series. In the Marvel Universe, the second Enchantress is a young girl from Oklahoma named Sylvie Lushton, who lived a normal life until the Asgardians moved to Earth following their planet’s destruction. After that, she woke up with unusual powers that, in the comic book series, Loki secretly gave her to mix things up — meaning Loki is responsible for her creation. Interestingly enough, the Marvel show takes us to Oklahoma at the end of the first episode, where the “Loki variant” aka Enchantress, wreaks havoc with her powers.

In addition to this, we see the variant has an extreme distaste for Loki and rejects his name, and has slightly different powers than him, which is why Loki was so quick to grow defensive and explain his own powers to the TVA when they were listing off hers. In addition, Loki makes several comments about how “he wouldn’t treat himself this way,” during their encounter, leading us to theorize it’s because she isn’t a variation of him at all, but rather a different character entirely. Lastly, while Loki’s theory about her using disasters to avoid disturbing the timeline is brilliant, it might be that she isn’t variant at all and is doing as she is intended as Enchantress.

To further bolster this theory, some on Twitter are sharing screencaps of the Spanish dub credits, which vary from the English credits that refer to the character as “The Variant.” Below, she’s referred to as “Sylvie.”

It’s a lot to speculate on, and unfortunately, there’s a little bit more to consider when it comes this show’s villains as well.

If we want to dive a bit deeper into some fan theories, I might even argue the “and it might not be who you think,” part of this headline could extend to someone else: Kang the Conqueror. While Kang isn’t scheduled to make his big MCU debut until 2023, when Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania hits theaters, there are a few things that point to his involvement in Loki. You might have noticed Ravonna Renslayer is a bit… off. It’s apparent to her favorite colleague Mobius, and it’s pretty darn apparent to us as well. It would appear there is someone else in her life she is seeing behind closed doors, and while we’re still unsure just what is going on there, it’s worth mentioning she canonically has a very close relationship with none other than Kang in the Marvel Universe.

You see, in the comics Ravonna is the daughter of King Carelius, the future ruler of Earth. During her father’s reign, Kang comes to the kingdom of Carelius — the last bastion of humanity on Earth — and attempts to conquer the land, but ultimately stands down after meeting Ravonna and falling in love with her. Despite his best efforts, Ravonna refuses to reciprocate his love because he is a commoner, which ultimately leads him to make a pretty intense promise to her: to bring Avengers to their future so he can fight them and show her his true power in battle, ultimately winning her heart. It could very well be the fabled Time Keepers do not exist and there is no scared timeline, but rather the whole TVA is made up of people Kang is using to carry out his will and win the love of Ravonna. Whew.

Looks like we’ll have to wait until next Wednesday to get some more answers.

Mystics MVP Elena Delle Donne is recovering from a pair of back procedures and has had her return date pushed back several times this season. Originally, there was hope she’d open the season on restricted minutes, then she was ruled out for the first two-to-six games, and now, 10 games into Washington’s season, Delle Donne’s return date has been moved even further.

Delle Donne has played one-on-one in practice and is working on defensive drills, but is yet to play five-on-five, head coach Mike Thibault said, and she could sit until after the Olympic break in August, via The Washington Post’s Kareem Copeland.

“Certainly she’s going to need team practice time for a number of days before we consider putting her in a game,” Thibault said. “So if we’re two weeks from now [and] we’re still wondering about that then, yeah, it’s probably more likely coming out of the break. But we’re not saying it’s absolute at this point.”

This is brutal news for Mystics fans, who haven’t seen Delle Donne play since she helped win the franchise’s first championship in 2019. The team had every expectation to run it back in 2020 until the coronavirus pandemic reached the United States. Several key players including Delle Donne opted out of playing in the bubble, and the Mystics lost in the first round of the playoffs.

Injury news and a chaotic offseason have completely altered the makeup of this year’s Mystics team, too. Two-way wing Aerial Powers and Sixth Woman of the Year candidate Tianna Hawkins signed elsewhere over the winter, center LaToya Sanders retired and joined the franchise as an assistant coach, new signee Alysha Clark suffered a season-ending Lisfranc injury before the start of the season, and 2019 Finals MVP Emma Meesseman has yet to play due to overseas commitments.

The injury bug hasn’t left the team either as point guard Natasha Cloud is battling a hip flexor injury that caused her to leave Sunday’s game in the third quarter, and Sydney Wiese has played in just six games due to an ankle sprain.

Washington has found ways to win this season despite it all. The Mystics are 4-6, staying competitive due to the MVP-caliber play of new-acquisition Tina Charles, who leads the WNBA in scoring at 24.0 points per game. Without Delle Donne down low, she’s had to carry a significant role on both ends of the court, securing 8.4 rebounds with 1.8 assists. She’s owned that spotlight and leads the WNBA in usage rate at 32.1 percent, but if the Mystics want another trophy come October, they’ll need Delle Donne back, too.

If Delle Donne returns in August, she’ll have little time to work her way back into game-shape and get acclimated with her new teammates. The roster looks drastically different than it did two season ago, and after the Olympic break, the Mystics will have only 14 games remaining on their schedule. Four of those games are against the three best teams in the league — the Connecticut Sun, Seattle Storm and Las Vegas Aces — which means the margin for error will be slim for Washington to get a good seed.

Indie pop trio Wet first captivated audiences with the emotive pop heard on their 2014 self-titled debut EP. To date, the group has shared two LPs and a handful of singles in the years following their last studio album, Still Run. But now with the return of all their original members, Wet usher in a new era of music with the tender single “On Your Side.”

The new tune is the first-released track since Wet shared their 2020 single “Come To You,” which debuted just a week before lockdown. “On Your Side” immediately opens with singer Kelly Zutrau’s sun-drenched vocals as she delivers a reflection on reminding someone close to her that she hasn’t given up her commitment to them.

The music itself reflects Zutrau’s reassurance as samples of gentle coos play out underneath atmospheric synths. The intimate production on “On Your Side” is thanks to producer Buddy Ross, who is known for his work with big indie acts like Vampire Weekend, Frank Ocean, Haim, and Bon Iver.

In a statement about the track, Zutrau says she tried to capture the feeling of fleeting love:

“‘On Your Side’ is about the feeling of embodying unconditional love as a special and fleeting experience. Even though it sounds contradictory, unconditional and fleeting, it’s about that duality. I often find myself in more ambivalent places in relationships and then when it happens it’s epic like planets and trees and rivers and then like that it’s gone again. I think I wanted to capture it as a way of holding onto that feeling. To me a lot of love songs are about capturing that quick moment before it’s gone, there’s a desperation to it.”

Watch Wet’s “On Your Side” video above.

Mike Lindell hosted yet another poorly-attended rally this weekend, this one with Donald Trump in virtual attendance. The former-president wasn’t the headliner, however: Lindell spoke after him, by which point “the crowd, which had begun to filter out after Trump’s speech ended, had already significantly dissipated,” according to the Daily Beast.

Lucky for the sunburned walk-outs, they didn’t miss Lindell ranting about Fox News (“Shame on you, Fox… This is disgusting what they’ve done to our country”), Newsmax (“Look at Newsmax, the cowards there”), and The Daily Show earlier in the afternoon.

What did The Daily Show with Trevor Noah do to Lindell, outside of frequently debunk his wild lies and call him the “alt-right Mario”? Well, the MyPillow founder was interviewed by Jordan Klepper earlier that day and he was unhappy with how it went. To get back at Klepper, Lindell leaked the interview before it could air on Comedy Central.

On Wednesday, Lindell told “Real America’s Voice” host Steve Bannon that Daily Show producers had insisted on conducting his interview in front of portable toilets. Bannon then aired about six minutes of cell phone video showing Daily Show personality Jordan Klepper interviewing Lindell… Lindell appears to be livid.

That’s put it mildly: Lindell is raving through most of the footage he provided, including a heated exchange where he calls Klepper a “jokester, you’re being real funny. Shame on you for what you’ve done to our country when you’re saying stuff like that. This has nothing to do with the pillow!” (I need to start using “this has nothing to do with the pillow” in casual conversation.) Later, Klepper says that instead of watching Lindell’s “cyber evidence,” he’d rather binge Mare of Easttown. After initially being confused, Lindell replies, “I don’t watch trash. I spend my time trying to evangelize. We’re in the greatest revival in history. Our country wants to get back to one nation under God.”

Lindell was trying to pull one over on The Daily Show and Klepper (I guess???), but it did not work. He ended up making himself look more nutty than usual.

(Via Raw Story)