Category: News

You may have noticed that Chrissy Teigen went quiet again on Twitter following her apology to Courtney Stodden. Well, this has been quite a saga that’s worth a brief recap. Back in late March, Chrissy quit Twitter (not for the first time) after writing that “my life goal is to make people happy. The pain I feel when I don’t is too much for me. I’ve always been portrayed as the strong clap back girl but I’m just not.” A month later, she resurfaced while writing that “it feels TERRIBLE to silence yourself.” During that interval, TMZ noted Courtney Stodden’s remarks about Teigen bullying her on the platform a decade ago.

In the process, TMZ published screencaps of several 2011 tweets by Teigen, who had told Stodden to take a “dirt nap,” among other trolling remarks. The Daily Beast then published an interview with Stodden, who revealed that the behavior extended to private messages (“[she] would privately DM me and tell me to kill myself”). This all resulted in Chrissy’s aforementioned apology to Stodden, which she publicly made and stated, “I’m mortified and sad at who I used to be. I was an insecure, attention seeking troll.”

Fast forward a few weeks, and Teigen has stayed quiet while fallout continues from the resurfaced tweets. She pulled out of a Netflix show, and unsubstantiated reports say that she’s possibly lost out on partnership deals. Teigen has now published a lengthy essay on Medium, in which she writes, “I’ve been sitting in a hole of deserved global punishment” that has involved feeling “crushing regret” every moment and day. She describes this recent period as an ultimate time-out, and here’s more:

“As you know, a bunch of my old awful (awful, awful) tweets resurfaced. I’m truly ashamed of them. As I look at them and understand the hurt they caused, I have to stop and wonder: How could I have done that?

There is simply no excuse for my past horrible tweets. My targets didn’t deserve them. No one does. Many of them needed empathy, kindness, understanding and support, not my meanness masquerading as a kind of casual, edgy humor… I was a troll, full stop. And I am so sorry.”

Chrissy says she has endlessly reflected upon how she didn’t see red flags in her behavior when they popped up, and she says that she’s grown up and sought plenty of therapy in an effort at self-improvement:

“I wasn’t mean in my everyday life. More than once, someone would come up to me and say, ‘You’re so much nicer in person.’ Why was that not a huge red flag? But I took it in and tossed it aside. I did book signings where girls would call me a bad ass bitch, and I’d stretch my arm toward them as they walked away, looking at my friends and saying, ‘I promise, I’m not!’”
At the time, I just didn’t get it. Believe me, I get it now… The truth is, I’m no longer the person who wrote those horrible things. I grew up, got therapy, got married, had kids, got more therapy, experienced loss and pain, got more therapy and experienced more life. AND GOT MORE THERAPY.

You can read Chrissy’s full apology essay on Medium.

(Via Chrissy Teigen on Medium)

Burna Boy is picking up the celebration of his fifth album, Twice As Tall, where he left off when he triumphantly took home the 2021 Grammy Award for Best Global Music Album (we here at Uproxx thought he’d been royally snubbed the previous year). Coasting on that Grammy glory, the Nigerian afro-fusion rapper revealed new dates on his Space Drift Arena tour that winds through lots of festivals through 2022 and takes him from North America to Europe.

Burna announced that he will also perform his first headlining show at the Hollywood Bowl, on Friday, October 8th, 2021. Tickets will be available for the public to purchase on Friday, June 18 at 12 p.m. local time.

Burna Boy will also play New York’s Governor’s Ball festival on Sunday, September 26, and San Francisco’s Outside Lands festival on Sunday, October 31.

Below is the full list of dates for Burna Boy’s Space Drift Arena tour. Purchase tickets on his website here.

07/02/2021 – 07/03/2021 — Sumol Summer Festival 2021 @ Ericeira, Portugal
08/20/2021 – 08/21/2021 — Blockfest 2021 @ Tampere, Finland
08/27/2021 — The O2 @ London, UK
09/11/2021 – 09/12/2021 — Parklife Festival 2021 @ Manchester, UK
09/24/2021 – 09/26/2021 — The Governors Ball Music Festival 2021 @ Queens, NY
10/08/2021 — Hollywood Bowl @ Hollywood, CA
10/29/2021 – 10/31/2021 — Outside Lands Music & Arts Festival 2021 @ San Francisco, CA
11/10/2021 — Accorhotels Arena @ Paris, France
11/20/2021 — Arkéa Arena @ Floirac, France
11/21/2021 — Zénith Nantes Métropole @ Nantes, France
06/02/2022 – 06/03/2022 — Primavera Sound Festival Weekend 2 2022 @ Barcelona, Spain
08/11/2022 – 08/13/2022 — Way Out West Festival 2022 @ Gothenburg, Sweden

Burna Boy is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

The Orlando Magic are one of four teams with a head coaching vacancy currently, along with the Boston Celtics, Portland Trail Blazers, and Indiana Pacers, and for most are the least desirable of the available jobs. The Blazers and Celtics each have established stars with postseason expectations, while the Pacers hope to get back to the playoffs after a rather disastrous 2020-21 season, but still have an All-Star talent in Domantas Sabonis and other high level players.

The Magic are more of a development situation coming off of, effectively, a lost season due to injuries that saw them finally commit to a rebuild by trading Nikola Vucevic to Chicago and Evan Fournier to Boston. Markelle Fultz and Jonathan Isaac will be returning from serious injuries and there are young players like Cole Anthony and Wendell Carter Jr. that present interesting upside, but a coach going in knows it’s going to take time before that’s a contender again and there will be growing pains along the way.

On Monday, word emerged that Jason Kidd will interview for the job after being granted permission to do so by the Lakers, which is particularly interesting given he recently publicly pulled his name from contention for the Portland job after Damian Lillard made it clear Kidd was his preferred choice.

When Kidd turned down the chance to interview for the Blazers job, there was a thought that he had his eyes on another job, but few would’ve guessed Orlando was that spot. It’s possible that he sees the Magic as a comfortable place to work his way back into the head coaching ranks with low expectations and high upside for him should he succeed there, while struggling wouldn’t be viewed as a coaching failure in the way that it would be if the Blazers didn’t improve.

Still, it’ll be interesting to see if the Magic want to go with Kidd or a younger coach who could grow with the team and might be seen as having more upside than a retread.

Despite being fired from The New Yorker after being caught masturbating during a Zoom call ahead of the 2020 election, Jeffrey Toobin made a surprise return to CNN on Thursday after being off the air since the incident. Toobin maintains that the whole thing was “moronic,” but it was an honest mistake caused by the anchor not realizing his end of the Zoom conversation was still on-camera.

Naturally, Toobin returning to CNN is a controversial decision for the network, and it seems like exactly the type of topic that would make for a spirited debate on The View. Instead, the co-hosts were mostly in agreement that the Toobin incident was a stupid thing to do, but rests in a “gray area” because, as Ana Navarro noted, the only person he sexually harassed was himself. Joy Behar took things a step further by saying that what Toobin did doesn’t make him a “bad person.” Via Mediaite:

“He said that he wants to be a better person. He’s working at a food bank. I don’t see the correlation between needing to engage Mr. Happy and being a bad person,” Behar said while addressing the interview. “I mean, maybe it causes blindness, but I don’t see how it causes you to be a bad person.”

While Whoopi seemed to be the only co-host to chastise Toobin and warned other men like him to just “go to another room,” it was a relatively calm segment thanks to Meghan McCain being absent. While The View co-host is often the source of tension on the panel, she saved her thoughts on Toobin for Twitter, where the conservative host spent the weekend blasting CNN for bringing the legal analyst back.

“SO F*CKING TIRED OF IT!!!!” McCain tweeted when the news first hit.

McCain then tagged CNN and demanded to know the network’s policy for self-pleasuring Zoom calls. “I want to know if the official stance of @CNN is that it’s okay to jerk off on a zoom call to your female colleagues as long as the camera is *off? Since the camera being *on was apparently the issue.”

(Via The View)

Square Enix didn’t have too much to show during their E3 presentation on Sunday. In an event that lasted about 40 minutes, their three big announcements were Guardians of the Galaxy, a pixel remaster of the first six Final Fantasy games, and then they ended with an action slasher game called Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin. The trailer for Origin was admittedly not impressive. Mainly it was held back by awful dialogue, but the gameplay itself had potential as long as it was fun to play.

Several reports from journalists and fans indicated that even after downloading it, the demo simply didn’t work. Everyone who’s attempted to play it so far has reported the same thing happening to them. They download the game, start the application, and are met with an error message that informs the player the data is corrupted and they need to re-download it. Except, re-downloading it will do nothing at all. According to reports, they are aware of it and currently working on a fix, but this is not the introduction developers were hoping for when it comes to their game.

As someone that tried to download the demo themselves, I can confirm that this does happen upon starting up the game. It’s unfortunate because Team Ninja is well known for fun faction games, but this is certainly an inauspicious start for this title. We’ll eventually get to experience this game for what it is, but that’s not going to be until they fix the demo. We’ll keep you posted.

The only thing better than watching a science-denier own themselves is when that person is Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene and her anti-vax conspiracy theories land on Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Twitter timeline.

Greene guested on a recent episode of Steve Bannon’s podcast to tout her completely unsubstantiated claims that the Coronavirus was actually a bioweapon released by, we assume, the Chinese government. That conspiracy theory makes zero logical sense as China was one of the hardest-hit countries when the COVID-19 outbreak first occurred, but it does piggyback on a growing concern that the pandemic originated because of a lab leak at the Wuhan Virology Institute. There have been calls by government officials to trace the source of the virus but, as of now, no official origin has been named so really, Greene and the rest of her anti-vax QAnon groupies are only talking nonsense right now.

Fortunately, AOC is active on social media and always willing to put science-denying public officials in their place. Case in point: Greene argued that COVID had to be a bioweapon because “Why is there any need to create a virus that could spread rapidly to a population, to make people sick and kill them?” on Bannon’s podcast before affirming that she doesn’t believe in evolution, she believes in God. What she was basically suggesting is that COVID had to be a bioweapon because God would never allow a naturally occurring virus to kill millions of people around the world.

Unfortunately for her, AOC came with those Biblical receipts.

Anyone who’s flipped through the Old Testament — or seen that Ridley Scott movie where Christian Bale played a Hebrew prophet whose eyeliner suggested that he was going through a real My Chemical Romance phase — would know that God loves a good plague. Weird, since Greene claims to be a devout Christian. But AOC wasn’t the only one willing to nail Greene to the proverbial social media cross of shame — another Biblical reference she probably won’t get.

All jokes aside, please don’t get your scientific theories from a woman who’s associated with a movement that believes lizard people are secretly ruling the masses. It won’t end well.

Getting compared to Larry David is a great thing if you’re working in comedy, and perhaps not as great a thing if it’s in reference to your social skills. But for Lil Dicky, that kind of comparison is exactly what he’s been going for all along.

The rapper and brain behind the surprise hit Dave is known for a lot of things, all of them sort of referencing parts of his own life and the musical persona that first made him famous. His success with Dave only tightens the connections between his persona, his real life and the show’s plot points loosely including all of the above. And if that sounds a bit like David’s work on Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm, well, you’re not alone in thinking that.

In a GQ profile of Dicky, the Larry David connections are front and center in a very flattering way. Early in the piece his mother quite literally says “You’re no Jerry Seinfeld. But you’re funny” when describing Dicky (real name Dave Burd) and his big ambitions. Apparently he used to straight-up ask his parents if he was a comedic genius, though he didn’t like the answer he got:

His friend Benny, the producer and hitmaking songwriter Benny Blanco, remembers this too. “Oh my God,” he says. “He’d be like, ‘Mom, Dad, am I a genius?’ And they’d be like, ‘Eh.’”

With two seasons of Dave now under his belt, though, the comparison isn’t nearly as absurd. And one longtime David collaborator is willing to broach the subject. The piece discusses Burd’s creative process and OCD tendencies at length, exploring how he first learned he could make people laugh and the stress that introduced into his life. The juxtaposition between attempted genius and the mental strain of actually realizing that makes him a difficult person to work with at times:

At work, the neurosis has a name: The No Stone Unturned Method. This means he must try out every single possible version of something, whether it’s a lyric or a joke, before he’s satisfied. “He’s the worst person I’ve ever been in the studio with,” Benny Blanco tells me. “But also the best person.”

The flipside of his neurosis is stratospheric confidence. The co-creator of Dave, Jeff Schaffer, remembers the first time he met Burd: “He’s talking to me, a stranger, about how he’s going to be so huge. He’s telling me he’s going to be the biggest entertainer in the history of entertaining. And I’m like, Oh, he’s delusional. This is great. I love this.” Schaffer, who’s also worked on Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm, adds that he sees “a lot of Larry” (that would be David) in Burd.

That’s high praise for a guy many know from funny rap songs, though the perception of Burd is certainly changing with Dave. The show is funny, and very successful, and as we see more of Burd’s work, it makes all of his talk about a wildly successful career not just more reasonable, but an actual reality.

(Via GQ)

Since getting their first No. 1 song on the Billboard Hot 100 a bit over nine months ago, BTS have become accustomed to spending time on top of the charts. Now, they’ve done it again: On the Hot 100 dated June 19, BTS’ “Butter” remains in the No. 1 spot for the third straight week. “Butter” is now tied with “Dynamite” for the group’s longest-running No. 1 song on the Hot 100, although since “Dynamite” had a break between its second and third weeks, “Butter” is the first BTS song to spend three consecutive weeks on top.

“Butter” staying at No. 1 comes thanks in part to the “Cooler” and “Sweeter” remixes of it, which came out on June 4 and therefore factored into the new chart, which reflects sales from June 4 to 10. “Butter” is the fourth No. 1 song from BTS, following “Dynamite,” “Savage Love (Laxed Siren Beat),” and “Life Goes On.”

After learning the news of this week’s chart triumph, BTS once again shared a celebratory message with their fans, writing, “YES! #BTS_Butter is on top of the chart for three weeks in a row. Thanks #BTSARMY.”

Elsewhere in the top 10 of this week’s chart, Olivia Rodrigo’s “Good 4 U” stays strong in the No. 2 spot for the third consecutive week. Her “Deja Vu” also remains in the top 10, at No. 9 this week.

Festival season is all the way back. After Made In America revealed its rap-heavy lineup headlined by Justin Bieber and Lil Baby, Day N Vegas got in on the action, announcing its massive lineup just minutes later. Headlined by Kendrick Lamar, Travis Scott, and Tyler The Creator, Day N Vegas will return to Las Vegas Festival Grounds on November 12-14 with three days of new and rising stars building on the success of the first iteration of the festival in 2019.

On Friday, Kendrick Lamar is billed to play songs from Section.80 up to DAMN. (no Overly Dedicated?? I will FIGHT), with DaBaby, YG, Ari Lennox, and Polo G top-lining a lineup that includes Kendrick’s TDE compatriot Isaiah Rashad, Flatbush Zombies, D Smoke, IDK, Yung Baby Tate, and more. Then, on Saturday, Travis Scott leads a roster of Lil Baby, Doja Cat, Saweetie, and Baby Keem. Undercards on Saturday include Cordae, Joey Badass, Freddie Gibbs, BIA, Blxst, and Audrey Nuna. Sunday, Babyface Ray, Flo Milli, Rico Nasty, Snot, Kota The Friend, Earl Sweatshirt, and Griselda build up to the big-faced names: SZA, Lil Uzi Vert, Snoh Aalegra, and Don Toliver, with Tyler The Creator closing out the festival.

Tickets go on presale Friday, 6/18 at noon Pacific. Get more info at DayNVegas2021.com.

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

Single malt and blended Scotch whisky generally fall into two flavor profiles: Sweet or smoky. Smoky scotch can have sweet flavor notes, but it’s often the peaty smoke that’s the star of the show. The sweet Scotch whiskies, on the other hand, tend to lean into florals, fruits, and honeyed sweetness (even if they carry a little smoke). While we enjoy all of the many notes prevalent in Scotch whisky, today we’re turning our attention solely to honey.

So where does this flavor come from and how can we find whiskies in which it’s heavily featured?

Honey flavor is most often prevalent in whiskies that have been aged in American white oak barrels, primarily ex-bourbon casks. Flavors reminiscent of clover, heather, and various types of honey come from the charred wood as well as the sweet esters that are created during the fermentation process, which layers in the honey notes.

To find these sweet, mellow bottles of scotch, we reached out to fifteen of our favorite bartenders and asked for their picks. Check their creative, often surprising answers below and click on the prices if you want to order a bottle for yourself.

Auchentoshan American Oak

Bobby Gleaon, USBG bartender in Las Vegas

ABV: 40%

Average Price: $45

The American oak brings notes of vanilla and coconut. The 12 years brings smooth notes of crème brûlée. The whisky is distilled three times and has a smooth, mellow finish. It’s definitely one to seek out for lovers of honeyed, floral flavors.

Dalwhinnie 15

Dennis Shea, beverage director at Fish & Fire Food Group in Washington, DC

ABV: 43%

Average Price: $75

Dalwhinnie 15 is an easy-drinking, delicate choice. Its lack of smoke coupled with honey, citrus, and dried fruit notes make it very approachable. It delivers a creamy, inviting mouthfeel on the palate.

Aberfeldy 12

Eugene Lee, founding bartender at Mix Lab in Los Angeles

ABV: 40%

Average Price: $45

These days, I’m loving Aberfeldy 12. It’s fantastic as an easy sipper as well as mixed into cocktails. Try it in a classic gold rush. It’s filled with all of the flavors you want in a whisky from caramel to vanilla, and especially honey.

The Balvenie 12 Doublewood

Chris Stevens, general manager of Five Sisters Blues Cafe in Pensacola, Florida

ABV: 43%

Average Price: $70

The Balvenie 12 is sweet with a good body. This scotch has a gentle spice with hints of vanilla and honey. This single malt is going to be a little easier to drink as an introduction to single malts and has also withstood the test of time with enthusiasts around the world.

Glenmorangie The Original

Andy Printy, beverage director at Chao Baan in St. Louis

ABV: 43%

Average Price: $45

I think one of the most approachable single malts has to be Glenmorangie. They have many expressions, but their flagship label is easy to get into. And with 17-foot stills, this expression is distilled with subtlety in mind.

The nose reminds you that it’s malted barley, but the palate is packed with honeysuckle and vanilla. The finish is lightly toasted oak and just a bit of praline.

Aberlour 12

Jessica Balts, bartender at FireLake Grill House & Cocktail Bar in Minneapolis

ABV: 40%

Average Price: $60

Aberlour 12 is a fantastic single malt scotch for honey-lovers. It’s super smooth and filled with honey sweetness. It’s heavy on caramel-like bourbon notes and smooth like an Irish whiskey.

The Macallan 12

Andres Rairan, lead bartender at High Tide Beach Bar & Grill in Miami

ABV: 43%

Average Price: $80

The easiest single malt scotch for me is The Macallan 12. I think it’s because it was one of the first single malt scotches introduced to me. I find the whisky to be extremely smooth, clean, light, and crisp for this category. It might be a little cliché because of its popularity, but I honestly think there isn’t a smoother or easier single malt to drink.

It’s also a perfect beginner single malt for someone wanting to get into this category, especially because of the honey flavors.

The Balvenie 14 Year Caribbean Cask

Ryan Cunningham, bartender at Anchor and Brine in Tampa, Florida

ABV: 43%

Average Price: $85

Anything aged in rum casks is going to grab my attention every time and this is why The Balvenie 14 Year Caribbean Cask is easily one of my favorite Scotches. This Highland scotch is going to be mellower and more approachable for bourbon drinkers and the aging in rum casks just adds to the honeyed sweetness.

Glenfiddich 12

Jeremy Williams, mixologist at MDRD at the Amway Grand Plaza in Grand Rapids, Michigan

ABV: 40%

Average Price: $49.99

For people wanting to explore entry-level single malt scotch with flavors like honey, I like to steer them towards some great Speyside distilleries. Glenfiddich 12 is great because you get mellow notes of rich barley, pears, baking spices, and sophisticated wood alongside that honey.

Bruichladdich Classic Laddie

Frantjesko Leonora, lead mixologist at Curaçao Marriott Beach Resort in Curaçao

ABV: 50%

Average Price: $59.99

Bruichladdich’s Classic Laddie has a signature flavor profile of the Islay region in Scotland. This Classic Laddie is a non-age statement single malt that is light and full of citrus, sweet malted barley, vanilla, and honey notes. Sip it neat or elevate a simple highball cocktail.

The Dalmore King Alexander III

Pascal Pinault, food and beverage general manager at Ambersweet at The Confidante in Miami

ABV: 40%

Average Price: $289

The absolute most outstanding single malt is The Dalmore King Alexander III. It’s a 10/10 for every single malt nerd with a very rich smooth finish and a combination of flavors of berries, spices, honey, and orange. This is one of those single malts that shift time and space.

The Balvenie 17 Doublewood

Nikole Calvo, bar manager at SIX in Tampa, Florida

ABV: 43%

Average Price: $159

The most mellow and honeyed single malt scotch whiskey to drink would have to be The Balvenie Doublewood 17 Year. It’s finished in sherry oak casks and is absolutely delicious over a large cube. The water enhances the flavor of the malt, opening up the wood and honey flavors for an easy-drinking experience.

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