Category: News

May is a great month for craft beer releases. Spring is in full swing, sure. But right now is actually when all the summer beers start to drop. That means craft breweries are launching their refreshing, light beers for a long season of sipping and crushing.

The best thing about summer brews is the variety. As mentioned, there are plenty of light, almost seltzer-like session beers available. But you also get the huge fruit-bomb IPAs with enough zest and sweet tropical fruits to almost transport you to a sunny beach under a palm tree. Summer beers can be light. They can be heavy (though they’re rarely dense, like a stout). They’re often bold. And they’re always quaffable AF.

Hopefully, the eight beers we’re giving love to this month will pique your interest and inspire you to explore exciting breweries in your neck of the woods. These picks represent regional craft beer releases from breweries that we vouch for (with tasting notes from the brewers themselves if we didn’t get to taste the beer yet, due to the pandemic), along with some seasonally released bottles that we’ve been looking forward to trying again.

PACIFIC NORTHWEST DROP: Elysian Full Contact Hazy IPA

Style: Imperial IPA, 8.8% ABV

Average Price: $13.99, six-pack

The Beer:

This new release from Seattle’s iconic Elysian brewery is part of a bigger story. Their “Contact” beers are all somewhere in the dank West Coast hoppy range, with different releases highlighting different hop levels and characters. In this case, bright fruit is the driving force, hence the pre-summer release.

Tasting Notes:

This beer has a kick. It’s high ABV, sure, but the real kick is in the rush of pine resin dankness that leads towards mango creamsicles, orange flowers, and a touch of savory melon. The dank resin lasts the longest on the tongue with a high-level bitterness tempered by all that creamy fruit and a final hint of vanilla.

Bottom Line:

This is close to the boldest beer on the list but not quite. The fruit really helps this brew go down easily, especially on a hot day. Though, don’t forget about those high ABVs. This beer will put you on your ass.

SOUTHWEST DROP: Sierra Nevada Hoptimum

Style: Imperial IPA, 11% ABV

Average Price: $9.99, four-pack

The Beer:

This is the boldest beer on this list. The IBUs (bitterness units) and ABV are almost off the charts high and you’ll feel it when you’re sipping this one. The brew has a foundation of Carapils, Two-row Pale, and Pilsner malts that support a tower of Chinook, Magnum, and Idaho 7 hops.

Tasting Notes:

The hops are the star of this show. There’s a touch of that classic Sierra Nevada malt far below the blast of floral hops, sticky pine sap, and almost chewy cannabis flowers. This is all about the floral dank with citrus zest making a bitter-ish appearance while brightening things up a little.

Bottom Line:

This is an IPA for true believers. If this is your first IPA, it might not only turn you off the style but off beer entirely. It’s a lot. If you think you’re ready for the mountaintop of the dankest of dank West Coast hop monsters, then this is going to be your jam all summer long.

ROCKY MOUNTAIN DROP: New Belgium Dominga Mimosa Sour

Style: Fruited Kettle Sour, 6%

Average Price: $11.74, six-pack

The Beer:

This sour wheat beer spends a good amount of time mellowing in oak that held wine. The brew is then spiked with Calamansi oranges to help edge it towards a classic brunch mimosa.

Tasting Notes (from the brewer):

“Inspired by bottomless sips in the sun, this citrusy-sweet sour ale shines with flavors of Mexican orange, tangerine, preserved calamansi fruit and is blended with wood-aged golden sour. Perfect for any day ending in ‘y’.”

Bottom Line:

New Belgium’s last Dominga release was a wonderful Sunday brunch sipper. We can’t imagine this new release doesn’t live up to the line’s easy drinkability and light body, making it the perfect brunch pairing beer.

SOUTHERN DROP: Jester King Balcones Bourbon Barrel Aged Montmorency vs. Balaton Batch 2

Style: Wild Ale, 8.4% ABV

Average Price: $40, 750ml bottle

The Beer:

We love Jester King Brewing. We love Balcones Distilling. This is the Texas beer and whisky match that speaks directly to us. Batch 2 is a wild ale that’s been double-aged in Balcones whisky barrels and former wine barrels for 21 months with a lot of Montmorency and Balaton cherries right in the barrel.

Tasting Notes (from the brewer):

“Our brewing team gets flavors and aromas of old fashioned, Red Hots, SOUR PUNCH® Cherry Straws, and graham cracker pie crust.”

Bottom Line:

We were lucky enough to snag a bottle of Balcones Bourbon Barrel Aged Moderne Dansk from Jester King. And yeah, it was a hell of a beer. There’s no way this isn’t going to be a subtly divine sip of beer from a big bottle that’s worth sharing with any close friend or lover who really cares about beer.

MIDWEST DROP: Great Lakes Lemon Hefeweizen

Style: Wheat Beer, 5.1% ABV

Average Price: $12.49, six-pack

The Beer:

This May release from Great Lakes is a consistent winner. It helps that hefeweizen is pretty much the perfect summer beer, to begin with. This American crafty version takes the soft fruitiness of a good German wheat beer and layers in lemon via a lemon puree and oil-filled lemon peels.

Tasting Notes:

When you crack this open, especially a can, you’re greeted with a spritz of light and bright lemon oils. The body of the beer is light and not overly-fizzed. Think of something more akin to a homemade lemonade with fizzy water that’s been amped up with almost spicy maltiness and bright citrus.

Bottom Line:

This beer is f*cking crushable, especially when the weather gets too hot. The lemonade aspect really shines as the maltier side of the wheat beer reminds you that you are indeed enjoying a nice, cold glass of the sudsy stuff.

NORTHEAST DROP: Allagash Fine Acre

Style: Belgian Blonde Ale, 5.5% ABV

Average Price: $13.59, six-pack

The Beer:

It seems like every five to seven years, “Organic” beers make the rounds with craft brewers. This time around, Allagash has crafted a subtle Belgian blonde ale with local and organic ingredients that highlight the agriculture of Maine.

Tasting Notes:

Subtlety is what really drives the beauty of this beer. There’s a nice hint of peppery spice next to fresh bushes of mint with hints of funky yeasts, dry straw, and sweetened malts. There’s a bit of an oatmeal cake vibe with orange icing that kind of brings the whole sip together with a malty, fruity, peppery throughline.

Bottom Line:

This is just a solid beer all around. While this beer is organic to its core, the taste of this beer is the reason you should buy it because it’s just … damn tasty.

WILD CARD DROP: Upslope German Style Pilsner

Style: German Pilsner, 4.9% ABV

Average Price: $8.49, six-pack

The Beer:

A perennial favorite, Upslope’s German Style Pilsner has become the ultimate marker that summer is indeed here. This seasonal May release is all about balance. The malts and hops find a certain harmony in this beer that is rarely seen outside of Bohemia and Bavaria.

Tasting Notes:

This beer is light, in the sense that there’s nothing weighing it down. It’s still bursting with bready maltiness, floral hoppiness, and light notes of straw. The body of the beer is all about freshly cut grass, orange marmalade on hefty bread, and a bouquet of wildflowers.

Bottom Line:

This is the most crushable beer on the list. The ABVs are below five percent, which means you can enjoy a few of these refreshers as the days get longer and the backyard fills with barbecue smoke.

INTERNATIONAL PICK OF THE MONTH: Helles Schlenkerla Lagerbier

Style: Helles Lager, 4.3% ABV

Average Price: $5, 500ml bottle

The Beer:

Speaking of smoke-filled backyards and long summer nights, Bamberg’s Schlenkerla has just the beer for backyard sipping this year. Their Helles Lagerbier is a full-bodied lager that is smoked-beer adjacent. This brew is a lager that uses Bavarian malts which are fermented in the same tanks they make their smoked beers in. So the beer picks up a very faint hint of smoke without using smoked malts. The brew is then barreled in wood and lagered in the old Schlenkerla cellars until it’s ready.

Tasting Notes:

Heavy-seeded bread with a hint of sour butter mingles with floral hops and a twinge of fatty bacon smoke. Hints of orange zest, old cellar beams, minerality, and more of that heavy bread with butter dominate the palate as the smoke lingers very far in the background and almost completely disappears.

Bottom Line:

This is another crushable brew. The lower ABVs make is the perfect session beer for an all-day smoke session in the backyard. As far as smoked beers go, this is 100 percent a lager first and foremost with a nod towards the world of smoked beers, making it very accessible even to the average beer drinker.

After attaining his first No. 1 album with A Gangsta’s Pain, Moneybagg Yo is well on his way to becoming a household name. However, when it comes to names, the Memphis rapper was surprised to find his government name used as trivia during a Music Choice stream of his album’s defiant single “Time Today.” Catching a video of the moment, Yo zoomed in on the “Did You Know?” section of the screen informing viewers that “Moneybagg Yo’s real name is Demario Dewayne White Jr.,” declaring Music Choice to be “police as hell.”

“Appreciate the love but damn!” he exclaims in the video. “Talking about, ‘Did y’all know his real name?’”

Moneybagg Yo must not have Googled himself recently because it isn’t that hard to find this information in the public sphere. For what it’s worth though, the whole point of a trivia section is to reveal things to a reader that they might not have been aware of before. One person who did seem amused by Moneybagg’s real name — or at least, his reaction to it — was Drake, who commented on DJ Akademiks’ post about Yo’s discovery. “DD White mayne,” he wrote, accompanying his post with several laughing emojis.

Ultimately, Moneybagg Yo is likely to be the one to get the last laugh. He’s been too busy celebrating his wins to worry about internet commenters throwing shade, laughing off one critic’s assertion on TikTok that one of his recent performances was “boring.”

You can read Uproxx’s review of A Gangsta’s Pain here.

May is the beginning of Mental Health Awareness Month, which has prompted several musicians have opened up about their own personal struggles. Selena Gomez recently unveiled an initiative to campaign for greater mental health education in schools, detailing how “scary and lonely” it can be to undergo depression alone. Following suit, Ariana Grande says she’s committed to ending the sigma surrounding open conversations on mental health.

Grande ushered in Mental Health Awareness Month by sharing some important information on social media. Posting a mental health-related infographic, the singer shared a handful of specific mental health crisis lines and treatment centers across the country. “here’s to ending the stigma around mental health and normalizing asking for help,” Grande wrote alongside the infographic. “healing isn’t linear, fun, quick or at all easy but we are here and we’ve got to commit to making this time as healthy, peaceful and beautiful as possible. the work is so hard but we are capable and worth it. sending so much love and strength.”

Grande’s commitment to mental health awareness comes on the heels of another major career success: The singer’s “Save Your Tears” remix with The Weeknd officially hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts this week, earning both Grande and The Weeknd their sixth career chart-toppers.

The dream of every 10-year-old after watching Star Wars for the first time has come true: Disney has created a real-life, working lightsaber. It’s debatable if we’re living in a more civilized age, but it definitely looks less clumsy and random than a blaster.

As part of May the 4th Be With You, a.k.a. Star Wars Day, Disney revealed details about the much-anticipated Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser at Walt Disney World Resort in Florida, where park attendees will be able to go on “an all-immersive, two-night vacation experience that goes beyond anything Disney has ever created before.” Here’s more:

Yes, that’s a new type of lightsaber Rey is holding in her hand, created by Walt Disney Imagineering Research and Development. Guests who experience Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser will be the first to see it in action – along with so much more – starting in 2022 when this amazing new two-night adventure debuts.

Watching that lightsaber activate right before your eyes will be just one of the countless ways that, from the moment you arrive to the moment you depart, you’ll be plunged into a Star Wars story where your decisions and actions – or even the casual conversations you may have – determine how your personal journey unfolds.

Along with the lightsaber, Galactic Starcruiser visitors will also eat and drink in the Corellia Dining Room (“The dining room is a bright and welcoming hall that will offer breakfast and lunch to passengers before transitioning each evening into a lavish multi-course menu of both otherworldly and familiar origins”). From the moment you arrive, you’ll feel like you’re on an actual spaceship, with viewports and a bunch of weird aliens milling about. I’m going to pull a Holdo maneuver if there’s not at least one Toydarian.

For more details on Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser, head here.

Back in October, it was revealed that former Blink-182 leader Tom DeLonge was making his directorial debut with a film called Monsters Of California. Deadline previously described the film as “a coming of age adventure with a science fiction twist that follows teenager Dallas Edwards […] and his derelict friends on a quest for the meaning behind a series of mysterious, paranormal events in Southern California.” Now, one of the movie’s stars, beloved and omnipresent actor Richard Kind, has spoken about the experience with Seth Meyers on Late Night. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it seems DeLonge spent a lot of time on set talking about UFOs and aliens.

After telling Meyers that he doesn’t believe in aliens, Kind continued:

“I gotta tell you: The guy who directed it, his name is […] Tom DeLonge. He was a singer for Blink-182. He loves aliens, he loves UFOs, has met with the Pentagon, and the whole time we’re shooting… and he’s a lovely guy, good director, everything like that… he was a great skateboarder and he’s a rock and roller who’s a director now, OK? So I’m memorizing lines […] I’m in the scene and everything and he goes, “No no no, dude! Dude! You gotta listen to this story! There was one time this alien…’ I’m going, ‘Tom! Tom! Direct! Don’t tell me your stories about aliens! Let me… I’m working here!’ It was fun, it was hilarious.”

Check out the full interview below.

Blink-182 is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

This week in the best new pop music saw some highly-anticipated releases. Billie Eilish returned with a vulnerable track, Bebe Rexha tapped Lil Uzi Vert for an empowering earworm, and Miley Cyrus linked up with rising rapper The Kid Laroi for a kiss-off tune.

Each week, Uproxx rounds up the best new pop releases. Listen up.

Billie Eilish — “Your Power”

Billie Eilish released the stripped-down and stirring single “Your Power” this week after officially announcing her sophomore album Happier Than Ever. The track is a melancholic take on the prevalence of men abusing their power in the music industry, a nuanced issue that Eilish addresses with a delicate vocal delivery.

Bebe Rexha — “Die For A Man” Feat. Lil Uzi Vert

Debuting another track from her forthcoming album Better Mistakes, Bebe Rexha taps Lil Uzi Vert for the radio-ready hit “Die For A Man.” Steeped in empowerment, Rexha confidently addresses the importance of putting herself first in a relationship over a shuffling beat.

The Kid Laroi — “Without You” Feat. Miley Cyrus

After weeks of teasing, The Kid Laroi dropped his Miley Cyrus-featuring “Without You” remix. A soothing guitar’s strumming chords craft a backbone for Cyrus’ wispy vocals, where she playfully details how she’s learned to grow after moving on from past relationships (and damning headlines).

DJ Khaled — “Let It Go” Feat. Justin Bieber, 21 Savage

DJ Khaled dropped the star-studded project Khaled Khaled this week, which boasted big-name artists like Drake and Cardi B. It also featured the more buoyant tune, “Let It Go,” with Justin Bieber and 21 Savage. Over a snappy beat, Bieber and 21 Savage trade inspiring verses on the importance of focusing on the bigger picture.

Jessie Ware — “Please”

Jessie Ware returned this week for another disco banger. “Please” arrives off her What’s Your Pleasure? deluxe release and features the familiar cascade of sparkling synths, groove-forward beats, and Ware’s euphoric lyrical delivery. “‘Please’ is full of optimism and ready to be played in a place where we can all be together and flirt, dance, touch, and kiss,” she said about the track. “A wonderful excuse not to stop the party from ending.”

Hayley Kiyoko — “Found My Friends”

In her first new single of the year, Hayley Kiyoko shares “Found My Friends.” The dark pop track draws on brooding synths and layered harmonies, which offer a intriguing contrast to Kiyoko’s sunny vocals. “‘Found My Friends’ is a song I wrote during a challenging time when I realized instead of being my own worst enemy, I could actually be my own best friend,” she said. “It’s about discovering and nurturing a strong friendship with yourself.”

Julia Michaels — “Little Did I Know”

Julia Michaels released her long-awaited debut LP Not In Chronological Order this week. Much like the album as a whole, her track “Little Did I Know” showcases Michaels’ vulnerable songwriting. The track also marks a sincere and newfound hope about the possibilities of love, which Michaels details in her impassioned lyrical delivery.

Still Woozy — “Kenny”

Dream pop aficionado Still Woozy offered “Kenny” as an anthem for self-sufficiency this week, trading in his signature layered synths for a more guitar-focused tune. Inspired by the picturesque landscapes and intriguing people of Montana, the song itself reflects a sense of lonely wonder. “I wrote ‘Kenny’ after experiencing life in the great plains of Montana for a bit,” he said. “I met people I will never forget, people never fed by the silver spoon who could genuinely laugh about gambling away 60k in one night, people living in what felt at the time to be the middle of nowhere.”

Girl In Red — “Body And Mind”

This week marked the official release of Girl In Red’s anticipated LP If I Could Make The World Quiet. Much of the album boasts vulnerable lyrics, but her snappy tune “Body And Mind” is a more playful tune. Its popping hook and interesting production displays a jazzier side of Girl In Red’s music, while the track’s lyrics speak to the difficulties of healing from heartbreak.

The Marías — “Hush”

After sharing a handful of effervescent singles, The Marías have officially unveiled their debut full-length album Cinema with the dark pop anthem track “Hush.” Over a reverberating beat, vocalist María Zardoya’s gossamer vocals delicately ushers in an era of sensual-yet-energizing music.

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

Tom Hiddleston’s theater background couldn’t be more evident with the way that he embodies mercurial trickster Loki, and it’s clear that he has an absolute blast whenever revisiting the character, so the upcoming Loki series looks to be a treat for all involved (especially for those of us at home). Well, Monday evening’s Marvel-themed NBA game (the Golden State Warriors vs. the New Orleans Pelicans) revealed a special look for fans who are counting the weeks before the show’s June arrival on Disney+, and Loki is getting things done again.

By “getting things done,” I mean that he’s disturbing everyone else’s goals and generally frustrating the world. Yet he’s always a delight to behold, and this series’ trailers have already revealed that Loki’s sort-of making attempts to clean up the fine mess that he made and must atone for his time crimes. Of course, Thor’s brother was last seen snatching the Tesseract during Endgame, so who knows whether the God of Mischief will actually cooperate with Owen Wilson’s Time Variance Authority agent. Loki does, of course, remind everyone that he’s been “burdened with glorious purpose,” and he’s probably waiting for these pesky humans to subjugate themselves.

Given that this show very obviously revolves around the time concept, it’s tough to completely nail down a timeline, and we might not be able to expect full clarity on that end at all. The show takes place following the events of Avengers: Endgame, but it’s still unclear what Loki’s true essence (somewhat reformed, or no?) will be in this show. We saw Thanos kill Loki as Avengers: Infinity War began, yet he popped into Time Stone-stealing mode at the conclusion of Endgame. In other words, we should expect the unexpected and realize that, yeah, Loki is in charge here. We’re all just a bunch of mewling quims to that Frost Giant exterior.

In any event, it seems likely that Loki will be a multi-season affair. Marvel Studios VP of Production & Development Nate Moore recently told IndieWire that the show “lends itself to multiple seasons in a way where it’s not a one-off.” The first season (which co-stars Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Sophia Di Martino, and Wunmi Mosaku) will premiere on June 22.

The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow, and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.

For the last several years, Julia Stone has been working on new music. That in of itself isn’t unusual: Stone has released several albums with her brother as the duo, Angus and Julia Stone, along with a couple albums of her own. But last week’s Sixty Summers marks her first solo record in over eight years, and some of the songs on the record are almost that old. After writing thirty demos over the last five years — the bulk of them collaborations with Thomas Bartlett, aka Doveman — Stone said that, in some ways, her third album is functioning like a debut would. “For me it does feel like a first record,” she mused when we spoke over the phone about the album, and how her sound has pivoted in the process of refining these songs. “It’s a body of work I’ve been creating over five years, and it was a really slow understanding of where I was heading. I was so used to working with my brother, and we had found a nice rhythm with the way that we worked that was very comfortable. I didn’t realize this was what I wanted to do until I was doing it.”

This new direction moves away from the slow and steady folk-pop songs Stone has been making with Angus for the last decade and a half, and toward a bluesy, frenetic pop sound that was guided and shaped by album producers, Bartlett, and Annie Clark of St. Vincent. “Being championed by people like Annie and Thomas gave me a lot of confidence to do something in a different style and a different way of writing,” Julia said. “Some of the music I wanted to make was less of a first-person, direct way of communicating a specific experience and more about exploring abstract ideas. It’s a bit more abstract lyrically and sonically.” Across thirteen tracks, Stone explores ideas as disparate as booming ’80s nostalgia on the title track, dramatic, slinky glam-rock on “Queen,” and the disco-inflected electro-pop on “Who” — even bringing the familiar folksy duet set-up on “We All Have,” although Matt Berninger of The National subs in for Angus in this case.

As a whole, Sixty Summers is a gigantic step forward for the Australian singer-songwriter, who faced the twin crises of the devastating bushfires in her native country, quickly followed by the onset of COVID-19, when it came to timetable for the release of her most ambitious album yet. “It was so wild in 2020, I just couldn’t see or feel a space where I wanted to release the record or any of the songs,” she explained. “It just took time for it to feel like a natural inspiration. I wanted to bring it out at a time when I felt a little bit more colorful in my life, and I wasn’t feeling that for most of last year.” With the widespread distribution of vaccines, and a hopeful opening to travel, touring, and public gatherings, Sixty Summers is now coming at a time when dreaming of summer is more relevant than ever. Read a condensed, edited conversation with Julia below for more details about her songwriting for the album, how working with Annie and Thomas to help shape it, and the emotional resonance of the record’s themes.

How was the songwriting process different for the songs on Sixty Summers than it was on your first two solo albums?

There’s been sounds I’ve had in my head for a long time but never felt like I knew how to get them out, within the context of how I was used to writing songs, which was traditionally for me on an acoustic guitar or on a piano, and writing on my own a lot. When I started co-writing with Thomas, the way that we were working was different. I was working to the foundations of songs that he’d already structured in terms of chords. Writing to music that comes from somebody else’s brain and heart opened up this world of possibilities. In those songwriting sessions it felt natural to freestyle write. There was a real freedom to it and a lot of just turning on the microphone and recording whatever came into my head. A lot of the songs like “Break” and “We All Have” and “Heron” — they were songs that were just happening in the moment.

Because of Thomas’ sound palette, and when Annie (of St. Vincent) came on board, her influence, I found a space where those sonic and lyrical ideas really worked. I felt like it was bringing me back to life in music, and I was having a lot of fun making it. It sounds really obvious, but songwriting has been a cathartic way to explore quite challenging experiences. And this was still exploring challenging experiences, and there’s a lot of darkness on the record, but I was doing it in a fun way.

Working with Thomas and Annie seems to have influenced the record quite a lot, can you talk about your relationship with both of them?

The first time I meant Annie was in an airport in Helsinki. It was a really nice meeting, we both shared a drummer, Matt Johnson, and I saw Matt walking through the airport with this beautiful woman. I ran over to him and gave him a hug and he said ‘Annie this is Julia, Julia, Annie. You guys should be friends.’ She got out her phone and said ‘What’s your number?’ and sent me a text message on the spot saying “friends.” That was the beginning of us occasionally texting each other and bumping into each other at the hotel and a festival, here and there around the world.

Thomas I met years before that backstage at a festival in the UK. I’d been a fan of his solo music, Doveman, for a while, and he was backstage with his friends from The National. I went over to him and I said ‘I love your music, I think you’re extraordinary,’ and that was a very fast friendship. He took me by the hand and said ‘let’s go watch my friends play,’ so we went to watch The National. And Thomas and I just kept trying to find excuses to hang out. Music was a side product of our friendship. We just, we enjoy each other a lot. I think we understand each other really well. I have always felt quite at home with Thomas, and that was very immediate.

So you’d been collaborating with Thomas on a set of songs for years, when was it that St. Vincent got involved with the process as a producer?

During the writing of the record, Thomas and I would just be in the studio where so many people come and go, it’s a very welcoming place. He likes to bring people together for a real collective feeling. And after we’d gotten to about year three of sessions writing together, we had all these demos and just didn’t really know what it was going to be. I finished a tour with my brother and Thomas brought up the idea that maybe there was a record in these songs. We both felt a bit confused about what genre it was, or what the record was going to be, they all felt so different. He said ‘You know who will know what this is? Annie. Let me ask her if she’d be keen to jump on board as a producer and help us turn this into a record.’ She was just in the final stages of producing the Sleater-Kinney record, and she listened to a few of our songs and said yes. I’ll never forget her turning up to the studio and after the first listen through she narrowed it down to sixteen songs she wanted to work on.

Introducing this new shift in your sound with the song “Break” felt like a major moment — with all the multi-tracked harmonies, the uptempo feel and the horns — why did you choose that one as the first single?

I chose “Break” as the first single because I felt like it was the most indicative of what the record was about, for me. It was still a song about love, which is the only thing I guess I write about. And it’s a song about accepting the challenges of love, and being at the mercy of a feeling you have no control over. It also had a sonic quality to it that was so weird and strange to me, and I love it. It also came together easily, it was one of the most natural songs to write. I’d just got off tour and came to Thomas’ studio, and he’d usually make tracks for me to listen to when I got there. That song started, and I just felt like I instantly wanted to turn on the microphone and sing. I found myself very comfortably singing and speaking these words. I was speaking memories and feelings that were coming out from listening to the music, it felt so fun and cathartic in a really fun way. We did this for about twenty minutes, I just didn’t stop until I said something really stupid that made us both laugh. I remember us looking at each other and Thomas said ‘I think there’s a song in that.’ We found these parts and turned it into three verses, and took the “darling darling” part and made it the chorus. It felt like as a first song, it embodied what the record was about: Making music for the love of making music.

Another distinctive moment early on in the album is when Matt Berninger’s vocals suddenly appear on “We All Have.” What was that collaboration like?

That was definitely a real highlight in my life of collaborating with artists. I’ve been a fan of the whole band and Matt for so long. I’ve had the good fortune of collaborating with almost everyone from The National except for Matt. I remember Thomas coming to me with the idea for “We All Have,” and that one is the very first song we wrote in 2015. It was very close to how it sounds now, it had almost all of the same parts. Originally I had sung the ‘love is all we need to be here for part. Then Thomas said he thought “We All Have” is missing something, and said ‘I’d like to ask Matt if he wanted to sing on the track with you, I think it’d be really great.’ Matt said he liked the song and he’d like to sing on it, and he sent back these beautiful vocals. Straightaway it felt like the dichotomy between his voice and my voice was really special. We’re at the opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of tone and sound, and it added this beautiful gravity to the message of the song too to have this deep voice come in sand say ‘love is all we need to be here for.’ Then to have the two voices together — I like the directness of that song and Matt’s voice to me is very direct and easy to connect with.

Let’s also talk about the title track. There seems to be such a nostalgia there but also a look toward the future, what’s the story behind this song?

There was this period of time in my life where I was living in London, and I’d fly home for summer in Australia. Summer for us is Christmas and the New Year, and I’d go back to the beach town I grew up in. It would be really nostalgic, a summer of seeing friends and family and going to house parties, going to the beach. I had this one particular friend who I would always spend the summer with when I came back from London, and we had a beautiful few years doing that. It was on the third or fourth year of these summers back in Australia. It felt like summer was just there all of a sudden, it felt really quick. So when I was back and we were having a house party. It was a really beautiful night, one of those magic nights where everything just goes beautifully. She turns to me and grabs me by the shoulders and very urgently looks at me and says ‘can you believe we only have sixty summers left?’

I remember feeling what that meant, in that moment, it was the first time I had some clarity around how short life was going to be in. In the context of summer it just felt so brief to only have sixty of them, I’d already just had three and they’d gone by rather quickly. I started to think about how do you create a sense of urgency around that moment, about not wasting time. That was how the song became what it became, and I felt it was very representative of why I made this record. When I started really understanding I had this freedom to write music in any way I wanted, that was starting to feel like I was using my sixty summers in a way that felt conducive to my happiness and authenticity.

It seems like this an album that resonates with you emotionally, even if it isn’t super first-person-y. So what are some of the emotional themes that stand out to you about Sixty Summers?

A lot of it has to do with acceptance. Accepting the fact that you don’t have control over the circumstances that you find yourself in very often. The only way through those circumstances or that grief or the pain is to accept it. That’s something that definitely in the past I’ve resisted. I have felt that I could control the outcomes of certain things, but part of growing and learning in my life has been about learning that it’s not in my control. There’s a certain amount of accepting of the path you’re on. Through that acceptance come an opening and a lightness. Maybe a clearer view about what you can actually do and contribute.

Sixty Summers is out now. Get it here.

Billie Eilish made waves recently (as she tends to do) with a revealing new British Vogue photoshoot. Aside from that and the cover story, though, she also participated in the publication’s Ask A Legend series, in which she fielded questions from some other famous folks.

Justin Bieber came through with a challenging hygiene-related question, asking in a pre-recorded video: “I’m going to have to ask you a really, really serious question: Would you rather have fresh socks or fresh sheets?” Eilish responded, “Oh my god, I can’t have them both, Justin? It really depends on the situation. I really don’t wanna sleep in dirty sheets, and I really don’t wanna put on dirty socks, you know? I feel like fresh sheets, but also I… I can’t wear dirty socks. So maybe fresh shocks. But I love sheets, so either one.”

Finneas, who has regular access to Eilish and probably doesn’t need this forum to get answers from her, came through with a question as well, asking if there are any concerts of hers that she sees photos of but does not remember. She responding by mentioning an outfit she’s seen herself wear but doesn’t remember at all. She also told Dominic Fike that she just went on a date for the first time the day before the video was filmed.

She also fielded questions from Missy Elliott, Halle Berry, Denzel Curry, Avril Lavigne, Dominic Fike, Stormzy, Hailey Bieber, Arlo Parks, Orlando Bloom, Viola Davis, Tim Burton, Mel C, Jessie Reyez, and others, so check out the video above.

Elizabeth Olsen has lined up her next TV project after dominating the small screen with her celebrated performance in WandaVision. The Scarlet Witch actress will play axe murderer Candy Montgomery in a new limited series for HBO Max titled Love and Death. The Montgomery case gripped headlines in the 1980s after the Texas woman murdered her next door neighbor and best friend Betty Gore. Via THR:

“This is a gripping story about the frustrations and desires of two women in a small town that culminates in a terrible act of violence,” said HBO Max head of original content Sarah Aubrey. “We are thrilled to be partnering with David, Lesli, Nicole and Per [Saari] and incredibly fortunate to have Elizabeth at the center of our story to bring out all the layers of Candy that make this story so unforgettable.”

If that project rings a bell with true crime aficionados, that’s because The Handmaid’s Tale actress Elisabeth Moss also has a TV series about Montgomery in the works. Titled Candy, the project was picked up by Hulu back in December 2020, according to Deadline. Moss had been shopping the project since July after being captivated at the chance of tackling the role.

“I have been wanting to play an anti-heroine for a while now, and have been trying to work with [executive producer Robin Veith] again after Mad Men for even longer,” Moss said in a statement. “So when she asked me if I wanted to play a housewife from Texas who, some would say, got away with murder, I simply said, ‘Where do I sign?’”

(Via The Hollywood Reporter)