Category: News

Broadcasters ranging from WNBA All-Star Layshia Clarendon to Sophia Jones, the daughter of the great play-by-play man Mark Jones, will join NBC Sports California’s broadcast of Kings-Cavaliers on Saturday night, making it the first all female and non-binary broadcast in the team’s and station’s history.

Clarendon (who identifies as non-binary) and Jones will be joined by Krista Blunk, Kayte Hunter, and Laura Britt, all longtime Bay Area media personalities.

“Each of these individuals are such valuable contributors to sports broadcasting and we are excited to bring them together to showcase their talent,” Kings President of Business Operations John Rinehart said in a statement. “It is critically important to provide opportunities and pathways for more diverse voices to be included in the industry while also highlighting the incredible ones working in sports currently.”

The news comes the same day as the Toronto Raptors are set to feature their first all-female broadcast team on Sportsnet in Canada, with analysts Amy Audibert and current WNBA player Kia Nurse calling the game, among others. An NBC affiliate doing this in the NBA could signal further steps toward more diverse broadcasts across the country.

“Advancing new and diverse perspectives is key to serving sports fans great content and in promoting opportunity and inclusivity in sports media and beyond,” said Devon Fox, senior director of live events and special projects at NBC Sports California.

The broadcast will begin on Saturday night starting at 6:30 p.m. PT.

Palehound‘s Ellen Kempner and Jay Som‘s Melina Duterte already boast a fair number of accolades for their respective projects. But last month, the two songwriters announced that they would be pivoting to focus on something else, their joint band Bachelor. They shared Bachelor’s debut single “Anything At All” alongside the project’s announcement and now, they’ve returned to announce a full-length album.

Bachelor’s debut LP is titled Doomin’ Sun, and Kempner and Duterte have offered another preview of its sound with the bass-heavy song “Stay In The Car.” About the single, Kempner explains that it was written shortly after their partner underwent top surgery:

“I wrote the lyrics to ‘Stay In the Car’ back in December of 2019 when I was in Florida for my partner’s top surgery. I had run out one afternoon, post op, while he was healing to grab lunch for us and as I was gathering my stuff in the parking lot, a big car pulled up and this absolutely beautiful woman got out. She was dressed all in red, dripping with jewelry and had the most wild fiery mane I’d ever seen. She was yelling at the man behind the wheel asking him what he wanted from the store and I wished I was that man. I wanted to be a part of her life, her best friend, her driver, whatever she wanted me to be. I was completely mesmerized.”

Echoing Kempner’s statement Duterte adds, “We wanted this song to be a visceral listening experience, inspired by The Pixies and The Breeders. For the music video, we worked on a two-day shoot with Haoyan of America in Poughkeepsie in extremely cold weather. We all collaborated on the idea that our friendship should be portrayed in a fun and stylish way. Haoyan captured that energy in his own unique and creative lens through his collection of 80s/90s/00s props and toys, CGI, and anything car-themed.”

Watch the “Stay In The Car” video above and find Bachelor’s Doomin’ Sun cover art and tracklist below.

1. “Back Of My Hand”
2. “Sand Angel”
3. “Stay In The Car”
4. “Went Out Without You”
5. “Spin Out”
6. “Anything At All”
7. “Moon”
8. “Sick Of Spiraling”
9. “Aurora”
10. “Doomin’ Sun”

Doomin’ Sun is out 5/28 via Polyvinyl. Pre-order it here.

Whenever the internet latches onto a strange moment, it tends to get even stranger as more details emerge (and more racist, i.e. the “milkshake duck” effect, but thankfully, this isn’t about that). Case in point, the man who kidnapped the internet’s attention yesterday by tweeting about a bizarre discovery in his breakfast cereal turned out to have a truly fascinating past as a battle rapper — one that resulted in plenty of success outside of the music industry.

Jensen Karp, aka Hot Karl, may not be a household name to most, but in the LA battle rap scene — and in certain Hollywood television production circles — he’s kind of an underground legend. As Hot Karl, he was signed to Ice-T’s Rhyme Syndicate at just 11 years old, he entered Power 106’s Roll Call freestyle competition and held the title for 45 weeks while in college, and he signed to Interscope Records in the early 2000s, recording a debut with features from DJ Quik, Kanye West, Redman, and more which was never released. He wrote a memoir about it and shares his hip-hop knowledge as part of a trivia game. Oh, and he paid Chance The Rapper $5,000 to shoot a music video back in 2013.

Those experiences served him well in Hollywood, where after several gigs writing for WWE and VH1 and a truly fated radio hosting gig, he became executive producer of the short-lived celebrity rap battle show Drop The Mic, which famously featured battles between The Muppets’ Kermit and Miss Piggy, Randall Park and James Van Der Beek, and more, and helped launch the career of the white half of Blimes And Gab.

Users on Twitter were delighted to learn this info, but the “Hot Karl” trend was quickly taken over by teen fans of a gaming YouTuber named Karl Jacobs, who is apparently bad at taking selfies. I kid, teen girls, please do not murder me or perform witchcraft at me.

Karl Marx, the famed German philosopher who laid the groundwork for the modern conception of socialism, also got roped into the fun.

Knowing Karp, he’s likely enjoying all the shenanigans his tweets have caused because he’s a pretty funny guy, but hopefully, this thing doesn’t flatten his hard-won legacy down to just being “Cinnamon Toast Crunch Shrimp Guy” or “Danielle Fishel’s husband.” Oh yeah, that’s right: He’s also married to Boy Meets World‘s Topanga. I guess you could say he’s the real winner here.

Check out the reactions to “Hot Karl”‘s unlikely comeback above.

Netflix can’t stop and won’t stop giving us plenty of bingewatching opportunities as the pandemic keeps rolling through spring. For sure, this month’s selections form a batch of highly varied entertainment, and there’s likely no way that you can (or even will be crazy enough to try) absorb all of the films and TV shows that will be newly up for grabs in April. No one knows for sure how Netflix continues to pack itself full of fresh offerings without the coffers running dry, but sometimes, a little mystery can be better than learning the true process. Enjoy!

Tons of original offerings are on the way, including a film starring Idris Elba in a cowboy hat, and a highly anticipated fantasy series based upon bestselling novels. Then there’s a fascinating, high-dollar art heist to explore, and Sir David Attenborough continues to have a work ethic that’s somehow greater than all of us combined. How’s he still pulling those globetrotting feats at age 94? He and Betty White must know something. With that said, the sum of offerings look stoo good to be believed.

Here’s everything coming to (and leaving) Netflix in April.

Concrete Cowboy (Netflix film streaming 4/2)

Idris Elba in a cowboy hat should be enough of an attraction here, but assuming that you want to know about the all-important plot, here we go. A troubled teen (Caleb McLaughlin) spends the summer in North Philadelphia, where he’s torn between diving into a life or crime or embracing the urban-cowboy subculture that’s embodied by his estranged dad (Elba). The story’s based upon Ghetto Cowboy, the novel by G.Neri, and the film co-stars Jharrel Jerome, Byron Bowers, Lorraine Toussaint, and Clifford “Method Man” Smith.

Shadow And Bone (Netflix series streaming 4/23)

Need a little fantasy to shut down reality for awhile? You’re in luck. Based upon Leigh Bardugo’s bestselling Grishaverse novels, this show follows dark forces that move against an orphan mapmaker (Alina Starkov), whose power might be the key to transforming a war-torn world. Can Alina set her people free? She must conquer the Shadow Fold threat and train as an elite magical soldier (a Grisha) while learning that nothing is it seems, and she must also maneuver around a crew of charismatic criminals to determine who is an ally, who is an enemy, and who is both.

This Is A Robbery: The World’s Biggest Art Heist (Netflix documentary series streaming 4/7)

This docuseries goes big while digging into a $500 million stash of missing art and a $10 million reward for the lucky person who finds it. The mystery sources back 30 freaking years after two thieves pulled off the greatest art heist in history in 1990 Boston, and investigators are now tracking the cold case in an attempt to uncover legendary works by Rembrandt, Vermeer, and more. Get ready for dead ends and lucky breaks aplenty.

Life in Color with David Attenborough (Netflix documentary series streaming 4/22)

Earth Day needed this three-part series, and so does your soul. Or at least, I’m assuming that your soul will be soothed while watching Sir David Attenborough traveling from Costa Rica’s rainforests to Scottish Highlands’ snow-covered landscape to show the world how animals make extraordinary use of color. The show promises “revolutionary camera technology created specifically for this series” (according to Netflix) to reveal, uh, invisible-to-us colors? It sounds utterly fascinating, especially the details about a butterfly wing sending “seemingly magical ultraviolet signals” and the revelation of what a Bengal tiger’s stripes truly signal.

Here’s the full list of titles coming to Netflix in April:

Avail. 4/1
2012
Cop Out
Friends with Benefits
Insidious
Legally Blonde
Leprechaun
Magical Andes: Season 2
The Pianist
The Possession
Prank Encounters: Season 2
Secrets of Great British Castles: Season 1
Tersanjung the Movie
The Time Traveler’s Wife
Tyler Perry’s Madea’s Big Happy Family
White Boy
Worn Stories
Yes Man

Avail. 4/2
Concrete Cowboy
Just Say Yes
Madame Claude
The Serpent
Sky High

Avail. 4/3
Escape from Planet Earth

Avail. 4/4
What Lies Below

Avail. 4/5
Coded Bias
Family Reunion: Part 3

Avail. 4/6
The Last Kids on Earth: Happy Apocalypse to You

Avail. 4/7
The Big Day: Collection 2
Dolly Parton: A MusiCares Tribute
Snabba Cash
This Is A Robbery: The World’s Biggest Art Heist
The Wedding Coach

Avail. 4/8
The Way of the Househusband

Avail. 4/9
Have You Ever Seen Fireflies?
Night in Paradise
Thunder Force

Avail. 4/10
The Stand-In

Avail. 4/11
Diana: The Interview that Shook the World

Avail. 4/12
New Gods: Nezha Reborn
Nicky, Ricky, Dicky & Dawn: Seasons 1-4

Avail. 4/13
The Baker and the Beauty: Season 1
Mighty Express: Season 3
My Love: Six Stories of True Love

Avail. 4/14
Dad Stop Embarrassing Me!
The Circle: Season 2
Law School
The Soul
Why Did You Kill Me?

Avail. 4/15
Dark City Beneath the Beat
The Master
Ride or Die

Avail. 4/16
Arlo the Alligator Boy
Ajeeb Daastaans
Crimson Peak
Fast & Furious Spy Racers: Season 4: Mexico
Into the Beat
Rush
Synchronic
Why Are You Like This
The Zookeeper’s Wife

Avail. 4/18
Luis Miguel – The Series: Season 2

Avail. 4/19
Miss Sloane
PJ Masks: Season 3

Avail. 4/20
Izzy’s Koala World: Season 2

Avail. 4/21
Zero

Avail. 4/22
Life in Color with David Attenborough
Stowaway

Avail. 4/23
Heroes: Silence and Rock & Roll
Shadow and Bone
Tell Me When

Avail. 4/27
August: Osage County
Battle of Los Angeles
Fatma
Go! Go! Cory Carson: Season 4

Avail. 4/28
Sexify
Headspace Guide to Sleep

Avail. 4/29
Things Heard & Seen
Yasuke

Avail. 4/30
The Innocent
The Mitchells vs. The Machines
Pet Stars
The Unremarkable Juanquini: Season 2

TBA
The Disciple
Searching For Sheela

Here’s the full list of titles leaving Netflix in April:

Leaving 4/2
Honey: Rise Up and Dance

Leaving 4/4
Backfire

Leaving 4/11
Time Trap

Leaving 4/12
Married at First Sight: Season 9
Surviving R. Kelly Part II: The Reckoning: Season 1

Leaving 4/13
Antidote

Leaving 4/14
Eddie Murphy: Delirious
The New Romantic
Once Upon a Time in London
Thor: Tales of Asgard

Leaving 4/15
Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant

Leaving 4/19
Carol
The Vatican Tapes

Leaving 4/20
The Last Resort

Leaving 4/21
The Great British Baking Show: Masterclass: Seasons 1-3

Leaving 4/22
Liv and Maddie: Seasons 1-4

Leaving 4/23
Mirror Mirror

Leaving 4/24
Django Unchained

Leaving 4/26
The Sapphires

Leaving 4/27
The Car
Doom

Leaving 4/28
Paul Blart: Mall Cop

Leaving 4/30
17 Again
Blackfish
Can’t Hardly Wait
Den of Thieves
How to Be a Latin Lover
I Am Legend
Jumping the Broom
Kingdom: Seasons 1-3
Knock Knock
Palm Trees in the Snow
Platoon
Runaway Bride
Snowpiercer
The Green Hornet
The Indian in the Cupboard
Waiting

Much of the intrigue surrounding the Toronto Raptors as we approach Thursday’s trade deadline involves the future of Kyle Lowry, as the best player in franchise history is rumored to have piqued the interest of the Miami Heat and the Philadelphia 76ers. He isn’t the only Raptors player who has drawn plenty of interest, as a recent report by Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN indicates there is a huge market trying to acquire the services of one of his teammates.

According to Woj, Norman Powell isn’t just drawing interest, nearly half the league is doing its due diligence on the high-scoring wing, with “a dozen or so” teams trying to bring him on board.

“The Raptors have a host of ways to go with a Powell trade — a number of combinations of young players, draft picks and expiring contracts — that’ll give Toronto optionality,” Wojnarowski wrote.

Powell is a sensible trade target in a few ways. The big one is his contract, as the soon-to-be 28-year-old has a player option for $11.6 million in 2021-22 that Woj reports he’s expected to decline. For teams that could use a scoring punch ahead of this year’s playoff push, Powell can absolutely bring that, as he’s averaging a career-high 19.5 points per game while connecting on 49.5 percent of his shots from the field and 43.4 percent of his threes.

Justin Bieber has openly discussed his deeply religious background and this week, he put his beliefs into action. Following the release of his anticipated album Justice Friday, which examines his religious roots, the singer returned from vacation and immediately got to work spreading the word of God.

Bieber rolled up to California State Prison of LA County in his prized RV trailer early this week, according to a report from TMZ. His goal was to preach Christianity to inmates there. Apparently, the warden of the state prison signed off on a brief visit for Bieber and his pastor, who was there to support faith-based programs at the jailhouse. The report states that it’s unclear exactly what Bieber’s plans were for the day, but he may have read the gospel or lead a choir in song. Thankfully, COVID-safe protocols were reportedly followed “to a T” during his visit.

Not only did Bieber’s Justice album touch on themes of Christianity, but it also attempts to discuss social justice issues. His way of doing so was to include quotes by Martin Luther King, Jr, which felt disjointed and received some backlash from listeners. Bieber claimed that his goal was to simply “amplify Martin Luther King Jr.’s voice to this generation” and while many didn’t think the intention was clear, MLK’s estate had actually signed off on the samples.

Justice is out now via Def Jam. Get it here.

Earlier this month, Arizona rapper Baby Keem shared his first new single of 2021, “No Sense,” after a relatively quiet 2020 that saw the release of just two singles despite Keem’s appearance on the 2020 XXL Freshman cover. Today, he shared the apocalyptic video for the new track, which was produced by Kendrick Lamar’s pgLang, naturally.

The video finds Keem staring out the window of an apartment in a large apartment building complex, watching what appears to be masses of people congregating in the courtyard below. Inside the apartment, he seems to see a group of women sitting around a table exchanging little white packages, while outside, one of the buildings collapses for seemingly no reason.

Keem finally decides to leave the apartment, running to the parking garage and commandeering a car, but at the end of the video, he takes a curve in the exit corkscrew a little too quickly in his haste to escape and the car careens off the building before a smash-cut to black. If anyone wants to take a guess at what any of this means, they’re welcome to, because the video leaves a lot open to interpretation.

With “No Sense,” the total of videos he’s released since 2019’s “Orange Soda” blew up comes to three, including “Moshpit” and “Hooligan.” It seems clear that Keem is willing to take his time in releasing a full-length project and judging from the growing stream counts, his fans are more than willing to eagerly consume each long-awaited release.

Watch Baby Keem’s “No Sense” video.

It’s been years since The Antlers released a new album, and now listeners don’t have to wait much longer for their next one, as Green To Gold is set for release this week. Fans who don’t mind leaving the confines of their streaming platform of choice, however, can actually listen to the full album right now, as the band has premiered it early in full via a film on their website.

The band wrote of the film, “So humbled to work with such ridiculously talented people on this project— directors Derrick Belcham & Emily Terndrup, and featured performers Bobbi-Jene Smith, Dea & Or Schraiber. They’ve created a deeply moving story here, one that parallels that of the album, but told in their own language of movement and light. I can think of no better way to reveal Green to Gold than through their vision.”

Peter Silberman previously said of the album, “I set out to make Sunday morning music. […] Most of the songs on Green To Gold are culled from conversations with my friends and my partner. It’s less ambiguous about who’s speaking and who’s listening. I think the shift in tone is the result of getting older. It doesn’t make sense for me to try to tap into the same energy that I did ten or fifteen years ago, because I continue to grow as a person, as I’m sure our audience does too. Green To Gold is about this idea of gradual change. People changing over time, struggling to accept change in those they love, and struggling to change themselves. And yet despite all our difficulty with this, nature somehow makes it look easy.”

Watch the film here and check out our recent Indie Mixtape 20 Q&A with Silberman here.

Green To Gold is out 3/26 on Anti-. Pre-order it here.

Cult hit Scott Pilgrim vs. the World came out 10 years ago last year, but due to the pandemic, celebrating the anniversary in a theater (the way it should be seen) proved impossible. But now that things are gradually, cautiously, ever-so-slowly returning to normal (99 percent of AMC theaters will be open by the end of the month), it’s time to —

WE ARE SEX-BOB-OMB 1 2 3 4.

A never-before-seen version of Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is being released in select Dolby Cinema theaters for one week beginning April 30. “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World was designed for the big screen and for the best sound systems,” co-writer and director Edgar Wright said. “To be able to see it with the best specs is obviously any filmmaker’s dream. You want people to see it as good as it could possibly be. I suspect that if you’re a fan of the movie, you’re going to get such a kick out of seeing it like this.” It also will tide over fans of Wright’s work until his new film, Last Night in Soho, is released in October.

The stacked cast for the third best comic book movie of the 2010s includes Michael Cera, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Kieran Culkin, Chris Evans, Anna Kendrick, Brie Larson, Ellen Wong, Jason Schwartzman, Aubrey Plaza, Brandon Routh, Alison Pill, and Mae Whitman. For ticket information, head here.

If a new report is correct, there might be more extremely devoted Snyder Cut fans out there than anyone realized. According to Samba TV, 1.8 million HBO Max subscribers stayed up late to watch Zack Snyder’s Justice League as soon as it hit the streaming platform. The third party pollster, whose information comes from terrestrial smart TV users and is not official data from HBO Max, based its numbers on any subscriber who fired up the Snyder Cut within the first five minutes of its release. Given that the film started streaming at 3 AM EST/12 AM PST on March 18, it’s no surprise that the numbers skew heavily towards the West Coast. Via Deadline:

Samba TV showed that the diversity breakdown for Snyder Cut households were Black (+17%), Hispanic (+20%), and Asian (+18%) demos which over-indexed. Of the 25 largest markets, the most over-indexing were San Francisco (+67%), Sacramento (+33%), and Los Angeles (+32%).

Of course, there’s a chance the number of Snyder Cut viewers could be even larger than Samba TV reported, given its polling methods, but it also doesn’t tell the whole picture as many of those users could’ve started the film, only to bail minutes later. However, Samba TV is making a bold claim that the Snyder Cut actually outperformed The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, but not by much. The Disney+ show reportedly brought in 1.7 million viewers during its debut, which is pretty darn close to the Snyder Cut’s 1.8 million. But, again, these aren’t official numbers.

That said, Samba’s data did support Marvel’s claim that The Falcon and the Winter Soldier had the most watched premiere of any Disney+ series to date, which now puts The Mandalorian Season 2 premiere and WandaVision in second and third place, respectively.

(Via Deadline)