Category: News

For weeks, P.J. Tucker’s future has been up in the air. The Houston Rockets are embracing a youth movement in the post-James Harden era, and Tucker, who is an unrestricted free agent after this season, wants to play for a team that can satiate his desire to win a championship for the first time in his career.

Basically every good team has been linked to him in recent weeks, and on Wednesday night, we finally got resolution to this entire saga. According to Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN, the Rockets and the Milwaukee Bucks came to terms on a deal that will send Tucker to the Eastern Conference, while a collection of other players and picks will also be moved in the deal.

In a subsequent move, the Bucks sent Torrey Craig to the Phoenix Suns.

It is worth mentioning that Tucker has not been particularly good this season — he’s averaging 4.4 points and 4.6 rebounds in 30 minutes a night while connecting on 31.4 percent of his threes — but he also hasn’t exactly been in a situation conducive to success. Plus, Tucker’s value has always come in the postseason, where his defensive versatility and ability to his threes has been coveted.

If Tucker is capable of being that, this move is a boost for the Bucks’ frontcourt. If not, well, their fortunes to win a championship will still be ultra-reliant on Giannis Antetokounmpo, but Tucker should at least be able to provide some defensive solidity once the playoffs roll around.

In another, better timeline, Black Widow would have come out last May. Instead the next Marvel movie is due in theaters this May, being one of many blockbusters that decided to wait out the pandemic, to see if humanity finally got a handle on a once-in-a-century catastrophe. Jump a whole year and, alas, even its current May 7 due date is being optimistic. Disney honcho Bob Chapek knows it, too, and when asked whether the long-delayed solo vehicle for Scarlett Johansson’s Natasha Romanoff would be getting an exclusive theatrical run, his answer was refreshingly honest — which is to say he doesn’t know.

Chapek appeared on Bloomberg Television, interviewed in front of Disneyland in California, which recently set a limited capacity reopening for late April. When asked about Black Widow, he noted that everything, now, still, even with the increasing vaccine rollout, is in flux.

“Our situation and our conditions change,” Chapek said. “Just a few weeks ago, theaters in New York and Los Angeles weren’t even open. Now, all of a sudden they’re open, so we’re waiting to see how prospective theatergoers respond to these reopenings. We’re going to remain flexible. We’ll make the call probably at the last minute in terms of how these films come to market, whether it’s Black Widow or any other title.”

Marvel, of course, is owned by Disney, and the company has either made their big films available free with a Disney+ subscription (Onward, Soul) or in theaters and PVOD simultaneously (Raya and the Last Dragon). So Black Widow could wind up dropped in multiplexes, to socially distancing crowds, and for $30 over their streamer.

Movie theaters in New York City opened two Fridays ago, while Los Angeles ones opened earlier this week — both having been shuttered since mid-March of last year. While movie theater attendance has since skyrocketed, it’s still nowhere near what it was pre-pandemic — in part because the pandemic is still very much in full swing. And even though vaccines are being more distributed than ever, only a small portion of the country is fully vaccinated, and anxieties about contracting or spreading COVID-19 remain.

So will people feel comfortable enough in less than two months to go see the first new Marvel movie in almost two years? (The last one, Spider-Man: Far from Home, came out in July of 2019.) Like Chapek, we’ll just have to wait and see. But for now, Black Widow is due in theaters on May 7.

(Via Deadline)

The first time one of my kids had a panic attack, I didn’t have any idea what to do. The pounding heartbeat, racing thoughts, shortness of breath, and feeling like you’re losing control are disconcerting symptoms for adults to experience, but they’re even more alarming for a child who doesn’t know why it’s happening. As a parent, it’s scary not knowing how to help your child when they clearly need help.

The exact cause of panic disorder is unknown, but experts estimate it affects close to 4 percent of the population. Like other anxiety disorders, it also tends to run in families, which appears to be the case for my kiddos. But even people who don’t have a full-fledged disorder can occasionally experience a panic attack, and it’s good to know what actually helps.

My youngest was around six years old when he had his first bout of panic. It wasn’t long after we’d tucked him into bed when he called for me with a shaky urgency in his voice. When I got to his room, he said he couldn’t breathe and that his heart was going really fast. “I don’t know what’s going on,” he said through chattering teeth. “My whole body won’t stop shaking and I’m freaking out.”

I immediately recognized the signs of panic, having gone through it with his older sister, but he was a lot younger than she had been when she had her first episode. Thankfully, the tools we used with her also worked with him.

Here’s how we help our kids through a panic attack:

1) Verbalize what’s happening to them.

Panic attacks are intense for the person experiencing them and saying something like “Calm down” isn’t really helpful. They want to calm down, they just can’t.

For our kids, explaining exactly what’s happening, what they can expect to happen, and what they actually can control is the first step toward regaining calm. After the first time through it, they don’t need this much detail, but here’s a basic script of where we started:

“You’re okay, even though it doesn’t feel like it. You’re just having a panic attack. The fear part of your brain is sort of stuck for a bit, and it keeps revving up your body. It’s like your brain thinks there’s a tiger chasing you, even though there isn’t. That makes your heart beat really fast and makes it hard to breathe. You might feel like you’re losing control. You might even feel like you’re going crazy. But it’ll pass soon, I promise. Panic attacks are just temporary glitches. Your brain and body will calm back own, usually within ten minutes or so. Let’s work on helping you feel better while it works its way out of your system.”

2) Use “box breathing” to help them catch their breath.

Breathing intentionally is one of the quickest ways to reset when your body is in a heightened state. The best technique we’ve encountered for this is an exercise called “box breathing” or “square breathing.” It’s actually a tool Navy Seals use to keep calm under stress, but it’s so simple even kids can use it.

Slowly draw the shape of a square in the air, starting from the bottom left-hand corner. As you draw the first line upward, have your child breathe in for a count of five. Then have them hold their breath while you draw the top line, then exhale while you draw down the right side. Finally, have them hold the exhale while completing the square with the bottom line. Then repeat—breathe in, hold, breath out, hold. Around four or five seconds for each breath and hold wonders for getting breathing under control, which helps calm the brain and body.

Here’s a quick video that shows how it works. (With our kids, I usually draw the box for them while talking them through the breaths and holds at first, then have them start drawing the box with me as they start to calm down.)

Box breathing relaxation technique: how to calm feelings of stress or anxiety

youtu.be

3) Ground them in reality with the “4-3-2-1” exercise.

Panic is the brain gripped by a state of fear that doesn’t reflect what’s actually happening. It’s basically the amygdala—the fight or flight center of the brain—wigging out for no apparent reason. The intense fear triggers the fight or flight response, forming a sort of feedback loop, with the body freaking out because the brain’s freaking out, which makes the body freak out, and so on.

Getting the brain to focus on the body’s physical senses can help break that loop and bring the body and brain back to a state of calm (or at least calmer). For this, we use a simple grounding exercise we call “4-3-2-1.”

Have the child look for and then name, out loud:

– Four things they can see. (“I see my lamp. I see the cat. I see the window. I see my teddy bear.”).

– Three things they can feel. (“I feel my pillow. I feel your hand. I feel the sheets.”)

– Two things they can hear. (“I hear cars outside. I hear the heater running.”)

– One thing they can smell. (“I smell your lotion.”)

I always have the kids say a full sentence for each thing they count, as that reinforces the physical aspect of the exercise. Without fail, my kiddos are always calmer when they get to what they can smell. Super simple, but super effective.

It’s important to note that these exercises don’t stop an attack in its tracks. Panic usually just has to run its course. What they do is take the edge off, make the attack more tolerable, and help the kiddo wait it out without feeling like they have no control at all while it’s happening.

Panic attacks and anxiety attacks (which share similar symptoms and can respond to the same tools) aren’t fun for kids or for parents. But when a kid knows what’s happening and a parent has tools to help them manage it, they’re a lot less scary for everyone involved.

The NCAA Tournament kicks off on Thursday evening when the First Four games tip off, followed by the usual March Madness craziness we have come to expect during this time of year over the next four days. Before things tip off, though, a number of college athletes, many of whom will participate in the upcoming bubble-type environment in Indiana, decided to speak out about the way the NCAA operates.

At the forefront of the discourse was standout Rutgers guard Geo Baker, who got this ball rolling on Tuesday in an interaction with Jon Rothstein of CBS and in a follow-up tweet. One day later and he created a hashtag, #NotNCAAProperty, to excoriate the organization for how it keeps a vice grip on players being able to profit off of their likeness.

Baker ended up boosting messages from a number of other college basketball players, while plenty of current and former collegiate athletes hopped on board with this message.

A pair of ESPN college basketball personalities, Dick Vitale and Jay Bilas, endorsed the message from these athletes — the former tweeted out a story about the hashtag, while Bilas created a video trying to address one of the misconceptions around compensating athletes.

Earlier this year, a bill introduced by Sen. Chris Murphy and Rep. Lori Trahan sought to remove any restrictions on name, image, and likeness that the NCAA could put on a college athlete. In a statement to ESPN, Trahan, a former college athlete during her time as a volleyball player at Georgetown, said, “I’m all too familiar with the NCAA’s business model that for decades has utilized the guise of amateurism to justify obscene profitability while student athletes have struggled to get by.”

There’s a ton of content on Netflix — so much that people can find themselves spending more time scrolling and scrolling and scrolling through their menu than they do actually watching something. Netflix itself has tried to find ways to help indecisive customer; for some there’s actually a shuffle option, which gives you a random option based on your viewing history. But one user found a way to narrow it all down, providing what you really want to watch is some grisly true crime.

As The Mirror, a TikTok user named Laura Lindsay made video in which she shared a lifehack in which you can whittle it down to only their many, many true crime documentary series. All you do is go up to the search function and instead of typing in a title, type in four letters: 9875. Voilá! Nothing but Tiger King, Making a Murderer, The Staircase, etc., etc., etc.

Of course, then you have to figure out which gruesome, nightmarish show you want to spend your evening with. But concentrated scrolling is better than aimless scrolling.

You can thank Lindsay later, though you can also thank The Mirror, who went next level, supplying similar numerical codes to all manner of genres. So if you’re not a true crime nut but are such specific sub-genres as “Dramas based on books,” “Dutch movies” or “Zombie Horror Movies,” then you’re in luck:

Action & Adventure: 1365
Action Comedies: 43040
Action Sci-Fi & Fantasy: 1568
Action Thrillers: 43048
Adult Animation: 11881
Adventures: 7442
African Movies: 3761
Alien Sci-Fi: 3327
Animal Tales: 5507
Anime: 7424
Anime Action: 2653
Anime Comedies: 9302
Anime Dramas: 452
Anime Fantasy: 11146
Anime Features: 3063
Anime Horror: 10695
Anime Sci-Fi: 2729
Anime Series: 6721
Art House Movies: 29764
Asian Action Movies: 77232
Australian Movies: 5230
B-Horror Movies: 8195
Baseball Movies: 12339
Basketball Movies: 12762
Belgian Movies: 262
Biographical Docs: 3652
Biographical Dramas: 3179
Boxing Movies: 12443
British Movies: 10757
British TV Shows: 52117
Camp Movies: 1252
Children & Family Movies: 783
Chinese Movies: 3960
Classic Action & Adventure: 46576
Classic Comedies: 31694
Classic Dramas: 29809
Classic Movies: 31574
Classic Musicals: 32392
Classic Romantic Movies: 31273
Classic Sci-Fi & Fantasy: 47147
Classic Thrillers: 46588
Classic TV Shows: 46553
Classic War Movies: 48744
Classic Westerns: 47465
Comedies: 6548
Comic Book and Superhero: 10118
Country & Western/Folk: 1105
Courtroom Dramas: 2748
Creature Features: 6895
Crime Action & Adventure: 9584
Crime Documentaries: 9875
Crime Dramas: 6889
Crime Thrillers: 10499
Crime TV Shows: 26146
Cult Comedies: 9434
Cult Horror Movies: 10944
Cult Movies: 7627
Cult Sci-Fi & Fantasy: 4734
Cult TV Shows: 74652
Dark Comedies: 869
Deep Sea Horror Movies: 45028
Disney: 67673
Disney Musicals: 59433
Documentaries: 6839
Dramas: 5763
Dramas based on Books: 4961
Dramas based on real life: 3653
Dutch Movies: 10606
Eastern European Movies: 5254
Education for Kids: 10659
Epics: 52858
Experimental Movies: 11079
Faith & Spirituality: 26835
Faith & Spirituality Movies: 52804
Family Features: 51056
Fantasy Movies: 9744
Film Noir: 7687
Food & Travel TV: 72436
Football Movies: 12803
French Movies: 58807
Gangster Movies: 31851
LGBTQ Dramas: 500
German Movies: 58886
Greek Movies: 61115
Historical Documentaries: 5349
Horror Comedy: 89585
Horror Movies: 8711
Independent Action & Adventure: 11804
Independent Comedies: 4195
Independent Dramas: 384
Independent Movies: 7077
Independent Thrillers: 3269
Indian Movies: 10463
Irish Movies: 58750
Italian Movies: 8221
Japanese Movies: 10398
Jazz & Easy Listening: 10271
Kids Faith & Spirituality: 751423
Kids Music: 52843
Kids’ TV: 27346
Korean Movies: 5685
Korean TV Shows: 67879
Late Night Comedies: 1402
Latin American Movies: 1613
Latin Music: 10741
Martial Arts Movies: 8985
Martial Arts, Boxing & Wrestling: 6695
Middle Eastern Movies: 5875
Military Action & Adventure: 2125
Military Documentaries: 4006
Military Dramas: 11
Military TV Shows: 25804
Miniseries: 4814
Mockumentaries: 26
Monster Movies: 947
Movies based on children’s books: 10056
Movies for ages 0 to 2: 6796
Movies for ages 2 to 4: 6218
Movies for ages 5 to 7: 5455
Movies for ages 8 to 10: 561
Movies for ages 11 to 12: 6962
Music & Concert Documentaries: 90361
Music: 1701
Musicals: 13335
Mysteries: 9994
New Zealand Movies: 63782
Period Pieces: 12123
Political Comedies: 2700
Political Documentaries: 7018
Political Dramas: 6616
Political Thrillers: 10504
Psychological Thrillers: 5505
Quirky Romance: 36103
Reality TV: 9833
Religious Documentaries: 10005
Rock & Pop Concerts: 3278
Romantic Comedies: 5475
Romantic Dramas: 1255
Romantic Favorites: 50267
Romantic Independent Movies: 9916
Romantic Movies: 8883
Russian: 11567
Satanic Stories: 6998
Satires: 4922
Scandinavian Movies: 9292
Sci-Fi & Fantasy: 1492
Sci-Fi Adventure: 6926
Sci-Fi Dramas: 3916
Sci-Fi Horror Movies: 1694
Sci-Fi Thrillers: 11014
Science & Nature Documentaries: 2595
Science & Nature TV: 52780
Screwball Comedies: 9702
Showbiz Dramas: 5012
Showbiz Musicals: 13573
Silent Movies: 53310
Slapstick Comedies: 10256
Slasher and Serial Killer Movies: 8646
Soccer Movies: 12549
Social & Cultural Documentaries: 3675
Social Issue Dramas: 3947
Southeast Asian Movies: 9196
Spanish Movies: 58741
Spiritual Documentaries: 2760
Sports & Fitness: 9327
Sports Comedies: 5286
Sports Documentaries: 180
Sports Dramas: 7243
Sports Movies: 4370
Spy Action & Adventure: 10702
Spy Thrillers: 9147
Stage Musicals: 55774
Stand-up Comedy: 11559
Steamy Romantic Movies: 35800
Steamy Thrillers: 972
Supernatural Horror Movies: 42023
Supernatural Thrillers: 11140
Tearjerkers: 6384
Teen Comedies: 3519
Teen Dramas: 9299
Teen Screams: 52147
Teen TV Shows: 60951
Thrillers: 8933
Travel & Adventure Documentaries: 1159
TV Action & Adventure: 10673
TV Cartoons: 11177
TV Comedies: 10375
TV Documentaries: 10105
TV Dramas: 11714
TV Horror: 83059
TV Mysteries: 4366
TV Sci-Fi & Fantasy: 1372
TV Shows: 83
Urban & Dance Concerts: 9472
Vampire Horror Movies: 75804
Werewolf Horror Movies: 75930
Westerns: 7700
World Music Concerts: 2856
Zombie Horror Movies: 75405

(Via The Mirror)

Welcome to SNX DLX! This week we’ve got fresh new sneakers from some old friends — yes, we count Nora Vasconcellos, Kanye West, and Pharrell as friends of the series, wouldn’t you? — and some new, thanks to Bad Bunny’s first collaborative sneaker with Adidas. It’s a major step up from the reggaeton star’s Croc collaboration, we can promise you that!

Rounding out the list you’ll find some new looks out of New Balance Japan, a sleek pair of Jordan IIIs with a classic colorway, and the repeatedly postponed Love Letter iteration of the Nike Air Max, which may have come a month late, but… better later than never. If you’re looking for an outfit to complete the fit, be sure to check out last week’s apparel roundup after you scan this week’s best kicks.

Let’s get it!

Bad Bunny x Adidas Forum Low Buckle The First Cafe

Hot on the heels of winning a Grammy for his album YHLQMDLG Bad Bunny is in the midst of a victory lap. In just two days he has received his first Grammy win, and now his first Adidas sneaker collab has dropped, what will the end of the week bring us from the Puerto Rican trap star? Who knows, but it feels like Bad Bunny is about to blast off into the moon!

While BB is no stranger to the footwear game (dude designedsome Crocs because, of course), this is his first sneaker and according to Adidas this is merely the start of a much longer collaboration. The Adidas answer to Nike’s Travis Scott drops? Sounds like it.

Inspired by BB’s morning ritual of drinking a hot cup of coffee, the First Café features a beige, brown, and cream white colorway across a Forum Low silhouette that makes it resemble, well, a cup of coffee. Rounding out the design is a set of brown or blue laces (or both!) and a reinforced buckle that reads Yo Visto Así, which is the name of one of BB’s tracks on 2020s El Último Tour del Mundo and translates to “I dress like this.”

The Bad Bunny x Adidas Forum Low Buckley “The First Cafe” is set to drop on March 17th for a retail price of $160. Pick up a pair via the Adidas confirmed app, select Adidas retailers, the aftermarket and, if you’re in Puerto Rico, Uber Eats.

Nora x Adidas Gazelle ADV

We’re big fans of pro skater Nora Vasconcellos — both for her skills on a deck and the pastel aesthetic she’s been infusing into her sneaker and apparel line with Adidas. The latest piece from the star features a fresh take on the Gazelle silhouette with a white leather upper beside nubuck suede detailing, an exposed foam tongue, and Adidas’ Soft Vision Purple on the sneaker’s throat and three-stripes.

The design is rounded out with original art and words by Vasconcellos along the heel tab and sock liner. It’s simple and clean, another solid effort from Vasconcellos, Adidas best skate shoe collaborator that isn’t Blondey McCoy.

The Nora x Adidas Gazelle is out now for a retail price of $100. Pick up a pair at the Adidas webstore.

Nike WMNS Air Max 90 Love Letter

The WMNS-exclusive Air Max 90 Love Letter has been postponed so many times, they might as well have renamed the sneaker. It’s clear that this release was originally meant for Valentine’s Day weekend, but now… here it is!

Sure the theme doesn’t quite connect anymore. But the Love Letter is still a dope look.

Featuring a white upper with pink suede paneling, the Love Letter utilizes core white, university red, and tulip pink colorways for a solid design that showcases the best the Air Max has to offer.

The Nike WMNS-exclusive Air Max 90 Love letter is set to drop on March 16th for a retail price of $140. Pick up a pair at select Nike retailers and aftermarket sites like GOAT and StockX.

Auralee x New Balance Tokyo Design Studio R_C2

Coming out of New Balance Japan and made in collaboration with premium Japanese clothing label Auralee, the New Balance R_C2 features an elegant upper of muted pink or forest green and is reinforced with GORE-TEX lining for a sneaker that combines that high-quality construction of a New Balance silhouette dressed in Auralee’s muted and elegant aesthetic.

This baby is ultra-clean in both color options, and the whole thing sits atop a slip-resistant outsole. We’re not sure why you’d ever need that, but we felt it was worth mentioning.

The Auralee x New Balance Tokyo Design Studio R_C2 is set to drop on March 19th for a retail price of $260. Pick up at SSENSE.

Pharrell x Adidas PW Triple Black Collection

Pharrell is dropping his largest collection with Adidas yet with the super sleek Triple Black Collection. Consisting of a Hu NMD, Terrex Free Hiker, D.O.N. Issue 2, Crazy BYW, Trailmaker Mid (with GORE-TEX!), and 0 to 60 silhouette, this six sneaker collection features a mix of Adidas classics and new designs made in collaboration with Pharrell.

The entire collection is dropping in a single colorway — Triple Black — and comes accompanied by an apparel collection that also utilizes the famous Adidas colorway. If you ever wondered what Darth Vader’s sneaker closet would look like, this is it!

The Pharrell x Adidas PW Triple Black collection is set to drop on March 19th for a retail range of $110 to $220. Check out the full collection at Adidas.

Adidas Yeezy QNTM Sea Teal

This sneaker straight up looks like a mountain. A snowy chunk of rock you might see looming in the distance along some never-ending road trip. We gotta hand it to Ye, this is probably his best iteration of the Yeezy QNTM, it mixes the futuristic and minimal design with the best of Yeezy’s earth-toned textured uppers. Proof that Ye’s still got the fire.

The Adidas Yeezy QNTM Sea Teal is set to drop on March 19th for a retail price of $250. Pick up a pair at the Adidas webstore or via Yeezy Supply.

Air Jordan III Midnight Navy (Georgetown)

Dressed in the signature colors of the Hoyas (no stranger to Michael Jordan, he crushed the team on his way up to an NCAA national championship) this colorway is another great iteration of one of Nike and Tinker Hatfield’s greatest designs.

Featuring an upper of navy blue tumbled leather which pairs perfectly with the gray-scale elephant print overlays, the Midnight Navy III sports an embroidered navy Jumpman logo over a synthetic leather tongue and matching outsole. A polyurethane midsole keeps this sneaker extra light.

The Air Jordan III Midnight Navy is set to drop on March 20th for a retail price of $190. Pick up a pair at GOAT.

Adidas Yeezy BOOST 350 V2 Ash Pearl

Looking at the newest Yeezy 350 colorway you might think you’ve seen Ash Pearl before, but you haven’t quite seen this mix of throw-up-like earth tones.

This one isn’t a groundbreaking makeup of Yeezy’s most popular shoe, but that’s not what 350 fans expect from the brand. This isn’t just Ye’s most popular sneaker, it’s his most consistent, for better or worse.

The Adidas Yeezy BOOST 350 V2 Ash Peal is set to drop on March 20th for a retail price of $220. Pick up a pair at GOAT.

Eight-year-old Nyima Mitchell was playing with his friends near the water behind his home in Nova Scotia last fall when he made an incredible discovery.

“It was lying under a pine tree,” Nyima said according to Yahoo. “I thought it was just some bottle that washed up here, but then I saw it had the paper in it,” Nyima told CTV. The boy grabbed a pair of pliers to pry the top off the bottle and found a wrinkled and torn letter inside.

He unrolled the letter and saw it was dated August 12, 1995.

The letter was sent by a then-14-year-old girl from Quebec named Nellie Nadeau who wrote the letter while vacationing in the Magdalen Islands that summer. The bottle took 25 years to travel roughly 60 miles through the Gulf of St. Lawrence before it was found by Nyima.

“Dear friend, me and my friends have decided to write someone,” the letter reads.

“I thought, ‘wow, it looks like a teenager wrote this,” Britta Mitchell, Nyima’s mother said. So the two went online to find Nellie and they ran across a description of a 39-year-old doctor in Alaska who loved the outdoors that seemed to fit.

“The description on it, I think it was the hospital website, it said she grew up in Quebec and she was very outdoorsy, and I thought, ‘well, the age is right,” Britta recalled.

Naima mailed her a hand-written letter that reads:

Hello Nellie,

I found a message in a bottle in Chéticamp that was maybe sent by you 25 years ago from the Magdalen Islands. Please let me know.

Nyima Mitchell

After the letter was sent, they never received a response because Nellie’s letter didn’t make it through the post. But eventually, they were able to make contact with each other online.

“She said it gave her the chills for a few days, like it was really something,” Britta said of Nellie’s response. “So now we’re waiting for her next letter. We still didn’t get it, but I think she’s working on it.”

Nellie is still shocked that anyone returned her message at all, let alone someone 25 years in the future.

“You sort of hope when you launch it [that someone will get it], but afterward realize that the probability of it ever making it intact to someone is really low,” she said. “If it did, that person might not even be interested in writing you back.”

The Mitchells say that even though they can contact Nellie through modern technology, they prefer to correspond to their new pen pal through the mail. That way it honors Nellie’s original; intentions back in the summer of ’95.

The newfound friends hope to see each other sometime soon.

“I think we both want to keep it that way,” Britta said. “And she said she actually wants to come the next time she is in Eastern Canada and meet us, so that’s super exciting.”

For the first time in seven years, a new album from The Antlers is set for release this month. Over the last few years, songwriter/vocalist Peter Silberman moved from Brooklyn to upstate New York, worked through a debilitating hearing issue that contributed to a deepening meditation practice, released a solo album, and much more.

Green To Gold takes on a more personal stance than previous efforts from The Antlers — where Silberman is usually writing about human experience through a mythological lens, his new songs are more or less a reflection of the last few years of his life. The album is full of sparse, roomy arrangements that mark a triumphant return from the duo.

To celebrate the new album, Silberman sat down to talk The Beatles, listening to oldies radio, and Home Alone 2, in the latest Indie Mixtape 20 Q&A.

What are four words you would use to describe your music?

The answer really depends on who’s asking. For example, if it’s a TSA agent at the airport, I’d probably say something like “Uh you know, like, mellow, kinda psychedelic, folk stuff” and then they’d suggest someone totally different sounding and I’d be like “Yep, sure.”

It’s 2050 and the world hasn’t ended and people are still listening to your music. How would you like it to be remembered?

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to assume that by 2050, AI will be producing an enormous amount of music, and dominating whatever algorithms determine popularity (this is already beginning to happen). But I hope music made by people occupies a big enough niche that it can continue to thrive, even if it’s thought of as a novelty or a nostalgic throwback. Best case scenario, it’ll be valued for its rare humanity, and I hope our music lives on in that way.

What’s your favorite city in the world to perform?

It’s hard to point to a city where the shows are consistently great. But what comes to mind is any show where the venue is close enough to the ocean as to be able to walk on the beach after soundcheck.

Who’s the person who has most inspired your work, and why?

From the earliest days and most consistently throughout my life, that would be my parents. My mom’s a writer and editor, and my dad taught me to play guitar. So I’m continually talking to them about things I’m working on or projects I’ve just finished.

Where did you eat the best meal of your life?

In recent memory, it was at a Spanish restaurant in Copenhagen in 2019. Of course I don’t remember the name of the spot, but it was a rare luxurious tour meal.

What album do you know every word to?

Probably many, but Abbey Road comes to mind as one example. I listened to so much Beatles as a kid that most of those albums’ lyrics are probably imprinted in me.

What was the best concert you’ve ever attended?

One of the best was certainly seeing Animal Collective play a tiny show at Bennington College to maybe 30 people, when they were touring Sung Tongs in 2005. It was wild… I seem to remember them throwing an amp through a window.

What is the best outfit for performing and why?

I like to keep it really simple – in most cases, a plain dark grey t-shirt. I’ve come to appreciate the ability to pack ten of the same shirt for a tour and not think about it.

Who’s your favorite person to follow on Twitter and/or Instagram?

That’d have to be David Shrigley. If you know his work, then it’s obvious why following him on Instagram is so great.

What’s your most frequently played song in the van on tour?

I always used to put on Yo La Tengo’s “Night Falls On Hoboken” as we would make our return drive back into NYC. It’s calming and very long, and eases you through the transition from the highway back into the city.

What’s the last thing you Googled?

“Convert polyphonic audio to midi.” Based on my search, it doesn’t sound like the technology’s quite there yet. But if anyone out there reading this has a good solution for that, hit me up!

What album makes for the perfect gift?

Emahoy Tsegue-Maryam Guebrou’s Ethiopiques collection. Everyone who knows this album loves it, and I think it’s something nearly anyone can get into.

Where’s the weirdest place you’ve ever crashed while on tour?

Long ago, we had to take an overnight ferry across some channel or sea in Europe. Little did we know it doubled as a party casino boat for bachelorette parties and other
people heading to whatever city to go wild for the weekend. All of that wrapped up earlier than you’d think, and it became somewhat of a ghost ship after midnight, and we wandered around the empty decks til late. It was a weird vibe.

What’s the story behind your first or favorite tattoo?

Not my first, but one of my favorites is an illustration of my childhood home, done by the incredible Annie Lloyd several years ago.

What artists keep you from flipping the channel on the radio?

There’s an oldies station up here that mostly plays doo-wop. Sometimes I know the artist but much of the time I don’t. But in any case, it’s easy to leave on.

What’s the nicest thing anyone has ever done for you?

I mean, my parents bringing me into this world and raising me was pretty generous of them! I don’t think anything could top that.

What’s one piece of advice you’d go back in time to give to your 18-year-old self?

“Try to figure out for yourself who you are before the world has a chance to provide an inaccurate description.”

What’s the last show you went to?

I saw Bonny Light Horseman at Levon Helm Studios outside of Woodstock, about a month before lockdown began. I hadn’t heard their record at the time, so it was all new
to me and I just fell in love with it. They just seemed like such a solid group of players who loved making music together.

What movie can you not resist watching when it’s on TV?

Like a lot of people, I don’t have cable or broadcast TV anymore, so it’s only if I’m visiting my folks that a movie would just appear like that while flipping through channels. I associate that with the holidays, so I’d have to go with Home Alone 2: Lost in New York.

What would you cook if Obama were coming to your house for dinner?

Cooking for Obama would be way too much pressure, I think I’d be too stressed to cook and I’d surely ruin whatever I made. So I’d opt for takeout.

Green To Gold is out March 26 on ANTI-. Pre-order it here.

Operation Varsity Blues: The College Admissions Scandal (Netflix film) — Matthew Modine stars as Rick Singer, the man standing at the center of the enormous storm cloud that rocked the Ivy League world. Once all was said and done, Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman received prison sentences for their participation in an elaborate scheme to get children of wealthy parents into elite colleges, and yes, there’s still plenty of scandal left in this saga to entertain.

Snowfall: Season 4 Premiere (FX, 10:00pm) — The John Singleton-co-created series sees Franklin’s struggling to dance between business and authority while tragedy strikes. Meanwhile Teddy’s bailing out Gustavo as the show continues tearing through the mid 1980s, Reagan-era streets of America, although now, his missteps put Leon in danger. Meanwhile, Teddy’s attempting to avoid fallout from Tijuana, and Irene’s in investigative mode.

Riverdale (CW, 9:00pm) — Cheryl puts a plan in motion that might have unintended consequences, all while Jughead’s distracted, and a big announcement is making everyone evaluate their priorities.

Nancy Drew (CW, 9:00pm) — Nancy just team up with an ally to dispense with a ghost who’s inhabiting George’s bod. Elsewhere, Bess is more surprised than anyone by a blast from the past.

Jimmy Kimmel Live! — Anthony Mackie, Edgar Ramírez

The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon — Desus & Mero, Taylor Kinney, Camilo

The Late Late Show With James Corden — Magic Johnson

Late Night With Seth Meyers — Dr. Anthony Fauci, Diane Von Furstenberg

In case you missed this pick last Wednesday:

South ParQ Vaccination Special (Comedy Central 8:00pm) — Following the success of last year’s The Pandemic Special, creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone are back with the gang, and of course, everyone in South ParQ wants to get this dang vaccine. And that’s great! Well, other than (according to the synopsis) “[a] hilarious new militant group tries to stop the boys from getting their teacher vaccinated.” That group must be QAnon or something like it, and from the looks of the special’s preview, Butters is fully on board with the conspiracy theories.

Last Chance U: Basketball (Netflix series) — The Emmy-winning franchise returns with a gritty look into community college basketball. The players all want to rise to the next level and achieve dreams, but first, those damn personal demons and warring emotions happen on and off thecourt, all while the East Los Angeles College Huskies set their sights upon an unprecedented California state basketball championship.

The Dubliner cocktail is a modern classic. The Manhattan variation was born in the late 90’s New York bar scene, thanks to icon Gary “Gaz” Regan. Regan was a true bon vivant, raconteur, and mixologist. His tome, Joy of Mixology, is a must for any burgeoning mixer (home or professional).

Regan’s assembly of a Dubliner is both simple at heart and inspired in flavor. As with all cocktails that become classics, there are a lot of versions out there. I tend to keep mine fairly close to the original mix of Irish whiskey, sweet vermouth, Grand Marnier, and Orange Bitters, with a green bauble as a garnish. When I learned the drink, though, we always released orange oils over the finished cocktail. To this day, that’s my one ripple when making the drink, as I think it adds that extra x-factor.

As for the difficulty level, this is a pretty easy stirrer. If you can make a Manhattan, you can make this. It’s also a quick cocktail to make. All told, it shouldn’t take more than two minutes from start to finish. Lastly, you can batch these easily (it is St. Patrick’s Day, after all) by simply multiplying the ingredients up and storing the cocktail in a corked bottle or sealed pitcher, ready to be poured, spritzed with orange oils, and garnished.

Let’s get mixing!

Dubliner

Ingredients:

• 2-oz. Irish whiskey
• 0.5-oz. Grand Marnier
• 0.5-oz. sweet vermouth
• 2 dashes Orange Bitters
• Orange Peel
• 1 cherry apple
• Ice

I’m using Jameson Black Barrel because it’s a great cocktail base. The boldness of the oak char can stand up to mixing, and you’re left with hints of vanilla, orchard fruits, and, well, whiskey when using it in this drink. I also like using Redbreast 12, Bushmills Single Malt 10, and Tullamore D.E.W. Single Malt. I’d stay away from the peaty Irish single malts if I were you.

I’m using Carpano Antica vermouth because that’s the bottle I have open in the fridge (always store your vermouth in the fridge once you open it). But by all means, use Martini Rosso if that’s what you have on hand. It’ll be a bit thinner, but it gets the job done.

Let’s talk about orange liqueur for a moment. Yes, you can use triple sec in this recipe. But triple sec, Cointreau, or orange liqueur is not the same Grand Marnier. Triple Sec is an orange liqueur that’s clear. Cointreau is the same, but made in France. Grand Marnier is a blend of Cognac and orange liqueur that’s the color of brandy. So you’re getting both a Cognac-infused orange liqueur in the taste and the color of brandy in the body of the cocktail. You want both effects in this cocktail.

Lastly, I couldn’t find green Maraschino cherries (they were literally out on the store shelf — that’s what I get for going ON St. Patrick’s Day). So, I’m using cherry apples that have been treated like cherries canned in light syrup. They actually add a nice heft to the garnish, a bolder green, and less overly syrupy sweetness of a classic Maraschino. If you can find green Maraschino’s this time of year, use those.

What You’ll Need:

• Cocktail jug
• Strainer
• Pre-chilled coupe or Nick and Nora glass
• Barspoon
• Jigger
• Fruit peeler/pairing knife
• Spear

Method:

• Add the Irish whiskey, Grand Marnier, vermouth, and bitters to the mixing jug.
• Fill with ice and stir until the outside of the jug is frosted over and ice-cold to touch.
• Strain the drink into a waiting, pre-chilled coupe.
• Spritz orange oils from the orange peel over the cocktail. Discard peel.
• Spear a cherry apple and balance on the rim of the glass.
• Serve.

Bottom Line:

This is such a light and refreshing cocktail. It feels very much like spring in a glass with the citrus oils brightening everything up. The whiskey shines through wonderfully with a tinge of botanicals from the vermouth and bitters.

What’s interesting is that the “orange” isn’t overt. It’s more like a subtle nod, similar to the orange you’d find in an orange cake where the orange essence is a single part of a bigger whole of eggs, sugar, flour, vanilla, etc. In this case, that orange is a part of a bigger whole of spice, vanilla, grains, oak, botanicals, and fruit.

Overall, this is a very crushable cocktail to drink straight up (with no ice and in a stemmed glass). It’s full of Irish whiskey vibes, plenty of subtle spice and botanicals, and just the right amount of orange to add a ray of sunshine to everything.

Alternate:

So, sometimes I like my drinks on the rocks and this is a great candidate for that.

I adjust the measures a little by adding 3-oz. Irish whiskey, 1-oz. sweet vermouth, 1-oz. Grand Marnier, and four dashes of Orange Bitters to a mixing jug.

I stir that until very cold. I then strain the cocktail over a waiting rocks glass with four ice cubes. I release the orange oils and drop in a speared cherry apple. Done.

This is a little bolder, overall. The whiskey shines through more clearly with a real sense of the vanilla, oak, and grains at the base. The sweet vermouth creates a velvet body while the orange seems to pop a little less. But that’s okay. The orange is sharp but tastes like an accompaniment to the whiskey, not the star of the show.

If I had to choose, I’d make a batch and probably pour these over the rocks. But that’s just me. Find the way you like it best, and go with that.