Category: Trending

In July, Post Malone and Doja Cat teamed up for a wholesome music video for their song “I Like You (A Happier Song)” from Malone’s recent album Twelve Carat Toothache. The two have shared “I Like You (A Happier Song) (Even More)” today, which captures the behind-the-scenes moments of the video.

The original video started with Malone working on a painting of a woman before eventually disappearing into a puff of dust and re-emerging in a flowery and overgrown field, through which a topless Doja is running. This new video starts with Malone showing off his sketch of a woman while Doja holds an umbrella and laughs. Mostly, it consists of takes of them dancing in the field in front of the cameras, goofing off as both of them are known to do.

One user commented, “The fact that Post and Doja have such a good friendship/chemistry together makes this music video mean so much more. Seeing this behind-the-scenes footage with everyone laughing and smiling on the set is the GREATEST proof of that.” That may be the purpose of this new video — to flaunt the way Malone and Doja are not just awesome collaborators but genuine friends.

Watch “I Like You (A Happier Song) (Even More)” above.

Steve Bannon may have received a pardon from buddy Donald Trump, but that doesn’t protect him from criminal charges lodged against him by an individual state. Which is why Trump’s former chief strategist — or, as Trevor Noah calls him: “what happens when you wait too long to clean out your fridge” — is currently facing charges in New York for ripping off MAGA supporters.

Noah could hardly keep a straight face when reporting on Bannon’s second arrest, which occurred as a result of his alleged siphoning of funds from We Build the Wall, an online fundraising campaign to help build a section of Trump’s proposed border wall. The group, which promised that every cent raised would go directly toward construction, managed to amass a whopping $25 million — part of which, authorities alleged, ended up in Bannon’s unwashed pockets.

But Bannon says he’s not about to go down without a fight — which The Daily Show host finds hilarious. In a statement to CNN, Bannon claimed that he is being unfairly targeted for being “a leading voice on protecting our borders and building a wall to keep our country safe from drugs and violent criminals,” then added that “I am never going to stop fighting. In fact, I have not yet begun to fight. They will have to kill me first.” Which made Noah laugh even harder.

“What a little bitch,” Noah said of Bannon’s tough guy act. “Why don’t you get into a shootout with the cops, huh? ‘They have to kill me first!’ This guy’s acting like a gangster while he’s surrendering to the police. ‘You’ll never take me alive, coppers! Please put the handcuffs on gently, yeah. My wrists are so soft!’”

Even more fascinating to Noah, however, is that Trump supporters keep playing into the hands of Trump and his equally corrupt pals:

Can I just ask: How long are the MAGA crowd going to keep falling for this shit? Trump’s people have been fleecing them for seven straight years and still they’re like, ‘Don Jr. says he needs $2 million to reclaim his throne as the Prince of Nigeria. Let’s give him the money, honey.’

And, by the way, kudos to the prosecutors who even thought to investigate Steve Bannon for stealing millions of dollars. ‘Cause I won’t lie, I would have never suspected this guy. This guy doesn’t look like he has $15. Look at him! Millions of dollars? This guy looks like he sublets from Oscar the Grouch! I wouldn’t have suspected him of having the money.

You can watch the full clip above.

In 2019, Rian Johnson introduced the world to the mind of Detective Blanc, and society was never the same! Knives Out became a box office hit that single-handedly made Star Wars fans forget that they actively disliked Johnson after The Last Jedi hit theaters in 2017.

After the first installment dominated the box office, Netflix decided to shell out over $400 million (!!) for two more Daniel Craig-led mysteries, beginning with Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery. The second whodunit will feature Craig alongside a new cast of quirky characters/suspects that include Edward Norton, Janelle Monáe, Kathryn Hahn, Leslie Odom Jr., Jessica Henwick, Madelyn Cline, Kate Hudson, Ethan Hawke, and Dave Bautista.

Glass Onion will take place in a completely opposite environment than its predecessor, which was set in the northeast. The sequel was shot on a private Greek island, which will be a wonderful backdrop for murder or other shenanigans. Norton portrays tech billionaire Miles Bron who invites some of his friends to a secluded island, where someone ends up dead. Of course, Detective Blanc (and his whimsical southern accent) is the only one who can figure out the whodunit.

“It’s structured around a group of friends, or frenemies, who all have a power dynamic with one of their successful friends,” Johnson told Netflix earlier this year. “It begins with him sending an invitation for them to come and play this murder mystery game at this exotic locale. In The Last of Sheila, it’s on his yacht, and everything ends up going horribly wrong. That is essentially how Glass Onion begins.”

As shown in the slightly chaotic but thrilling new trailer, there are various puzzles, scenic views, and David Bautista keeping a gun in his speedo. All the ingredients for a Christmas classic! Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery will be released in theaters in November 2022, before making its way to Netflix on December 23rd.

Yesterday, Funkmaster Flex debuted Megan Thee Stallion’s “Plan B” remix featuring Lil Kim, and while the song has yet to receive an official release, it’s already causing controversy. After the song premiered on Flex’s show, Instagram troll extraordinaire 50 Cent took the opportunity to goad Kim — with whom he’s had friction in previous years despite Kim giving him an early career boost via her La Bella Mafia hit “Magic Stick” — by stoking the Brooklyn rapper’s long-simmering feud with Nicki Minaj.

“@nickiminaj you better light her ass up I’m watching,” he wrote, accusing Kim of taking shots at Nicki on “Plan B.” “she said something about the baby.” Being who he is, he also couldn’t resist sneaking in his own snide jab. “her baby eye f*cked up.” The line in question opens the verse with a brutal string of uppercuts as she snaps, “N****, you’s a bitch, your father’s a bitch, your brother’s a bitch / Keep acting like this and your son gon’ be a bitch.”

Kim laughed off the accusation, though, commenting, “It’s ok he just doing what bitch n****z do. Now watch what God do to his life.” She then followed up with an explanation on her own Instagram Story, writing, “I never said a word about anyone’s child… please feel free to listen to the song where we were clearly talking about an EX. To try and twist my words to have an excuse to take digs at my child is disgusting. I’m one of the most disrespected legends in the game but what you will not do is come for MY CHILD.”

Then, she flipped 50’s reaction on him with a devastating judo move. “It’s so crazy how a song about bitch ass n****s could touch a bitch ass n****’s soul so deeply that he results to attacking a child,” she wondered. “Oh yeah it’s official to say… I’M THAT BITCH!!!! Okayyyyy 50 you got me! The song was about YOU!!!!” In other words, hit dogs holler.

50 has since deleted his Instagram post. Stay tuned for the official “Plan B” remix release.

With Confess, Fletch still a week away from its release, star Jon Hamm is having hopes of the film franchise finding new life after seemingly getting stuck in development hell. Taking over for Chevy Chase, who last played the title character in 1989’s Fletch Lives, Hamm is very open to the idea of a “Fletch-verse,” should the movie do well with audiences.

Confess, Fletch is a more faithful adaptation of the books written by Gregory McDonald. Should Hamm’s take on the character prove to be a hit, there are 10 more books to choose from each with unique characters primed for spinoffs. However, considering the reboot’s long-winding road to becoming a reality, Hamm is being understandingly cautious about creating a “Fletch-verse.”

“You know, we’re looking at a lot of things,” Hamm told ComicBook. “There’s a lot of potential. I get very nervous about talking about future projects for fear of jinxing it.”

Here’s the official synopsis for Confess, Fletch:

In this delightful comedy romp, Jon Hamm stars as the roguishly charming and endlessly troublesome Fletch, who becomes the prime suspect in a murder case while searching for a stolen art collection. The only way to prove his innocence? Find out which of the long list of suspects is the culprit – from the eccentric art dealer and a missing playboy to a crazy neighbor and Fletch’s Italian girlfriend. Crime, in fact, has never been this disorganized.

Confess, Fletch hits theaters and VOD on September 16.

(Via ComicBook)

The Rundown is a weekly column that highlights some of the biggest, weirdest, and most notable events of the week in entertainment. The number of items could vary, as could the subject matter. It will not always make a ton of sense. Some items might not even be about entertainment, to be honest, or from this week. The important thing is that it’s Friday, and we are here to have some fun.

ITEM NUMBER ONE – Let the celebrities spit on each other

Okay, we are all aware of the spitting, yes? The thing where Harry Styles is alleged to have spit on his co-star Chris Pine during a press event for the massively chaotic upcoming film Don’t Worry Darling, which has been riddled with reports of on-set romances and feuds between its female star (Florence Pugh) and its director (Olivia Wilde), to the degree that every film journalist in Venice is doing high-level body language analysis at every red carpet event to see if they can uncover any addition drama? I hope you are. It’s been just a parade of anarchy for a few weeks now. Nick Kroll is there, too, because he’s also in the movie, which is really funny to me for some reason. Anyway. Chaos.

I won’t post the video of the alleged spitting because it is getting nuked offline with copyright claims as fast as people can put it up, but three things are worth noting here:

• You have probably seen it already or can track it down if you haven’t
• I have watched the video maybe 500 times this week and it is my opinion that there was actually no spitting, even if the thing Chris Pine does with his hands and face in the immediate aftermath is a little suspicious
• This is really just a lot of fun for me

All of it, too. There are not enough massive entertainment stories about famous pop stars spitting on their co-stars on the press tour for indie movies. I have always said this. I will always say this. The whole thing is like the film festival version of the thing where The Rock and Vin Diesel feuded on the set of the Fast & Furious movies so much that The Rock went on Instagram and posted a whole messy message about his “male co-stars” being candy asses. Remember how much fun that was? I do. I will never forget it. It’s up there with “a teen supervillain rappelled into a showroom and stole Guy Fieri’s Lamborghini” on the list of All-Time Brian Stories.

This one isn’t there yet and will probably never get there, although I do reserve the right to alter this position if we get THE MYSTERIOUS SECOND CAMERA ANGLE.

New evidence is now being rumored — in the form of a “mystery woman” who was sitting behind both actors and may have caught the entire exchange on her phone. Now, fans are taking to social media to demand the unknown woman come forward with her “conclusive” footage. According to photos taken at the event, the woman — who is seated two rows behind the “Watermelon Sugar” singer and Pine — was the closest person to the altercation except Wilde, who was looking the other way at the time.

I mean, yeah. We’ve just got everything here. Scandal, superstars, spit, mysterious women with potentially explosive video evidence, all of it. And that’s before we get to my favorite part of it all, which is the thing where publicists and extremely famous people had to wade out into public and issue strongly worded denials about people spitting on each other. Here is Chris Pine’s representative giving a statement to Variety that I like to imagine was tapped out furiously on an iPhone.

“This is a ridiculous story — a complete fabrication and the result of an odd online illusion that is clearly deceiving and allows for foolish speculation,” Pine’s rep said in a statement to Variety. “Just to be clear, Harry Styles did not spit on Chris Pine. There is nothing but respect between these two men and any suggestion otherwise is a blatant attempt to create drama that simply does not exist.”

And here’s Harry Styles himself addressing it at his sold-out concert at Madison Square Garden, which is another nice reminder that the alleged spitter in this scenario, in addition to being the star of a little film festival movie, is also one of the most famous people in the entire world.

“This is our tenth show at Madison Square Garden. It’s wonderful, wonderful, wonderful to be back in New York. I just popped very quickly to Venice to spit on Chris Pine,” Styles says jokingly in video footage captured by fans. “But fret not, we’re back!”

It’s great. I love it. I love every part of it. And the beautiful thing about it all is that it doesn’t even really matter if the spitting was real at this point. If it was, great, then Harry Styles and Chris Pine hated each other so much while making this movie that their disdain spilled over into the press tour with spaced-out stares and actual loogies, which is so messy and funny that it should be documented by historians and in museums.

Or, it’s not real, and these poor dudes have had to spend an entire week answering questions about a spit-related incident that never happened. And Nick Kroll was there. Like, the whole time. I don’t think we can possibly overstate that last part. I like to picture him doing the Coach Steve voice from Big Mouth to try to settle things down on the set.

You can never take this away from me.

ITEM NUMBER TWO – Kathryn Hahn is going to destroy in the new Knives Out movie

This is the first teaser trailer for the second Knives Out movie, which comes out December 23 and is called Glass Onion. There’s not much there by way of substance, I guess, which makes enough sense given the thing where the movie doesn’t come out for over two months and they’re not going to come right out and tell us today who committed the murder and why they did it. That would be kind of funny, though. If they just full-on spoiled the whole Christmas event movie in a 90-second YouTube video they dropped on an 82-degree day in September. I would respect it, if only for the needless chaos of the whole thing. Something to consider for the next one, which I still want to feature Daniel Craig and then just a lot of Muppets.

Anyway, my point here is that the trailer gives us our first look at the cast in action, and one member of that cast is Kathryn Hahn, and Kathryn Hahn is going to absolutely dominate in this sucker. To be clear, I’m not saying her character is going to be a dominating figure. That could be the case. Very few people on earth know that for sure so far. What I mean is that Kathryn Hahn and the sensibilities of the Knives Out universe are a perfect match and I would bet all of my own money and most of yours that she is going to be awesome in this.

That should not be a controversial statement, either. Kathryn Hahn rules in almost everything and has for a while. The rest of the cast is great, too. Dave Bautista is playing an influencer named Duke Cody who packs a firearm in his Speedo and appears to be having a blast. That’s great. But Kathryn Hahn — if she wants to, which she might not because she is a team player — will absolutely eat his lunch in front of him. I’m excited. I was excited already. Now I’m, like, double excited.

The only downside in all of this is that it took them all the way until the second movie to get her into the series. I mean, what are we doing here? That’s some Day One business right there. But we are remedying that now, at least. Better late than never.

ITEM NUMBER THREE – This is art to me

Okay. The Queen of England died this week. You know that. It’s been all over the news. There have been so many tributes, including one from — I promise this is true — Domino’s Pizza. It’s been pretty weird. And that was before The Rock tweeted out this video. It is… it is incredible. One of the most fascinating things I’ve ever seen online. I’m not exaggerating. Please watch it. We have:

• Professional wrestler turned A-list movie star Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson
• Delivering a heartfelt two-minute video message to the royal family of England about the death of the Queen
• Very informally and personal, like he knows them, almost like they’re people who live down the street from him
• From his home gym
• Where he appears to be mid-workout
• In a skin-tight quarter zip Los Angeles Rams shirt
• In front of a massive American flag, which is kind of hilarious from a historical perspective
• With the workout music still blasting

Again, incredible. I’ve watched it twice just now while typing this. I might watch it again when I’m done. Please take some time this weekend and really think about all we’ve seen here. Soak everything in, one of those bullet points at a time. I’m going to stop typing now but please know that I will be thinking about this for days, at minimum. Probably weeks.

ITEM NUMBER FOUR – This makes sense now

Hey, speaking of The Rock and a borderline maniacal commitment to physical fitness, his Baywatch co-star, Zac Efron did an interview with Men’s Health this week where he talked about how getting insanely shredded for that movie actually kind of sucked a lot. Good for him. Good for Zac Efron, being honest about that stuff. Look at him ripping back the curtain with his still plenty shredded arms.

“That Baywatch look, I don’t know if that’s really attainable,” he says. “There’s just too little water in the skin. Like, it’s fake; it looks CGI’d,” he says. “And that required Lasix, powerful diuretics, to achieve. So I don’t need to do that. I much prefer to have an extra, you know, 2 to 3% body fat.”

I had never thought or even considered this next thing I am going to type until this very moment: It would make me really happy if Zac Efron got a little fat for a year or two. Not, like, super unhealthy or anything. And I’m not saying this out of jealousy. I like Zac Efron. He is so good in the Neighbors movies. But he’s been doing this for so long and there’s so much pressure based on his appearance I think he would like eating some donuts more often than he does.

Donuts are great. Have some donuts, Zac.

Aside from the diuretics—which explains the lack of water in the skin—Efron also stuck to a diet consisting of “organic protein and leafy greens.” And lots of workouts. Like: months and months and months of intense workouts. He now says he was probably overtraining—and losing sleep because of it; workouts started at 4 a.m. some days.

Hmm.

Hmmmmm.

No thank you to any of that.

“I started to develop insomnia, and I fell into a pretty bad depression, for a long time. Something about that experience burned me out. I had a really hard time recentering.”

This last part actually gets me to my point here. Do you guys remember the little eco-travel show Zac Efron made for Netflix a couple years ago? The one where he zipped around the world learning about the environment and saying things like “these turbines are sick” and just having his mind blown every 20 minutes in the most sincere and pure way you can possibly imagine? I hope so. I loved that show. It was legitimately fun and good. And at one point he sat down for a pasta dinner with his co-host and a sweet old woman and he kind of got weirdly emotional about how happy he was to be eating carbs again. Look at his face.

So… yeah. That all suddenly makes a ton of sense now. You’d be emotional about some gnocchi too if you had been waking up at 4 am for months and eating a single leaf and dehydrating yourself on purpose so you wouldn’t look like a schlub next to a dude whose name is literally The Rock. I’m so happy he ate those carbs now, too. Someone make Zac Efron a pan of lasagna. Make me some lasagna, too. Make lasagna for me and Zac Efron. We’ve both earned it. For different reasons.

ITEM NUMBER FIVE – It is pretty cool that Tim Robinson won an Emmy

The creative arts Emmys were last weekend, over Labor Day, which is both a little weird and something I would not mention here if something really cool did not happen during the ceremony. But you knew that. Because you trust me. And because you saw the title of this section. It is cool, though. It’s cool that Tim Robinson won an individual Emmy for acting in I Think You Should Leave. It’s less cool that the show itself lost to Carpool Karaoke, but still. Not the point. Positive vibes only here.

He did a whole interview about the show a few weeks ago over at Vanity Fair, along with his co-creator Zach Kanin. Feel free to read the whole thing if you missed it back then, but I want to focus on one specific part, about the sketch above. After getting into how much he hated the costume and how he gets claustrophobic and riddled with anxiety and kind of has panic attacks under heavy prosthetics like those, we got to this.

How aware were the people in that mall of what was going on?

Robinson: Some people were actors, but they couldn’t hear…they were just going about the day. Because I’m in the suit, I was talking to Gary, but they couldn’t hear Gary. So I think it was probably just confusing for them. Because it wasn’t a prank.

Kanin: It’s just a guy.

Robinson: [Laughs.] Just a guy.

Please imagine you’re in a mall trying to buy back-to-school stuff or something and you come around the corner near the food court and, blammo, there’s Karl Havoc. Think about how you’d react to that without any context. I think I might have screamed in a very non-masculine way. I feel no shame in admitting this. And when my friends brought it up months later to roast me about it, I could now counter with “yeah, but that dude won an Emmy for that!”

Enough to make it all worth it. Kind of. But good for Tim!

ITEM NUMBER SIX – WHY WASN’T THIS A TV SHOW??????

I will be quick about this only because my blood is boiling and stewing all my internal organs and I need to move on for my own health but… how… how did Redman — very famous rapper and goofball and star of How High — go on dozens of skydives and study for and pass an actual skydiving exam… in 2022… without one of the many streaming services out there throwing money and cameras at him to document it all?

How did this one slip through everyone’s fingers? I’m asking honestly now. I want to know, in part because, again, I’m very angry and want names and the heads of the people who have those names, but also because I want us to correct whatever went wrong here so it never happens again.

Why do I not have 10 episodes of a Redman skydiving show at my fingertips right now?

Just unacceptable on every level. Do better.

READER MAIL

If you have questions about television, movies, food, local news, weather, or whatever you want, shoot them to me on Twitter or at [email protected] (put “RUNDOWN” in the subject line). I am the first writer to ever answer reader mail in a column. Do not look up this last part.

From Josiah on Twitter:

This is just really terrific work by everyone. George RR Martin for littering his violent dragon books with character names from Sesame Street, Josiah for correctly identifying that I would adore this piece of information, and me for posting it here as fast as I could. We are all doing great.

I hope one of the dragons is named Big Bird. I might start calling one that anyway now. They have wings and they fly and they are big. It works. Shut up. Let me have this one.

AND NOW, THE NEWS

To Milan!

A drug-sniffing dog led frontier police Friday at a Milan airport to some 13 kilograms (nearly 30 pounds) of cocaine stuffed into the leather upholstery of a motorized wheelchair, whose user immediately stood up and was arrested, authorities said.

Okay, I need to be clear about two things here before we go any further:

• This was not me
• I have not been faking my spinal cord injury for over a decade so I can smuggle cocaine inside my power wheelchair

Moving on.

When a dog drew officers’ attention to the traveler, police first checked his luggage, which yielded nothing, then slashed the wheelchair’s upholstery, discovering the cocaine.

I will say, against my better judgment, that this is kind of genius. People do not question me about anything, usually. I joke all the time that I could straight up steal stuff if I wanted and people probably would not stop me. Sometimes, when I’m leaving a store, my wheelchair will set off the little alarms by the door — this just happened in the mall last week, there was a lot of buzzing and beeping — and the people in the store will apologize to me about it from behind the counter instead of checking to see if I’m trying to sneak out with hundreds of dollars worth of merchandise.

So there’s that.

But don’t do it.

If only so people do not start hassling me.

I’m very busy.

Police said that when the cocaine was found, the chair user — a Spaniard who had requested airport personnel to help guide the wheelchair — got up, walked without assistance and was taken into custody.

Also, do not fake a disability for personal gain, in general. I probably should have led with that.

Police said the 11 packets of cocaine, weighing a total of 13.35 kilograms (nearly 30 pounds) could have yielded some 27,000 individual doses of the drug and had a street sale value of some 1.4 million euros (dollars).

To recap:

• This is diabolical
• Do not do it
• I swear to god this was not me

I am glad we had this chat.

The Baltimore Ravens entered this offseason with one main goal: sign star quarterback Lamar Jackson long-term. The former league MVP’s contract runs up this season and the self-represented quarterback has seen the price tag on star-level quarterbacks go through the roof in recent years, with the likes of Kyler Murray, Russell Wilson, and others lock in monstrous deals that pay them nearly $50 million per year.

That was, undoubtedly, where Jackson wanted the contract figure to land for his services, but the Ravens and Jackson went through this offseason without ever finding common ground. After Jackson told reporters the deadline for an extension was Friday after long proclaiming he wouldn’t discuss a deal during the season, the team announced on Friday morning that there would be no extension as the two sides simply could not agree on a deal.

As such, Jackson will play out this year on his current deal, paying him $23 million, and the Ravens will almost assuredly put the franchise tag on Jackson next year while, again, trying to work out a new contract. With Jackson representing himself, it makes sense why he wouldn’t negotiate during the season to avoid the distraction (or at least, the perception of a distraction), but it does hinder progress that could be made.

After struggling with Jackson out of the lineup a year ago (despite solid play from Brett Huntley), there’s little doubt of the importance of Jackson to the success of the Ravens. If they have a bounceback this year with Jackson under center and he returns to the elite tier of QBs post-injury, he likely will only boost his position in negotiations and the Ravens may regret not locking him up sooner at what may end up being a cheaper (even if very high) price.

Rosalía took over the world this year with the massive Motomami, an album that became more and more anticipated with every fiery single and provocative music video. Even after unveiling the wildly successful LP, she released the one-off song “Despechá.” Now she’s back again with more material from Motomami.

The star unleashed Motomami + today, the deluxe version of the record. It features a remix of “Candy” with Chencho Corleone, a live version of “La Fama,” “Despechá,” as well as a handful of brand new songs: “Aislamiento,” “La Kilié,” “LAX,” and “Chiri.” They all prove Rosalía’s status as a relentless hitmaker; she has a real knack for songs that stick. This is especially true with the instantly infectious track “La Kilié,” which kicks off with a sputtering beat and Rosalía’s hypnotic vocals casting a spell on the listener.

Rosalía’s album received praise from tons of celebrities, including pop singer Lorde. “I’ve listened to the Rosalía album every day since it came out,” she wrote in the newsletter. “F*ck, it’s so good, I gagged when I heard that interpolation of ‘Archangel,’ ‘Hentai’ is genius, ‘Sakura’… projects like this remind me why I live for pop music — at its best, there’s nothing better.”

Listen to “Aislamiento” above and check out “La Kilié,” “LAX,” and “Chiri” below.

Earlier this month, YG began the rollout for his upcoming sixth studio album, I Got Issues, with a smooth performance of the album’s lead single “Toxic” for A COLORS Show. After announcing the project’s official release date, he’s getting going in earnest with another laid-back single, “Alone.” The common throughline appears to be a thread of introspection that has always been in his musical output but has become more pronounced now that he’s in his 30s with more control over his music and career. While it remains to be seen whether more aggressive singles like “Run” and “Scared Money” will appear on the project, YG has displayed a growing sense of balance in his music.

Rather than dropping an elaborate video for “Alone,” YG doubles down on the song’s reflective nature with an in-studio performance video highlighting its moodiness. Seated on a stool in front of his microphone with a red Solo cup and backed by candles and masked security guards (the skiing kind, not the COVID kind), YG takes stock of how his gangster habits — formed by the trauma of growing up in Compton — interfere with his current lifestyle. He’s got money, status, and safety now; he’s got to leave the streets alone. Whether he’ll be able to is another story entirely but we’ll say this: He has a way of staying out of trouble and making amends when he does mess up. That’s more than you can say for a lot of entertainers.

Watch YG’s in-studio video for “Alone” above.

I Got Issues will be out 9/30 via Def Jam. The album is available to pre-save and pre-order here.

What rhymes with DRAM? The rapper’s new song “Wham!” does. A hypnotic banger produced by Spiff Sinatra, Hero, and Shelley/DRAM, he blends creative rhymes with a chill R&B chorus. “Wham!” was showcased during DRAM’s prior Instagram Live and teased via his social media channels in August. According to the song’s YouTube page, there will also be an acoustic video version.

Raised in Virginia, he was born Shelley Marshaun Massenberg-Smith, and has gone through a number of artistic name changes over the years. Stepping on the scene as D.R.A.M. with his debut EP #1Epic, the musician made impressive waves early on. His debut album Big Baby DRAM reached top 10 on the US rap charts in November 2016, and has since been certified Gold. Eventually, he changed his stage name in September 2020 to Shelley FKA DRAM, releasing a sophomore album in April 2021 with the same title. Now, as of a tweet he shared in July 2022, it appears he is back to just DRAM.

Over the past few years, DRAM has also attracted attention for a number of significant artist collaborations. His hit single “Broccoli” featuring rapper Lil Yachty made it to the top 5 on the Billboard Hot 100 and opened the door for DRAM’s work with other musicians. During the fall of 2016, he appeared alongside Chance The Rapper for a performance of “Blessings (Reprise)” on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. The following year, he teamed up with Gorillaz for the song “Andromeda” from the band’s 2017 album Humanz.

Now, DRAM’s “Wham!” is the first glimpse of a potential new project titled What Had Happened Was. On Twitter, he revealed that he will be including R&B songs cut from 2021’s Shelley FKA DRAM on his next release.

Listen to DRAM’s new song “Wham!” above.