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YG‘s Mary J. Blige-sampling new single, “Toxic,” is off to a strong start after dropping on Friday, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t about to help it along with some promotion of his own. YG made the trip to Colors Studios to deliver a smooth performance of his new song for the fan-favorite A COLORS Show. As usual, he’s decked out in bright red, with a paisley-printed jacket setting off his leather pants and unsubtle jewelry collection, choosing a lavender backdrop that highlights his favorite color rather than contrasting it.

The lyrics of “Toxic” find YG contemplating the dissolution of a situationship as his would-be paramour realizes that his attentions come cheaply, no matter how much money he spends. “But she confused, she want titles and I tell her ‘Nah’ / She confused, us together is what she saw / She confused, ’cause I love her so that’s what she thought / She’s confused and that’s ’cause I be in it raw.” In the end, it turns out that the woman YG has lavished with gifts and money is just a sidepiece who has to be content with playing her position.

“Toxic” is the fourth single YG has released this year after “Sign Language,” “Scared Money” featuring J. Cole and Moneybagg Yo, and “Run” with Tyga, 21 Savage, and BIA. It’s thought that these songs will all appear on his upcoming album, I’ve Got Issues, due in September. The album will be YG’s first after completing his five-album deal with Def Jam, although he did re-up on a licensing deal with his old label to make sure he retains ownership of his music.

Watch YG’s A COLORS Show performance of “Toxic” above.

Bay Area rapper Rexx Life Raj dropped one of the most powerful and emotionally stirring hip-hop albums of the year in The Blue Hour. While it presents Raj as the dexterous, creative lyricist that he is, the album largely deals with the trials and tribulations of Raj’s last few years amid the death of both of his parents, who he cared for in their final days. The album is triumphant in Raj’s perseverance at every turn, and he made an appearance on the Sway’s Universe radio show on SiriusXM this week to talk about it and spit one of the most memorable freestyles you’ll hear this year.

Raj gets deep with Sway and co-host Heather B, talking about his loss, the music that came from it, and questioning his faith in the process. The show took multiple callers who talked about their similar experiences with losing loved ones and dealing with cancer as a family. It’s clear that Sway has an affinity for Raj, as he calls The Blue Hour “one of the most important albums to come out of the Bay in a recent while.” He also lauds it for its honesty. Then Sway drops a beat out of nowhere and puts Raj on the spot for a freestyle — although he also calls him a “singer,” which the rapper must’ve taken personally [insert Jordan meme].

The clip above follows the first two minutes of Rexx Life Raj’s flow and presents the moment where he just snapped, rapping: “N****s try to make this sh*t seem hard when it really ain’t / I watched my Momma take her last few breaths, this sh*t is cake / What’s hard when you still got my brother locked in a cage? / A real first diagnosis is cancer in final stage.”

Raj tipped a cap to his days as an offensive lineman for the Boise State Broncos as well, name-checking former QB (and now Dallas Cowboys offensive coordinator) Kellen Moore. And then might’ve been the first dude to ever slip in Packers tackle David Bakhtiari’s name in a freestyle: “I pray for positivity and optimism / To turn life lessons into gems that I can drop on n****s / Still giving credit to the ones who never did it hardly / ‘Cause do you get an Aaron Rogers without Bakhtiari?”

Sway flies out of his seat when it ends and you probably will too. Watch the snippet of the freestyle above and check out Rexx Life Raj’s full appearance on Sway’s Universe below.

From the first moment it appeared on screen, Steve Harrington‘s luscious mane has been the stuff of legends and one of the reasons Stranger Things continues to be a pop culture juggernaut. Part of the show’s appeal has been its exacting attention to detail in recreating the look and feel of a small town in the ’80s right down to the wood-paneled walls and, of course, the massive hair.

With four seasons under her belt as the head of Stranger Things hair department, Sarah Hindsgaul has managed a small army of wigs, and now, she’s spilling her secrets for making the Netflix show look like it was plucked directly out of the Reagan years. In a new interview with Mashable, Hindsgaul walks through her process, which includes an extensive collection of wigs that still has to be shared with actors because, again, there’s a whole lot of ’80s hair to get on-screen.

However, when it comes to Steve, actor Joe Keery is one of the few actors who’s not sporting a rug, but he is subjected to a feline grooming trick to unlock his righteous look:

“We put products in [his hair] and then you squeeze like a cat.” Hindsgaul demonstrated by kneading her hand just like a cat paw. “I get all the texture into it and dry it hard into his hair so we get that wave texture. Otherwise, it gets really straight.”

“The cat paw” became a shorthand term on set. Hindsgaul said that if someone other than her was working on Keery’s hair, she’d just ask them to do “the cat paw” and they’d understand. So the secret to Steve’s glorious hair isn’t just four puffs of the Farrah Fawcett spray, as Steve tells Dustin in Season 2. It’s also cats.

On top of sharing the secret to Steve’s legendary hair, Hindsgaul also revealed that while Keery is one of the few actors who doesn’t wear a wig, he does have extensions in the back. Our apologies if your whole world seems like a lie right now.

(Via Mashable)

It would take roughly five days to watch every episode of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul and the oft-forgotten (but pretty good!) El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie. Who needs bathroom breaks and other television shows when you’ve got Walter and Saul and Kim and Huell and Todd and especially Lalo to keep you company? It’s maybe the most accurate way to determine the “best” season of the combined shows, but if you don’t have a work week to re-watch the Breaking Saul (Better Call Bad?) saga because you’re too busy deciding which of your two copies of Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium to plop into the DVD player, Rotten Tomatoes has done the dirty work for you.

Of the 11 combined seasons of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, two have a 100 percent “Fresh” rating: seasons three and four of Breaking Bad. They both have the same number of reviews under “Critic Ratings” with 35 (user ratings should always be ignored), so for all intents and purposes, they’re tied for the best season.

Of course, this comes with the usual caveat of Rotten Tomatoes scores are reductive, a positive review can get a green splat, a negative review can get a red tomato, etc. That being said, Breaking Bad was, I believe, at its peak in those seasons, so you’ll find no complaints here. Three other seasons have a near-perfect 99 percent “Fresh” rating: seasons four, five, and six (which includes the series finale) of Better Call Saul. In last place, so to speak? The first season of Breaking Bad with 86 percent. Still pretty good!

Here’s the full ranking:

1. Breaking Bad season 3 / Breaking Bad season 4 (100 percent)
2. Better Call Saul season 4 / Better Call Saul season 5 / Better Call Saul season 6 (99 percent)
3. Better Call Saul season 3 (98 percent)
4. Breaking Bad season 2 / Breaking Bad season 5 / Better Call Saul season 1 / Better Call Saul season 2 (97 percent)
5. El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie (92 percent)
6. Breaking Bad season 1

(Via Rotten Tomatoes)

Walmart has apparently found the perfect streaming platform to help it compete with Amazon. Following reports that the store was looking for a partner to offer movies and TV on its Walmart+ monthly subscription plan, the store announced on Tuesday that Paramount+ will soon be available for subscribers.

In a post on its website, Walmart detailed the addition, which will start in September for subscribers, and apparently won’t involve raising prices on its current $12.95 a month cost.

The streaming service benefit becomes yet another way Walmart is uniquely positioned to give members more for less with Walmart+, whether in-store, at the gas pump, on groceries, listening to music, and now when watching their favorite movies and shows. Walmart+ will remain $98 a year or $12.95 a month and include the Paramount+ Essential Plan subscription with an added $59 value.

“We know Walmart+ is providing members real value in their every day – from grocery shopping to filling up their tank and more,” said Chris Cracchiolo, senior vice president and general manager of Walmart+. “With the addition of Paramount+, we are demonstrating our unique ability to help members save even more and live better by delivering entertainment for less, too. Eighty-five percent of U.S. households use streaming services1 and Paramount+ has the premium content and broad appeal that our members are looking for – like Walmart, they have something for everyone. We’re excited about the launch and what comes next for Walmart+.”

In a lot of ways Paramount+ feels like the most Walmart of streaming services, so a lot makes sense here. As the Wall Street Journal reported, the partnership is good for two years, which may or may not be enough time for the big box store to catch up to Amazon’s 200 million subscribers and counting.

Yesterday (August 15), Kehlani had a show at Philadelphia’s Mann Center. Unfortunately, it was cut short, as Kehlani opted to end the concert early after multiple fans apparently fainted in the audience.

Before walking off stage and ending the show, Kehlani told the audience (as seen in fan-shot videos), “I can’t have this. This is not OK. I don’t feel comfortable. I don’t feel OK. I don’t feel like anybody is safe right now. […] I love you so much. I do not have more words about how disappointed and heartbroken I am. I love you, get home safe.”

In a couple Instagram Story posts after the show, Kehlani wrote, “philly thanks for an incredible evening. i care about you guys more than anything & i put you before anything else. thank you so much to the venue and staff for your diligence swift care for everyone in my audience. outstanding job. i can’t wait to come back. love you Philly. cannot stress how much i love all of you, and how important you are to me. seeing you all on tour for the first time in so many years has really reminded me what i do it for. i hope you know how deep my love runs. thank you for everything.”

Rolling Stone reports that according to officials at the Mann Center, nobody was transported to the hospital during the concert, but three people were given “minimal treatment on site.”

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

Eric Trump would like you to believe that Americans are so mad about how the FBI is treating his family that they’re fighting amongst themselves to pay his dinner tab.

Trump’s most-forgotten-about middle child went on Sean Hannity’s show Monday to spin a wild yarn about how beloved he is by MAGA supporters — enough that they’re apparently jumping over each other to pay for his steak dinner (which he probably orders well-done with ketchup on the side.) Trump told Hannity he was out to eat with his wife Laura recently when an argument ensued between two patrons over who would get the privilege of paying for the nepo baby’s meal.

“Last night, I had an argument between two people who were trying to buy Lara and I dinner to apologize for what the United States Government has done to our family,” Trump said. “You wouldn’t believe the energy out there, I have been through all of these firestorms over the years, I have never seen America more mad than it is right now.”

Trump is presumably talking about the recent FBI raid of Mar-a-Lago and the 11 boxes of classified material seized by the government, material Donald Trump was required by law to hand over before he left office. Those boxes allegedly contained everything from presidential pardon information to dossiers on fellow world leaders to materials on our nuclear weapons program. Trump first claimed he had declassified the documents (he didn’t have the power to do so), then claimed they were planted by FBI agents (they weren’t), then threw a fit that the government had stolen his passports (they didn’t). Still, Eric Trump is really lapping up this chance to play the victim, telling Hannity, “They are targeting Donald Trump, they are targeting his family, everyone around him, his lawyers, anybody who is close to Donald Trump. Anybody who is effective, they are targeting right now.”

“Effective” feels like high praise for a guy whose own father probably has to have a daily calendar alert to remind himself his middle son even exists but sure, enjoy that free charred cow meat, Eric.

(Via Newsweek)

A decade ago, Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te’o had become one of the most decorated defensive players in college football. He was the unquestioned leader of the team heading into the BCS national championship game. But none of that really matters anymore. That’s because Te’o became embroiled in one of the weirdest and most notorious catfishing cases ever. Te’o had forged an online relationship with who he thought was a college student named Lennay Kekua, who had been in a car accident and was diagnosed with leukemia. His supposed girlfriend’s tribulations were framed as a sort of inspiration for Te’o on the field, until he found out… that she didn’t exist.

Long story short, Kekua was actually a male named Ronaiah Tuiasosopo, who has since transitioned and is now Naya Tuiasosopo. While Tuiasusopo explored their gender via the online relationship, Te’o was catfished. Some pundits tried to accuse Te’o of being in on the ploy, but by all accounts he was an unknowing participant. The scandal went very public and Te’o’s draft stock slipped, sending him to the Chargers in the 2nd round. Today, he’s out of football after stints with the New Orleans Saints and Chicago Bears and he’s never really spoken at length about the scandal until now, and he says Jay-Z inspired him to do so.

With the recent release of Netflix’s documentary, Untold: The Girlfriend That Didn’t Exist, viewers will soon be privy to the ins and outs of the catfishing hoax. But Te’o said he wouldn’t have spoken out about it — let alone for a documentary — until something Jay-Z said at a concert made him change his tune. He explained that he went with some Saints teammates to the concert in 2017, saying on CBS Mornings, “And at that concert, Jay-Z opens up with saying these words: ‘You cannot heal what you don’t reveal.’ And it may have been just some random words to everybody, but for me, at that time, it hit me like a ton of bricks.” He added, “In order for me to kind of heal from this, I needed to reveal it.”

Untold: The Girlfriend That Didn’t Exist is streaming now on Netflix. Watch Te’o’s full CBS Mornings appearance below.

When you’ve got Robert De Niro in your mob movie, why limit to yourself to having him only play one crime boss? That’s apparently the approach that director Barry Levinson is taking for his next movie, Wise Guys, which will feature De Niro as two real-life mob bosses.

Based on the book, Wiseguy, by Nicholas Pileggi (who also wrote the script), the film will star De Niro as both Vito Genovese and Frank Costello, according to The Hollywood Reporter, and here’s where things get interesting. Genovese famously tried to have Costello assassinated. While the attempt failed, Costello was injured enough that he retired. So, basically, De Niro is going to try and whack himself in this one, which is definitely a new take on the mob genre.

Wise Guys also marks the first original picture greenlit under the newly formed Warner Bros. Discovery and was reportedly championed by new CEO David Zaslav, who’s been making headlines for his aggressive cuts and dramatic restructuring of the DC Comics films. Via THR:

The project doesn’t seem to have the hallmarks of a tentpole — big-budgets, visual effects, big intellectual property — nor does it feel like “young Hollywood,” something that would seemingly attract the demographic most known for going to the movies. Instead, it feels like a throwback, and has a team whose average age is four score — De Niro is 78, Levinson is 80, and Winkler is 91.

As THR notes, Warner Bros. Discovery has discarded the strategy of making films for HBO Max and will be aggressively leaning into theatrical distribution, so it’ll be very interesting to see if De Niro in a mob movie has the same juice it used to have.

(Via The Hollywood Reporter)

When HBO named the Game Of Thrones spinoff show House Of The Dragon, it was effectively warning us that there would, in fact, be a ton of dragons in this proverbial house. It’s great! Dragons all have different personalities and now they will get their time to shine (or… breathe fire?) in the spotlight once again. But with many great dragons comes great responsibility, and that responsibility is to tell them apart.

You can’t just have a whole handful of characters without giving them defining characteristics, says co-showrunner and co-creator Ryan Condal. “Otherwise, you won’t be able to differentiate between them,” Condal explained to TVLine. “So not only are they bright and colorful the way George [R.R. Martin] described them in the book, he actually gives a lot of detail about what each dragon looks like, the color of their horns and crest, the color of their scales. And then they have different silhouettes.” This is important because there will be seventeen (!!!!) dragons to keep track of in the series.

The dragons will be a bit different than the scaley beasts in Game of Thrones, due to the fact that the series takes place a few hundred years before Daenerys and her lil’ magic dragon babies. “[Dany’s dragons] were born of magic, so they matured very quickly,” Condal explained. “These dragons grow like a real dragon would.” Ah yes, real dragons.

In order to tell the dragons apart, since there will be 17, some of the dragons will look like Drogon, the last dragon standing at the end of GoT, while others will get their own dragon personality. “Certain ones will look a little bit more like Drogon did, and others look completely different,” Condal explained. “And then there’s their different scale size. You have the biggest dragon alive in Vhagar, down to younglings and juveniles who have grown up over time.”

Condal stresses that even though there are many of them, they each have their own specific characteristics that will make them unique. “We really tried to imbue them with an individual personality that you can start to detect… through the animation of them and how they interact with their rider, and who their rider is,” Condal adds. “It’s my feeling that the dragons are some of the most memorable characters in our little universe here.” Hear that, Matt Smith? Nobody cares about your character and his sex scenes! We have dragons to focus on.

House of the Dragon premieres August 21, 2022 on HBO.

(Via TVLine)