Category: Viral

Bookmarks: Celebrating Black Voices (Netflix series) — The first season of this series focuses upon Black celebrities and artists (including Lupita Nyong’o, Common, Tiffany Haddish, Jill Scott, and more) reading children’s stories from Black authors who showcase the Black experience. There’s no rule against adults enjoying this show too, you know. Sometimes, especially now, it’s fun to pretend to be a kid again. However, each book (from I Love My Hair to Firebird to I Am Enough to Pretty Grown Face and ABC’s For Girls Like Me) will revolve around themes like identity, respect, justice, and action, which should also provide a nice jumping-off point for difficult conversations.

Tell Me A Story (CW 9:00pm EST) — If you’re looking for more of a psychological-thriller bent to your stories, this show should fit the bill well. This week, Eddie’s feeling the brunt of Jordan’s tortuous ways while Kayla and Nick consider the future of their relationship.

Transplant (NBC 10:00pm EST) — This new drama series follows a trained doctor from Syria who works to save the wounded but finds a new opportunity after a life-changing event.

Hard Knocks: Training Camp (HBO 10:00pm EST) — The Los Angeles Rams and Los Angeles Chargers both get deep-dive, all-access journeys into their season prep. Enjoy!

Last week, players around the NBA made the historic and unprecedented decision to strike in the midst of the playoffs in protest of the police shooting of Jacob Blake, a Black man in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

In the immediate aftermath of the walkout, there was confusion and uncertainty around both how the players came to their decision as well as their plan for potentially resuming play. Teams in Orlando met collectively last Wednesday night to discuss their options, and the picture that has since emerged is one fraught with tension and a certain level of dysfunction among their ranks.

Initial reports indicated that both the Lakers and the Clippers voted to end the season and leave Orlando altogether so that they could focus on social justice reform, but the details about how this came about remain murky, at best. Clippers guard Lou Williams attempted to clarify the situation when speaking to reporters on Wednesday, suggesting that what took place was more of an informal poll and discussion rather than an official vote, but added that the discussions fell apart as emotions ran hot.

“It was never a decision,” Williams said. “It was a poll being taken in the room, and what was supposed to happen was that there was supposed to be conversation, why this team feels like this, why this team feels like that. Unfortunately, we didn’t get that far. Emotions were running high. And then the reports came out that we were one of the teams to say no. So we never had an opportunity to really explain our position because, truth be told, we didn’t really know our position.”

Regardless of how it came out, the strike resulted in league owners implemented a multi-tiered coalition to ramp up their efforts toward social reform, one that includes earmarking significant funds for equal justice initiatives, launching a media campaign designed to educate the public on these causes, and turning team-owned arenas into voting stations for the upcoming election.

Greta Thunberg kicks off the latest album from indie favorites the 1975 with a warning: “We are right now in the beginning of a climate and ecological crisis, and we need to call it what it is: an emergency.” It’s message that the 17-year-old, arguably the most prominent voice in climate action today, has been trying to get across for years, as documented in Hulu’s I Am Greta. The documentary, from director Nathan Grossman, follows Thunberg from her strike outside Swedish parliament at 15 years old to when Time‘s Person of the Year pissed off You-Know-Who (and out-trolled him in the process).

“I really like the film and I think it gives a realistic image of myself and my daily life. I hope anyone who watches the film can finally understand that we young people aren’t school-striking just for fun. We are protesting because we don’t have a choice,” Thunberg said about I Am Greta. “All that we ask for is for our society to treat the climate crisis as a crisis, and give us a safe future. I think the film shows just how far that is from happening right now. It shows that the urgency of the scientific message isn’t getting through.” The clip above shows her voyage from the United Kingdom to the United States aboard a boat (she doesn’t fly due to the “enormous climate impact of aviation”) to attend a climate change conference.

Here’s the official plot synopsis:

In August 2018, Thunberg, a 15-year-old student in Sweden, started a school strike for the climate as her question for adults was, if you don’t care about my future on earth, why should I care about my future in school? Within months, her strike evolved into a global movement as the quiet teenage girl on the autism spectrum becomes a world-famous activist. The documentary follows Greta’s heroism and passion in fighting for climate change.

I Am Greta premieres at the Venice Film Festival before hitting Hulu on November 13.

Adele fans are anxiously awaiting a new album from the superstar, but she’s been making headlines in different ways lately. She recently posted an outfit of the photo she wore to Notting Hill Carnival in London, and it drummed up some controversy. She wore a Jamaican flag bikini top and had her hair in bantu knots, a traditionally African hairstyle, and some folks didn’t care for her style. There was one person who was predictably a fan, though, and that’s Chet Hanks.

Hanks — who was born in Los Angeles and whose parents, Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, were also born in California — generated some controversy when he spoke in a Jamaican Patois accent at the Golden Globes earlier this year. Hanks is, to put it one way, a Jamaica enthusiast. So, after Adele shared her photo, he posted a video of himself jamming out to and singing along with Adele’s “Set Fire To The Rain” in his car. After turning down the volume, he said, in a Jamaican accent and with Jamaican slang, that he was a fan of the photo. After turning the volume back up, he pointed to his phone and mouthed, “Get in my DMs.” He also captioned the post, “PLEASE SOMEONE TELL ADELE HIT MY LINE ASAP !!!!!!!!!!!! I NEED TO TALK TO HER ABOUT SOMETHING,” followed by a bevy of Jamaican flag emojis.

Hanks did not expand on what he wants to discuss with Adele, and that might be for the best.

Love & Hip Hop: New York star Tahiry Jose detailed the alleged abuse she endured at the hands of rapper and podcast host Joe Budden during their relationship during a recent interview, including broken bones. Their relationship, which lasted several years and helped make them a focus of the popular reality show, ended in 2014. The duo have since been the subject of online gossip relating to their relationship and their apparent friendship after it ended but speaking with Hollywood Unlocked, Jose revealed the extent of how tumultuous their relationship truly was.

The subject came up after Jose addressed a recent incident on the show Marriage Bootcamp in which her most recent rapper ex, Harlem’s Vado, attacked her during filming, grabbing her by the throat. The incident resulting in Vado’s removal from the program and a torrent of rumors on social media. Speaking on the incident, Jose mentioned past abusive relationships, leading to a question about Joe Budden. She confirmed that Budden was the ex she referred to and gave details of the alleged abuse, while insisting that she wanted nothing more than to be done with him altogether.

“I’ve had to endure this bully for the last 10 years,” she said. “I even befriended the bully. I didn’t know what else to do… Then watch your ex say something like, ‘Tahiry will fight a man…’” referring to Joe’s reaction to Vado’s attack. “I didn’t fight him. I was scared to death. No, I don’t walk around throwing apples or fighting a man. I’ve been beaten before. That relationship left me with a fractured rib, a broken nose because somebody was sending him a message….pushed me down a flight of stairs.”

“I remember having a plan to leave because the reason he was so upset was because I was already leaving,” she continued. “Looking through my phone and sh*t. But I had already told him, give me two weeks to pack up my things, and he agreed to it. Then he started looking through my phone. Next thing you know, I got woken up by him dragging me from my ankle.”

For his part, Budden has acknowledged the volatile nature of his past relationships in interviews, on his podcast, and in his music, but has always downplayed the seriousness of his part in them. However, he was also accused by model Esther Baxter of beating her so badly she suffered a miscarriage.

Watch the full interview above.

Through the first round of the NBA Playoffs, Jamal Murray has staked his claim as one of the league’s brightest young stars. He’s gone head-to-head with Donovan Mitchell, dropping multiple 50-point games and leading the Nuggets to a win-or-go-home Game 7 against the Jazz for a place in the Western Conference semifinals.

On a team ostensibly led by All-Star center Nikola Jokic, Murray has emerged as Denver’s go-to option down the stretch, and over the course of six thrilling games, has proven he’s as clutch and unguardable as any player in Orlando and a relentless threat from just about anywhere on the court.

It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what’s at the root of his electrifying play, but his newly-discovered taste in music might offer us some clues. Murray, who is just 23, has apparently arrived at the ’90s hip-hop portion of his musical education journey, thanks in part to Carmelo Anthony, who has introduced him to the many joys and wonders of old-school rap.

Via Joe Walker of Hip Hop DX:

“Sometimes when I go back and if I’m getting a haircut, a lot of guys say, “[Car]melo [Anthony] likes to listen to a lot of the old music, most music,” he said. “And then, that kind of put me on where I’m like, ‘OK, let me go back and look at my collection, to all the music that I listen to.’”

He continued, “With all the players here, everybody is so different from each other [and] everybody listens to different stuff. It definitely brought my mind in terms of Method Man, I listen to Wu-Tang [Clan] and Method Man and they’re showing me tracks from Method Man that I didn’t even know. So, stuff like that where I can broaden my mind, broaden my listening to different rappers, different artists and just kind of get that feel. Like, I put on Raekwon the other day. I don’t even know Raekwon‘s album, but I know a couple songs on it are just fire.”

And he hasn’t stopped there. Murray went on to say that he’s also been checking out Nas, Busta Rhymes, Jay-Z, and Eminem. It’s enough to make you nostalgic for a time when you are just opening the door to so much incredible music. The pregame hype music possibilities are virtually endless.

Murray and the Nuggets will try to stave off elimination in Game 7 against the Jazz on Tuesday night, which tips off at 8:30 p.m. ET on ABC.

(Hip Hop DX)

Jason Momoa got his hands on the new Metallica album, S&M2, and we’re pretty sure he likes it.

In an Instagram video seemingly shot in the desert, and maybe from the back of a pickup truck, a fully blown-away Momoa is so stoked by the new album that he can’t even get the release date right or tell the difference between Bluetooth and Blu-Ray discs. The Aquaman star loves it that much. While gushing about the band reuniting with the San Francisco Sympathy to commemorate the 20th anniversary of their first epic collaboration for 1999’s Metallica S&M, Momoa shares a clip from his laptop even though he’s not entirely sure if he should be doing that. In fact, Momoa is such a huge fan of Metallica that he’d actually be honored if they sued him.

You can watch Momoa going nuts over the new album below:

In a recent interview with UPROXX, Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett opened up about coming back to the sympathy experience with S&M2 and what the future holds for live Metallica shows during the pandemic:

We’re hoping that maybe if Europe can get it together, then maybe we can start playing some festivals in Europe in the summer. But I don’t know. No one knows. Maybe we’ll be taking temperatures. Maybe there’ll be a saliva test, I don’t know.

I have to warn you, and I have to warn everyone: It’s going to take a long time, and no one’s going to tour until it’s safe. I can only talk for us. We’re not going to tour until it’s safe for our fans. Until it’s safe for our fans, we’re not going to expose them, or take the risk of anyone getting sick and getting infected. We don’t want to be responsible for any sort of irresponsibility of that type.

Sounds like some solid advice that Smash Mouth could’ve used before causing an outbreak in Sturgis, South Dakota. Leave it to 2020 to be the year where we sit around asking bands, “Why can’t you be more responsible like Metallica?”

(Via Jason Momoa on Instagram)

Nick Cannon teased an interview with Kanye West yesterday, in which he addressed his presidential campaign and some rumors surrounding it. Now, Cannon has shared the first part of the interview, and in the 45-minute clip, he reveals that he spent $50 million putting on Sunday Service performances in 2019.

During the chat, he revealed that the money went toward things like costumes, travel, his operas, and other operating expenses. He said towards the end of the video, “I actually had to design wardrobes all the time. I spent every dime that I had for marketing from Yeezy on Sunday Service. Every dollar I had. I spent $50 million last year on Sunday Service, if you add up the operas, if you add up the flights… there’s 120 people going to Jamaica. […] With the Yeezys, they were selling themselves. So instead of paying for ads, I invested it into church. I invested it in saying Jesus’ name on high.”

As previously noted, Kanye said regarding his presidential campaign, “People keep on saying, ‘I think that y’all, you and Republicans, are in cahoots.’” Cannon added, “They’re saying that they’re paying you to do what you’re doing to be a distraction.” Kanye replied, “Bro, can’t nobody pay me! I got more money than Trump!”

Watch the Kanye interview above.

Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion became a hot button topic when the duo released the NSFW song “WAP” alongside a racy video. Just about everyone had their opinions about the track, from Tucker Carlson to Tiger King‘s Carole Baskin. But Cardi reveled her label nearly pulled the plug on the single, citing its provocative lyrics.

In an interview with Hot 97, Cardi discussed the track’s breakout success. According to the rapper, Atlantic Records wasn’t so sure about the raunchy nature of the song. Cardi said executives even asked if Meg would be willing to scrap her feature and do a new verse on a different track, but the rapper persisted:

“I just wanted, like at least a top ten. ‘Cause, it got to the point one time that even my label asked, ‘Yo, are you sure? Because this song, it’s so raunchy. You cannot even play it in certain places.’ I’m like, ‘I’m not gonna make this girl do another verse to another song. She like the song and it’s fire.’ They were like, ‘You know, you’re right. It is what it is.’ And it just exceeded everything.”

Elsewhere in the interview, Cardi said she had reached out to Lizzo to join her and Meg on the track, but there was one problem — Lizzo was on vacation. Apparently, Cardi couldn’t reach Lizzo in time to secure the feature: “I was like, ‘Oh my gosh,’ because I had a whole vision about how I want to see Lizzo and everything,” Cardi said. “It was so important to me to include different women that are different races and come from different backgrounds, but are so powerful and influential.”

Watch a clip of Cardi’s Hot 97 interview above.

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

Netflix will be a source of lighthearted escapism (among many other vibes) as this long year turns into fall. Fortunately, Emily In Paris is preparing to land like the lightest, fluffiest sugar cookie on the shelf. The series hails from Darren Star (Younger, Sex and the City, Melrose Place) and looks like the kind of easily-bingeable fare that one can gobble up in one weekend. Also, Kate Walsh might not be instantly recognizable to The Umbrella Academy fans of The Handler, but she’s a boss here, so watch out.

Lily Collins stars as Emily, who (as the title more than suggests) moves to Paris for work. The move’s pretty sudden though, and Emily transplants while being unable to speak French, but that’s no real obstacle to all the handsome Frenchmen lurking about, although it does cause friction with her new work colleagues. Here’s to new adventures and the notion that every bedroom window in Paris makes one feel “like Nicole Kidman in Moulin Rouge” and sits only a stone’s throw away from the Eiffel Tower:

From the synopsis:

Lily Collins stars as Emily, an ambitious twenty-something marketing executive from Chicago, unexpectedly lands her dream job in Paris when her company acquires a French luxury marketing company — and she is tasked with revamping their social media strategy. Emily’s new life in Paris is filled with intoxicating adventures and surprising challenges as she juggles winning over her work colleagues, making friends, and navigating new romances.

Emily In Paris will stream on October 2.