Trey Songz is the latest artist to join the wave of those speaking out about injustice through music. His sardonically-titled “2020 Riots: How Many Times” video addresses the ongoing civil unrest in the wake of police killings of Black citizens like George Floyd and Breonna Taylor with footage of protestors occupying the streets of his hometown, Petersburg, Virginia — peacefully, with very little evidence of “rioting.”
“How many mothers have to cry?” he questions in the gospel-inflected chorus. “How many brothers gotta die? How many more times?” He also takes to task the concept of colorblindness, pointing out the hypocrisy of claiming not to see color when it’s clear that Black Americans have faced incarceration, wrongful death at the hands of the police, and income inequality at a disproportionate rate. “Don’t be colorblind, ’cause when they’re killin’ mine /They’ll try to justify it each and every time.”
“How Many Times” is just one of a spate of protest-themed songs that have come out since May of this year, with other artists like Lil Baby, Denzel Curry, DaBaby, and Anderson .Paak all releasing songs speaking about the current climate.
Watch Trey Songz’s “2020 Riots: How Many Times” video above
Trey Songz is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Phoebe Bridgers released her highly-anticipated sophomore album Punisher last month and while she can’t tour behind the effort, the singer has stayed engaged with fans by performing various tracks on a handful of livestreams. On Monday, Bridgers appeared on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert to give a colorful rendition of “Kyoto.”
For the at-home performance, Bridgers decked out her room with decorations reminiscent of a middle school dance. The singer crooned “Kyoto” in front of glittery streamers, a shimmering disco ball, and multicolored lights all while sporting her signature skeleton costume.
Ahead of her late-night performance, Bridgers joined Zack Fox in the premiere of his brand-new Twitch show, Released!. During the episode, Fox helped Bridgers get to “goth prom” in an animated flying space car. During their journey, Bridgers explained the meaning behind her Punisher album title: “Say you’re hitting on someone at a bar, and then their friend comes up and starts talking to you about Jordan Peterson or some sh*t and you’re like, ‘Please get me out of here.’ But they don’t release that they’re punishing you. So, I guess I’m self-conscious that I do that.”
Watch Bridgers perform “Kyoto” on The Late Show above.
The NWSL is headed to the semifinals of its Challenge Cup on Wednesday, as the league has thus far successfully pulled off its bubble tournament restart as the first team sports league in the United States to attempt to restart during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The tournament has showcased the league and the immensely talented women that play in it over the past month, as nine of the 10 teams in the league took part in the tournament — the Orlando Pride did not make the trip due to an outbreak on the team. On Tuesday, the league announced some major news in the form of an expansion franchise coming to Los Angeles, currently dubbed “Angel City” — which is, objectively, a tremendous name and hopefully sticks.
The ownership group for the franchise is a who’s who of prominent women from sports, entertainment, and business, led by actress Natalie Portman, venture capitalist Kara Nortman, and entrepreneur Julie Uhrman (who will serve as team president), along with Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, who led the bid through his firm. The other stakeholders feature a tremendous amount of star power and sports know-how, including tennis legend Serena Williams (who is married to Ohanian) and 14 former members of the USWNT.
Led by consortium President Julie Uhrman, the founding investor group includes Serena Williams and daughter, Alexis Olympia Ohanian, Jr., actors Uzo Aduba, Jessica Chastain, America Ferrera, Jennifer Garner, and Eva Longoria, late night talk show host Lilly Singh, former US Women’s National Team players including twelve representing Southern California including Julie Foudy, Mia Hamm, Rachel Buehler, Shannon Boxx, Amanda Cromwell, Lorrie Fair Allen, Ronnie Fair Sullins, Joy Fawcett, Angela Hucles, Shannon MacMillan, Tisha Venturini Hoch, and Saskia Webber, two-time Olympic Gold Medalist and FIFA World Cup Champions Lauren Cheney Holiday and Abby Wambach, author and activist Glennon Doyle, Netflix VP Original Content Cindy Holland, tech entrepreneur and filmmaker Casey Neistat, Founding Board Member of Baby2Baby, Sabina Nathanson, Media Executive David Nathanson, Baby2Baby Co-President Norah Weinstein, and Bad Robot President and COO Brian Weinstein.
It is quite the list of names and they will look to capitalize on L.A.’s soccer boom, as LAFC and the LA Galaxy have one of the MLS’ best young rivalries, with LAFC having a similarly stacked ownership group. The team will join the league officially in the 2022 season, and more details like an official name and logo are still to come. For soccer fans in Southern California, it’s very exciting news as the NWSL finally brings a squad to Los Angeles and has the backing of some of the biggest names in the sport.
The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow, and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.
Usually, when rappers talk about going back to the basics for a new project, the promise is more of an appeal to fans disappointed with a past work for marketing purposes. For Kyle, it’s been more than a mission statement or a selling point; it was actually his philosophy going into See You When I Am Famous!!!!!!!!!!!!, his recently released follow-up to 2018’s Light Of Mine.
The story behind album closer “Mr. Man & K.i.D.” is a prime example of this; Kyle hasn’t released a song with his junior high buddy Mr. Man since 2013’s “Bang” from Beautiful Loser, the Ventura product’s debut mixtape. Yet, Mr. Man has been there all along, as part of Kyle’s entourage and as a confidant throughout Kyle’s rise to stardom, as I learned at the video shoot for the Tyga-featuring “Money Now,” being invited to the Westlake Village shooting location to get more background for this review.
Kyle and Mr. Man not only explained how the reunion came to be, they also shared details of their long friendship that brings the overall theme of the album into clearer focus. Kyle prompted his old friend to record the verse while on a trip to Vegas but when he heard it, he insisted he come re-record it in person at Kyle’s own studio on Mr. Man’s birthday. Mr. Man insists he had no idea the song would even appear on the album, but Kyle says it had to, because it captured exactly the feeling he was going for — a reminder that nice guys don’t always finish last.
That same insistence on capturing just the right vibe led Kyle and his manager Ben to pursue the Beastie Boys sample on “Girls” with Rico Nasty for eight months, until finally, Kyle reached out to Rick Rubin personally on Twitter hoping to get the song cleared. He expressed doubts that it would be ready in time for the release, but it’s now one of the album’s standout tracks, thanks to the aforementioned nod to hip-hop history and Rico’s stunning tongue lashing of a verse.
Everything about See You When I Am Famous!!!!!!!!!!!!, from its cover to the video for lead single “What It Is,” is permeated with the sense of Kyle tapping into not just his nostalgia for his early career, but also his hunger to push his pen game to new heights. As he says on “Bouncin,” “Man you n****s made me wanna rap again.” That’s not just a regular flex; while reminiscing at the “Money Now” shoot, Kyle and his friends regaled with stories of his battle rap days, when he outrapped grown men as a junior high student.
That doesn’t mean his album is brimming with aggressive, rappity-rap bars though. The thing that has always made Kyle stand out among peers has been the cheerful, upbeat expressiveness of his delivery. He can rap his ass off; he doesn’t feel the need to, instead serving the needs of the beat, from the bouncy flexes of “Money Now” to the warm introspection on “The Sun.”
On the latter, he once again displays his dedication to and passion for the art and history of music by connecting a contemporary with an inspiration. The song features Bryson Tiller on its mellow choruses and one verse, but it’s produced by and contains a feature credit for Raphael Saadiq, a dream get for the two ‘90s kids. Kyle repeats the feat on the title cut, which he calls the bonus track because of its sonic inconsistency with the rest of the project.
Knowing that AzChike is a huge E-40 fan, Kyle made sure to connect the two for the track, because he feels obligated to use his platform to “make people happy.” And while that may not be good enough for some hip-hop fans, See You When I Am Famous!!!!!!!!!!!! proves why the game needs artists like Kyle. Most hip-hop fans are probably closer to Kyle’s story than Pusha T’s; there are way more class clowns and passionate hip-hop fans than there are shooters and drug dealers.
See You When I Am Famous!!!!!!!!!!!! isn’t about shining on haters, or proving how tough Kyle can be. Instead, it’s a call to action, an affirmation. Kyle isn’t stunting out of spite, but to show that anyone can be a star, so long as they remain true to themselves and pursue what they love with determination, dedication, passion, and joy. It’s about naming your dream, then claiming it, taking that moment to savor it — then becoming an example for the next generation to keep chasing their own.
See You When I Am Famous!!!!!!!!!!!! is out now on Independent/Atlantic Records. Get it here.
Kyle is a Warner Music artist Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
The Atlanta Hawks are no strangers to new uniforms and rebrands, as they made a pretty significant shift in brand identity when the league brought Nike on as their uniform and merchandise partner, as the Hawks went to the black, red, and volt look.
Now, not all that long after taking a big swing on a futuristic design, the organization is going back to the classics with a return to their original colors and a redesign that brings their uniforms a clean, retro look. The Hawks released their three new uniforms on Tuesday morning, with Torch Red, Infinite Black, Legacy Yellow, and Granite Gray as their four primary colors now, as the volt experiment has come to an end.
The uniforms are now featured in the red, black, and white, all with clean piping down the sides and have gotten rid of the aggressive patterning of their most recent uniforms, for a crisp and clean design with no fuss or effort to do too much.
Atlanta Hawks
Of note is that the Black Statement uniforms feature the Jordan Brand logo, while the Icon and Association uniforms have the Nike Swoosh. The shorts feature piping on the sides and bottom, all the way around, with a small Pacman logo on the right side. The waistband on the shorts also features the new alternate logo, as they’ve also introduced new classic logos aside from the Pacman emblem that they keep as the primary.
Atlanta Hawks
Overall, this seems like an upgrade for the Hawks, who took a big swing with their last redesign that just didn’t quite land as they had hoped, and now they return to a classic, clean look with a trio of very solid uniforms.
The last time Travis Scott and Chase B hosted an episode of their .WAV Radio Beats 1 show was nearly two years ago. The pair returned last night, though, and they had a big reason for doing so: The two announced a new collaborative album, Escapism, and previewed a bunch of tracks from it.
The pair premiered a couple of Big Sean collaborations, “Zen” and “Lithuania.” Beyond that, they also shared “Cafeteria” (featuring Don Toliver), Picky (featuring Nav and Wheezy), “Scrooge” (featuring Swae Lee), “The Parables” (featuring YBN Cordae), “White Tee” (featuring Young Thug), and “Mayday” (featuring Thug and Sheck Wes).
During the show, Scott also took a moment to tell Houston residents to take the coronavirus pandemic seriously so the city can hopefully return to normal soon. He said, “This is a public service announcement. Make sure y’all got the good echos on that thing right there. COVID-19 in the H. Listen here, my fellow Houstonians: We have to lock in and we got to protect ourselves, y’all, because it’s going up, man. I got a call from Miss Linda Hidalgo and she was just explaining to me that at the rate we going, it can get into the super red and it can be very immediate for us. If we don’t kind of get more control of how we moving around and things like that, it can be another breakout and we’d have to slow the city down so — We don’t need that right now. We need everybody to try to practice as much as they can. You know what I mean? Social distancing, whether y’all got to get on FaceTime or even if y’all got to come to each other’s houses, try to just keep it day one squad or whatever it is.”
The Seattle Storm — despite missing both Sue Bird and Breanna Stewart for the entire season — enjoyed a surprisingly fruitful season, buoyed by the performances of Jordin Canada, Jewell Loyd and Natasha Howard. In 2018, the Storm won their third championship and were looking to repeat in 2019 until Stewart ruptured her Achilles tendon during a EuroLeague game in April, a month before the WNBA season was slated to start. But even without their two future Hall of Famers, the 2019 Storm still managed to finish with a 18-16 overall record and make the playoffs for the 15th time in their 20-year history. Sophomore point guard Canada stepped off the bench and into Bird’s Nikes to average career-highs in points (9.8), assists (5.2), rebounds (2.4) and steals (2.3) per game. Alysha Clark, Mercedes Russell, Howard and Loyd also made impressive gains last season, with the latter pair earning All-Star distinctions.
This season, Stewart and Bird are set to return to the floor along with some new additions to the team in Ezi Magbegor, Epiphany Prince and Morgan Tuck. Head coach Dan Hughes is not in Florida due to health concerns, so assistant coach Gary Kloppenburg has been handed the reins. Kloppenburg has a very experienced and deeply talented roster in the “wubble,” and it will be a welcome sight to see Bird and Stewart back on the court in Storm jerseys.
WUBBLE ROSTER
Sue Bird
Jordin Canada
Alysha Clark
Natasha Howard
Crystal Langhorne
Jewell Loyd
Ezi Magbegor
Epiphanny Prince
Mercedes Russell
Breanna Stewart
Morgan Tuck
Sami Whitcomb
KEY PLAYERS TO WATCH
Sue Bird: If it’s not clear enough already, the Storm will have their floor general back and healthy this season. In 2018, the Bird averaged 10.1 points and 7.1 assists per game before helping her team defeat the up-and-coming Washington Mystics while playing with a mask over her broken nose in the Finals. After having to sit on on the sidelines all of last year, Bird will be hungry for her fourth title. The veteran point guard is one of the greatest to ever play in the WNBA, and while it’s unclear if this is Bird’s last hurrah, all eyes will be on her.
Breanna Stewart: Having a healthy Stewart back at the four will be much welcome news to the Storm. The 2018 league MVP was Seattle’s biggest impetus in winning the title, and they will need her to do it again this year. In 2018, she was unstoppable, averaging 21.8 points and 8.4 rebounds per game on her way to helping Seattle earn the best record in the league. In the Finals, she even took it to another level, earning the Finals MVP award after scoring 30 points in Game 3, a career-high in the playoffs. It seemed like Stewart’s story in the league was only just beginning to take off when she suffered an injury prior to the 2019 season. This year, the league will watch “Stewie” return and if she can hit the heights of her MVP season, the sky’s the limit.
EXPECTATIONS
Everyone expects the Storm to pick back up where they left off in 2018 following the returns of Bird and Stewart and contend for a title. The roster remains mostly the same, and is incredibly well-rounded. Last season, Clark, Canada and Howard proved their defensive abilities, earning spots on the All-Defensive First Team and helping the Storm earn the fourth-best defensive rating in the league. Everyone stepped up for the Storm in 2019: Canada was an assist machine and Whitcomb and Clark made their names as three-point threats after shooting 34% and 48%, respectively from beyond the arc. Howard made it seem like there was nothing she couldn’t do and 6’6 Russell made her presence known around the rim after averaging 6.1 rebounds per game.
This year, Kloppenburg should be able to manage minutes effectively knowing that he has proven talent on the bench. Certain players like Canada will see less time compared to last year, but the hope is that she can continue to learn from Bird and eventually ascend to greatness. Seattle certainly has one of the best teams on paper and many expect them to figure into the title race, but Bird and co. are not fooling themselves by assuming this season is a wrap by any means. “Paper is paper — it means nothing,” Bird said in a recent press conference.
X-FACTOR
Natasha Howard: Last season, Howard stepped up tremendously in the absence of Bird and Stewart and could’ve easily been named Most Improved Player for the second year in a row. In addition to showing up on the defensive end — the 6’2 forward was named Defensive Player of the Year after averaging the second-most steals per game (behind Canada) and third-most blocks in the league — she also took on the responsibility of being the team’s primary scorer. Howard averaged a career-high 18.1 points, 8.2 rebounds, 1.7 blocks and 2.2 steals per game while having the third-highest usage rate in the league. Last year, Howard’s star potential really started to emerge and this season, the Storm will hope that she can continue to progress and show the kind of consistency that the WNBA demands.
BIGGEST ON-COURT QUESTION
Will Bird and Stewart truly be able to return to their stellar best? An Achilles injury is among the most serious for a basketball player, and though the delayed start to the 2020 WNBA season was likely an added boon for Stewart’s recovery, we won’t truly know if she can return to her MVP-caliber level of play until the first few games. Stewart and Bird did suit up with Team USA earlier this year in the team’s college tour, although playing week in, week out in the WNBA is an entirely different experience. Bird, who is going on 40 years old, has been cognizant of the increasing pace in the WNBA and of her status as the oldest player in the league. Of course, it is impossible to rule either of these stars out — and Bird looks to be in the best shape of her life based on the photos.
Jim Carrey’s taken quite the story-filled tour while promoting his new novel, Memoirs and Misinformation (which he has described as “none of this is real and all of it is true”). He told Jimmy Fallon about those 10 minutes he spent thinking that he was about to die in Hawaii during the false missile alarm. The Ace Ventura star also related (to Marc Maron) the twisted tale of Fire Marshall Bill’s origins. However, the not-so-verifiable stories contained within Carrey’s novel sound just as entertaining.
USA Today reveals that the book, which blends fiction and reality, portrays his “Nic Cage” character as a guy “with an affinity for semi-naked jiujitsu and given to prophetic visions of saber-toothed tigers.” It’s not “true,” but it’s believable, right? And Gwyneth Paltrow makes an appearance as well, as Carrey and co-author Dana Vichon revealed. The real-life GOOP CEO’s fictional iteration “discovers an insatiable appetite for death” while pushing guided meditation to help her followers cope with the apocalypse and declaring that people should be happy and only concerned about getting “a little neck work.” Here’s more on that little gem:
Vachon: “You’re actually looking at the Goop proprietor there, but everything around that is the hard opposite, which is a Viking berserker who rejoices in combat.”
Carrey: “She seems so proper that it’s just like Jimmy Stewart saying dirty words, you know? There’s gotta be a little mercenary in her, you know what I mean? If she’s gonna be the CEO of a big company.”
Other celebrities who get roasted with absurd counterparts in the book include Kelsey Grammer and Anthony Hopkins. Oh, and Kanye West apparently gets the same treatment, although the novel would be hard pressed to eclipse Kanye’s messy and problematic behavior in our own world. As for Cage, though, Carrey said that he’s captivated with how he was portrayed: “He said Melville, would’ve loved this book! Heinlein would’ve loved this book!’” What an endorsement.
Jim Carrey’s Memoirs and Misinformation is available in stores now.
After the song leaked earlier in the year, Smino and JID have finally shared their Kenny Beats-produced collaboration “Baguetti.” Along with Buddy and Guapdad 4000, the two rappers are members of a loose collective known as Zoink Gang, which sprouted as a side effect of its members participation in Dreamville’s Revenge Of The Dreamers III sessions in Atlanta. The drop has fans on Twitter speculating that a Zoink Gang album is coming soon, as the crew apparently has enough tracks recorded for one.
First, though, there are a number of side projects for the “Baguetti” rappers on the way. JID is one of the members of Spillage Village, which is promising their own full-length sometime this year. They released their “End Of Daze” video earlier this month, while JID used an Instagram Live session to preview his own music, presumably for a followup to 2018’s DiCaprio 2.
Meanwhile, Smino is also up for a new album after saying that it was “done” in February of this year. He’s also about two years removed from his last release, Noir, as well as billed on the Ghetto Sage album with Noname and Saba that has been teased since last year. With so many projects in the works, one can only hope that the various obstacles blocking all these releases — namely, a nasty virus that’s been going around because some people won’t wear facemasks — can be cleared, so that Spillage Village, Ghetto Sage, and Zoink Gang can all see the light of day.
Listen to Smino, JID, and Kenny Beats’ “Baguetti” above.
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, one of the best comic book movies of the 2010s, came out 10 years ago next month, and to celebrate the almost-anniversary, the cast reunited for a charity table read. In attendance was, among others, Mary Elizabeth Winstead (and her dog), Chris Evans (and his dog), Anna Kendrick, Alison Pill, Aubrey Plaza, Mae Whitman, Jason Schwartzman, Ellen Wong, Satya Bhabha, Brandon Routh, Mark Webber, and Scott Pilgrim himself, Michael Cera. (Brie Larson and Kieran Culkin were both absent.)
The Arrested Development actor isn’t as everywhere as he was in the late 2000s and early 2010s, but he still continues to work consistently, including voicing Robin in The Lego Batman Movie (another great comic book movie) and appearing in Netflix’s Medical Police and Showtime’s Twin Peaks: The Return as greaser icon Wally Brando. But Scott Pilgrim fans were still surprised to see Cera’s new look during the Zoom reunion.
The best thing to come out of ‘Scott Pilgrim vs. The World’ reunion was Michael Cera’s facial hair
We’ve seen the mustache before (“Anyone remember that time when Michael Cera decided to sport a mustache for a while? There are men that can pull the look off and there are those that just can’t, and unfortunately Cera falls into the latter category,” TV Overmindonce wrote, rudely), but the beard, in all its unmaintained glory, is new.
But honestly? I respect the patchiness. Michael Cera: a quarantine king.
Not the point but Michael Cera’s facial hair always looks so fake to me and I love that. https://t.co/lf3qNO5phb
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