Category: Worldwide

Did you see that viral Grimes tweet in which she completely roasted Elon Musk, the father of her children? Well, it’s fake.

As Gizmodo notes, yesterday (March 6), Musk wrote in a real, not fake tweet, “‘Super rich ex-wives who hate their former spouse’ should filed be listed among ‘Reasons that Western Civilization died.’” The publication notes Musk’s tweet was in response to an X (formerly Twitter) user criticizing MacKenzie Scott, ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, about the organizations she donates her money to.

After the Musk tweet, a screenshot of a supposed Grimes tweet started making the rounds online. In it, Grimes quote-tweets Musk’s post and adds, “Is the ex-wife destroying Western Civilization in the room with us right now?” Another fake screenshot has also circulated, this time with an added community note that reads, “While she did bear multiple of Elon’s children, Grimes was never technically married to Elon. Elon’s only real ex-wife is merely kinda rich.”

Gizmodo notes they found the X account that was the origin of the initial fake screenshot, and confirmed with them that they were indeed responsible for it, and that the Grimes tweet is therefore not real.

Meanwhile, Grimes recently shared some thoughts on criticism of her and Musk’s son’s name, X AE A-XII. As part of a larger conversation, one X user wrote, “That’s funny coming from you Claire did you name your kid something that humans can’t even pronounce? How’s that gonna go down for him when he’s in school? Why did you feel like you need to make a comment on this? Bored?” Grimes replied, “This is the most bizarre criticism. He loves his name and mostly ppl think it’s cool. X men etc. x is popular at school lol. Also, I don’t wanna say his friends names cuz they’re civilians but most millenials named their kids weird names – not just me.”

Zack Snyder was on Joe Rogan’s podcast.

No, wait, come back.

OK, let’s start again: Zack Snyder was on Joe Rogan’s podcast, where he discussed his decision to have the typically murder-averse Batman kill bad guys in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (and probably somewhere in the 47-hour cut of Zack Snyder’s Justice League).

“Batman can’t kill is canon,” he said, according to IGN. “And I’m like, ‘OK, the first thing I wanna do when you say that is I wanna see what happens.’ And they go, ‘Well, don’t put him in a situation where he has to kill someone.’ You’re protecting your god in a weird way, right? You’re making your god irrelevant if he can’t be in that situation. He has to now deal with that. If he does do that what does that mean? What does it tell you, does he stand up to it? Does he survive that as a god? As your god, can Batman survive that?”

Rogan agreed with Snyder, commenting how “it seems ridiculous given the circumstances in which Batman operates.” Now, instead of comic book purists getting mad at him for breaking the supposed rules of Batman, he’s creating his own rules with Rebel Moon (if only it was better)

You can listen to the entire podcast episode below.

This past weekend, Sydney Sweeney hosted SNL for the first time with musical guest Kacey Musgraves. It was a perfectly fine episode. Not one of the show’s best; not one of its worst. But you wouldn’t know it from the response to the episode: people are using Sweeney — or more specifically, her breasts — as an avatar for the death of wokeness… or something.

This is a real headline on The New Republic: “Wokeness is no match for Sydney Sweeney’s undeniable beauty.” I don’t know what “And while her breasts have caused a furore, I don’t see this as the sudden death knell of wokeness” and “If [Dave] Chappelle had Sweeney’s buxom bust, we could have easily been having this same cultural conversation more than a year ago” mean, but one thing’s for sure: they are undeniably sentences that exist on the internet.

People on X are — would you believe it? — acting even weirder. Especially conservatives. “HOT TAKE: Sydney Sweeney would be much more attractive if she covered up,” @JonnyRoot_ (who has “FAITH,” “SPORTZ,” and “CULTURE” in his bio) wrote. “Men embracing her & defending her immodesty as ‘feminine’ and ‘genuine’ are just showing how they can’t control their eyes and hearts of lust. Sydney Sweeney flaunting her body like this is not a good example for young women. It’s not a net positive. It’s not something to admire.”

No wonder Sweeney barely tweets. Would you want to deal with all that?

Now more than ever: sometimes it’s good to log off.

During her time in the spotlight, 2022 Uproxx cover star Chloe Bailey has made it clear that she’s somebody who knows her worth. On that front, she’s not about to settle for less than she believes she deserves, so she has some red flags that will send her running the other way if she spots them in a man. Bailey was just asked about that and she presented her list of no-no’s.

In a recent Instagram Live broadcast, Bailey answered a fan’s question, explaining, “Oh, what are the red flags for me? Liars. Cockiness, I hate cockiness. And if someone isn’t excited about the things that I’m excited about. You don’t have to like them, but to just know that you care about what make me happy. Like, if you don’t… [buzzer noise] [laughs].”

So, there you have it: Be honest, humble, and engaged, which sounds like good advice for a relationship with anybody, not just Bailey.

Speaking of relationships: Last summer, Bailey came through for a fan who just got broken up with… at one of Bailey’s concerts, no less. The fan tweeted, “I just got dumped at @ChloeBailey concert [teary-eyed emoji] [crying emoji] she was a bad b*tch tho!! Bro just blew my night fr.” Chlöe quote-tweeted the post and added, “wtf. better off without him. onto the next!!! love you boo.”

Technicals got handed out with less than 10 seconds remaining in Wednesday night’s game between the Chicago Bulls and the Utah Jazz. The Bulls were nursing a one point lead and the Jazz, unsurprisingly, were playing the free throw game, with Collin Sexton committing a personal foul on DeMar DeRozan right in front of Chicago’s bench.

It’s unclear what got said after this, but some words got exchanged between Sexton and members of Chicago’s bench, which led to a whole lot of people congregating around one another. Things really looked like they boiled over when a Bulls assistant, Chris Fleming, and John Collins engaged in some pushing and shoving with one another.

After the referees looked things over, both Fleming and Collins got technical fouls, but in a fortuitous turn for Utah, so did Chicago’s Torrey Craig, who was on the bench with an injury. This led to Utah getting a technical free throw, which Jordan Clarkson took and made. And after DeRozan shot and made both of his free throws, the Jazz got the ball with 9.3 seconds left while facing a two point deficit.

While Clarkson got a good look from three and missed, Chicago kept the door cracked open, as Coby White corralled the rebound but stepped out of bounds. But they were unable to make anything of it, because while Sexton got an open look in the corner, he was unable to connect and the Bulls got out of Utah with a 119-117 win.

Kenny Mason has been displaying Lebron James-level consistency, steadily building up toward his forthcoming 9 album for the better part of a year. Most recently the Atlanta artist dropped the three-track EP Highway 9, which followed in the footsteps of the three-track EP 3 last March and six-track EP 6 last June. The EP is due out March 14 via RCA Records.

“The 3 and 6 EPs are a part of an 18-track unique rollout leading up to his album 9,” a press release explained on Wednesday, March 6. “Having released EPs 3 and 6, which provided three and six tracks respectively, fans can expect a fresh batch of nine new songs on the album.”

Two of those songs are here, namely “Jumpin In” and “Us.” The singles dropped late on Tuesday, March 5, and represent Mason’s range.

“Us” is a rock-charged single showcasing Mason’s singing ability, as he aggressively and repeatedly calls someone a “b*tch,” narrates how he “grew up in a cold world,” and asks in the chorus, “Who in the f*ck, who in the f*ck / Who in the f*ck want it with us?” By contrast, “Jumpin In” is a smooth listen featuring Mason spitting bars about commitment and overcoming his formative environment: “I had to devise a plan to prove that I was divine / I demonstrate similar traits to the greats / But I’m in the space / Even thеy can’t imitate / I watch and wait.”

Watch the “Jumpin In” video above, and find more information about Mason’s Route 9 Tour below.

Kenny Mason’s Route 9 Tour Dates

03/22 — St. Paul, MN
03/23 — Chicago, IL
03/24 — Annarbor, MI
03/26 — Philadelphia, PA
03/28 — Boston, MA
03/29 — Washington, DC
03/30 — New York, NY
04/04 — Orlando, FL
04/05 — Atlanta, GA
04/11 — Dallas, TX
04/12 — Houston, TX
04/13 — Austin, TX
04/16 — Denver, CO
04/17 — Salt Lake City, UT
04/19 — Vancouver, BC
04/20 — Bellingham, WA
04/22 — Seattle, WA
04/24 — Eugene, OR
04/26 — Sacramento, CA
04/27 — San Francisco, CA
05/01 — Phoenix, AZ
05/02 — Santa Ana, CA
05/03 — Los Angeles, CA

Kenny Mason’s Route 9 Tour Poster

9 is out 3/14 via RCA Records. Find more information here.

On Thursday Joe Biden is set to deliver his third and maybe final State of the Union. You know what that means? Time for the more extremist members of the Republican Party to act like jackasses. During Biden’s first one, in 2022, Lauren Boebert infamously heckled him as he talked about his dead son Beau. Last year saw numerous interruptions, including Marjorie Taylor Greene calling him a “liar.” (She also threatened to troll him with a Pennywise joke.) What will happen this year? Maybe nothing, should they obey the Speaker of the House.

Per The Hill, in a closed door meeting, Mike Johnson reportedly begged House Republicans to not be total nuisances during Biden’s address. “Decorum is the order of the day,” one lawmaker claimed. Another echoed that, saying, “He said we should carry ourselves with good decorum.”

A lot has been said about Biden’s advanced age, but he managed to outsmart them last year. When discussing how Republicans are deadest on killing Social Security and Medicare, he earned loud booing from conservatives. So he demanded they agree, there and then, to leave the programs in-tact, lest they enrage voters.

“Let’s all agree — and we apparently are — let’s stand up for seniors,” he said, effectively offering a checkmate.

The State of the Union will be held on Thursday. Will it be as fun without watching Kevin McCarthy sitting there looking miserable for 90 minutes? You never know.

(Via The Hill)

On February 1, Universal Music Group removed its entire roster of artists’ catalogs from TikTok. In an open letter, UMG expressed that “TikTok attempted to bully us into accepting a deal worth less than the previous deal, far less than market value and not reflective of their exponential growth” during negotiations. In its own open letter, the service predictably rebutted UMG’s “false narrative and rhetoric.” It was an ugly situation, but it appears TikTok has another problem on its hands.

On Wednesday, March 6, Billboard exclusively reported that The National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA) license with TikTok is due to expire on April 30, and “do[es] not anticipate that there will be an option to renew or extend the current NMPA licenses or participate in a new license with TikTok through NMPA.”

See the full letter sent to NMPA members below, as obtained by Billboard.

“If you are receiving this Member Alert you are currently participating in a license with TikTok through NMPA’s 2022 model license opt-in.

NMPA is notifying all participants that these two-year licenses are set to expire on April 30, 2024.

Recently, the press has highlighted concerns around TikTok’s licensing practices, concerns that NMPA has heard directly from many of our members.

At this time, we do not anticipate that there will be an option to renew or extend the current NMPA licenses or participate in a new license with TikTok through NMPA.

NMPA members should make their own business determination whether to engage directly with TikTok to negotiate a license beyond April 30, 2024.

It is important that all NMPA members understand that without a license in place, TikTok should not be using your musical works on its platform. Starting May 1, 2024, any members who are not licensed with TikTok and would like to discuss enforcement options can contact attorneys at NMPA. If circumstances change prior to the expiration of the current TikTok licenses, NMPA will promptly notify members. We are here to answer your questions.”

Product placement has been a staple (if not scourge) of cinema since the dawn of the medium. Sometimes it’s subtle, sometimes it’s not. Sometimes it’s done as a satirical joke (while also serving as product placement). But no example is as out-there as what a Chilean advertising agency did when they hawked Cerveza beer back in the early aughts.

Over the weekend someone on Twitter/X dropped an example of what Chilean TV viewers saw when they watched the original Star Wars trilogy. Among the advertisers was Cristal Beer, but instead of stopping the movie for traditional commercial breaks, they had their product edited right into the film itself. For example, this is what happens early on in the first Star Wars, when Luke Skywalker first meets Obi-Wan Kenobi.

That’s right: Obi-Wan grabs a Cristal Cerveza, complete with a little jingle. Can they get Cristal at the Mos Eisley cantina? Probably not!

That wasn’t the only example. There’s the part where Obi-Wan is infiltrating the Death Star.

And the climax from Return of the Jedi, with Emperor Palpatine chilling on his throne with a cool one before he eats it (before coming back, of course).

Not only are these real, but the ads won awards. A 2004 piece by The Guardian reveals that OMD Santiago, the agency that came up with this idea, scooped up the top award at that year’s Cannes International Advertising Festival. Cristal wound up edited into a number of major films as they aired on TV, a move the judges deemed “genius.”

The posts blew up, and soon a new meme was born, with people splicing Cristal into all manner of movies and shows and whatnot. There were more Star Wars ones.

Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Lord of the Rings.

Dune.

Spider-Man 2.

Alien.

Everything Everywhere All at Once.

Se7en.

Surely Cristal is enjoying all this free advertising.

(Via Business Insider)

Kazuchika Okada is officially All Elite, siding with the Young Bucks in a completely rebranded The Elite faction.

The Young Bucks hit the ring as part of AEW Dynamite to reveal they had two special announcements. After complaining about how Sting and Darby Allin defeated them at Revolution over the weekend, the Bucks announced “Hangman” Adam Page would be suspended for his attack on numerous referees and they were firing Kenny Omega from The Elite for missing action over the last few months.

Before they could get to their second announcement, Eddie Kingston’s music hit and he came down to the ring to trash talk the Bucks. They attacked Kingston and set up for the EVP trigger before Kazuchika Okada’s familiar coin drop came across the speakers. Okada came down to the ring and aligned himself with Kingston before pulling him backwards into the Rainmaker.

While Kingston was laid out in the ring, the Bucks got back on the mic to announce Okada had joined The Elite.

Okada joins AEW at a time when business appears to be booming. After signing Will Ospreay and bringing in Okada, the promotion is reportedly on the cusp of debuting former WWE star Mercedes Moné, who is expected to be at next week’s AEW Dynamite.