Taylor Swift’s rumored relationship with Matty Healy has reportedly ended. However, her musical partnership with Hayley Williams and Fall Out Boy is just getting warmed up. Swift is preparing to roll out her latest Taylor’s Version album, Speak Now, and both acts will be featured on previously vaulted songs from Swift.
Fall Out Boy will appear on the song “Electric Touch,” whereas Hayley Williams will be heard on the track “Castles Crumbling.” The band is one of Swift’s special guests on her The Eras Tour; however, this marks their first musical collaboration with the musician. Meanwhile the latter “You All Over Me” singer has had a long-standing friendship with Paramore’s frontwoman.
Swift shared the news on social media, writing, “I’m very excited to show you the back cover of Speak Now (My Version), including the vault tracks and collaborations with Hayley Williams from Paramore and Fall Out Boy. Since Speak Now was all about my songwriting, I decided to go to the artists who influenced me most powerfully as a lyricist then and ask them to sing on the album. They’re so cool and generous for agreeing to support my version of Speak Now. I recorded this album when I was 32 (and still growing up, now) and can’t wait to unveil it all to you on July 7th.”
Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) is out 7/7 via Republic. Find more information here.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Riding the school bus is generally an uneventful experience outside of the occasional fight or someone sitting in you seat. In Milwaukee, students and the bus driver had a more exciting trip than any of them planned. As the bus driver, Imunek Williams, was nearing the school to drop off a bus full of children, the bus started filling with smoke.
Williams, who is eight months pregnant, told WISN, “I started to smell something funny at the stoplight, and I just thought it was normal smoke coming from another car, because I always smell smoke or weird smells.”
But the smoke only got thicker as they continued to drive. It was then that Williams knew that she had to make a decision quickly to save herself and the kids entrusted to her care. The bus was only a half mile away from the school when the mom-to-be attempted to radio in the condition of the bus to dispatch.
“I couldn’t barely get what I was trying to say out because of the smoke was hitting me in the face in my eyes so I was just like OK forget the radio. Just got the kids off the bus,” Williams told WTMJ.
It was clear that she was in a race against time with how quickly the bus was overcome with smoke. Thankfully, Williams was able to get all 32 kids off the bus and lined up along the fence before it burst into flames.
“I was the last person off once I get off, I turned around and I just seen flames,” said Williams told WTMJ. “I wanted to make sure that I was safe, baby was safe and you know if it was my kid on the bus I would’ve wanted one of the bus drivers to act the same way that I did.”
None of the children suffered injuries and the soon-to-be new mom was treated for smoke inhalation and was able to return to work the following day. You can watch the incredible story below.
In November, the multi-day 2023 Corona Capital Festival will be headlined by The Cure, Blur, Pulp, and more. The event will be held at the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez in Mexico City, Mexico.
On the first day of Corona Capital 2023, Friday, November 17, Arcade Fire, Pulp, and Alanis Morissette are billed as headliners. As for Saturday, November 18, Blur, The Black Keys, and Thirty Seconds To Mars will take over headlining duties. Finally, closing out the festival on Sunday, November 19, The Cure, The Chemical Brothers, and Pet Shops Boys will headline.
Other notable acts on the lineup include Feist, Sleater-Kinney, Fleet Foxes, Arlo Parks, Brittany Howard, MUNA, Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Alvvays, and Soccer Mommy.
During an interview with The Grammys, Ricardo Gomez, the Senior International Talent Buyer for Mexican promotions company OCESA, shared what goes into selecting artists for the festival.
“We don’t have any Latin acts, and we do that because we want to desegregate Corona Capital from other festivals in the market. We look at trends and what’s happening in the music scene internationally,” said Gomez.
The special CitiBank members’ pre-sale starts on June 9. While general ticket sales for Corona Capital 2023 begin on June 10 at 2 p.m. CDMX via Ticketmaster. Find more information here.
Ron DeSantis has been trailing way behind Donald Trump in the polls. But you know what might beef up his stats? Committing crimes — or at least getting cronies to commit crimes for you. After all, being an indicted criminal who’s been found guilty of other crimes has worked wonders for Trump’s numbers. As it happens, DeSantis may be in luck.
As per Miami Herald (via Raw Story), Javier Salazar, the Sheriff of Bexar County, Texas, has concluded its investigation into the Florida governor’s Martha Vineyard’s stunt last fall. According to a statement, they’ve concluded that heads must roll. Salazar and team are recommending both felony and misdemeanor charges of Unlawful Restraint for those involved with luring migrants to a place unprepared to help them.
Back in September, members of DeSantis’ office arranged for 49 migrants, most of them from Venezeula, to be flown from San Antonio, Texas and deposited, without warning, on the island of Martha’s Vineyard, off of Massachusetts. Some of the migrants described being lured with false promises of work and shelter. Upon arrival, they were housed at a church shelter, who did their best to help with limited resources. They were later voluntarily shipped to nearby Cape Cod.
The decision over whether or not to issue charges now moves over to the office of Bexar County DA. It’s unclear which DeSantis team members will be charged, but in their statement, Salazar’s team suggests they could go as high as top aides, including his chief of staff, James Uthmeier, and public safety czar Larry Keefe.
DeSantis may escape responsibility, but he may get a Mulligan: After a group of migrants were dropped off outside a San Francisco church on Friday, California governor Gavin Newsom suspected DeSantis was behind it and accused him of “kidnapping.”
Tom Holland is still a young guy, but he’s not that young. He’s 27, three years shy of his 30s. For some context, he’s less than a decade younger than Shameless star Emmy Rossum — who, as it happens, is playing his mom on Apple TV+’s forthcoming psychological thriller series The Crowded Room. But you know who doesn’t mind the short age gap? Rossum.
“It makes sense when I read the script,” Rossum recently told Entertainment Tonight. Her character, Candy, she says, is “a super young mom, she’s almost a child in her own right when she becomes pregnant at age 16. You watch as I age from 25 to 35, which is actually younger than I am now.”
Besides, she got over any anxiety she may have had about playing the mother of a 20-something after she “fell in love with the relationship between mother and son and the closeness and everything that they’re grieving in later episodes.”
Holland, mind you, isn’t the only actor playing Danny Sullivan, who as a young man is arrested for a shocking crime in 1979. The younger version of him is played by Zachary Golinger, with whom Rossum, a real-life mother, really bonded.
“I was so taken with the series and really just loved all my scenes, especially with young Danny,” Rossum said. “Our relationship was so beautiful and so I knew everything that we had that I had lost in the scenes with Tom. [It] was really fun.”
Anyway, this is far from the most unrealistic age gap in TV or movies. When The Graduate was released in 1967, 30-year-old Dustin Hoffman was playing an undergrad collegiate having an affair with his parents’ good friend, played by 35-year-old Anne Bancroft. Then there’s Oliver Stone’s Alexander, in which Angelina Jolie plays Colin Farrell’s mom (one year apart, by the way).
The Crowded Room, which also stars Amanda Seyfried, bows on Apple TV+ on June 9.
Donald Trump is up to his ears in legal woes. Not that the majority of Republicans care. The former president is crushing his GOP opponents in the 2024 primary polls, perhaps in part because he’s finally being held responsible for his alleged crimes. One MAGA lawmaker even thinks the many criminal investigations plaguing him give him “credibility.” Now a former employee is speculating that he might have to accept his third nomination while affixed with an unwanted gizmo.
“He could be wearing an ankle bracelet while accepting the nomination at the Republican convention,” James Comey tells @jrpsaki about Donald Trump.
“You could have a president who is potentially incarcerated when he is elected.”
— Inside with Jen Psaki (@InsideWithPsaki) June 3, 2023
As per Newsweek, James Comey, who served as the director of the FBI from 2013 through 2017 — i.e., for the first year-and-change of Trump’s presidency — went on Jen Psaki’s MSNBC show over the weekend. They discussed, among other investigations, the Department of Justice’s look into his alleged mishandling of government documents. Trump has long maintained his innocence, though last week a smoking gun emerged: a recording of him acknowledging that one document in particular was indeed classified.
At one point, Psaki asked Comey if he could “envision a scenario where Trump manages to win back the White House and justice is delayed.”
“I could, I don’t want to but I could,” Comey replied. “It is this crazy world that Donald Trump has dragged this country into but he could be wearing an ankle bracelet while accepting the nomination at the Republican convention.”
Comey added, “It would be rejected if you put it in a script for a show but you could have a President who is potentially incarcerated when he is elected president, so that would be weird and awkward.
“It seems crazy to even be coming out of my mouth but that is the situation that we face,” he continued. “It looks like the Republicans will likely nominate someone who is under serious criminal investigation, is indicted, who knows where that is going to lead us.”
Comey’s not the first person to acknowledge that Trump may have to campaign after being convicted of a crime (or crimes). Ages ago his good pal Sean Hannity assured viewers that he could still run for president from the slammer.
Taking to Twitter, hip-hop’s favorite Barbie shared that her new project will be released before the year’s end. On social media, Minaj kept it short, writing, “10/20/23. The Album.”
This isn’t the first time Minaj has discussed the upcoming album. “NM5 is the best thing that will come out of 2023 & will raise the bar to new and unreachable heights,” Nicki wrote in a tweet. “NM5 tour will be hailed as ‘genius.’ That’s it & that’s all.”
When the album is released, it will mark Minaj’s first studio album in over five years. The last album she released was Queen in 2018. The album featured singles “Chun-Li,” “Barbie Dreams,” and “FEFE” with 6ix9ine.
Minaj has shared no further details. However, it is safe to assume that her latest singles, “Super Freaky Girl” and “Red Ruby Da Sleeze” will be included in the album’s tracklist.
Warning: This post contains some very well-known spoilers for The White Lotus Season 2.
Jennifer Coolidge’s Tanya McQuoid was such a breakout character on the first season of The White Lotus that creator Mike White brought her back for the second — then had her killed off. She could always return; surely one season could go prequel. But for now consider her dead. Perhaps a similar fate awaits another character — a character who may have played a hand in her demise. If so, Coolidge wants it their end to be very nasty indeed.
During a recent chat with The Bear star Jeremy Allen White for Variety’s Actors on Actors series (as caught by Entertainment Weekly), Coolidge hoped that her on-screen husband Jon Gries gets to return — only so Greg, Tanya’s philandering husband, may get his just desserts.
“My hope for Jon [Gries] is that he’s not finished with Greg,” Coolidge told White. “I hope there’s some comeuppance for evil Greg. I think he should, I don’t know, end up in a meat-grinding machine.”
Towards the end of Season 2, Tanya pieced together that Greg, who’d bailed on their Italy trip for a likely affair, was probably in cahoots with the “gays” who tried (and failed) to kill her so Greg could inherit her fortune. Even though Tanya thwarted her attempted murderers (only to die herself — big body count that season), Greg probably did inherit that fortune. That sets him up for some grisly retribution, and if Coolidge has anything to do with it, his demise could come straight out of Fargo.
Over the weekend The Atlantic published a devastating profile of Chris Licht, who last year made the perhaps unwise decision to go from late night comedy to running the currently spiraling CNN. Its 15,000-word length is positively teeming with dirt, but there was one part that seemed like a positive: Back in 2020 he managed to drop 50 pounds through a combination of exercise and dieting. But it turns out that maybe that’s BS, too.
As per The Daily Mail, multiple sources have told the British rag that it wasn’t just extremely clean living that helped Licht shed pounds. It was also Ozempic, Hollywood’s favorite weight-loss drug. Indeed, one “close friend” of his blabbed that he was an early adopter.
“I heard about Ozempic from Chris,” the pal claimed. “When he was at Colbert he explained that he was a huge fan of it and he’d been using it to get his weight under control. This was back in 2021”
The source said they were “shocked” that Licht attributed the weight loss to a personal trainer and skipping meals. “Puh-lease,” they said, “he told me point blank he uses it.”
In the profile, Licht calls himself a “f*cking machine” for going from 226 pounds to 178. He went further than that: He charged that his CNN predecessor, ousted president Jeff Zucker, “couldn’t do this sh*t.”
“When he mocked the physicality of Jeff it was beyond hypocritical as he lost all of his weight on Ozempic. This was just so offensive,” said two senior staffers in a joint quote. They alleged that Licht had straight-up told them he was on the drug. “I was impressed that he was so open about it as he looks great.”
Upon reading the profile, they quipped that he’s “the Star Jones of CNN,” dragging him for claiming he used diet and exercise. “No sweetie you used a doctor.” They even said he “championed” the drug during editorial meetings.
“Our iconic brand tagline is ‘This is CNN,’ they said. “He should’ve just said ‘’This is Ozempic.’ instead of sh**tting all over Jeff Zucker.”
Vodka is maybe one of the most misunderstood spirits on the shelf these days. For years, decades even, every bartender and spirits “expert” in the West would tell you that vodka was a neutral spirit that was odorless and flavorless (this was never an issue in Central and Eastern Europe or Central Asia, by the way). The gospel was so ingrained in the U.S. that it bordered on a faith that blinded some from seeing what was right in front of them.
I always hated that “odorless/flavorless” descriptor. As someone whose baptism by vodka led me to take spirits seriously as a professional, I knew it wasn’t true. So I’ve spent my life looking for fellow travelers in the vodka world who knew that definition of vodka was pure bullshit. This led me to Ricky Miller, III.
Miller co-founded Carbonadi Vodka and has been spearheading a movement to not only make a killer vodka with a deep flavor profile but educate the average vodka drinker on how deeply flavored the spirit can be. Miller is the sort of champion that vodka needs. He cares deeply about the terroir, process, and presentation of vodka and is elevating the whole category by making one that absolutely slaps as an example.
Before we dive in, let’s get a little context. For years, the TTB (the trade bureau that defines U.S. spirits) classified vodka as a “neutral spirit without distinctive taste.” People took that to mean that a “neutral” spirit must be odorless and flavorless thanks to inaccurate and poor wording. First of all, “neutral spirits” are never flavorless, odorless, or “without distinctive taste.” All spirits are made with water, yeast, and sugar from grains, fruits, vegetables, or even dairy and always have flavors and odors.
Moreover, unaged whiskey is a “neutral spirit.” So is unaged brandy and rum and tequila. “Neutral” has never meant flavorless or odorless, it simply means it hasn’t been altered by other flavoring agents — like oak aging or a ton of other possibilities. Thinking that vodka is odorless and/or flavorless is wildly inaccurate since it’s impossible for it to be. The water, yeast, and sugar in the fermentation will always impart a wide range of flavors. And all of the multiple distillation or filtering processes that you hear some vodkas go through are meant to highlight specific flavors while muting others — but never removing all flavor.
Luckily, Miller knows all of this too, and was kind enough to jump on a call. We talked about making vodka in Italy, the official re-defining of vodka by the U.S. government, and how he likes to drink the good stuff. It’s a very educational conversation that’ll hopefully get you interested in drinking and enjoying the nuances of a great our of vodka. Let’s jump in!
Also Read: The Top Five Cocktail Recipes of the Last Six Months
Let’s start with the grain. Tell us how Carbonadi stands out from the jump.
We’re using organic Winter wheat. Everything’s grown and harvested in Piedmont in North Northwest Italy Right by the French and Swiss borders. So people obviously don’t associate vodka with Italy. But some of the best ingredients in the world are from Italy so it tracked for me to make my vodka there. Plus, I never lead with “organic” just because I’m not pushing it as an “organic product.” I’m really trying to elevate the category and that’s where Italy comes in. And I think I kind of have to be careful with what and how people get attached to the product. I want to push it as elevated Italian vodka and the bonus is that it’s organic too.
Where do the black diamonds come into play?
For some history, before they were called “black diamonds,” they were called “carbonado.” So at first, the vodka was called “Black Diamond Vodka.” But, it kind of came off as a little corny to me. I wanted people to focus more on the function of the carbonado rather than the vanity of the black diamonds. You know, if you Google “diamond-filtered vodka,” you get a bunch of cheesy options online. And usually, they only touch the diamonds and that’s it (for marketing speak) and I didn’t want to go that route. I wanted people to focus more on the science of it. And so we went with Carbonadi because I want people to, you know, really focus on the filtration part of it.
Tell me why the filtration is so important.
So we filter it through these stones — the black diamonds or carbonado — and what they’re doing is extracting impurities from the alcohol that common filtering cannot extract.
What does that mean to the average person though?
So all that really means in terms of the consumers is that it makes the vodka way cleaner than your average vodka. You don’t get that smack in the face of ethanol. And so it’s really mild in that sense and people love it.
But there’s more than just filtering that makes for a smooth vodka. Talk us through what happens to the spirit next.
After filtering, we “micro ox” it, which is infusing specific amounts of oxygen into the spirit. Without getting too technical, this process elongates the molecule so that it’s gliding across the tongue as opposed to poking and burning your senses. We’ve eliminated that as much as possible. I like to imagine it like, ‘Do you want a square wheel going across your tongue or do you want a round wheel going across it?’
So how does that present to the person actually drinking the vodka?
First, visually a glass of Carbonadi will coat the glass like a fine wine. It’s also pleasantly creamy and has a lot of body, the cleanliness and the texture are really what sets it apart. Then it comes through on the palette in the glass.
So let’s talk about the taste of Carbonadi. You have a combination of Italian ingredients, black diamond filtration, micro-oxygenation, and then proofing with Alpine water. What flavor notes are you going for?
For me, I’m not the guy on the machine working the stills. It’s all a taste thing for me. It’s an experience thing. So my distiller will give me like four different options and we’ll taste them, play with them, and then that’s how I’ll decide which distillate will become Carbonadi.
What I’m looking for is that you get more of those florals, herbal, and fruity things that come out of the yeast specifically. The Winter wheat is actually slightly sweeter than the typical wheat that’s often used.
For sure. I’d say you have a good balance of sharp yet sweet mint with a touch of creamy vanilla as the core-tasting touchstone.
I think you’re right, Zach. And look, when I was new to this game, I thought a lot of tasting notes were bullshit. It really just felt like they were all just marketing words like “buttery” and “creamy” because it sounded good but it has nothing to do with the spirit. But now I know better because something like “creamy” is what I’m actually producing in the flavor profile of this vodka, man.
Then when you’re talking about the mint part of it, I love that too. That’s a note that’s consistently being called out by people who are pretty sophisticated tasters and I can always find that too.
With brown spirits truly having a moment right now, what has been your biggest hurdle in getting people interested in vodka again?
I feel like with vodka right now, it’s a huge uphill battle, especially with knowledge. You know, the whole “neutral” thing, which we already touched on.
Also, I feel like part of the propaganda of both brandy and whiskey is that ‘if it’s not aged, it should be cheap.’ That is a huge misconception because the grain, the fermentation with yeast, the water, the whole process isn’t cheap, man. The distillation process, the filtering, the proofing like all of that costs the exact same amount of money in whiskey and brandy as it does in vodka. It’s the exact same process at the end of the day. I know we’re not aging our distillation, but the biggest expensive processes are done by then. So that makes it the biggest hurdle for the consumer in understanding our product — just helping people understand the price and the quality they’re getting for that amount of money.
One thing that I love that you’re doing is breaking down the idea that “neutral” means “odorless” and “tasteless” when talking about vodka. The idea that vodka doesn’t have any flavor notes is so wildly inaccurate.
You know, we talk to bartenders and they always talk about how vodka is an “odorless, tasteless, neutral spirit.” And I’m like, “No, we really have distinct characteristics in our spirit, and all spirits do.”
And then during the pandemic, the TTB (Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau) finally and very quietly changed the definition of vodka by removing the phrase “a spirit without a distinctive taste” which was such a dumb definition. I was like, “Man, fucking awesome!” That definition was the bane of my existence for so long.
Dude as a long-time vodka snob, it was mine too. It was a Sisyphean task convincing people of the beauty of nuanced vodka.
Same. I just thought it was a very archaic way of like to look at it. And it was just a poor word choice because neutral doesn’t mean flavorless. You know, when your cars are neutral, it’s still running.
Exactly. A white dog or moonshine is a neutral grain spirit that’s whiskey. So unaged whiskey is neutral and, obviously, people have a million tasting notes for that and would never call it odorless or tasteless even though it’s “neutral” — it was wildly stupid that vodka got pigeon-holed that way, man.
Yup. With my vodka, we’re still dealing with a yeast-driven grain product. There are going to be flavors in there, right? And I find that interesting in that you can sort of go multiple ways then because you have flavors that you can build up, build off of, that you can remove, or you can have flavors that you just enjoy.
So let’s wrap up by talking about how you actually like to drink your vodka.
If I’m at home and I have access to whatever I need, I keep it in the freezer and I drink it neat with anything citrus. That’s all I need.
Nice. Simple. Tasty. Something I try to tackle as well as using good ingredients when making cocktails. Like, you don’t want to use shitty wine when cooking food. It’ll taste like that shitty wine. No one wants that!
Exactly!
So, I like using great spirits for great cocktails. What’s your go-to when you do make a cocktail with Carbonadi?
So the signature martini is a Black Diamond Martini which is extra dry. A tiny amount of dry vermouth and the oils from the lemon peel — just very, very simple. I dig the lemon because, for me, it ties into the lemon culture in Italy. It just all makes sense to me and to the taste of the vodka.
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