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The most fun aspect of The Last Dance, ESPN’s 10-part docuseries about Michael Jordan that gave us all something to do in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, was the variety of stories about how insane of a competitor Jordan is, was, and forever will be. My personal favorite was his sheer disgust at Gary Payton’s suggestion that he guarded him well during the 1996 NBA Finals, with the anger he still has about Scottie Pippen having a migraine once coming in a strong second.

Anyway, I say that to say this: We have a new story about what happens when someone gets under Jordan’s skin, and my goodness, is it terrific. Marc Spears of ESPN’s The Undefeated shared the story of Makhtar N’Diaye, who played at the University of North Carolina alongside guys like Antawn Jamison and Vince Carter. The short version: N’Diaye thought it’d be fun to pretend he didn’t really know Jordan and say that one of his contemporaries, Hakeem Olajuwon, was the greatest player of all time.

You can probably guess how the rest of this goes, but basically, Jordan threw his workout clothes on and made life very difficult for that young man.

The story ends with Jordan reminding us that he does not forget things, something that got hammered home during The Last Dance but is fun to see in any Jordan story.

When Paramount+ announced they would be rebooting the popular Nickelodeon show iCarly, one member of the cast was missing from the list. Jennette McCurdy, who portrayed Carly’s best friend on the show, won’t be returning to the screen. McCurdy said that she was done with acting, something she had been doing since she was six, and her iCarly character Sam had also gotten the spin-off show Sam & Cat with Ariana Grande. But now, McCurdy says she was immensely jealous of Grande’s career at the time of their show.

McCurdy addressed her jealousy towards Grande on an episode of her Empty Inside podcast with special guest Mike Birbiglia. McCurdy detailed how Grande’s music career had taken off while they were still filming Sam & Cat‘s first season. There would even be instances that Grande had to miss filming in order to perform at awards shows:

“I was on a Nickelodeon show and initially I had been told, ‘Oh, it’s going to be your show.’ And then a couple week before hand they were like, ‘We’re going to make it a two-hander and your co-star is going to be Ariana Grande.’ I kind of knew her, she had been on another Nickelodeon show and I had seen her at events and things but I didn’t know her well. Then we started the show and her explosion to Ariana Grande fame happened during our first 20 episodes. She would have to miss work because she was pulled in all directions. She’s gotta do the radio shows, she’s gotta do Billboard Awards, the Grammys. She’s performing at the Grammys and I’m, like, acting on this show with a box because they decided for that week her character had to be trapped in a box so she can go perform at the Grammys.

Despite McCurdy’s jealousy at the time, she was finally able to overcome her negative feelings with the help of Birbiglia’s 2013 movie My Girlfriend’s Boyfriend. “I was like, ‘I deserve more.’ I didn’t even want to do music, like pop star things, so I don’t know why I was comparing myself to that person,” she said. “But seeing your movie was really helpful to process the bitterness and jealousy and wondering why is it there. It motivated me to work on myself more and work on getting to the bottom of why I’m comparing myself to this person, why being me not enough.”

Listen to McCurdy’s full Empty Inside podcast episode above.

Hard as it is to believe, heavy metal giants Metallica are celebrating 40(!) years together. To honor the occasion, the band have scheduled two shows in their hometown of San Francisco for later this year, on December 17 and 19, at the Chase Center. According to a press release, the shows will be “unique,” with two different set lists. Likewise, tickets will only be available to members of Metallica’s Fifth Member fan club.

The band, who released their last studio album, Hardwired… to Self-Destruct, in 2016, is also stretching their birthday celebration into a long weekend: in addition to the two shows, Metallica will be “curating other live music and comedy events, Blackened Whiskey tastings, and so much more all around the city during the long four-day weekend of celebrations starting on Thursday, December 16.”

Take note of the fine print, though: If you’re a Fifth member, you’ll be “invited to enter to win a reservation code that will guarantee them the opportunity to purchase tickets.” Should you win a reservation, which are chosen randomly, all of the relevant info will be emailed to you and you’ll “have the option to choose from two-day tickets to gain entry to both Metallica shows at the Chase Center or single day tickets for the show on either December 17 or December 19. Get more information here.

TMZ reports that a judge has dismissed a lawsuit against Cardi B for allegedly threatening a blogger after the blogger made disparaging comments about the rapper online. The blogger, Latasha K, filed the suit against Cardi in response to Cardi suing her for defamation over the comments, claiming that Cardi’s response prompted death threats from the rapper’s fans.

The judge said that Latasha failed to produce any evidence that [Cardi] herself threatened [Latasha] or made her believe that she was going to harm her. Instead, [Latasha] has only made allegations that others who may be associated with [Cardi] made these threats … and has failed to demonstrate here that the threats … were directed by [Cardi].”

Meanwhile, Complex detailed the tiff between the two media personalities, which began in 2019 when Cardi sued two bloggers, Latasha and Starmarie Ebony Jones, for making videos full of outlandish claims about Cardi. Among them were accusations of drug abuse they said would cause her daughter Kulture to be born with “intellectual disabilities.” Cardi gave both bloggers the opportunity to back down and remove the videos but when they refused, she sued them for defamation, warning them of the impending suit on social media.

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

It’s hard to think of another actor with a more unique skill set than Paul Giamatti.

Early in his career, he played a lot of voluble screamers, often villains — Pig Vomit in Private Parts, the bad guy in Big Fat Liar — perfect roles for an operatic shouter with a deft uvula like Giamatti. Of course, he’s equally good playing the put-upon everyman, a guy who’s maybe a little too persnickety for his own good. Not likeable, precisely, but certainly relatable, to the part of all of us that occasionally struggles with impostor syndrome.

The one-two punch of American Splendor in 2003 and Sideways in 2004 forever put away the notion that a character actor like Giamatti couldn’t carry a whole movie. He became, for a time, the face of quiet desperation. He’s more than that now, of course, but also still that.

In short, Giamatti is the kind of actor who seems like he can kind of do everything, barring physical limitations. I always like to ask character actors who they get confused for or what lines people shout at them, but Giamatti is that rare breed: the character actor who even your mom’s brunch friends mostly know by name. He’s Paul Giamatti! The guy from ‘Billions!’

Part of the reason it maybe seems like he can do everything is that he actually tries to. Ironically for a guy who so often plays the reticent and the meek, Giamatti’s inherent “gameness” is central to his persona. There isn’t a type of movie Paul Giamatti hasn’t been in.

This week he’s in Gunpowder Milkshake on Netflix, playing a shadowy (but square) functionary in an international crime syndicate. A hyper-stylized, graphic novel sort of movie, from Israeli director Navot Papushado, Gunpowder Milkshake feels a bit like a female Baby Driver meets John Wick, with a heavy dose of Shoot ‘Em Up — which Giamatti was also in. The role isn’t a huge departure for Giamatti (which, let’s be honest, would be hard to do at this point), but as he tells it, it’s the script itself more than the character he’ll play in it that draws him to a project these days. So, what was it that appealed to him about Gunpowder Milkshake?

“It was weird,” Giamatti told me. “I thought it had a weird sense of humor and I liked that about it.”

You get a lot of answers like this from Giamatti. Perfectly adequate responses to questions that nonetheless lack the usual soliloquizing you expect from actors at these things. They bolster his self-effacing, everyman quality.

It’s a quality that’s both undeniable and a curious thing for a guy like Giamatti to have, given his elite background. Giamatti’s father was the president of Yale, and later, briefly, the commissioner of Major League Baseball. His grandfather was the chairman of the Italian department at Mount Holyoke. Giamatti and his older brother, Marcus, both graduated from Yale’s drama school. Yet there he is, taking life as it comes and greeting compliments with a bemused shrug. Paul Giamatti contains multitudes. He speaks to the part of all of us that greets good news with a bit of suspicion.

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Do you still audition these days or do people have a good idea of what you can do already?

No, I haven’t. I haven’t auditioned, fortunately, for a long time.

What is the meeting process of you agreeing to be in a movie like this? Do you get a full script?

Sure. I’ll get the script. I’ll get something offered to me or, somebody who’s interested in me, they’ll give me the script. Sometimes I’ll talk to the director, sometimes I won’t. It’s different all the time. In this instance, I did end up talking to the director. I guess I just was interested to hear what he had to say. He was an interesting guy. I would have done it without even talking to him, but he wanted to talk to me I guess to make sure I was interested, but that’s generally how it goes. I got the script and I get an offer and I decide on a case-by-case thing.

What was it about this one that intrigued you?

I thought it was weird! I thought it had a weird sense of humor and I liked that about it. It reminded me of another action movie I did a long time ago, called Shoot ‘Em Up. Which was also really strange. I like action movies, but I like oddball ones like this. I mean, I like the John Wick movies, which are sort of odd too, but I think this is even more strange. I liked it.

That’s funny, I was just about to ask you about the Shoot ‘Em Up similarity. When you’ve been acting for this long and you’ve done so many different characters, is there a tendency to play a character as a version of something you’ve done before?

Yeah, sure. I suppose so. I mean, you just end up getting similar things.

Do you try to avoid that or does it matter to you at all?

I try to avoid it. It doesn’t super matter to me. A lot of the time it’s the story that interests me more than the character. Like what the guy’s going to do with it. I’ve gotten a pretty big variety of things over the years, so it’s okay with me. I’m a character actor. It’s inevitable that I’m going to end up playing similar kinds of things. But oftentimes, like with this, I just was like, I think the story is so interesting, I just want to be a part of the world. I almost didn’t care what I played.

When you talk about being a character actor, you’re super recognizable, but not necessarily pinned to a specific role. When people come up to you on the street, do you get a lot of like, “Hey, you’re that guy from that thing that I know”?

Oh yeah. I’ve gotten more and more people actually knowing who I am over the years, but that’s definitely been the case. People have more of an idea though now. I think doing the TV stuff I’ve done, people have more certainty about who I am, but for sure. I get a wide variety of things and I still definitely get people who are like, “Why do I know you? What have you been in?”

Have you ever tried to make amends with the Merlot industry?

I think many years ago they wanted me and Tom Church to do some kind of advertising campaign for them, but we chose not to do it. Apparently, I think the sales are back up. I don’t think they need my help anymore.

Have you noticed that you have become a reaction meme online?

I think I’ve heard about this. My son occasionally sends me things, but I’m a reaction meme in terms of how? Explain it. Because my son sends me things all the time, but I wouldn’t have known that I was a reaction meme necessarily.

It’s hard to describe. It’s sort of like they use your face at different premieres and whatever your facial expression is as a sort of bemused reaction.

So, I’ll look dismissive of something or I’ll look pissed off about something or I’ll look like… Like that kind of thing?

I think most often it’s like casually pleased for whatever reason.

Okay. I didn’t know. I wasn’t aware of that. My son has sent me enough. I mean, my son, what is he? He’s 20 now. But he’s sent me enough weird memes over the years, but I wasn’t aware of that specifically. Is that a good thing? Is that something I should be happy about?

It’s definitely not an insult. I would say for a character actor, it’s a compliment. It’s saying you have an expressive face, I think.

That’s true. Yes, I do. I definitely have an expressive face. All right. I’ll take it as a compliment.

On that note, you do have another Alexander Payne project coming up, don’t you?

Yes, I am. That’s correct. I’m shooting at the beginning of next year. I play a prep school history teacher in 1970. It’s a period thing in 1970, which actually has significance in the movie. It’s about him and the kid that he teaches. It’s a very nice script.

Do you have any prep school experience yourself?

Oh yeah. I went to one of those places. I wasn’t a boarding school student, but I went to one of them as a day student, so I have some familiarity.

What was that like? Was that where you got into acting?

I did sort of, kind of by accident I did. It was okay. I mean, those places are interesting. I don’t know what it’s like to actually live at those places. I can imagine that would be not necessarily very pleasant.

Were there people there that were boarders that you went to school with?

Oh sure. I knew tons of people who were boarding school students there. They’re intense. It’s like college for kids who aren’t supposed to be in college yet. I mean, I was meeting kids from New York City and stuff like that. They were all very sophisticated. They’re very intense environments.

Your father was a baseball commissioner and then you and your brother both went into acting. How did that happen?

Well, my father was only the baseball commissioner for a very short period of time. He only did that for about six months, but he was a teacher other than that. He taught at Yale University. I don’t know how we both got into it. My brother always wanted to be an actor all his life. Probably having my brother doing it got me more interested in it as I got older.

You guys went to Yale Drama School. Was that a familial tradition at all or was it just spur of the moment?

No, I think it was just a good school, so we ended up going there.

Are there roles that you wish that you’d gotten or that you turned down that you still kick yourself over?

No, I don’t think so. I don’t feel like I ever spend a whole lot of time worrying about or regretting something I couldn’t do. Well, now that I say that I did… It wasn’t that I turned it down. I got offered the opportunity to be in that David Lynch Twin Peaks, the one that he just did a few years ago. That I would’ve really wanted to do. He’s a director I would have really wanted to work with, but I couldn’t do it, so that was a disappointment.

You do some TV now in addition to your movies, do you think there’s a difference in doing TV versus movies these days?

Well, it’s a longer form thing, so it just takes a lot more focus and it takes a different kind of concentration. It’s trickier to do in some ways because it just goes on a lot longer. The limited series stuff feels like a movie. It’s pretty similar, but doing six years of a show is a different experience, definitely.

Does it still excite you in the same way? Playing the same character for so long, do you have to find ways to make it new in some way?

You do, but they also are pretty good at varying up these guys. On this particular show that I’m on [Billions], they’re pretty good at varying it, actually. I mean, I do definitely see some things on TV and wonder, how does somebody play like the police captain guy over and over again for seven, eight years on a Law and Order show? I don’t know how somebody does that. It must drive you crazy. This character I play on Billions has a lot of variety to him.

This movie, you likened it to Shoot ‘Em Up. Shoot ‘Em Up seemed more like a straight-up parody, where this isn’t. What do you think about the sense of realism in Gunpowder Milkshake?

I like how heightened it is. Even better than Shoot ‘Em Up did it though, you feel like you’re in this world that should be familiar to you from having read about it in a book or a comic book or something, but it’s not. The way he pulls that off is really cool. You’re put in this world where he’s not explaining to you all the backstory of this stuff, but you kind of feel like you know it. I like it a lot. It’s heightened, but the characters don’t feel thin and the story doesn’t feel thin. It feels really filled out somehow. That’s hard to do.

Is part of this you wanting Shoot ‘Em Up to have done better?

Ha, no, I just liked this too.

Do you think that that was in any way an influence on movies like John Wick that we’re seeing now?

I don’t know. You might be better placed to say that than I would. Somebody else I just had to do another interview with said the same thing and I was like, “Huh. I don’t know if it had that much of an influence. Maybe it did.” It certainly felt slightly different than a lot of other things at that time, so maybe it did have some lasting influence. It’s an odd movie. But you’re right, it’s much more of a direct, deliberate parody than this is.

I know your director in this is Israeli. Do you think that American directors are more married to realism in some way than non-American ones?

I suppose so. A lot of them seem to be. That may be true. Although the guy who did Shoot ‘Em Up is American, but he definitely wanted to just mock everything. He’s a strange guy. I suppose Americans traditionally have been a little bit more married to naturalism and realism.

Do other actors look at you for experience or as a mentor in any way now that you know you’ve been doing it for so long?

Not as far as I can tell, no. I don’t think so.

Shouldn’t they?

I don’t know. Should they? Just because I’m old and because I’m getting old and because I’ve been around? I don’t know.

No, I mean you’ve had a good career.

I don’t know what I would tell anybody. I don’t know what I’d have to say. I don’t think anybody’s looking to me for wisdom.

‘Gunpowder Milkshake’ hits Netflix July 14th. Vince Mancini is on Twitter. You can access his archive of reviews here.

The Velvet Underground have influenced generations of musician, and now the band’s original label home, Verve Records, is honoring the group with I’ll Be Your Mirror: A Tribute To The Velvet Underground And Nico. The tribute album is set to release on September 24, and it features contributions from an all-star roster that includes St. Vincent, Kurt Vile, King Princess, Michael Stipe, Matt Berninger, Sharon Van Etten, Angel Olsen, Courtney Barnett, and Fontaines DC, among others.

Vile says of his contribution to the album, a cover of “Run Run Run” that was shared today:

“I literally covered ‘Run Run Run’ when I was a kid. In my late teens with my band at the time. So it was pretty cosmic, let’s say. There is a direct connection to certain indie bands and beyond w/ the Velvets. That’s why the Velvets are a classic. You know it can have doo-wop in there and things like that, but it can also have this jagged noisy thing, and it immediately let me feel like I could do anything. The possibilities are endless. You’re completely free. Unapologetic and effortless.”

Listen to Vile’s rendition of “Run Run Run” above and find the I’ll Be Your Mirror tracklist below.

1. Michael Stipe — “Sunday Morning”
2. Matt Berninger — “I’m Waiting For The Man”
3. Sharon Van Etten — “Femme Fatale” Feat. Angel Olsen
4. Andrew Bird & Lucius — “Venus In Furs”
5. Kurt Vile & The Violators — “Run Run Run”
6. St. Vincent and Thomas Bartlett — “All Tomorrow’s Parties”
7. Thurston Moore — “Heroin” Feat. Bobby Gillespie
8. King Princess — “There She Goes Again”
9. Courtney Barnett — “I’ll Be Your Mirror”
10. Fontaines DC — “The Black Angel’s Death Song”
11. Iggy Pop & Matt Sweeney — “European Son”

I’ll Be Your Mirror: A Tribute To The Velvet Underground And Nico is out 9/24 via Verve Records. Pre-order it here.

Fans of microtransactions got a bit of good news on Wednesday morning, as 2K Sports announced that its signature sports game, NBA 2K22, will feature a trio of editions with three separate covers and five total cover athletes. Dallas Mavericks star Luka Doncic will get his first video game cover on the Standard Edition of the game.

The other two editions celebrate the anniversaries of the two primary professional basketball leagues in the United States. The WNBA, which is in the midst of its 25th anniversary season, will get a special edition of the game that features one of its biggest stars, Candace Parker, on the cover. Parker is the first WNBA player to make it onto the cover of an NBA 2K release.

The NBA, meanwhile, is on the verge of its 75th anniversary campaign, which is getting its own unique logo from the league. 2K Sports is getting in on the fun, too, with a special edition of the game that features a trio of legends — retired stars Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Dirk Nowitzki alongside Brooklyn Nets standout Kevin Durant — on its cover.

Dirk, unsurprisingly, decided to have some fun with the whole thing.

NBA 2K22 is slated to be released on Sept. 10, 2021.

Following his first voyage to (technically, the edge of) space, Richard Branson stopped by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert on Tuesday night where he gushed about the flight, but also defended it from detractors who aren’t exactly thrilled with the notion of billionaires funding spaceship joyrides. As a geek himself, Colbert understands the scientific implications of Branson’s space mission, but that didn’t stop the late night host from pressing the mogul for his thoughts on the criticism he’s been receiving.

“I see a lot of value in people going to space, but there’s been a lot of pushback from people out there saying, ‘Why spend your money to go do that?’” Colbert said. “What would you say to those people who say that this is a misuse of resources?”

“I think they’re not fully educated to what space does for Earth,” Branson responded before explaining the benefits of the space trip. Via Mediaite:

“It’s connecting the billions of people who are not connected — on telephones, on other things,” he added, noting that placing satellites in space allows people to monitor food distribution, the degradation of rainforests, and climate change.”

Two of Branson’s critics are Seth Meyer and Amy Poehler who roasted the Virgin mogul over on Late Night shortly after his interview with Colbert. Granted, the comedians had words for both Branson and Bezo launching a space race while “we have sh*t to do down here,” Meyers really went to town on Branson’s “space” flight.

“You didn’t go to outer space! You just went pretty high for a plane!” Meyers joked. “You went to outer sky! I mean, really!?! You’re the astronaut equivalent of driving by your ex’s house to see if the lights were on.”

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.

In the week leading up to the release of his latest, self-titled album, Vince Staples, Long Beach native Vince Staples appeared on Apple Music’s Radio 1 show to premiere the single “Are You With That?” for host Zane Lowe. In describing the record’s new, more mainstream-friendly sound, Vince said this: “I was just having a lot of conversations with a lot of people around me… and people always say, ‘Oh, you used to always say these stories and this and that, and I don’t notice much about these specific things. Why don’t you put it into the music?’ And it’ll be stuff that has been in songs for years. And then I realized the backdrop wasn’t right for certain things I was saying or vice versa.”

To translate: Civilians missed the pungent reality of Vince’s detailed storytelling and trenchant, hard-won observations because they couldn’t get past the admittedly sometimes bonkers beats he shared them over. Now, Vince Staples is way too good of a rapper with way too much authenticity behind his rhymes to be getting overlooked this way — a flag I’ve been waving since first hearing him tearing up Common’s “Kingdom” back in 2014 — so it was one of those problems that needed correction, despite being a much better problem to have than the ones he describes in his music.

Vince is currently at a place in his career where this approach makes all the sense in the world. I’ve had conversations about his music similar to the ones he described to Apple Music, where fans of all ages and affiliations would argue that they just couldn’t get past those alarming beats — even those who were inclined to see past his galling comments about the ‘90s being overrated or his profuse praise for Millennial whipping boys like Bow Wow and Ray J. Rap, for all the noise its greatest proponents make about the importance of lyrical innovation, is prefaced by the beats that rappers choose to rhyme on, making the production every bit as important as the bars themselves.

To that end, he’s recruited longtime friend and frequent collaborator Kenny Beats to recalibrate the abrasive soundscapes that scared away potential listeners who warily approached his music after finding that they loved his incorrigible online personality. Rather than the bombast of a “Blue Suede” or the mid-apocalyptic futurism of his work on Big Fish Theory, listeners are now confronted with the easygoing haze of “Are You With That?” The subject matter is no less harrowing but now, the spoonful of honey helps mask the flavor of the bitter medicine with which Vince laces each of his stony-eyed recollections — which even he sometimes seems to feel ambivalent about.

We saw a little bit of this with FM!, the bouncy collection of summery bangers from 2019 that saw Vince leaning a bit toward the territory of radio friendliness, but here, he finally wholeheartedly embraces the role of an artist — something he always claimed he wasn’t. Now that he sees value in sharing the sometimes grim stories that have made up his oeuvre in a more accessible fashion, Kenny’s beats make his responsibilities a much lighter lift. It’s easier to sink into the fatalism of “Sundown Town” when the song sounds almost like a PBR&B standard made for lounging on a lazy summer day.

Likewise, “Take Me Home” would be right at home on a YouTube lo-fi station, even with its sobering depiction of gangbanging activities and their deleterious effect on his relationships. And the mellow mood of the top-down cruising anthem “Taking Trips,” camouflages the paranoid tension sizzling just below the surface without undercutting it. Instead, chill-inducing lines like “Can’t even hit the beach without my heat, it’s in my trunks” hit harder because of the relaxed atmosphere — just like an outbreak of gunshots on a warm summer day, right when you least expect it.

Clocking in at a truly breezy 22 minutes and with two interludes among its 10 tracks, it’s an even quicker listen than FM! — yet, due to its comforting sonic palette, it feels more cozy than disappointing, prompting repeat playthroughs to try and catch the witty wordplay and cushy vibes of Kenny Beats’ production. Vince Staples is just one of two planned projects this year, marking an uptick in productivity for the young rapper and as functions as something of a checkpoint delineating the break between Vince Staples, the defiant upstart, and Vince Staples, the potential star.

Vince Staples is out now via Blacksmith Recordings/Motown Records. Get it here.

Tinashe looks like she’s having the time of her life in the video for “Bouncin,” a simple but exuberant affair in which she sticks to her strengths — namely, performing elaborate choreography as she flirts with her male co-star. In this video, the twist is the addition of some small trampolines for Tinashe and her dance team, which allow for some theme-appropriate moves that bring a new dimension to the usual kinetic direction of Tinashe’s visuals.

The video arrived just five days after the song premiered on New Music Friday, following a rollout strategy that has gotten rarer and rarer in the streaming era. It’s Tinashe’s second video of the year after the clip for “Pasadena” featuring Compton rapper Buddy and appears to be building up to her new, independently released fifth album, which fans believe will be titled 333 after Tinashe shared a teaser about the album on social media.

That speculation was reinforced by Tinashe’s announcement of the 333 Tour which will start in September and include 22 stops, concluding with a live stream on Moment House in late October. 333 will be Tinashashe’s first album since 2019’s Songs For You, which she also released independently after leaving RCA Records in 2018.

Watch Tinashe’s “Bouncin” video above.