Category: Worldwide

On Monday, Houston Rockets coach Stephen Silas met with the assembled media and confirmed that James Harden had yet to report to training camp as the team expected he would on Sunday, calling it “a setback.” This came after videos circled around social media of Harden once again out and about in a club in Las Vegas, and with his lingering trade request there were legitimate questions as to when he would join the team, questions Silas simply couldn’t answer.

On Tuesday, word emerged that Harden’s trade request, which to this point had been focused on Brooklyn, was being opened up to Philadelphia and other contenders, with Harden seemingly recognizing the need to cast a wider net if he wants to find a new home. Later in the afternoon, he apparently arrived at the Rockets facility to enter the NBA’s COVID-19 testing protocol and, finally, begin the process of joining the team for training camp, per ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski — although Stephen Silas still didn’t seem to know much about what it meant for Harden’s timetable.

What this means is that Harden can begin individual workouts at the team facility soon — something they anticipated happening late last week or this past weekend — and then join the team for full workouts once he’s cleared the appropriate number of negative tests. The Rockets open their preseason slate on Friday against the Bulls with two games in Chicago (the second on Sunday) and one would think Harden is unlikely to be available for Friday and probably not Sunday either. Their final two preseason games are at home against San Antonio on next Tuesday and Thursday, which seems like the target for Harden’s first action of the season, but that is of course all pending testing results and, you know, a trade happening or not.

If you’ve been anywhere near hip-hop in the past 25 years, you’ve seen the Hieroglyphics logo before. Guaranteed. You know, the deadpanned circular face with three dots for eyes and a straight line for the mouth? Maybe you don’t remember the first time you saw it, because it’s just been everywhere. On a hoodie in the Bay Area. On a hat in New York City. A sticker on a bathroom wall in Chicago or even on a pair of skate shoes in Brazil. It’s global. And it’s come to symbolize much more than the Oakland-based Hieroglyphics crew that it represents. It’s become one of the rare symbols of hip-hop culture and style.

But how did an independent hip-hop crew formed in 1991 develop a ubiquitous logo that’s towered over most other hip-hop iconography since and still keep it fresh in 2020? The answer lies in an unwavering ethos of independence from the nine-member crew and in a fundamental design concept: Keep it simple.

“I was hella into counter-culture. ’60s rock…hippie era sh*t and funk. I was into that cause I was born in the ’70s,” says Del The Funky Homosapien, the eclectic Hieroglyphics MC and the artist behind the logo’s original design. “I wanted something like the yellow smiley face, but the way I drew it, with the third eye in the middle and a line instead of a smile, it indicated that you’re concentrating or something. I’m into graphic design and I wanted something simple like that. I doodled it on a napkin.”

The logo became the mark of the Hieroglyphics (Hiero) crew which also includes the group Souls Of Mischief and appeared on all of their album covers. Between the two groups and their respective solo careers, the entire Hiero Imperium has produced undisputed hip-hop classics like Souls Of Mischief’s “93 ‘til Infinity”, Hiero’s “You Never Knew” and Del’s “Mistadobalina.” A part of the Bay Area hip-hop fabric, Hiero have stayed relevant on their golden age era stature and a steady stream of solo releases from the crew’s members. But above all, it’s the merch component predicated on the Hiero logo that has cemented their stylistic legacy.

In 1992 and 1993, the Plan B Skateboards company’s influential skate videos “Questionable” and “Virtual Reality” featured songs from Del and Souls Of Mischief. The rappers were soundtracking your little brother’s favorite Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater character, Rodney Mullen, flipping tricks that nobody had ever seen before and it flowed so well. Skaters started gravitating to the music and Hiero’s appeal was immediately beginning to transcend hip-hop circles. In short, the logo was gravitational.

“A lot of skaters, headbangers, and punk rockers started getting the tattoo or putting it on their skateboards representing,” says rapper Tajai of Souls Of Mischief. “So then it took on a different cultural significance, almost like a fight club. This counter-culture club where if you know about Hiero, you know and ‘I f*cks witchu.’ Like the masonry or something… And the people getting the tattoos were actually listening to the music, you see what I’m saying?”

Hiero seeped into the underground, where skaters and rap cats who consciously looked away from the mainstream were finding meaning in the logo. It was something that they could don on decks and shirts to simply show that they were looking for style and culture below the surface. And for many, it was an introduction to hip-hop.

Cryptically enough, the crew came to find out that if you remove the circle from the face, the three dots and single line look exactly like the Mayan numeral for eight. Del explained that Souls Of Mischief’s A-Plus showed him a book of ancient hieroglyphs after he created it and that’s when he first noticed it. Tajai says that the Mayan number 8 means “infinity and harmonious resonance” and that these tangential, coincidental meanings just added to the allure of the logo.

The Hiero logo merchandise has flourished non-stop across almost three decades. Shirts, hats, custom skateboards, beanies, lanyards, millions of stickers, men’s clothes, women’s clothes, baby clothes, all emblazoned with the Hiero logo. Of course, there’s even a Hiero mask available in the pandemic era. It’s available in every color combination you can think of. Bay Area sports teams crossover designs, limited edition runs, you name it. It’s become bigger than hip-hop. It’s become a hip-hop lifestyle brand.

“The Rolling Stones logo symbolizes rock, the Black Flag logo symbolizes punk and sh*t, you feel me?” Del says. “It’s definitely one of them types of logos. And I never had an idea that it would be [big] like this.”

“It’s huge. It’s our main thing,” Tajai adds. “It’s the main reason why we have money. Show money? There’s nine of us, you can’t do nine shows a day, but you can sell $1000 of merch every day. It’s become iconic; we’ve got fans worldwide and that’s the thing, kids might not be old enough to go to a show, but they can definitely wear a t-shirt.”

A couple of years ago, in an effort to be able to focus more on their music and less on the day-to-day operations of the merchandise, Hiero partnered with Oaklandish, a civic pride-focused retailer and designer in Oakland. A bastion of Bay Area style themselves, Oaklandish now produces and sells the full-line of Hiero merch.

Previously a vendor at the yearly Hiero Day festival in Oakland since 2014 and making the official shirt of the event, Oaklandish and Hiero shared a distinct history and each had unique footholds in Bay Area culture. Bringing the two Oakland institutions was a natural fit in that regard, and Oaklandish CEO & Creative Director Angela Tsay knew the power of what she was working with.

“There’s certain logos that are so simple and iconic,” Tsay says. “Even as a one-color design, you can immediately recognize them; for a split second in a video or someone walking down the street. That’s what makes the best logos, that instant recognizability and that it means something. You’ve seen it so many times, that it’s become a part of your life.”

Tsay says that Oaklandish has helped Hiero elevate the fabrics, added more custom made cuts and sew pieces to the line, and can ship orders out more efficiently. They did a Hiero fleece collection with major performance wear brand Champion and a New Era fitted hat that sold out in 24 hours. They’ll soon be rolling out a colorway of the Hiero fitted hat with new color combos every month for people to match their outfits to and Tajai says that even with a partner in the mix, the sales returns for the Hiero crew have increased.

“Those guys have proven that being independent can work,” Tsay says. “That you can still control your own destiny even in the midst of capitalism, and they’ve stayed true to that.”

Fans spazzed out hard when a Clubhouse chat spawned a rumor that a Verzuz battle between longtime rivals Foxy Brown and Lil Kim is imminent. However, the event’s founder/primary coordinator Swizz Beatz wants fans to hold their horses. Perhaps it was lost in the wash of excitement or maybe it was due to the rules of Twitter that only allow users to see a direct reply if they are following both accounts (that’s why tweets must start with a period if they use an @ handle first), but it didn’t seem too many folks saw Swizz’s reply to Bossip associate editor Jason Lee about the plans for the battle.

“No!!!!!” Swizz denied. “Not confirmed!!!”

Of course, even if fans had seen his tweet, they’d have probably only used it as a chance to harangue the veteran producer to make the rumor come true. If there’s one immutable rule of social media, it’s that once a fan theory has been adopted, they’ll run it into the ground until they make it happen (see: The Snyder Cut). Fans have plenty of reason to want to see Fox and Kim share the stage, though. It was previously unthinkable that Gucci Mane and Jeezy could be in the same room without violence, yet Verzuz reunited the beefing trap rap pioneers to perform their hit “So Icy” just last month.

Meanwhile, Foxy and Kim’s beef goes back even farther and includes fewer dead homies, so there’s even more investment in seeing them bury the hatchet — especially in an era where women in rap are helping each other more than ever and even Cardi B and Nicki Minaj seem prepared to reunite on a track. Whether we’ll actually get to see that long-awaited reconciliation is, per Swizz, still unconfirmed — but we can dream.

Despite the NFC East being, by far, the worst division in football, the Philadelphia Eagles still find themselves third in the division at 3-8-1, trailing both the Giants and the Football Team, who are both 5-7. It was a year that, in theory, should’ve shaken out for Philly to make the postseason as they were the only one with, theoretically, a proven commodity at quarterback after Dallas saw Dak Prescott go down for the year with a gruesome leg injury.

Dallas has been platooning backups, led by Andy Dalton, while the Football Team has turned to Alex Smith coming off two years away from football rehabbing his own nearly career-ending leg injury, and the Giants have won their last two games with, of all people Colt McCoy. The Eagles, meanwhile, have had Carson Wentz healthy all season, fresh off of a monster contract extension that will pay him $128 million over the next four years — with $66 million guaranteed at signing.

So far this season, Wentz has been a disaster, as his career has followed a truly bizarre trajectory of, at times, looking like an MVP candidate but this season looking totally rattled behind a shaky offensive line and not finding any consistency. That has led to Eagles fans begging Doug Pederson to turn to rookie second round pick Jalen Hurts, and they finally got their wish late in this weekend’s game against the Packers. While Hurts wasn’t perfect, his performance (and that of Wentz) was enough to lead the Eagles to finally, officially, make the change to hand Hurts the keys.

Hurts will now start against the Saints, with Wentz serving as his (highly paid) backup, and we’ll learn an awful lot about how ready the rookie is against the NFC’s top team and a pass rush that is downright nasty. The Eagles offensive line woes have been among the reasons some have advocated against the QB change, but at this point Philly has nothing to lose as a team as they have to rattle off a number of wins in a row to have a shot at the playoffs. As for Wentz, it remains to be seen what his future holds as he’s guaranteed $25 million next year and carries a ton of dead cap so Philly likely won’t want to release him outright (and his deal makes it incredibly unlikely to find a trade suitor), but if Hurts plays well down the stretch of the season his future seems like it won’t be with the Birds.

For the majority of her career, Taylor Swift’s music has been pretty safe for work and appropriate for people of all sensibilities. That remains mostly true today, although there is one moment on Folklore where kids might want to put on their earmuffs. On “Mad Woman,” she says “f*ck” for the first time in one of her songs, singing, “What do you sing on your drive home? / Do you see my face in the neighbor’s lawn? / Does she smile? / Or does she mouth, ‘F*ck you forever?’”

Studies have shown that swearing is good for you, and indeed, Taylor says dropping that F-bomb felt awesome. In a new Entertainment Weekly interview, she was asked how it felt, and she responded simply, “F*cking fantastic.”

She then elaborated:

“Every rule book was thrown out. I always had these rules in my head and one of them was, You haven’t done this before, so you can’t ever do this. ‘Well, you’ve never had an explicit sticker, so you can’t ever have an explicit sticker.’ But that was one of the times where I felt like you need to follow the language and you need to follow the storyline. And if the storyline and the language match up and you end up saying the F-word, just go for it. I wasn’t adhering to any of the guidelines that I had placed on myself. I decided to just make what I wanted to make. And I’m really happy that the fans were stoked about that because I think they could feel that. I’m not blaming anyone else for me restricting myself in the past. That was all, I guess, making what I want to make. I think my fans could feel that I opened the gate and ran out of the pasture for the first time, which I’m glad they picked up on because they’re very intuitive.”

Check out the full interview here and see where Folklore falls on our list of 2020’s best albums here.

Several notable indie rock artists joined together for charity recently. To raise money for Seattle Children’s Hospital, artists like Angel Olsen, Kim Gordon, and Fred Armisen were tapped to perform music for the annual benefit livestream SMooCH, which took place virtually this year. During the event, Death Cab For Cutie’s Ben Gibbard was joined by a Foo Fighters member and others to deliver a subdued cover of a country classic.

Gibbard united with Foo Fighters bassist Nate Mendel, Modest Mouse’s Isaac Brock, and Guns N’ Roses members Duff McKagan and Mark Lanegan for a jangly rendition of “Highwayman.” Each musician took turns delivering verses, combining their unique styles for a compelling cover Jimmy Webb’s iconic 1977 track.

The cover isn’t the only musical charity project that Gibbard has been involved in this year. Along with raising money for various organizations at the beginning of lockdown, Gibbard recently appeared on The Georgia EP, a benefit record featuring covers of TLC, R.E.M., and other prominent Georgian songwriters. Proceeds went directly to Fair Fight, an organization started by Stacy Abrams to combat voter suppression in states like Georgia and Texas.

Listen to the “Highwayman” cover above, around the 53-minute mark.

Death Cab For Cutie is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Olivia Jade has given her first interview since the college admissions scandal that infamously landed her parents, actress Lori Loughlin and fashion designer in Mossimo Giannulli, in prison. However, Jade was met some resistance when she reached out to Red Table Talk whose three female hosts [Jada Pinkett Smith, Willow Smith, and Adrienne Banfield-Norris (Gammy)] were divided over the optics of a letting a wealthy, privileged white girl use their show to restore her reputation after her parents essentially bribed her way into a college education that she didn’t even want or need.

“You know, I fought it tooth and nail,” Gammy stated right up front. “I just found it really ironic that she chose three Black women to reach out to for her redemption story. I feel like here we are, [a] white woman coming to Black women for support when we don’t get the same from them. It’s just, it’s bothersome to me on so many levels. Her being here is the epitome of white privilege to me.”

But despite Gammy’s objection, Jade was allowed to speak freely about her experience, which she openly admits was “messed up” and a “mistake.” She specifically regrets how she didn’t realize how the whole situation was wrong as it unfolded and tried to explain why she was a willing participant in the scandal. Via Red Table Talk:

“I was like, ‘Well, this is what everybody does and my parents worked really hard, and I don’t understand.’ But that’s not, that’s not how it should be and unfortunately that’s how it was. And I’m grateful for the situation to see that big change and that big difference in my own mind to know like, ‘Okay, Olivia, the fact that you were on YouTube and you were saying stuff like, ‘I don’t want to go to school, I just want to go party at school…’ Like, the fact that you even could say those things just shows how fortunate you were. That you didn’t have to worry about that. That you knew you were gonna be okay without it.’ And that sits with me and makes me cringe and it’s embarrassing that I ever said those types of things, and not only said them but edited it, uploaded it, and then saw the response to realize it was wrong. There was no like malicious intent behind it. I was never trying to hurt anybody or say those things to brag about my life, it was just — I was oblivious.”

While Jade voiced her concerns about her life going forward, Gammy brought the bluntness back. “You know, so there are some people who would feel like, ‘She’ll be fine.’” Pinkett Smith said, causing Gammy to jump in with, “I feel that way. Clearly. I feel like you will be fine.”

You can watch the full Red Table Talk interview with Olivia Jade below:

(Via Red Table Talk on Facebook)

JT‘s back after a relatively short hiatus from Twitter and she’s got a message for fans who called out her outrageous posts on the site. The City Girls member deleted her account when fans started resurfacing old tweets in which she mocked musical stars — some of whom are now her labelmates — and expressed racist views. After taking a day to collect herself, JT’s account popped back up with a tweet simply reading, “Hi.” However, the real message was hidden in her profile picture, which astute fans recognized as a screenshot from a viral video from 2016 — the year after many of her scandalous tweets were made.

In the video, a man sings what CNN described as an “Adele-inspired apology” to the judge. Unfortunately, his apology didn’t quite have the desired effect; he was sentenced to 17 years in prison for multiple felony charges. JT, no stranger to the justice system herself, probably isn’t trying to make light of the man’s performance but rather seems to be giving a sarcastic apology to those who brought back her old tweets.

However, JT hasn’t deleted the offending tweets — likely because she knows the screenshots have already been captured and are never going away. While some fans might have liked a more sincere apology from the Miami rapper, it looks like she’s more interested in keeping the past In the past and enjoying her current success. Besides, those tweets aren’t even the most embarrassing thing to happen to her this month.

The 2020 college football season has been defined by the unusual due to its happening amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, the season has taken its most unusual of turns, as perhaps the sport’s greatest rivalry game will not be played for the first time since 1917.

According to a statement released by the University of Michigan, this weekend’s matchup against Ohio State will not be played due to an uptick of COVID-19 cases in Ann Arbor. It marks the second weekend in a row that the Wolverines will not be able to take the field due to the internal spread of the pandemic, as the team’s game against Maryland last week was also canceled.

In a statement, Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel called this “disappointing for our team and coaches,” but stressed that the university’s No. 1 priority is making sure everyone is able to remain healthy. The statement also clarified that Michigan intends on playing as soon as it is cleared by health officials.

The Buckeyes had previously won eight games in a row in this series, including a 56-27 victory over the Wolverines last weekend. This year, Michigan was set to travel to Columbus to take on fourth-ranked Ohio State, and it is unclear if the Buckeyes will canvas the college football landscape with the hopes of finding a replacement game to help bolster its resume for the College Football Playoff selection committee. In an added twist, this should mean that the Buckeyes are ineligible for the Big Ten Championship Game next weekend, as the conference’s guidelines state that teams must play five games in order to participate, but there have been rumblings that this rule could be changed. If not, the Indiana Hoosiers would earn the distinction of participating in the game.

King Von might be gone but his work lives on. In the bone-chilling video for “Wayne’s Story” — shot before Von’s death — the late Chicago rapper details a mutually destructive cycle of violence that has even more weight, considering how he died himself. The song, which comes from Von’s final album, Welcome To O’Block, finds Von telling the story of “Shorty,” a young friend from the block, and his downward spiral into a life of crime. Unfortunately, the first one to pay the price is Shorty’s cousin, who dies as a result of his actions.

The true tragedy, both of the song and of Von’s life, is that neither Von nor his semi-fictional subject can see how they contribute to their own destruction. Or maybe they can, but they both feel stuck as if there’s no other choice. Shorty’s story is yet to be concluded by the end of the video but in real life, there is no “to be continued…” for Von.

In the weeks since his death in Atlanta, Von has been memorialized, both by the actions of his peers and admirers and by musical appearances with collaborators like Fivio Foreign. His album, Welcome To O’Block, re-entered the Billboard 200 and charted within the top 10.

Watch the “Wayne’s Story” video above.