Category: Worldwide

It looks like the rollout for Latto’s upcoming album, Sugar Honey Iced Tea, has begun in earnest. The Atlanta rapper released a new song, “Big Mama,” and its video, in which she and her sister Brooklyn book a flight to Miami, where they turn up at the club, twerk it out on a yacht, and cruise the streets in luxury cars. Latto said her new album is going to “wash” her old music, and we already see flashes of how she has been working on new approaches to familiar subjects in “Big Mama.”

The song puts the rapper’s duality on display, opening with a soft and sweet verse in which she gushes about her man before the beat turns hard and Latto gets boastful, putting down her enemies while still bragging about her boyfriend. Speaking of: she might never beat the “dating 21 Savage” allegations after basically employing his flow throughout the first half of “Big Mama” and flashing that tattoo, which peaks out from behind her “Big Mama” door knocker earrings in a closeup.

“Big Mama” follows the release of “Sunday Service” and its remix, which features Flo Milli and Megan Thee Stallion, suggesting that her album may be coming sooner than later. She revealed the album’s title during her recent Birthday Bash concert in her hometown, where she brought out a slew of local stars, including 21 Savage, Summer Walker, and Usher, who she helped through a performance of his hit “Superstar” when technical difficulties struck.

Watch Latto’s “Big Mama” video above.

For weeks, there was speculation that the Los Angeles Lakers would use the No. 55 pick in the 2024 NBA Draft to select Bronny James and pair him up with his father, LeBron. That ended up coming to fruition on Thursday night in the second round of the NBA Draft, as the team took the guard out of USC.

Whether or not Bronny makes it in the NBA remains to be seen — it’s worth mentioning that, for how unique his freshman year was with the Trojans, guys who get picked in the 50s rarely go on to be effective NBA players. Still, it’s essentially a free roll of the dice on a guy with legitimate NBA upside that also makes LeBron happy, so the Lakers were probably very happy to do this. And understandably, folks on Twitter made plenty of jokes about the selection, with one in particular gaining a ton of traction.

It’s an easy joke to make, and Savannah James seems like she found it pretty funny, too.

Here’s the fun twist in all of this: It turns out Twitter’s AI chatbot, Grok, got fooled into thinking something serious was going on. Grok, among other things, summarizes news on the platform based on what people post, but one of its issues is that it can have a hard time understanding when something is, you know, real. As such, this happened:

Safe to say, this technology still has some wrinkles that need to be ironed out.

Kristaps Porzingis ended up in Boston after a particularly strange NBA career. While he entered the league as one of the most exciting European prospects in recent memory — a gigantic, skilled big man who could stretch the floor and protect the rim — his tenure with the New York Knicks was filled with ups and downs before he was traded to the Dallas Mavericks, and signed a big extension. Things just flat out didn’t work out in Dallas, though, so he was salary dumped to the Washington Wizards, where he spent a year and a half rehabbing his career before joining the Boston Celtics in a deal where Boston netted two first-round picks, too.

Sometimes, NBA players follow weird paths to get to the mountaintop. Porzingis is one of the best examples of this — he started off on some truly awful Knicks teams, then his fit on the Mavs wasn’t nearly as smooth as it seemed. In Boston, he got put into a perfect role, one which accentuated what he does well.

The Celtics are not the first championship team to find a guy like that — another really good example of this, funny enough, came with last year’s champs, as the Denver Nuggets saw that Aaron Gordon was overextended as the guy in Orlando put him into a perfect role alongside Nikola Jokic. The NBA has had plenty of champions like this over the years, as identifying guys who are not in the right role and giving them a chance to play that role on their team can help get them over the top.

With the NBA’s free agency period beginning soon, we tried to identify guys who could stand to benefit from a smaller role on a team that would let them lean into what they do well.

Mikal Bridges

There may not have been a more miscast guy in the NBA than Bridges, who is a spectacular player that was overextended as the main guy in Brooklyn. It was especially hard to watch because we’ve seen what happens when Bridges is in a role that leans into the stuff he does well: catch-and-shoot threes, some occasional self-creation and playmaking for others, switchy perimeter defense where his length is used as an asset.

He was great for the Nets after the Phoenix Suns traded him for Kevin Durant, then did not look like the same guy this past season, which is ok. Now he’s on the Knicks, who traded five first round picks to complete their Villanova collection, in what appears to be an ideal fit for him to slide back into that role that made him such a valued player around the league. While the rest of the players on this list are waiting to find a potential new home, Bridges has that across the river in Manhattan where he’ll join Jalen Brunson, Julius Randle, OG Anunoby, and the rest to form what they hope will be a dominant force in the Eastern Conference. New York is hoping less is more for Bridges (similar to how Anunoby thrived last year after his arrival from Toronto), and they’re happy to pay to have guys that can thrive in a defined space rather than asking them to do more than they’ve shown to be comfortable doing.

Zach LaVine

By all accounts, LaVine’s stock is as low as ever right now. Between the insane amount of money he’s owed on his deal and his injury history, all the reports about the Bulls trying very hard to find a deal for him and coming up short make a ton of sense. He’s not a bad player by any stretch of the imagination, but last year was such a lost season for him that it’s understandable why teams would be leery of acquiring him. And with Alex Caruso now in Oklahoma City, one of the best pieces the Bulls had to sweeten the pot in a LaVine deal is now gone.

It is fair to say that LaVine as the guy your offense is built around just can’t happen anymore — even when he is 100 percent, his inability to consistently set up his teammates makes this a non-starter, while his defense is always going to be a weakness. Still, he’s such a dynamic scorer when he’s healthy that it’s not hard to imagine him doing well if he ends up as a second or third option on the right team — putting him on a team like Philadelphia, where everything will run through Tyrese Maxey and Joel Embiid on offense and the big man can clean up his mistakes on defense, would be reasonable, if they’d want to take on his salary.

Brandon Ingram

Kind of similar to LaVine — I think it’s pretty safe to say that Ingram as a No. 1 option, or Ingram as a 1A alongside Zion Williamson, is just not a winning formula at the highest level. Sure, New Orleans can (and will) win a bunch of games in the regular season, but we’ve seen that this group has a pretty apparent ceiling on it, and if the decision gets made to build entirely around Williamson and their collection of talented, two-way wings, suddenly Ingram doesn’t fit especially well, and would give them a trade chip as they build out their roster.

Still, as a scorer, Ingram would bring value to a team that needs a shot in the arm on offense, especially if they’re able to take advantage of his feel as a playmaker and can hide his deficiencies as a defendere. It’s a delicate balance to figure out, because you don’t want to over-correct for your need to get better on offense by really hurting your defense, but if you can strike that balance, Ingram is a good option — especially if he won’t get checked by an opposing team’s best perimeter defender, as he showed that guys like Lu Dort can really give him trouble this postseason. That hypothetical with the Sixers and LaVine makes sense here, too.

Jerami Grant

It’s been quite the journey for Grant. Going from a second-round pick who grinded away on the Process Sixers to a guy who has made nine figures in his basketball career and has a lot of money coming his way is legitimately very impressive. He also hasn’t played for a team that has won more than 33 games since his 1-year pit stop with the Denver Nuggets back in 2019-20. And while he’s owed a lot of money over the next three years (or four, if he opts into his player option in 2027-28), it’s more palatable considering how the cap will go up in that time.

Grant is a good player who has shouldered a ton of responsibility in Detroit and Portland over the last few years, and while that responsibility has turned him into a better player and got him a monster payday last offseason, he’d be a very smart acquisition for a team that wants to try someone in the Aaron Gordon archetype. Gordon is a more athletic and versatile defender, while Grant is a better shooter. For a team that can use reinforcements on the wing and a little more shooting out of their third option, Grant would be one heck of a pickup.

Kyle Kuzma

If a team is going to bet against the Wizards again, Kuzma seems like a pretty good guy for that. It’d make sense if they want to move him — Kuzma turns 29 in July, his contract descends each of the next three years, and he only has about $65 million left owed to him over that time. Maybe he likes life in D.C. and the team values him as a veteran who has won a ring, but he’s like Grant in that he’s grown to a point where he’s a good player asked to do a lot on a team that doesn’t win a bunch of games. In a sign of how ridiculously gigantic his role was on his team, Kuzma took the sixth most field goal attempts per 36 minutes in the NBA last season — only Luka Doncic, Jalen Brunson, Steph Curry, De’Aaron Fox, and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander took more.

Kuzma was a little better than he got credit for on the Lakers’ championship winning team — he embraced a role off the bench after putting up big numbers on bad teams to start his career, and while he probably won’t want to end up in a situation where he takes that small of a role, he’d be a nice third or fourth starter on a team that wants someone who can score a little and guard bigger wings. Like Grant, he’s not the same player archetype as Gordon, but in the right context he could be a very good 4-man for a contender.

Lauri Markkanen

The way Markkanen’s career has gone draws some parallels to Porzingis — a nice player who didn’t quite work out for the team that drafted him, a stop elsewhere before going to the team where he’s really blossomed. Would Utah actually want to trade him, or would the team view him as an important piece for whatever they are building around some of their younger dudes and whomever they bring in going forward? An important piece of the puzzle here: Markkanen is on an expiring deal, and he only makes $18 million before he hits unrestricted free agency next summer.

He’s been a very good player in Utah, earning an All-Star bid two seasons ago, but if there is one executive who you have to think would make a deal if the right one comes along, it’s Danny Ainge. Markkanen’s flaws defensively and as someone who doesn’t really create shots for others mean it’s hard to see him being the best player on a championship team, but his size, shooting, and rebounding mean it’s very easy to see him being a member of one. It’s hard to imagine a team with championship aspirations that he couldn’t help, particularly if they already have a really good core in place that he can help take to another level — I love the thought of him being the guy Oklahoma City cashes in some of its trade chips to acquire as a running mate for Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.

Mia Goth might sound like the name of a shady Sims character, but it belongs to a modern star turned scream queen. Over the past two years, Goth has positioned herself as the top horror-maker with X, Pearl and now MaXXXine. But for someone who has been steadily on the rise, it appears that Goth doesn’t really like her job…or maybe she’s just acting? It’s unclear.

While speaking with Time, Goth expressed her difficulty with acting. “The truth is, I hate acting. Acting is actually the hardest thing to do. It’s this elusive thing and you think you have it—it’s like trying to grip smoke.” Goth seems to like the elusiveness, however, as she added that the opportunities are not lost on her, “I love it so much.” So which is it? We may never know.

In MaXXXine, Goth stars as the titular adult film actress who bursts onto the Hollywood scene in ’80s LA. As she lands a leading role, Maxine must grapple with her tumultuous past. You know, all of the murder and whatnot.

Even with the real-life controversy surrounding the latest X installment, in which an extra accused Goth of bullying and intentionally kicking him, Goth says that she’s keeping her ego in check. “My sense of self is actually quite low,” she says. “I’m actually trying to build myself up a little more.” She should take Pearl’s acting advice!

Next up on her schedule will be starring in Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein alongside Jacob Elordi and Oscar Isaac. So…she must not hate acting that much, or else she could easily start that blueberry pancake cafe that she’s been chatting about.

(Via Time)

Jxdn flashes a warm smile when he greets me at his front door. He’s standing on a multi-colored “JXDN” entryway rug, which matters because he once abandoned his identity. But on this blue-skied, sunny May afternoon, Jxdn is proud. We had met the evening prior at Warner Music’s headquarters in downtown Los Angeles, and he had been dangerously dehydrated with a fever, which scared him because it presented an excuse to revert to self-destructive patterns. He’d anxiously paced, his head spinning with manic impulses, and wished he were in his bathtub. But he’d shown up to perform acoustic versions of “Sad October,” “You Needed Someone I Just Happened To Be There,” and “Just Let Go” from When The Music Stops, his sophomore album out now via DTA Records, because he cares more about music than comfort.

“It was so important that I went yesterday,” the 23-year-old artist born Jaden Hossler says. “I can’t just say sh*t anymore. I have to do it.”

Jxdn has worked hard to reconfigure his comfort zone. Two Junes ago, his foundation was shattered when Cooper Noriega, his best friend and biggest fan, died from an accidental overdose. Jxdn hid — what good was anything if he couldn’t have Coop? — and stopped listening to music. It was an inconceivably dark comedown from the euphoric highs he’d experienced after being hand-picked by Travis Barker as his first DTA Records signee, releasing his July 2021 debut Tell Me About Tomorrow (spawning pop-punk/rock hits “Angels & Demons” and “Better Off Dead”), opening on Machine Gun Kelly’s Tickets To My Downfall Tour, and headlining his first tour.

“I don’t want to be famous anymore,” Jxdn says. “I don’t want the extremes. I want the grey because that’s where the gold is. Nobody sits in the grey.”

On this afternoon, we’re sitting in the grey. His friends, including longtime manager Shannon Bayersdorfer and roommates Onyx Mayor and Quinton Griggs, huddle in the movie room. Jxdn’s brand-new Maltipoo puppy, Kurt — named after Kurt Cobain — darts around for scratches. Jxdn moved in two months ago after ending his high-profile relationship with Stassie Karanikalaou. In the past, he would have isolated and self-sabotaged, but it dawned on him he’s happiest when his home is full of people — people dedicated to changing the world through music, to be specific.

“Every breakup I’ve gone through has destroyed me,” he admits. “I really loved this girl. That was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. I hadn’t been spending time with people of my nature. At heart, I’m kind of a little rat. I felt a lot of inferiority with ex-my girlfriend and her friends because they are the biggest celebrities in the world. It’s nobody’s fault but mine, but I just had to change my environment. I would’ve been very happy with her, but I wouldn’t have been very happy with myself. I needed to marry music again.”

In the kitchen, Chef TJ unintentionally affirms Jxdn’s decision. “I was on FaceTime with one of my best friends in France last week,” TJ says while preparing a Southern feast that Jxdn and his friends will devour in two hours. “He has a daughter, and she was like, ‘I’m going to see that guy from California. His name is Jxdn.’ She showed me her ticket, and it was you.”

Jxdn is cautiously excited about his upcoming European promo trip for When The Music Stops: “I don’t like leaving my house, but I need to go talk to my fans. I’m an in-person person. I think that’s the best way people can at least try to understand what I’m trying to do.”

As such, Jxdn asks if he can play me a few in-progress songs. To watch him sing along and play air guitar with his eyes closed, as if nobody is in the room, is to instantly understand him. His all-consuming passion and aching transparency covers every square inch of When The Music Stops, a 17-track album encapsulating two years, nine genres, and infinite emotions.

“Coming out of the hardest time of my life, I was ready to give up completely,” Jxdn says. “I’ve been fighting to feel the way I feel for as long as I can remember, to the point where it broke me. I am willing to lose everything to do what I’m doing, but that is not the only option. I think that’s what people forget: We don’t have to lose everything to make things better.”

Jxdn only knows that because he lost everything.

Growing up, Jxdn moved 15 times. His adolescence was split between Texas and Chattanooga, Tennessee, with his two sisters. His parents were pastors. He was constantly exposed to new cities and peers, but he remained sheltered and severely depressed, surviving suicide attempts. “I was never opened up to the world,” he says. “I didn’t know you could have posters, didn’t know you could go to concerts. I would make friends, lose friends, and I was always trying to fit in.”

Jxdn’s chronic desire to fit in led him to TikTok in 2019 — earning money and millions of followers. He toured the United States, relocated to LA, and attended his first concert. At 18, he witnessed the late Juice WRLD perform “Empty” and knew music was where he belonged. He made up for lost time, squeezing the world for all it’s worth, with Noriega by his side. “I don’t want to discredit the other people in my life, but everybody knows that Cooper was my first genuine best friend,” he says.

After Noriega’s death, Jxdn crashed for eight weeks with Bayersdorfer, his manager since March 2020 whom he says “knows me better than anyone” and grieved Noriega.

“We always talked about dying, but it didn’t seem like it would actually happen,” Jxdn says. “I died when he died it. I started taking a lot of drugs, and my goal was not to kill myself, but also not to keep myself alive.”

On May 26, 2023, he performed at The Cumberland Hotel in London but was “spiraling, feeling incredibly manic and dissociated,” so he flew home early and checked into a 21-day treatment program in San Diego.

“I’m not an addict; I just suffer,” he says. “I was more interested in the escape of it all, but it turned into this weird obsession.”

Jxdn left San Diego sober but convinced he needed to get clean from himself. Soon thereafter, Jxdn called a meeting to sell his label on why he should rebrand as Jaden Hossler, the pop star, which he briefly did with the October 2023 single “Chrome Hearted.” Jxdn and Bayersdorfer hadn’t spoken in months. Barker had unfollowed Jxdn. Those who had been there through Noriega’s death feared they’d lost Jxdn. “After [the meeting], I got in the car, called his mom, and sobbed because I was looking at somebody I did not know and could tell he was running from the truth,” Bayersdorfer says.

The truth confronted Jxdn at When We Were Young Festival last October. Seeing “Jaden Hossler” on the screen behind him sprung loose what he’d been avoiding.

“All my numbers had fallen [online], and as much as I don’t care now, it affected me to go from getting a million likes on anything I posted — I would chop off my left hand to get rid of those videos — to no one congratulating you anymore,” Jxdn says. “I don’t know if I would be here if I hadn’t been embarrassed to look at myself. You can’t carry that sh*t with you when you’re trying to create beautiful things. You already have enough weight inside your head as an artist.”

A few weeks later, he traveled to Brazil and was met by fans who had gotten “JXDN” tattooed where he’d autographed their bodies during his trip to Brazil for Lollapalooza 2022, and it hit him. He’d ruined the most beautiful thing he’d ever created.

“[At Lollapalooza], we were with Taylor Hawkins the night before he died,” he continues. “That night, Dave Grohl looked at everyone, pointed at me, and said, ‘Yo, take care of that kid.’ That doesn’t just happen to people. Going back to Brazil, I already knew it was going to be special, but [it showed me] Jxdn isn’t me; it’s us.”

Upon returning home, Jxdn asked Barker to meet in person. He looked his mentor in the eye and said, “I f*cked up. I need you.” Barker, Blink-182’s iconic drummer, is keenly familiar with the confusion of young stardom and trauma of losing a best friend to overdose. Barker knew Jxdn’s epiphany was a matter of when, not if. Two years ago, they made “Sad October,” a melodic, raw confessional, and Barker told Jxdn, “This is you.” Like Noriega, Barker saw Jxdn before Jxdn saw himself.

After their reconciliation, Barker, Jxdn, and producer Andrew Goldstein hit the studio and rapidly crafted When The Music Stops. Barker executive produced and played drums. Jxdn missed his emo, punk, and rock roots, discovering bands like Deftones, Nirvana, The 1975, or The Strokes, and craved music intended to be enjoyed purely at shows. “I didn’t want to [chase] hits,” he says. Jxdn’s authenticity inspired Goldstein, who says, “He knows what he wants to say. It was a good reminder for me, like, ‘Oh, just being yourself is good enough.’”

Jxdn and Hunter Moreno, his close friend and photographer/videographer since 2021, shot 15 When The Music Stops visuals, and Moreno watched Jxdn slowly open up again in the process. Filming the video for “Drugs,” a gut-punch of an acoustic ballad, signaled to Jxdn, Moreno, and Bayersdorfer that “Cooper is everything, everywhere,” as Jxdn says. While organizing candles on set, they landed on exactly 28 candles without counting. Noriega’s birthday was June 28, and 28 was his favorite number.

“Years prior, I did this photoshoot with Cooper where I sat him in the middle of heart-shaped candles,” Moreno says. “It was this really beautiful photo that ended up being Jxdn’s cover art for [28 (Songs For Cooper)]. I put Jxdn in the middle of a heart surrounded by candles and let him sing this beautiful ballad. It was one take. The camera didn’t move. I cried like a little baby.”

Moreno adds, “I don’t think any of us will ever be the same, but he’s getting up every morning. I’m proud seeing the light turn back on in him. All he wants is for his music to be heard and to be felt, and he doesn’t care how many people it’s being felt by.”

Even if it’s an audience of one. Jxdn sings to Noriega on several songs, like “Drugs” (“I guess you’ll never know if I ever got help / Oh, the drugs don’t work anymore / Yeah, I’ve tried them all before”) and “When The Music Stops” (“Are you letting me know / That I should be letting you go?”)

Jxdn accepted that nobody could ever replace Noriega. With that, he realized that the best way to honor Noriega is to love others as much as Noriega loved him.

Three days before the album drops, Jxdn calls me from his backyard. He’s so overwhelmed by what he’s experienced since we sat together in his backyard that he doesn’t know where to start. Most recently, he opened for Blink-182 in Orlando and Miami.

“I came off stage and felt the history of it all,” he says. “I’ve never been ready to reach my full potential. My entire career so far was just the prequel. My actual career, who I am, starts now. I blocked Travis out after I got on that pop kick. I knew that he knew that that wasn’t me, and I knew he would tell me that. He saw the vision before everybody. What I’m doing right now is why he signed me four years ago.”

As full-circle as those Blink shows were, Jxdn was viscerally moved by his intimate When The Music Stops fan sessions at the end of May. In Paris, When The Music Stops rang through the corridors of The Louvre. In London, he met fans at a skatepark and beer garden. In Chicago, LA, Miami, and New York, he rented out theatres — no phones, masks on, just music. It felt like an extension of welcoming his friends into his home.

“We will have met somebody one time, and Jxdn will see them again and be like, ‘Hey, so good to see you again,’ and he genuinely means it,” Bayersdorfer says. “He remembers them because, with every interaction, he takes it to heart. Whether it’s for this album, the next one, or whenever that time comes, Jxdn is going to get his flowers because I know where his heart lies.”

If you ask Jxdn, he’s already getting his flowers because he’s learned what kind of flowers he values. “I need to feel the sun, listen to a new song, and see people and have that connection with people,” he says. “If I can have music, the sun, and people all together? Oh, man, nothing can beat that.”

He got all three in London. Jxdn sat criss-cross applesauce with 30 fans and noticed a few familiar faces from his mental break in London. Last May, he had walked to a nearby park to sit and smoke cigarettes. A group of fans recognized him and timidly approached.

“This kid taps me, and he’s like, ‘Hey, I don’t want a picture or anything, but is it cool if I just sit with you?’” Jxdn says. “He just wanted to sit with me, and so, we had a real human moment talking about our struggles. At this listening event, a year later, I saw the kid that came up and sat down with me, and I went up and gave him a hug. It was such an in-the-grey, mundane moment that I could never forget.”

Jxdn credits When The Music Stops with saving his life, and he refuses to waste it. In July, he’ll be happy to leave the house for his When The Music Stops Tour.

“One percent of me makes music; the other ninety-nine percent lives it,” Jxdn says. “Humans deserve to feel life again. I genuinely feel it’s a human right. It’s been taken out of our control by things in our pockets, TVs, computers, social media. I talk about taking off the goggles of habit, and music allows me to do that. When the music stops, God — the world — keeps singing. We are music.”

The Toronto Raptors shifted their focus towards the future last season, trading away Pascal Siakam and OG Anunoby to pave the way for Scottie Barnes to take a central role. In return, they brought in Bruce Brown, RJ Barrett, and Immanuel Quickley, along with draft capital, and the latter of those entered this summer as a restricted free agent. Quickley was a bright spot for Toronto after arriving from New York in the Anunoby deal, averaging 18.6 points and 6.8 assists per game, while hitting 39.5 percent of his threes, in 38 games with the Raptors.

Re-signing Quickley, who brings some needed pace, spacing, and shot creation to this Toronto roster, had to be a priority for the Raptors after they got a max deal with Scottie Barnes done. The question was how much would Quickley get, and we got that answer on Friday when word broke he was signing a 5-year, $175 million deal with the Raptors.

That is a handsome contract for a guy that was in a sixth man role a year ago, and it’s clear the Raptors view him as their long-term starting point guard. If he can continue growing into that role and maintain the kind of three-point percentage he shot a year ago, the Raptors might end up with some great value out of this deal. With Quickley and Barnes agreeing to new 5-year deals, Barrett and Jakob Poeltl under contract for three more years, and Gradey Dick entering the second year of his rookie deal, the Raptors hope they have the beginnings of a new core and that they’ll be able to skip the bottoming out process of rebuilding and get back to competing for a Play-In spot fairly soon.

Doechii has rapidly been developing a reputation for swapping genres like outfits in a music video. After making her mark with hip-house hits like “Persuasive” and straightforward Southern rap street bangers like “Universal Swamp Anthem,” she takes on Afroswing with her new single “Rocket.”

Part of Sprite’s Limelight series, which invites artists to give unique takes on a single “core hook” created by Take A Daytrip, the song is meant to highlight a moment from each artist’s life in which they’ve “prevailed over a moment of heat.” In Doechii’s case, she details a situationship that is going nowhere fast — hence the “Rocket” of the title, which she says she is debarking posthaste — and the video is set in the primary incubator for confusing, hormonal relationships: High school.

Decked out in a variety of Y2K mall ensembles and gymnastics gear, Doechii’s “Rocket” video depicts the camaraderie between girls and women that gets them through such situations. In the song’s press release, she says, “Music is so many things to me, to artists, to fans. It soothes you; it heals you; it can uplift you and drive you on when you need it most. That’s what compels me to be part of this project with Sprite Limelight – creating new music with different producers, different artists, for people to connect to and feel a part of. It’s special.”

Watch Doechii’s “Rocket” video above.

Apple TV+ is home to a wealth of stellar TV shows including crowd favorites like Severance and Slow Horses. However, do not sleep on the tech giant’s film offerings, including Oscar fare like Killers of the Flower Moon but also comedy flicks starring A-listers. Such is the case for The Instigators, which brings back Matt Damon with a Boston accent, and what more do you need?

Much more is on tap for the film, as it turns out. For starters, this is Road House remake director Doug Liman’s followup movie, so you can count on snappy one-liners and a barrel full of wit amid the laughs and action pieces. Do not forget also, that Liman previously directed Damon in The Bourne Identity, so Damon and Affleck weren’t the only parties coming home with this project. What else can we expect from the movie?

Plot

Matt Damon portrays Rory, a father looking to improve most facets of his life and who begrudgingly teams up with Casey Affleck’s ex-con, Cobby. Together, they’re going to steal the ill-gotten gains from a corrupt politician. Naturally, the situation goes sideways, and the pursuers end up being pursued. Where do they turn for help? Rory’s therapist (Hong Chau), of course, as one does. Surely, nothing else will go wrong with that kind of backup.

Of Damon’s character, Liman previously told the Associated Press, “You’ve never seen a character like this in a heist movie.” How so? “This is a guy who doesn’t speed. He’s done everything in his life sort of by the books and this is the first time he’s going to break the rules.”

Affleck co-wrote the script, for which he drew from a deep well of iconic buddy comedies and crime team-ups. As he told Entertainment Weekly, “The inspiration for this was definitely Midnight Run and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.” This was fully intentional, since Affleck has “wanted to do a buddy action comedy” for awhile.

From the Apple TV+ synopsis:

[W]hen the heist goes wrong, the two find themselves engulfed in a whirlwind of chaos, pursued not only by police but also by backward bureaucrats and vengeful crime bosses. Completely out of their depth, they convince Rory’s therapist to join their riotous getaway through the city, where they must put aside their differences and work together to evade capture — or worse.

Cast

In addition to the leading duo, this film co-stars Jack Harlow, Ron Perlman, Michael Stuhlbarg, Paul Walter Hauser, Ving Rhames, Alfred Molina, and Toby Jones.

Release Date

The Instigators streams on August 9.

Trailer

Let the Boston accents roll. Damon is loving it!

The Dallas Mavericks, fresh off of an appearance in the NBA Finals, are in a position where they need to tweak their roster to remain competitive in the Western Conference moving forward. One of the players who was widely viewed as available on the trade block was Tim Hardaway Jr., the microwave scorer who fell out of the team’s rotation on their run this postseason and has seemingly been dangled as an option on the trade market for years.

On Friday morning, Hardaway finally got dealt to the Detroit Pistons, which received three future second-round picks — one from Toronto in 2025, two in 2028 — for taking him on. In exchange, the Mavericks received an interesting young player in Quentin Grimes, who Detroit acquired from the New York Knicks last season.

Hardaway is about to enter the final year of his contract, which is worth a little more than $16 million. He’s coming off of a season where he averaged 14.4 points per game, appeared in 79 games for Dallas, and finished in ninth place in Sixth Man of the Year voting, so time will tell if Detroit is able to flip him down the road to a team that wants to take on an expiring contract and add someone who can score.

Grimes, the No. 25 overall pick in the 2021 NBA Draft, is in the final year of his rookie deal before he hits restricted free agency next summer. While he struggled mightily after the Pistons got him last year, the version of him that we saw in 2022-23 with the Knicks was the exact sort of role player you want next to Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving, as he’s a capable shooter (he hit 37.9 percent of his threes in 2.5 years in New York) who competes on the defensive end of the floor. Acquiring also frees up some room for Dallas to try and re-sign Derrick Jones Jr. in free agency.

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