It’s deserted out there.

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“She was a supermom, you know?”

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Havasu Falls is the ultimate Instagram flex for travelers, travel writers, travel influencers, photographers, celebrities, and models. The pale blue waters against the red rock cliffs have become a wildly popular backdrop of the travel world in the Instagram Age. Tourism is so important to Havasupai Nation that even though it’s not open in the winter, it accounts for 75 percent of all jobs.

Well much like Lennie Small and his rabbit in Of Mice and Men, the same avid travelers who forced Havasu to go to a lottery ticketing model were squeezing the falls and its traditional owners to a metaphorical death by not stopping their trips in the wake of a pandemic. This put an extremely at-risk community with severe and deeply rooted health issues in danger of an outbreak of the coronavirus — which was already raging around the world. If the virus were to take hold in the community, the results would be devastating.

So the Havasupai Nation took drastic measures and completely shut down their main source of revenue and stopped allowing backpackers onto their Nation and into the falls. They announced that the falls would close on March 16th and remain inaccessible for at least one month. Naturally, there were still travelers seeking that Instagram flex until the last minute on March 15th, even though the Havasupai were offering free rescheduling for permits, but the bigger question soon became: “what does one of America’s most remote and poorest communities do when it has to shut down its own revenue stream?”

Havasupai Nation is so remote that all food and medical supplies need to be either packed or helicoptered in. A one-month closure of the falls will result in a seven percent loss in revenue for Havasupai Nation, and that’s the best-case scenario.
To fight this economic downturn and isolation, Ethel Branch — a Diné attorney and leader — has set up a GoFundMe to financially support Havasupai. The fund aims to funnel money into the remote nation by helping them buy bulk food and medical supplies. In doing so, Branch is giving travelers the chance to pay back (and pay forward) the community that supported their epic adventures and beloved blue-water photos.

We can hear you ask, “isn’t the federal $2 trillion bail out going to help Indigenous nations across the country?” Yes and no. That package does include $1.03 billion of emergency funding for the Indian Health Service (IHS). That figure is basically one-half of what Indigenous nations asked for. Moreover, the IHS is already woefully underfunded. It should receive around $36.8 billion yearly to deal with regular medical issues facing America’s Indigenous people. In 2020, Congress only allotted the IHS $6 billion, underfunding the service drastically. So an additional $1 billion still means the IHS is working from a massive deficit to deal with day-to-day medical service. And that’s without a pandemic in play. If people start getting sick in Supai Village, that’s a whole new can of worms. (It’s also important to keep in mind that the money allotted to the IHS is meant to cover millions of people across 574 Indigenous nations.)

This GoFundMe is crucial to help the Havasupai Nation weather this viral storm. We at UPROXX — who named “Visiting Havasu Falls The Right Way” our #1 hot list experience of 2020 — believe that travelers, travel writers, models, and travel influencers owe a debt to this community. It’s time for us all to step up.

When Pusha T spat the bombshell revelation “You are hiding a child” on his corrosive Drake diss “The Story Of Adidon,” he effectively ended the war between the two rappers and prompted a new era of Dad Drake memes. Fans’ tendency to side with whichever side of a rap feud seems to have the upper hand finally turned against the once-invincible Torontonian star, making him the butt of the joke — and for once, he couldn’t spin it to take advantage. Now that Drake has finally shared a photo of the now toddler, those jokes have resurfaced along with the realization that he may have been justified in keeping his son a secret.

It didn’t take long for Pusha T to begin trending on Twitter after Drake posted the photo. While some users posted the lyrics from “The Story Of Adidon,” others seemed content to pronounce that Pusha T actually won the war, imagining his response to the photo, Drake’s response to Pusha’s diss track, and even Adonis’ potential response to hearing the song later in his life.

However, there were also plenty of fans whose jokes got downright mean, making fun of the toddler and prompting others to come to his defense.

As with any controversial viral moment, it seems that everyone has an opinion. However, it’s important to remember that there are actual people at the center of the polarized responses, with the current crisis affecting their family as much as anyone else’s. Now might be a good time to put compassion first.

The 1975 have been teasing the release of their record Notes On A Conditional Form for some time. The group’s fourth studio effort was originally slated for a February release, but the band’s vocalist Matty Healy has consistently announced delays. Healy formerly confirmed the album would see a debut at the end of April, but the band has once again pushed back its release. Now, Notes On A Conditional Form now finally has a firm release date and a full tracklist.

Healy said the record would debut in April, but in the months that followed, The 1975 decided to take a little more time. The band announced on social media that Notes On A Conditional Form will be released on May 22.

In an Instagram live session in January, Healy discussed the album and pinpointed a new release date. “We have been finishing our album, so we’ve been very busy,” Healy said. “It takes like three months or something to physically make a record on vinyl so it comes out on the 24th of April, I think. Sorry if that’s annoying or whatever.”

Check out the Notes On A Conditional Form album art and tracklist below.

1. “The 1975”
2. “People”
3. “The End (Music For Cars)”
4. “Frail State Of Mind”
5. “Streaming”
6. “The Birthday Party”
7. “Yeah I Know”
8. “Then Because She Goes”
9. “Jesus Christ 2005 God Bless America”
10. “Roadkill”
11. “Me & You Together Song”
12. “I Think There’s Something You Should Know”
13. “Nothing Revealed / Everything Denied”
14. “Tonight (I Wish I Was Your Boy)”
15. “Shiny Collarbone”
16. “If You’re Too Shy (Let Me Know)”
17. “Playing On My Mind”
18. “Having No Head”
19. “What Should I Say”
20. “Bagsy Not In Net”
21. “Don’t Worry”
22. “Guys”

Notes On A Conditional Form is out 5/22 via Dirty Hit. Pre-order it here.

The personalities in Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem, and Madness have become the most unlikely of celebrities, as millions of Netflix users have turned the seven-episode documentary series into the “most popular current TV show.” And as their profiles grow, people are beginning to realize that Carole Baskin, Joseph Allen Maldonado-Passage (Joe Exotic), and Mahamayavi Bhagavan Kevin Antle (Doc Antle) have been in our lives much longer than anyone realized. Does anyone in this photo look familiar to you?

That’s not Danzig feeding a tiger behind Britney Spears — it’s Doc Antle, who runs the Institute of Greatly Endangered and Rare Species (T.I.G.E.R.S) in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. He was on stage with the pop star during her memorable performance of “I’m a Slave 4 U” at the 2001 MTV Video Music Awards, the same ceremony that had Mark Wahlberg and DMX introducing Staind and “Lady Marmalade” winning Video of the Year over “Weapon of Choice,” which is nuts. But I digress. Here’s a behind-the-scenes look.

All these years, we’ve been focusing on the snake when a freaking tiger was right there. “There was also a tiger — an adult tiger — in that performance, and that was the big deal, even though it wasn’t featured as much in the show,” snake trainer Mike Hano told MTV in 2016. “Britney didn’t have to handle that thing like she did the snake, but in some ways, that was really a bigger deal for me.” In that same article, Antle revealed that the “rare golden tabby tiger” on stage with Britney has sadly since passed away.

You know who was also there? Carole. The Tiger King cast is like Forrest Gump.

(Via Huffington Post)

Nintendo apparently has big plans for the 35th anniversary of its most beloved character. According to reports, the Japanese video game company is planning a big celebration for Mario that will see some retro classics hit its latest console as well as some new games and even an animated movie.

According to UK gaming website Video Games Chronicle, Nintendo is going big for the 35th anniversary of the stout plumber’s first appearance, including new titles and a surge of “most” games in its Mario back catalog remastered for the Nintendo Switch.

Multiple sources have told VGC that the platform holder is planning to hold an event to coincide with this year’s anniversary, which marks 35 years since the start of the mainline Super Mario series in 1985.

As part of its anniversary celebrations, Nintendo will reveal plans to re-release most of Super Mario’s 35-year back catalogue this year, remastered for Nintendo Switch, VGC was told.

According to the report, the plans include Super Mario 64 from 1997, 2002’s Super Mario Sunshine and Super Mario Galaxy, which came out on the Wii console in 2007. There’s also word of a new version of Paper Mario and Super Mario World 3D. We know of at least one new Mario game coming soon which is set in the Lego universe and features building toys based on the series. That was revealed with a video earlier in the month.

The big news was apparently supposed to arrive at E3 in June, but with coronavirus canceling the expo Nintendo had to make other plans. The VGC report indicated that new anniversary plans could be made official when Nintendo speaks about its forthcoming partnership with Universal, which is supposed to include Super Nintendo World theme parks and, intriguingly, a new Super Mario animated movie.

This is all great news for Nintendo fans, and even more reason to buy a Switch these days. Just good luck finding one at retail price.

Angel Olsen released her stunning record All Mirrors as a culmination of a full decade in the music industry. While the record boasts an expansive production that diverts from Olsen’s former catalog, the singer still occasionally busts out her acoustic guitar to perform soulful covers on social media. Olsen recently put her own spin on the 1929 track “More Than You Know.” Now, Olsen has shared a soaring cover of Roxy Music’s “More Than This” from their 1982 debut record.

Roxy Music’s original version possesses brights synths and driving percussion. But Angel Olsen’s version only needs her impressive vocal range and an acoustic guitar. Sitting down in her living room, Olsen gently plucks the strings of her guitar while her voice smoothly climbs each octave. “It was fun for a while / There was no way of knowing / Like a dream in the night / Who can say where we’re going,” she belts.

Ahead of her cover, the singer discussed her plans to release an alternate version of All Mirrors. Expected to arrive this fall, Olsen plans to record each of her All Mirrors songs as an acoustic solo version. “[I] needed to separate these two records and release All Mirrors in its heaviest form,” she said. “It was impossible for me to deny how powerful and surprising the songs had become. The truth is that I may have never allowed this much sonic change in the first place had I not already made an account of the same songs in their purest form.”

Watch Olsen’s cover of Roxy Music’s “More Than This” above.

All Mirrors is out now via Jagjaguwar. Get it here.

When Snoop Dogg challenged Rhythm + Flow contestant (and eventual champion) D Smoke during the show’s first episode, the moment elicited chuckles from many of the live audience members, but may have confused viewers at home. At the conclusion of the three main judges’ comments about Smoke’s performance, Snoop coolly asked, “Where you from, homie?” When Smoke responded simply, “Inglewood,” Snoop repeated the question, weighting the words. Smoke’s response, though, remained unchanged and after a terse moment, Snoop broke out in a sly grin, prompting cheers from the crowd.

But, as D Smoke tells Talib Kweli on this week’s episode of People’s Party With Talib Kweli, he believes that there was more behind the moment than even those-in-know realized, breaking it down on multiple levels “for the cameras.” As Kweli jokes, it’s a very “LA” moment that shows how the city’s natives communicate in a way almost no one else does.

“I think before I said I was from Inglewood, I think he already wanted to ask,” Smoke explains. “And I think that speaks to the energy and the authenticity behind what I presented in my art, in my performance. Snoop didn’t ask anybody else that, which means he was moved in a different way. In his world, he’s familiar with that energy coming from that place.” He expands by saying that he’s such a combination of influences, that it’s easy to mistake him for being one thing or another, rather than all of them.

He does, however, have one further theory for why Snoop may have singled him out. “I think it was a line — I didn’t mean to look at Snoop — I think I looked at him when I was like, ‘If you don’t like it, then fight me / You gon’ meet the heel of my Nikes.’” Of course, Snoop showed love and the moment eventually became part of D-Smoke’s greatest hits on his way to winning the competition. Since then, D Smoke has released two projects, Inglewood High and Black Habits. Check out the full People’s Party interview above and D-Smoke’s greatest moments from Rhythm + Flow below.

People’s Party is a weekly interview show hosted by Talib Kweli with big-name guests exploring hip-hop, culture, and politics. Subscribe via Apple, Spotify, or YouTube.

Netflix’s Tiger King couldn’t possibly have landed at a time when people needed to watch Joe Exotic’s shenanigans more. We won’t talk about that very serious matter here — because let’s face it, it’s everywhere — but attempted murder-for-hire felon Joseph Maldonado-Passage has captured a ton of attention, years after freaking out John Oliver. Two weeks after the series’ release, Tiger King is Netflix’s most-watched title, and people want to know when there will be more Joe Exotic-related content.

The good news (?) is that there will be more Tiger King on the small screen. Kate McKinnon already signed on to portray Carole Baskins in a scripted series. However, there’s always room for more. Maybe something based upon the memoir that Joe Exotic is most certainly penning (or will enlist a ghostwriter for) in prison. Yes, a biopic. And actors are already lining up on Twitter to nominate themselves for the gig.

The first thespian in line? Dax Shepard, who believes that “[i]f I don’t get cast as Joe Exotic in the eventual biopic, Hollywood is broken.”

An unlikely rival soon stepped up. Edward Norton is totally ready to Hulk out over this one. “Um, step aside, pal,” the American History X star wrote. “You’re way too young and buff and you know it. You could probably pull off Maldonado still, actually. Wouldn’t that be fun?” Fun? That’s one word for it.

Dax considered this possibility before noticing an almost seamless-looking photoshop of his face on Joe Exotic’s body. Now, he’s all in.

Netflix soon weighed in, and they’re all for Dax taking the role. Wait, not so fast!

Dane Cook thinks he’s the man for the part (of course he does). Good luck, pal!

Soon enough, Twitter users began tossing out nominations. Nic Cage may have been preparing for this role with his whole wild career, but there’s also David Spade, Tom Lennon, and Danny McBride. Lots of qualified candidates.

May the strangest man win because, well, Joe Exotic himself definitely did not win. Barring a release on good behavior (or a pardon), he’ll remain behind bars for two more decades. And yes, Tiger King is currently streaming on Netflix.