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A few months after Kaytranada and Aminé joined forces to release their first self-titled album together as Kaytraminé, the duo now have some other fun plans in store for their fans. They will be hitting the road across North America this fall to play a handful of shows in major cities and showcase their latest tunes.

While Kaytranada brought Aminé out during his weekend one Coachella set, the two haven’t played together since. And, considering the record boasts a ton of features, including Big Sean, Freddie Gibbs, Pharrell Williams, and Snoop Dogg, we can only hope that they might have some special surprise guests in store for the tour.

“It has some of the best Kay beats that he’s ever made, and some of the best singing and rapping I’ve ever done,” Aminé told W Magazine upon the release. “It really leveled up my artistic capabilities.”

“‘4EVA’ is one of the dance songs on the album, and people expect it’s going to go in that direction, but it’s completely the opposite,” Kaytranada added. “They are really going to experience my versatility as a producer.”

Tickets for the tour are available starting this Friday at 10 a.m. local time for each city. Find additional information here, and a complete list of dates below.

09/07 — Montréal, Quebec @ Off Piknic
09/09 — Portland, Oregon @ McMenamins Edgefield
09/12 — Chicago, Illinois @ The Salt Shed
09/14 — New York, New York @ The Brooklyn Mirage
09/16 — Los Angeles, California @ Greek Theatre

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.

There’s been a lot of talk of late about “Album of the Summer” — a lot more than usual. Perhaps it’s a function of the dark times we’re living through, but most folks just seem more eager than ever to designate a work of art as thee definitive escape from the drudgery and chaos of everyday life. I could write a whole other essay on why this way of approaching art is not just inane but futile, but instead, I want to draw your attention to a project that has all the hallmarks of an “Album of the Summer” that you might have missed.

I’ve written before about Kota The Friend, the Brooklynite hip-hop traditionalist whose music veers less aspirational than inspirational. And you might have seen that he had a new album out and, perhaps expecting more of the same, kept scrolling by since the sort of music he usually makes is not your cup of tea. That’s understandable, but here’s the thing: Protea, Kota’s latest album, is not the sort of music he usually makes. Riding the wave of joyful, uptempo dancefloor-filling tunes that has overtaken hip-hop lately, Protea not only presents a fresh take on those sounds but also perhaps the best version of them of the year to date.

You’re probably aware of the sort of sounds I’m talking about. Spurred by the ongoing Black reclamation of dance music that was accelerated by Drake and Beyoncé with their much-lauded projects last year, more entertainers in hip-hop and R&B than ever have embraced the booty-moving (and soul-sustaining) grooves of latent Black genres like house, funk, and jazz, updating and fusing them in new and exciting modes with more contemporary rap and soul.

The results have been crowd-pleasing fare like Aminé and Kaytranada’s joint project, Kaytraminé, which was awash in tropical sounds and poolside aesthetics, much like the funk-hop of Ric Wilson’s Clusterfunk. We’ve also seen Coi Leray embrace the exuberant energy of jock jams with her self-titled sophomore album, and even Lil Uzi Vert dabbled in Eurohouse alongside Nicki Minaj on “Endless Fashion” from his new album Pink Tape. And then, there’s the continued dominance of Beyoncé’s Renaissance, particularly tracks that combine genres, like “Virgo’s Groove” and “Plastic Off The Sofa.”

This is the climate into which Kota introduces Protea, which opens with the declaration, “I wanna hear love songs. Don’t wanna hear no more sad songs… What about the good times? What about love?” You really have to love an album that puts its thesis right out front; there are no heady metaphors to wade through here. Kota tells you what the album is, and with that out of the way, proceeds straight to the ecstatic two-step of “Super 8”: “Let’s have it all,” he semi-croons on the chorus. Kota wants to shake off the blues and invites listeners to join him in doing so.

There are certainly plenty of blues worth shaking off. Dotted throughout the 16-track set are interludes of Kota in conversation with his wife in which they refreshingly excavate the highs and lows of their relationship. It’s like a therapy practice but without the ostentatious jargon or obvious staging that so often accompanies mental health discussion within the genre. Meanwhile, there’s consistency between the theme and the lyrics, another area in which hip-hop consistently tends to come up short in recent years.

Even on the sole scuffing, hip-shaking nu-disco take “Barcelona,” Kota raps about overcoming tribulations and sharing his successes with the people he loves most. I hate to say it, but this is the album Chance The Rapper was trying to make with The Big Day, capturing the exuberance and optimism of newlywed life — it’s a take on Chance’s “I love my wife, EUGH!” music that remains focused on the feeling instead of The Big Day‘s didactic approach to its “find a good one and settle down, my brother” messaging.

The thing about Protea that makes it so much fun is its commitment to presenting the good vibes in such a way that it feels freeform and engaging — bursts of saxophone and joyous belting from its who’s-who of guest vocalists give it the underpinnings of a jazz jam session, but the four-on-the-floor beats and disco strings keep the mood lively. You could throw this on at a party or nightclub and let it play from end to end (save the interludes, of course) and no one would ever stop dancing.

So when Kota chants “They gon’ try to bring you down” on “Forget About It,” he captures the same spirit of rebellious intent behind early house that made Beyoncé’s “Break My Soul” such a revelation, particularly when the hook switches the focus to the positives of life while maintaining the refrain. This is music made for forgetting your problems, if only for the moment; the defiance in its message of uplift is sublimated within the music itself, making the jazzy keys and snaking basslines a stealth delivery system for words of love, affirmation, and resistance.

Like the summer itself, Protea is a break from the routines, it’s the splash of sunshine cascading through the window to remind us that there is more beyond the office, the struggle, the anxiety and depression of our modern times. It’s the knowledge that today brings at least one good thing, the hope that tomorrow can be better, and the beach of better days is waiting.

Protea is out now on FLTBYS Music and Venice Music.

With the 2023 Emmy nominations out in the wild, TV fans are having strong reactions to two performances who they feel were egregiously snubbed: Elizabeth Olsen in Love & Death and Paddy Considine in House of the Dragon.

Starting with Olsen, fans were not pleased to see that the actress wasn’t recognized for her performance as real-life alleged ax murder Candy Montgomery in the HBO Max limited series Love & Death. Ironically, her co-star Jesse Plemons was nominated for Emmy, which only further sparked the fan furor as social media filled with Scarlet Witch gifs and Jennifer Lawrence on Hot Ones clips.

You can see some of the Elizabeth Olsen reactions below:

As for Considine, the actor was snubbed for his portrayal of King Viserys on the wildly popular Game of Thrones prequel series House of the Dragon. However, unlike Olsen, Considine’s co-stars were also snubbed for nominations as their fellow HBO brethren on Succession and The White Lotus dominated the drama categories. The series will just have to settle for pulling in record ratings, we guess.

Nevertheless, House of the Dragon fans were not pleased at seeing Considine’s hard work go unrecognized by the Emmys, and folks let their feelings fly on Twitter.

You can see some of the Paddy Considine reactions below:

House of the Dragon and Love & Death are available for streaming on Max.

Over the years, fans of One Direction have wondered what exactly went wrong in the boyband. Follow Zayn Malik‘s departure in 2015, rumors began to circulate that there were beefs within the group. In a recent appearance on the Call Her Daddy podcast, Zayn explained what went down.

While he doesn’t get into specifics too much, Zayn revealed that constantly being lumped together proved draining for him.

“There were obviously underlying issues,” he continued. “Like within our friendships, too. We’ve been together every day for five years, and we got sick of each other, if I’m being completely honest. So we were close.”

He also revealed that stardom became overwhelming. Especially as there was more “visual evidence” of the One Direction phenomenon.

“We started to get a fan base and an audience and you could see that people were paying an interest in us,” he said. “From that point on, it was kind of a bit crazy.”

Zayn dropped his third album, Nobody Is Listening in January of 2021, which was his last album under RCA.

He recently signed a deal with Mercury Records, and will release his new single, “Love Like This,” next Friday, July 21.

You can see a clip of Zayn’s episode of Call Her Daddy above.

The recently announced nominations for the upcoming 75th annual Primetime Emmy Awards include a very big name from the music world that is rarely associated with TV. Jay-Z, who prefers to operate from behind the scenes rather than in front of the camera, is nominated for Outstanding Directing For A Variety Special for The Apple Music Super Bowl LVII Halftime Show Starring Rihanna alongside Hamish Hamilton. The special is also nominated for Outstanding Production Design For A Variety Special, Outstanding Music Direction, Outstanding Variety Special (Live), and Outstanding Technical Direction and Camerawork For A Special.

The other nominees Jay finds himself up against include Paul Miller for Carol Burnett: 90 Years Of Laughter + Love, Joel Gallen for Chris Rock: Selective Outrage, Glenn Weiss for the Oscars, and Linda Mendoza for Wanda Sykes: I’m An Entertainer. It’s Jay’s second nomination for an Emmy; he was nominated as Outstanding Executive Producer/Performer in 2015 for the HBO concert film, Beyonce And JAY Z On The Run.

Rihanna’s Super Bowl Halftime Show was incredibly successful, reportedly bringing in more viewers than the game itself. The show was notable for revealing Rihanna’s second pregnancy.

The Emmys were originally planned for September 18, but with the ongoing WGA strike — and the impending strike by the SAG — that date will most likely change.

Marjorie Taylor Greene continued to flex her political muscles this week by making a series of demands that will never happen. The Georgia congresswoman is reportedly calling for President Joe Biden to get tested for cocaine because, apparently, there’s still hay to be made out of narcotics being found in the White House over the holiday weekend.

“In the real world, employees have to take drug tests,” Greene recently tweeted on Monday. “And remember how you had to take a COVID test in order to do anything? The entire Biden family, especially Hunter and Joe, need to take a drug test, including all staff to screen for cocaine.”

Citing necessary efforts to stem the COVID pandemic as some sort of crime against humanity, Greene doubled down on her demand for Biden’s entire family to be tested for coke.

“If we all had to have a giant Q tip shoved up our nose to test for COVID constantly, even when we weren’t sick, then the entire Biden White House and family need to take a drug test!!” Greene ranted.

Not content with demanding Biden take a drug test, Greene introduced an amendment that would force the United States to pull out of NATO despite the defense treaty being an effective deterrent to Russia‘s invasion of Ukraine.

Via The Independent:

“They are not a reliable partner whose defense spending should be paid for by American citizens. For the better part of the last decade, Germany has contributed only around one per cent of its GDP to finance Nato obligations while the United States is paying around four per cent of our GDP to defend Nato countries,” Ms Greene said in announcing the amendment.

She added that the US “has been financing and promising to defend Nato countries for decades and paying more than its fair share.”

To Greene’s credit, she also made outrageous demands to members of her own party. The Georgia congresswoman has refused to take calls from the House Freedom Caucus that would officially inform her that she’s been voted out of the caucus. However, she recently told members that she is open to a meeting, but only on the House floor where everyone can see it.

According to Raw Story, the Freedom Caucus’ reaction to Greene’s request got straight to the point: “Doesn’t make any sense.”

(Via Newsweek, The Independent, Raw Story)

After some cryptic teasers earlier this week, Haim announced that they’ll be honoring the tenth anniversary of their 2013 debut album, Days Are Gone, in a very special way.

They will be releasing a special anniversary reissue of the record, notably on a green two-disc vinyl pressing. The first will be the regular album; the second will have bonus tracks and remixes, according to a press release.

While a tracklist for this is still TBD, fans can expect it to drop later this fall — and likely more information to arrive before then.

Additionally, Haim announced an extra show at Los Angeles’ The Bellweather will be held on July 19, where they will perform the album in full. Tickets go on sale this Friday, with more information available here. (Buzzy Lee will open as support, along with the band’s two earlier regular dates at the same venue.)

At the time of the original release of Haim’s Days Are Gone, the album reached No. 1 in the UK charts and No. 6 on the Billboard 200 in the US. The immensely popular trio have since dropped two more albums and will be supporting their friend, Taylor Swift, on The Eras Tour throughout this summer.

Fans in the UK can also catch the group at London’s All Points East festival next month.

Find more information on the Days Are Gone reissue here.

The NBA’s Board of Governors passed a pair of rule changes on Tuesday designed to address flopping and the number of challenges that a coach can use. After it was previously announced that the league would put the rule changes in front of the Board last month, the decision was made to adopt an in-game flopping penalty for the next year, while coaches will receive a second challenge in the event their first one is successful.

While the league will keep the fines that have been in place for players who greatly embellish calls, the new rules will add a non-unsportsmanlike technical foul call that goes against the offending player’s team. This would allow the opposing team to shoot a free throw, although there would not be an automatic change in possession. Additionally, while flopping violations aren’t able to be addressed by a coach’s challenge, the referees can add it if they notice a flop while reviewing a different play, and can wait until there’s a stop within the game to make a call instead of immediately interrupting a play.

As for the additional coach’s challenge, the league had to slightly change how timeouts are addressed within the new rule. Currently, if a team wins its only challenge, it gets to keep the timeout that it called to trigger a review. While that will remain the case going forward, the team will lose its timeout no matter the outcome of a second challenge.

You have probably heard about those dastardly orcas that keep tanking ships near Spain and Portugal, possibly out of revenge, in addition to a killer whale sinking a yacht. Experts have theorized that the orcas, which are an intelligent species, are feeling the pain from mankind as an endangered species.

As well, there’s no way that you’ve forgotten the recent Titanic submersible disaster, in which the ocean literally crushed five Oceangate tourists, including a 19-year-old who didn’t even want to be there. Some people (myself included) wonder if perhaps we should give the ocean a break because it’s trying to tell us something: “Get outta here.”

Now, the otters have seemingly had it, too. In Santa Cruz, KSBW covered the story of one of these cute little critters deciding that they own the surfboards. Aggressive attacks have ensued:

The New York Times also published a feature on this otter gone mad. It really wants to eat surfboards, and this is somehow no joke:

On Monday, Joon Lee, 40, a software engineer, was surfing at Steamer Lane, a popular surf spot in Santa Cruz, when 841 approached his board.

“I tried to paddle away but I wasn’t able to get far before it bit off my leash,” he said.

Mr. Lee abandoned his board and watched in horror as the otter climbed atop it and proceeded to rip chunks out of it with her powerful jaws.

“I tried to get it off by flipping the board over and pushing it away, but it was so fixated on my surfboard for whatever reason, it just kept attacking,” he said.

Yes, the ocean needs a vacation from us, but it probably won’t ever receive one. After all, the Icon Of The Seas looks like an absolute monstrosity and will soon launch as the world’s biggest cruise ship to date. Be careful out there!

(Via KSBW & New York Times)

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: Teachers deserve all the kudos, high fives, raises, accolades, prizes and thanks for everything they do. Even if they just stuck to academics alone, they’d be worth far more than they get, but so many teachers go above and beyond to teach the whole child, from balancing equations to building character qualities.

One way dedicated educators do that is by developing relationships and building rapport with their students. And one surefire way to build rapport is to dance with them.

A viral video shared by an assistant principal at Sumner High School & Academy in Riverview, Florida shows a group of students gathered around one student as he challenges a teacher to a dance-off.

“Our 8th grade Stingrays having a well deserved exam dance break,” wrote assistant principal Natalie McClain. “Of course our teachers are ending 2022 with a win.”

The teacher, Ms. Yolanda Turner, took the challenge—and the students went wild.

Watch:

u201cOur 8th grade Stingrays having a well deserved exam dance break. Of course our teachers are ending 2022 with a win. Love my Stingrays ud83dudc99ud83dudc9a Happy Holidays @HCPS_SumnerHSu201d

— Natalie.McClain (@Natalie.McClain)
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The student really thought he had her, didn’t he? It looked as if his soul left his body when he tapped her shoulders and then realized what he’d done. But to her credit, she took it in stride and took him out with her dance moves.

“The music was on, all the kids were pumped,” Turner told Fox 13. “So it was like, let’s have a dance challenge. So I’m like, okay, all right, so everybody’s having fun. And I said, ‘I’m going to tap in. I’m going to tap into the dance.'”

“I really try to emphasize for kids to be their authentic selves and to really never be afraid to express who they are no matter who’s watching,” she told the outlet.

This dance-off video is a prime example of how schools can be places of joyful connection in addition to academic achievement. Gaining students’ respect doesn’t require being a stuffy authoritarian hard nose, and students generally respond better to teachers they genuinely care for. Meeting them where they are is one of the best ways to reach kids and creating experiences that include for silliness and fun is one of the best ways to keep them engaged.

Plus, who doesn’t need to blow off a little steam in between exams? What a lovely example of striking a balance between academic rigor and modeling healthy stress relief. Well done, Ms. Turner.

This article originally appeared on 12.2822