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Juvenile stopped by NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert series to give them a taste of New Orleans’ musical gumbo, but this weekend’s Essense Festival is where you go for a whole serving of what the Crescent City has to offer. With R&B fixtures such as Ari Lennox will grace the Caesars Superdome stage, this year’s three-day live performances will heavily pay tribute to 50 years in hip-hop.

To celebrate the monumental moment for the genre, Essence will feature performances by the “Back That Azz Up” rapper, Megan Thee Stallion, Missy Elliott, and more. Here is the Essence Festival performance schedule for 2023.

Today (June 30), Transformers: Rise Of The Beasts star Tobe Nwigwe, Ari Lennox, Juvenile, Jagged Edge, Janelle Monáe, and Ms. Lauryn Hill will perform. The hip-hop tribute set will feature Doug E Fresh, Big Daddy Kane, EPMD, KRS-One, and Slick Rick.

Tomorrow (July 1), BET’s Best New Artist, Coco Jones, Monica, Jill Scott, Missy Elliott, Ice Cube, E-40, Ice-T, Lady Of Rage, and Yo-Yo will perform. The hip-hop tribute set will feature Jermaine Dupri, Big Boi, Gucci Mane, Lil Jon, Ludacris, and T.I. on Saturday.

Closing out the festival on Sunday (July 2), Muni Long, Tems, Wizkid, and Megan Thee Stallion will perform. The hip-hop tribute will feature Angie Martinez, Eve, Mia X, Remy Ma, Salt-N-Pepa, and Trina.

Essence Festival 2023 will take place at Caesars Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana, between June 30 and July 2. Find more information here.

Some of the artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

With Khalid missing Ed Sheeran’s next two Mathematics Tour shows, two new acts step up to take his place. The injured singer had been in a car accident after opening for the first two months of the tour, prompting Ed to play as his own opener at his recent stop in Maryland.

Fortunately, he won’t have to pull double duty at his upcoming dates in Massachusetts at Gillette Stadium. He revealed the replacement openers in a post on Instagram, writing: “We have two surprise openers for today and tomorrow I’m very excited about.” In a follow-up slide, he told fans that tonight’s opener (Friday, June 30) is John Mayer, while the opener for Saturday (July 1) is Little Big Town.

In addition to the larger Mathematics Tour, Sheeran’s been setting aside dates in bigger markets for the more intimate Subtract Tour. Playing theaters instead of stadiums, Sheeran performs his album Subtract, which was released earlier this year ahead of the North American leg of the Maths Tour. Sheeran’s clearly a busy guy these days. Meanwhile, John Mayer had better hope there aren’t any Swifties in the crowd tonight; despite his ex Taylor Swift asking fans to chill out on him — their relationship was less than a year long and over 12 years ago, after all — her request seems to have had an opposite effect, making things worse.

Ed Sheeran is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

While many people during the pandemic were searching for a partner on dating apps and experimenting with Zoom dates, Amber Bain — aka The Japanese House — found herself in a throuple. But in a time where the world felt like it was dissolving around her, Bain’s relationships were doing the same. Putting pen to paper and hand to synth, Bain penned her much-anticipated sophomore album In The End It Always Does, a follow-up to 2020’s 4-track EP Chewing Cotton Wood.

In The End It Always Does weaves snapshots of romantic turmoil with ruminations on trauma, identity, love, and loss. With enveloping production, Bain crafts a poignant dreamscape with her music and dances around her keyboard with expertise on songs like “Boyhood” and “Sad To Breathe.” The album also includes some excellent features, like MUNA’s Katie Gavin, who co-wrote “Morning Pages” and “One For Sorrow, Two For Joni Jones,” and Matty Healy, who provides backing vocals on “Sunshine Baby.”

To celebrate the release of In The End It Always Does, Bain sat down with Uproxx to talk Talking Heads, making a Sunday Roast, and sleeping at a motel where patrons were carrying guns (yes, really), in our latest Q&A.

What are the four words you would use to describe your music?

Gay, sad, hopeful and inward.

It’s 2050 and the world hasn’t ended and people are still listening to your music. How would you like it to be remembered?

I think the ideal way of being remembered would be like how people think of Talking Heads now… kind of poppy, but kind of cool. Like a gay Talking Heads.

What’s your favorite city in the world to perform?

San Francisco. The fans there are always batsh*t crazy and it’s a really fun show.

Who’s the person who has inspired your work the most and why?

George Daniel because I’ve been working on this project with him since the beginning. And it doesn’t sound like The Japanese House without him. I think that he’s such an integral part of the whole thing… he’s basically a band member at this point.

Where did you eat the best meal of your life?

Do you know what? I’m really good at making a Sunday roast, and I love making a really good Sunday roast with the best people. Oftentimes, in my house, we’ll have a house roast and I think those are the best meals of my life because it’s just the coziest feeling ever, and it’s the tastiest thing. It’s my favorite thing to eat, and also the feeling surrounding it is so good. It kind of just feels like Christmas every time.

What album Do you know every word to?

Avril Lavigne’s Let Go.

What was the best concert you ever attended?

That is so difficult… my top three would probably be Fleetwood Mac, Rosalía and probably my first ever gig that I went to, which was Blondie with my mom.

What is the best outfit for performing and why?

This is hard because when I feel like I can just wear a hoodie and jeans, I feel like I perform the best because I’m just so comfortable, and I can focus more on performing. When I feel a bit more styled, I feel less at home so I’ve really loved gigs where I’ve been like, “oh my god, I can’t decide what to wear.” So then I just kind of throw on a hoodie and jeans and I’m like, “cool, whatever.”

Okay, who is your favorite person to follow on Twitter and or Instagram?

I’m not really a big Twitter user, but I’ve gotten back into it because my girlfriend posts really funny tweets. So, she’s my favorite on Twitter. I’m going to expose her — it’s @breadlosing. And my favorite Instagram is probably Naomi from MUNA (@flurtcobain). Their stories are my favorite. They have such a good collection of memes.

What’s your most frequently played song in the bus on tour?

It would probably be “Know My Ting” by Ghetts or “Chalice” by Donae’o. We listen to a lot of UK Grime on the bus. Or… “Toxic” by Britney Spears.

What’s the last thing you Googled?

I googled something really weird actually. I was in the park, and there was this little bird that was going absolutely crazy. And I couldn’t figure out what kind of bird it was, and I figured out what bird it was then I just googled “Mistle Thrush acting weird.”

What album makes for the perfect gift?

Beach House’s Teen Dream.

Where’s the weirdest place you’ve ever crashed while on tour?

I don’t actually remember where it was, but it was this weird little motel and there was blood on the floor. The guests were carrying guns. There was this dog off the lead that looked like he was gonna murder us. But my FAVORITE place we’ve stayed on tour was this Airbnb in Oakland. This absolutely magical woman lives in the apartment downstairs, but she owned the whole building. And she was just a dream. I just loved her so much. And she would come upstairs every day with fresh orange juice from the garden, and I was like… “wow, this is bliss.” But overall, just being in a tour bus is really f*cking weird. You’re just kind of traveling in a coffin.

But what’s the story behind your first or favorite tattoo?

I have one tattoo, and I got it really recently. It’s my only tattoo and it’s just the letter A because my girlfriend and I, in like the first few months of dating, decided to get them. We’re both A names — she’s called Alyssa and I’m called Amber and so we both got little A’s that she drew. We were hanging around in LA and were like “let’s just get a tattoo right now on the motorcycle.” It’s just a cute little love tattoo, and I love having it.

What artists keep you from flipping the channel on the radio?

Really anything dancey — I actually just really love pop, and any kind of country music. But I would say… Beyonce, Caroline Polachek, and Charli XCX.

What’s the nicest thing anyone has ever done for you?

My dad made me a bed, but it gets better… he basically made this bed when he was in his woodworking era. And he was putting the headboard on, and he was like “this is the best bit.” And he took these weird little metal ball bearings that are magnetic, and at the top of the bed there was a hole so he put the ball in and he made like these tubular bells out of a clothes rail and as the ball rolled down this little track, it hit these bells and it played the first lullaby that he wrote for me when I was a baby. I still have it, it was very sweet.

What’s one piece of advice you’d go back in time to give your 18-year-old self?

Don’t smoke. You’ll become addicted.

What’s the last show you went to?

Chappell Roan at The Garage in London.

What movie can you not resist watching when it’s on TV?

Eat Pray Love — anything with Julia Roberts in it I really worship.

Do you have any hidden talents?

I’m amazing at knowing not just dog breeds, but like exactly what a dog is mixed with. Like, if it’s a Whippet/Collie or a Great Dane/Staffordshire or something, I can always just know the mix. I don’t really know if that’s a hidden talent… also, I can do the worm really well.

In The End It Always Does is out now via Dirty Hit. Find more information here.

ESPN announced 20 on-air personalities would be let go on Friday as part of the company’s latest round of layoffs, with Andrew Marchand reporting the purpose of this round was to cut some of the highest-paid on-air talent to avoid any further cuts to behind the scenes employees.

As the day wore on, names began to trickle in, mostly via Marchand, first with a pair of longtime NBA on ESPN mainstays in Jeff Van Gundy and Jalen Rose, with ESPN heading into the 2023-24 season needing to revamp its lead broadcast booth and NBA Countdown desk lineup. Max Kellerman and Keyshawn Johnson, whose ESPN Radio morning show with Jay Williams had been cut recently, were also named as cuts. Kellerman’s This Just In program that he was given after being taken of First Take was being replaced with The Pat McAfee Show in the fall, while Johnson was among the high-salaried analysts on the NFL side who was now without a daily show presence after the radio show got cut.

Later in the afternoon, one of the biggest surprises of the day came when Suzy Kolber announced she was among the layoffs, posting a message to Twitter about her “good run” at ESPN over 27 years. Kolber has long been one of the faces of ESPN’s NFL coverage, doing sideline for Monday Night Football for nearly a decade before taking over as host of Monday Night Countdown in 2015, among various other roles on ESPN.

Kolber’s status as a legend at ESPN indicated how ruthless this round of cuts was at the network, while also raising eyebrows with regard to what may be to come with ESPN. Letting go some big names on the NFL side when their new, 10-year deal with the league is just beginning this fall seemed particularly odd and signaled a sizable shift in the network’s coverage of the sport.

The NFL and NBA sections weren’t the only ones impacted, as baseball writer and analyst Joon Lee likewise announced he was among those laid off after four years with the network.

Marchand also reported SportsCenter anchor Ashley Brewer was part of the layoffs. There are still a number of these layoffs yet to be made public, and based on some of the massive names being let go, it’s possible we see some more fan favorites leaving ESPN as a dreadful Friday at the network continues.

Of course there are more glass ceilings to be shattered, but a ton of notable progress has been made for women in the workplace—from actively addressing sexual harassment, to lessening the gender pay gap, to providing better maternity support and access for women to start their own businesses.

And to think, we can largely thank a mass stewardess rebellion for that.

Back in the 1930s, when the few career options available to women were domestic in nature—like teaching or secretarial roles—working as a flight attendant, aka stewardess, promised a more glamorous and exciting life. A chance to see the world, one flight at a time.

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However, the job wasn’t all perks. Airlines capitalized on advertising the stewardesses as sex objects, even using highly suggestive marketing campaigns where stewardesses would all but outright say they were available for sex work. Companies would also exclusively hire young (we’re talking 27 as the cut-off limit), unmarried, white women with specific body measurements to promote their elite luxury image.

The strategy worked—by the 1970s, there was a huge increase in ticket sales. But stewardesses were fed-up with discriminatory labor practices, and became one of the first groups to band together to push for change. Using Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, these women were able to not only transform the airline industry, but help women in other fields take-off as well.

Gleaning from books “Femininity in Flight: A History of Flight Attendants” and “The Great Stewardess Rebellion,” as well as personal accounts from the revolt, the video created by Vox below gives a quick overview of this often overlooked chapter in feminist history.

Please buckle your seatbelts.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is running for president in 2024 and his chief rival is a man who might just be campaigning from inside a prison cell next year. And yet, of the two men, it’s the guy who has an unexplainable beef with a cartoon mouse that has earned the title of the “worst presidential candidate ever seen” by a prominent member of his own party.

DeSantis graced Fox News earlier this week to share more about his plans for governing should he make it to the White House. The brave pizza defender regurgitated some of his favorite right-wing buzzwords like “woke ideology” while explaining why he’d gut the Department of Education, the Department of Energy, and maybe even the IRS. He promised to get rid of initiatives like DEI and CRT, but how he’d make paying taxes less liberal, we’re still not sure.

Unfortunately for DeSantis, no matter how many times he says the word “woke” in conversation, many Republican insiders still view him as a weak challenger to not just Trump, but President Joe Biden as well. When sharing the Fox News interview on Twitter, longtime Republican strategist Jeff Timmer — who worked on Ohio Governor John Kasich’s 2016 presidential campaign — named DeSantis the “worst presidential candidate” he’s ever seen.

“It’s like he’s been assembled from the discarded spare parts of Bobby Jindal, Bill de Blasio, Rick Perry, and Scott Walker,” Timmer wrote while quote-tweeting the video.

What DeSantis needs to do to get his own party members to like him is still a bit of a mystery. Maybe adding a couple more words to his vocabulary would help? Learning how to laugh like a human being? Getting a personality? Or growing just enough of a spine to stand up to the dehydrated human orange that’s been hurling childish nicknames your way for the past year? Just a few suggestions, Ronnie.

Vanna White has been the co-host of Wheel of Fortune since 1982. For nearly that half time, she hasn’t gotten a raise.

White is “lawyered up” for an overdue increase in her pay. TMZ reports that she won’t return to Wheel “unless she makes at least half of what Pat Sajak has been making.” White earns $3 million per season, which ain’t nothing, but it’s only one-fifth of Sajak’s alleged $15 million salary. “After 41 years as a model employee and more the face of that show than him [Pat], asking for 50 percent of what he makes seems like a no-brainer,” a source said.

Sony, we’re told, is not on board, at least not yet. One source with direct knowledge described the negotiations as “very difficult.” Our sources also say Vanna feels like the issue is bigger than her. As one source says, “She feels like it’s a statement for all women.” We’re told Vanna wants to stay on the show, but if she doesn’t get what she believes is “a minimum of what is fair,” that’s a real possibility.

Here’s an idea: give Vanna a raise, let her host the show instead of Ryan Seacrest (no offense but save some jobs for the rest of us, buddy), and get a rotating group of Muppets to turn the letters. Series-best ratings.

(Via TMZ)

America might be celebrating its birthday in the next few days, but all eyes international eyes are focused on the Netherlands. Rolling Loud Rotterdam, to be more specific. The two-day outdoor music concert is set to take place today (June 30) and tomorrow (July 1). With performances by some of the biggest names in music across the globe — including Kendrick Lamar, Travis Scott, and more — keeping track of the performance schedule is important.

So, here are the Rolling Loud Rotterdam set times for 2023.

Notable performances slated for today (June 30) include TiaCorine at 3:45 pm local time (on the Havana Club Stage), JID at 4:15 pm (on the Snipes Stage), Central Cee at 7:30 pm (on the Snipes Stage), Latto at 8:30 pm (on the Havana Club Stage), and Kendrick Lamar at 9:15 pm (on the Snipes Stage).

As for tomorrow (July 1), Lakeyah will perform at 3:30 pm (at Ahoy Arena), Denzel Curry will perform at 5:30 pm (on the Snipes Stage), GloRilla will perform at 6:30 pm (at Ahoy Arena), and Travis Scott will take the Snipes Stage at 9:15 pm.

The next installment of Rolling Loud will take place in Miami, Florida, between July 21 and 23. Find more information here. View the full lineup, stage assignments, and performance times below.

Some of the artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

“Cash Money Records takin’ over for the ’99 and the 2000” are words every millennial knows. The reaction is darn near Pavlovian at this point. You know it’s about to go down. When Juvenile pulls up at the NPR offices to perform his long-awaited Tiny Desk Concert, the reaction is such that he performs the song not just once, but twice. As soon as he finishes, the audience clamors for more, bringing the whole band back for an encore that spills over into the crowd.

The New Orleans legend performs for nearly 30 minutes with not just keys, drums, bass, and guitar, but brings along a full-fledged second line and strings to flesh out his set, which features backup from in-house Cash Money producer Mannie Fresh (of course)”R and runs through classics like “Bling Bling,” “Ha,” “Set It Off,” “Slow Motion,” “Rodeo,” “Nolia Clap,” “I Need A Hot Girl,” “Project Chick,” and OF COURSE “Back That Azz Up.” If this don’t make you move, check your pulse.

This Tiny Desk was one of the more anticipated ones in a while, thanks to an immaculate roll out by Juvie the Great, who has certainly grasped his stature as a rap elder statesman and keeps a sense of humor about it. More artists should promote their Tiny Desk Concerts like this — it’s an honor to perform but it should also be fun for everyone. This one certainly is.

Watch Juvenile’s NPR Music Tiny Desk Concert above.

Nick Cave always has wisdom to share, whether that’s in the form of sprawling songs or thoughtful blog posts. The enigmatic musician has a new collaboration with Debbie Harry for The Task Has Overwhelmed Us, the fourth installment of “The Jeffrey Lee Pierce Sessions Project” series.

It’s a gentle, piano-driven cover of “On The Other Side,” and it showcases his natural knack for tear-jerking, moving ballads. Their vocals together create beautiful, memorable harmonies, and it serves as a wonderful tribute that chooses hope over grief.

Earlier this year, Cave revealed that he’s working on a new Bad Seeds album. “My plan for this year is to make a new record with the Bad Seeds,” he wrote in a post for The Red Hand Files. “This is both good news and bad news. Good news because who doesn’t want a new Bad Seeds record? Bad news because I’ve got to write the bloody thing.”

He added, “I started the process at 9am on January 1st. It is now January 6th — nearly a week has passed and I’ve written a few things but they aren’t very good, or maybe they are, it’s difficult to tell.”

Listen to “On the Other Side” above.