There are rumors about other artists headlining as well. One of them is the massive group Blackpink, who released Born Pink last year and made fans go crazy. Of course this is just a rumor — it remains unconfirmed.
It would make sense, though, considering the group’s domination as of late. Last year, the release of their single “Pink Venom” was monumental, serving as the biggest premiere on YouTube of 2022. They hit 90.4 million views in the first 24 hours — so if they played Coachella, it’s safe to assume that the crowd they’d draw in would be inconceivably big.
They were also named 2022 Entertainer Of The Year by Time: “Blackpink has managed to become the biggest girl group in the world precisely by allowing its members to be solo stars in their own right,” Raisa Bruner, a Time contributor, wrote. “The group may be bigger than the sum of its parts, but each of its parts is bigger than most other pop groups’ combined efforts.”
This week, a potential landmark case in the music industry was filed against Universal Music Group for allegedly withholding over $750 million of royalties from its artists over streams. Meanwhile, in Fulton County, a recording artist who was included in a gang indictment using his lyrics as evidence will face the legal fight of his life later this month, while his record label lies in ruins as a result.
It’s clear that, when the law crosses paths with the business of making and selling music, the course of one or the other can shift dramatically. In response to Young Thug’s case above, several states have introduced bills protecting artists’ freedom of speech whose lives and livelihoods can be wrecked by overeager prosecutors looking to score political points. Meanwhile, if Black Sheep’s class action suit against UMG proceeds, it could change the way streaming profits are shared with musicians, effecting broad-ranging changes in the way labels do business.
There have been plenty of other court cases that defined the course of the music industry. Some were copyright fights that caused new rules to be adopted — whether formally or informally — about how artists use and credit past works. Others are legal fights between artists and their labels, which prompted the latter to work out new types of deals in efforts to protect profits and attract savvier recording partners. And at least one seemed to be about artists and labels against the oncoming seismic shift caused by new technology. Here are ten of the court cases that defined the music industry.
1944 — Olivia de Havilland vs. Warner Bros. Pictures
One of the court cases that had the biggest impact on the recording industry wasn’t even about music. In 1944, actress Olivia de Havilland sued Warner Bros. Pictures after the term of her seven-year contract with the studio expired. However, much like with record contracts today, back then, actors signed to studios for a certain number of “pictures” over the course of a given term, and if they didn’t deliver, they couldn’t leave.
However, de Havilland argued that this was a violation of California labor law and that seven years means seven years. The courts agreed, forcing WB to release her; since then, numerous recording artists have used the same statute to end contracts they deem unfair, from Courtney Love and Metallica to Luther Vandross and most recently, HER. Even Kanye cited the rule during his feud with EMI and Roc-A-Fella, although a 1980s amendment allows labels to sue artists for damages if they don’t deliver the full number of contracted albums — even after seven years.
1960s — Chuck Berry vs. The Beach Boys
When the California rock band The Beach Boys basically plagiarized Chuck Berry’s 1958 “Sweet Little Sixteen” to create their 1963 hit “Surfin’ USA” (an event that was parodied in the 2006 adaptation of Dreamgirls), they inadvertently kicked off what nearly became the first copyright lawsuit in recording industry history. Although a lawsuit was never actually filed, all the royalties for “Surfin’ USA” go to Berry’s publisher Arc Music after the Beach Boys’ manager Murray Wilson struck a deal.
1990 — Queen vs. Vanilla Ice
This infamous case wound up being settled out of court, but it also laid the groundwork for future cases in which older artists expressed resentment for hip-hop’s proclivity for sampling their past hits. In 1990, upstart white rapper Vanilla Ice lifted the bassline from Queen’s 1981 song “Under Pressure.” The resulting single, “Ice Ice Baby,” became a monster hit and was hugely profitable, despite its later reputation as a novelty song.
However, the British band wasn’t too happy about it and sued Vanilla Ice over the song. Years later, it was revealed that the rapper paid for part of the publishing rights for “Under Pressure,” while giving credit to the original writers. Although he claims he bought the rights from the band outright, they refuted it, saying that a profit-sharing agreement was reached.
1990 — Roy Orbison vs. 2 Live Crew
Another landmark case revolving around the use of sampling in hip-hop, this one went all the way to the Supreme Court before all was said and done, and laid down some ground rules about how sampling can work. After requesting the rights for Roy Orbison’s “Oh Pretty Woman” and being denied, the group went ahead and released their parody track, “Pretty Woman” anyway in 1989. 2 Live Crew argued that their version constituted “fair use” which allows for parody.
After going through a federal district court and an appeals court, the Supreme Court ruled that 2 Live’s “Pretty Woman” does fall under fair use. However, not many artists have tried to use this defense in the years since — in part because parody tracks have fallen out of favor in hip-hop (although Weird Al is still cranking them out) and in part, because no one really wants the headache.
1990 — 2 Live Crew vs. Decency
Poor Uncle Luke. The 2 Live Crew spent a massive part of their early career battling legal enemies when they should have been enjoying the sort of debauchery that defined much of their creative output. In this case, the Broward County Sheriff’s Office had issued an edict that any stores selling 2 Live’s 1989 album As Nasty As They Wanna Be would face arrest on the grounds of obscenity. 2 Live fought back, filing suit in federal district court. Although an initial judge agreed with the Sheriff, an appeals court overturned the ruling, and the Supreme Court backed it up by refusing to hear a second appeal. Despite the raunchy material, the appeals court decided that the music itself had artistic value and that the band being “nasty” wasn’t enough to ban them outright.
1994 — Tupac Goes To Prison
This was impactful less as a matter of how it changed the rules of the game and more as how it changed the substance — even if indirectly. When Tupac was sentenced to 18 months in prison on rape charges (he eventually served just eight), he became something of a folk hero to a fanbase that felt he was railroaded by a racist system, emerging from prison more popular than ever. This set a precarious precedent in hip-hop, but it also helped to solidify what the genre looked like and represented. “Thug life” more or less became the default expression of the art form and Tupac became its avatar.
So many artists now have at least a little of his DNA in their flow, business moves, and public personas and this was arguably the start of his iconic status. After his prison stint, fans were so ravenous for new music that his final two albums, released during and after his sentence, both went No. 1 after he’d previously only managed to peak at No. 24. We certainly see echoes of that in artists such as 21 Savage and the support for Young Thug.
1994 — Prince Vs. Warner
Also in 1994, Prince waged his infamous one-man war on his label, Warner, for control over his music. By now, you’ve undoubtedly heard of how he changed his name to an unpronounceable symbol in an attempt to free himself from his contract, or how he wrote “Slave” on his face to protest his inability to release music how and when he wanted under those contract terms. Ever since then, artists have spoken out about how they disagree with label practices — whether they’re practical or not — and ownership of their creative output, and any number of them, from Kanye to Megan Thee Stallion to New Jersey rapper Russ, have taken the Prince route to freeing themselves from the constraints of the major system.
2000 — Metallica vs. Napster
The first case of an artist suing a peer-to-peer file-sharing company, Metallica’s victory over Napster not only effectively ended Napster’s reign over the distribution of music, it basically opened the door for the whole streaming era in which we currently find ourselves. P2P sharing was never effectively ended, but it was forced underground, eventually evolving into the download sites that fueled the so-called “blog era.” It also demonstrated the viability of digital distribution, first in the form of .mp3s, and later, as streams, as fans had demonstrated that they were willing to adopt the new technology in lieu of only purchasing physical media.
2000s — MusicNet and PressPlay
Of course, the above transition wasn’t quite as smooth as that sentence may have made it out to be. In the early 2000s, the labels’ early attempts to get into the music-streaming game, MusicNet and PressPlay, weren’t quite as user-friendly as Spotify and Tidal would later turn out to be. But that wasn’t the only problem. The US Justice Department investigated the apps for antitrust violations, suspecting that the labels were suppressing competition and inflating the price of downloads.
Once iTunes hit the scene, though, the labels closed up shop on MusicNet and PressPlay, instead shifting their business models from trying to dominate the streaming space with their own propriety platforms in favor of partnering with tech companies who could do the concept justice.
2014 — Marvin Gaye Estate vs. Robin Thicke & Pharrell Williams
In a case that changed the standards for just what constitutes copyright infringement, the estate of Marvin Gaye alleged that Robin Thicke’s Pharrell-produced hit “Blurred Lines” illegally reproduced Gaye’s 1977 soul staple “Got To Give It Up.” A court agreed that, even without direct plagiarism of sheet music or lyrics, the later song certainly reproduces a lot of the sound of the original — enough that $5.3 million and 50 percent of all future royalties of the song were awarded to the Gaye estate.
This opened the door (and a couple of windows) for all kinds of copyright cases, with everyone from upstart rappers to established producers alleging plagiarism for even the slightest similarities in tone, style, lyrics, or instrumentation. And while a significant portion of those is getting chucked out, they’re likely to keep coming until another ruling draws firmer boundaries around what’s protected and what isn’t.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Seth Meyers may as well have been speaking for all Americans (well, maybe with the exception of Kevin McCarthy) when, on Thursday night, he admitted that the chaos surrounding Republicans’ continued inability to get their sh*t together and just name a Speaker of the House already “is pretty fun to watch.”
While the political shenanigans will continue today (and who knows for how much longer), Meyers very keenly decided that now might be the right time to remind the world of just how confident Kevin McCarthy was that he’d surely be kicking his feet up in Nancy Pelosi’s former office by now. As part of Thursday’s “A Closer Look” segment, Meyers shared some clips of McCarthy over the past several years (not months) making essentially the same promise/joke: “I want you to watch Pelosi hand me that gavel… It will be hard not to hit her with it.”
Classy!
That specific quote came from a GOP dinner in 2021, but McCarthy was using iterations of the same line going back to 2020. Although, at one point, he claimed that “I won’t bang [Pelosi] with it, but I’ll bang the end to the socialism and yes to America.” Putting aside the fact that listening to McCarthy talk about the things he will and won’t “bang” is nauseating, you’re right if you think that sentence makes no sense — as Meyers was quick to point out:
Are you sure you didn’t bang yourself with it? ‘I’ll bang the end to the socialism and yes to America.’ I can’t believe that soaring message didn’t resonate! He has the same broken syntax as a Norwegian tourist looking for the M&Ms Store.
Even more amusing to Meyers is how “McCarthy and the GOP were full of bravado about how they would seize the gavel in a show of Republican power and confront Joe Biden and the Democrats.” Instead, while we’re all watching “feuding Republicans in utter chaos on the House floor,” Biden’s week consisted of stopping by Just Q’in BBQ, a Cincinnati restaurant, where he was photographed chowing down on a peach cobbler.
“The only way that could have been more fun for Biden right now is if he was eating his peach cobbler while sitting in the back row of the House of Representatives.”
when we taped this closer look a mere five hours ago, mccarthy had lost eight speaker votes. it’s up to 11 now, but the rest is still just as relevant as it was before, including this photoshop of joe biden eating peach cobbler in the back row of the house https://t.co/N6tP7lcFMEpic.twitter.com/ZOtrNk1U3Z
Bad Bunny could be performing on the main stage of Coachella next. Today (January 6), a report was released naming the Puerto Rican superstar as a possible headliner for the upcoming music festival.
Hits Daily Double released a report with the rumored headliners for 2023 Coachella. Bad Bunny is listed as a possible headliner along with South Korean girl group Blackpink and elusive singer-songwriter Frank Ocean. After finishing off 2022 as the No. 1 global artist, Coachella would be the perfect stage for Bad Bunny to take on next.
Thanks to his success of his blockbuster album, Un Verano Sin Ti, Bad Bunny made history by claiming the No. 1 spot on the Billboard 200 year-end chart. The album was first Latin LP and the first all-Spanish release to reach the summit of the chart. Bad Bunny was also named Spotify’s most-streamed artist of 2022. He claimed the top touring artist of the year title as well. Bad Bunny pulled ahead of Ed Sheeran and Elton John with a total touring gross of $373.5 million.
Bad Bunny started off 2023 in a storm of controversy. Earlier this week, a video went viral of the singer tossing a fan’s phone after they were forcefully trying to take selfies with him. Bad Bunny responded to the backlash by calling the fan’s behavior “a lack of respect.” The Coachella stage in April could be a great way for him to make a triumphant comeback to the live music scene.
The next best thing to the snap, crackle, and bite of a great bottle of sparkling water is one that actually, you know, has a flavor and doesn’t just taste like fizzy water. Generally spiked with a fruity twist, flavored sparkling water still hovers at or around zero calories and is clearly more popular than its flavorless counterpart — convenience and grocery stores carry a shit ton of them.
For our roundup, we got our hands on 18 different flavors. And I know we’re only scratching the surface.
So which tastes the best? In order to figure that out we’re turning to our tried and trusty blind taste test. But before we dive in, I’d like to outline what I think makes for great sparkling water. When it comes to fizzy water, it has to have a high level of bubbles, the sort that sizzle on the tongue and provide a subtle burn to the throat. If it’s flat and just tastes like somebody dropped some fruit in a glass of tap water, it isn’t going to cut it in my book!
PART I — Methodology
Our guidelines for this blind taste test are as follows: it must be branded as sparkling water, it has to have some sort of fruity flavor, and ideally, it needs to have no sugar, or at the most under five grams. The idea here is that this sparkling treat is a true soda substitute, meaning not calorically or sugar-rich.
Some brands out there have too many flavors and because we’re not going to blind taste test 12 different La Croix (again), we kept it to flavors we could buy single cans or bottles of at gas station convenience stores, corner stores, and 7-Elevens. If we forgot your favorite, we’re sorry — sound off in the comments!
Here’s the class we’re working with:
Aha Blueberry and Pomegranate
Aha Caffeinated Mango and Black Tea
Aha Lime and Watermelon
Bubly Strawberry
Good & Gather Strawberry Mango
Perrier L’Orange
Perrier Lime
Perrier Pink Grapefruit
Perrier Pineapple
Polar Seltzer Lemon
Polar Seltzer Raspberry Lime
La Croix Key Lime
La Croix Pamplemousse
Liquid Death Berry It Alive
Liquid Death Severed Lime
Spindrift Lime and Mint
Spindrift Raspberry Lime
Waterloo Peach
PART II — The Tasting
Taste 1:
Dane Rivera
There is an initial fizz once it passes your tongue but it quickly settles into a dull flatness that I find offputting. There are some tart lime notes but it tastes more like the rind than the actual fruit. Overall not bad… but not good either.
Taste 2:
Dane Rivera
Very large visible bubbles and candy sweet on the nose. On the palate, it has a nice fizz followed by a rich berry flavor with a pleasingly bitter aftertaste that makes you want to quench it with more sips. I like this one!
Taste 3:
Dane Rivera
A nice sizzling mouthfeel that sustains itself the entire time it crosses your palate. There is a grapefruit tartness to it that tastes very natural and bright. Really excellent!
Taste 4:
Dane Rivera
A nice strong fizzle/sizzle but the strawberry flavor of this one comes across as stale. Strawberry is a juicy fruit and it just doesn’t really work here when backed with so much fizz.
Taste 5:
Dane Rivera
Awful and almost completely flat. It tastes like someone cleaned a dirty lemon in it and then served it to you. Whatever brand this is, avoid it at all costs!
Taste 6:
Dane Rivera
It’s pink! This one is noticeably sweeter than everything I’ve tasted so far, but each sparkling water was vetted beforehand so if this has any sugar in it, it’s not enough for it to come across as this sweet. There is a prominent cranberry tart flavor with some fruity berry sweetness. I like it, even if it feels like cheating.
Taste 7:
Dane Rivera
A nice bright grapefruit flavor kisses the palate and quickly settles into something more biting and sharply bitter, but in a good way. The bubbles feel noticeably thin, but there is a very nice interplay between the fruity flavors and the steady fizz.
Taste 8:
Dane Rivera
Very bubbly with a strong fizz that crackles on the tongue. There is a strong sweet lime flavor here and once the bubbles are finished snapping on the palate it settles into something with a soft and smooth mouthfeel. It takes you on a journey, and that’s a good thing!
There is definitely added sweetness here though, definitely one of the brands with sugar.
Taste 9:
Dane Rivera
Thin bubbles but a great flavor! Pronounced orange notes dominate with a citrus brightness that makes this one very addicting. I like it a lot, bigger bubbles would be appreciated but the flavor is undeniably delicious.
Taste 10:
Dane Rivera
Another strawberry-flavored one but this works a lot better than Taste 4. It’s very fruity on the nose and palate with a decent fizz and some notes of mango. Very tropical and refreshing.
Taste 11:
Dane Rivera
Hmm, this one is very interesting, I’m getting some mango notes and something else I can’t quite put my finger on. There is a sort of nutty and toasted quality to it and a very round and pleasing character. I’m honestly stumped as to what this flavor is supposed to be, but it tastes great.
Taste 12:
Dane Rivera
A very strong sweet berry-forward flavor. I’m getting some raspberry and blueberry notes with a nice pronounced fizz and some added sweetness. Very delicious.
Taste 13:
Dane Rivera
A nicely balanced mix of berry and citrus flavors but the fizz is too flat and weak for me to truly enjoy it. It’s very middling overall.
Taste 14:
Dane Rivera
Really nice and balanced! There is a delicate floral sweetness here that is mixed with a strong fizz that has some bite to it. The two elements are wonderfully juxtaposed. I can’t get enough of this one.
Taste 15:
Dane Rivera
A lot of sparkling waters rely on citrus or berry flavors but this one is watermelon and it’s very refreshing, both in flavor and how different it is from everything else on the market. It has a… cool sweetness to it.
Taste 16:
Dane Rivera
Whoa, this one is wild. It’s very tart, almost assaulting so with a strong mint and citrus flavor that I don’t doubt would taste amazing with some gin. On its own, it’s good, but a tad overwhelming.
Taste 17:
Dane Rivera
Of all the lime-flavored sparkling waters in this tasting, this one is the best. Rather than tasting too zesty like a rind, there is some actual sweetness here that tastes a lot like actual lime. There is some tartness here, but the sweetness is the dominating note with a great fizzy body. Really solid.
Taste 18:
Dane Rivera
And we end on a weak note. This one has an overwhelmingly bitter top note that tastes like it’s trying to mimic some sort of fruit, and failing miserably. The weak bubbles on it don’t help either.
Generally, I feel a little sympathy for whatever snags the bottom spot in our rankings but I don’t feel bad about this one, it was hands down the worst sparkling water I’ve ever tasted. As a brand Polar has been around since 1882 and produces everything from flavored seltzer water to lemonades, basic bar mixers, cane sugar-sweetened sodas, energy-infused seltzer waters, and plain ‘ol water.
One of those other pillars must be holding this company up because it’s definitely not the seltzer!
The Bottom Line:
The worst lemon-flavored seltzer water you’ll ever drink.
Perrier is all over the place. In our blind sparkling water taste test, this brand scored pretty high (and even in this taste test, other flavors landed much higher), but I just don’t like what the brand went for with this lime-flavored version of its sparkling water. It’s too dull, flavored sparkling water gets a lot of criticism for tasting like someone washed fruit in it and this take on lime very much fits that stereotype.
The Bottom Line:
The reason that some people think sparkling water doesn’t taste good.
Bubbly has over 10 sparkling water flavors and I truly wish I could’ve tried them all, unfortunately, Strawberry was all I good find selling as a single can and I don’t think it represents the brand well. The brand is owned by PepsiCo so if you’re team Pepsi you might find a lot to like here in the texture and mouthfeel of this sparkling water, but I’m team Coke and to me this just tasted flat and dull, like its parent company.
The Bottom Line:
Bubly has a grip of flavors so they must be doing something right, but if you’re trying this brand for the first time skip the strawberry.
Overall, I think Aha is a pretty solid brand but the Blueberry Pomegranate just wasn’t geared to my tastes, it was too sweet. It somehow manages to come across as sticky, sweet, and overwhelming, without having any calories or added sugar. The flavors are just too loud and you don’t get to taste enough of the sparkling water. If a lot of sparkling water taste like someone washed dirty fruit in them, this one tastes like someone dropped some hard candy in it and let it dissolve.
The Bottom Line:
Too heavy on the berry notes; not enough fizz and bite.
Another Perrier? Get used to seeing this brand, they are all over this ranking. The reason I’m ranking the Pineapple this low is that to my palate it didn’t even register as pineapple. It had this weird stale tart flavor that came across as unfocused and, frankly, rancid. The only saving grace was the bubbles and mouthfeel, which were smooth and supple but someone needs to tell Perrier that they need to reformulate this one.
The Bottom Line:
I know, I know, it’s pineapple, but don’t take the chance — it’s not good and Perrier has several other flavors that are.
Your eyes don’t deceive you, this is the same brand that I ranked at the bottom and ironically, this Raspberry Lime flavor marks the section of this ranking where I actually start to enjoy these sparkling waters. This is good! Its only weakness is the lack of bubbles and the overall flat texture.
If it had more fizz I’d easily be able to rank it up a few spots.
The Bottom Line:
Maybe Polar Lemon was a fluke, this brand might have more to offer than I initially thought. This is at the very least good, but not great.
This one came as a shock to me because of its bright pink color and strong sweet notes. Once it was revealed to me what brand this was I had to check the nutritional contents again because it tasted too sweet to be under five grams of sugar but lo and behold, it packs a mere one gram. For something that comes across as this sweet, that’s amazing! According to the ingredients list, that sweetness comes from raspberry puree and lime juice, which explains why it’s so intense and tart.
In a way, this allows you to have your cake and eat it too.
The Bottom Line:
Spindrift’s recipe is simple, sparkling water + real fruit juice, and it works! This is the ideal brand for using as a mixer with your favorite spirits.
Target’s brand, Good & Gather, generally makes some middling products but I’m surprised at how good this is. It’s got a strong fizz, a great and unique fruity flavor, and it’s dirt cheap. That’s a strong recipe for success. This brand of sparkling water is basically Target’s answer to LaCroix and in addition to this Strawberry Mango flavor, the brand also makes Cucumber Mint, Ginger Peach, Cranberry and Citrus, Pomegranate and Dragonfruit, and more!
I’m all for the two-flavor combination the brand is going for, I only wish more were available as single bottles instead of 8 packs so that I could’ve included more in this ranking.
The Bottom Line:
Target’s answer to LaCroix with its own unique two-flavor concept that allows the brand to stand on its own.
Spindrift’s so-called “Nojito” isn’t quite as sweet as the Raspberry Lime (and it’s not pink) but it comes across as better balanced, which is why I’m ranking it much higher. This flavor still follows the simple philosophy of the brand, using actual lime juice and mint to provide the flavor, but clocks in at just four calories and 0 grams of sugar. The flavors are transparent and easy to latch on to, so I’m going to go ahead and say this works as a perfect mixer.
I know it’s called the “Nojito” but if you have a bottle of gin and don’t want to carry around real mint and lime, a can of this will give you everything you need to still make a decent mojito.
The Bottom Line:
Minty, refreshing, and slightly tart, Spindrift is the most natural-tasting flavored sparkling water you’ll ever drink.
Liquid Death is the brand that is quite literally funding all of your favorite podcasts. In recent years this brand has exploded and for whatever reason everyone who doesn’t know what this stuff is has a hard time believing it’s just water. I’ve had random people ask me on the street, “is that some sort of beer?” I’ve even puzzled convenience store employees who have asked me to see my ID before scanning it and exclaiming, “wait this is just water?” There is something genius about the way the brand has marketed itself.
At three grams of sugar and 20 calories, Liquid Death is just barely making it onto this ranking but that “under five grams of sugar” rule was pretty much put in place just so we could include Liquid Death because I know that if we didn’t the comment section would blow up with complainers. We hear you, this stuff is popular, but I feel like the Severed Lime comes across as just a little too much to rank any higher than this.
The Bottom Line:
Don’t get me wrong, it’s good, but I think a few brands are doing the lime flavor better without using any sugar in the process.
AHA’s Mango and Black Tea sparkling water is one of the most unique flavor combinations on the market. It was hard to pin down exactly what I was tasting during the blind portion but in the most pleasant way. It made me repeatedly dive in to try and identify the flavors and in a weird way, I think tasting it blind made me like it more than If I knew what it was beforehand. Looking at the ingredients list is puzzling though, it doesn’t have any tea in it whatsoever, so I’m not exactly sure how AHA is managing to get the essence of brewed black tea in here.
Whatever the brand is doing, it’s working.
The Bottom Line:
One of the more unique flavor combinations of any sparkling water, and it has caffeine so it gives you a kick!
Perrier again — but I’m not mad because this stuff tastes delicious. It’s fruity, bright, a little bitter, and has that silky smooth mouthfeel that is characteristic of the brand. Along with the lime flavor, this seems to be one of the most widespread flavors on the market. At each of the six stores I went to round up these sparkling waters, Perrier Grapefruit was at all of them.
The Bottom Line:
Perrier’s best-tasting and easiest-to-find flavor.
You have to hand it to La Croix, they helped to popularize sparkling water a few years back and they still make some of the best flavors on the market. This is my favorite pure lime-flavored sparkling water because it offers something a little different — key lime. Key lime is generally tarter and more intense than regular lime, which translates better when mixed with sparkling water. Instead of coming across as dull and flat like a lot of lime-flavored seltzers, this one is loud and juicy and I love it.
The Bottom Line:
The best pure lime-flavored sparkling water your money can buy.
AHA is all over the place on our ranking but this is hands down the best flavor of the brand I’ve tried so far. Why aren’t there more watermelon-flavored sparkling waters? There is a refreshing juiciness here that no other brand on the market is offering. If you love watermelon, this will be an easy pickup and it represents the juicy melon in the best way, but be careful, you just might find yourself addicted.
The Bottom Line:
If you love watermelon, you’re going to love this.
Pamplemousse, a flavor so good FKA Twigs named a song after it. If La Croix has a flagship flavor, it’s this one, and for good reason. It’s simply the best-tasting grapefruit-flavored sparkling water on the market, hands down, no contest. In a blind taste test of just grapefruit flavors, this would no doubt come out on top. It has a bite, a strong fizz, and a juicy flavor.
The Bottom Line:
La Croix’s flagship and best flavor. If you’ve never tried the brand, start here.
Each Liquid Death flavor has its loyal fans, count me amongst team Berry It Alive because I think this dunks on the Severed Lime. I think berry flavors are some of the hardest to translate to sparkling water, they generally come across as too candied and loud, but Liquid Death’s Berry It Alive approaches the flavor with subtlety. There are shades of raspberry and blueberry here that never distract from the real star of the show, the sparkling water, which crackles on the tongue in the best way. On some days, this could take my number one spot, but since it has sugar in it, that feels like cheating, so I’ll have to leave it with the bronze medal.
The Bottom Line:
Always go Berry It Alive over Severed Lime. Always.
I have to hand it to Perrier, they have an amazing market reach. Of the six convenience stores I visited, this brand was present at all of them. However, the brand’s best flavor, L’Orange, was one of the hardest to find. Why isn’t this at more stores? It’s amazing. As you can tell from this ranking, sparkling water brands f*cking love lime, but L’Orange ignores the hype and instead relies on lemon and orange for a brighter less bitter flavor, and I love it.
The Bottom Line:
Perrier’s best and hardest-to-find flavor. It single-handedly makes the case that orange is one of the most underutilized fruit flavors in the sparkling water universe.
Waterloo is a brand I was unfamiliar with prior to this blind taste test. I had seen the cans floating around but they never really enticed me enough to give this brand a try, I figured it was just another La Croix copy. I was wrong, this was far and above the best sparkling water in the whole lineup. Based in Austin Texas, Waterloo uses all the same techniques as La Croix, utilizing fruit oils and essences to flavor its sparkling water, but the way the brand balances those essences with the texture of its sparkling water is what makes it so damn good.
The bubbles and fizz are strong with that snap on the tongue and the burn on the throat that makes seltzer so addicting. The carbonation feels alive on the palate with a clean and natural fruit flavor that actually comes across as sweet and juicy and not bitter. Consider me sold on the brand, if it was as big as La Croix culturally, it would deserve a full line-up review!
The Bottom Line:
Easily the best sparkling water on the market. The way it balances fruity flavors and fizz is unparalleled. It wasn’t even a question as to what deserved the number one spot — from the moment it hit my tongue I knew I was dealing with a winner.
Celebrities, reality TV stars, and social media influencers’ favorite annual music event, Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival, is just months away. This year’s multi-day celebration of arts and culture is locked in for the second (April 14 to 16) and third weekend (April 21 to 23) of April. At the same time, the festival’s location is no surprise. Each year, it is held on the grounds of the Empire Polo Club in Indio, California. The headliners are always a fun guessing game for music lovers. As festival goers financially prepare themselves for the steep ticket price, whispers of this year’s headliners have begun to make the rounds on social media.
In 2021, Coachella co-founder Paul Tollett told Los Angeles Times that he’d love to have Frank Ocean return as a headliner, given that his 2020 return to the festival was canceled due to COVID. Tollett and Ocean have since remained tight-lipped about his potential resurgence. However, with anticipation building for the festival, social media users have begun circulating a flyer of Coachella’s entire lineup.
The image has not been authenticated and should only be treated as speculation; fans are excited at the possibility of seeing Justin Bieber, Bad Bunny, and Frank Ocean headlining the first weekend. Other notable acts on the graphic include Jack Harlow, Skrillex, and Lil Durk, as well as international acts Blackpink, Rosalía, Burna Boy, and Tems.
In 1993, Michael Jackson was the most famous person in the world but his image was severely tarnished by countless bizarre rumors. Why was he turning white? How much cosmetic surgery did he have? Did he really try to buy the Elephant Man’s bones? Why did he grab his crotch during performances? What was his sexual orientation? Did he sleep in a hyperbaric chamber? Why does a grown man love to play with children in a home filled with theme park rides and exotic animals?
To add to the controversy, Jackson’s most recent album “Dangerous,” which sold around 20 million copies, was seen as a “disappointment” because it failed to reach the status of his previous albums “Bad” (1987) and “Thriller” (1982).
To help improve his public image, Jackson sat down for a live, 90-minute interview from his Neverland Ranch in Santa Ynez, California, with Oprah Winfrey. At a time when the media landscape was far less fragmented, the interview was a massive event that drew more than 90 million viewers.
Jackson hadn’t given a TV interview in 14 years and Winfrey was at the peak of her fame as America’s favorite talk-show host. “It was the most exciting interview I had ever done,” Winfrey later recounted. “It certainly was going to be the most watched interview I had ever done.”
Here are five of the most memorable moments from “Michael Jackson Talks … to Oprah,” which originally aired on February 10, 1993.
1. Jackson admitted to having cosmetic surgery.
When asked about his history of cosmetic surgery, Jackson said it’s less than most people think. “You can count them on two fingers,” he said, admitting he’s had his nose done. “I have never had my cheekbones done, never had my eyes done, never had my lips done,” he added.
Given his drastic change in appearance over the years, the admission was a little hard for some to swallow. Reports show that it’s likely he wasn’t being totally honest about his history of cosmetic surgery during the Winfrey interview.
2. He admitted to having vitiligo.
One of the biggest questions about Jackson at the time was why he was becoming paler by the day. Many believed it was because he wanted to become white. To set the record straight, Jackson admitted to having vitiligo, a skin disorder that causes the skin to lose pigmentation, resulting in visible blotches.
“It is something I cannot help. When people make up stories that I don’t want to be who I am, it hurts me,” he said. “It’s a problem for me. I can’t control it. But what about all the millions of people who sit in the sun to become darker, to become other than what they are? Nobody says nothing about that.”
Vitiligo forced Jackson to change his appearance but he made it clear that he was still a proud Black man. “I am a Black American. I’m proud to be a Black American. I am proud of my race. I am proud of who I am,” Jackson emphatically told Winfrey.
3. He taught Winfrey how he does the moonwalk.
The moonwalk was Jackson’s signature dance move that gives the appearance he’s moving backward while hovering above the ground. In the interview, he revealed how he creates the illusion and where it started.
“The moonwalk came from these beautiful Black kids who live in the ghettos in the inner cities, who are brilliant. They just have that natural talent for dancing any of the new, hot dances. They come up with these dances,” Jackson said. “All I did was enhance the dance.”
4. He was an incredible beatboxer.
Winfrey asked Jackson to sing something acapella and he gave her a lot more than that. He did a perfect beatbox version of “Who Is It” from his “Dangerous” album and was able to perform the percussion and bass line simultaneously.
5. He discussed his abusive dad and losing his childhood.
Jackson revealed that growing up a child star he missed out on the simple joys of childhood and that’s why he enjoyed spending time with children as an adult. This seemed to be an honest explanation for one of the most curious parts of his personality. He also admitted that his father called him “ugly” and was physically abusive.
“I love my father, but I don’t know him. … Sometimes I do get angry. I don’t know him the way I’d like to know him,” he said. “My mother’s wonderful. To me, she’s perfection. I just wish I could understand my father.”
Jackson’s interview with Winfrey was a public relations success for Jackson because it provided a psychological framework for his peculiar public image. In the interview, Jackson comes off as sensitive, thoughtful, intelligent and his dancing and beatboxing reminded everyone of his incredible talent. The Washington Post said the interview changed public opinion of him from being “weird” to an “eccentric” and resulted in an increase in album sales.
But this pubic re-evaluation would be short-lived. By the end of the year, he’d be the subject of an intense investigation into sexual abuse, and he’d be dogged by lurid allegations for the rest of his days.
Before Avatar: The Way of Water came out, director James Cameron made peace with the idea of ending the series before five films, as he planned. “The market could be telling us we’re done in three months, or we might be semi-done, meaning, ‘OK, let’s complete the story within movie three, and not go on endlessly,’ if it’s just not profitable,” he told Total Film, adding, “The question is: how many people give a sh*t now?”
The answer: a lot. Avatar: The Way of Water has grossed over $1.5 billion worldwide, making it not only the highest-grossing movie of 2022, but also the 10th highest-grossing movie ever. Not bad for an endlessly delayed sequel to a film that supposedly left no cultural impact. Cameron is now locked into the finishing the series.
“t looks like just with the momentum that the film has now that will easily pass our breakeven in the next few days, actually, so so it looks like I can’t wiggle out of this, I’m gonna have to do these other these other sequels,” he said on this week’s episode of HBO’s Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace?. Cameron expects to have a conversation with the “top folks” at Disney about the future of the franchise soon.
“[Avatar 3] is already in the can — we’ve already captured and photographed the whole film. And then Avatar 4 and 5 are both written; we even have some of 4 in the can. So you know, I think we can see that that I think we’ve begun a franchise at this point.”
Avatar: The Way of Water is a lot of fun, but I do have one complaint: I didn’t sh*t myself with my mouth wide open. Maybe Cameron is saving that for the fourth movie.
Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace? is available on HBO Max.
The Georgia Bulldogs are on the verge of repeating as national champions. The only thing standing in between them and a second straight triumph in the College Football Playoff are the TCU Horned Frogs, one of the best stories in the sport’s recent history. Unfortunately for TCU, it’ll take something special to take down the Dawgs, as Georgia enters the game favored by nearly two touchdowns.
This is not, however, stopping Shaquille O’Neal from trying to annoy Ernie Johnson, who attended the University of Georgia and has never been shy about supporting his alma mater. During Thursday’s edition of Inside the NBA, Johnson decided to spend a little time celebrating his team making it to the title game, which led to Shaq — who, of course, went to a rival SEC school in LSU — saying on television that he will eat a frog if Georgia beats TCU on Monday.
It is worth mentioning that Shaq stressed he will eat a cooked frog, which, that was probably implied but it is still good to get that on the record. Charles Barkley got Johnson to agree to giving Shaq 17 points in this situation, although it didn’t seem like he had to work all that hard, because his prediction was that the Bulldogs would win, 45-17.
In what was already a busy year for all of NCT in 2022, with sub-units like NCT Dream and NCT 127 releasing EPs and singles left and right, as well as going on tours and making guest appearances internationally and domestically, recent news on the members’ well being comes to no surprise to many.
In a statement released by SM Entertainment earlier today (January 6), the Korean music label disclosed Haechan’s health status and future participation in NCT 127’s schedules. In the statement, it was said the 22-year-old singer, who is a part of both NCT Dream and 127 sub-units, has experienced “abnormal conditions such as heart palpitations, chest tightness, and more” and was ultimately advised to receive treatment and rest.
The youngest NCT 127 member will not be able to participate in the group’s upcoming Latin America and US tour stops this month and will take a break from any type of scheduled promotions.
Tour organizer and concert production company Dream Maker USA later followed up with the statement to confirm Haechan’s absence from the upcoming tour saying “eight members will participate in the USA/Latin America concerts as scheduled.”
Check out the full statement from SM Entertainment below:
“Hello.
This is to inform fans with regards to member Haechan’s health status and absence from scheduled activities.
Recently, Haechan had experienced abnormal conditions such as heart palpitations, chest tightness, and more, so he went to the hospital with his manager and got a consultation and examination where he received the medical advice that treatment and rest are required. As Haechan’s health recovery is the most important, he will not participate in scheduled activities for the time being and plans to recover his health while resting.
As a result, Haechan has decided not to participate in scheduled activities starting next week and we will let you know later when it is confirmed for him to resume his schedules. We sincerely apologize to fans for causing concern and we ask for fans’ kind understanding that this is a decision made for Haechan’s health.
We will do our best to work hard and support Haechan so that he can greet fans with a healthier image.
Thank you.”
NCT 127 will embark on their 2023 NEO CITY: THE LINK tour stops in the US and Latin America next week on January 9, 11, 13, and 28.
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