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Has there ever been a band quite like Gorillaz? This is not a trick question. The answer is no. The English virtual band formed in 1998 as a collaboration between Damon Albarn and Tank Girl co-creator Jamie Hewlett, but as the project has evolved, so has the backstory behind its virtual members. At a time when AI rappers are falling flat on their faces, the virtual four-piece of bassist Murdoc Niccals, singer 2D, drummer Russel Hobbs, and guitarist Noodle, are entering the next elaborate chapter in their storied virtual (and non-virtual) careers.

In the lead-up to their 8th album, Cracker Island, the band’s core virtual members were living at their London-based Kong Studios, until they relocated earlier this year to Los Angeles’ buzzy, hipster enclave of Silver Lake. They’ve come to LA to gather a following for ‘The Last Cult,” which is devoted to finding a higher consciousness into the future amid a broken world. The journey has seemed a bit bumpy so far, as Gorillaz found themselves entangled in a trippy evening that ended in the emergency room, a story that unfolds in the music video for the album’s title track, “Cracker Island” featuring Thundercat. We then get a kaleidoscopic view into this utopia in the video for “New Gold” featuring Tame Impala and Bootie Brown.

While Cracker Island comes out next year, Gorillaz have embarked on an insane tour of North America, where Damon Albarn is backed by a 14-piece live band, a slew of guests, and of course the core four virtual members. As the band prepares to perform in Los Angeles, with shows at the Forum on September 23 and the YouTube Theater on September 25, we took this opportunity to catch up with 2D, the singer who Murdoc calls, “A blue-haired, black-eyed god,” but was once described by Albarn and Hewlett as having, “A blank sheet of paper where a brain should be.” Don’t let that fool you, he’s kind, adventurous, and a damn fine singer. He’s also been getting along just peachy in Los Angeles and we spoke with 2D about living in the City of Angels.

So you recently moved from West London to LA’s Silver Lake area. How has that transition been for you?

Yeah really good cheers! I made sure to bring loads of extra pants cos in America they wear pants instead of trousers.

I saw that you guys spent a crazy evening in the emergency room surrounded by cops. Everything okay with that situation? Seemed a bit concerning.

It’s always concerning being in Gorillaz. Russ says that stuff ain’t happened yet as that is the future or something. I am not looking forward to getting arrested.

Besides that, have you been getting along well with your neighbors?

The neighbors are nice, I’ve made a new friend called Moon Flower who makes me weird-tasting tea, I think they make it different over here.

Do you find yourself getting noticed around town a lot?

Usually I find myself with that ‘find my phone’ app.

LA can be a bit vain…looks are important. Are you ever self-conscious walking around a city among celebrities and #influencers?

I don’t really leave the house much as the Great Leader gives me too many jobs to do to cleanse my soul. Except when he needs more vodka and sends me to the shop.

What’s something you’ve had to eat at a restaurant out here that you can’t stop thinking about?

Twinkies!

Where else do you like to spend your free time out in LA?

In my free time Great Leader Murdoc gets me digging holes in the garden then filling them up again. I lost my phone down one of them.

Before you moved here or even after, what’s the wildest time you’ve ever had out there. Kindly describe it in excruciating detail.

Got stuck in a suit of armour. Noodle got me out with butter and a wooden spoon.

I know you’re a Crawley Town FC lifetime supporter, but have you adopted any LA area sports teams? Been to any games? If so, what’d you think?

Not yet but I adopted a raccoon. Well more like it adopted me. It’s on my leg right now. I asked Tame Impala to help but he only tames impalas.

Snoop Dogg’s been on a couple of your albums. Have you guys linked since you moved down here recently? Get into any trouble?

He hasn’t got back to my text and now my phone is buried in the garden. Snoop if you’re reading this how’s it going mate. Do you want to go bowling? Cheers, 2D. From Gorillaz.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t ask you about the new album. What can you reveal about Cracker Island ahead of this tour and how has LA played a part in it?

I can’t reveal much as I have been sworn to secrecy by this new club thing Murdoc’s got going. Russ reckons Cracker Island is a well nice place where the sun shines bright and birds never crap on your shoes.

Ok, last question. Now that you’re an LA resident living in Silver Lake. Which do you prefer, the beaches or the bars?

Have they got beaches here? I’m still looking for the lake. You ain’t seen it, have you?

Check out Gorillaz in Los Angeles or in a city near you.
Cracker Island is out 2/24/2023 via Parlophone. Pre-save it here.
Gorillaz is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

After claiming that he was cleared of gun possession charges stemming from a June traffic stop for speeding, DDG has been charged with two counts of firearm possession (carrying a loaded weapon and carrying a concealed weapon) and one of reckless driving. They are all misdemeanor charges. If he’s convicted, he could spend a year in jail for each of the gun charges and/or 90 days for reckless driving, along with fines and penalties.

In June, DDG’s manager, Dimitri Hurt, told TMZ that new California gun laws allowed for concealed weapons and that the District Attorney had dropped the charges. However, it appears that Hurt was mistaken (or lying), or that the District Attorney’s office changed its collective mind about the charges. DDG was pulled over on June 7 for speeding in his Lamborghini on the way to a video shoot, when he told the officers he had a loaded 9mm in the car. He was arrested and posted $35,000 bail a few hours later.

The Pontiac, Michigan rapper has received increased attention over the past few months, in large part due to his public courtship of R&B singer/Disney princess, Halle Bailey. The pair recently appeared together in DDG’s video for “If I Want You,” his latest single.

Courtney Barnett brought the cowbell and vibes to Late Night With Seth Meyers on Monday night (September 19) for a moody performance of “Turning Green.” The free-spirited love song is from Barnett’s latest album, Things Take Time, Take Time, from last November. The acclaimed Australian indie-rocker recently appeared on late-night TV with this July performance of “Before You Gotta Go” on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, and she previously stopped by Seth Meyers in late 2018.

This time, Barnett held her own on a night where Meyers also welcomed Quinta Brunson and John Oliver. “Turning Green” is a dichotomous example of Barnett’s versatility — an optimistic story of transformation underscored by a transfixing drum machine beat. “The trees are turning green,” she sang slowly in the second verse. “In this springtime, lethargy / Is kind of forcing you to see / Flowers in the weeds.” After delivering the third verse, Barnett launched into a two-minute guitar solo that made it easy to forget she’s on Late Night and not headlining a concret.

Earlier this month, Barnett wrapped her ambitious Here And There touring festival that featured a revolving lineup including Japanese Breakfast, Lucy Dacus, and even Fred Armisen. The innovative tour produced a limited-run Here And There: B-Sides, Live Tracks + Demos compilation project to benefit Advocates For Youth and the National Network Of Abortion Funds. She will head to Germany on October 28 to kickstart a run of European dates, which can be seen here.

Watch Barnett’s performance of “Turning Green” above.

Yesterday (September 19), Maroon 5 singer Adam Levine faced accusations from model Sumner Stroh that he cheated on his wife, Victoria’s Secret model Behati Prinsloo, with her over the course of a year. Furthermore, Stroh said Levine wanted to name his baby after her. Now, Levine has offered a response.

Levine told TMZ in a statement:

“I used poor judgment in speaking with anyone other than my wife in ANY kind of flirtatious manner. I did not have an affair, nevertheless, I crossed the line during a regrettable period of my life. […] In certain instances it became inappropriate. I have addressed that and taken proactive steps to remedy this with my family. […] My wife and my family is all I care about in this world. To be this naive and stupid enough to risk the only thing that truly matters to me was the greatest mistake I could ever make. I will never make it again. I take full responsibility. We will get through it and we will get through it together.”

In her video, Stroh explained, “Essentially, I was having an affair with a man who was married to a Victoria’s Secret model. […] Maroon 5 is practically elevator music at this point, so I’m sure you know who Adam Levine is. But Adam and I were seeing each other for about a year.”

Levine and Prinsloo have two children together, 5-year-old Dusty Rose and 4-year-old Gio Grace, as well as the aforementioned third child on the way.

According to the Associated Press, Mystikal has pleaded not guilty to charges including rape and false imprisonment at his arraignment on Monday. Mystikal was arrested at the end of July for an incident in which he’s alleged to have held a woman against her will, sexually assaulting her and robbing her in an apparent drug-induced episode. Mystikal was denied bond as a result of the grisly details described by the alleged victim. However, Mystikal’s attorney maintains his innocence, telling Rolling Stone, “My client doesn’t even do drugs, so he has absolutely no idea what they were talking about.”

Mystikal has previously been accused of sexual assault two other times. In 2004, he pled guilty to sexually assaulting his hairstylist, serving a six-year prison sentenced and registering as a sex offender. In 2017, he was accused of sexual assault of a casino employee, but the charges were dropped after over a year when a grand jury was presented new evidence and declined to indict the rapper. In that case, he paid $3 million bond after nearly 18 months in jail.

Should his current case proceed to trial, Mystikal faces a potential life sentence for the first-degree rape charge, as well as domestic abuse, battery by strangulation, simple robbery, and miscellaneous possession of controlled substance charges.

Mike Flanagan is back with another horror series for Netflix. Following the critically acclaimed, Midnight Mass (and The Haunting Of Hill House), Flanagan returns with a 10-episode adaptation of Christopher Pike’s The Midnight Club. (As well as a few of the author’s other works for good measure.) The show will feature a group of terminally teenagers who swap horrifying ghost stories and have a few encounters of their own. Judging by the trailer, it has all the terrifying elements Flanagan fans have come to expect. Although, sadly, no Hamish Linklater delivering stirring sermons to usher in vampire ways this time around. (Sorry, Midnight Mass fans.)

According to Variety, the main cast includes Adia, Igby Rigney, Ruth Codd, Aya Furukawa, Annarah Shephard, William Chris Sumpter and Sauriyan Sapkota as members of The Midnight Club. In addition to creating the series and acting as showrunner, Flanagan reportedly directed the first two episodes while his The Haunting of Bly Manor collaborator Leah Fong handled the writing duties.

Here’s the official synopsis:

At a hospice with a mysterious history, the eight members of the Midnight Club meet each night at midnight to tell sinister stories – and to look for signs of the supernatural from the beyond. A new horror series from Mike Flanagan and Trevor Macy’s Intrepid Pictures (The Haunting of Hill House, Midnight Mass), and Leah Fong, based on the creative work of bestselling author Christopher Pike.

The Midnight Club starts streaming October 7 on Netflix.

(Spoilers for The Karate Kid spinoff Cobra Kai will be found below.)

The Cobra Kai audience knows that only a few weeks have passed since the Season 5 release on Netflix. Still, they’d really like to know if Season 6 will get the green light. And I gotta say, I can’t really tell what the intent was with that finale. Obviously, ultimate karate villain Terry Silver’s arc is all wrapped up, and Johnny Lawrence got a happy ending (he’ll be a dad again), as did several other characters. Yet there’s still Kreese out there on the streets and straight out of prison (possibly headed towards Hawk?), so we’ll see if the powers that be decide to leaving things open-ended or do the damn good thing and give us more.

Netflix is going through some things, to say the very least, and they’re not rushing out too many renewal announcements at all, but with a juggernaut like this The Karate Kid spinoff, the investment should pay off. Also, Ralph Macchio made it known that he’s very into the idea of expanding the Cobra Kai arm of the universe with more movies, and that announcement hasn’t happened yet, either. However, Sony did announce that a The Karate Kid movie is on the horizon. Expect to see it in 2024, and details are slight, but Cobra Kai co-creator Jon Hurwitz addressed the matter. In short, it’s a mystery to him, too.

“The guys and I would love to make Karate Kid and Cobra Kai movies and hope to someday,” Hurwitz tweeted. “But this one isn’t from us or focused on the Cobra Kai cast. Don’t know much about it, but wish it well.”

Hmm. That’s an odd one, especially considering that everyone who matters in The Karate Kid universe is also now part of the Cobra Kai cast, if even only for a breeze-thru like Elisabeth Shue’s Ali. Recently, Hilary Swank did dodge questions about whether she’ll ever do the Cobra Kai thing, but would Sony really want to revisit her role in a movie? That doesn’t sound likely, but hey, maybe Thomas Ian Griffith could get that Terry Silver romcom after all. One can dream!

(Via Deadline)

Anticipation is high for Disney’s live-action adaptation of The Little Mermaid, which is set to premiere next year. At Disney’s D23 expo, Disney revealed the first teaser trailer for the upcoming film, which features Halle Bailey as Ariel, singing a portion of the iconic musical number “Part Of Your World.”

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Bailey discussed the process of incorporating parts of herself into Ariel, including her locs.

“With Rob, he’s so amazing and just saying, ‘I see you and I want to bring you into the character,’” Bailey said. “It was a beautiful thing. My hair, for example — incorporating my locs into the red hair was something that was really special to me. The outfit, the fins, everything. It’s just amazing. I’m just grateful that I’ve been able to take the essence of me and mix the two.”

Bailey, known largely as one half of the sister musical duo Chloe x Halle, has been working on several films, including The Color Purple, which is set to arrive next Christmas. She has also teased solo music on her social media channels.

She revealed that playing Ariel has helped her come into her own as an actress, musician, and young woman.

“I really felt like I got strong, mentally and physically,” Bailey said, “and I think it was a really good thing for me to do, just in terms of developing into a woman and myself, and knowing myself more. I’m more sure of myself after the filming experience, for sure.”

The Little Mermaid arrives to theaters May 26, 2023.

Though it’s now been two weeks since “Queen Elizabeth died of being old,” according to Trevor Noah, the fervor that has ensued in that time has been a bit of a roller-coaster ride — even for the millions of people around the world just watching the events unfold. While the Queen was officially laid to rest on Monday, Noah was still having trouble believing not just how many people came to pay personal tribute to Britain’s longest-reigning monarch and see her casket lying in state — but how long they waited in line to stare at the coffin of a person they had likely never met.

At one point, the Department for Digital Culture Media and Sport was practically begging people to please not travel to queue up with the tens of thousands of other mourners, as the line was more than 5 miles long and some truly undeterred royalists waited for up to 25 hours to stand mere inches from the Queen’s corpse.

Noah shared several news clips reporting on the immense crowds, and how David Beckham refused an offer to trade in on his celebrity to cut the line and waited 13 hours overnight. Which prompted a CBS News report to note how it was really “a reminder of how much people in this country really like to line up.” Which Noah found to be an “interesting takeaway” — as if thousands of people had gathered for no other reason than to stand in line. Though Noah continued:

But this is true: Apparently, standing in line is really popular in Britain. It’s like their national pastime. And before you make fun of them for doing something so boring, don’t forget America’s national pastime is baseball. Which is when people act as if someone died but they didn’t.

But 22 hours in line — that’s no joke. Twenty-two hours! ‘Cause remember: there’s no iPhone at the end of that line. It’s just a box, and you don’t even get to open the box.

While lots of people chose to pay their respects by re-watching The Crown, Noah was particularly impressed by Beckham waiting in line. “Because apparently he was offered a chance to skip the queue and he refused,” Noah said. “Which is really admirable. Especially when you consider you don’t know who you’re going to be stuck in that line with.” Noah’s biggest concern: An Arsenal fan.

You can watch the full clip above, beginning around the 1:45 mark. But just remember, there are always consequences for standing in line too long.

The only people who weren’t delighted by the all-pink-everything photos of Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling while filming Barbie were Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling themselves. “I can’t tell you how mortified we were,” the Oscar-nominated actress said during Monday’s episode of The Tonight Show after host Jimmy Fallon presented a photo of her and Gosling in rollerblades. “We look like we’re, like, laughing, having fun, but dying on the inside.” Dead inside is also how I will feel if the Barbie movie isn’t good.

Robbie called it the “most humiliating moment of my life,” and she had no idea the photos would go viral. “I knew that we had some exteriors to shoot in L.A. I knew, OK, once you’re doing exteriors, you’re gonna get papped. There’s probably going to be a little crowd of people who are going to take notice because, you know, the fluoro,” she said. “We stand out a little in the outfits.” But Robbie didn’t expect “hundreds of people watching.”

Barbie doesn’t hit theaters until 2023, but Robbie has a new movie, Amsterdam, coming out next month. After raving about the star-studded cast, including John David Washington, Anya Taylor-Joy, and Taylor Swift, she told Fallon about the time that the cops tried to shut down filming because lead Christian Bale wouldn’t stop acting.

You can watch The Tonight Show clip above.