Harry Styles season is rapidly approaching, as Harry’s House is set for release on May 20. Actually, you could say Styles season has been ongoing for a little while now as “As It Was” dominates the music world. It’s had a couple different stints on top of the Billboard Hot 100 chart and now it adds another week at No. 1: On the new Hot 100 dated May 7, “As It Was” is No. 1 for a second consecutive week and third total.
Its top spot has a lot to do with the 52.7 million radio airplay audience impressions it tallied over the tracking week (from April 22 to 28), which is up 23 percent from the previous week. It dipped a bit in streams with 28.2 million (down 6 percent) but saw an uptick in downloads sold at 9,200 (up 9 percent).
Meanwhile, Jack Harlow’s “First Class” is still doing well, spending a second week at No. 2 after debuting in the top spot, dethroning “As It Was.” Styles returned to the top, though, demoting Harlow to his current position. Another former No. 1, Glass Animals’ “Heat Waves,” is also still hanging around the top at No. 3.
Harry’s House is out 5/20 via Columbia/Erskine. Pre-order it here.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Once celebrated attorney and former “America’s Mayor,” Rudy Giuliani is being absolutely roasted on social media thanks to a new video promoting his Cameo account. The cash-strapped Giuliani has taken to the video platform after hitching his star to Donald Trump’s wagon, which has reportedly left him broke after a combination of multi-billionaire lawsuits and the former president allegedly stiffing Giuliani on his legal fees.
In the latest video posted to his various social media accounts, Giuliani awkwardly stands on a golf course in a pair of silly, huge shorts while he awkwardly swings a club from side-to-side in an effort to entice someone, anyone to pay him for a Cameo video.
“I’m Rudy Giuliani,” the giant shorted menace says. “If you want to have a really nice conversation, or a birthday greeting, or just talk golf, go to the link below.”
Much like his disastrous appearance on The Masked Singer in late April, the jokes started flying in as people went to town on Giuliani’s outfit. Specifically, his shorts, which again, are stupid huge. As one Twitter user expertly notes below, they’re a size only Kevin Smith could dream of.
You can see reactions to Giuliani’s mammoth shorts below:
— Mr. Butter Chicken (@MrButterChicken) May 2, 2022
To the surprise of no one, Giuliani’s time on Cameo has been a non-stop thrill ride of embarrassment. Shortly after joining the platform, he got duped into making a video that essentially trashed his own client. It’s the type of bonehead legal move that only Giuliani could make in his desperate attempt to stave off the poor house after working for Trump. Then again, he could easily sublet his shorts. There’s plenty of room in them.
Once upon a time, back before we all had supercomputers in our pockets but after video killed the radio star, the place to go to learn more about the then-nascent music and culture of hip-hop was Yo! MTV Raps (at least for those of us outside the New York tri-state area). Airing in the US from 1988 to 1995, the two-hour video block was the first of its kind on the network, airing rap videos, interviews with rappers, and in-studio performances. It was the first time many folks outside of urban America got to see the exciting new art form as it gained in popularity and power.
With the exception of a few anniversary shows, the block has been off the air for over 25 years. However, that’s soon to change thanks to the new streaming service Paramount+, which is relaunching the show with battle rapper/MTV fixture Conceited as the host alongside DJ Diamond Kuts. Like its predecessor, the show revival is set to feature interviews, performances, and, perhaps inspired by the original show’s legendary final episode, live ciphers from some of hip-hop’s hottest rising stars.
The show will premiere on May 24 with Freddie Gibbs and will air weekly, with future takeovers from Latto, Saba, JID, Shenseea, Tee Grizzley, IDK, and Trina. According to Complex, more stars including Baby Tate, Just Blaze, and Maino will appear throughout the season. In addition, Paramount+ will feature archived episodes from the show’s original run alongside past episodes of VH1’s Behind The Music and another pivotal MTV staple, Unplugged.
Check out the trailer for the return of Yo! MTV Raps above.
With Cinco de Mayo nearly here, it’s time to get ready for a rush of tequila, burritos as big as your forearm, as many birria tacos as you can eat, and plenty of Mexican beer. While we’ve been helping you handle the food and the tequila, I’m going to turn my attention here exclusively to the beer.
Before we dive in, a little background. Frequently confused for Mexico’s Independence Day, which takes place September 16th, Cinco de Mayo commemorates Mexico’s underdog victory over the French empire at the Battle of Puebla, on May 5th, 1862. Remembered in Puebla ever since, Mexican-American civil rights activists began promoting the day as a source of cultural pride in the 1960s. By the 1980s, drinks importers were creating entire advertising campaigns based around the holiday, and as of 2013, Americans were buying more beer on Cinco De Mayo than for the Super Bowl or St. Patrick’s Day.
In honor of the biggest beer buying day of the year, I thought it was time for a tried-and-true blind taste test. For these latest rankings, I hand-selected 10 well-known Mexican beers from my local grocery store for this test, attempting to choose only pilsners and light-colored lagers so they were as similar in style as possible.
Today’s Lineup:
Dos Equis Lager Especial
Tecate Lager
Modelo Especial
Sol Cerveza
Corona Extra
Carta Blanca Original
Estrella Jalisco
Victoria
Pacífico Clara
Bohemia Pilsner
How will your beloved Tecate fare? Or Pacifco? Will a lesser-known brand take the top spot? Let’s find out!
Part 1: The Taste
Taste #1
Christopher Osburn
Tasting Notes:
There isn’t much going on with this beer’s nose. It took a lot of sniffing to find anything. If you put this in front of me and told me it wasn’t a beer, I might believe you. There are some floral hops and maybe some corn sweetness, but really nothing else. The palate is really sweet and almost sugary with little to no other flavors noticeable. This is the epitome of fizzy, watery beer. Bland to the max.
Taste #2
Christopher Osburn
Tasting Notes:
Wet grass, bread, caramel malts, and light sweet corn are abundant on this beer’s nose. The aromas are subtle, but they definitely draw you in. The palate doesn’t disappoint with more freshly cut grass, freshly baked bread, sweet grains, caramel malts, light corn, and floral, slightly bitter hops at the finish. It’s not overly exciting, but surprisingly well-rounded.
Taste #3
Christopher Osburn
Tasting Notes:
The nose is slightly herbal with honey, sweet cereal, wet grass, and caramel malts. It’s sweet, refreshing, and has notes of fresh corn, grains, pilsner malts, caramel, clover honey, and just a hint of bitter, floral hops at the very end. By far the most refreshing, easy to drink, well-balanced beer in this blind taste test so far.
Taste #4
Christopher Osburn
Tasting Notes:
On the nose, I found biscuit-like malts, sweet corn, slight ripe fruit, and caramel. Sipping it brought forth notes of sweet corn, floral hops, cracker malts, toffee, fresh hay, light grain, and a gentle, bitter hops presence to bring everything together nicely.
Taste #5
Christopher Osburn
Tasting Notes:
Nosing this beer reveals aromas of sweet corn, some light floral hops, and bread-like malts. That’s really it. The palate is extremely sweet with corn notes as well as more floral hops, bread, and a slight caramel malts. Overall, this is a crushable, light beer that doesn’t have much substance at all besides corn sweetness.
Taste #6
Christopher Osburn
Tasting Notes:
A nose of caramel malts, sweet corn, bread, and light floral hops greeted me before my first sip. The palate has notable flavors like freshly baked bread, floral hops, sweet grains, slight fruit flavors, corn, and a gentle bitterness that ties everything together nicely.
Taste #7
Christopher Osburn
Tasting Notes:
There’s a ton of corn on this beer’s nose and that’s not necessarily a terrible thing. On top of the sweet corn aroma, there are also notes of sweet grains, fresh-cut grass, bread-like malts, and some slight floral hop aroma. On the palate, I found more sweet corn, grains, and caramel malts, with a slightly acidic, mildly bitter finish.
Taste #8
Christopher Osburn
Tasting Notes:
A fairly muted nose of sugary corn, caramel malts, and faintly floral hops met nostrils. It didn’t really get me excited to sip it. Luckily, there was a little more going on with the palate. There were notes of freshly-baked bread, wet grass, more sweet corn, and caramel malts. While definitely not exciting to any degree, it was definitely easy to drink.
Taste #9
Christopher Osburn
Tasting Notes:
Bread, corn, wet grass, malts, and light floral notes are prevalent on the nose. Taking a drink, I found more sweet corn, bread-like malts, caramel, and light, slightly bitter, floral hops. Still kind of watery, it goes down easy. All in all, it’s an easy-to-drink beer with little to no frills.
Taste #10
Christopher Osburn
Tasting Notes:
This beer had a real “adjunct” smell to it. There were notes of corn, bread, and maybe some citrus. But it all smelled very generic. Sipping it didn’t reveal much more. It’s fairly muted with some corn sweetness, bready malts, and a more generic flavor. While fizzy and crisp, it tastes mass-produced and watery.
When many beer drinkers think of Mexican beer, one name stands out above the rest: Corona. Likely because of its advertising, there’s no Mexican beer more famous. Does that mean it’s the best? Probably not. The top-selling imported beer in the U.S., this pale lager is known for its refreshing, highly crushable flavor.
Blind Notes:
There isn’t much going on with this beer’s nose. It took a lot of sniffing to find anything. If you put this in front of me and told me it wasn’t a beer, I might believe you. There are some floral hops and maybe some corn sweetness, but really nothing else. The palate is really sweet and almost sugary with little to no other flavors noticeable. This is the epitome of fizzy, watery beer. Bland to the max.
Bottom Line:
Honestly, I couldn’t have been less surprised to see Corona Extra ranked as the worst of the bunch. I’ve very infrequently imbibed this beer without a slice of lime. Without that added citrus, it’s as flavorless as seltzer water.
Created in 1899, Sol Cerveza is a light, refreshing lager that’s pretty much designed to be enjoyed on a hot day. Available in over 70 countries, it’s always cheap, light, refreshing, and easy to drink. It’s the kind of beer you crave on a humid summer day.
Blind Notes:
This beer had a real “adjunct” smell to it. There were notes of corn, bread, and maybe some citrus. But it all smelled very generic. Sipping it didn’t reveal much more. It’s fairly muted with some corn sweetness, bready malts, and a more generic flavor. While fizzy and crisp, it tastes mass-produced and watery.
Bottom Line:
I haven’t had many Sols in my life, so I didn’t know what to expect with this beer. It is a beer available almost anywhere and is super cheap. It’s still a fairly bad beer sans lime wedge.
Owned by Grupo Modelo, Pacífico is a pilsner-style Mexican beer that gets its name because the brewery it’s produced at is in the Pacific Ocean port city of Mazatlán in Sinaloa, Mexico. Like many beers in this style, it’s known for its crisp, light, easy drinking flavor and little to no frills.
Blind Notes:
Nosing this beer reveals aromas of sweet corn, some light floral hops, and bread-like malts. That’s really it. The palate is extremely sweet with corn notes as well as more floral hops, bread, and a slight caramel malts. Overall, this is a crushable, light beer that doesn’t have much substance at all besides corn sweetness.
Bottom Line:
Pacífico is also not a beer I’ve had a ton of experience with so I didn’t have any expectations with this beer. While not an abrasively bad beer, it has very few redeeming qualities besides being easy to drink, making this beer is a snooze fest.
If you’re a fan of tequila, you know all about Jalisco. This Mexican state is where the town of Tequila and the heart of the spirit is. It’s also the state where Estrella Jalisco was created and gets its name. Because of that, this 4.5% ABV Czech-style pilsner just might be the best beer to pair with tequila.
Blind Notes:
A fairly muted nose of sugary corn, caramel malts, and faintly floral hops met nostrils. It didn’t really get me excited to sip it. Luckily, there was a little more going on with the palate. There were notes of freshly-baked bread, wet grass, more sweet corn, and caramel malts. While definitely not exciting to any degree, it was definitely easy to drink.
Bottom Line:
Estrella Jalisco isn’t a bad beer. It’s not a good beer either. It’s a fairly “meh” beer that’s sweet, light, and crushable. That’s about it.
First brewed in 1890, Carta Blanca is known as the beer that made Monterrey, Mexico famous. Brewed by Cervecería Cuauhtémoc Moctezuma, like many Mexican-style lagers it’s known for its light, crisp, easy-to-drink flavor profile.
Blind Notes:
Bread, corn, wet grass, malts, and light floral notes are prevalent on the nose. Taking a drink, I found more sweet corn, bread-like malts, caramel, and light, slightly bitter, floral hops. Still kind of watery, it goes down easy. All in all, it’s an easy-to-drink beer with little to no frills.
Bottom Line:
Carta Blanca is a decent take on the Mexican lager style. It’s not very complex, but it has enough going on in the flavor department to make it a better choice over some of its more well-known rivals listed below it in this ranking.
Unlike many of the other well-known Mexican lagers, Dos Equis actually lists the ingredients. They are water, malted barley, corn starch, corn syrup, hops, and ascorbic acid. A little more scientific sounding than most beers we’re used to, at least they’re being honest.
Blind Notes:
There’s a ton of corn on this beer’s nose and that’s not necessarily a terrible thing. On top of the sweet corn aroma, there are also notes of sweet grains, fresh-cut grass, bread-like malts, and some slight floral hop aroma. On the palate, I found more sweet corn, grains, and caramel malts, with a slightly acidic, mildly bitter finish.
Bottom Line:
While very sweet and corny, there’s something more drinkable about Dos Equis as compared to its counterparts. Maybe it’s because it’s slightly more complex than some of the others. Still, fairly muted though but just with just enough profile to make the middle of the list.
Victory is one of the lowest alcohol content Mexican beers you’ll find at your local grocery store. This Vienna-style lager has been brewed for more than 100 years and, even with its low alcohol content, is known for its surprisingly complex flavor profile.
Blind Notes:
A nose of caramel malts, sweet corn, bread, and light floral hops greeted me before my first sip. The palate has notable flavors like freshly baked bread, floral hops, sweet grains, slight fruit flavors, corn, and a gentle bitterness that ties everything together nicely.
Bottom Line:
The only time I had Victoria before this blind taste test was in Mexico and I remember enjoying it then. It tasted just as good this time with a nice combination of sweet and bitter flavors. Still, there were a couple of beers that stood out that little bit more.
The flagship of the Bohemia beer line, this pilsner gets its name because of its use of hops sourced from the Czech Republic. It’s well known for its complex, crisp flavor profile with nice herbal, floral, and slightly bitter hops.
Blind Notes:
Wet grass, bread, caramel malts, and light sweet corn are abundant on this beer’s nose. The aromas are subtle, but they definitely draw you in. The palate doesn’t disappoint with more freshly cut grass, freshly baked bread, sweet grains, caramel malts, light corn, and floral, slightly bitter hops at the finish. It’s not overly exciting, but surprisingly well rounded.
Bottom Line:
We’re getting into the better beers now. Bohemia Pilsner is the flagship beer from this brand for a reason. It’s a great take on the Czech style with a solid balance of sweet malts and floral, slightly bitter hops.
Also known as Tecate Cerveza Original, this classic, easy-drinking Mexican lager lists only three, simple ingredients: water, barley, and hops. Regardless of any other ingredients that might be present, this beer is known for its malt-forward, refreshing, highly crushable taste.
Blind Notes:
On the nose, I found biscuit-like malts, sweet corn, slight ripe fruit, and caramel. Sipping it brought forth notes of sweet corn, floral hops, cracker malts, toffee, fresh hay, light grain, and a gentle, bitter hops presence to bring everything together nicely.
Bottom Line:
Tecate is a surprisingly well-balanced and easy-drinking beer. If you prefer your Mexican lagers to be more malt-forward, this is the beer for you. And I do, so it’s ranked almost at the top.
Brewed since 1925, this classic, pilsner-style lager is brewed simply with water, barley malt, non-malted cereals, and hops. Made using the same traditional brewing techniques popularized in Europe, it’s crisp, delicious, and known for its light, easy-drinking, highly refreshing nature.
Blind Notes:
The nose is slightly herbal with honey, sweet cereal, wet grass, and caramel malts. It’s sweet, refreshing, and has notes of fresh corn, grains, pilsner malts, caramel, clover honey, and just a hint of bitter, floral hops at the very end. By far the most refreshing, easy-to-drink, well-balanced beer in this blind taste test so far.
Bottom Line:
I’m usually surprised when I see which beer takes the top spot. But, in this case, I wasn’t. Modelo Especial is surprisingly well-balanced, crisp, and effortlessly crushable. The best beer on this whole list by far.
This month’s slate of Artists To Watch is especially eclectic and positively fire. Follow along as we jump from dynamic British afrobeats and the next rapper about to take over, to an indie band on repeat, real Brazilian sh*t, and more. These are the artists to watch for in May. And this is On The Up.
Obongjayar
The Nigerian-born, London rapper came firmly into focus last year on Little Simz’s track “Point And Kill.” But it was on the first single from his upcoming album, “Message In A Hammer,” (with one of the best videos of last year) where we get to witness the menacing, raspy-tongued rapper establishing his piercing singular vision. A dynamic MC, he fuses British rap and afrobeats with a silky vocal delivery that touches newfound forms of R&B. On “Try,” the whole range of his voice — from a fine-grain sandpaper flow to his sweet coo over atmospheric production — is on full display. His debut, Some Nights I Dream of Doors, is due out on May 13th.
Momma
While Momma’s third LP (and first since signing with Polyvinyl Records), Household Name, isn’t out until July 1st, the singles that the Brooklyn alt-indie band has released leading up to it oughta be living on repeat in your speakers. Led by Etta Friedman and Allegra Weingarten, Momma has heavy vibes of The Breeders, with the vocalist pair complementing each other a la Kim and Kelley Deal. They supported Wet Leg on their sold-out tour earlier this year and will be joining Snail Mail for theirs in August. But we can’t say enough about how sticky Momma’s first three singles are. They channel ’90s nostalgia in a decidedly of-the-moment package, like on “Speeding 72” when they sing, “You can catch us around, Listening to “Gold Soundz”. Keep me in your car,” before a harmonic guitar riff takes the melody into space.
Domi & JD Beck
The future is here. Domi & JD Beck are two jazz prodigies signed to Anderson .Paak’s Apeshit label, who are starting to build some serious buzz. They backed Thundercat and Ariana Grande’s version of “Them Changes” at the 2020 Adult Swim Festival, sat in with the legendary Herbie Hancock at the Hollywood Bowl last year, co-wrote Silk Sonic’s “Skate,” and their debut album is due out later this year on Apeshit and Blue Note Records. The 21-year-old Domi plays keys, is French, and sports blonde pigtails that flap in unison with her hypnotic fingers tickling the ivories. At 18, the shaggy-haired JD Beck plays drums like he’s possessed by Gregory Coleman, and puts down some of the most dizzying snare work you’ve ever heard. They just dropped their debut single, “Smile,” which features .Paak, Thundercat, and Mac DeMarco in the hilarious video. The visual is a prime example of how they infuse child-like fun into complete and utter mastery of their instruments and it’s them who will surely continue to spread the gospel of real next-level jazz music to future generations.
Sessa
In 2019, Brazilian singer and multi-instrumentalist emerged as a unique talent in the shape of the bossanova and tropicalia greats like Caetano Veloso, João Gilberto, and Antonio Carlos Jobim. His debut album, Grandeza, presented gorgeously-woven poetic expressions of love that only Brazilians are capable of articulating. Now he’s signed to Mexican Summer for the June 24th release of Estrela Acessa and the lead single, ”Gostar Do Mundo,” is a globally-minded declaration of otherworldly desire. Alongside a gentle guitar, Brazilian percussion, and female backing singers, he swoons, “Chega mais pra cá, moço lindo desse lugar. Vem me namorar, sabe o mundo vai acabar”. (translation: “Come closer, good looking man from this place. Come nestle up against me, because the world is ending you know.”) This is the stuff right here.
Doechii
Top Dawg Entertainment (TDE) has been notoriously insular in thrusting forward the career of artists from Kendrick Lamar to SZA. But when the venerable hip-hop label announced a new partnership with Capitol Records last month, Doechii was at the center of it. The Tampa rapper is here to usher in the next movement of the TDE roster and she’s come out with a serious bang. The absolutely bonkers (and NSFW) video for “Crazy” feels like it’s floating fiercely over an OG Timbaland beat (it’s actually produced by Kal Banx.) On “Persuasive,” she flashes a silkier side of herself, one that’s indulgent and coyly extravagant. No word yet on an album release, but don’t be sleeping on Doechii.
Doechii is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music.
Pusha T took to Instagram this past Sunday evening to celebrate as his latest album, It’s Almost Dry, earned the No. 1 spot on the Billboard 200 chart. Over audio of the track “Let The Smokers Shine The Coupes,” the 44-year-old posted a moving graphic displaying the album’s accomplishments with various photos of himself in the background. In the caption, he started, “We all can’t be number 1 at the same time, this week it’s mine… [sunglasses emoji].”
He also thanked and tagged executive producers Pharrell and Kanye West; manager Steven Victor and his staff; Tunji Balogun and the entire Def Jam label; featured artists such as Jay-Z, Kid Cudi, Lil Uzi Vert, and many more who played a part in his fourth solo album. Pusha also shouted out his wife Virginia Thornton, son Nigel Brixx Thornton, and paid homage to his late parents.
This marks the Virginia rapper’s first No. 1 album after over twenty years in the game, starting as one half of the duo Clipse alongside Malice (formerly known as No Malice, also featured on It’s Almost Dry) before going solo. It’s Almost Dry debuted with 55,000 album units sold, 45,500 of which are streaming equivalent album units in addition to 9,000 pure sales.
Prior to It’s Almost Dry, his 2018 LP Daytona earned a Grammy nomination for Best Rap Album, and Pusha was also featured on West’s “Mercy,” nominated for Best Rap Song in 2013.
Lil Uzi Vert is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Throughout the first-round matchup between the Phoenix Suns and New Orleans Pelicans, All-Stars Chris Paul, Devin Booker, and Brandon Ingram each enjoyed their moments. All of them, for one reason or another, though, experienced various games of silence. From injuries to shooting struggles to poor decision-making, their typical star impact evaporated on multiple nights.
The most consistent star of this series was fourth-year center Deandre Ayton, who never scored fewer than 10 points or shot worse than 61.5 percent from the field across the six games. Five times, he scored 19 or more. His series-long averages of 20.5 points, 9.8 rebounds, 2.5 assists and 1.2 blocks were exactly that of a star, reinforced by the film and punctuated by defensive artistry.
His 72.1 percent true shooting leads all eligible playoff players. Set for a new contract this summer, he’s dialed up his performance for the second straight postseason.
With Booker sidelined for Games 3-5, Phoenix required Ayton to shoulder an increased scoring load and he delivered, averaging 23.3 points and 15.7 shots in his teammate’s absence. Led by Paul, the Suns employ a pick-and-roll-heavy scheme designed to produce finishes for Ayton, kickouts for open triples, or inevitable midrange jumpers from the Point God.
Ayton’s long benefited from this attack, but displayed substantial signs of growth as a scorer throughout his fourth season. That shined brightly in round one, when he was decisive and aggressive off the catch, quickly let jumpers fly, and wielded ball skills not often seen before this year.
Whether it’s hook shots, floaters, or delicate finishes, his touch is immaculate from virtually anywhere within striking distance of the key. He proved too spry and light off the ground for Jonas Valanciunas to contain him on the catch, bemusing the veteran center for many of his tantalizing buckets inside.
Ayton’s looks weren’t confined to close range either. He buried deep, tough face-up and turnaround jumpers, drove from the perimeter to score through contact and even canned two of his four three-point attempts. His touch is truly special. The confidence he’s now operating with as a shooter and scorer is unprecedented in his NBA career.
According to NBA.com, during the regular season, 13.9 percent of his shots came after 2-6 dribbles. Against the Pelicans, that number sprung to 26.3 percent. He’s a premier release valve and has considerably expanded the way he effectively concludes possessions. Those traits are amplified by his knack for flipping the angle of screens or re-screening to carve space against defenses. Connecting with Ayton likely precedes prosperous offensive results.
Through expanding his scoring repertoire, ball-handlers can feed him in an array of spots and trust that he’ll execute. Setting him up for success demands much less specific situations than it did, say, a year and a half ago. That development greatly eases the responsibility of Phoenix’s initiators, especially when he’s cooking like this. New Orleans deployed an assortment of pick-and-roll coverages to try and frustrate Paul. Ayton was ready to thrive as an outlet regardless of the defensive approach.
Ayton’s shot chart from the first round is a highlighter come to life. Per Cleaning The Glass, he shot 86 percent at the rim (89th percentile among bigs), 70 percent from short midrange (4-14 feet, 96th percentile), 56 percent from long midrange (14 feet to the 3-point line, 79th percentile) and 65 percent overall from midrange (100th percentile).
The man was en fuego, evidenced by the fact that his worst region on the floor produced a sterling 1.12 points per possession.
Cleaning The Glass
Ayton’s high-volume, uber-efficient scoring might’ve overshadowed his spectacular defensive series. Both as a helper and pick-and-roll custodian, he consistently quelled the Pelicans’ endeavors.
In ball-screens, his mobility, active hands and recognition of proper angles complemented Phoenix’s point-of-attack stoppers. He and Mikal Bridges are one of the NBA’s foremost pick-and-roll defensive duos, functioning with synergy and a rare ability to impede or extinguish space for opposing teams. When New Orleans involved him in actions, he posed problems and was adept playing against 1-on-2 scenarios.
As a help defender, Ayton etched a similar footprint. His awareness, lively limbs, and mobility enabled him to influence a bevy of possessions, primarily in the paint. According to NBA.com, he’s contested a playoff-high 56 shots within 6 feet of the hoop, where players are shooting 19.9 percent worse than their average.
His verticality and timing were essential, while his 7-foot-6 wingspan deterred numerous other field goals. Confronting him near the rim rarely panned out for the Pelicans.
With Phoenix now set to face the Dallas Mavericks in round two, Ayton will, as he always does during the playoffs, loom large. Luka Doncic is a vastly better pick-and-roll conductor than Brandon Ingram or CJ McCollum. He’s also a more devastating driver and downhill scorer. All of those qualities will challenge Ayton.
On the other end, Dallas’ small-ball 5 rotation of Dwight Powell, Maxi Kleber, Davis Bertans and Dorian Finney-Smith are an ideal matchup for Ayton. Whereas the Mavericks often neutralized Rudy Gobert as a roller by switching or sitting back to defend the lob, Ayton will torch switches and Paul’s intermediate game is more equipped to seize that available space than Donovan Mitchell’s or Mike Conley’s.
Dallas’ cast of rangy, well-connected perimeter defenders will have to overwhelm Paul’s maneuvering as it did Conley to really stymie Phoenix’s pick-and-roll game. But Ayton is a much more malleable and skilled scorer than Gobert, just as he emphasized against New Orleans.
Nobody was more reliable than him. He’s further solidifying himself as a star, one who’s ready to receive the massive payday that’s long overdue.
Just about 20 years ago this year, Virginia Beach brothers Malice and Pusha T — aka Clipse — released their debut album, Lord Willin’, via Pharrell Williams’ Star Trak and Arista Records. However, longtime heads know that this was actually the duo’s second chance at making their first impression after a previous deal at Elektra Records resulted in the 1999 album Exclusive Audio Footage — an album that was shelved after the poor response to the lead single, “The Funeral,” resulting in the end of the duo’s record deal. Now, a couple of decades later, it seems things worked out okay.
Until now, though, only a handful of people had ever heard that first album, which never made it to stores. And while you could get ahold of it relatively easily due to leaked promotional versions that found their way online, as of today, you can simply open your favorite DSP. That’s right; Exclusive Audio Footage is now available for streaming — legally — for the first time in nearly 25 years. According to 2DopeBoyz, the album is mostly unchanged (likely thanks to producers The Neptunes’ approach of building beats from scratch rather than sampling), meaning you’re likely to hear references to Pusha’s old rap name, Terrar, and reworked versions of beats such as the one from Jadakiss’ “Knock Yourself Out” on the second track, “Hear Me Out.”
The update is sure to fuel the long-simmering rumors of a possible reunion of the sibling act, which has been on unofficial hiatus since 2010, with Malice going Christian rap as No Malice — his last album was Let the Dead Bury the Dead in 2017 — and Pusha continuing as the number-one coke rapper, who recently went No. 1 with his fourth studio album It’s Almost Dry (which No Malice also appears on). Those rumors were helped along by two more recent collaborations on albums from Kanye West and their designer friend and DJ, Nigo.
You can hear it for yourself via Apple Music, Spotify, and Tidal.
The streaming realm has recently gifted us (for better or worse) with a glut of shows about scammers and tech gods, but those shows owe plenty of their granddaddy, the true crime genre. That’s the simmering mainstay behind the flashier trend, and for sure, the public’s fascination with true crime will never die. Streaming has, of course, made those stories much more accessible (and plentiful) in binge-friendly form, but one would be hard-pressed to find a more notorious-streamable classic than Jean-Xavier de Lestrade’s The Staircase, which is currently on Netflix for the taking.
That docuseries surfaced back in 2004 with a few re-up installments, arriving as recently as 2018 to fill in the audience on legal developments regarding convicted novelist Michael Peterson. And it’s safe to say that, for many viewers including myself, people still find it difficult to draw any definitive conclusions regarding the role played by Michael in his wife’s death. After a lengthy North Carolina trial, he ended up serving nearly 15 years for the murder of his wife, Kathleen, who died in 2001 under mysterious and possibly extraordinary circumstances involving (as the title suggests) a staircase in the expansive family home. To this date, theories abound about what really happened to her, and the series fuels all the questions that still surround her bloody and violent demise.
Did Kathleen die as a result of a wine-tipsy fall, or did Michael bludgeon her to death, or was there *cough* a third party involved? And beyond the whodunnit aspect of this story, can a dramatized HBO Max miniseries add enough texture to justify its existence — without exploiting the victim and broadcasting her plight as sheer entertainment?
Let’s just say that I was slightly worried about how the dramatization would go, given that one of the trailers leaned into campiness at about the halfway point. Fortunately, my fear was misplaced because the campiness is mainly bound to the trailer as well as the theatrics of law enforcement and courtroom counsel. There’s still some camp there, perhaps to diffuse tension, and there are places where the tone felt a little bit “off” to me, but that’s probably because dramatization of true crime (as with the recent Dirty John seasons) has to walk a fine line. In the end, there’s a very different product here than the cinéma vérité presentation of Lestrade’s docuseries. However, both the O.G. series and the HBO Max version (helmed by Antonio Campos of The Devil All The Time) take great pains (at least in the first five episodes screened for critics) to never declare, “Yep, this is what the hell actually happened to Kathleen”). And given that we don’t know what the hell happened in real life, that’s appropriate.
HBO Max
I must say, though, that watching Colin Firth — the guy who’s beloved for playing Mr. Darcy, both in a Jane Austen adaptation and those Bridget Jones movies — as a potential (manipulative) killer is wild. He’s giving a master class here, making the audience wonder what his seemingly contradictory personality traits and his slightest of wavering expressions could possibly mean. And as always, Toni Collette finds it impossible to turn in a subpar performance, which lends at least some respect for Kathleen’s memory, even if there’s some hefty speculation about how Kathleen reacted upon learning one of Michael’s secrets. That sort of loosey-goosey vibe could have backfired, but this dramatization allows for some enhanced speculation on various scenarios that seem at least halfway plausible about Kathleen’s final moments. These sequences, peppered throughout the episodes, are incredibly brutal to behold. That’s to be expected, given that Kathleen’s autopsy revealed a number of lacerations on her head. Obviously, the subject matter can be difficult to watch during occasional scenes.
So yes, the lead actors really climb into their roles from the inside out, and they carry this series home with all the subtle turns that one would expect. Likewise, the grown-up Peterson biological and adopted kids (played by Sophie Turner, Odessa Young, Patrick Schwarzenegger, Dane DeHaan, and Olivia DeJonge) get stepped-up accounts of what they were doing behind the trial-and-documentary scenes. And my goodness, Miss Parker Posey also has a grand time with her assistant DA role, Freda Black, whose procedural bent was questionable at best (and who died in 2019 from late-stage liver disease due to alcoholism). Add in the portrayal of corrupt, biased, and bigoted members of law enforcement and we’ve got ourselves quite a cast of characters. And although the show does recreate many of the docuseries’ scenes and heavily supplements with flashbacks, there’s a key addition that sets this production apart: Lestrade (who produces this HBO Max series) himself becomes part of the story. He’s portrayed by Vincent Vermignon, who unfurls the process by which he frames Michael’s perspective for the camera.
In other words, there’s a whole lot of dissection on how this crime was positioned by not only law enforcement and prosecutors but also by the documentary filmmakers (including producer Denis Ponce, portrayed by Frank Feys). Everyone’s got their competing version of what could have happened, and yet, no one (but Michael Peterson) knows what went down for sure. He was, for certain, a skilled liar in many facets of his life, and Firth does a remarkable job of diving through the dances that Micheal does, both in an attempt to save himself after the crime but also beforehand, when he was living a double life. Likewise, we finally get to know Kathleen beyond the home movies that the docuseries showed. Collette does a fantastic job of making sure that her character — and she surely went through hell — surfaces as much more than an object of obsession for a voyeuristic audience. That is to say, Kathleen was a fully-formed, complex person, rather than a figurative chalkboard drawing in a crime scene.
Since the limited series will run eight episodes, and I’ve seen five of them, I can’t say whether this show will end with any kind of definitive judgment on Michael’s actions surrounding Kathleen’s death. It feels certain, however, that Firth will continue to evaporate from view and truly emerge as Michael Peterson, down to his characteristic manner of speaking. It’s a haunting performance, and if you’ve seen the O.G. docuseries (currently streaming on Netflix), you will likely marvel at the resemblance. More than that, you’ll learn more about Kathleen, much more than archival footage could deliver. Don’t be afraid of this dramatization of your baby, true crime fans. The Staircase is in good hands.
HBO Max’s ‘The Staircase’ premieres three episodes on May 5, followed by weekly installments.
Rhea Seehorn is the breakout star of Better Call Saul, most likely because she is the only one who can put up with Jimmy/ Saul’s crap. She plays Kim Wexler, the lawyer who is much too good at her job and is often roped into Jimmy’s questionable shenanigans. As it turns out, Seehorn is making her directorial debut on this week’s episodes of Better Call Saul.
“It was definitely terrifying. People were like, ‘Was it fun?’ When I wasn’t sweating like Albert Brooks in ‘Broadcast News,’ yeah,” Seehorn told USA Today, “It was alternating just sheer joy and sheer adrenaline and terror. Yes, it’s daunting. This is not a first-time director type of show, let’s face it. This is an extremely advanced show.”
This is the final season of the hit Breaking Bag spinoff, which is split into two parts: part one is currently airing, and the second batch of episodes hits screens this summer. Seehorn knows the show well enough that she didn’t feel too intimidated to sit in the director’s chair. She even shadowed the other directors, co-creators Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould.
“It was a free master class any day you went to set to watch any department. When I am not frantically trying to learn my own stuff or getting to see my family, the only other place I prefer to be is on set,” the actress added. “I like watching other people’s work. I also like learning all of the other cogs in the wheel of this giant, collaborative art form… It helps me as a performer; it helps me as a human.”
As it turns out, Seehorn has a background in art. She graduated with a degree in studio art, which helped prep her for her work behind the camera. “They tell you all the time: Don’t do a cool shot just to do a cool shot. It has to be in service of telling the story,” she added. “So I looked for places to do that.” Okay, but Better Call Saul is known for its cool shots, so hopefully, she threw a few in there.
Fans are also hoping that Kim Wexler survives, and Seehorn appreciates it. She added, “You can’t imagine how amazing it feels as a performer to create this character that wasn’t even in the Breaking Bad pantheon that people have come to truly see as this three-dimensional person that they’re deeply concerned about. And that they also want to have a beer with and hang out with!”
Better Call Saul airs Mondays on AMC.
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