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Charli XCX didn’t keep us waiting for very long. Just yesterday, she told Rolling Stone that she was bumming out over her cancelled performance in late 2021 amid the Omicron variant surge. “This would have been my best TV performance ever,” she said. “When it couldn’t go ahead, it was crushing. I was going to have a main pop-girl moment. Hopefully something can happen in the future. Fingers crossed.”

Today, she has been announced as the musical guest for the March 5th episode hosted by Oscar Isaac. That was fast! And the timing couldn’t be more perfect, as her hotly-anticipated album, “Crash,” is set to drop two weeks later. With killer early singles like the banging “Good Ones” and the incredible collaboration with Rina Sawayama, “Beg For You,” the prospects are bright for her performance.

Also announced today, Spanish flamenco-pop queen Rosalía will be the musical guest for the March 12th episode hosted by Zöe Kravitz. Rosalia’s upcoming album Motomami arrives on the same March 18th date that Charli XCX’s does and it’s a really strong back-to-back episode slate of musical guests for SNL especially when you consider that LCD Soundsystem are the musical guests for the February 26th episode hosted by John Mulaney.

Charli XCX is a Warner Music Artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

It’s fairly incredible how open Nick Cannon is about his sex life. The father of seven children with four different women has an eighth on the way with a fifth. He’s been speaking publicly with family therapist Dr. Laura Berman, both on The Nick Cannon show and recently on her podcast called The Language of Love With Dr. Laura Berman. In a “Valentine’s Day episode” that aired yesterday, Cannon opened up about his previous stance of celibacy, which led into him speaking about monogamy and how he doesn’t think it’s “healthy” for him.

The Masked Singer and Wild N’ Out star began talking about definitions of being single versus being married. “To define me is to confine me,” he says. They talk about forming covenants, whether bound by the government or not, at which point Cannon says “And I just don’t feel like that’s healthy. Monogamy is not healthy. I feel like that gets into the space of selfishness and ownership.” Berman validates him, before Cannon admits that he feels like his trajectory in life is to “be the best father I can be,” and as he gets older, “whoever is willing to put up with me” is who he’ll end up with and maybe be monogamous with.

Berman posits that perhaps his fear of being left or discarded is contributing to his fear of monogamy. And it’s really fascinating for someone who is so virile and is such a well-known public figure like Cannon, to make themselves this much of an open book when it comes to their sex therapy.

You can listen to the whole episode of the podcast here.

This poster for Dog is one of those posters so perfect that I almost don’t want the movie to exist. There’s no way an actual film could be as good as the one this poster already conjured in my head.

Yet Dog does exist, marking the directorial debut of star Channing Tatum (long known affectionately as “C-Tates” around these parts), who co-directs and co-writes alongside his long-time producing partner Reid Carolin. They’re adapting from a story by Carolin and Tatum’s former assistant, Brett Rodriguez, who is also an ex-soldier. The three had previously collaborated on a documentary for HBO called War Dog: A Soldier’s Best Friend, focusing specifically on Army Rangers and their dogs. Thus what we have in Dog is, essentially, Turner And Hooch, only Turner is a troop. And so is Hooch.

Tatum plays Jackson Briggs, an Army Ranger discharged with a TBI (Traumatic Brain Injury) whose dream job in diplomatic security requires a recommendation from his commanding officer. But the CO (Luke Forbes) only agrees to do give it on one condition: that Briggs transport a “disturbed” Ranger dog named Lulu back to Nogales, AZ for the funeral of her former handler, a Ranger named Riley Rodriguez. Translation? ROAD TRIP MOVIE!

As a dog man, an avid C-Tates booster, and someone who has raised and loved multiple German Shepherds in my life (close cousins to the Belgian Malinois featured in the film) my sense that I was probably the ideal audience for this film was confirmed when I cried during the opening credits. Dog‘s intro sequence is a montage taken from Lulu’s “I Love Me Book,” a scrapbook of military paperwork and mementos, which in Lulu’s case includes drawings and poems written by her dead owner, pictures and videos of Lulu in action — Lulu passing soldier tests, Lulu nuzzling her soldier brothers, Lulu getting treated for war wounds, etc… Christ, it’s hard to even write about, a series of HERO DOG SAVES ORPHANAGE headlines intercut with a sweet doggie limping around in a cast. We are all susceptible to certain forms of emotional manipulation, and sad doggies could sell me the Brooklyn Bridge.

Yet for a concept that feels so self-propelling, probably the biggest surprise of Dog is that it’s not nearly as Disney as you might expect. I anticipated something akin to A Dolphin’s Tale, another movie about a wounded animal inspiring wounded veterans, featuring Marine Biologist Harry Connick Jr. (I take every opportunity I can to type the words “Marine Biologist Harry Connick Jr.,” which is my personal “cellar door“). Tatum and Carolin, by contrast, seem far more concerned with doing right by their military consultants, retaining the particular camaraderie shared by military men than they do with making a family-friendly tear-jerker. So when Briggs and his military pals discuss their fallen comrade, they do so not in the weepy, reverent tones years of war propaganda have conditioned us to expect, but in the understated, gallows humor patois of soldier bros. “Riley was as solid as they come,” Briggs tells a buddy.

“Yeah, tell that to the tree he hit doing 120,” the buddy responds, a verbal sack tap for getting too mushy.

Likewise, Dog studiously resists making Briggs too “cuddly,” clearly determined to remain authentic to what it believes a Ranger veteran with a TBI might actually be like. True, Tom Hanks’s character in Turner and Hooch similarly began the movie as a squared away cop who didn’t particularly like dogs, thus leaving room for his transition into hopelessly doting dog dad (and room to fulfill the “dad who loudly resisted getting a dog” stereotype). But Tatum seems determined never to let us forget that Briggs is a War Man who has Seen Some Shit; a guy who casually reminisces with Lulu about “kickin’ in doors and gettin’ our murder on.” I don’t remember Marine Biologist Harry Connick Jr. ever describing himself as a murderer.

Hanks and C-Tates both have a natural lovableness that frequently transcends whatever was on the page. Yet there’s a natural disdain, among the characters Dog depicts, for civilian society — blissfully ignorant of the details of their dirty work that the soldiers have had to do. It’s a natural disconnect, but one that always risks becoming a political football. And so a constant tension exists in Dog, between wanting to appeal to the military guys who inspired and helped make it, and maybe even go full Black Rifle Coffee Company/operator culture propaganda op; and its natural shape as a heartwarming buddy-dog movie.

Which is to say that Dog frequently risks “getting political,” like when Briggs and Lulu pass through Portland, here populated by women who are all varying degrees of “liberal loonies,” (Dog doesn’t use the phrase but it’s heavily implied), or when Lulu freaks out at a San Francisco hotel and nearly attacks a Muslim man. “I’m sorry, she’s been trained to go after people like you,” Briggs attempts to explain.

That’s pretty dark! I admit I cringed, and that part of me just wanted to see a nice movie about a whole town coming together to nurse a disturbed doggy back to health. But maybe a society that spends 20 years doing war doesn’t deserve sanitized soldier dog movies. Dog won’t give it to us, which is admirable. Though neither is it some Peter Berg tac ops circle jerk, even though sometimes it almost is.

Dog attempts and mostly does a solid job walking a perilous line, being honest about and sympathetic to the concerns and inside jokes of veterans without licking boots or justifying endless war. Ethan Suplee shows up late in the film as a fellow veteran and dog whisperer, and it’s almost disturbing the degree to which a former pussy posse member can not only believably play an ex-soldier but function as the film’s moral center. Suplee’s character urges Briggs to find a higher power, AA talk here applied to PTSD. Part of me wishes it had been Lulu delivering the life lessons (this is a dog movie after all), but Suplee was oddly solid.

Could Dog have been more about the actual dog? Sure, but no movie was ever going to top the poster. And in the end, it’s hard not to appreciate a tight 90 about C-Tates and a dog learning to love again.

‘Dog’ is available only in theaters February 18th. Vince Mancini is on Twitter. You can access his archive of reviews here.

Adam Scott is no stranger to workplace comedy. In fact, he’s been the lynchpin of some of the best shows in that genre for the last few decades — see Parks and Rec, Party Down, etc. But with Severance, the new thriller from Apple TV+ directed by Ben Stiller and created by Dan Erickson, Scott’s pushing out of his comfort zone – even if he does still find himself in a cubicle.

As Mark, a grieving widower who chooses to undergo the process of Severance – a procedure that splits a person’s consciousness – Scott essentially plays two versions of the same character. In the outside world, Mark is depressed, lonely, and a pretty awkward dinner party guest. Within the walls of Lumon — the mysterious company he works for that encourages its employees to undergo Severance so that they can fully separate their work life from their personal life — he’s naïve, upbeat, and perfectly content with the idea that his body lives an entirely different life outside the workplace but his mind will be forever trapped in a dimly-lit office space. Until that is, a new hire arrives that shakes up the monotony, sending Mark and his coworkers on a wild goose chase that reveals some sinister truths about the people they work for.

UPROXX chatted with Scott about the show’s central mystery, if he would ever undergo something like Severance, and how the show helped him process his own grief over the recent death of his mom.

I’m struggling to define what this show is. Is it a workplace comedy? A Hitchcockian thriller in an office setting? Help me out here.

Yeah, it has this fun workplace comedy surface to it when it starts. It really is genuinely funny, but there is something weird and sinister lurking underneath that sort of finds its way out. And that’s what really interested me — that it worked as something fun to watch, but also that the world it’s in and the big conceit of the show is so kind of sticky and mind bendy. It’s exactly the kind of thing that I like watching as an audience member. But beyond all of that, the role itself is sort of the dream role that I felt like I’d been waiting my whole career for in a way. I finally had an opportunity to dig into something like this. I was really excited to do it. I’m still excited that I got to do it.

You’re essentially playing two versions of the same character. How did you separate Outie Mark and Innie Mark?

Yeah, it was really challenging. We didn’t want it to feel like two different people because it’s not. It needs to be the same guy, right? It needs to feel like the same person, but it just needs to feel like different halves of the same person. So it’s a matter of figuring out who Mark is in the outside world and just maybe subtracting from that and starting over in a sense with the basic elements. In the outside world, he has 40 odd years of life experience and all the joy and sorrow and everything that goes along with that. He’s grieving his wife who died two and a half years ago and he has not moved on from it. And rather than figuring out how to move on from it, he’s decided to stay put and just disappear for eight to 10 hours a day.

Innie Mark is unencumbered with all of that. There are feelings and emotions that sort of carryover, but Innie Mark doesn’t know what those are, how to locate or name them. He just knows there are feelings in there and sometimes he gets to work, and he has tears in his eyes and just has no idea. So it was a constant game of addition and subtraction because we were shooting the whole season at once and jumping around all the time. It was almost like this math problem we were constantly doing throughout — trying to figure out how those different life experiences manifest themselves. One’s experiences may be affecting the other because things do carry over — not consciously of course — but they’re sharing a body. Of course, there are going to be things that go back and forth.

Is there a job – acting or otherwise – that you would have liked to have undergone Severance for?

[laughs] I feel like when I was like in my twenties, maybe I would’ve gotten severed just because it sounds cool and it would’ve been an experience. Maybe now I would do it for like sitting in traffic or something. Apparently, Elon Musk has been talking about a similar technology recently. I just don’t think I would do it, but I guess it kind of depends on who’s doing it and why, which is the big question here. It’s interesting because I think for the past several years, big companies have really become intertwined in our lives. We’ve kind of been co-opted and are a part of these companies in a way.

That can’t be a good thing though, right? There are definitely cult-like undertones at Lumen that make me think of places like WeWork and companies that trade on this idea of the workplace as a “family” in order to take advantage of their workers.

That’s right. And this company, Lumon, has the added advantage of having been around since, what, the 19th century or something? They have these deep roots in America and a whole culture that they’ve been cultivating and creating for over a hundred years, to the point where they’re just sort of ubiquitous. They’re one of those companies that make your breakfast cereal and your air conditioner and you don’t even realize it unless you really look. I think that could be dangerous — when companies sort of start to put themselves out there as a lifestyle and a theory of living.

There’s a central mystery to the show that pulls you along each episode. Why was that an important element to add to the story?

Those are the kinds of things I really love as a viewer, these kinds of core mysteries. I love Lost so much and re-watched it with my family last year and it’s just perfect. The show is just unbelievably good. But I think the big sort of central mystery to this world is, ‘Why is Lumon so interested in doing this? What’s in it for them? Why is it better for them to have workers who don’t know who they are in the outside world and people in the outside world don’t know what they’re doing when they’re there? Why is that?’ I think the mysteries sort of emerge and go from there. And there are many that kind of bubble up over the season that are really fun to think about.

I’m going to continue my trend of recommending Yellowjackets to everyone I meet, especially if you’re a Lost fan.

Oh yeah! Yellowjackets is just really fun. I’m in the middle of it right now.

I’m trying to pay attention to shows’ opening credits more and Severance has a really weird opening sequence. It feels like a nod to Ben Wyatt’s Claymation bit on Parks and Rec, just much darker. Did you plan that?

[laughs] Totally. It’s just a Ben Wyatt claymation nightmare. [laughs] That’s great. That’s so, so funny. Yeah. Ben Stiller was working on it for the better part of a year with this guy that he found on Instagram and I just went one day for like 20 minutes and stood in one of those volumes, which is just surrounded by thousands of cameras. I just stood there and struck a couple of different positions with a hairnet on. And that was all I had to do, but I love the end result. It being me, notwithstanding, I think it’s just a really cool piece of animation and, and a little piece of filmmaking in and of itself. It’s very weird.

Do you have more of those deja-vu moments with a character like Ben Wyatt who’s so culturally recognized at this point? Do you get sick of talking about him?

I do find myself, if I’m getting ready to do something and we’re figuring out wardrobe, I try and avoid a plaid shirt with a tie because it’ll remind me of Ben Wyatt and I think it might be distracting if there’s a Parks fan watching. Maybe that’s overthinking it, but yeah, there are things here and there. Working on Severance with the workplace sort of banter did remind me of that world. And there’s nothing wrong with it because I love Parks so much and I miss all of those people so much and anything to sort of drum up those feelings again is all good with me.

What’s even more compelling to me than the work-life balance question is the lengths Mark is willing to go to sidestep his grief. He’s a very sad human being when we meet him on the outside. Was that emotional arc hard to play within the stranger environment of the show?

Yeah, I mean, I was going through my own grief when we ended up making the show and was away from my family. I landed in New York and my mom had passed away six months before. And I had been surrounded by my kids and family and stuff for those six months and then I was just … in New York, by myself. I was either in an apartment alone or shooting the show. And it was when I was alone with the work that I realized I still had a hell of a lot of grieving to do that I hadn’t really come to terms with it because I was kind of buoyed by all of this love and support … [Pauses] There was a lot that I could sort of stave off because of that. So I found myself really coming to terms with it and really facing the grief through the show. You know?

I read something about how grief is like this hole that never gets smaller. Your life just gets bigger around it, and over time, that makes it seem a little bit smaller. But if you’re doing something like Mark is doing, your life never grows.

That’s right. That’s the choice he’s made — that this is all he has left of his wife. So he doesn’t want to let go of it.

There’s no good way to pivot here so I’ll just ask: Where are we with the Party Down reunion and why did you guys want to come back?

[laughs] Well we only made 20 episodes total so I feel like there still was a lot of possibilities sort of left on the table. And now that it’s been 12 years since we finished shooting, there are even more possibilities because the intervening years … it just gives you all of these story possibilities that John Enbom is taking full advantage of. And, and the big kind of idea and thrust of this season is so much fun. It is going to be great and I just can’t wait for everybody to see it.

As the saying goes, “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” Science has proven, on multiple fronts, that this is not the case. And psychology aside, our hearts know just how much leverage both an insult and a compliment can carry. Just think of how your body reacts when remembering the very best thing anyone has ever said about you … and the worst.

Though that saying might be less than accurate, the phrase “a picture’s worth a thousand words” certainly still holds up, especially when it comes to the work of Thai artist Tim Ulit.

Ulit’s comics have captured hearts on Instagram, for both their sweet illustrative style and their powerful, sometimes heavy messages.

His latest strip delivers a thought-provoking and intimate look depicting just how much what we say, for good or for ill, matters.

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When used in anger, our words become weapons.

As seen (quite literally) with a couple arguing, insults become swords. Accusations become axes. Instead of practicing nonviolent communication, which focuses on authentically expressing emotions without insults, judgment, or put-downs, the couple use their words to further drive an emotional wedge between them.

And perhaps worst of all, though the husband and wife are intending to attack each other, their son, who hears it all, becomes caught in the crossfire of their unkempt rage.

There’s a reason why words of affirmation are part of the five love languages. As seen here, with the affectionate father visibly praising his son’s monster creation.

Having this kind of emotional fortitude later helps the son’s confidence become impenetrable, even when schoolmates (and the teacher) make fun of his monster. Which is, of course, totally inappropriate, but also inaccurate, because that little monster is so cute!

Words wound us. But wounds can heal with kindness.

When the kids meet, the son from the previous vignette, who saw his parents fighting, is still carrying the burden of hurtful words.

Clearly not from only his parents fight, but from bullying as well.

Yet with the help of his new friend, he learns that those thoughts don’t have to be carried.

The comic cuts to 15 years later, where the monster-creating kid is now a debuting artist, who comes face to face with one of his idols. In an esteem-crushing blow, the idol criticizes the artist’s work (a pain worse than death for most creatives).

The harsh judgment blasts like a torpedo straight to the artist’s heart, completely trapping him in his own disappointment.

That is, until his friend comes in to return the favor, and save the day with kindness. This time, encouragement acts like a key, rather than a shield, but still just as effective.

Words can lift us up or knock us down in one breath. Having distance through technology doesn’t change that, ask anyone who’s been trolled or cyberbullied. It’s easier now more than ever to be unkind without consequences online, but let’s remember that what we say does matter. The choice to be kind is always there. And if there is so much power contained in the words we use, let’s make that power a force for good.

A bunch of years ago, our family traveled around the United States as nomads for a year, driving thousands of miles through dozens of states. And throughout the entirety of that kind of epic road trip, I never once learned that there’s a system for how our highways are numbered. It always seemed random, but it’s so very not.

A viral Facebook post sharing just two basic principles of interstate highway numbering blew my mind, and also the minds of approximately 196,000 other people who shared the post in the past few days. Rich Evans included two images showing the East-West interstate highways and the North-South interstate highways with this explanation:

“I always knew there was a logic to it, but I never saw it explained so well until I stumbled upon this delightfully informative short video on how the US interstates are numbered.

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Those with 2-digits traverse the entire country.

If they end in “0” they run East-West (10, 20, 30, ..)

If they end in “5” they run North-South (5, 15, 25, ..)

Those with 3-digits are bypasses and contain the last 2 digits of the interstates they bypass.

That’s it! (plus exceptions ) Neat!”

It is neat, actually. But it’s even a bit more complex than that, and the video link Evans shared explains it all in a clear (usually) and funny way. “The Interstate’s Forgotten Code” from CGP Grey uses animation to show that the numbering system does indeed have a rhyme and reason, despite there being a few notable exceptions. (A highway system would be boring if it always followed the rules, wouldn’t it?)

Enjoy learning something new if you didn’t already know this:

Winona Oak is the next big thing when it comes to Scandinavian pop. Born Johanna Ewana Ekmark, the singer-songwriter grew up on a Swedish island in the middle of nowhere called Sollerön, which translates quite literally to “island of the sun.” With such a great phrase built in to her own personal mythology, she decided to use the name of her home for the title of her debut album. Island Of The Sun will be out later this year, but for now we’ve got the stunning title track to tide us over.

“This song was created on a sunny evening in Los Angeles when I was going through a really tough time and felt more homesick than ever,” Winona said of the single in a press release. “I grew up on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, approximately 5360 miles from LA in the middle of the Nordic forests of Sweden on a small island called Solens ö, aka Island of the Sun. The island works as a metaphor for a place when everything’s peaceful and simple. Like that time in your childhood when the world is only as big and beautiful as you make it, you know as we grow older we tend to complicate things. I want the island to represent a happy place in ourselves or in a relationship, a bittersweet yearning for a place we ache to go again.”

That’s a highly relatable concept in my opinion, check out the icy video up above.

Sometimes the best new R&B can be hard to find, but there are plenty of great rhythm-and-blues tunes to get into if you have the time to sift through the hundreds of newly released songs every week. So that R&B heads can focus on listening to what they really love in its true form, we’ll be offering a digest of the best new R&B songs that fans of the genre should hear every Friday.

This week is led by the ladies in R&B. Jazmine Sullivan returns with Heaux Tales, Mo’ Tales: The Deluxe, a deluxe reissue of her beloved 2021 album, Heaux Tales. Mary J. Blige adds another chapter to her 30-year career with her fourteenth album Good Morning Gorgeous while Sevyn Streeter also arrives with a deluxe edition of her 2021 album Drunken Wordz Sober Thoughtz.

Jazmine Sullivan — Heaux Tales, Mo’ Tales: The Deluxe

For all of 2021, Jazmine Sullivan was showered with praise for her project Heaux Tales. It presented her fight for social norms and an embracing of sexual liberation. She accomplished this through stories of her own life and anecdotes from women she invited to the album. A year later, she’s back with more Heaux Tales thanks to the album’s deluxe version, Heaux Tales, Mo’ Tales: The Deluxe. It adds five songs and five skits to the original project with help from Issa Rae and more.

Mary J. Blige — Good Morning Gorgeous

Thirty years after she released her Platinum-selling debut album What’s The 411?, Mary J. Blige is still going strong as she returns with her fourteenth album Good Morning Gorgeous. The project presents 13 songs and contributions from Anderson .Paak, Dave East, DJ Khaled, Fivio Foreign, and Usher. Altogether, Good Morning Gorgeous is a celebratory album that also reaffirms her beauty while hopefully doing the same for her listeners.

Sevyn Streeter — Drunken Wordz Sober Thoughtz (Deluxe Edition)

Back in September, Sevyn Streeter dropped her second album Drunken Wordz Sober Thoughtz. The project arrived more than four years after her strong debut Girl Disputed. It also presented 15 songs and contributions from BIA, ASAP Ferg, Jeremih, Lucky Daye, and more. Five months after the album’s release, she returns with a deluxe version that shows off more of her impressive vocals with five excellent contributions to the album.

Cautious Clay — Deadpan Love (Deluxe)

New York-based singer Cautious Clay is adding to the experience that made up his debut album Deadpan Love. After releasing the project complete with 14 songs last summer, Clay returns with its deluxe version which adds eight songs to the project. Four of the new additions are brand new songs like “Rapture In Blue” while the remaining four are reimagined versions of songs of the original album.

Fana Hues — “Wild Horses”

After relating her debut project Hues in 2020, Pasadena singer Fana Hues earned a highlight moment last year after joining Tyler The Creator on his 10-minute song “Sweet / I Thought You Wanted To Dance” which also features Brent Faiyaz. Now she’s gearing up to release her second project Flora + Fana next month. Ahead of its arrival, she drops off “Wild Horses” which lands as a melodramatic offering from Hues. In addition to the new song, she’s also set to join Raveena on a North American tour later this year.

Johan Lenox & Lancey Foux — “I’m A Mess”

For his latest single before his upcoming album WDYWTBWYGU (What Do You Want To Be When You Grow Up), Johan Lenox returns with Lancey Foux by his side. The two join forces for “I’m A Mess” and it’s a track that reflects on one’s personal failures. With the aid of liquor and a mind swirling with thoughts, Lenox and Foux tackle their wrongdoings and their inability to do right over production with weeping cello and careening violins.

Lion Babe & Busta Rhymes — “Harder”

In 2021, R&B duo Lion Babe, which consists of singer Jillian Hervey and producer Lucas Goodman, dropped their second album Rainbow Child, a solid follow-up to their 2019 debut Cosmic Wind. With hopefully more music on the way, the duo returns with “Harder” alongside Busta Rhymes. The track is a dance-heavy track that features an energetic verse from Busta Rhymes who slides with ease over the song’s groovy production.

Ogi — “I Got It”

Singer-songwriter Ogi is off to a great start in a music career. She just dropped her debut single “I Got It,” which is supported by production from No I.D. It’s a strong debut from an artist who says her music “represents me coming into myself and not being afraid of saying things I wish I said to other people.” The Chicago-born Nigerian singer floats with ease on her debut track as she balances confidence and soul for an ear-pleasing debut that is hopefully the start of more great music to come.

Alex Vaughn — “Mirage”

Alex Vaughn, the DMV native who is one of the latest signees to the talented LVRN roster, makes quite the impression with her latest single, “Mirage.” The track marks her first release under LVRN and it couldn’t be stronger. Her vocals fly effortlessly on the single that finds her coming to her senses after realizing a man she was romantically involved with was no longer good for her.

Moonchild — Starfruit

After warming our ears with singles like “Tell Him” and “Love I Need,” Moonchild has finally arrived with their fifth album Starfruit. The project is comprised of 14 songs and additional features from Alex Isley, Ill Camille, Tank And The Bangas, Mumu Fresh, Chantae Cann, and more. Starfruit is drowned in soul and rich textures that are sure to make you excited for the warm weather months that await us.

Eli Derby — “Love Song”

With a new project en route, LVRN’s Eli Derby is back in action with his new track “Love Song.” The singer allows his youthful optimism to fly without restraint on the track as he lays his cards down for a woman he’s grown feelings for. He admits to constantly thinking about her while he seeks just enough reciprocated energy from her in order to validate his love for her.

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

“Euphoria” is without question a heavy show. The teenagers at Euphoria High deal with abusive relationships, drug addiction, mental illness and the dark side of sexuality. There’s not one episode that feels comfortable. When I think of “easy viewing,” this is certainly not it.

The show has received a lot of backlash for its content, with critics claiming that it glorifies and glamorizes toxic behavior. Following “Euphoria”’s second season, D.A.R.E. issued a statement to TMZ saying “It is unfortunate that HBO, social media, television program reviewers, and paid advertising have chosen to refer to the show as ‘groundbreaking,’ rather than recognizing the potential negative consequences on school age children who today face unparalleled risks and mental health challenges.”

Though I understand the concern, I do not agree. I think “Euphoria,” and shows like it, can be vital viewing. They’re painful, intense and hard to watch. And that’s exactly why we need them, if we ever aspire to strengthen our compassion for those dealing with issues that often lurk under the surface.

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As the central character Rue (played by Zendaya) struggles to gain control of her life, we feel her loneliness, her yearning, her despair … all of it. This is in part thanks to emotional empathy, a term coined by psychologists Daniel Goleman and Paul Ekman, meaning to “feel physically along with the other person, as though their emotions were contagious.” When we engage in emotional empathy, we activate mirror neurons, the cells of the brain that fire up both when we perform an act and when we observe an act.

Think about the excitement you feel when your favorite team scores a winning goal, or seeing a stranger stub their toe and suppressing the urge to yell “ouch!” Though you are not experiencing a situation on the outside, you are definitely experiencing it on the inside. Compare this to cognitive empathy, which refers to “simply knowing how the other person feels,” which keeps things intellectual, abstract, distant.

Television impacts our culture with emotional empathy. Watching TV can be a visceral experience: We get invested in the outcomes of characters’ decisions, relate to them, seeing the world differently as a result. Quite often we feel what a character feels, without ever having lived a similar experience. “Euphoria” harnesses the power of story beautifully in this way. It’s incredibly painful to watch, but so is addiction. And I think we owe it to those going through it to witness their inner battles. We’ve already seen the importance of representation, after all.

Zendaya responds to D.A.R.E’s criticism of Euphoria:

“Our show is in no way a moral tale to teach people how to live their life or what they should be doing. If anything, the feeling behind Euphoria … is to hopefully help people feel a little bit less alone in their experience” pic.twitter.com/rSz5tePSZX

— Pop Crave (@PopCrave) February 7, 2022

Zendaya has been very candid that the intention of the show was never to make drug use and violence aspirational. “Our show is in no way a moral tale to teach people how to live their life or what they should be doing,” she said in an interview with Entertainment Weekly. “If anything, the feeling behind Euphoria, or whatever we have always been trying to do with it, is to hopefully help people feel a little bit less alone in their experience and their pain. And maybe feel like they’re not the only one going through or dealing with what they’re dealing with.”

And to that end, the show has been successful. “I’ve had a lot of people reach out and find so many parallels from all ages, all walks of life,” Zendaya told EW. “So many parallels with Rue and her story and Rue means a lot to them in a way that I can understand, but also maybe in a way that I could never understand, and that means the most to all of us.”

Previously, the Netflix series “13 Reasons Why” received similar criticism for glorifying teenage suicide. Though the show’s creators initially defended their decision to keep a scene that graphically depicted a young character taking their life, eventually the scene did get removed. According to Vanity Fair, this was at the urging of both advocates and health experts, after there was an increase of calls to suicide hotlines from teenage viewers.

I am not a mental health expert, but I cannot help but wonder: Rather than making suicide appear more attractive, could the show have inspired teenagers to express what was already going on inside? Could instead this be the first time these issues were out in the open, and therefore safe to talk about?

Even Netflix released a statement saying “We’ve heard from many young people that 13 Reasons Why encouraged them to start conversations about difficult issues like depression and suicide and get help—often for the first time.”

This reminds me of the third type of empathy that Goleman and Ekman identify. Compassionate empathy is when we ”not only understand and feel a person’s predicament, but we are moved to help as well.” Though by definition this is regarding being moved to act for somebody else, I think the principle still applies to both “13 Reasons” and “Euphoria.” People were moved to talk to someone about their mental health. That to me is a huge victory.

Empathy is one of the most valuable skills we can learn. It can defeat misunderstandings, derision and dogma while cultivating the best parts in all of us. That’s why we need stories, even the uncomfortable ones, to help us understand a different world as our own, so that we can remember we are all connected, and even, when possible, take compassionate action.

Shows such as “Euphoria” help those struggling with similar issues find unconditional love for themselves and their journey. It helps family members of addicts better understand what’s happening underneath the surface (this coming from a daughter of addicts, by the way). I think that anything created with this kind of heartfelt intention is a force for good. No matter how painful.

The first part of the Netflix Kanye West documentary Jeen-Yuhs has been out for about a day now, and as fans take in the episode, one scene, in particular, has sparked a wide-ranging Twitter debate between fans and industry professionals. The documentary follows Kanye as he bum-rushes the Roc-A-Fella Records office with his camera crew in tow to play “All Falls Down” for people during a busy workday.

Much of the criticism focuses on then-head-of-marketing Chaka Pilgrim’s stonefaced reaction to Kanye’s antics as he commandeers her CD player and proceeds to perform the song in her face. Meanwhile, the narration provided by the documentary’s director and longtime Kanye cheerleader Coodie depicts this moment as a deflating one for Kanye, who believes that he should be signed to the label as a rapper and not just a producer.

Today’s fans are aghast that the denizens of the office seem less than enthused by the record, which went on to peak at No. 7 on the Hot 100, receive a double Platinum certification, and was nominated for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration at the 47th Grammy Awards. However, some industry professionals — at least one of whom was actually in the office on the day in question — have responded to the backlash hoping to set the record straight.

By way of context, Wayno Clark, who is the current VP of A&R for Quality Control Music after holding positions all over the music industry for the past two decades, offered his take as one of the people who were in the office on the day in question. “He played this song in the office and did this with a camera crew like 10x,” he explained. “How many times can you have a crazy reaction to something you’ve heard 10x? It was kind of annoying at that point.”

So, Kanye, in a nutshell.

“Y’all also gotta realize this is at a time when phones ain’t even have cameras on em,” he further elaborated. “He came with a camera crew all the time recording everything. People weren’t used to that, Chaka hair ain’t even done you think she was happy to be on camera?”

Other industry vets also weighed in on the intrusion, explaining that it was not only a workday but that the folks in the office were busy ensuring that Roc-A-Fella’s existing roster of potential hits got out to the world at large, as well. That didn’t stop fans from replying with their fan goggles firmly in place, berating industry pros — y’know, the people whose jobs entailed making sure that the music was put out and marketed well enough that it could do all those things listed above — for basically not doing their jobs — which, y’know… they did.

It’s a prime example of “not everybody deserves a platform to share their opinion” but alas, here we are. Social media gives everyone a megaphone — including Kanye, who spent the last week or so abusing his by using it to harass his ex-wife — and everyone is entitled to their opinion. But there comes a certain point when you really should listen to the experts. Fortunately, they’ve got megaphones of their own. Check out more responses below.