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Hailing from Chicago, Ravyn Lenae came up five years ago as a future R&B revelation of sorts, albeit an enigmatic one. Creating alongside some of Chi-town hip-hop’s finest like Smino and producer Monte Booker, Lenae was a core member of the Zero Fatigue crew. Her 2016 Moon Shoes EP is sublime and 2018’s Crush EP featured the breakout song “Sticky,” plus a track with The Internet’s Steve Lacy. The latter is now back on deck with Lenae on her first single in years, “Skin Tight,” and it’s pure silk from the pair.

Lacy strings the beat on a smooth guitar, as drums lay the groundwork for Lenae’s luscious coo. She shares the hook with the prodigious Lacy, but it’s Lenae and her magnetic delivery that linger fondly. She’s been an exciting emerging force for years and “Skin Tight” is released as the lead single from her debut album that will drop sometime later this year.

She shared a statement on the comeback track:

“I wanted to snap people into my world through the sonics, so they can feel how I’ve felt over the past couple of years… It has those hypnotic elements, but it’s very simple, familiar, and fresh. Thematically, it’s about not being in a relationship with somebody, but still having those physical and mental ties. It speaks to sharing kinetic energy with another person, even if time has passed and you aren’t together anymore.”

Listen to “Skin Tight” above, along with the surrealist video directed by Zongbo Jiang.

This week, Pam & Tommy — the miniseries chronicling the strange-but-true tale of Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee’s stolen sex tape — debuts on Hulu. The incident was one of many tumultuous things that happened during their three-year marriage, which lasted from 1995 — about a month-and-a-half after they first met — to 1998. So when was the tape first leaked and when did they break up?

As per Us Weekly, the tape was made early in their relationship, including footage of them on a houseboat on Lake Mead. (Anderson does not like the term “sex tape,” saying it was really “a compilation of vacations that we were naked on.”) The two met at a New Year’s Eve party in 1994. He proposed to her four days later, and they were wed in mid-February. The tape was stolen from their Malibu home later that year, pilfered by a former porn actor-turned-electrician named Rand Gauthier, and by early 1996, it was being sold to thousands. (They didn’t win their case against the distributor, Image Entertainment Group, until 2002.)

Anderson has said the scandal added “so much frustration and stress to our relationship.” But it wasn’t the main reason they divorced two years later. Their marriage had ups and downs, including fights, a miscarriage, and Lee being jailed for six months in 1998 for spousal abuse after kicking Anderson in the back while she was holding their seven-week-old son Dylan. After his release, Anderson said she was “very proud” of Lee’s attempts at reconciliation. They divorced later that year.

The pair tried to patch things up a decade later, in 2008, but that ended quickly.

You can see a version of the sex tape scandal when Pam & Tommy, starring Lily James and Sebastian Stan as the pair and Seth Rogen as Gauthier, debuts its first three episodes on Feb. 2 on Hulu.

The House select committee that’s spent months investigating the lead-up to the Jan. 6 Capitol riot had to go over and beyond to procure White House documents from the National Archives, for one main reason: former president Donald Trump did his best to stop them from getting into their hands. Two weeks ago, those documents were finally delivered to lawmakers, but there was a catch: According to The Washington Post, some of them had been torn into shreds then taped back together.

This shouldn’t come as a surprise. In 2018, Politico reported that Trump had a peculiar (and possibly illegal) habit: He liked to tear up official White House documents and throw the remains on the floor.Aides then had to scramble to tape them back together, sometimes dealing with shards as thin as confetti. This was in direct violation of the Presidential Records Act, which stipulates that all memos, letters, notes, emails, faxes, and any other documentation pertaining to presidential duties be preserved.

Alas, not all of them had been reconstructed. Among the 700 documents they received from the National Archives, the committee found a number that had never been put back together again by some poor aides.

Trump’s habit was one of many norms and even laws that Trump gleefully violated during his single term. A New York University law professor told the Post that, because the documents Trump tore up are technically government property, what he did “could be a crime under several statutes.”

Then again, Trump’s made it pretty clear that should he ever have to pay for any of his many alleged crimes, he may just summon his supporters again.

(Via The Post)

After months of hype and unrecognizable promo pictures, the highly-anticipated Pam & Tommy will finally hit screens this week. With all of the streaming options out there, it can be confusing to try and figure out how to watch.

Well, first things first: Pam and Tommy is an eight-part mini-series, not a movie. That said, the first three episodes are set to stream on Hulu on February 2nd. After the first three episodes, the rest of the series will air on Wednesdays until March 9th. If you don’t have Hulu, the series will also be available on Star+ and, believe it or not Disney+ with Star, if you are outside the US.

Pam & Tommy will follow the notoriously over-the-top relationship between Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee, played by Lily James and Sebastian Stan, respectively. The cast also includes Nick Offerman, Seth Rogan, Taylor Schilling, and Jason Mantzoukas, who will be voicing Tommy’s penis, obviously, because what else.

Despite the cast of comedians, the show promises some darker moments, which sparked the downfall of the infamous marriage, which was four days after the pair met. James and Lee supposedly tried to reach out to the real-life couple before shooting, but sources close to Anderson said she believes the whole thing is “a joke.” Well, when there is a talking penis involved, one would hope it would be a little light-hearted.

How was your weekend? Probably not as productive as Donald Trump’s. In the span of about 24 hours, the former president a) vowed to pardon any jailed Jan. 6 rioters, who stormed the Capitol in an attempt to overturn democracy; b) promoted unrest should he be prosecuted for crimes he may have committed; and c) straight-up admit he wanted ex-veep Mike Pence to “overturn the election” of 2020. Meanwhile, all you might done is shovel snow.

Trump’s comments — which, again, include confessing to a crime he’s previously tried to bury under an avalanche of voter fraud nonsense — sparked outrage, even from cronies like Lindsey Graham. Perhaps the most forceful pushback came from Liz Cheney, the longtime traditional Republican (and, lest we forget, daughter of one of the least-liked conservatives in American history), who has seen herself all but booted from the party for daring to stand up to Trump. Well, she’s still not backing down.

“Trump uses language he knows caused the Jan 6 violence; suggests he’d pardon the Jan 6 defendants, some of whom have been charged with seditious conspiracy; threatens prosecutors; and admits he was attempting to overturn the election,” Cheney wrote on Twitter, adding, ominously, “He’d do it all again if given the chance.”

Cheney’s ire wasn’t meant exclusively for Trump. It was also for fellow Republicans, most of whom have turned their gaze as the 45th president and his minions have shredded democratic norms and punished Republicans like her for not marching in lockstep.

“The leaders of the Republican Party have made themselves willing hostages to a man who admits he tried to ‘overturn’ a presidential election and suggests he would pardon Jan. 6 defendants, some of whom have been charged with seditious conspiracy,” Cheney told The Washington Post. “I’m a constitutional conservative and I do not recognize those in my party who have abandoned the Constitution to embrace Donald Trump. History will be their judge. I will never stop fighting for our constitutional republic. No matter what.”

Meanwhile, Cheney’s fellow Republicans are busy doing other things, like quoting neo-Nazis who pled guilty for possession of child pornography.

(Via Yahoo! News and The Washington Post)

Texas senator, noted vacationer, and offense to beards everywhere Ted Cruz has a couple good opinions. He likes The Princess Bride, even though its star hates his guts. (Ditto, probably, its noted lefty director, Rob Reiner.) But many of his opinions are, to put it mildly, bad. So here’s another: While a lot of Republicans are tellingly up-in-arms over the idea that President Joe Biden seems intent on nominating a Black woman to the 5/7ths white Supreme Court, Cruz went farther than most.

On Monday’s episode of Verdict with Ted Cruz, the podcast/streaming show he hosts with conservative pundit Michael Knowles (whose name is suspiciously not in the show’s title), the most dunked-on person in America sounded off on the idea of nominating the first-ever Black woman to replace the departing Stephen Breyer (though Biden has yet to name a anyone).

“The fact that he is willing to make a promise at the outset that it must be a Black woman I’ve got to say that’s offensive,” Cruz said. “Black women are what, six percent of the U.S. population? He’s saying to 94 percent of Americans ‘I don’t give a damn about you, you are ineligible.’”

He then took his already strange argument in an even more surreal direction. “It’s actually an insult to Black women, if [Biden] came and said ‘I’m going to put the best jurist on the court’, and he looked at a number of people and he ended up nominating a Black woman he could credibly say ‘OK, I’m nominating the person who is most qualified.’ He’s not even pretending to say that,” Cruz said. “He’s saying if you’re a white guy, tough luck. If you’re a white woman, tough luck, you don’t qualify.”

After whining about how tough life is for white guys, Cruz added, “It is an example how Democrats, in particular the far left, everything is race, everything is that they will discriminate based on race, they will pigeonholed you, they don’t care about the individual.”

Well, at least one person thought Cruz was insightful, even funny: His co-host, who was once called “disgraceful” by Fox News for describing teenage climate change activist Greta Thunberg as “mentally ill.”

(Via ABC News)

19-year-old Memphis rapper NLE Choppa (born Bryson Lashun Potts) has come a long way in two years. After breaking out in a big way back in early 2019, then just 17, Choppa slowly but surely began to build out his discography beyond his viral hit “Shotta Flow.” Signing a deal with Warner Records, the teenage rapper released his Cottonwood EP in early 2020, along with his debut album, Top Shotta, and a mixtape shortly after called From Dark To Light. Given his output during that short one year span, it makes sense that Choppa held off on full-length releases last year, but came back in strong at the top of 2022 with his second album, Me Vs. Me just last Friday.

Now, he’s following up the album’s release with a new video for “Stompin,” in which he plays a whole host of characters, including none other than The Dark Knight himself. Switching gears for other visceral roles like a butcher tenderizing meat (with lots of blood splatter), and even finds himself in a similar situation to the lethal hypnotism that trapped Daniel Kaluuya’s character in Get Out. Check out the new video for “Stompin” above and stream the Me Vs. Me mixtape, which includes features from Young Thug, Polo G and G. Herbo, right here.

A time-honored tradition of NBA in-arena entertainment is getting incredibly frustrated at whatever fan fails at a game or challenge. Whether it be a halfcourt shot that doesn’t even come close to making it to the basket or someone making a terrible guess at trivia, part of the allure of the Jumbotron games is the belief that, if you were ever put in that position you would succeed and win the prize.

On Monday night in Philadelphia, we got an all time Jumbotron Hall of Shame moment during a casino-sponsored game of blackjack, where the fan simply was trying to beat the Sixers mascot, Franklin, serving as the dealer for a prize. What transpires during this game is something absolutely awe-inspiringly dumb.

First off, hitting 17 against a 7 is decidedly not a “by the book” move, but he is somehow rewarded for that with a 3, which is the second-best possible outcome. When I first saw this video, I assumed that was going to be the crazy part, but he then hits a 20 to the dismay of the arena host, the entire crowd, and even Franklin appears to be judging him as he slams a jack down on the table to give the fan 30, which is an incredibly difficult total to get to in a game of blackjack.

I have seen a lot of things at a blackjack table that have baffled (and infuriated) me. I’ve seen someone split 10s four times. I’ve seen people stay on 14 against a face card. But never in my life have I seen someone hit 20. It is such a terrible decision that I’m almost impressed by it.

It’s a safe bet that Voltaire, the nom de plume of French Enlightenment writer, historian, philosopher, and wit François-Marie Arouet, has rarely if ever trended on Twitter. But on Monday, thanks to an obscure Republican who pals around with Marjorie Taylor Greene, Jim Jordan, and Lauren Boebert, he did, and for reasons unbefitting of the genius who wrote Candide.

Over the weekend, Kentucky representative Thomas Massie decided to become the umpteenth member of his party to go after the nation’s top immunologist, who somehow managed to keep his job through the final stretch of the Trump presidency while still doing his job. “You mustn’t question Fauci, for he is science,” Massie sarcastically tweeted above a quote, allegedly from Voltaire: “To learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize.”

Problem is, Voltaire never said that. But a neo-Nazi who was arrested for child pornography did.

As per expert CNN fact checker Daniel Dale, “there is no record” of Voltaire writing or uttering those words. Still, it’s a popular quote among certain types, even though it’s commonly attributed to Kevin Alfred Strom, said child porn-having neo-Nazi, who said the following in a 1993 broadcast: “To determine the true rulers of any society, all you must do is ask yourself this question: Who is it that I am not permitted to criticize?” Strom was, in fact, referring to Jewish people. (Dr. Fauci, incidentally, is Jewish.)

Massie’s far from the first person to fall for this misquote. In 2015, an Australian senator misattributed the quote to Voltaire and, after receiving pushback like Massie is now, deleted all of his tweets.

As of this writing, Massie’s tweet remains live.

Speaking of, in August Massie was condemned after tweeting out an image that compared vaccine cards to Nazis tattooing numbers on concentration camp prisoners. He deleted that one.

In the meantime, perhaps Voltaire’s Candide (or one of his many history books) will become yet another work of great literature to hit the sales charts, much like Art Spiegelman’s Maus.

(Via CNN)

Rosalía decided to share the album artwork for her upcoming record with the world today, and in the process, she’s sharing quite a bit. The Spanish singer/songwriter and rising mainstream pop star is pretty much naked on the cover, with her hands and some scribbles and spray paint strategically covering certain areas. On her head, she sports a massive black helmet and teased out hair that blends it all into what looks like one big headpiece. With the contrast of her naked body, the result is quite striking.

She shared the image to Instagram today, along with a caption in her native Spanish and in English. “Madre miiiiia aquí tenéis la portada de MOTOMAMI y este viernes adivina k nuevo tema se vieneee,” she began, including a string of heart and fire emojis before offering the translation as well: “Omg here you have the cover of MOTOMAMI and guess what new song is coming this Fridayyyy.”

Keep an ear out for that new music that’s coming later this week. If you’re trying to get caught up on the rising singer before her third album comes out, check out her collaboration with Billie Eilish or Motomami‘s first single, “La Fama,” which features The Weeknd.