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Kyle Rittenhouse, the 17-year-old kid who traveled across state lines and killed two people during protests against police violence in Wisconsin last year, is currently on trial trying to prove he acted in self-defense.

Rittenhouse — who is from Illinois but traveled down to Kenosha, Wisconsin during the unrest armed with an AK-47 — has had his defense team employ a number of contradictory statements to explain why the teenager was in the city and what he intended to do there. The most unbelievable of these being that Rittenhouse was there, armed with a literal killing machine, to provide (via Raw Story) “medical support” and “first aid” despite being a high school student with no formal medical training.

But, as wild as that story is, it’s nothing compared to seeing the theatrics on display when Rittenhouse took the stand today. It’s normal for defendants in self-defense cases to testify under oath in order to tell their side of the story during trial, but Rittenhouse quickly became a blubbering mess while trying to describe the night in question and the moment he decided to take two people’s lives (and injure one more).

Now, just as Rittenhouse has no formal medical training, he’s also not a trained thespian, so his weepy performance on the stand didn’t really leave many (except maybe the judge, who offered him some water and a chance to compose himself) convinced of his sincerity.

We can’t predict what the actual court of law will decide, but in the court of social media opinion, Rittenhouse is maybe guilty of needing better acting lessons.

(Via Raw Story)

Was it prophetic for the Cavaliers that the power in Toronto’s arena abruptly went out as soon as the team wrapped shootaroound? Shooting the lights out is colloquial by now, but the way the Cavs would go on that night to out-grit the Raptors, digging deep into the mentality behind the ethos coach J.B. Bickerstaff and his players continually referred to postgame as “winning the scrap,” felt fitting for a team that had earlier worked the lights out.

A big part of that work is shouldered by Cleveland’s behemoth front court, made up of rookie Evan Mobley, offseason Chicago transplant Lauri Markkanen, and the now-default veteran presence of the three, Jarrett Allen.

Allen, who was named the NBA’s Eastern Conference Player of the Week on Monday, arrived in Cleveland last winter as part of the four-team trade that put James Harden in Brooklyn. It was abrupt, as most deals with a superstar tend to feel, but what was lost in the Nets’ big get was how bittersweet it was to give up Allen and Caris LeVert. Coached by Kenny Atkinson, Allen — who, drafted at 19, was the second-youngest Brooklyn player ever to make an NBA debut— and LeVert had turned the Nets into an energetic and resourceful team. The stakes were low and easily surpassed, making the franchise enough of a draw for Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant to turn a dingy Brooklyn dive bar into the NBA’s most polished nightclub of a team.

Initially, it looked like Allen was bound to have an Andre Drummond-sized impediment to playing time in Cleveland, but that changed when Drummond and the team decided it would be best for him to stay home before a buyout. The Cavs finished 22-50 last season, with a defensive rating of 25th and an offensive rating that had them third-to-last in the league. It was a bleak season for the NBA at large, so Cleveland coming out of it healthy and with some retooling to do seemed a net positive overall.

While most of the league looks to craft compact teams comprised of smaller stretch forwards and rangy wings, the Cavs upsized by drafting Mobley and nabbing Markkanen in a deal that was deemed head-scratching at best, or completely misguided at worst. But Cleveland GM Koby Altman had his sights set on something bigger — literally, the goal was to build an enormous basketball team.

But this notion of “scrap” that Bickerstaff and his players talk about is new, and it’s come from the trickier thing that’s not always assured in trades and acquisitions: chemistry.

It’s evident on the floor — whether through intuitive screens, incisive passing, or digging in defensively — that the Cavs move around as a cool-headed collective. When Raptors rookie Scottie Barnes battled with Allen for a ball and tossed him to the ground in Cleveland’s last game against Toronto, there was a palpable caught breath across the arena. The affair had been physical from the start, and the question of whether things would escalate loomed over Allen’s suddenly sprawled out on the floor frame. Instead, Mobley and Darius Garland quietly moved in to lift Allen to his feet while Ricky Rubio, first stopping under the net to collect the ball, walks over to close the Cavs’ protective circle and checks in with a few words. There’s no holding Allen back, no move to guide him away from the knot of Toronto players in the paint.

Instead, he calmly nods at whatever Rubio has said to him and positions himself for the resulting jump ball.

“For me, I always bring it back to my teammates. They kept me level-headed, they kept me cool,” Allen said after the game when asked by Dime how he toggles so easily between physicality and keeping a cool-head in the clutch. “And for the physicality, I’m always going to be physical down there, especially on the offensive board. If I can tap it out, if I can grab the ball and kick it out for a three, that’s what I’m going to do.”

And that’s what he did. Allen would go on to make the most of the game’s last two minutes, first delivering a sideways pass to Mobley in the corner then wedging himself between Toronto big Khem Birch and Fred VanVleet to get open beside the basket and bunny-hop a tidy dunk off of Mobley delivering the ball back to him; then pulling down a rebound with under a minute left and easily covering the floor to screen for Garland, cutting diagonal through the paint in a single, languid stride for a layup that brought the Cavs within one point in a game where they’d never led. They would go on to take down the Raptors, 102-101.

It was a masterclass in patience and communication, things rarely attributed to a team as young as Cleveland is now.

“We try and do everything that we can together,” Allen said when asked how he, Markkanen, and Mobley have been building chemistry together. “We have a bigs group chat, just so that we can stay connected. ‘Cause a lot of it is learning each other’s identity off the court.”

The on-court identity, while only two months old, has been just as accelerated. Allen noted the three are often put on the same team during practice to hasten familiarity between them. And it’s an entirely different atmosphere up there, where the three of them take in the game from, so are they operating like pilots in formation and developing a new shorthand of in-game communication?

“You kinda do,” Allen nods. “‘Cause we’ve all — except for Lauri [Markkanen], he’s kind of a hybrid — but we’ve all played the same position growing up. We’ve always been the tallest people on the team, so we kind of know what each other’s going to do, and we can predict it in that way.”

As if on cue, a towering shadow falls across Allen’s legs as he laces his sneakers, and Tacko Fall, who could be the big trifecta’s air-traffic controller, grins down at Allen. It’s indicative of a deeper connection running through this Cavs team, evident on and off the floor as much as in players’ postgame interviews where they’re often paired up. Everyone likes each other, but more than that, they’re curious about one another.

It’s a gamble Altman may or may not have banked on, but one Bickerstaff’s been guiding thoughtfully in the locker room where he’s noted “something special is brewing.” Underscoring that is the notion that a center-heavy team is bound to be more watchful and necessarily steady. Bigs have to watch and wait, it’s what their whole game is predicated on. Bigs also now have to shoot the three, or fold some other aspect of development into their skillset to stay competitive. The Cavs adding a veteran pass-first point guard in Rubio signals that they’d like their bigs to take that attentiveness and care to the other end of the floor, too.

Allen received two of the Toronto crowd’s loudest reactions of the night in Cleveland’s win over the Raptors — first when he was unceremoniously flipped to the floor, and second when he jackknifed a deep three as the shot clock buzzed its stubborn assent. Allen is already taking, and making, more shots than in any of his other four seasons, averaging 14.9 per game. His three-point attempts are on par with his rookie season, when Atkinson encouraged him to let it fly. He’s connecting on 33.3 percent of his attempts, a slight but noticeable step forward from last year’s 31.6 percent mark.

Shooting more isn’t the only way Allen has expanded his offensive arsenal, nor is it necessarily his focus. Allen’s taken the unselfish way he plays, harkening back to the give-and-go chemistry he shared with LeVert in Brooklyn, and folded in the Cavs’ ethos of unselfish, scrappy basketball to use his increased touches for extra distribution. He’s dabbling in playmaking and creating offensive opportunities for his teammates, grabbing boards but kicking them out where an open second chance from deep could yield a higher reward.

Asked if he’s enjoyed these new offensive opportunities and depth and Allen nods, a smile breaking across his face. “Absolutely,” he says. “Growing up, we weren’t able to touch the ball and distribute like we are now. But now, I’m able to make the pass to the open man, the ball is getting in my hand more, and I’m making the right decisions.”

The trust to make the right decisions has been reenforced by his teammates, like Garland, who said he knows Allen is “going to make the right read,” whether from the pocket or paint. Still, the capability for this expansion in Allen’s game took work, and before he got to Cleveland where it was readily encouraged, that work came in the offseason.

“Coming into the NBA, I didn’t have the knowledge of where to make the extra pass or who to hit, the open man,” Allen says, noting that the extra offensive handling “definitely did” take some getting used to. “But as I’ve been in the league, every summer I try to work on reading plays, knowing where to be, and knowing who to pass to.”

Perhaps the most thundering affirmation of Allen’s knack for reads comes when he does what seems so natural to him, lifting to a height parallel with the rim and dunking the ball into oblivion. Since his rookie year, Allen has recorded 627 dunks (and counting), his season best in 2019-2020 with 178. For how jarringly joyful and wrenched from gravity a dunk can seem, it takes a boggling amount of exacting control. Velocity, lift, the mechanics of the brain calmly instructing limbs flying through the air what to do, all of it a perfect balance to shatter the moment and make an arena explode. Allen has long since deciphered the dunk, so how does he know when to deploy one and when to stay the steadying presence on the floor?

“It’s a feel. And everybody’s going to love the explosive dunks, so I can do that, or try to do that, whenever,” Allen says with a smile. “But sometimes you’ve gotta find the open man, sometimes the three is going to get the team going. So, you just have to be able to find the right balance.”

And because it’s difficult not to ask someone like Allen, who careens through the air so calmly and often that Brooklyn’s announcers thought to dedicate a new measure of distance — “as the fro flies” — to him, to describe the feeling of a dunk, I do.

“Ah,” he sighs, thoughtful. “It’s something you enjoy doing. It gets the crowd going. You know your teammates are going to get going. You know the crowd’s going to roar. Even if you’re in another gym, an away gym like here, you get a good dunk? The away crowd’s going to go crazy. So it just gives me that extra boost.”

It’s credit to Allen’s game IQ as much as it is his knowledge of self that his increased versatility is rooted in the mainstay of his defensive prowess. When the game is balanced, good defense is generative of explosive, cohesive offense. Similarly, Allen sees versatility in the center position naturally coming full-circle back to defense.

“It’s versatility on the offensive end, like you said, bigs have been able to expand their range and basically turn into guards now,” Allen says. “But now, versatility’s almost on the other side of the court, on the defensive end. Being able to guard one through five, to know how to guard different actions on that end, too.”

Allen is already one of the league’s best on that end. To counter Allen, Toronto continually threw Birch and OG Anunoby at him, doubling up in order to squeeze him out from under the basket where he seems fixed, magnetized as if toward a geographic pole, or bulldozing him before one of his feet made it past the arc, because nobody wanted him in there. Even the tie-up with Barnes came because Allen held the ball so firm in two hands it wouldn’t budge, so Barnes tried dislodging Allen, instead.

But Allen sees even more room for his defensive aptitude to improve, and it’s been sparked by the curriculum of the Cavs.

“I want to be able to switch on the guards, because that’s kind of our offense,” Allen asserts. “Or at least switch on the three men. ‘Cause we switch with our bigs. So, to be able to guard any position.”

It might be a tall order for anyone else, but Allen has landed on a team that sees him expanding his offensive reads real time, or hone his defensive specialties to fit their schemes. They don’t get hung up on any current limitations, but empower a player moving with conviction toward a peak still partially obscured, potentially much higher than had been mapped to this point.

“It’s the buy-in that he has to his teammates, to the organization, and helping this team be as good as it possibly can be,” Bickerstaff says when asked by Dime how Allen has gotten so good at knowing what his team needs and when. “He knows what his strengths are. He doesn’t try to be anybody other than who he is. He’s got the ability to dominate the paint on both ends and when he makes his mind up, we’ve seen it time and time again, he’s in there kicking ass and taking names.

“That’s just a fierce competitive nature to go get a job done and help this team win by being the best that he can possibly be,” Bikerstaff continues. “That’s what’s brewing in that locker room. Guys are trying to figure out each of them individually: ‘What’s my way to help the team?’ Jarrett has found his way.”

Finding a bar that suits your vibe can be a bit tough when you’re flying blind. We’ve all walked into places that looked promising from the outside or on Instagram that we’ve immediately walked right back out of. It happens. As someone who makes their living tasting, thinking, and talking about spirits every day, finding a good whiskey and cocktail bar wherever I land is essential. But even with the best-laid plans and advice, I still strike out every now and then. But I also find some gems too, and that’s what we’re going to focus on in this new series.

Dutch Kills Bar in the Long Island City neighborhood of Queens is that gem today. While the name sounds forbidding, “kill” in Dutch simply means a small brook or creek, meaning that the name references where some Dutch colonizers put down roots next to a creek back in the mid-1600s.

The name aside, Dutch Kills Bar has one of the best and most eclectic spirits collections that rivals the best bars in the world. The focus is squarely on whisk(e)y but the prowess of the bar chefs means that there’s a long list of very deep cut liquors, liqueurs, bitters, vermouths, and just about everything else you can dream of in relation to booze on the back bar. Plus, all the ice is hewn from one huge block every night. With all of that in mind, let’s dive into what makes this bar a must-stop the next time you’re in New York.

WHY IT’S AWESOME:

One of the best aspects of this bar is its accessibility. If you’re in Mid-town Manhattan, all that you have to do is pop over the Queensboro bridge (or ride the subway to Queens Plaza) and you’re there. The bar is physically closer to Mid-town than Flushing and the heart of Queens further east. That means you’re getting the best of both worlds at this sort of crossroads between two major parts of the city.

Okay, let’s get into the bar. What I personally love about this place is the staff. They’re really f*cking chill while knowing their shit. While there’s a great menu of bespoke and well-crafted cocktails — all made with ice from that huge block — on the menu, I tend to choose a whiskey and ask for a favorite cocktail with that libation. The best part is that you can ask the bar chefs for advice, guidance, and tips. Granted, I work in spirits and come from a high-end cocktail bar background so I get that I’m more at ease doing this than some folks. Still, the gentle affability of the staff at Dutch Kills Bar is welcoming to all drinkers, whether complete newbies or seasoned pros.

If the bar is a little quieter, you can really dive into some amazing pairings and concoctions as the night wears on. I had fun pairing cognacs and craft Kentucky bourbon to find the perfect Sazerac for a stormy fall night.

And, very importantly, free, cold water was always in front of me. The bar staff made sure I always had water. This is crucial (and often overlooked) to a great bar experience. I know it seems simple, but it matters when you’re hitting the hard stuff.

WHAT TO DRINK:

This is up to you, of course. I was last there during a rainy Monday night past midnight. My Vans were damp from walking in the rain and I was jetlagged from a long flight. So, I went for a Michter’s Rye Manhattan.

Had I been there a month earlier and been sitting out in the sun, I would have ordered something fresh and bright off the menu like the Stay Up Late. It’s a nice and fizzy mix of lemon, simple syrup, cognac, and gin topped with seltzer.

Alternatively, you can really dive into the whiskey list. There are so, so many great whiskeys from all over the world (as you can see in the above photo) on the shelf that you could spend months at Dutch Kills trying a new whiskey every day and not get anywhere near the end of that whiskey menu.

Finally, if it’s a quieter night, talk to the bar staff. I know I’ve said it above but it’s worth reiterating. The bar chefs really know what they’re doing and care deeply about your bar experience and that comes down to whatever drink ends up in front of you.

WHAT TO EAT:

Dutch Kills serves a very small menu that’s provided by Stretto Bros. Sandwich Shop. Imagine classic Italian streetfood sandos amped up to eleven and you’ll have a good idea of what to expect. The bread is serious Italian white rolls with a solid crust and soft and tangy interior. The fillings tend to be stacked.

The Ill Papa (pictured above) is heaped with mortadella, capocollo, chorizo, shredded lettuce, tomato, dijonmayo, crumbled manchego, and giardiniara. It’s a lot but everything you want at the same time.

Another favorite was the Deli Boy (pictured further below). It’s stacked with mortadella, some jack cheese, lettuce, and yellow mustard. It’s kind of like the ultimate bologna sandwich jacked up on steroids.

SEATING:

10/10 — There’s covered outdoor seating with heaters for the cold nights ahead and the eventual return of summer. The main entrance is a long hall where you walk past booths just big enough for two sitting across from each other. There are a few larger booths for four just past the bathrooms but before you hit the barroom. Finally, the bar is barstool seating and standing room only.

VIBE:

9/10 — This is a really chill place that can also be rocking. It’s open seven nights a week, so naturally, it’ll be a lot busier during prime time Thursday through Saturday. Sundays and Mondays are slower and much more chilled out and you may well sit next to someone else in the spirits industry or bar scene on their day off.

SEXINESS:

8/10 — I like bars like this when they’re quieter, post-midnight so you can really dive into the bar’s bottle list with the staff. But, I can also see taking a date here and snagging a booth for two up front and having a super intimate night with great drinks or maybe a bottle of champagne and then a cocktail or two.

INSTAGRAMABILITY:

7/10 — The joint is pretty dimly lit but has enough light at the bar to take decent photos if you’re in the right spot. The booths up front are pretty dark, which is great for sexy good times but won’t play for IG. Still, those cocktails always look good enough to be photographed every single time.

BATHROOM GAME:

8/10 — The black and white tiled bathrooms are single-use, meaning you can hook up in them without someone walking in on you. They’re well lit and very clean with standard amenities.

BEST TIME TO DROP IN:

The bar opens at eleven am every day and is open until two or three am depending on whether or not it’s the weekend. While I like hitting places like this late (between midnight and closing), this really works as an any-time-of-day-or-night bar. You can drop in for lunch, get a massive sammie, down a cocktail, and have a great afternoon. Or you can hit it up on a Friday night with a date and maybe get a little lucky. It’s an all-around anytime sort of place is what I’m getting at.

IF I HAD TO COMPLAIN ABOUT ONE THING:

This is tough. I really like this bar. I guess I’m going to have to go with the jukebox. Letting the crowd control the music can be great or terrible. It’s not that the jukebox isn’t full of great music. It is. It’s that there’s no music if no one is playing a tune, which takes away from the atmosphere slightly.

WHERE TO GRAB A LATE-NIGHT BITE NEARBY:

Hitting a diner at two or three in the morning is a must if you’re in New York and a little tipsy. Court Square Diner is a brisk five-minute walk down Jackson Street, towards the Court Square subway station.

The menu is a classic menagerie of diner mainstays with 24/7 breakfast, lunch, and dinner items. I got the Patty Duke Patty Melt with a load of fries and it hit the spot and was ridiculously filling. I also got the stuffed clams, which were great but way too much food. What can I say, it was three in the morning and it made sense at the time.

DETAILS:

Dutch Kills Bar (27-24 Jackson Ave.) is open seven days a week from 11 am to 2 am Sunday through Thursday and 11 am to 3 am Friday and Saturday. The nearest subway stop is Queens Plaza on the E, M, and R lines.

You can reserve a table here.

MORE PHOTOS:

After making their official national TV debut earlier this week with a performance on Austin City Limits, Texas-based trio Khruangbin are keeping up their momentum by added even more dates to their massive 2021/2022 North American and European tour.

The tour celebrates the release of the band’s 2020 album Mordechai, which saw a return to their endlessly groovy sound. After selling out shows in LA and Colorado, Khruangbin have now added the entire month of March onto their 2022 tour, which will see them starting in Milwaukee and coming to a close in Tampa Bay before heading oversees to Europe in April.

Check out Khruangbin’s full 2021 and 2022 Mordechai tour dates below.

12/01/2021 — New Orleans, LA @ Orpheum Theatre *
12/02/2021 — Atlanta, GA @ The Eastern *
12/03/2021 — Atlanta, GA @ The Eastern *
12/04/2021 — Atlanta, GA @ The Eastern *
12/06/2021 — Indianapolis, IN @ Egyptian Room *
12/07/2021 — Cleveland, OH @ Agora Theatre *
12/10/2021 — Detroit, MI @ Royal Oak Music Theatre *
12/11/2021 — Columbus, OH @ Express Live! *
12/14/2021 — St. Louis, MO @ The Pageant *
12/16/2021 — Oklahoma City, OK @ The Pageant *
12/17/2021 — Dallas, TX @ Bomb Factory *
12/18/2021 — San Antonio, TX @ Tobin Center *
12/19/2021 — San Antonio, TX @ Tobin Center *
12/31/2021 — Houston, TX @ 713 Music Hall ^
03/02/2022 — Madison, WI @ The Sylvee ^
03/03/2022 — St. Paul, MN @ Palace Theatre ^
03/04/2022 — St. Paul, MN @ Palace Theatre ^
03/05/2022 — Chicago, IL @ Byline Bank Aragon Ballroom ^
03/11/2022 — Washington, D.C. @ The Anthem ^
03/12/2022 — Pittsburgh, PA @ Stage AE ^
03/14/2022 — Nashville, TN @ Ryman Auditorium ^
03/15/2022 — Nashville, TN @ Ryman Auditorium ^
03/17/2022 — Boston, MA @ Roadrunner ^
03/18/2022 — Boston, MA @ Roadrunner ^
03/19/2022 — Philadelphia, PA @ The Met ^
03/20/2022 — Tampa, FL @ Tampa Florida ^
04/04/2022 — Paris, FR @ L’Olympia
04/05/2022 — Zurich, CH @ X-Tra
04/06/2022 — Cologne, DE @ Oarlswerk Victoria
04/07/2022 — Berlin, DE @ Columbiahalle
04/09/2022 — Stockholm, SE @ Annexet
04/10/2022 — Copenhagen, DK @ K.B.Hallon
04/12/2022 — Amsterdam, NL @ Afas Life
04/14/2022 — London, UK @ Alexandra Palace
04/15/2022 — Glasgow, UK @ O2 Academy
04/16/2022 — Manchester, UK @ O2 Apollo

* with Nick Hakim
^ with Nubya Garcia

Tickets to Khruangbin’s expanded tour go on sale 11/12 at 10 a.m. local time. Get them here.

Mordechai is out now via Dead Oceans. Get it here.

Comedy legend John Cleese recently announced (back in August) that he’s making a documentary about “cancel culture.” He’s doing so (and this is what he declared) because “there’s so much I really don’t understand” about “so-called political correctness.” This seemed to be a genuinely enjoyable endeavor for the at-times controversial Monty Python and Fawlty Towers star, and he declared that he was “delighted” to take on the project. It must be noted that the doc’s title is John Cleese: Cancel Me, and well, something has happened that has led Cleese to actually, you know, cancel himself.

At least, Cleese has gone on a tear to “blacklist” himself preemptively while pulling out of a scheduled Friday performance. Via Variety, Cleese was on tap to give a talk at the Cambridge Union, until he learned that the Union decided to “blacklist art historian Andrew Graham-Dixon. The historian had performed a mock impression of Hitler ranting, during a debate last week on art and good taste at the Union.”

Cleese reacted to this blacklisting of Graham-Dixon by preemptively pulling out of his own talk, and he did so while referencing his own Hitler impression from Monty Python [he also performed an impression of Hitler’s Nazi March (and mustache) in Fawlty Towers]. On Twitter, Cleese made the announcement: “I was looking forward to talking to students at the Cambridge Union this Friday, but I hear that someone there has been blacklisted for doing an impersonation of Hitler.” He then declared, “I regret that I did the same on a Monty Python show, so I am blacklisting myself before someone else does.”

The comedian added, “I apologise to anyone at Cambridge who was hoping to talk with me, but perhaps some of you can find a venue where woke rules do not apply.”

It’s worth noting that Cleese is a Cambridge alumnus. Yet as the years have passed, jokes that were considered comedic in a pull-no-punches way, decades ago, simply won’t fly in a culture that’s growing increasingly more inclusive. Despite determining to make a documentary on the subject of “cancel culture,” it seems that Cleese has decided not to take that stage when confrontation could await him. Or maybe, you know, this will be part of the documentary. (You never know.)

When it comes to flavored vodka, we’re pretty used to the usual flavors of blueberry, watermelon, orange, lime, and even cranberry. Salted caramel has made an appearance. Even pepper vodka is pretty popular. Flavored vodka isn’t a new thing by any stretch is what we’re getting at. But, are you ready for french fry-flavored vodka? Arby’s is betting that you are.

We know all about the allure of Arby’s iconic curly fries, but they also recently added crinkle-cut fries into the mix. So, it should come as no surprise that the fast-food chain is dropping not one, but two flavored vodkas. One flavored is like their beloved curly fries and the other is flavored like their new crinkle-cut fries, which … are just fries with a bit of salt.

“Though we’ve mastered the art of drive-thru fries, we wanted to take it one step further by making them 80-proof,” Patrick Schwing, CMO of Arby’s said in a press release. “Being a potato-based liquor, this limited-edition vodka is infused with crinkle and curly fry flavor so Arby’s fans can enjoy our menu from bag to bottle.”

This is where it’s okay if you want to say, “wait, what?!” 

We’re as dubious as you. While you have to wait to try this french-fried vodka, we don’t. We got a chance to try them early. So, we’re giving you our professional opinion on what’s actually in the bottle. And hey, if they sound good to you, these limited-edition vodkas will be available beginning November 18th (and then again on November 22nd) at ArbysVodka.com for $59.99 for a 750ml bottle.

ABV: 40%

Price: $59.99

The Story:

The first vodka is flavored like Arby’s beloved Curly fries. Called “Curly Fry Voda,” it was distilled with cayenne pepper, paprika, garlic, and onion to make it taste as similar to a spicy, crisp curly fry as possible.

“Crinkly Fry Vodka” is a little simpler. It’s made to taste like crinkle-cut fries by distilling the vodka with kosher salt and sugar. The result is a sweet, salty homage to the newest addition to the Arby’s menu.

Tasting Notes:

Curly Fry Vodka

With all the spices included, the nose is surprisingly sweet. It actually has a sweet corn/moonshine scent to it. This is followed by a kick of cayenne pepper and other spices. Even knowing the ingredients, I wasn’t fully prepared for the heat of the palate. It’s still sweet, but there’s a ton of cayenne, paprika, and other over-the-top chili spices. It sort of burns similar to pepper vodka. I definitely would never drink this neat again. But … it would probably be pretty decent in a Bloody Mary.

Crinkle Fry Vodka

This vodka’s nose is truly unique. It smells like french fries (should I be surprised?). It also smells very sugary and slightly fruity. The palate is fairly muted with a ton of sugar and salinity at the end. This is another vodka that I would definitely never drink neat again. With the sweetness and saltiness, it might work in a vodka tonic? But who knows? I’m not a big flavored vodka drinker.

Bottom Line:

These vodkas really feel like a gimmick to sell Arby’s new crinkle-cut fries. That shouldn’t take away from the fact that while they might not be palatable to every drinker, they’re kind of fun. They’re silly and whimsical and I didn’t hate them.

If I had to pick one, I’d go with the Crinkle Fry vodka. It was much more subtle and closer to pepper vodka. Plus, I could actually see drinking this in Bloody Mary on a Sunday morning.

Geraldo Rivera is no stranger to the way things are done at Fox News, having been a part of their team—initially as a war correspondent—for the past 20 years. But ever since COVID-19 became the biggest headline, the 78-year-old has regularly found himself butting heads with several of his colleagues. On Tuesday night, he tweeted out a no-context message that many understood to be a clear shot at some of his fellow Fox News hosts, saying:

“Nothing is more contemptible than vaccinated commentators urging their unvaccinated followers to fight (and die) for their freedom. It’s like the punk-safe on the street-urging the guy in the ledge to jump.”

While his tweet elicited plenty of snarky replies, it almost seemed like a prelude an hour or so later, when he appeared on Hannity to discuss the backlash against Aaron Rodgers, who lied to the NFL about his vaccination status (and who, apropos of nothing, apparently has a huge dong). While Hannity and fellow Fox News personality Dan Bongino think Rodgers is being treated unfairly, Rivera says what Rodgers did was a total a**hole move, as Yahoo! Entertainment reported.

Though Rivera claimed that Rodgers and Shailene Woodley are one of his favorite couples (random), he went on to tear into the Green Bay Packer for being selfish, saying: “If I’m in your room with my grandchildren who are not vaccinated because they are too young and you lie about vaccine status and you sneeze on my grandchildren, that could be a crime. That is absolutely so selfish.”

Meanwhile, Hannity was complaining that while he believes in the science behind vaccines (and is reportedly vaccinated himself), he’s not necessarily a fan of vaccine mandates. Which is when Rivera really lost it, telling his colleague:

“I despise vaccinated people who are smug in their protection who urge unvaccinated people to exercise their freedoms. It’s like the guy in the street telling the guy on ledge to jump.”

To be continued.

“I can’t pretend to be humble about it,” Lindsey Jordan, more commonly known as Snail Mail, tells me about her new record Valentine, out Nov. 5 via Matador. She’s wearing a white tank top, a golden locket around her neck, and silver slacks with intricate prints. She doesn’t look like she should be humble; she looks like the embodiment of the real deal.

The 22-year-old was not prepared for the success and fame that her debut full-length Lush ushered along, which is something she’s disclosed many times in interviews. It’s not exactly surprising; she was only 17 when she wrote the record, and the project of Snail Mail started off by playing basement shows. A few years after receiving praise from Pitchfork, NPR, and pretty much every other prestigious music outlet, she appears to be readily accepting the royal status.

“I feel like I’m really growing as a musician and a songwriter, and it’s hard to look backward at all,” she says. “Any expectations that are held that have to do with my teenage self are just super unfair because I’m a thousand percent different person. It’s uncomfortable because I feel like I have to kind of ease everyone into the adult version of my music and myself.”

Valentine pushes us into Jordan’s maturity, instantly portraying distance from the completely separate world of Lush. The songs on the first record are known for their visceral honesty, but it’s anchored by a kind of timidness; this new album is elevated with a newfound sense of strength and confidence. The opening song alone reaches a louder, more unabashed climax than any of Lush does, and the rest of the album oscillates between those roaring highs and intimate lows.

Her fashion choices communicate this with sophistication and a refined nature. Her suits give off an aura that explicitly demonstrates growth from Lush; Lush is someone who wants to see the world, and the aesthetics of Valentine are that of someone who has seen the world.

“My stylist Alexa [Lanza] and I worked for months together on figuring out how everything was gonna be,” she explains. “I think it’s really important to be careful when you start working with a stylist that you don’t start looking dumb. Bringing fashion into things is a slippery slope. You want to look cool, but not look like you’re wearing a rockstar costume. A big thing about being a part of the process was getting everything so that it’s like a high-stylized version of how I actually feel inside. I think it’s important to not let the clothes wear you. I have a very distinct style and a distinct eye for what I like and what I don’t like. It’s made the shopping process extremely difficult, but I also am really happy with everything that I wear. It’s like a sweet spot of glam and preppy and kind of androgynous.”

The shirt on the cover art of the third single “Madonna” is from the 1800s. The black, puffy garment makes Jordan stand out like a sore thumb against the white background. “It was crazy,” she says with a laugh. “It made me feel gross wearing it. I was like, ‘How would this have been washed if it’s well-preserved?’ And they were skinny as fuck back then. I was [sucking in my stomach] the whole time because there was a jacket inside the jacket and all this stuff. It’s an interesting thing to mess with, especially when you’re messing with the gender of it because they weren’t doing that back then.”

There’s almost a sense of sacrilege in this, but that’s a common theme of Valentine. The singer plays with divinity as if it’s an everyday topic for her, whether it be by calling herself the devil in “Ben Franklin” or summoning Jesus on “Glory.” The songs were primarily written during the pandemic, when she stayed productive and inspired by exercising and cooking. The process of being a newly-successful musician was strange considering there was really only one avenue through which she could do her job: relentlessly working on Valentine.

“Writing a record is a scary thing because, unless you work with songwriters, it’s really you, yourself, and you, just trying to keep your career afloat,” she says. It was the only expectation of her, and it intensified as Lush’s release in 2018 grew more distant. “I was just taking it one day at a time trying to do what feels right. Sometimes that’s writing. Sometimes it’s not,” she says. “It only feels real to me to make songs about things that I feel strongly about, but it doesn’t always translate to music I want to put out. Sometimes I cut songs because they’re too personal. Sometimes I change verses because they’re too personal. Sometimes I think something is just the perfect amount of personal. Sometimes I think something is a little too personal but I put it out anyway.”

The few years in between Lush and Valentine felt long to impatient fans, but it was especially long for Jordan. “[Lush] is so full of wonder and curiosity and pure excitement about life,” she says. “It’s super weird to return as a kind of cynical adult.” Her adulthood is mirrored in her new style as well: “I still hear so many things about what I was doing before, even as far as going into styling for shoots. It’s hard to be like, ‘Yeah, I wore a dress two years ago, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s who I am now.’ It feels uncomfortable for me to even think about it because it’s just a self that I’ve shed. I don’t want to look at my 19-, 18-, 17-, 16-year-old self.”

Things are always changing; she says that things are already even different from when she worked on Valentine. “But I still feel the pain of the songs. It was such an intense process and all of the songs do really mean significant things to me. I think with Lush and Habit, I was writing from the experiences that I had, but a lot of those feelings went away really quickly because they were about crushes and the pressures of growing up and stuff like that. And that just doesn’t cut as deep later as some of the stuff that I’m singing about now. It’s really twisted and turned my life; it really made me the person that I am.”

Valentine is not only a departure from teenage years, but also a goodbye to being regarded as only an indie-rock figure. “Madonna” and “Ben Franklin” are jangly, mischievous pop tracks with R&B undertones; throughout the whole album, there are synth-laden moments, detours into folk, and many places where genre is eluded altogether. “I think I started to get to a point where the guitar-heavy stuff appeases everybody. I was like, ‘If I’m making a guitar record, I’m doing it for someone else,’” she explains. “I didn’t want to make another ‘Damn this chick rocks’ album. I’m so sick of being the chick that rocks. I just want to make something that feels entirely like I’m not doing any kind of people-pleasing here.”

She also learned what to prioritize this time around, taking more creative control with Valentine than she did with Lush. “Last time I was so overwhelmed that I didn’t take any interest in the producing or music videos or any of the stuff that would have taken me out of how busy I already was,” she says. “But something I learned about myself is that it’s more important for me to put the effort in when it’s hard because later it’s a lot more rewarding.” The result is Valentine being not just music, but a carefully-constructed world that’s cohesive and layered with intent. There’s no reason for Jordan to be humble; Valentine feels like the beginning of a Snail Mail empire.

Back in March, Cardi B achieved a huge milestone: She became the first-ever female rapper to have a solo song be certified Diamond, meaning it garnered over 10 million sales in the US. Now, a few months later, Cardi’s predecessor has followed her achievement. Nicki Minaj’s 2010 track “Super Bass” just hit 10 million sales, meaning she’s the second-ever female rapper to have a song be Diamond-certified.

“Super Bass” originally appeared on the deluxe version of Minaj’s debut album Pink Friday, nearly a decade ago. Now celebrating its new Diamond status, Minaj took to social media to share her gratitude. She posted a video of the official Diamond certification plaque, which is encrusted with shimmering rhinestones and features a photo of Minaj from the “Super Bass” single art. In the post’s caption, the rapper thanked her fans for a “decade of support” and even gave Taylor Swift a special shout-out. “Thank you for over a decade of support,” she wrote. “(special thx to Ester Dean, Kane, Juice, Taylor Swift, Sofia Grace & Rosie, Ellen, Young Money/Cash Money & Republic. This one was released b4 the streaming era, so millions of fans actually purchased the song. I’m so grateful for you guys. Sending love & blessings your way.”

Cardi B is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Picture, if you will, Maya Rudolph coming home after a long day at work saying “bubble bath.” Waiting for her is her long-time partner Paul Thomas Anderson, their four kids, and a Marvel movie. That’s a typical night at the Rudolph / PTA household, based on an interview with the Oscar-nominated (but somehow never Oscar-winning!) filmmaker.

When asked by Variety what movies he’s enjoyed recently, Thomas Anderson replied, “Shang-Chi was good fun. There’s a terrific energy about it, but I also live in a Marvel-obsessed household, so continuing the journey of these Marvel stories is exciting to us.” He also said that he liked Venom 2: Let There Be Carnage and Titane, one of the best movies of the year. He expanded on his feelings for the Julia Ducournau film:

“Proceed with caution: I have no idea how to recommend it, because it’s certainly not everyone’s cup of tea. I don’t know entirely how I feel about it, but, my God, you are in the hands of a real filmmaker. I was holding on tight for dear life, and that is a terrific feeling.”

PTA was also quizzed on whether he thinks Daniel Day-Lewis, who he worked with on There Will Be Blood and Phantom Thread, will come out of retirement. “We can all get together and hope he’ll come back. Wouldn’t it be great? When Phantom Thread came out, I was asked about it a lot, and I feel the same way now that I did then. Yes, I’m greedy like everybody else. I want more Daniel Day-Lewis performances,” he said. “But I also think he’s given us more than enough, and we should stop being so greedy. He’s the king.”

Paul Thomas Anderson’s next movie, Licorice Pizza, comes out this month.

(Via Variety)