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The pride of Portland, Aminé did an admirable job staying busy during the pandemic. The rapper put out nearly a full album’s worth of new material in the Limbo (Deluxe Edition) and then was among those featured in the soundtrack to the Space Jam: A New Legacy sequel. Now he’s dropped “Charmander,” his first new track of 2021 and the video is telling of what he’s been up to since… well, sort of.

“Charmander,” named after the classic Pokémon fire-breather, sees him expanding into new sonic frontiers as the track is propped up by a sped-up jump up drum and bass beat. He ruminates on being comfortable in his home base with the repeatable hook, “I’ve been chillin’ on an island, too,” and is seen hanging with a new friend: A giant poodle. As he goes about his day-to-day in a woodsy Oregon cabin, flipping through records, cooking with his lady, and chopping wood, the massive pup is by his side. And the dog has a similar disposition to Aminé: Curious, but always relaxing. He spoke about the track in a statement:

“After the release of Limbo I took some time to experiment and challenge myself to create in ways I hadn’t before — exploring different textures and tempos without any expectations. ‘Charmander’ was the first product of that period that felt natural while still being at a completely different BPM than any of my previous work.”

Watch the video for “Charmander” above.

The post Aminé Kicks Back With A Giant Poodle In The ‘Charmander’ Video appeared first on UPROXX.

While promoting his new book, Kevin Smith’s Secret Stash, the always talkative writer/director opened up his interactions with infamous producer Harvey Weinstein, who already had an unscrupulous reputation before his #MeToo reckoning in 2017. According to Smith’s book, Weinstein allegedly pulled Good Will Hunting out of theaters specifically to screw Robin Williams out of his back-end deal on the film, despite the fact that the acclaimed actor helped to clinch its box office success.

“It was doing incredibly well,” Smith told The Daily Beast‘s Marlow Stern. “And the deal that they’d made with Robin was a high-percentage first-dollar gross—a movie-star deal—and it was great, because instantly by putting Robin in the movie their pre-sales paid for the whole f*cking film.”

Good Will Hunting was doing so well, in fact, that it almost broke the $100 million barrier, which would result in paying Williams a larger cut, so Weinstein pulled the film to Smith’s surprise:

From what I remember, Robin’s split would be even greater and he’d get a bigger percentage if it crossed $100 million, so every dollar the movie made at the theatrical box office would have to be split—I’m not sure if it was a 50/50 split—with Robin Williams. I was on the movie as a co-executive producer, so we were privy to some details, and I remember the day when Good Will Hunting was leaving theaters and it felt weird because it was like, “Wait? There’s all this Oscar buzz, so why would you pull it if it was just making money?” And they did it because keeping it in theaters meant that more of the money would go to Robin, whereas the moment it went to video the split wasn’t Robin-heavy. It was hamstrung because greed.

Smith also made it a point to distance himself from Weinstein, who made Clerks a success after buying it at Sundance. The Mallrats director was quick to shoot down the term “mentor” to describe their relationship.

“‘Mentor’ is a big word,” Smith said. “[George] Carlin and Stan Lee were mentors; Harvey was a guy that produced our movies.”

(Via The Daily Beast)

Just month removed from helping spearhead the Phoenix Suns’ run to the NBA Finals, Chris Paul is three games into his 16th season in the league. After stops in New Orleans, Los Angeles, Houston, and Oklahoma City, all of which made playoff appearances during his tenure, Paul said Phoenix stands out among the rest.

“Man, this is probably one of the best locker room that I’ve been in my whole career,” Paul told Yahoo Sports. “Because we have young guys that are leaders and everybody leads in their own different ways. We communicate, we talk. It’s a real family over here. You celebrate the guys that got paid this summer.”

One teammate yet to be paid the money he’s earned, however, is center Deandre Ayton, despite his third-year breakout and consderable in-season strides. Paul said he and Ayton talked about the big man’s contract situation and that Ayton “knows what he has to do.”

“The goal for everybody is to see everyone getting paid,” Paul said. “His situation is what it is, but it’s going to work out for him. We hope it works out for him. The biggest thing we know we can do is go out there and win games.”

Ayton should be playing out this season with the security of a new deal awaiting him. But at the very least, wisdom and encouragement from a leader like Paul might offer some reassurance that a big contract is coming soon.

While Edgar Wright might not be the first name you’d throw out there when asked who should get to take a swing at writing the next James Bond movie, you can’t deny the thought is actually pretty damn cool. With films like Baby Driver, Hot Fuzz, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, and the upcoming psychological horror romp Last Night in Soho under his belt, there seems to be little question of if Wright could do it, but rather if the dark comedy legend would even be given chance to shoot his shot. However, Wright might just be manifesting the opportunity for himself, confessing in a recent podcast appearance he already has a pitch ready to go.

On the latest episode of the Happy Sad Confused podcast, the British director gushed about his love of the James Bond series to host Josh Horowitz before telling him what direction he thinks the 007 franchise needs to go in. According to Wright, the James Bond movies are a mix of “dark chocolate of milk chocolate,” with “dark chocolate” referring to the films with a more intense take on Bond and his storyline and “milk chocolate” meaning the movies that are a bit more light-hearted and comedic in tone.

Wright says that after Daniel Craig’s decidedly “dark chocolate” approach to the character, the series is “crying out for another milk chocolate Bond,” as there’s nothing “to be gained by continuing in the same vein.” Luckily for MGM, Wright even has an idea for a “milk chocolate” James Bond movie, however the director is unsure of if the studio feels the same way about the series’ direction as he does based on the names he’s seen tossed around for the upcoming project.

“I don’t think there’s anything to be gained by continuing in the same vein, and I think it would certainly be interesting to try and… I mean, I do have a take [on Bond], and if they ever ask me, I’ll pitch it to them [laughs], so I’m not going to say it, but when I see some of the names being bandied around, I can’t quite see it, and they seem like Daniel Craig II.”

To Wright’s point, all of the rumors and names tossed around do seem to foreshadow the Bond character will remain more serious in the series’ next installment, making his light-hearted, comedy pitch seem a bit too out there to be greenlit. Hell, even Dune director Denis Villeneuve seems to be advocating for a shot to direct the next 007 movie, and we all know he takes himself and his work very seriously. However, fingers crossed Wright one day gets to at least pitch his idea and maybe we see the Thor: Ragnarok-ification of the Bond series. We all know the suave super spy likes things shaken anyways.

In something straight out of Succession, an executive of the parent company that co-owns MLSE — the ownership group of the Toronto Raptors — tried multiple times to manipulate, block, and sabotage Masai Ujiri’s new deal. In a bombshell investigation by Christine Dobby and Doug Smith of The Toronto Star, individuals within Canadian telecommunications behemoth Rogers Communications and the NBA revealed that Edward Rogers, the former chairman of Rogers, actively fought plans to re-sign Ujiri, whose contract as Raptors President was coming due and had been speculated about since the start of the team’s 2019-20 Tampa season.

Negotiations to re-sign Ujiri were all but wrapped this past July. MLSE chairman Larry Tanenbaum and Bell, the other Canadian telecom juggernaut that happens to also have an ownership stake in MLSE, were onboard for a package that included incentive pay linked to future valuation of the team — the Star‘s story notes one NBA franchise offered Ujiri a three percent ownership stake in the team and that multiple clubs in the English Premiere League came calling. But despite this kind of pressure for MLSE to keep their guy, Rogers remained the lone and outspoken detractor of getting the deal done.

One particularly damning section of the story recalls Ujiri being invited to late-July negotiations at Rogers’ cottage, a few hours north of Toronto, with Ujiri leaving “feeling positive,” but Rogers complaining that it was one of the worst meetings he’d ever had. According to sources, Rogers called Ujiri “arrogant” and alleged he arrived with bodyguards. In fact, Ujiri arrived with his regular driver and a camera operator who was capturing footage for an upcoming Giants of Africa (Ujiri’s longstanding non-profit organization) documentary. Rogers went as far as to call Ujiri after the meeting and to tell him he wasn’t worth the money he was being paid, after which Ujiri reportedly felt so disrespected he considered stepping away from his role and the team for a year.

While Tanenbaum and MLSE went into damage control, Rogers went on to demand a cryptic 12 conditions be met before he would consider the deal. According to the story, “eleven of the conditions concerned contractual issues such as the terms of incentive-based pay, but the 12th had nothing to do with Ujiri’s compensation.” Essentially, Rogers attempted to adjust the ownership stakes of MLSE — as it stands, Rogers Communications owns 37.5 percent, Bell another 37.5 percent, and Tanenbaum’s own group controls the remainder — and combine it with the Toronto Blue Jays to create an entirely new and separate company. Tanenbaum and Bell held out, while Rogers went to NBA Commissioner Adam Silver to complain. But because Tanenbaum also holds the position of governor of the Raptors, he has the final say on personnel disputes and possessed the ability to overrule Rogers.

Rogers, who was ousted as chairman by a board that included his mother and sister since this all went down, has since put together a shadow council of a separate, not technically legit board at Rogers to reappoint him as chairman. Regardless of what he attempts, though, Ujiri is now firmly ensconced in his role as Raptors president.

Matt Amodio’s run on Jeopardy! is slowly fading into the rearview, but his presence in the show’s canon isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. That’s due in part to just how much he meant to viewers who have endured a long string of controversies in recent months and grew attached to the dominant run by the Ph. D candidate.

That run ended earlier in October, though, thanks to a great game from newcomer Jonathan Fisher and another contestant who largely beat Amodio at his own game. But Fisher has turned out to be quite the strong champion in his own right, and on Friday he made a bit of Jeopardy! history that Amodio now shares in as well. Fisher, an actor who won his 10th game on Saturday, became the first contestant to knock off the winner of double-digit games and go on at least a 10-game streak of their own as Jeopardy! champion. As of Monday, Fisher had rattled off 10 wins for a total of $230,100, an impressive amount in his own right given that he beat a 38-game winner to start his own streak.

Winning Jeopardy! is no fluke, but the fact that Fisher is making Jeopardy! history here does show just how hard it is to pull off a long string of wins on the show. His 10 games amount to just two or three days of filming, for starters. And while we don’t know how long he will last as champion, the show is also being fairly bullish about his chances to keep the streak going this week.

And Amodio certainly seems to be a fan of the run as well.

We’ll see how long Fisher goes, but he’s already in some very good company. And likely has set up a rematch with Amodio in the next Tournament of Champions.

“That would be amazing,” Fisher said in an in-episode interview last week. He’s certainly not alone in that assessment, either.

Ed Sheeran and Eminem are familiar collaborators, as they’ve worked together on songs like “River,” “Those Kinda Nights,” and “Remember The Name.” Their relationship extends beyond their work together, though. The first time they met in the studio, they talked more about video games and movies than they did music. It turns out the two have a sort of pen pal relationship now, too, thanks to their mutual love of collecting cassette tapes.

On a recent episode of Later… With Jools Holland, Sheeran noted (via HipHopDX):

“I collect cassettes and I’ve got Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder, and they are quite difficult to find. The only person I know who collects the same is Eminem. He collects cassettes — that’s his thing. He loves collecting. He is avid at going to find them. We have started having this… it’s like a very cool pen pal thing. I got a message the other day about an LL Cool J cassette. He said, ‘This is the cassette which made me want to start rapping.’ I sent him Van Morrison and I will send him David Gray’s White Ladder next.”

Meanwhile, Ed Sheeran is fresh off receiving a positive COVID-19 test, meaning that his upcoming Saturday Night Live performance may be a no-go.

Ed Sheeran is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Ah, Thanksgiving. A chance for the family to come together to eat food, watch football (or see whatever’s on TBS when the Lions game is on — I bet it’s Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation), and give thanks to Mike Lindell for exposing the biggest criminal cover-up in American, nay, world history. After many, uh, trial runs, the MyPillow CEO has been talking up November 25 as the day that the Supreme Court will convene to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. In fact, while you’re stuffing the turkey, Lindell will be holding a multi-day “marathon” broadcast in honor of the occasion.

“I cannot wait to drop this Supreme Court case the Tuesday at 9 a.m. before Thanksgiving and the whole world is going to be watching all this unfold over Thanksgiving,” he told Steve Bannon on Friday (watch it above). “We’re going to do a marathon from Wednesday night of Thanksgiving all the way to Sunday.”

“And you’re going to be sitting around the table — this is very important to our country and the world — everyone can be sitting around the table and going, ‘Hey, what do you think of that? You think the Supreme Court is going to accept it and protect our country like they’re supposed to?’” the pillow executive opined.

Lindell thinks the marathon will be a conversation starter around the turkey day table and that it’s “going to be a uniting” experience, while Bannon opined it could lead to “fistfights.” This is the first, and hopefully only, time that I have ever agreed with Steve Bannon. Uncle Tim gets punchy after the second glass of wine.

I’ll see you, “every person in the world,” two days before Thanksgiving.

(Via Raw Story)

Perhaps the most recognizable voice in all of gaming is Mario. Charles Martinet was responsible for voicing the character in Super Mari 64, and ever since, the legendary voice actor has been behind Mario and a number of other characters in the Mushroom Kingdom. While it’s hard to imagine anyone else doing the voice, Martinet is 66, and a question that has entered some fans’ minds is when he may decide to call it quits.

Martinet recently made an appearance at FanExpo Canada 2021, where he did a panel and Q+A session with fans. One of the questions he faced was whether or not he plans on handing the reins to someone else, but Martinet made clear he has no intent on doing that.

“Until I drop,” Martinet said when asked how long he’ll continue as Mario. “Ya know, I love these characters, but when I can’t do them well enough, I’ll be the first one to call up my friends inside Nintendo and say, ‘Ya know something? I didn’t sound right on that one. We need to find somebody.’ I love these characters, but I will know when I don’t sound right.”

Martinet’s love for the character can really be felt throughout the panel. As he’s answering the questions, he’ll frequently give a “woohoo!” just because he’s excited. It’s what has made his entire career. We hope he voices Mario as long as he wants, and hopefully, we’ll get at least a Martinet “woohoo!” in the upcoming movie.

It may feel like just yesterday that Christopher Moltisanti and his crew of Sopranos family agents were hijacking a shipment of Pokemon cards at the turn of the millennium on HBO, but two decades later, the trading card game based on the Nintendo series is arguably more popular than ever.

Packs of cards are flying off the shelves amid the latest trading card boom, and sales of older cards have skyrocketed as people have gone back home to mine their closets for a nice payday. And while there’s a lot of speculation that these big sales have something sketchy behind them, the government has apparently found proof of at least one illegal sale of a single Pokemon card that cost five figures.

As the Washington Post detailed, the federal government released details of the few people who misused the bevy of pandemic-related business programs and loans floated to people over the last two years as a result of pandemic-related hardships. Some of that went to Vinath Oudomsine, who apparently used two-thirds of his loan on a single card that cost the Georgia man $57,789.

On July 14, 2020, according to prosecutors, Oudomsine sought a loan for a business that he said had 10 employees and revenue of $235,000 over a year. The next month, court documents state, the SBA deposited $85,000 into a bank account in Oudomsine’s name.

Court filings give few details about the alleged Pokémon card purchase — such as which “Pocket Monster” it carried — simply stating that Oudomsine bought it “on or about” Jan. 8 of this year.

Collectible gaming cards can fetch big sums — this year, one unopened box of first-edition Pokémon cards sold for more than $400,000.

Interestingly, they did not get specific about which card it is, though the most likely candidate is the Charizard card many have long coveted from the base set. Still, no matter how nostalgic you want to get about your Pocket Monster-filled youth, try not to break the law along the way.

[via WaPo]