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In a few days, a new leg of Dua Lipa’s Radical Optimism Tour will descend upon North America, starting with two nights in Toronto at the top of September. To help make the occasion extra special, Lipa has announced today (August 27) that she is also launching a series of Radical Optimism Pop-Up Stores, presented by American Express.

All stores will be open daily from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. local time. These are the cities, dates, and locations:

Chicago, IL – September 6 to 7 at Anthony Gallery (1360 W Lake St.)
Atlanta, GA – September 12 to 13 at Cam Kirk Studios (112 Krog St. NE)
New York, NY – September 17 to 21 at The Hole NYC (312 Bowery)
Dallas, TX – September 27 to 28 at Kettle Art Gallery (2650 Main St.)
Los Angeles, CA – October 3 to 6 at The Hole LA (844 N La Brea Ave.)
Seattle, WA – October 11 to 12 at River (1927 3rd Ave.)

A press release notes the stores will “offer visitors an immersive retail experience with exclusive merch, unique photo opportunities, and a refreshment station serving one of Dua’s favorite drinks available for sale.” If the pop-up Dua hosted in London a couple months ago is any indication, that drink will be her viral jalapeño pickle cola. At specifically the Los Angeles and New York pop-ups, fans will be able to experience “being inside the music of Radical Optimism, presented in L-ISA Immersive Sound, the ultra-high resolution spatial audio technology from L-Acoustics.”

American Express Platinum Card Members get access to an exclusive perk: early access to the stores for themselves and a guest from 10 to 11 a.m. local time. All eligible Card Members get a dedicated checkout lane, access to buy an exclusive merch item, and a complimentary gift with any purchase made using an eligible Amex card. More information on the perks can be found here.

To get an idea of what the stores might look like and what they may offer, find some photos of the previous London pop-up here. Also check out Dua’s upcoming tour dates below.

Dua Lipa’s 2025 Tour Dates: Radical Optimism

09/01 — Toronto, ON @ Scotiabank Arena
09/02 — Toronto, ON @ Scotiabank Arena
09/05 — Chicago, IL @ United Center
09/06 — Chicago, IL @ United Center
09/09 — Boston, MA @ TD Garden
09/10 — Boston, MA @ TD Garden
09/13 — Atlanta, GA @ State Farm Arena
09/14 — Atlanta, GA @ State Farm Arena
09/17 — New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden
09/18 — New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden
09/20 — New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden
09/21 — New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden
09/26 — Miami, FL @ Kaseya Center
09/27 — Miami, FL @ Kaseya Center
09/30 — Dallas, TX @ American Airlines Center
10/01 — Dallas, TX @ American Airlines Center
10/04 — Los Angeles, CA @ Kia Forum
10/05 — Los Angeles, CA @ Kia Forum
10/07 — Los Angeles, CA @ Kia Forum
10/08 — Los Angeles, CA @ Kia Forum
10/11 — San Francisco, CA @ Chase Center
10/12 — San Francisco, CA @ Chase Center
10/15 — Seattle, WA @ Climate Pledge Arena
10/16 — Seattle, WA @ Climate Pledge Arena
11/07 — Buenos Aires, Argentina @ Estadio River Plate
11/08 — Buenos Aires, Argentina @ Estadio River Plate
11/11 — Santiago, Chile @ Estadio Nacional
11/12 — Santiago, Chile @ Estadio Nacional
11/15 — São Paulo, Brazil @ MorumBIS
11/22 — Rio de Janeiro, Brazil @ Estadio Nilton Santos
11/25 — Lima, Peru @ Estadio Nacional or Estadio San Marcos
11/28 — Bogotá, Colombia @ Estadio El Campín
12/01 — Mexico City, Mexico @ Estadio GNP Seguros
12/02 — Mexico City, Mexico @ Estadio GNP Seguros
12/05 — Mexico City, Mexico @ Estadio GNP Seguros

With his new album Wake Up Supa, dropping today, Inglewood rapper D Smoke drops by our Sound Check studios to challenge his musical taste — and our host Jeremy Hecht’s ability to guess his lifetime anthem.

Here’s how it works: Jeremy plays two songs for the guest artist, who has to choose one and explain their choice, giving Jeremy a chance to learn their musical taste. Jeremy then has to guess the artist’s life anthem, the song they’d take to a desert island, which the guest wrote down earlier on a piece of paper. Our production team has also given him a decoy song, and Jeremy has to guess which is correct based on what he’s learned in the previous rounds.

Although Smoke shared, in his words, “a mid-difficulty-level” example for his favorite song, Jeremy shows no mercy throughout the challenge, pitting one of the rapper’s “favorite West Coast songs of all time,” Kurupt’s “We Can Freak It,” against SiR’s “Life Is Good.” I’m sure we all know that the Farrises value family over everything, so of course, Smoke had to pick his brother. But other choices — 2Pac vs. Outkast, Prince vs. Michael Jackson, and Lauryn Hill vs. Kanye West — led to some interesting thoughts from the multifaceted artist.

Watch D Smoke take on the Sound Check challenge above. New episodes of Sound Check drop every Wednesday at noon ET/9 a.m. PT on Uproxx’s YouTube.

In contrast with his last two videos — for “Sugar On My Tongue” and “Darling, I” — Tyler, The Creator’s video looks and feels relatively simple and lo-fi. However, it ties into the throwback themes of his new album, Don’t Tap The Glass, in a really elegant way.

Those of us old enough to remember iMac computers and AIM away messages will likely remember the nostalgic aesthetic of the video for “Sucker Free.” Shot in grainy digital footage and edited with Y2K-era effects — ironic text from Tyler overlaid on scenes of the Hawthorne rapper dancing on a breakwater and a New York City street — the visual captures the memorable undercurrent of happy memories from T’s childhood in the same way the album’s songs use cues from ’90s and 2000s dance scenes to shake off the modern blues of our current events.

In an interview with Apple Music, Tyler explained that this return to simplistic goals was intentional after tackling heavier topics on Chromakopia. “After the weight of that got off, I just wanted to be silly again,” he said. “I just want to be fun and say outrageous shit and say sh*t that… inside jokes that me and my friends laugh at, and just talk big fly sh*t… It’s just some sh*t that I would love people to dance to because it’s music that I will want to dance my body to. And that’s all type of dance music on there.”

You can watch Tyler, The Creator’s “Sucker Free” video above.

Don’t Tap The Glass is out now via Columbia Records. Find more information here.

Ryan Murphy is busy. Over a ten-day stretch in 2024, for example, he released four new shows: American Sports Story: Aaron Hernandez, Grotesquerie, Monsters: The Lyle And Erik Menendez Story, and Doctor Odyssey. This year, he’s also involved in Mid-Century Modern, All’s Fair, and 9-1-1: Nashville.

He’s already plotting for 2026, too. Set for some point next year is The Beauty, a new FX series that, in his words, takes on “Ozempic culture.” The show is based on a comic book series by Jeremy Haun and Jason A. Hurley.

Ahead of the show’s release, keep reading for everything you need to know before it comes to TV.

Plot

The official description of the original comic book reads, “Modern society is obsessed with outward beauty. What if there was a way to guarantee you could become more and more beautiful every day? What if it was a sexually transmitted disease? In the world of The Beauty, physical perfection is attainable. The vast majority of the population has taken advantage of it, but Detectives Foster and Vaughn will soon discover it comes at a terrible price.”

Murphy said to Variety:

“It’s something I’ve never done before, which is a sci-fi medical show about a new virus that mutates and it’s sexually transmitted, that turns you into your absolute perfect self. And the question is, how far would you go to be beautiful? What would you sacrifice to that, and does that matter? That show was looking at, I call it the Ozempic culture. One little shot, and suddenly you’re going to look better and feel better, and all your problems are going to go away. But what are you really working on? What’s going on with you that you feel you need to do that? Sometimes it is health, sometimes it’s vanity.”

Cast

The show stars Evan Peters, Anthony Ramos, Jeremy Pope, Rebecca Hall, and Ashton Kutcher.

Murphy told Variety that he had long wanted to work with Ramos and Kutcher. He also said to Entertainment Weekly he was “going all over the world” in 2025 to make the show, calling it “a very long shoot.” (The show filmed in New York, Paris, Venice, and Rome, per New York Comic Con.)

Murphy added:

“I’ve always written about beauty culture in my work from my very first big thing, which was Nip/Tuck. I’ve also done a lot of body horror in my work, mostly through American Horror Story. I just think that it asks that deep essential question that I always like to ask about anything: What would you do for love? What would you do for beauty? What would you do for money? It has all of those things that I’ve grappled with in my entire career, all in one package.”

Release Date

The show is set to premiere in early 2026, per New York Comic Con.

Trailer

There is not currently a trailer or teaser for The Beauty.

LOS ANGELES and NEW YORK — August 27, 2025 — UPROXX Studios, the culture-first content studio and #1 most-viewed music video network in the U.S., today announced the appointment of Greg Osborne as Vice President of Brand Partnerships. Osborne will report directly to UPROXX Studios cofounder and CEO Jarret Myer.

Osborne joins UPROXX Studios at a moment of rapid growth across YouTube and its viewership proliferation across streaming TV platforms. With nearly 150 million monthly U.S. viewers, more than 50% of its audience consumes UPROXX Studios content on televisions. As a result, UPROXX Studios has emerged as a go-to advertising partner for brands aiming to turn cultural relevance on TV screens into real business results. State Farm, Toyota, T-Mobile, Universal Pictures, Paramount, Starbucks, Sparkling Ice, Red Bull, Rémy Martin, McDonald’s, and Pluto TV are examples of blue-chip brands tapping into the studio’s unique ability to drive impact at scale.

“Greg has spent his career connecting brands to diverse audiences in environments where culture leads and authenticity matters,” said Jarret Myer, cofounder and CEO at UPROXX Studios. “His experience across both legacy media and modern streaming makes him the perfect fit as we help brands show up where people actually spend time today – on CTV, YouTube, TikTok and across music culture.”

As the exclusive seller of Warner Music Group’s official music video inventory, UPROXX Studios guarantees 100% share-of-voice around superstar artists such as Bruno Mars, Dua Lipa, and Ed Sheeran, making it an essential buy for advertisers looking to own the moment.

“Brands can’t invest in the music category and its surrounding culture on the TV screen without UPROXX Studios in their media mix,” said Greg Osborne, Vice President of Brand Partnerships at UPROXX Studios. “UPROXX has a rapidly growing presence in the living room, and sits at the center of culture-driven premium content in a way I’ve never seen before. We aren’t out here forcing ads into people’s feeds. We’re creating moments people actually want to watch, talk about, and share. That’s where the future of brand storytelling lives.”

Osborne brings more than two decades of sales and leadership experience to the role. Notably, he served as Vice President of West Coast Sales at Vevo, where he led brand and agency relationships and developed sales strategy across CTV and YouTube. While at Vevo, Osborne helped transform the West Coast team’s structure, expanded into new verticals, and played a key role in driving new business through modernized go-to-market strategy – diversifying revenue and helping shape the media company’s evolution into a CTV-first platform. Prior to Vevo, Osborne spent over 20 years at Univision, ultimately serving as Vice President of Network and Digital Sales, where he guided national and multicultural revenue strategy. He began his career at Cox Communications.

As part of his role, Osborne will oversee brand partnerships strategy across verticals, helping agencies and marketers unlock full-screen, high-impact inventory tied to the moments that matter most in music, entertainment, and internet culture.

“I’m thrilled to be a part of an organization that doesn’t just follow culture, it creates it,” added Osborne. “CTV advertising deserves culture, and UPROXX Studios has built a platform where brands can perform with more resonance, more data, and more heart.”

About UPROXX Studios
UPROXX Studios is the music category leader across connected TV, YouTube and social media. With more than half of its 150 million monthly U.S. viewers consuming its content on televisions, UPROXX Studios has emerged as a go-to advertising partner for brands aiming to turn cultural relevance on TV screens into real business results. Founded by creative visionary will.i.am and media titans Rich Antoniello and Jarret Myer, UPROXX Studios has redefined the modern media company model, acting as the definitive youth culture platform through the lens of music. Known for its iconic brands UPROXX, HipHopDX, Dime Magazine, Indie Mixtape, and Country Mixtape, UPROXX Studios connects brands and fans to the energy of music culture. As the exclusive seller of Warner Music Group’s official music video inventory, UPROXX Studios guarantees 100% share-of-voice around superstar artists such as Bruno Mars, Dua Lipa, and Ed Sheeran. For more information about brand opportunities with UPROXX Studios, visit: UPROXXstudios.com.

It has been a long road to Lana Del Rey’s upcoming country-influenced album.

In early 2024, she declared the project was title Lasso and it was set for release that September. September came and went without the album and that October, Del Rey said, “The songs I have, I love, so I don’t want to turn it into something that’s half cooked, even if it’s super stripped back. I want it to be what it was supposed to be.”

The next month, Del Rey declared the project had a new title, The Right Person Will Stay, and an expected release date of May 21, 2025.

This past April, though, Del Rey indicated the album title and release date had changed yet again. Now, we know more.

In a new interview with W, the piece notes the album is now titled Stove and that part of the reason for the latest delay was that Del Rey decided to add six songs to the project.

She said, “They were more autobiographical than I thought, and that took more time. The majority of the album will have a country flair. Eight years ago, when I was looking to make a country record, no one else was thinking about country. Now everyone is going country! I’ve asked myself, ‘Should I retire all my snakeskin boots? Should I put my cowboy hats in storage?’”

Read the full feature here.

Despite its cultural ubiquity, Apple’s products have never really been all that user-friendly. Consider how long it took Apple to adopt the RCS messaging standard, making it easier for Apple users to finally send and receive secure messages and media from non-Apple users. Then, there’s the fact that it took a literal law to force Apple to embrace USB-C chargers instead of the 8-pin Lightning standard they pioneered.

Well, it looks like the successes of those advances have finally convinced Apple to get with the times in other areas, as well. Today, the tech giant announced that it will finally allow Apple Music users to import their Spotify playlists. Maybe now those year-end lists will finally match. Here’s how:

The recently revamped Music settings menu now includes the option to “Transfer Music from Other Music Services.” You’ll need to sign in to those other services, so have your passwords handy. It’ll likely take a bit for Apple Music to find matches in its own library, and judging from past experiences moving lists from Spotify to Tidal and vice versa, it probably won’t be a perfect process, but Apple’s anticipated that, adding a “Some Music Needs Review” alert. This will present you with close matches and allow you to save them in place of the missing tracks.

You can find more info, including detailed instructions, on Apple’s Help page.

In other news, Spotify is also rolling out a new feature: messaging, which will likely go over like a lead balloon.

It’s always fun when entertainers can turn their hobbies and interests into something they can share with their fans. Billie Eilish, for instance, is a huge Uno fan, hosting game nights with her musician friends, and making waves online for calling out some of the game’s official rules.

She loves the controversial card game so much that she’s designed her own limited-edition pack, now available for pre-sale on her website. Printed on 300-gram premium card stock, the cards bear Billie’s signature, graffiti-inspired aesthetic — you’ll definitely be able to tell 6s from 9s with this pack. Of course, the rules you use are still up to your discretion, but remember, Billie plays stacking rules. “You gotta stack all the pluses and reverse the reverses and skip the skips,” she wrote on Twitter (which I will never once call “X,” are you kidding me?).

Billie’s cutthroat house rules were on full display a few holiday seasons ago, when her game with Denzel Curry, Thundercat, and Vince Staples went viral from fans arguing over whether stacking is indeed a legal move. While Mattel sought to establish this on its official Uno social channels, there were still plenty who believe that this vicious method is the only “true” way to play. If you can’t swim with the sharks, stay out the ocean.

Billie’s still on her Hit Me Hard And Soft Tour after adding shows in May. You can check out the remaining dates here.

Keeping up with new music can be exhausting, even impossible. From the weekly album releases to standalone singles dropping on a daily basis, the amount of music is so vast it’s easy for something to slip through the cracks. Even following along with the Uproxx recommendations on a daily basis can be a lot to ask, so every Monday we’re offering up this rundown of the best new music this week.

This week saw Doja Cat’s pop era and Sombr capitalize on his recent upswing. Yeah, it was a great week for new music. Check out the highlights below.

For more music recommendations, check out our Listen To This section, as well as our Indie Mixtape newsletter.

Doja Cat — “Jealous Type”

Earlier this month, Doja dropped some big news: Her new album Vie is set to launch on September 26. While Doja’s previous album, Scarlet, was mostly straight-up rap, she appears to be getting back into the pop lane for her new project, as the ’80s-inspired “Jealous Type” indicates.

Sombr — “Crushing”

Sombr broke through earlier this year with “Undressed” and “Back To Friends.” Now he’s ready to capitalize on the newfound attention with his latest album, I Barely Know Her, which is out now. On “Crushing,” Sombr finds himself evoking a bit of Killers frontman Brandon Flowers.

Laufey — “Forget-Me-Not”

Laufey previously said that for her new album A Matter Of Time, she “wanted to let my heart wander.” Indeed, there’s a lot of feeling on the project, which is out now, like on the lush and delicate “Forget-Me-Not.”

Offset and Gunna — “Different Species”

Offset and Gunna are regular collaborators, and now the musical pals have linked up once again, this time on Offset’s new album, Kiari. Here, they team up on the woozy “Different Species.”

BigXthaPlug — “Box Me Up” Feat. Jelly Roll

BigX is firmly in bed with the country community, as he makes clear on his new album I Hope You’re Happy. The project features collabs with folks like Shaboozey, Bailey Zimmerman, Darius Rucker, Luke Combs, and Jelly Roll, the latter of whom joins in on the heartbroken “Box Me Up.”

Dominic Fike — “Great Pretender”

Fike announced the Rocket mixtape, and a week later, it was out. No time wasted. An immediate highlight is “Great Pretender,” a jaunty number that makes for a fun and soothing three minutes.

Mac DeMarco — “Shining”

DeMarco has kept active in recent years, but his new project Guitar is actually his first non-instrumental studio in a little while, since 2019’s Here Comes The Cowboy. As the title suggests, the album is mostly unadorned, led by vocals, guitar, and light percussion on songs like the simple “Shining.”

Deftones — “Infinite Source”

A few weeks ago, a new Deftones album was just a rumor. Well, things change fast, as now, private music is here and it features standouts like the shoegaze-y “Infinite Source.”

The Dare – “Exhilaration”

On his new release, Freakquencies: Volume 1, The Dare caters exclusive for people on, or yearning for, the dancefloor. He described the project as marrying “French touch, big beat, electro, and acid,” and whatever influences you hear, it’s all club-ready.

Toro Y Moi — “CD-R (unerthed)”

Toro Y Moi delivered Hole Erth, and now he has taken it for another spin with Unerthed: Hole Erth Unplugged. The project completely re-imagines the original album, like with “CD-R,” which went from having hip-hop-inspired production to being more of an alt-country tune.

Mariah The Scientist — “Sacrifice”

Mariah kept her biannual tradition of putting out a new album alive last week with Hearts Sold Separately. She has some cool sounds going on here, too, like the ’80s/’90s synths on the smooth “Sacrifice.”

In 1891, the first production of Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler was staged. In the hundred-plus years since then, it has became a theater standard, with new productions regularly happening somewhere. It has been adapted to film several times over the years, and now director Nia DaCosta is taking a swing at it in her upcoming film, Hedda.

This time, it’s Tessa Thompson’s turn to play Hedda. DaCosta has also taken some creative liberties with her interpretation of the story: Eilert Lövborg, a man who was once in love with Hedda, is a woman this time, because as DaCosta sees it, the change “helps themes about power and autonomy, about choice, about self-regulation.”

Ahead of the film’s release, keep reading for everything you need to know before it hits theaters.

Plot

The official synopsis reads, “From writer/director Nia DaCosta comes a provocative, modern reimagining of Henrik Ibsen’s classic play. HEDDA (Tessa Thompson) finds herself torn between the lingering ache of a past love and the quiet suffocation of her present life. Over the course of one charged night, long-repressed desires and hidden tensions erupt–pulling her and everyone around her into a spiral of manipulation, passion, and betrayal.”

DaCosta told Vanity Fair, “Hedda is an inscrutable character. And since the beginning, for the past hundred years, people have been like, ‘What the f*ck is her deal?’ […] Hedda is someone who wants people’s animals to come out. She just feels like everyone is cowardly, everyone’s lying. She has this deepening emptiness inside of her that makes her do things she doesn’t understand — and she is living in a world that she doesn’t get.”

Cast

The movie stars Tessa Thompson, Imogen Poots, Tom Bateman, Nicholas Pinnock, and Nina Hoss.

Thompson said to Vanity Fair of playing the character, “Nia and I were really interested in this idea of what happens when we’re pretending to be something that we’re not, trying to fit into a world, a life, a marriage, a house, a place that doesn’t suit us. How that perverts our fundamental nature.” DaCosta also praised Thompson: “She’s so brilliant at playing characters who have a roiling ocean inside of them but have to keep a façade. She’s just really great at that tension.”

Release Date

The film is set to hit select theaters on October 22, following its global streaming release via Amazon’s Prime Video on October 29.

Trailer

Check out the Hedda trailer below.