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Making an uncomfortable situation that much ickier, a representative for Marilyn Manson has confirmed that the shock-rocker — who is currently under investigation by the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department for accusations of domestic abuse — features on Kanye West’s forthcoming album, Donda. “Marilyn Manson’s voice is featured on Donda, and he will continue to conceptually collaborate with Ye on the Donda project,” a spokesperson for Manson told Billboard, who picked the story up from Newsweek.

Last night, Kanye prompted fan backlash when he brought Manson and DaBaby onstage with him during his third Donda listening party at Chicago’s Soldier Field. During the event, Kanye premiered a new version of “Jail” that replaced a Jay-Z verse with one from DaBaby, who has been under fire for making homophobic comments onstage during Rolling Loud.

Earlier this year, actress Evan Rachel Wood came forward to name ex-partner Manson as her alleged abuser, whom she accused of terrorizing her during their relationship, which began in 2007 (when she was 18 and he was 36) and ended in 2010. At the time, Wood accused Manson of both “grooming” and “horrifically” abusing her. After that, at least ten more women came forward to make similar accusations against the singer, including Game of Thrones actress Esme Bianco, who had previously testified alongside Wood in support of California’s Phoenix Bill, which is aimed toward lengthening the statute of limitations for crimes involving domestic violence. Bianco eventually sued Manson for sexual assault and battery. Following the accusations, Manson’s label, Loma Vista, dropped him from their roster.

Manson has denied the allegations, posting a statement to social media in February: “Obviously, my art and my life have long been magnets for controversy, but these recent claims about me are horrible distortions of reality… My intimate relationships have always been entirely consensual with like-minded partners. Regardless of how — and why — others are now choosing to misrepresent the past, that is the truth.”

Jonathan Majors is having a very good 2021: he stole the show in Loki; he was announced to play Kang the Conqueror in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania; his Western movie (The Harder They Fall) with Idris Elba, Zazie Beetz, Lakeith Stanfield, Delroy Lindo, and Regina King comes out in November; and he was nominated for his first Emmy. The one blemish on an otherwise-amazing year: the HBO show that he was nominated for, Lovecraft Country, was canceled after one season.

“I was in a strange situation because I had no assurance that Atticus was even going to be in a potential season 2. I had made peace with not being with my Lovecraft family again. [So being nominated] is a Lovecraft-ian situation, to be living two realms with it,” Majors told Entertainment Weekly about learning he was up for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series after Lovecraft was axed. “But all in all, I’m most excited the work is being seen and appreciated and honored with the nominations, not just mine but everyone else’s.”

If Lovecraft Country had returned for another season, it would have been set “in a new world, and that new world sits precisely where the United States used to sit.” Instead, creator Misha Green is making a Tomb Raider movie, Jurnee Smollett will star in a Black Canary movie (directed by Green!), and Majors will continue to have a very good year.

(Via EW)

Ken Jennings may get another shot at guest-hosting Jeopardy! following Mike Richards’ tenure blowing up on the launchpad, but now we have a better idea of why Jennings didn’t get the nod initially: his tweets might have disqualified him from the job.

The Wall Street Journal reported Friday about the lengthy and disastrous search for a full-time host of Jeopardy! following the death of Alex Trebek. The details about Richards and his return to his executive producer gig are particularly juicy, but so is confirmation that Jennings’ own controversy while guest-hosting the show ended his hopes of actually winning the job himself.

Jennings scored the best ratings of any guest Jeopardy! host and got the longest stint behind the podium, though his six weeks ended abruptly, reportedly due to some Mike Richards-related chicanery. But when it came time to actually pick a host, multiple reports have indicated it was Mayim Bialik and then Richards, in that order, who got the job offer.

Left out in the cold was fan favorite LeVar Burton, but also Jennings. And many speculated that some controversy over past offensive tweets — and a haphazard defense of Bean Dad, you know, a thing that also happened in this year — was what torpedoed his odds. According to the report, that was exactly the case.

While Mr. Jennings didn’t have much experience hosting, the executives at Sony and producers at “Jeopardy!” were confident that he would grow into the role. He was a fan favorite and already a familiar face to the “Jeopardy!” machine from working as a consultant on the show since 2020.

Then came the old tweets.

The old tweets, in this case, were jokes the Jeopardy! GOAT made on social media that he apologized for when they resurfaced as his guest-hosting appearance kicked in early this year. They’re offensive, for sure, and were apparently enough to change his perception among focus groups the show convened as part of their selection process.

“Nothing sadder than a hot person in a wheelchair,” read one of the tweets from 2014. Mr. Jennings apologized, but the succession plan started unraveling.

Reaction to the tweets gave Sony executives pause, said people familiar with the selection process. Focus groups also didn’t react well to Mr. Jennings afterward, one of the people said.

Jennings’ tweets were bad, but it’s curious that his online missteps weighed heavier than an actual lawsuit Richards was involved in, as well as his own controversial comments on a podcast. It took all of that, and outrage over the influence he had on the selection process, to finally sink the embattled executive producer who somehow, as of now, still plays a role in the day-to-day operations of the show.

What happens next is, well, entirely unclear. And while Jennings paid the price for his bad tweets, it’s possible he may reemerge as an option to at least guest host again as the show struggles to find a path forward.

[via WSJ]

The Other Two went on a forced, seemingly short-term break from production in March 2020. In March 2021, they finally returned to set, becoming one with nasal swabs to do their show their way, which means weaving New York City and its unique side characters into the mix. Not in the mix? COVID storylines. This isn’t that show. According to star Heléne Yorke, The Other Two (whose second season begins today on HBO Max) is meant to be a comfort. Just one where you feel better watching people poke fun at celebrity and social-first culture while speaking directly to the frustrations of trying to find your way through a world where everyone seems as outwardly perfect as you are internally awkward.

This isn’t the same show as it was in season 1, though. Well, not exactly. All of the above still factors in, but Brooke and her brother Cary (Drew Tarver) seem to be in a better place with their careers while no longer being attached to the hull of their Bieber-esque brother’s viral fame. Well, not quite as attached. But subtle evolutions can still be scary and the characters still fall flat, freak out, and hilariously misread moments and other people around them. “She’s still Brooke,” says Yorke when we spoke about the new season. “I think she’s trying to find her way through the surprise of being actually capable at something.”

We spoke with Yorke about Brooke’s growth, fitting in with the comedy cool kids who run the show, Tarver’s bold pandemic facial hair choices, becoming the patron saint of the put-upon Zoom call participant, and why falling asleep to her show is the ultimate compliment.

Is it intimidating to work with a pair of showrunners like Chris Kelly and Sarah Schneider, where they have so much experience working together and, obviously, an established pattern and dynamic?

It’s a great question. When I went in for it and had an audition, I met them, and I was like, “I’ll never get this. I’m not a cool …” Like these are the head writers of SNL, they have an arsenal of cool, funny people at their disposal. I was this theater kid that had run around and done some various other things, but it sort of felt like getting admitted to an amazing club, like being asked to come work with them. And what’s so amazing about Chris and Sarah is that they’re incredibly disarming. They’re lovely people. And so it doesn’t feel like, “Oh, I can’t put my own stamp on this.” They’re smart because they celebrate the actors they work with. And I think that they got so much experience of that through doing SNL, having all these wonderful comedians that they worked with and tailoring sketches to them… specifically Kate [McKinnon] and Aidy [Bryant].

I think Brooke was written with Sarah in mind. We had shot the pilot, and then what’s so incredible and flattering is that as it goes on, I noticed the character gets… It’s tailored to me, which makes it very easy to play. Like friends of mine, family, they’re all like, “I just feel like I’m watching you.” Which is both flattering for the acting accolades and also terrifying to know that I am actually this kind of a mess. That it’d be that believable that I’d be flailing in this way. Thanks, guys.

“It’s like a documentary. Wow!”

Yeah, exactly. But I think I spent the entire pilot terrified because I was a fan, and plus like Drew (Tarver) is an improviser, and everybody worked on SNL. I remember this one day Beck [Bennett] was on set, and it was like watching a ping pong match. And I’m kind of sitting there wanting to stick my hand in the spokes of the wheels and say something funny and just knowing that you’ll never step up to the shit that just comes out of their faces naturally.

Contrast that with how it is when you’re filming season two. How’s your comfort level?

That’s the thing, I think there’s a shorthand. Sarah will come up to me and she’ll just say, “You know, that thing that you do?” I’m like, “Yeah, yeah, yeah.” So it’s just these notes that are non-notes that I just know how to interpret based on how they know. Sarah directed a couple of episodes this season, and she gave me a literal note, which was, “Can you do that thing that your face does?” And I knew exactly what she was talking about.

And so the shorthand, when you do a season two, is just so nice. Also Drew and I got so much closer. We were in touch all during the pandemic. He was down in Georgia refurbing an Airstream and growing mutton chops. I was in New York trying to force myself to ride my Peloton enough to burn off the booze and cheese. Trying to keep it tight for my career! [Laughs]

No mutton chops for you?

No mutton chops for me. Well, I shave them and wax them. I keep that shit correct.

I hope you screenshotted Drew’s mutton chops for blackmail purposes.

It wasn’t even a mutton chop. I’m sorry, it was a mullet and basically mutton chops. Then they made a T-shirt of his profile of that time. He loves it. He was very proud, he has a time-lapse of when he shaved it all off. Trash.

It’s a timeless look.

Yeah, timelessly bad. [Laughs]

Obviously, the nature with any show is to sort of evolve or die. When you’re reading these pages to start, is there any apprehension that they’re going to move away from the thing that you just got really good at?

What was great about reading the pages for season two is that it was a build on where she was and where she’s going. But what I loved about it is that it wasn’t a departure from who she is. She’s still kind of clueless. She’s still in a mode of trying to see 50 dicks, but it’s a little bit of a fancier situation now. [Laughs] So it’s Brooke, but in better clothes and actually being able to find somewhere to live. I honestly, and again, it’s flattering and also terrifying to realize that I get compared to this a lot. I think that you look at people that have status or are doing really well… That their lives are completely together and you’re like, “No, I still need to run out and figure out how I’m going to get fucking toilet paper, like a full pile of trash.”

I’m trying to put this eloquently: you’re always who you are. No matter where you find yourself, you’re always who you are. Your anxieties are the same. And I think that that’s universally true for everybody. And what I love about what Chris and Sarah did was, I think, what they touch on with the character is thinking like, “Oh.” You look at how evolved people are about stuff, like there is a journey for Brooke about figuring out her own place in feminism, you know what I mean? Like thinking, “Oh my god, I need to be this woman who’s totally realized, and really, I’m just trying to figure myself out.” And I think that it’s relatable, it’s like a meme that you’re like, “Oh my god, me too.” I feel that is how Brooke was written.

Do you realize how much of a folk hero you’re about to become because of the Zoom revenge scene this season?

The small talk that you all endure all the time. I know, I was telling a friend of mine who has what I call a real job. And I was saying like, “Oh my god, I’m on all these back-to-back Zooms on Thursday.” And she was like, “Oh my god, relax. You have Zooms on a Thursday. How dare you complain?”

I was on a call yesterday. It was like the first call of the day. And somebody asked somebody how they were doing. And they were like, “Oh, I’m good” in a sort of unexcited way. And the other person sarcastically said, “Wow. Way to bring the enthusiasm.” And that was the most offensive thing.

Oh my god, I’m doing my best to give you literally anything! You know, I keep getting sick of like… I got invited to Zoom baby showers. And everybody’s there trying to figure out who’s talking at what time. I find that I scream at the computer. I’m constantly losing my voice because I’m trying to emote and connect to somebody through a screen. So my voice is 10 times louder and I’m gesticulating wildly. I’m exhausted by the end of it. Yeah, trying to make jokes, like what am I doing? I once did a reading of a play over Zoom and the director was like, “Are you okay?” And I’m like, “I’m not,” I’m pushing everything, trying so hard to be funny.

They were telling me before that this is the first call of the day for you.

I’m literally yelling at you already.

You’re going to be burned out by number 10. The guy from TVFunWire or whatever is not going to get the same quality discourse that I’m getting. Oh well.

No, you’re dealing with me and my brain fog of like, “Who is Brooke? She is this for you. This is the show. Please watch. We like it. Doing my best! Please watch The Other Two. Please.” [Laughs]

That’s fine. Nobody ever really gives a full plug. That’s the full honest plug.

It’s so funny, friends of mine, or people that I meet, ask me what I’m doing. I tell them about it and I’m like, “Watch it, you’ll like it.” It’s the easiest thing I’ve been in to recommend to other people. Trust me, I have been in shit where I’m like, “You don’t have to watch it, or you don’t have to come see me in this,” or whatever. But with this, I’m like, “Oh, just fucking watch it, you’ll like it.”

A friend of mine paid the best compliment I’ve ever heard about the show. She was like, “It’s the thing I put on when I want to go to sleep at night,” which to me is not I’m boring, she’s falling asleep. It’s like she’s watched it so many times, it’s good, she has it on in the background. It makes her happy, it’s where she wants her subconscious to be in her dream state. It’s like people have been falling asleep to Seinfeld for 20 years. It’s like that’s the ultimate compliment. I told Chris and Sarah and they’re like, “She’s sleeping to it? That’s rude.” And I was like, “No, you don’t get it. This is the ultimate praise.”

‘The Other Two’ is streaming now via HBO Max.

The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow, and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.

Humans have had a fraught relationship with technology for centuries. When the lightbulb was first invented, the obvious upside was that people would no longer need to depend on sunlight to determine when or how long they worked. The downside, then, was that your average worker was probably asked to work longer hours. The lesson being, for every improvement a new piece of technology offers, the invention also brings about a new series of challenges. Which brings us to Chvrches.

When the Scottish synth-pop trio — comprising Lauren Mayberry, Iain Cook, and Martin Doherty — first popped up in the early 2010s, they found an early fanbase on SoundCloud, where they’d share youthful, electropop bangers such as “Lies” and “The Mother We Share,” both of which eventually found their way over to the band’s 2013 debut, The Bones Of What You Believe. Though the internet has awarded Chvrches a flourishing career, complete with headlining sets at major music festivals, collaborations with musical heroes like The Cure’s Robert Smith, and three follow-up albums (2015’s Every Open Eye, 2018’s Love Is Dead, and this year’s Screen Violence), technology has not always been kind to them. It’s a paradox that’s plagued them for years: In 2013, Mayberry wrote a poignant op-ed about online misogyny in The Guardian, condemning the hateful language aimed at her on a daily basis. “I am in a band that was born on the internet,” she acknowledges before laying out a series of graphic comments sent to her from anonymous — mostly male — users. “Is the casual objectification of women so commonplace that we should all just suck it up, roll over and accept defeat?” she asked. “I hope not. Objectification, whatever its form, is not something anyone should have to ‘just deal with.’” This was nearly a decade ago, and four years before #MeToo.

A conversation around online misogyny might be more mainstream in 2021, but Mayberry maintains that not a lot has changed. “People always ask us, ‘Have you noticed a change in the last 10 years?’ she says over Zoom. “And I’m like, ‘No. If anything, my tolerance is just higher.’ The stuff that happened to us in 2019 — I definitely don’t want to sound like I’m playing a victim or any of those things. But if something like what happened to us at springtime 2019 had happened at the beginning of the band, I think I would have quit immediately. There’s no amount of media training that will prepare you.”

That “stuff” is likely a reference to comments on her Instagram page from fans accusing her of dressing too skimpily onstage. “To the people saying that my gig outfits are too revealing / I shouldn’t dress like that if I don’t want men to comment on it: I disagree,” she wrote on her Stories. “This argument assumes women only dress for the attention of men. When I dress for shows, I want to own my gender and my femininity […] People have tried to weaponise my gender against me since the start of my career as a musician. It happens now but it also happened when I was wearing baggy flannel shirts and jeans, because it’s not really about what a woman is wearing. It never is. It’s about claiming ownership of women’s bodies and women’s narratives.”

So no, things haven’t improved. Quite the opposite. “People act like it’s gotten better and it just really hasn’t,” Mayberry concludes. “So I think if that’s the kind of headspace you’re in, it’s natural to go into making a record that is a bit darker thematically.”

Enter Screen Violence: a whirlwind of high-energy electropop gems (truly, these are some of the catchiest tracks of Chvrches’ career) that use horror films and the dark side to technology as a framework to discuss social-media burnout and gendered double-standards. Calling in from their respective residences in Los Angeles, Chvrches spoke to us about the origins of their most evolved album yet, trading remixes with slasher king John Carpenter, and what they’ve learned after spending nearly 10 years together.

I don’t think I realized that all of you guys weren’t able to leave America throughout the pandemic. Has that been hard, having to stay?

Martin: Well, we could have left, but we just wouldn’t have been allowed back in. It’s like the visa timing thing. I haven’t seen my family since Christmas 2019, which is kind of bizarre. Definitely the longest I’ve ever been apart. But thanks to things like this — Zoom or whatever — we get on the phone, you don’t need to be near someone to be close to them. And in a bizarre way, I see them on screen more than I saw them when I lived close to them. It’s not all bad.

Lauren: Maybe this is growth and maturity, you guys. We’re growing and treating our parents like human beings. When I was 21, I would just be like, “What do you want? No, of course I’m not coming round. Why would I come over? You live so far away, no way.” And now you’re like, “I will come round.”

Martin: “I miss you, I love you.”

Lauren: Yeah, I actually say, “I love you” on the phone now. We’re very reserved, we’ve not done that ever. The Gods is my witness, I used to say that without getting on a flight. I was always paranoid that something terrible would happen so I’d be like, “I love you.” At the end of the call and they’d be like, “Mm-hmm (affirmative)” And I’m like, “That feels great, thank you for that.” But you know, now it’s good. Turns out all we needed was a global crisis, emergency situation to get our sh*t together in all senses.

I kind of got the sense that there was some burnout happening with the band toward the end of your 2019 tour. Do you feel rested, heading into another album cycle? Did you ever hit a point where you felt like pressing pause on the whole thing?

Lauren: I think we always knew that we were going to make another record. I think we figured out roughly — not exactly what we wanted to make, but we came up with the album title when we were still touring. We knew from about summer 2019 that it was going to be something called Screen Violence, we just didn’t know what that was going to be. And it was very like, TBD, we’ll start this and maybe it’ll work, maybe it won’t. But that’s kind of where we wanted to go. And I think that’s probably a natural response to what was happening emotionally, around the band at that time. But also I feel like it does make sense to me that if you make some shiny records that after that you want to do something different. I feel like every person wants that, they want a change of scenery and every record shouldn’t be the same. It should be a snapshot of a moment.

I’ve always found it very hard to write stuff that I don’t feel like. I’m very bad at writing a cheery pop song if I don’t really feel very cheery and I definitely didn’t feel very cheery by the end of 2019. Not because we don’t love the band or we’re not grateful for it, but it was 10 years of a lot of emotional baggage that goes along with being in a band and being a female in a band, specifically. And I think when you’re on the inside of that, it’s hard to get any perspective on that. And it does feel personal. It does feel mentally destructive and I don’t feel like it’s gotten better over the course of the band.

Chvrches owes its early fame to technology, but so much has changed about the way artists interact with online platforms since then. Do you think younger artists engage with social media in a healthier way, given that they’ve been on these platforms essentially for their entire lives?

Lauren: Yeah. I don’t know. I suppose coming of age when the internet is in your hand from the moment you’re born, it maybe gives you a different perspective on certain things. We were talking about that the other day. I’m like, I read something that said that my generation is the only generation that will have had half of their adolescence without the internet and half of it with. So you remember the before and you remember the after, both during that specific coming-of-age time period. I think in a weird way, people my age, we didn’t understand what the internet really was properly.

We didn’t understand what social media really was. And I remember we had to get Instagram on one of the first Chvrches tours. Someone was like, “You posted on your Instagram.” We’re like, “All right, I guess we got to figure out what this is.” And that’s just not a thing that younger artists will have to know. It’s just so embedded in the language that they understand. I hope that that means that they have more of a grasp on the good and bad things of it. Whereas I feel like that was more of a shock for people who were getting used to it.

Martin: I wonder if we would have been bigger on MySpace? Makes you wonder.

When a newer platform becomes popular, like TikTok for example, are you inclined to figure out a way for the band to engage with it? Is that something your label asks for?

Martin: Every label tries to get you to embrace every new startup.

Lauren: Yes.

Martin: Every day of every week of every year.

Lauren: I remember the, “We need to get Snapchat” conversation and we were like, “We don’t understand what that is. Don’t get it.” But I try and keep an open mind, especially for a band like us that’s always been so fan-driven. Any of those things can be useful depending how you use them. We were selling shows because we got big on SoundCloud. It always has been a very people-driven project. And I think that’s why people feel that kind of ownership over the band. Because they’re like, “That’s my band and I helped them get here.” And I feel like we’re very aware of that. And the only way to actually directly communicate with people is at shows or on social media or the rest of it has to go through a filter of the media. Sometimes that’s not good, sometimes that hasn’t been the best way to get a message across.

I think you just have to take each thing as it comes. We’re not natural to TikTok necessarily. I made one the other day that I was like, “Yeah, if I was a fan of the band, I would find this interesting,” because, it’s unpacking how we made a song. I haven’t posted yet but I looked at it and I was like, “Is there a way to use this creatively?” So it’s not just you doing that silly dance on the internet. Yes, we will never be doing any of those meme trends. So I’m like, “Well, can you take this technology and use it as a tool for communication like Instagram?” Yes, it could all be just like selfies on your face but can it be like a mood board to help extend the story of the record for people and have that be a fun escapist place, rather than a place that’s all about insecurities and physical things that you feel good or bad about and vanity.

Iain: Me personally, I’m very interested in technology and new ways to share things with people and to broaden their horizons of the band or embrace what’s going to be… What’s a year down the road, two years down the road. But that doesn’t always extend to social media trends. I like to be on top of that stuff because it’s interesting to me from a human perspective. But TikTok… I do like watching, although I did just see amazing AI doing artwork for… It was asking AI what sleep paralysis looks like. It was f*cking cool. That space is incredibly interesting to me. I think the next 20 years will probably result in the destruction of humanity, but will leave [something good] along the way.

Does any of that anxiety start to work its way into Screen Violence? I think it’s really easy to go into a dark place mentally, when you think about the end game of technology.

Lauren: Well, Screen Violence was actually a proposed band name that we didn’t end up using. So, we were thinking in summer 2019 of what we wanted to do and then that list of names resurface and that phrase just really jumped out of the page. ‘Cause we all love that, filmmaking and making a David Cronenberg-y take on it and the questions that he was posing. And even sonically, a lot of the instruments that we use and the composers and writers that we admire were working on those films. And then after writing a few songs, I think for me, it was partly talking about violence through screens and by screens. But also thinking about… It was not a concept record as far as it’s not about those things.

It’s not about horror movies, but it was more like we can build a backdrop and a landscape that you can tell personal stories through. Once we’ve written a few songs and I had a few things under our belt and especially with the aesthetics and the visuals, it was more about the role of women in those stories and the role of women in horror. How can you take those tropes and ideas and use those to tell your stories? And what about being a woman feels horrific? What about it feels violent? How do you live in and around that violence, how can you live through it? What do you do with it when you live in this space? I think that’s been really fun to play with, especially like with the imagery on the record and the imagery in terms of the album artwork and the videos and the visuals. How can you take that genre and bend it to tell your stories?

I read in a previous interview, Lauren, that you said this album benefited from spending much of the last year physically separate from the music industry. Are there feelings around the industry that might’ve made their way onto this album?

Lauren: I feel like that’s kind of what we were trying to do with this record, but especially myself with the lyrics. But I hate that. For me, I’m like, it’s not a record about the music industry. It’s not a record about internet trolls. Because I think that, that puts the focus on the perpetrators, it puts the focus on mostly men that do these things. And I think that’s always what’s interesting when these things are written about, because even when we see if you’re reporting on assault cases or rape cases or any of those things, you talk about a woman getting raped. You don’t talk about a man raping a woman.

All nine years in this band, people wanted to talk about gender, feminism, and the internet. They don’t really have a huge number of questions about the music. But we’d never actually written about any of those things [until now]. There are no lyrics that are really about any of those.

And I feel like the themes on the record are fear and anxiety and depression, regret but also trying to find the way to the other side. The idea that you’re running for a horizon that you don’t really need, but you have to keep running for it. And the perseverance of that, I think hopefully that’s something that people can relate to, whether or not they’ve experienced those things personally, in the context that we were talking about.

What about this particular period of horror — the ’70s/’80s John Carpenter era — that really spoke to you?

Martin: Things got a lot more imaginative with special effects with Nightmare On Elm Street and Hellraiser and stuff like that in the ’80s. It just felt really fresh and new and vital, even though a lot of that stuff is quite played out now. Because the nature of exploitation cinema, it’s cannibalistic things and that stuff. But also I think here’s an element of that stuff that was this sort of taboo. When we were kids, you were really lucky to get to see those movies and so it felt kind of good and naughty. And so there’s a nostalgic element to that too. It feels like the best of those movies were the earlier ones, where the real imagination was kind of going into it full force. The Thing, it’s a great example of that. Some of the best practical effects.

Lauren: I feel very affected by them in a way that I don’t [understand]. That’s what anybody wants out of any film. You’re watching to tell the story, but you’re projecting your own stuff onto the story as well. And you’re figuring out some subconscious stuff while you’re watching it, I suppose. I feel like I’m a quite fearful person in a lot of spaces in my life.

You recently traded remixes with John Carpenter, and you collaborated with Robert Smith on “How Not To Drown.” A Robert Smith collab in particular felt like a long time coming for Chvrches. Is there anyone else you’d like to work with down the line, off the top of your head?

Lauren: I don’t know. I guess, the best things that happened for us have been ones that we really haven’t planned. We didn’t go into it knowing or thinking that Robert would be on it. It was this amazing, bizarre thing that came up and we were able to do it. And then John Carpenter, we had this idea one day about remixes. We’re like, “Well, if we’re talking about these kind of films, we should [reach out to] people that made the soundtracks. I wonder if someone like John Carpenter could interpret the song, enact the remix?” And then that actually worked out.

I feel like we don’t really think about those kind of collaborations in the current Top 40 sense. I feel like things will come up, as and when, and we take them on a case-by-case basis because I don’t feel that you should box off your creativity.

Given the cinematic inspirations behind this album, and the fact that Chvrches has written music for video games, what’s your interest level around eventually scoring films?

Martin: We’re very much interested in that. I mean, I’ll still be here at 70 years old trying to make [Chvrches] albums if the other two are interested. But [scoring is] definitely interesting to us in terms of drawing the band sideways, you know what I mean?

Working with [Hideo] Kajima on Death Stranding was a tremendous honor for us. I mean, he’s like the Beatles of video games and design. That was an incredible experience. But I think the way that we operate and the type of skill set that Iain and I have lends itself very, very well to motion picture of some kind or interactive mediums like video games.

Of course, the problem is finding the time for such a thing because we’re really committed to do what we do, first and foremost. I think it’s always just like, look after your main. Do whatever you like and anyone do all the side projects you want, but always make sure you’re not like harming the band or disregarding the band and the process.

What major lessons come to mind after spending a decade together as a band?

Iain: Don’t do promo on an empty stomach… Number one. Have snacks on hand and in case the hunger strikes for any particular member because you never know when it’s going to come and where it’s going to come from.

Lauren: Wee Snickers.

Screen Violence is out now via Glassnote. Get it here.

This article originally appeared on 05.15.15

In this super-cool video from Field Day and Cut Video, a young engaged couple is given a rare opportunity to see how they might look 30, 50, and 70 years in the future. With the help of some seriously talented makeup artists, the couple ages before each other’s eyes. But it’s the deep emotional impact of imagining a life shared together that is far more striking than their physical transformation. Their love seems to strengthen as they see each other age, and the caring they display for one another is likely to make even the most cynical person a little emotional.

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100 Years of Beauty: Aging | Cut Has A Field Day

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Aaron Dessner and Taylor Swift have become enamored with collaborating. After Dessner helped Swift bring Folklore and Evermore to life, she visited his world and featured on a couple of Big Red Machine songs. The first was “Renegade,” and the second one, “Birch,” was released today alongside the band’s new album, How Long Do You Think It’s Gonna Last?.

On the track, Swift does something she doesn’t often do: play a support role, as her job on “Birch” is to complement Justin Vernon’s vocals with her own, a task she handles wonderfully.

Dessner tells Apple Music of the song:

“It’s actually a beat that The National’s drummer, Bryan Devendorf, made in his basement. He will make these kind of loopy, trippy beats in his basement on a drum machine, and then send them to me as a Voice Memo. I wrote music to it and developed it and played all the parts to it and made it. It was during a time where I wasn’t doing that well, actually — maybe in fall 2019. I sent it to Justin, and good friends sometimes know when you’re going through something and maybe he felt that. He wrote the words and melody to it and as we recorded and developed it, we played it for Taylor at some point, towards the end of Folklore. She really loved the song, and heard harmonies, and then kind of helped to lift further into some heavenly place.”

Listen to “Birch” above and check out our review of How Long Do You Think It’s Gonna Last? here.

How Long Do You Think It’s Gonna Last? is out now via Jagjaguwar/37d03d. Get it here.

There really is “no defeat” in the Cobra Kai dojo. Following the Netflix series earning four Emmy nominations this past July — and just ahead of its season four premiere this December — the hit Netflix series has announced it is returning for a fifth season next year. According to Variety’s report on the renewal, the season is set to start shooting in Atlanta this fall.

While it always feels a bit bold when a series is renewed prior to its upcoming season being released, the news comes as no surprise when you consider just how big a hit the Karate Kid spinoff series has become. Even prior to Cobra Kai moving from YouTube over to Netflix for its third season, the show has consistently held its own as one of the U.S.’s most-streamed shows. The series has earned nonstop critical acclaim and racked up four Emmy nominations (Outstanding Comedy Series, Outstanding Sound Editing for a Comedy, Outstanding Stunt Performance, and Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Comedy) just last month.

Taking place several years after The Karate Kid series, Cobra Kai follows the legendary Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio) and his rival Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka) as they open their own dojos and vow to teach the next generation of martial artists. When we last saw Danny and Johnny, the pair had at long last cast aside their differences in order to take on an even bigger opponent and threat to their students: John Kreese (Martin Kove). The upcoming season will pick up directly where season 3 left off and promises big character returns and a connection to The Karate Kid Part III.

In addition to Macchio and Zabaka, Cobra Kai also stars Courtney Henggeler, Xolo Maridueña, Tanner Buchanan, Mary Mouser, Jacob Bertrand, Gianni DeCenzo, Martin Kove, Vanessa Rubio, and Peyton List — all of which will hopefully be returning to the series in its fifth season. Until then, season four of Cobra Kai hits Netflix this December, and we can’t wait to see what Johnny and the kids of the Cobra Kai dojo have in store for us.

Summer is swiftly coming to a close, so if you’ve been meaning to hit a festival before the Fall school season resumes be advised that you’re kind of running out of time. That said, there are a ton of dates on the books over the next few weeks. This past weekend, electronic music fans were treated to an all-day party at Los Angeles’ Pershing Square, courtesy of Jamie Jones’ Paradise Festival. Based on some of the photos we’ve received from the action on the ground floor, the vibe was absolute unhinged hedonism. In fact, ‘unhinged hedonism’ feels like the general vibe of festivals in 2021, which makes sense because we’ve been living through a tough couple of years. (As always we encourage you to take the Covid precautions that fit your lifestyle and allow you to enjoy yourself without harming others.)

If you’re still looking for a place to let loose, LA festival-goers have one last big summer party when All Day I Dream concludes its 40-city tour on September 4th before heading back to Ibiza. The Lee Burridge hosted festival includes performances from electronic music’s Sohmi, Detlef, Serge Devant b2b Amémé, Hot Since 82, Jamie Jones, and more and will take place at LA’s Gin Ling Way.

If the idea of dancing for a day like you don’t have a care in the world sounds appealing to you, definitely pick up tickets while you still can. And if you’re not convinced, check out the scene at Paradise below and then tell us that doesn’t seem like what you need right now.

After spending some time in the Fast & Furious franchise and its burgeoning Hobbs & Shaw spinoff world, Jason Statham has been having quite the career resurgence. He recently reteamed with director Guy Ritchie for Wrath of Man and the upcoming Five Eyes, and now, Statham is branching out with an all new thriller set in the high stakes world of… bee keeping?

According to a new report, Miramax, who’s been financing Statham and Ritchie’s reunion, has picked up The Bee Keeper from writer Kurt Wimmer, but with no director attached as of yet. The film is described as a “lightning-paced thriller deeply steeped in the mythology of Bee Keeping” because who doesn’t immediately associate harvesting honey with high-octane action that only Jason Statham can deliver. Via Deadline:

“The Bee Keeper explores universal themes with an unconventional story that will have fans sitting on the edge of their seats. We’re excited to bring another iconic and irresistible film to audiences around the globe,” said Miramax [CEO] Block.

The Bee Keeper is expected to start shooting in September 2022. In the meantime, unlike his Hobbs & Shaw partner, The Rock, Statham has been open to returning to the main Fast & Furious franchise, especially after learning that Sung Kang’s Han was returning for F9. Statham’s Deckard Shaw infamously “murdered” Han in The Fast & Furious 6, and Statham joked with reporters back in April that he’d love to come back to the main films and “put out that fire.”

(Via Deadline)