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Keeping a New Year’s resolution isn’t always the easiest thing to do, but it gets not quite so hard when you have Drake helping you out.

The 6ixBuzz TV Instagram account posted a video from a Toronto-based rapper known as BucksInDaCut, in which he declares that his goal for 2021 is to get and save money more than he did in 2020. After declaring he started the year with $500, he counts his current stack of cash, which was up to $1,300. Surprisingly, Drake popped up on the comments and wrote, “Yo what’s this mans PayPal I’m doubling that for my guy Bucks B.”

In a follow-up video, Bucks confirmed that Drake paid up, and that he went above and beyond by also taking care of his student debt. In the clip, Bucks says, “Yo fam, listen up: I gotta big up Drizzy, the one and only Drake, fam. He’s a man of his word, fam. He doubled my money and on top of that, fam, I told him about my OSAP [Ontario Student Assistance Program loan] and he cleared my debts, fam. So I gotta big up this guy one more time. He’s the biggest name in the city, fam. Drizzy Drake, fam, I’m tryna be be like him one day.”

Check out the BucksInDaCut videos below.

I truly had no idea what to expect when I flipped on Derek DelGaudio’s In And Of Itself on Hulu. I’d seen it praised up and down social media, with exhortations to drop everything and watch it, often without necessarily saying it was good, and always without explanation of what it actually is. After having watched it, I think I understand. In And Of Itself is fascinating and infuriating. I don’t know quite what it is and I think I might hate it, but I desperately want everyone I know to watch it so that we can scream about it together. Shall we?

(Yes, there will be spoilers in this piece, because that’s what discussion requires, and anyway, can you even “spoil” magic?)

In And Of Itself is a magic show, sort of, and even if Derek DelGaudio doesn’t perform that many tricks in this 90-minute one-man show, the show itself is an act of magic. It has card tricks, impressive ones, but DelGaudio’s central sleight of hand is the illusion of transparency. That magic is not just magic but some form of self-fulfillment. DelGaudio has been described in The New York Times as “the comedian who wants to break magic.” He’s famous, too, sort of. He was a magic consultant on Christopher Nolan’s The Prestige, worked as an assistant to the late Ricky Jay, and has been hailed as a prodigy by everyone from David Blaine to Penn and Teller.

DelGaudio’s latest work, In And Of Itself, directed by Muppet godfather Frank Oz and with music by Mark Mothersbaugh from Devo, combines elements of self-actualization, performative introspection, young millennial navel-gazing, and influencer culture. It’s either a brand new kind of magic or just the same old magic wrapped in nearly impenetrable layers of self-justification.

The show opens pensively. Home videos play as DelGaudio narrates: They ask you, what do you want to be when you grow up?

…Later they ask you, what do you do?

Which is just another way of saying, ‘what have you become?’”

So you search, you look at the roles the world offers you, trying to find the one that reflects you.

This leads us inside the theater, to a wall on which cards have been placed reading “I AM,” with some kind of “role” underneath — opponent, ophthalmologist, optimist. Sometimes they’re jobs, sometimes personality traits, sometimes puns or states of being. The audience files in, choosing one card for themselves, then quietly wait for the show to begin as a title card tells us that DelGaudio performed this show 552 times in a small theater in New York City. DelGaudio, who looks like a cross between Man Vs. Food‘s Adam Richman and young Seth MacFarlane, takes the stage, opening the show on a pensive note. He solemnly delivers his first anecdote, about a man in a bar in Spain who told DelGaudio that DelGaudio reminded him of someone. That someone was known as “The Rouletista.”

The Rouletista, DelGaudio goes on to explain extremely slowly, was a man who came back from the Great War an alcoholic, who turned to playing Russian Roulette. Without referencing The Deer Hunter, DelGaudio explains that the man played the first night and won, and then did what Russian Roulette players rarely do: he came back for a second night. He came back again and again, as audiences and purses grew and grew, until he added more and more bullets. One bullet. Two bullets. Three bullets. Four. Again and again he won until finally he demanded to play with six bullets. As he put the now fully-loaded revolver to his temple, there was an earthquake that displaced a ceiling beam, knocking the gun out of the man’s hand, at which point he quit the game.

Retiring to a mansion built with the money he made playing roulette, The Rouletista was confronted one day by a burglar. The burglar pointed a gun at The Rouletista, who scoffed at the notion that he could be harmed by guns, whereupon the burglar shot him dead through the heart.

All of this foreshadows DelGaudio’s chosen identity and his basic storytelling style. First of all, why Spain? It doesn’t seem to be important at all, yet DelGaudio includes the apparently throwaway detail, something he will do throughout the show, adding random details to everything in a way that makes us wonder, “Where the hell is he going with all of this?” It’s the central question driving In And Of Itself forward even as the answer, it seems, is ultimately nowhere.

In a show all about identity and self-conception, the central question is why DelGaudio takes being called The Rouletista to be such a painful revelation. Initially, it leads to magic tricks. This will become the pattern of In And Of Itself — DelGaudio doing a confusing 15-minute monologue about knowing one’s self as a lead up to two minutes of very impressive magic tricks.

He tells a story about someone throwing a brick through his window because his mom was a lesbian. Then he makes the brick disappear. He does card tricks — second deals and precise cuts that clearly require hundreds of hours of practice, effortlessly sorting and making people’s cards disappear and reappear in surprising ways. The choose-a-card, any-card trick leads into a similar one, only now the cards are actually letters. DelGaudio brings audience members onstage to open and read the letter they’ve chosen, seemingly at random. The letters turn out to be something heartfelt from someone who loves them. How did he do that??

Like almost all magic, the trick involves making the audience believe that the magician can read minds and predict the future. Unlike all magicians, DelGaudio uses this power not so much to make the crowd “ooh and ahh” but to convince them they are loved, that they are appreciated, that maybe they should reach out to that estranged father or tell their best friend they love them. He’s like Tony Robbins meets David Blaine meets an inspirational quote shared on Instagram. By the end basically the entire audience is crying and it’s hard to say exactly why.

Meanwhile, there are weird celebrity cameos. Hey, isn’t that Kamau Bell in the audience?

In Delgaudio’s closer, he reapplies the card trick again, identifying each audience member by the card they’ve chosen. He looks at them and then, with intense eye contact, reads their card back to them. Truth-teller. Mother. Midnight Toker. The celebrity cameos increase in frequency and weirdness. Deray. Larry Wilmore. Tim Gunn from Project Runway. The performance artist Marina Abramovic. Bill Gates. Being identified as the card they’ve chosen seems to, Rouletista-like, cut everyone to the core. Tim Gunn’s hand is shaking. Another woman bursts into tears after being identified as… an entomologist. I still cannot fathom why this would make a person cry. Finally, I can admit it to the world: I study bugs!

Perfectly capitalizing on a culture of performative empathy, Derek DelGaudio’s greatest trick of all was making his audience feel seen. DelGaudio cries along with them (even though we know he has done this more than 500 times), identifying his own mother and brother in the crowd and at one point tearfully telling the audience that, “I’m not just a rouletista… I’m also a son.”

Just like that, we’re back to The Rouletista thing. Why would one object to this identity? Is DelGaudio the Rouletista because he risks destroying himself in order to please an audience? As he told the Times in the same profile, “I daily suffer from the slings and arrows of being ‘a magician.’”

But what exactly are those slings and arrows? DelGaudio treats them as self-evident when they’re anything but. Hannah Gadsby famously contemplated quitting comedy in her acclaimed Netflix special, Nanette, but in that case Gadsby’s critique of the format was specific and pointed, with a clear explanation of why the act, as popularly conceived, was difficult for her, specifically as a gay woman. DelGaudio, by contrast, gives the impression that he invented an elaborate identity for himself (The Rouletista!) only so that he could chafe against it. It’s an odd thing, using one’s art as a forum to complain about having to do art.

DelGaudio said in 2017, that “the next step, with In And Of Itself, is using magic to express real ideas.”

But what real ideas does In And Of Itself express? That some people are mothers and others are entomologists? That Derek DelGaudio is a reluctant rouletista? It’s paradoxical that to justify magic requires claiming that it’s something else. It’s not just magic, it’s art! It’s self-expression!

Some of DelGaudio’s “grand” illusions have a similarly self-canceling effect. The more people cry and DelGaudio acts as if he’s serving us up some tender part of himself, the more I started to reflexively and retroactively apply banal explanations to his tricks. Oh, he has an assistant feeding him the answers. Oh, the person reading the heartfelt letter was clearly a plant.

In And Of Itself sets out to be not just magic, but an exploration of self. Yet I come to the end knowing very little about Derek DelGaudio, about labels, or about myself. In the end, it is exactly what we thought it was and not what Derek DelGaudio seemingly spent 90 minutes trying to convince us it wasn’t. It’s a trick.

‘Derek DelGaudio’s In And Of Itself’ is is streaming via Hulu. Vince Mancini is on Twitter. You can access his archive of reviews here.

Zack Snyder’s Justice League, out on HBO Max on March 18, is four hours long. Not four one-hour episodes, but four straight hours of gloomy Ben Affleck. That’s longer than Titanic, Gone with the Wind, or The Return of the King. You will need to something to eat while watching the Snyder Cut, so can I interest you in a Big Belly Burger?

Warner Bros. and Wonderland Restaurants (which is also working on a DC Comics-themed eatery in London) are teaming up for a Justice League-themed Mother Box meal kit. The “first-of-its-kind, immersive, at-home dining experience” costs “$130 for a kit for two or $260 for four (shipping and taxes not included),” according to the Verge.

The menu features (there’s also a vegetarian option):

OCEAN TRENCH – Icelandic cod and chips with “trench” dressing
THE BIG BELLY BURGER – An infamous fast-food burger from the DC universe, served with condiments
RESURRECTION – to be revealed later
ANCIENT THEMYSCIRAN FIRE – to be revealed later
SNACKS & EXTRAS – to be revealed later
KOUL BRAU BEER – Two beers straight out the DC universe exclusively brewed for Wonderland At Home
JITTERS COFFEE – Cold brew coffee in a can, served in a flash

I have one guess for who will serve the condiments:

Meanwhile, Ben Affleck plans to celebrate the release of Zack Snyder’s Justice League by eating and drinking the same thing he eats and drinks literally every day: Dunkin. For everyone else, you can order the Mother Box meal kit here.

(Via the Verge)

Rum gets better with age, there’s no denying that. It’s not that unaged white or “rested” gold rums don’t have their place in a home bar rotation, especially if you’re mixing cocktails. They certainly do. But a 15, 20, and even 25-year-old bottle of dark rum can hit some serious high marks in both taste and texture that an unaged spirit simply can’t — standing up to any aged whiskey, bourbon, or scotch.

That’s why today — even in the dead of winter — we’re calling out some of the best expensive dark rums we’ve had the pleasure to have ever tasted. Ever.

There are no caveats for this list. These are simply the 10 best expensive rums we’ve tried in recent memory. Naturally, with how vast the spirits universe is, this can’t be a complete list of every expensive dark rum. And you may not be able to find many of these bottles on the average liquor store shelf. But if you ever do spot any of these expressions — maybe at a bar or party post-pandemic or maybe at a well-stocked liquor store when you’re flush with cash — give them a shot.

Sure, they’re pricey — but they’re also freaking delicious.

Goslings Family Reserve Old Rum

ABV: 40%

Average Price: $90

The Rum:

This is a classy rum. It’s the standard Bermudian Goslings blend that spends a few extra years in the barrel. The rum is crafted to be a sipper that hints at both cognac and scotch.

Tasting Notes:

There’s a clear sense of very dark, almost burnt molasses on the nose that’s counterpointed by a spicy tobacco smoke. The palate introduces orange oils next to the Christmas spices and plenty of bittersweet oak. A dried fruit edge arrives and really drives home the Christmas cake spiciness while all that oak and tobacco emboldens the finish’s slow fade.

Bottom Line:

This really needs a little time to open up on the palate. Let it bloom in the glass with a touch of water and take your time savoring each sip.

Pusser’s Aged 15 Years

ABV: 40%

Average Price: $90

The Rum:

Pusser’s is an old-school British Navy stalwart that blends various rums from the Caribbean. These rums are crafted to be savored with no-flashy bottles or elaborate backstories. This is good old rum that is left to rest for 15 years in barrels kissed by Guyana’s sun and humidity.

Tasting Notes:

Musty oak sits next to a real rummy funkiness on the nose. The palate has a nice underbelly of Christmas cake with plenty of spice, dried fruit, and nuts that are counterpointed by that wood, funk, plus a hint of minerality. The finish is surprisingly short, sweet, spicy, and centered on the old oak barrels.

Bottom Line:

This is probably the most unique rum on the list. It really stands out as a palate expander that’s also mixable. Don’t go crazy though — try it in a highball with fizzy water or tonic.

Bacardi Gran Reserva Limitada

ABV: 40%

Average Price: $100

The Rum:

This is the mountaintop of Bacardi. The batch is a limited edition blending of Puerto Rican rums that have aged from 12 to 16 years depending on the release you come across. That blend is specifically crafted to mimic the reserved rum the Bacardi family kept for their own home bars back in the day as the ultimate sipping spirit.

Tasting Notes:

Hints of bourbon vanilla, rich Christmas spice, marzipan, and an old cellar full of resting oak. A slight note of dark chocolate covered raisins arrives next to a clear note of orange oils as the palate holds onto the spice and vanilla at its core. The end mellows dramatically as the oak sweetens and that vanilla fades. Pure velvet.

Bottom Line:

This really is next level Bacardi. It’s really smooth, meaning you barely need a rock or water to cool it down. Still, water will help it bloom, especially if you’re looking for those dark chocolate notes.

Ron Zacapa XO

ABV: 40%

Average Price: $114

The Rum:

This expression is a blend of Guatemalan rums that spent six to 25 years resting in the Solera warehouse in former sherry casks at high elevations. The rum is then finished in French cognac casks to add that little extra refinement to the final taste.

Tasting Notes:

There’s a familiar draw of vanilla and spice that’s accentuated by worn leather, salted butter, rich pipe tobacco, and a foundation of soft cedar. Those notes hold strong as a sticky and buttery toffee arrives with plenty of dried fruits, more spice, chewy vanilla tobacco, and a hint of cacao. The finish is long, svelte, mildly sweet, and full of that cedar until the very end.

Bottom Line:

This is a really f*cking good sip of rum. It’s complex while being totally accessible without even adding water.

El Dorado 21 Year Old Special Reserve

ABV: 43%

Average Price: $115

The Rum:

This expression is a blend of three one-of-a-kind Guyanan rums. The base is distilled in the world’s only still-in-operation 19th-century wooden column still. The next rum is distilled in the world’s only still-in-operation 18th-century single wooden pot still. The third rum is distilled in an 18th-century French Savalle column still.

That history alone is worth the money. Each rum then spends 21 years resting in oak before blending, proofing, and bottling.

Tasting Notes:

There’s a real sense of butter and rum-laden Christmas cake packed with dried and candied fruits and nuts wrapped up in a giant chocolate-tinted tobacco leaf on the nose. Those notes hold true on the palate as a clear sense of cacao arrives to take the sip toward bitter-yet-sweet territory before a hint of banana pushes it back on keel.

The sip holds onto the spices, nuts, fruit, and tobacco the longest as a mild sense of cedar arrives on the end, with one of the slowest fades on this list.

Bottom Line:

This is the perfect post-meal digestif. It really feels like the ultimate winter sipper, especially when you get a little water in there to let it bloom in a big old snifter glass.

Diplomático Single Vintage

ABV: 43%

Average Price: $120

The Rum:

This well-crafted expression is a marrying of Venezuelan rums aged in ex-bourbon and ex-single malt casks for up to 12 years. The rums are then hand-selected and hand-blended to find the perfect balance of taste and texture. The blend finally spends a year in sherry casks to give it that final note of ultra-refinement.

Tasting Notes:

There’s a sharpness to the nose that leans more towards candied ginger than Christmas spices with a bit of funk. The taste leans hard into the spiciness, with an orange zest brightness next to more funky old oak and plenty of sherried sweetness and plummy depths. The end fades very slowly and hits each note again as it warms your soul.

Bottom Line:

This is a surprisingly light sipper that usually works really well neat. It’s also crazy good in simple rum cocktails, like a rum Manhattan.

Appleton Estate Aged 21 Years

ABV: 43%

Average Price: $140

The Rum:

Master Blender Joy Spence has been making great rum at Appleton Estate for decades and this is a great example of her craft. This expression of Jamaican rum is a blend of minimum 21-year-old rums that are hand-picked by Spence for their ability to build a truly great final product.

Tasting Notes:

That classic Jamaican funk is front-and-center with hints of marzipan, vanilla, brown sugar, black pepper, and a hint of bitter orange marmalade. The palate delivers on what the nose promises — while also highlighting the aged oak, mild spiciness, more marzipan, dark chocolate (with water), and a white sugar cube sweetness (in the best possible way).

Bottom Line:

This goes down way too easily, especially with a single rock to open it up.

Flor de Caña 25

ABV: 40%

Average Price: $154

The Rum:

This rum is a true cane-to-glass experience from the slopes of the San Cristobal volcano in Nicaragua. This particular expression is a marrying of rums aged up to 25 years in the shadow of that volcano and is proofed with mineral water bubbling up from the volcanic soil underneath.

Tasting Notes:

There are classic bourbon notes of vanilla and caramel/toffee on the nose next to bitterly charred oak and chocolate with hints of orange oils and black tea. There’s a tobacco spiciness to the body of the sip that leads towards a mintiness next to more toffee, spice, and oak. The chocolate darkens as the spice sharpens on the slow fade, leaving you with a sense of an old cedar box that once held cigars and vanilla pods.

Bottom Line:

This is a massively popular sipper that wins awards and titles. It’s even been heralded as the best sipping rum in the world. We feel like that’s a pretty accurate way to look at this expression.

Mount Gay The Port Cask Expression

ABV: 55%

Average Price: $200

The Rum:

Master Blender Trudiann Branker hit it out of the park with this Barbados rum. The expression is a blend of rum aged for five years in Tawny Port casks that’s married to 14-year-old rums aged in ex-bourbon casks. That blend is then transferred to fresh Tawny Port casks for a final year of resting/finishing. The rum is then bottled at cask strength with no fussing whatsoever.

Tasting Notes:

The bourbon comes through with rich notes of oily vanilla and buttery caramel next to those deeper port notes of dried stonefruits next to marzipan with a hint of rose water. The palate builds on that by veering into a real sense of bright red cherries and chewy prunes stewed in Christmas spices with a sense of musty oak and more of that marzipan edging in. The end lightens to a velvet sip that’s perfectly rounded as the spice, cherry, and almond slowly fade out.

Bottom Line:

This is one of those sips that make you say, “wow…” It’s just so goddamn easy to drink without water. It’s also a wonderful outlier on this list with all that cherry really bringing some brightness.

Goslings Papa Seal Single Barrel

ABV: 41.5%

Average Price: $200

The Rum:

We’ve come full circle and back to Bermuda and Goslings. This bottle is a blend of ex-bourbon barrel rums that spent 21 years maturing. The batch is married and then finished for two more years in a new American oak barrel before it’s proofed and bottled from that single barrel.

Tasting Notes:

There’s a real sense of the bourbon via notes of vanilla and toffee up top, next to an almost cognac fruitiness and nuttiness. The taste holds onto the vanilla as soft cedar enters the fray along with subtle Christmas spices, chewy and fruity tobacco, and a salted caramel edge. The finish embraces that savory-sweet aspect with more of the cedar and tobacco lingering on the slow fade.

Bottom Line:

This is unbelievably smooth. It’s like drinking silk with beautiful notes of flavor delicately woven in.

The unprecedented move by Redditors on the WallStreetBets forum to pump up the fledgling GameStop stock made countless casual investors a lot of money and created substantial losses at a few major hedge funds.

While the meteoric rise of GameStop’s stock price is a bubble that will soon burst, there are many who got out at the right time and are already spending their earnings.

Most of those who got rich off the scheme come from a cross-section of society that’s a lot less wealthy than the hedge fund managers they tried to take down. So a lot of the investors are using their earnings to cover the basics in life: paying down school debt, making a downpayment on a home, or contributing the money to a health savings account.

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One of the big winners was Jaydyn Carr, a 10-year-old from San Antonio, Texas. Carr wasn’t a member of the WallStreetBets forum, his mother Nina bought him the GameStop stock two years ago as a Kwanzaa gift.

Nina bought Jaydyn ten shares of the stock at $6 apiece. Then printed out a stock certificate online so he had something to unwrap.

via Mike Mozart / Flickr

The gift was a representation of Ujamaa, one of the seven principles of the festival. Ujamaa means cooperative economics and the principle is a pledge to “build and maintain our own stores, shops and other businesses and to profit from them together.”

“My phone was going off, because I have GameStop on my watch list,” the mother said after seeing the stock price skyrocket. Even though the stock price was going through the roof, Nina allowed her son to make the final decision.

“I was trying to explain to him that this was unusual,” she said, “I asked him ‘Do you want to stay or sell?'”

Nina had taught her son the fundamentals of investing so he knew exactly what was happening when the stock price went up. So her son responded with a resounding, “Yes!”

“Any time I learn something, I show him as well,” Nina said. “I wanted to pass on the knowledge I have now because I learned it late in life. I want to give him a step up.”

The ten stocks were cashed out at $3,200. Not too bad for a $60 investment.

via Google

The family has decided to put $2,200 into a college savings account for Jaydyn and the remaining $1,000 will go back into the market. Jaydyn wants to invest the money in another video game company, Roblox.

Roblox is an online game platform and game creation system that allows users to program games and play games created by other users. The company plans on going public in the near future.

Jaydyn’s windfall is a big win for the fifth-grader, but more importantly, it’s a great example of what can happen when parents teach their children about financial literacy. Nina took the time to explain how the market works to Jaydyn when he was just a third-grader, and that knowledge will help him guide him through his lifetime.

In what has to be a new standard for her worst possible take, Meghan McCain has equated the Reddit traders buying up GameStop stocks with the MAGA rioters who assaulted the U.S. Capitol building earlier in the month. The hot take was so bad that even McCain recognized that it wasn’t her best thought and quickly deleted it. However, as everyone knows, nothing gets deleted on the internet, and a screencap has been bouncing around social media, earning McCain well-deserved criticism for the false equivalency. Here’s what she wrote via The Daily Beast:

“The same thing that drove people to the Capitol is driving Redditors to buy GameStop. The system feels rigged. And the little guy is trying to take back power in any way.”

Interestingly, the deleted tweet was a follow-up to a previous thought that’s still up on Twitter, and frankly, the two practically say the same thing, but without the first one mentioning the Capitol. “The GameStop stock story is like a mirror to the world of everything that is wrong,” McCain tweeted. “This is what happens when the system feels rigged and nothing seems to work anymore. It’s what has fueled the rise of populism in America. The story shouldn’t be dismissed because it is nuanced.”

Where McCain went wrong with the deleted tweet is justifying the attack on the Capitol based on the Big Lie that the election was rigged, which has been proven wrong in court over sixty times before January 6. As for Wall Street being rigged, that’s obviously a much more tangible and provable assertion even if the populist veneer of the Reddit traders is debatable.

Of course, this wasn’t McCain’s only false equivalency. Just 24 hours earlier, she attempted to equate Democratic Congressman Eric Swalwell being targeted by a Chinese spy with Marjorie Taylor Greene’s violent rhetoric and harassment of school shooting survivor David Hogg. That hot take also involved McCain playing fast and loose with the facts by accusing Swalwell of sleeping with the spy, which he did not.

(Via The Daily Beast)

Madlib‘s new instrumental album Sound Ancestors isn’t quite Piñata or Bandana, but Freddie Gibbs, his collaborator on those two albums, apparently felt inspired nonetheless. So inspired, in fact, that he couldn’t wait until he got to a studio to record his lyrical thoughts, leading him to freestyle over some of the tracks while riding in an Uber and begin uploading the results to his Twitter, leading to a nice semi-reunion between the two longtime collaborators.

So far, he’s two tracks in, but depending on the length of his ride, it’s entirely possible he can get through the whole thing, as it’s only about 40 minutes long, with most of the 16 tracks clocking in around two minutes. Freddie’s driver and fellow riders can be heard cracking up to his off-the-head punchlines. While the quick freestyles lack the polish of Gibbs’ other work with Madlib, they have plenty of charm — enough to already have fans begging the two to reunite officially ASAP.

The Gary, Indiana rapper stoked cries for another collaborative album as well recently when he turned down fans’ proposition for a Verzuz-style battle with Pusha T with his own, intriguing counterproposal. Who knows what he’ll drop next, but based on the reactions to his recent output, fans remain hungry for new razor-sharp raps from the resurgent veteran.

2020 was big for Jhené Aiko thanks to the release of her album Chilombo, and the album has helped her 2021 get off to a strong start as well. Earlier this month, the RIAA announced that the album had achieved Platinum certification, making it Aiko’s first Platinum album. Then, she got to make an appearance on The Late Late Show last night to perform “Born Tired,” appropriately singing the track on a cloud-like bed set while wearing onesie pajamas.

Aside from the performance, she also took a few minutes to speak with James Corden, noting that she has enjoyed the additional time she has gotten to spend with her daughter and her cats during the pandemic. She also talked about how it felt hearing that her album Chilombo was nominated for Album Of The Year at the Grammys, describing it as a bittersweet moment, as at the same time, she found out that her uncle had passed away due to COVID-19. She said, “It was kinda like an unreal moment, just a very reflective moment because I was in a room that was overlooking the ocean and I was getting this really great news and this really sad news. And it was kind of an out-of-body, surreal, bittersweet moment.”

Watch clips from Aiko’s appearance on The Late Late Show above.

Back in 2019, when the world made sense, millions of people on Reddit didn’t manipulate short-sellers into overvaluing stocks and driving rich hedge fund managers insane. Our society simply let those in charge of companies go insane, letting infusions of money from venture capital wildly inflate the value of those companies until it all blew up and lives were ruined. But, you know, not their own.

It made for a good story and, in the case of Adam Neumann’s WeWork, it made for a good podcast. And Apple TV hopes it will make for a good show that we now know Jared Leto is involved in, as The Hollywood Reporter said Friday that the top billing for Apple’s WeCrashed-based show is set. Leto will star as WeWork’s eccentric CEO, while Anne Hathaway will play his wife, Rebekah. According to the report, the two will also serve as executive producers on the show.

The eight-episode drama will follow the greed-filled rise and inevitable fall of start-up WeWork and the narcissists whose chaotic love made it all possible. Leto will play WeWork founder Adam Neumann, with Hathaway set to play his wife and co-founder Rebekah Newmann. Both stars will also be credited as exec producers on the show. (A premiere time frame has not yet been determined.)

Eisenberg, who has an overall deal with Apple, will co-write, exec produce and serve as showrunner alongside Crevello. Wondery will exec produce. Charlie Gogolak, a partner with Ficarra and Requa in Zaftig Films, will exec produce. Natalie Sandy, Eisenberg’s vp development at Piece of Work Entertainment, also exec produces. Leto’s Paradox partner Emmy Ludbrook also exec produces.

Leto in the role of Adam Neumann is certainly inspired, and Hathaway has the range to pull off Rebekah, who was involved in various ways as WeWork expanded into creating a school and other business endeavors. We know that Leto often gets very much into the heads of his characters, but there’s no word here on whether he will try to smuggle a large amount of weed into Israel in a cereal box to get in the right headspace here.

But it’s not the only WeWork TV show currently in the works, as Cousin Greg from Succession will also play Neumann in a show based on a book about WeWork that’s being made for TV by You’re The Worst creator Stephen Falk. If that sounds like too much WeWork to you, well, now you get their business model I suppose. We’ll eventually get to see who wins the WeWork bake-off in due time, but both shows certainly have gotten the vibe right when it comes to casting.

Few snack foods can surpass the cookie. It’s not as divisive as the world of chips (potato, vegetable, tortilla, banana, chicharron — nobody likes them all!), but just as diverse. Not as pricey as the world of booze, but just as indulgent and nearly as sophisticated (Jack Daniels is to Oreo as Glenfiddich is to Pepperidge Farm) and they appeal to everyone! Even people who don’t eat cookies will readily admit that cookies are the freaking best.

Just look how much joy a simple shortbread can bring!

But good as cookies are, they’re not all great. Some cookies are Nilla Wafers. Or Teddy Grahams! Some are overstuffed! Some are understuffed!

In an act of public service, we dove into the extensive world of grocery store cookies to weed out the delicious from the overprocessed, flavorless, bargain bin fodder. How did we arrive at these 25 brands? We asked friends and fellow food writers for their all-time favorites, hit r/Snacking for ideas, and did an inventory of what brands the grocery chains were currently carrying. Then we finally got around to the fun work: eating them all.

Here are the best store-bought cookies currently on the market, ranked.

25. Nabisco Nilla Wafers

Nilla Wafers aren’t bad, not at all. With some milk… very pleasant. They’re just so boring. You’ll hear people make excuses for them — “you just have to dip them in X!” or “Cumble them into a crust for Y recipe!”

That means they’re not good, friend. Of course, a Nilla Wafer is going to taste delicious if you dip it in Nutella or syrup or cocaine or whatever! But all it’s really doing is adding texture to that sweet/ cocaine element.

The Bottom Line

A cookie in its most basic form.

24. Teddy Grahams — All Of Them

Teddy Grahams are weird, they’re basically bite-sized graham crackers but they’re presented in cute bear form. Are graham crackers cookies? Graham crackers are for old people, but Teddy Grahams are clearly for kids, which are the opposite of old people. This is the world’s most dissonant cookie.

Whether you love the Honey, Chocolate chip, Cinnamon, or Chocolate flavor, they’re all better experienced by tossing them in a small bowl and pouring milk over them. Which means as stand-alone cookies, they’re just alright.

The Bottom Line

A better cookie than the Nilla Wafer, which is more of a testament to how bad the Nilla Wafer is, not how good the Teddy Graham is.

23. Oreo Golden

It must be tough to be Oreo. The OG Oreo is unbeatable by it’s younger siblings, which means no matter what the brand tries the end product is destined to live in the shadow of a greater cookie. That’s very much the case with the Golden Oreo, which is a pretty good cookie but pales in comparison with the OG.

Take note Nilla Wafers, this is how you make a vanilla cookie work! Golden Oreos are buttery and sweet, ideal for dipping in a tall glass of chocolate milk, or enjoyable completely on their own. The creme filling is an effective way to add some excitement to the bland taste of artificial vanilla, but it’s impossible to eat them without thinking about how you’d rather have a regular Oreo.

The Bottom Line

The Tiffany Trump of the Oreo Cookie family. Easy to forget it exists!

22. Mother’s Circus Animal Cookies

Animal crackers are somehow more boring than even Nilla Wafers but cover them in pink or white frosting and bedazzle them with sprinkles and you’ve got yourself a damn good cookie. It’s often debated whether or not the pink and white cookies are actually two different flavors.

To my palate they are, but could that be totally psychological? Definitely.

Something about the pink cookies just tastes better to me, they have a deeper flavor to them with a slightly bitter edge, whereas the whites taste sweeter??? This could all just be wild speculation induced by frosting. I’ve never thought to do a blind taste test because at the end of the day, who cares? The cookies are good, white or pink!

The Bottom Line

You feel like a glutton buying these, but if they’re in the house that bag doesn’t last two days.

21. Famous Amos Chocolate Chip Cookies

I love these dusty little cookies! Are they overly dry? Yes, do they make a mess of crumbs as soon as you open them? All the time! Do they always cut the roof of my mouth because they’re so hard — okay maybe these cookies aren’t so good. I don’t think there is a single occasion where I’ve actually purchased Famous Amos, I’ve only been offered bags in random places.

I eat them, of course, because they’re cookies and I’m not insane, but they really shouldn’t be anyone’s favorite chocolate chip cookie. Still, just being chocolate chip almost pushes them to the top 20.

The Bottom Line

If you’ve had Famous Amos but never actually bought a box/bag that should tell you everything you need to know about whether or not this is a cookie worth your money. If you have bought Famous Amos, well… to each their own.

20. Nutter Butter

Nutter Butter gets a bad rap amongst peanut butter cookie fans because whatever the hell Nutter Butter’s peanut butter creme filling is made out of, it doesn’t taste anything like actual peanut butter. Sure, Nutter Butter touts themselves as being “made with real peanut butter” but they never really specify how much peanut butter is used.

Spoiler: It’s likely not much. Still, the slightly salty/ super sweet nutty goodness works here, ingredients be damned!

The Bottom Line:

They’re not peanut butter cookies, they’re Nutter Butters — but they’re still tasty!

19. Grandma’s Peanut Butter Cookies

Grandma’s makes a pretty addicting Peanut Butter cookie. Released in two-packs, this Peanut Butter cookie is very rich and buttery with a slight peanut butter bitterness that really sets it apart from pretenders like the Nutter Butter. They are a bit on the dry side, you’ll defnitely want milk nearby, but for a storebought and mass produced PB cookie — solid.

The Bottom Line

A delicious peanut butter cookie but one you should never eat without something to drink handy.

18. Milk Bar Cornflake Chocolate Chip Marshmallow Cookies

Now available at Whole Foods, people go nuts for Christina Tosi’s Milk Bar cookies and the best of the bunch is the Cornflake Chocolate Chip Marshmallow. The cookie has a fantstic (and unique to the storebought cookie world) texture and combines the flavors of toasted corn flakes with marshmallows and chocolate chips — something we never knew we needed but absolutely love.

You’ve got the crispy crunch of cornflakes, the soft sponginess of marshmallows, and the addicting flavor of decent quality baker’s chocolate — these are very solid.

The Bottom Line

High concept cookies with balaced flavors and multiple textures — if you’re into that bougie shit.

17. Lofthouse Frosted Sugar Cookies

Lofthouse cookies, which aren’t so much a brand as they are a style, are usually found in the fresh-baked section of your grocery store — meaning they vary in quality from market chain to market chain. Who has the best? Who knows!

These are some seriously divisive cookies. Some people love them and others think they’re straight-up garbage — but how could you hate a sugar bomb topped with a dollop of thick and creamy frosting? [Because you can sense all the chemicals, that’s how!]

The Bottom Line

Imagine a Nilla Wafer, but loaded with saccharine, chemically, fake-colored frosting! Sounds… kinda good, right?

16. Bakery Section Oatmeal

A good oatmeal cookie is completely dependent on how fresh it is. No brand has really mastered how to make an oatmeal cookie with great shelf life, they’re usually too hard and way too dry. If you’ve only ever had an oatmeal cookie from one of the big brands, you probably hate these things. Grab a box from the bakery section instead, you’ll find an incredibly soft and fragrant cookie with heavy doses of brown sugar, butter, cinnamon, and chewy earthy oats.

I’m generally not a fan of soft cookies — unless they’re freshly baked — but with an oatmeal cookie, it’s exactly what you want. If you can find one with cranberries or golden raisins over the usual purple, grab a box and never look back!

The Bottom Line

Find out when they come in and grab these at their freshest!

15. Keebler Chips Deluxe Rainbow

Keebler’s Chips Deluxe Rainbow is who we have to blame for chocolate chip cookies with candy being a thing, which almost always tastes terrible… unless it’s this OG. While this pick seems like a cookie explicitly for kids, Keebler is using real M&M’s here, and that actually matters.

Do you think some stupid kids know the difference between M&Ms and off-brand candy-coated chocolates? No way, they need to the sophisticated palate of an adult.

The Bottom Line

Don’t ever eat cookies with candy-coated chocolate on them, unless it’s this one.

14. Keebler E.L. Fudge Elfwich

If you asked a 10-year old me to rank the best grocery store cookies the list would probably be topped by these babies. In my memories, this cookie is unbeatable but in reality — they just taste okay.

While the fudge inside is delicious and rich — like an airy, sugary Nutella with no hazelenut (so maybe not that much like Nutella) — the major drawback of this cookie is the sandwich ends. They’re actually somehow more bland than even the Nilla Wafer. They’re stale, hard, and barely taste like anything. Thank god each cookie is packed with fudge to hide that fact.

The Bottom Line

Not as good as they seemed when you were a kid.

13. Oreo Thins Mint Flavored

Why do we think Mint Flavored Oreo Thins deserve a spot on this list but Mint Flavored Oreos or, god forbid, Mint Flavored Double-Stuffed Oreos, don’t? Because you can have too much of a good thing. Mint Flavored Oreos are just way too much, but their thin counterparts feature what looks like half the creme filling (but taste like the whole thing, baby) sandwiched between crisper and thinner Oreo cookies.

It’s the perfect balance of cookie and creme.

These also look slightly elegant, like they should be served on a pristine saucer with a cappuccino. If you’d rather go the classic milk route, we suggest chocolate milk for this one — it’ll pair nicer with the Oreo cookie and fresh and minty creme filling.

The Bottom Line:

Oreo’s classiest cookie. Hard to believe the people who made the abomination that is Double-Stuffed made this one too!

12. Walker’s Shortbread Cookies

Have you ever bit into a stick of butter? It’s a wild experience and one that I won’t descirbe in detail to spare your genteel sensibilities. Luckily for us butterheads, Walker’s Shortbread Cookies exist, which are just like biting into a stick of butter but with a more pleasing and palatable texture. These shortbread cookies are easily the butteriest cookies I’ve ever eaten — they’re thick but not hard or crunchy and they melt in your mouth in the most delicious way.

Walker keeps their ingredients list short — consisting of just flour, sugar, butter, and salt. What more do you need in a cookie?

The Bottom Line

If you have dreams of biting into a stick of butter but still want to be accepted in society, this is the cookie for you!

11. Trader Joe’s Triple Ginger Snaps

These babies are so addicting. Ginger isn’t an ingredient that gets a lot of love from the world of grocery store cookies which makes these Trader Joe’s Ginger Snaps a bit of an anomaly. Our favorite detail is that the cookies have real chunks of ginger, right in the cookie! They’re spicy, sweet, and bite-sized — meaning eating 8 of them doesn’t feel so crazy.

The Bottom Line

A delicious anomaly in the world of grocery store cookies. Peep the real chunks of ginger!

10. Chips A’hoy Original Chocolate Chip Cookies

Are these too high?

They’re probably too high. Vienna Fingers probably deserved this slot. We don’t care, Chips A’hoy are great!

I prefer the Original variety over the chewy, they strike a great balance between flavors of butter and brown sugar, and each bite provides the perfect ratio of cookie to chocolate. The chocolate chips are interwoven throughout the cookie here, not just sitting on top, the cookies also have a slightly greasy quality to them that lingers in your mouth in the best way.

The Bottom Line

Classic, nostalgic, and they hold up to your memories better than most entries in that category.

9. Keebler Fudge Stripes

The Fudge Stripe takes everything from with the Elfwich and improves it. The cookie here isn’t as dense as the Elfwich sandwich and it has a better distribution of fudge, which keeps each bite from being bland. In addition to the swirls that decorate this cookie, the entire bottom is submerged in fudge, and while it’s not as airy as the fudge on the Elfwich, it tastes just as good.

The Bottom Line

If you love the Elfwich, the Fudge Stripe is a definite step up. It’s also just one of the best cookies you can buy at the market.

8. Trader Joe’s Speculoos

And the award for worst cookie name ever goes to Trader Joe’s Speculoos! “Speculoo” sounds like the British word for a tool that doctors use to open up your a**. The name, plus the disgusting imagery I just mentioned, plus this stupid old-timey box may lead you to avoid Speculoos (even typing it is gross) at all costs.

Don’t, because they’re delicious! Caramelized cinnamon is what gives this cookie its distinct flavor, which is best enjoyed after being dunk in coffee as they’re a little too dry for their own good.

The Bottom Line

Disgustingly named delicious cinnamon cookies, ideal for dipping.

7. Keebler Pecan Sandies

It’s hard to beat the shortbread cookie yet somehow Keebler found a way to improve upon perfection with the Pecan Sandie. All the buttery melt-in-your-mouth goodness of shortbread cookies are here in the Pecan Sandies but the flavor is elevated by the inclusion of pecans, which add a bit of nuttiness and nice texture that combats the mush of saliva-hydrated shortbread.

Our only gripe is we wish the Sandies had bigger chunks of pecan.

The Bottom Line

Everything you love about shortbread cookies. Plus pecans!

6. Tate’s Chocolate Chip Cookies

I have complicated feelings about Tate’s Chocolate Chip Cookies. On one hand, I recognize that they’re easily the best grocery store chocolate chip cookies — they’re big, chewy on the inside, crispy on the out, and taste shockingly like fresh-baked homemade cookies. But they’re not. This means every time I eat one I can’t help but think about how I could be having a slightly better cookie if I just made them myself.

If you put a gun to my head though — chill out and put that thing down, this is just a ranking of cookies! — I can’t deny that these are better in every way to Chips A’hoy.

The Bottom Line

The best grocery store chocolate chip cookie your money can buy.

5. Keebler Coconut Dreams

This is Keebler’s masterpiece.

If Girl Scout cookies were sold at grocery stores, you’d better believe Samoas would be topping this list. Keebler’s version, the Coconut Dream, are almost as good. A sweet cookie covered in caramel, fudge, and crispy toasted coconut, this cookie will shred the roof of your mouth but they’re so delicious its worth it.

Each bite from your first to your last is a fudgey rich dream.

The Bottom Line

Keebler’s answer to the Girl Scout Samoa! Almost as good as the original.

4. Trader Joe’s Cookie Butter Sandwiches

Why aren’t there more cookie butter cookies out there?

These bad boys consist of two thin shortbread cookies with some spicy caramelized cookie butter between each bite. They taste delicious dismantled and they’re equally when you bite into the whole thing at once. A cookie with no wrong way to eat it is a great cookie!

The Bottom Line

Trader Joe’s best cookie and one of the best grocery store cookies money can buy.

3. Pepperidge Farm Milanos (any flavor)

Milanos are synonymous with the Pepperidge Farm brand, probably because they’re insanely good and have been at the head of the class for decades. They’re crunchy but soften instantly in your mouth, delicate, which isn’t something you can say for every cookie, and feature the perfect cookie-to-chocolate ratio.

The chocolate is really the star of the show here, it tastes like real baker’s chocolate, setting itself apart from the competition in terms of quality. They’re also the only cookie we can eat one of and leave satisfied. Whether you dig on the milk chocolate, mint, or double chocolate variety — I love dark chocolate myself — every Pepperidge Farm Milano is delicious.

The Bottom Line

The fanciest cookie you can buy at the grocery store.

2. Pepperidge Farm Sausalito

Maybe it’s controversial to place the Sausalito above the Milano but I don’t care, this is my personal favorite grocery store cookie. Pepperidge Farm’s Sausalito features delicious high-quality chunks of dark chocolate chips with buttery and crunchy macadamia nuts peppered throughout.

They’re big cookies — which means one will do, but once the combination of butter, dark chocolate, and macadamia travel across your tastebuds you’ll want to try the brand’s other California-city-themed cookies. (Don’t bother, they all pale in comparison to the Sausalito.)

The Bottom Line

Pepperidge Farm’s best California-city-themed cookie. The perfect choice for someone who is looking for an elevated chocolate chip.

1. Oreo

Oreos are without a doubt the GOAT [sub in Newman O’s if you like fewer chemicals]. It might seem basic or predictable to give Oreo the number one spot but be completely honest with yourself, is there a better grocery store cookie out there? I’d argue that when one hears the phrase “grocery store cookie” they immediately envision a classic Oreo. Everything about this cookie just works. It has a distinct and original flavor that is often duplicated but never matched, it’s equally delicious dipped or eaten dry, and if you eat enough of them you’ll look like a legit pirate.

Because of the grainy black crumbs in your teeth, get it?

Anyyyyway, the Oreo is in every way the Nilla Wafer’s opposite.

The Bottom Line

Cookies and creme in cookie form! Grocery store cookies rarely get better than the Oreo. You can dip it, eat it dry, dismantle it or smash it into your favorite ice cream. It’s also the only cookie that belongs in a milkshake.