Tory Lanez wants the judge in his and Megan Thee Stallion’s assault case to drop the protective order preventing him from talking about the case, according to TMZ. Tory’s lawyers filed documents this week pointing to Megan’s reaction to a false report that the case had been dropped, saying that it was unfair for her to be able to address the case but not him.
At the time, Megan apparently believed Tory or someone close to him had released the false story to undermine her integrity, tweeting as much as Tory’s name trended on Twitter and his defenders began attacking her online. “That whole team figures out ways to create doubt with my story every week and the media eats it up,” she wrote.
While the source of the story was instead a fan gossip account misreading the LA County Superior Court website, Lanez still feels that this creates a one-sided narrative painting him as the aggressor (never mind how quickly fans believed the poorly reported story, which was shared by a number of publications despite the shoddy logic behind its conclusion).
Meanwhile, Tory’s docs claim he has evidence that he wasn’t the one who shot Megan, but can’t share it due to the protection order. He believes the optics will bias a jury against him before the case goes to trial.
This, of course, is only if you ignore the thousands of fans and numerous fellow artists giving him the benefit of the doubt, as well as his album Daystar released in the wake of the shooting going public in which he straight-up claims he’s being framed while also trying to profit from the situation through streams of the album. In the meantime, Megan hasn’t discussed any aspects of the case herself after explaining her side of the story in its immediate aftermath and refuting his Daystar claims on her sole Good News song addressing the shooting, “Shots Fired.” Tory’s also tried manipulating public opinion in other ways, such as advertising collaborators like DaBaby and Lil Wayne, insinuating that they believe his side of the story, despite his video with DaBaby never being cleared for release.
It’s hard to believe that it’s been a year since Kobe Bryant, his daughter Gianna, and seven others died in a helicopter crash near Los Angeles. It was a tragedy that shocked not only the NBA community, but the world at large, as Kobe’s enormous influence was put in stark relief after his passing.
Many are clearly still processing the grief from such an unimaginable tragedy, so it wasn’t a surprise that his wife Vanessa, on behalf of the Bryant family, asked that the NBA not flood the airwaves with tributes on the one-year anniversary on Tuesday. Still, it was inevitable that his many fans, teammates, and peers around the league would find ways to pay homage one of the NBA’s all-time greats.
Chief among them was former Lakers center Pau Gasol, who won a pair of championships alongside Bryant and forged a friendship that has practically made them part of one another’s family. On Tuesday, Pau took to Instagram to post a moving tribute to his friend and his daughter, the loss of whom will continue to reverberate for years to come.
Pau was one of Kobe’s many running mates throughout his career, and though Kobe famously clashed with several of them, his partnership with Pau was easily one of the most amicable and most successful. As such, their families have maintained a close relationship throughout the years, and Pau even gave his daughter the middle name Gianna as a way to honor Gigi’s memory.
As Marvel fans scramble to unravel the mystery of what’s really happening in WandaVision, the songwriting duo behind the Disney+ series ever-changing theme songs have revealed an interesting detail. While explaining the process of coming up with new music that matches the sitcom era of each episode, Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Bobby Lopez, who’s previous work includes both Frozen films and Coco, shared that each theme song contains a very specific musical trick with a name that could hint at an evil something — or someone — lurking beneath WandaVision. Via IndieWire:
“One of the techniques of this show is to use a bright and cheery sound, and then juxtapose it with a creepy situation,” he says. He brings up the rhyme from “A Nightmare on Elm Street” — “One, two, Freddy’s coming for you” — as a great example.
The duo explains they want the audience to feel that paranoia. “We put a tritone in the main theme which is [considered] the devil’s interval, and it might feel creepy, sometimes dreamy,” Lopez said.
That now makes two references to the “devil” in WandaVision. During Episode 2, Kathryn Hahn‘s Agnes made the off-handed remark, “That’s not the only place he is,” when one of the characters said “the devil is in the details.” This quickly led to fan theories that the Marvel villain Mephisto could show up on the Disney+ series, and may even be Agnes’ husband, Ralph, who has yet to make an appearance.
However, Elizabeth Olsen recently told Elle that the show might not even have a “villain” in the way that Marvel fans are using to seeing them on screen. “Someone said to me when you watch any of these hero movies, you know when the villain’s about to show themselves, and you also have an idea of who the villain is. With our show, you don’t know what the villain is, or if there is one at all,” Olsen said.
Of course, Marvel is notoriously secret, so Olsen could simply be doing her part to keep fans guessing.
Indie music has grown to include so much. It’s not just music that is released on independent labels, but speaks to an aesthetic that deviates from the norm and follows its own weirdo heart. It can come in the form of rock music, pop, or folk. In a sense, it says as much about the people that are drawn to it as it does about the people that make it.
Mike Milosh has been pretty prolific throughout the 2010s and into the 2020s, and his latest LP Home doesn’t falter in its dreamy and ambitious approach. “It seems trite to describe Rhye as indie-pop given the grand melodies, powerful beats, and strikingly idiosyncratic perspectives that comes across in Mike Milosh’s singular music,” wrote Steven Hyden in a recent issue of the Indie Mixtape newsletter.
Typhoon – Sympathetic Magic
Almost three years to the date after unleashing their last album Offerings, Typhoon is back with a surprise new LP, which dropped out of the sky last Friday. Sympathetic Magic is as politically-charged as Typhoon has ever gotten on a record, taking on the pandemic and political unrest that has been on full display over the last year.
CARM – CARM
CJ Camerieri has had a hand in recent music from Taylor Swift, Paul Simon, The National, and plenty more, but now he has centered his focus on the release of a self-titled debut album under the moniker CARM, which features flourishes of horns and entrancing instrumentation, along with guest appearances from Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon, Sufjan Stevens, and members of Yo La Tengo.
Kiwi Jr – Cooler Returns
Just over a year after releasing their debut album Football Money, Toronto quartet Kiwi Jr. are back with their sophomore effort, successfully building upon the template that quickly garnered them comparisons to Pavement. On Cooler Returns, the band’s “shambolic yet catchy songs are loaded with fractured riffs and lyrical non-sequiturs,” wrote Steven Hyden in a recent issue of the Indie Mixtape newsletter.
The Head And The Heart – Rivers And Roads: Live From Pike Place Market
In August of 2019, Seattle natives The Head And The Heart found themselves performing atop the city’s iconic Pike Place Market to 30,000 fans, the same market where they would busk at the beginning of their journey as a band a decade ago. The performance included energetic versions of tracks from throughout the band’s career, including “Honeybee” and “Missed Connection.” The group commemorated the event with a concert film and album, which can be watched in full on Amazon.
Palberta – Palberta5000
New York art-punk trio Palberta has been forging ahead over the last several years, dropping impressive album after impressive album. Palberta5000 might be the most intriguing of all the band’s releases to date, with Steven Hyden praising the band for finding “the middle ground between minimalist, deconstructionist indie and the danceable grooves and relentless rhythms of funk and R&B” in the latest Indie Mixtape newsletter.
Camp Trash – Downtiming EP
After generating a good amount of hype around their debut EP with the release of two promising singles, Camp Trash made good on the promise of an excellent (albeit short) collection of emo-inspired power pop tracks with Downtiming. The EP’s four tracks feel like a throwback to the height of teen movies, where a song like “Bobby” could soundtrack a high schooler surfing the internet for the first time. They should hang out with Beabadoobee.
Chai – “Action”
Japanese quartet Chai signed to esteemed indie label Sub Pop for their third full-length album Wink. “Action” is a great first taste of the LP, with glitchy electronic production and Mana’s affected vocals giving the song a unique futuristic aesthetic.
Hand Habits – “4th Of July”
Hand Habits’ Placeholder was one of our favorite albums of 2019, and now Meg Duffy is back with all new music on Dirt EP. The effort’s lead single “4th Of July” is what Derrick Rossignol calls for Uproxx a “climactic folk-rocker,” a slow-burning number that features little more than guitar and vocals at the outset before building to a dreamy, cinematic conclusion.
Matthew E. White & Lonnie Holley – “This Here Jungle Of Moderness/Composition 14”
Sometimes, it takes the creative push of a collaborative partner to help create your best work. This is the case for Matthew E. White and Lonie Holley, who claim in a press release that their new five-track effort Broken Mirror: A Selfie Reflection features the most exciting and explosive tracks of their collective careers. Lead single “This Here Jungle Of Moderness/Composition 14” is a sprawling seven-minute epic that encompasses everything from avant garde to funkadelic.
Deb Never – “Someone Else”
After running into a creative dry spell in Los Angeles, Deb Never packed her bags and booked a one-way flight to London, where she moved in with longtime collaborator Michael Percy with the only goal of writing an onslaught of music. “Someone Else” is the first taste of Never’s “London period,” a lo-fi indie number produced by Jam City that opens in a subdued, reflective nature before a hyper pop beat drops and transforms the song into something resembling a dance track.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
“Who is Rico Nasty?” Uproxx gives you a chance to find out in the latest installment of our “Who Is…?” documentary series focusing on the colorful DMV rapper/fashion icon. In the mini-doc, Rico recounts her growth from a boarding school student named Maria to the badass symbol of feminine self-determination she’s become thanks to hits like “Smack A Bitch,” “Key Lime OG,” “Own It,” and “OHFR?”
“I always had tough skin,” she admits. “I always left out the house with a chip on my shoulder like, ‘Hey, look, bitch. I’m here though. I’m alive!’” Rico explains how being a loner who classmates thought was weird set the stage for her to be the rebellious role model she is today. “I’m just happy that when another Black girl does this, she won’t feel so different,” she says. “I know that there’s a lot of other girls that are like me that are probably to be whoever they are or who they wanna be, but I make room for that.”
Watch Uproxx’s “Who Is Rico Nasty?” documentary above.
Nightmare Vacation is out now via Atlantic Records. Get it here.
Rico Nasty is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Usually, artists release new songs or albums on Friday, which allows the material to have a full week of tracking activity for Billboard chart consideration and therefore give it the best chance to place highly on the weekly ranks. However, Billie Eilish and Rosalía released their new collaboration, “Lo Vas A Olvidar,” on January 21, which was a Thursday. That means it only had one day to make an impact on the charts, and sure enough, it did: The single debuted at No. 45 on the Hot Latin Songs chart dated January 30, which gives Eilish her first appearance on the chart.
Eilish recently spoke about the track with Zane Lowe and said of it, “I love it. I actually think it’s so beautiful and it’s not something I feel like I’ve done. [Rosalía] just opened a little channel in me that I hadn’t tried out before. Obviously, a lot of it is in Spanish, which I think is so important. […] It went through lots of stages, which is kinda rare for us. Usually the production we do is the production we end up with. This one was really not that way. The time I heard it when it was done, I was just like, ‘This is so weird.’ I don’t feel like I’ve heard a song that sounds like this.”
It’s an emotional day around the NBA and the basketball world in general, as Tuesday marks the one-year anniversary of the tragic helicopter crash that killed Kobe Bryant, his daughter Gianna, and seven others. Friends, fans, family, and peers have come together to pay tribute to the Lakers legend who is gone far too soon.
Kobe’s leap from high school to the NBA was still something of a rarity at the time, but those who were lucky enough to witness him put his enormous talents on display in the lead-up to the 1996 NBA Draft were left in awe by what they saw. Now, a brief but compelling piece of video evidence has finally emerged showing Kobe doing the Mikan drill.
On first glance, it might not look that impressive. But the rigorous physical demands required to jump that high and that quickly for a solid minute is much harder than seems on the surface and speaks directly to both his otherworldly athleticism at such a young age and, perhaps more important, his competitive nature.
Just ask Rex Kalamian, the Lakers video coordinator at the time, who called it “probably the most athletic Mikan drill you’re ever going to see,” via the LA Times. Kalamian had the wherewithal to preserve a good chunk of the VHS tape of Kobe’s workout instead of recording over it, as was standard practice.
There is apparently more than an hour of footage remaining that has yet to be released, and we can only hope we’ll eventually get to see more of it, as we continue to honor Kobe’s memory in whatever way we can.
Grammy-nominated singer Andra Day is less than a month away from making her acting debut in Hulu’s forthcoming feature The United States vs. Billie Holiday. Of course, no story of Holiday’s life is complete without paying tribute her thought-provoking music. Previewing the film’s soundtrack, Day now shares her powerful original song “Tigress & Tweed.”
Over vintage-sounding piano keys, Day showcases her evocative voice while proving she was the perfect choice to portray the iconic singer in the biopic. Throughout the lyrics, Day touches on Holiday’s venerable protest song “Strange Fruit.”
Speaking about the songwriting process, Day said she hopes the song gives listeners strength:
“If Billie Holiday were with us now, I believe she’d want to see ‘Strange Fruit’ evolved. If ‘Strange Fruit’ was a call to awareness, ‘Tigress & Tweed’ is a call to action because she laid the groundwork. Raphael Saadiq sent the perfect track and the lyrics finally came to me like a flood after a prayer one day. I hope people are strengthened by Truth and Love when they hear it.”
Listen to Day’s “Tigress & Tweed” above and watch The United States vs. Billie Holiday trailer below.
The United States vs. Billie Holiday premieres 2/26 on Hulu.
Andra Day is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
The Indiana Pacers announced a major bit of news on Tuesday afternoon involving the health and well-being of recently-acquired wing Caris LeVert. After previously revealing that a mass was identified on LeVert’s left kidney during a routine physical following his trade as part of the gigantic deal that sent James Harden to Brooklyn, the Pacers announced that LeVert underwent surgery to treat renal cell carcinoma, a form of kidney cancer.
Thankfully, LeVert — who had credited the trade for unveiling this, saying “I was 100% healthy so in a way this trade definitely showed and revealed what was going on in my body.” — is expected to make a full recovery, per the team.
“Caris LeVert underwent successful surgery on Monday to treat renal cell carcinoma of his left kidney,” the Pacers said in a statement. “The surgery was performed by Dr. Jason Sprunger at Community North Hospital in Indianapolis, Ind. No further treatment is needed. Caris is expected to make a full recovery and will be out indefinitely. Further updates will be provided as needed.”
LeVert making his debut for the Pacers, whenever that may end up being, is obviously second to the fact that this was identified and treated as soon as possible. This is a scary thing for anyone to have to deal with, particularly due to the fact that it came from out of left field, and hopefully LeVert is back to being 100 percent as soon as possible.
It seems surreal that Tuesday is the one-year anniversary of Kobe Bryant’s passing. Of course, it still feels surreal that Bryant is gone after a helicopter crash that also took his daughter, Gianna, and seven others, but for many in the basketball world, Tuesday offered up the opportunity to look back on Bryant’s life and tenure in and around the NBA.
A number of individuals, whether they be current and former players and coaches or larger institutions, took to their Twitter accounts to offer up a kind word to Bryant and the rest of those who passed away.
On this day, one year later, we want to remember not only Kobe but Gianna Bryant, John Altobelli, Keri Altobelli, Alyssa Altobelli, Christina Mauser, Sarah Chester, Payton Chester, and Ara Zobayan.
We all miss the Great Kobe Bryant and his legacy will continue to live within all of us, but also make sure we Pray for Vanessa and her family and all the families that lost love ones on this day last year.
In an interview with TMZ, one of Bryant’s former coaches, Byron Scott, discussed the importance No. 24 had in his life, to the point that he finds himself thinking about who he calls an “unbelievable person” on a daily basis.
“There’s two people that passed away in my life,” Scott said. “My mom, who I think about all the time, and ‘Showboat.’ I think about him every day. It’s something about him that, in my life, every day something brings me back to a memory of KB.”
The Lakers, unsurprisingly, offered up a tribute, too, calling both Kobe and Gianna “family,” a sentiment that the NBA shared.
Honoring both Bryants was also done by another team for which Kobe suited up, USA Basketball, and by another one of the many residents of the Staples Center, the L.A. Sparks.
UConn women’s basketball decided to remember Gianna, a well-documented Huskies fan who had ambitions of suiting up for Geno Auriemma’s program some day.
Gigi wrote this to the team after the Final Four loss in 2017. We remember her positive, shining energy.
She loved being around the Huskies, and we loved being around her.
It seems certain that Tuesday will feature dozens more tributes to Bryant as the day goes on, both on social media and during the three games that the league has on its schedule this evening. Then again, it’s hard to watch or follow basketball without seeing someone pay tribute to Bryant in some form or fashion.
Jamal Crawford (@JCrossover) 
Kobe 
