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Without dropping an album — well, not yet at least — in 2020, Travis Scott has put up a strong year so far. Some of it is in thanks to tracks with the likes of Future (“Solitaires“), Nav (“Turks“), Kanye West (“Wash Us In The Blood“), and more. However, his best moments have come outside of the traditional music world with his Forntite and McDonald’s collabs serving as his highlights of the year. Returning with more music for loyal fans, the Houston rapper calls on Young Thug and MIA for his new single, “Franchise.”

For fans who are in the loop on all things Travis, they song may recognize it as “White Tee,” a track Travis and Chase B premiered on a recent episode of .Wav Radio. Supplied with a music video, the visual begins with some recognizable scenes from Michael Jordan’s The Last Dance documentary before shifting its focus to Travis who is found doing some pushups, playing golf, and showing off some Cacti products. Next, Young Thug joins the Houston rapper for a game of poker and a bunch of other wacky things including residing on the top of floating car before MIA appears in the middle of nowhere surrounded by a herd of sheep to complete her verse.

The song has been teased alongside a short film of the same title, which Travis Scott revealed will released together with Christopher Nolan’s Tenet film on September 25. The short film will serve as a music video of sorts for Travis’ new song which finds him and Young Thug reconnecting once again. In addition to collaborations like “Pick Up The Phone,” “Maria, I’m Drunk,” and “The London,” Travis’ and Thug’s new song arrives after the two connected at the top of the year to through a wild party — pre-quarantine of course — in their “Out West” video from Cactus Jack’s Jackboys compilation project.

In other news, Travis recently dropped the third release of merchandise as a part of his collab with McDonald’s. The release included cups, rugs, and tote bags. It was released after the popularity of the Travis Scott Meal forced the fast-food chain to make the meal available exclusively through the the McDonald’s app.

Hit play on “Franchise” in the video above.

Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Swae Lee is hard at work on his upcoming album, one that the Rae Sremmurd member has been promoting for much of the year. The upcoming release is currently preceded by a pair of singles, “Reality Check” and “Someone Said,” but now Swae Lee has returned with a third single. Letting his auto-tuned vocals lead the way once again, he returns with “Dance Like No One’s Watching.” Looking for a carefree partner while pushing the memory of an old flame out of his mind, Swae seeks a night where he and his partner worry about nothing else but the room they reside in.

The song comes after he dropped “Reality Check” back in May. In conjunction with the new single, the Rae Sremmurd rapper launched an Only Fans which he used to promote the single. Prior to that, Swae shared his “Someone Said” single, one that showed off his darker side and came attached with a video inspired by informercials. Aside from other loose releases from this year that include “Back To Back Maybach” and a remix of Arizona Zervas’ breakout hit “Roxanne,” Swae Lee has lent his voice to a pair of tracks this year which includes Internet Money’s “Thrusting” with Future and Kane Brown’s “Be Like That” with Khalid.

Listen “Dance Like No One’s Watching” in the video above.

Reason has been preparing to drop his second album under Top Dawg Entertainment since the stop of the year. The Del Amo rapper first kicked things off with “Show Stop” before he returned with “Trapped In” alongside Boogie and fellow Del Amo native Ab-Soul. The releases would continue to pour in from Reason with songs like “Might Not Make It” and “Pop Sh*t,” before he fell quiet for a few months. Ready to get things going again, Reason is back with a notable West Coast rapper for his second single of the week.

Calling on Vince Staples for their first ever collaboration, the two California-bred artists bring some West Coast flavor on “Sauce.” The track is dark and eerie and finds Reason and Vince flaunting the “sauce” they hold within, one that is also undeniable to others. “New whip sh*t crawl like insects,” Reason brags on the new song while Vince speaks on his cash flow. “We be stackin’ fetti,” he says. “I don’t ever wanna be a broke boy no more.”

While Reason has been fairly busy this year, Vince Staples on the the other hand has resorted to staying low, something the “Norf Norf” rapper is known for in his career. The rapper’s lone release in 2020 comes on Amine’s Limbo album where he appears on “Pressure In My Palms.” Other than that, Vince has spent most of the year trolling fans, voice his interest in being a Snowfall extra, and telling hip-hop fans where the best rappers are from.

You can hear “Sauce” in the video above.

Polo G has grown to be one of hip-hop’s strongest newcomers. After stepping into the light with his 2019 debut project, Die A Legend, the Chicago native soaked in the limelight and shined brighter than ever with his second project, The Goat. The young rapper beautifully depicted his trauma and impressed with his ability to create cohesive bodies of work. After a slew of videos follow his sophomore project, which include “21,” “Martin & Gina, ” and “3 Headed Goat,” Polo G shares his first solo release since The Goat with “Epidemic.”

The new single is driven by a fluttering piano and a hard-knocking bass that finds Polo G presenting a different kind of epidemic, one that recalls some of the things he witnessed in his youth and come up. Presenting it as a widespread issue, Polo G raps, “Might catch him at the red light, tryna load his blick / Everyday a gamble with your life, all we know is risk.” He adds, “From the windy city where you’re down to see the coldest sh*t.”

The song arrives after Polo G made his late-night TV debut by performing “Martin & Gina” on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. He was also included in this year’s XXL 2020 Freshman Class list alongside popular newcomers like Baby Keem, Jack Harlow, Chika, and more.

Press play on “Epidemic” in the video above.

The Los Angeles Lakers took a commanding 3-1 lead in the Western Conference Finals on Thursday evening. LeBron James led the way with 26 points, nine rebounds and eight assists, with Anthony Davis adding an efficient 34 points in what became a 114-108 victory over the Denver Nuggets.

Though the Lakers are in a favorable position, there is much to discuss with what has been an intriguing series. To that end, here are three takeaways from Game 4.

1. The first quarter was pivotal for the Lakers

Game 4 featured notable runs on both sides, with the Nuggets refusing to fade even as the Lakers throughout the night. Los Angeles did plenty in the latter stages of the contest to secure the victory but, in truth, it was the first quarter that might have sealed Denver’s fate.

Out of the gate, Anthony Davis had it going, scoring the first 10 points of the night for Los Angeles without missing a shot.

Davis made his first seven shots overall, including six in the first quarter alone, and he did a lot of damage with 14 points in the period. Elsewhere, the Lakers made massive gains in the possession battle, particularly on the offensive glass. Defensive rebounding was a problem for Denver throughout the night, but it was pointed in the first quarter, with the Lakers grabbing five offensive rebounds and generating a whopping 12 second-chance points.

Dwight Howard was huge for Los Angeles in that regard, grabbing four offensive rebounds on his own, and the veteran center scored eight points and snatched eight overall rebounds in the opening quarter. The choice to insert Howard into the starting lineup worked through that lens, and the Lakers issued only one turnover (to three for the Nuggets) in the quarter.

All told, the Lakers were able to take six more shots (and two more free throws) than the Nuggets in the first quarter, and that was enormous. In fact, Denver shot the ball beautifully, converting 65 percent of their attempts in the quarter, but it simply wasn’t enough because of the way the Lakers dominated in other areas.

2. Jamal Murray continues to be out of his mind

While it ultimately came in a losing effort, Murray was masterful. Though the Lakers owned the first quarter and led by as many as 10 points, Murray started hot in his own right, scoring 12 points on 6-of-7 shooting.

Los Angeles maintained their lead throughout the second quarter, but the Nuggets made another push late in the half, headlined by one of the more amazing finishes you’ll ever see.

The shotmaking exhibition continued for Murray, with another circus display after halftime that wasn’t fully digestible without a view from multiple angles.

Murray entered the night averaging 26.6 points and 6.5 assists per game in the playoffs, up notably from his pre-bubble averages. That comes with a ludicrous 47.7 percent clip from three-point range, which is unsustainable for any human. Murray finally cooled from beyond the arc on this night, going 0-of-3 from three-point distance, but he still managed to score an uber-efficient 32 points on 20 field goal attempts, going 12-of-17 on two-point attempts and a perfect 8-of-8 from the free throw line.

While the shotmaking was certainly the headliner for Murray, both in this game and throughout Denver’s playoff run, his passing has also seen an uptick. That showed up with eight impressive assists in this spot and, even on a night when the Lakers increased their series lead, Murray further cemented his new standing as a star-level performer on the league’s biggest stage.

3. The Nuggets aren’t dead yet

After back-to-back comebacks from 3-1 deficits, the jokes write themselves with regard to the Nuggets. Many on the internet have already insisted that Denver has Los Angeles “right where they want them” after a Game 4 loss and, while that specifically isn’t accurate, the Nuggets do have reason for optimism.

As noted above, this game essentially swung on the first quarter and, beyond that, the Nuggets were simply unable to secure defensive rebounds. Denver was outscored by 19 points in the second-chance department, and the Lakers generated 35 free throws with aggressive play and a few choice whistles. The broader story, though, is that Denver has been right there for three consecutive games, while only picking up one victory.

Mike Malone has his team bought in at a high level, with guys playing above their heads on both ends. Murray and Jokic are starring offensively while playing the best defense of their respective careers — although Jokic had one of his worst games of the playoffs in Game 4 — and the duo of Jerami Grant and Monte Morris has also stepped up when it counts.

It doesn’t need to be said that the Lakers are now substantial favorites to advance, and there is no way around that. The Nuggets have shown repeatedly that they have no intention of simply fading away, however, and Denver has the star power and recent high-level experience to steal a win in Game 5 and make things interesting again.

As if you didn’t have your fill of unexpected headlines in 2020, we now have the Doobie Brothers and Bill Murray in a legal battle to get us over the top. Bill Murray’s golf clothing company is officially in a legal fight with a lawyer representing the Doobie Brothers over the use of a song, Listen To The Music, in an ad for the company’s clothing.

According to The New York Times, Peter T. Paterno, an attorney for the band, is seeking payment for use of the song while advertising a polo shirt for William Murray Golf. And he even brought up Donald Trump’s infamous unauthorized use of songs in the letter he reportedly sent Murray.

On behalf of the Doobie Brothers, Mr. Paterno accused Mr. Murray of using the song “Listen to the Music,” an upbeat call for world peace that peaked at No. 11 on the Billboard chart in 1972, in an ad for a $50 polo called Zero Hucks Given.

The lawyer also said William Murray had used songs owned by other clients without permission. “It seems like the only person who uses our clients’ music without permission more than you do is Donald Trump,” Mr. Paterno wrote.

The lawyer, a music industry veteran who has taken on Joe Walsh and others on behalf of clients for using music without approval, wrote a fairly pithy filing that also called the shirts “ugly” and cited that as reason the band started the complaint in the first place.

“We’d almost be OK with it if the shirts weren’t so damn ugly,” the lawyer, Peter T. Paterno, wrote in a letter sent to Mr. Murray on Wednesday.

The letter contains a number of jokes and references to Murray’s career, which you can read in full below.

It’s unclear what will happen next with the lawsuit, but it certainly got some attention on Thursday.

Aaron Sorkin’s new Netflix movie, The Trial of the Chicago 7, doesn’t hit the streaming service until next month, but the reviews are in and there’s plenty of hype around the film. The director and playwright certainly keeps an eye on politics, which is why he’s already scripting out the real-life election night that may unfold in November.

Sorkin, who is certainly used to writing what fictional presidents do on The West Wing, revealed he has an ideal script in mind for what happens on election night in November. Though there’s plenty of uncertainty about what will happen with the election result itself, with vote by mail campaigns happening in many states and various issues with the USPS. There’s also Donald Trump’s recent comments about whether he will accept an election result and cede power if he loses to Joe Biden. But Sorkin has an idea, even if it may be as unrealistic as some thing that happened on his TV show about America’s political system.

As Variety shared in an interview with Sorkin, from the Conversations section of the Basque festival’s industry program, Sorkin talked about Chicago 7 and his take on the current political landscape, Sorkin already knows how he’d deal with Trump losing the election if he were writing it.

Sorkin, whose films often deal with the ethics of power, ended the conversation by revealing how he would write election night, 2020. “Trump does what we all assume he will do, which is not concede defeat, claiming the election’s rigged and the Democrats cheated. For the first time, his Republican enablers march up to the White House and say Donald it’s time to go. I would write the ending where everyone does the right thing. I don’t think Trump will do the right thing, except by accident.”

In a year like this, it’s tough to assume that anyone will do the right thing. But Sorkin’s political writings have not always been about what politics are actually like as much as they are an idealistic look at what they should be. If Trump truly isn’t willing to accept an election result that doesn’t go in his favor, things could get a lot more complicated than the script Sorkin has in mind. But sometimes it’s nice to just play pretend for a bit.

[via Variety]

Demi Lovato and Max Ehrich first began their relationship back in March, as Lovato revealed in a six-month anniversary post earlier this month. While things were looking good for the Hollywood couple, People has reported that Lovato and Ehrich have called off their engagement after two months.

“It was a tough decision, but Demi and Max have decided to go their separate ways to focus on their respective careers,” a source told the magazine. “They have respect and love for one another and will always cherish the time they spent together.”

Lovato and Ehrich got engaged back on July 22 in Malibu. The two had both been quite public with their relationship, as they made their first public appearance together with their cameos in Justin Bieber and Ariana Grande’s “Stuck With U” video. Less than two months after their engagement, Lovato previously explained how quarantine made her relationship with Ehrich strong while accelerating its progress on The Morning Mash Up on SiriusXM Hits 1.

“We were able to share this time together that we wouldn’t have normally gotten to spend,” she said. “And that accelerated our relationship on a level that you can’t really explain to people, but quarantine either makes or breaks the deal. And it really made that. So I’m really blessed, really fortunate and continuing to count my blessings every day.”

The announcement comes after Lovato and Marshmello dropped their “OK To Not Be OK” collaboration on World Suicide Prevention Day.

After a sluggish start to Game 3 allowed the Nuggets to take command early and hold on for a win to make it a 2-1 series, it was the Lakers turn to come out on fire in Game 4. However, despite taking an early double-digit lead, Denver, as they’ve shown all postseason just kept pushing forward and made it just a 60-55 Laker lead at halftime.

Leading the way for the Nuggets was Jamal Murray, who had 16 points in the first half and was the catalyst for a run that pulled Denver within range in the second quarter. While his shooting has been the story for much of the playoffs, his finishing at the rim can get a bit lost in how diverse his scoring ability is. Late in the second quarter, he made sure everyone knew exactly how good he is at the basket when he hit a hand-changing, swooping layup around LeBron James that left the TNT announce booth speechless.

It’s a sensational move, to steal Marv Albert’s line from Michael Jordan’s infamous layup against the Lakers in the 1991 Finals, and Murray’s is honestly a more difficult layup given the contest from James and the help side defender coming in Dwight Howard. His move got rave reviews from his fellow players, with plenty offering the MJ comparison.

Some pointed out it was closer to a different Jordan layup.

It won’t be as iconic, certainly, although it will run on highlight reels forever if Murray and the Nuggets somehow come back to beat the Lakers and make the Finals, but it was yet another star-making moment for a young guard who’s had a number of those this postseason.

Bestselling novelist Gillian Flynn takes her readers to the darkest, yet most (guiltily) invigorating places with tales of female antiheroes, and her work’s appeal couldn’t be more evident than Hollywood’s eagerness to adapt her novels thus far. From the David Fincher-directed Gone Girl to HBO’s Emmy-nominated Sharp Edges and the Charlize Theron-starring Dark Places, all three projects proved that Flynn’s got an enduring place in pop culture. She comes by it honestly, given her decade-long run as an Entertainment Weekly writer and her film-professor father, so the transition from novelist to scribe for Steve McQueen’s female heist movie, Widows, felt organic. Now, she’s showrunning (and writing) a U.S. remake of the U.K.-born Utopia series for Amazon.

Utopia is a strange beast. On its face, the story follows a conspiracy about two graphic novels that supposedly predict outbreaks of deadly diseases, including a pandemic that may or may not have something to do with John Cusack’s scientist character. Below the surface, a gaggle of comic-book junkies attempt to unravel the conspiracy and save the world while homicidal parties will do anything to nab the graphic novels. And in the middle of it all is a young woman who calls herself “Jessica Hyde” (Sasha Lane), which happens to be the name of a character inside the graphic novels.

Yes, it’s confusing, but the set up is meant to draw readers into what’s essentially a conspiracy thriller that just happens to include details of a pandemic. Flynn didn’t plan for the show to arrive in the middle of an actual pandemic, but here we are, and she was gracious enough to dig into the depths of her own fandom while discussing Utopia.

You used to be a TV critic for Entertainment Weekly, and now you’re writing and showrunning TV. Does your previous experience inform your screenwriting process?

It definitely does. I think it makes me very disciplined as a writer because, being on the other side, it doesn’t let me say, “Oh, this is good enough.” I tend to rewrite and rewrite, and I know that the ultimate result may not please everyone, but at least if I, as the writer, can get to a point where I’m satisfied with it, then I feel like I can make peace with it. It also helped me to spend all those years looking at TV and having it become organic, in a way, in my system, and spending time figuring it out.

Distilling a season of The Wire into the EW-length reviews ain’t easy, I imagine.

Yeah, not easy! And t’s easy to figure out why a show is really great, and it’s easy to figure out why a show is really bad, but for me, the most useful thing was figuring out if a show doesn’t quite click. When it’s so close, but it doesn’t quite work, and trying to figure out that puzzle. So, it helped me to look at whether each [Utopia] episode worked and then, as a whole, to really be able to view it that way.

With Utopia, you obviously gestated and filmed the whole season before our current situation. It wasn’t intended to be timely, but how do you think that will affect how people watch it?

That’s a great question as far as how it affects people on how they will watch it. I think it’s a show that was never intended to be a pandemic show in that it’s not a medical procedural or trying to be Outbreak. To me, at its core, it’s a conspiracy thriller and a paranoia thriller, and this is one of the plotlines, so it’s certainly intended to be viewed in that way.

John Cusack’s character, Dr. Christie, does not appear in the U.K. version of the show. You added him, and well, he feels very Elon Musk-y…

Yeah. [Laughs]

What kind of vibe did you want him to carry?

Kind-of exactly that. He was a character that I created, and I thought if we’re talking about pandemics and vaccines, I wanted this biotech/pharmaceutical giant as one element of it. John and I had a lot of conversations about that idea of the scientist or tech genius as rock stars. We know what Bill Gates looks like, or Elon Musk, and that idea of genius combined with media savvy, which definitely to me is his character at its core.

Christie has that wild line, too: “What have you done today to earn your place in this crowded world?”

That was something that, yeah, I wrote that line, and that was when I figured I had Christie. If everything kind-of emanates from that, and it can go from, depending on who’s saying it and from what circumstances, it can go from very heartwarming, this kind-of litany at the dinner table when we first see him. Everything from when his kids are like, “I shared my lunch! I biked to school!” to much darker implications, depending on who’s hearing it and who’s saying it.

You are known for your antiheroines, and you’ve described how you wrote the infamous Cool Girl passage of Gone Girl in a “fugue state.” You climb inside your creations’ heads. When a character like Jessica Hyde already exists, like in the U.K. Utopia, how do you go about making her your own?

You know, Dennis Kelly had created this great character, and I liked the idea that she was this sort-of wild warrior child, in a way. And to me, having been steeped in all sorts of hero stories growing up and loving those, that type of quest, I was playing with that idea but using an antihero to carry it forward. To me, she’s the person who asks those existential questions that we all ask, like, “Why am I here? What am I supposed to do? What is my purpose?” You hear characters say that a lot in the show. But being led by an antihero and someone that you can’t necessarily trust and wouldn’t trust with your safety.

And she’s out there, just claiming to be Jessica Hyde. I’d be skeptical, too!

Certainly, our core group of nerdlings need her but also know that she could, on a bad day, sharpen a toothbrush and stab them through the heart. I liked being able to play that, and I love antiheroines because I just don’t think that there enough of them. I’ve always loved books and movies when you have those divided loyalties, like at the end of Silence of the Lambs when you see Hannibal Lecter escaping and moving off into the crowds. You’re sort-of delighted about it and thinking, “Wait, I’m rooting for Hannibal, who I’ve seen do horrible things.” As an audience member, I’ve always loved that feeling of being unsettled in where your loyalties are.

You mentioned the term “nerdlings,” so what does Utopia say about that kind of pop-culture fandom?

I’m the ultimate fan. Obviously, I spent ten years at EW, and what I loved most about it is that most of my friends are still fellow writers that I came up with. I’ve always had a great love for people who just love their shit. Whatever it is, whether it’s someone who loves the same thing I love, or someone who is really into putting together model train sets. I appreciate people who get glee from things and get really into things. My dad was a film professor who also made his living as a comic book collector, so that’s what we did on the weekends. We’d go hustle the flea markets for certain issues, and it was a treasure hunt, and also going to conventions. I’m one of those people that loves to dress up and to really get into that. I go to Comic-Con and am a huge renaissance festival person with my full outfit. It’s that playing-make-believe element that I really enjoy. I like people who want to talk about what they love.

I am always curious about people who collect comics, and whether they prefer the single issues or graphic novels. If you went and hunted single issues, then there’s a chance you may have even been bagging them up all nicely in plastic?

Oddly enough, having spent my childhood watching comics being bagged up and not being able to touch them, I’m actually kind-of a dash of the opposite. Part of me knows now to open the package of the toy and to preserve everything, but the other part of me? I really like to play with the thing and have it. So I’m the opposite. I will admit to buying one version of a thing to keep it nice and another version because I want to use it.

It’s about time to say goodbye, and we haven’t even talked about conspiracies. Are there any that you secretly, or even jokingly, embrace?

Things that I want to believe in, certainly. My daughter and I have a very elaborate mythology about fairies that we spend hours creating, and my son’s into D&D, and we role play that around the house. That fantasy element is something that I always really want to believe in. But as far as the conspiracies go, to me, it was just a really good time to do a conspiracy thriller. I took my cues from all those amazing, post-Watergate conspiracy thrillers. Like Parallax View, and when I was pitching this, I called it a cross between Marathon Man meets Goonies, which I felt was pretty correct. And I think now we’re in a time period when conspiracies are so rife, and you can stay — through social media and your news feeds — you can go in and stay in a rabbit hole. I thought it was an important time and a resonant time to look at what that does to us as a society.

Amazon Prime’s ‘Utopia’ streams on September 25.