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Craft beer has never been bigger. Even in the current climate, it remains fairly strong as many of us look for an escape from, well, everything. The craft beer industry has been around long enough now that there are true classics on the shelf that are fairly easy to find nationwide. But what is the best craft beer to drink if you’re looking to move away from the macro brands? That’s a tougher question to answer.

Craft beer is a very wide net to cast. There’s a lot going on from the classic West Coast IPAs from yesteryear to the tart sours of the 2020s. It really comes down to what you dig. But, we’d also argue that it’s worth expanding your knowledge and palate with new things. So, maybe the best beer for you is one you haven’t even tried yet.

To figure out the best craft beers that people like to drink, we popped over to Ranker. The masses spoke and voted and a top ten list of craft beers emerged. Interestingly, most of these beers are throwbacks to the halcyon days of microbrewing.

10. Pliny the Elder

Style: Imperial IPA
ABV: 8%
Brewery: Russian River Brewing Company, Santa Rosa, CA

The Beer:

It doesn’t get much more classic than this West Coast IPA. The brew is hopped with a matrix of Amarillo, Centennial, CTZ, and Simcoe hops next to a fine malt. The result is the king of hoppy beers that’s surprisingly not higher on this list.

Tasting Notes:

Floral hops with a pine resin funk greet you. Notes of citrus cut through the resin dank as the florals support the light, bready malty underbelly. This is as dialed in as it gets.

9. A Little Sumpin’ Sumpin’

Style: American IPA
ABV: 7.5%
Brewery: Lagunitas Brewing Company, Petaluma, CA

The Beer:

This Californian standard is brewed with half malted barley and half malted wheat. The brew is then hopped with (takes a deep breath) Willamette, Santiam, Amarillo, Cascade, Centennial, Chinook, and Columbus hops. The addition of wheat gives the beer a velvety texture that edges it towards a hefeweizen while still sitting squarely in IPA territory.

Tasting Notes:

Hops, hops, hops. There’s a grassy nature with plenty of that West Coast pine resin dankness. The sip then veers into sunny California beaches with a nice and subtle citrus nature with pleasant florals. The beer ends dry and full of that resinous dank.

8. Grapefruit Sculpin IPA

Style: American IPA
ABV: 7%
Brewery: Ballast Point Brewing Company, San Diego, CA

The Beer:

This beer was a revelation when it dropped back in the day. The addition of actual grapefruit to an already fruity hopped beer added depth and accessibility to the often overwrought style.

Tasting Notes:

This is a fruit bomb in a bottle with tropical fruits, peaches, and citrus present throughout. The grapefruit is ever-present with a very distinct hint of saline. The beer ends with a rush of all that fruit, making it one of the most thirst-quenching beers on this list.

7. Boston Lager

Style: Vienna Lager
ABV: 5%
Brewery: Boston Beer Company, Jamaica Plain, MA

The Beer:

This is (kind of) the original craft beer. The brew is a simple blend of water, German hops, American barley, and Samuel Adam’s own lager yeast. The rest, as they say, is history.

Tasting Notes:

The ultimate airport beer opens with a clear hit of caramel malts next to grassy hops. The hops are an accent to the underlying maltiness and balance well. The end of the sip is dry and short but always draws you back for more.

6. Goose IPA

Style: English IPA
ABV: 5.9%
Brewery: Goose Island Beer Co., Chicago, IL

The Beer:

This Chicago IPA was brewed with the origins of IPA in mind. Back in the day, the English used to overly hop their ales for transport to, you guessed it, India. The India Pale Ale was born. The difference with the modern version, however, is that there’s very little time between brewing and quaffing IPAs, so the hoppiness has no time to fade as it would back in the days of old.

Tasting Notes:

Earthy and resinous hops mingle with big notes of tropical fruits that lean more sweet than fresh. Those big notes of citrus fruits lead the way as the bready malts remain buried under the hoppiness. A note of bitterness arrives late on the refreshing and dry finish.

5. Arrogant Bastard Ale

Style: American Strong Ale
ABV: 7.2%
Brewery: Stone Brewing, Escondido, CA

The Beer:

The Arrogant Consortia, an offshoot of Stone Brewing, has been brewing this bombastic ale since the late 1990s. It’s well-hopped and helped define the San Diego craft beer scene.

Tasting Notes:

You can almost smell the pine dank before you crack one of these open and that’s the point. There’s a toffee-esque sweetness to the malts that just balances all the dank, bitterness, and citrus of this West Coast classic.

4. Sierra Nevada Stout

Style: American Stout
ABV: 5.8%
Brewery: Sierra Nevada Brewing Co., Chico, CA

The Beer:

It’s great to see Sierra Nevada’s Stout on this list and in the top five. This was the first beer they brewed all the way back in 1980. It’s one of the better stouts you can find in the U.S. to this day, making it the progenitor of decades of imitation.

Tasting Notes:

Roasted and bitter malts greet you with a sense of damn-near burnt espresso beans. The bitterness barely wanes as the hints of black licorice mingle with cacao nibs and velvety maltiness. The brew ends with a lingering sense of a full-bodied beer with serious depth (and milky chocolate).

3. Stone IPA

Style: American IPA
ABV: 6.9%
Brewery: Stone Brewing, Escondido, CA

The Beer:

This San Diego IPA is part of the reason IPAs are still brewed by pretty much every craft brewer, homebrewer, and macro brewer these days. Though there were plenty of other IPAs already hopping up the microbrewing scene for years before this one dropped in 1997, it definitely harkened in a new phase of craft brewing to the country. It’s also a solid example of the style that’s, thankfully, not overdone.

Tasting Notes:

This is the West Coast in a can. There’s a nice mix of pine dank next to sweet citrus juices. The juice leans more orange than anything else as the malts peek in with an almost sourdough crustiness. The bitterness from the hops is unavoidable through the juicy end of this beer.

2. Lagunitas IPA

Style: American IPA
ABV: 6.2%
Brewery: Lagunitas Brewing Company, Petaluma, CA

The Beer:

This is another great example of the ol’ West Coast IPA that helped bring the style to worldwide domination. This brew is crafted to balance loads of hops with a clean maltiness, making this a very crushable brew to have stocked in your fridge.

Tasting Notes:

The woodiness of the hops leans away from pine and into cedar territory with a citrus counterpoint. That citrus is more bitter grapefruit pith as the fruitiness gets a little peachy. The malts hold onto a caramelized sweetness with a bready edge that’s very under the radar. The sip ends with all that resin and fruit as the star of the show.

1. 90 Minute IPA

Style: Imperial IPA
ABV: 9%
Brewery: Dogfish Head Craft Brewery, Milton, DE

The Beer:

And then there’s Dogfish Head, another powerhouse of the 90’s craft beer evolution. This beer is named after the fact that it’s hopped for 90 straight minutes, adding some serious hoppiness to the malty foundation.

Tasting Notes:

Pine, orange rind, and malty bread mingle on the nose. Toffee sweetness creates a base on which florals flourish and mix with bright citrus and grassy dankness. The sip ends briskly with plenty of juice, resin, and subtle sweetness.

Hip-hop is moving as fast as ever. Luckily, we’re doing the work to put the best music in one place for you. This week, there were videos from Big Sean and Jhene Aiko, Bobby Sessions, DaBaby and Quavo, Kaash Paige, Gunna and Lil Baby, Tobi Lou, RMR and Westside Gunn, as well as Buddy and Tinashe. Along with his Aiko collaboration, Big Sean released a solo video, and there was also a single from Mozzy, Here’s the best of the rest:

Big Havi — “Vibez’n” Feat. Lil Keed

Big Havi tears through an atmospheric production “Vibez’n,” where he’s “on some rich sh*t” alongside Lil Keed’s soaring, autotune-infused presence.

D Flowers — “She Fleek”

Houston’s D Flowers is “sittin in the trap on a beanbag” on “She Fleek,” a smooth track where he delves into a melodic flow and rhymes that his friend “just took a leg shot / now I gotta go buy him some ‘Red Bottoms.’”

Elzhi — “Jason”

Elzhi is one of the first artists on our list of anticipated albums to announce a project. The inspiringly-titled — though technically incorrect — Seven Times Down Eight Times Up is coming September 25th. We got a taste of what to expect with “Jason,” where he delves into layered lyrics like “before my life became the most splendid / I was in a haunted house, plottin’ on the mansion with the ghost in it.”

Grafh — “Killing Kings” Feat. Mysonne, Sly Piper & Ray Emmanuel

Grafh gets with a couple of other artists to speak to the times on “Killing Kings,” where they lament the scourge of police brutality as well as gun violence which stems from poverty. The track is from Grafh’s Good Energy project, which is coming September 18th.

H!ghr Music — H!ghr: Red Tape

Korean-American artist Jay Park’s H!ghr Music collective released their debut compilation project — and it’s such a grand introduction that they’ll be making it twice. The first half of the project is Red Tape, which was released earlier this week. The project features Park alongside prominent Asian hip-hop artists like Sik-K, pH-1, Woodie Gochild, Golden, and more. The other half of The New Chapter, entitled Blue Tape, will be dropping on September 16th.

Joyner Lucas — “Fall Slowly” Feat. Ashanti

Joyner Lucas gave us a change of pace with the lovelorn “Fall Slowly,” where he rhymes about his passion for romance over a delicate, sample-based instrumental. The song is paired with a romantic video where he and Ashanti play a loving couple.

Marshmello & 42 Dugg — “Baggin’

It’s an unlikely but impressive pairing on “Baggin’,” where Detroit’s 42 Dugg offers up a gruff portrait of his hometown over producer Marshmellio’s haunting piano melody.

Money Mu —”Eat” Remix Feat. Lil Durk

Money Mu linked up with Lil Durk, one of the artists of the moment, for the remix to his buzzing “Eat” track. The two track turns rhyming about the everlasting grind over an eerie piano melody.

NoCap — “Mistake”

On “Mistake,” NoCap affirms that, “this how I live I ain’t takin’ no pictures I ain’t gotta keep up with images” over moody 808-based production.

Valee — “Rice”

Valee’s whispery delivery slithers through a quaking Kiltkarter-production on “Rice,” the Chicago rhymer’s latest delivery.

The Toronto Raptors were on the receiving end of a miracle on Thursday evening. With the team down by two with half a second left and a 3-0 series deficit to the Boston Celtics staring them in the face, Kyle Lowry lofted a pass over Tacko Fall to the other side of the court, where OG Anunoby was wide open. Anunoby got off a clean shot, it went in, and suddenly, the defending champs found themselves right back in the series.

It wasn’t quite miraculous, but it was really, really close. What was miraculous was how Lowry stayed in the game at all, as dude accidentally took a knee directly where the sun don’t shine from Celtics guard Brad Wanamaker. You can probably tell how that went by the picture at the top of this post.

Still, Lowry played all but 91 seconds on Thursday night and, somehow, did not come out of the game after that. Following the game, Lowry was asked about the incident and spelled it out in the most Kyle Lowry way possible.

Lowry had himself one heck of a game against Boston — he led the Raptors in scoring (31 points on 13-for-23 shooting) and assists (eight) while hauling in six rebounds and somehow seeing Anunoby despite a guy who is, in his words, 7’12 on him. Despite that, the fact that he was able to withstand that is something else.

It’s the first Friday of the month, which means one thing in the indie music world: Bandcamp Friday. The artist-friendly service has been waiving their fees once a month to help its base of independent artists make money during a time when the worldwide quarantine is affecting everyone’s bottomline. They grossed $4.3 million in sales on the first Bandcamp Friday, which helped an untold amount of artists. We’ve put together indie rap roundups before, but this one is even more sprawling. Here’s a look at 20 songs and projects you should consider supporting this Bandcamp day, from melodic, genre-bending artists to straight up lyrical exercises:

Cambatta — “Kovid 24”

Cambatta is one of the most lyrically and conceptually ambitious MCs out there. “Kovid 24” is, as his Bandcamp description expresses, a 10-minute “lyrical stemutation” over a The Heretic production that sounds like the theme to an apocalyptic fever dream.

Chris Cassius — 6 Tape Vol. 1.5

Baltimore’s Chris Cassius’ versatility is displayed throughout his 6 Tape Vol. 1.5 project. On the intro track “Baby Steps,” he, Scotty Banx, and Mama 6 rhyme about the travails of mere survival in the hood, with the striking observation that “the beauty of a baby takin’ they first steps: they walkin’ right through hell and they don’t even know it yet.”

Che Noir & Apollo Brown — As God Intended

In July, Che Noir and Apollo Brown linked up for As God Intended, a coming of age project where Noir reflects on her life and times over Apollo’s soulful, searing production.

TheDeeepend — Calm (2018)

The adage is that there’s no new music, just music you have or haven’t heard before. In that vein, Raleigh MC TheDeeepEnd released Calm (2018), a trio of tracks from 2018 that serve as a sequel to his 2019 Verano project (which is also on Bandcamp).

H3IR — ve·loc·i·ty

Brooklyn MC Maassai linked with producer JWords to form the H3IR duo. They released their debut project today, right in time for Bandcamp Friday. The 12-track project features Maassai’s sharp lyricism over JWords’ whirling, experimental soundscape.

Iceberg Theory — The Cabal(a)

Iceberg Theory linked up with producer August Fanon for The Cabal(a), a 17-track project where Fanon laces Iceberg with smooth, jazzy soundscapes ripe for his intense delivery and esoteric lyricism.

JessB — 3 Nights In Amsterdam

New Zealand-based MC JessB is a bold, genre-bending artist whose catalog reflects the breadth of her experiences across the globe. 3 Nights In Amsterdam is the latest such offering. The 6-track project is full of dancefloor-ready tracks that range the influence of hip-hop, electronic, and reggaeton.

Kipp Stone — “Cheap Sangria”

On “Cheap Sangria,” Kipp Stone gets philosophical over an idyllic, self-produced instrumental ripe for him to show off his rhymes and offer his universal truth: “it’s all about the moment / how you bouta own it.”

Lance Jackson — “We’re Still Sippin’ Teenies”

Earlier this week, Massachusetts MC Lance Jackson dropped off “We’re Still Sippin’ Teenies,” a reflective track that serves as the first single from his upcoming album.

Latashá — Past Life

In June, LA-based artist Latashá put together a collection of tracks that are usually her show-only tunes. The result is Past Life, a varied celebration of her run as one of the Brooklyn scene’s most memorable acts before her cross country trek.

Madwiz — God’s Gold Teeth

Madwiz’ God’s Gold Teeth project is a seven-song exhibit of the Brooklyn rhymer’s technical prowess and charismatic mic presence over fun, inventive production.

Quanna — “Like Me Remix”

Quanna is self-assured on her effervescent “Like Me” Remix, letting the world know, “it’s my time go ‘head pass the torch” and delivering an earworm hook ripe to be recited by anyone who’s feeling themselves in the moment.

Red Shaydez — Feel The Aura

Boston’s Red Shaydez rhymes, “conscious or pop I do what the beat makes me do” on “They Call Me Shadez,” then actively showcases her versatility throughout the sprawling 19-track project.

S!lence — Camouflage Cognizance

With July’s Camouflage Cognizance, Brooklyn MC S!lence dropped off a project of what he called “scattered notes” of skillfully crafted witticisms and insights over a suite of arresting production.

Sadistik — Elysium

Sadistik’s Elysium is a skillful exhibition of the LA artist commandeering murky production that allows his poetic, stream of consciousness-style lyricism to prosper and offer much-needed food for thought.

Sidewalk Kal — Pink Moon

The rhymes on Sidewalk Kal’s Pink Moon EP start out with a “god like message” on “Message.” The Brooklyn-based rapper-producer keeps the frequency high from there, offering six introspective, spiritually-tinged tracks on his July release.

Sivion, Dre Murray, & Sojourn — “Better”

Virtually the entire world is on hold, and Sivion, Dre Murray, and Sojourn spoke to these unprecedented times on “Better,” a confessional collaboration where Murray notes, “spirit wide awake, to the king I will cling.”

Tef Poe — Surviving The Times

Anyone familiar with St. Louis rapper and activist Tef Poe knows he’d have a lot to express in these dire times. That’s exactly what he did throughout the aptly-named Surviving The Times, where he unleashes over eight well-known beats as well as the soulful, Mr. Fritz-produced “Black Messiah.”

Uniique — “Stand Back” Feat. Dj 93rd

New Jersey artist Uniique got with Dj 93rd to offer people a jolt during quarantine with “Stand Back,” a frenetic Jersey Club track that’ll turn wherever listeners are into a dancefloor.

Witch Prophet — “Musa” Feat. Stas Thee Boss

Stas Thee Boss delivers a hushed-but-urgent verse on the remix to Witch Prophet’s “Musa.” The two speak to the peril of the moment, with Witch Prophet pondering, “where do we go from here” and Star chiding, “you be Headed to beheading / where the hell ya head at?”

Last night, Chloe X Halle shocked the world (and disappointed Normani fans) with the remix to their buzzy hit single, “Do It.” Adding rappers City Girls, Doja Cat, and Mulatto to the track, the sister duo provided a little extra bite to their hit, as well as punching their tickets to the female solidarity train currently barreling through the hip-hop end of the music business. And while it was generally well-received, fans did take issue with one of the new additions: the oft-ridiculed Yung Miami, who has been branded the weaker rapper between the City Girls pair.

“waiting for the day yung miami find the beat,” wrote one fan. The sentiment seemed to be echoed from multiple quarters of the Twitterverse, with fans appearing to agree that Yung Miami’s verse was the worst one due to her offbeat approach.

However, Miami herself presented an unbothered response to the jokes, joining in with some self-deprecating humor of her own. “My verse was for the kids & tik tok period,” she wrote. “Y’all eating me up and I’m living for it.” To those who said that she “ruined” the song though, she shed a few sarcastic emoji tears and wondered whether her critics might grow to love her verse with time. “That’s wrong y’all said I ruined the song,” she joked. “Maybe it gotta grow on y’all idk.”

For what it’s worth, she’s not offbeat at all, but she does rap over a section of track where the snare drops out and leaves a lot of space in between her bars. As for her explanation of the backlash, Miami noted that it’s probably just because “it’s popular to drag me.” Considering the response to the track and its inevitable increase in streams, Miami will likely cry-laugh her way right to the bank.

Listen to Chloe X Halle’s “Do It” remix featuring City Girls, Doja Cat, and Mulatto above.

Moving halfway across the U.S. (during a pandemic, no less) isn’t an easy task, especially if one also considers that Joe Rogan needed to prepare a new studio for the Joe Rogan Experience podcast in Texas. He officially also moved over to Spotify this week with some pre-filmed episodes, including one in which Miley Cyrus flamed him, and one in which he wore a NASA suit while guest Duncan Trussell wore a shiny space suit. And now, it looks like there’s a space theme going on with Rogan’s new studio.

According to commenters on Rogan’s Instagram post, it’s going over well. Bob Saget wrote, “Holy sh*te!!!!” Chris Stapleton remarked, “It looks like Darth Vader’s bedroom.” And MMA commentator Robin Black added, “Dude it’s a f*cking spaceship of truth.”

It’s certainly snazzed up more than his California background, but a $100 million Spotify deal must have led to a few upgrades. Notably, he’s replaced Buddha with a statute of Lord Ganesha, known for removing obstacles in anyone’s way.

His next obstacle (the Friday podcast episode) will be Mike Tyson, although that installment was filmed in California. It should produce some interesting moments, although Tyson would have been a fantastic first guest in Texas, right? Meanwhile, Rogan’s fans are still holding out hope that he’ll bring Alex Jones back, despite Spotify leaving out some controversial episodes (including Jones entries) from his archive. Yet Jones has claimed that he has spoken to Rogan, and there’s no reason to worry because “Joe Rogan’s favorite 100 episodes of the last 10 years or so will be left on YouTube starting December 31 when he goes exclusively to Spotify. For this couple months no man’s land the content will be on both platforms and will be migrating over.”

The BTS Army has made it their task to ensure that everything BTS does will be superlative. That’s what they’ve done with the group’s recent “Dynamite” video, anyway. The video for the first English-language BTS song had the most concurrent viewers during a YouTube premiere of all time, it was the fastest video to reach 10 million views, and it was the first video to eclipse 100 million views in its first 24 hours on the site. On top of that, the song debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, making BTS the first all-South Korean artist to ever top the chart.

The “Dynamite” video (which currently has nearly 300 million views) is still out there getting plenty of attention, even two weeks after its release. In fact, it has broken another record: The “Dynamite” visual is now the most commented-on music video in YouTube history, with over 6.5 million comments currently. As Mashable notes, that breaks the record previously set by BTS’ own “DNA” video, which has about 6.3 million comments.

Times have been prosperous for BTS lately. Aside from all the aforementioned, they also performed at the VMAs and won all four of the awards for which they were nominated.

Watch the “Dynamite” video here.

Do people still grow up wanting to be astronauts? It’s a fair question in a world where the space program hardly sparks the same level of awe or maintains the same visibility that it did years ago. It’d be unfair to hang the burden of flipping that trend on Away, Netflix’s new space-focused series (it’s streaming now). But no one associated with the show would likely balk at a suggestion that some might be inspired by this ambitious drama about our capacity for doing awesome things among the stars and the sacrifice endured by those who take on that adventure.

Away is, itself, inspired by something like that, taking both its title and a key part of its story from Chris Jones’ 2014 Esquire feature about astronaut Scott Kelly. Specifically, the telling of Kelly finding out that his sister-in-law, former Congresswoman Gabby Giffords, had been shot in a mass shooting while he was orbiting high above the Earth on the International Space Station in 2011. But while both Jones and Kelly are involved with this adaptation, Away pivots to a fictional (but one day possible) mission to Mars and a female commander (played by two-time Oscar winner Hilary Swank) who is dealing with her husband’s horrifying medical emergency at home.

It probably goes without saying, but that last bit is something that might hit a little bit harder in the midst of a pandemic when Zoom funerals and Facetimed final moments are part of the equation of life and death. Series creator Andrew Hinderaker surely gets that, but he’s also long had an understanding of the pain of being just out of reach of a sick loved one, telling us about his own occasionally long-distance relationship with a partner managing a progressive disease. “She was diagnosed when I was opening up a play as a playwright in Chicago. The experience when someone you love suddenly faces a crisis, and you’re not there and what that feels like… I wanted to write about that,” he says when offering us some background ahead of our conversation with Swank, who he says “elevated, deepened, and complicated her character” before lauding her willingness to collaborate.

This is more than a family drama spread across an unfathomable expanse, though. Away is also about the sometimes repressed ambition of our species and a functional amalgamation of nations that might feel like the show’s most fantastical suggestion in this divisive climate. It’s also about gazing at a sci-fi epic through the eyes of a female commander and flipping genre norms, something that inspired both the show’s creator and its lead. In the following interview, we spoke with Swank about that and how Away stands out in a crowded field, the daunting physical challenge of playing an astronaut, and developing chemistry with castmates like Josh Charles, who plays her husband.

Obviously, you’ve been through quite a few grueling roles. Where would you rank this in terms of physical preparation?

It was more challenging than I thought. I thought that we’d be on these cables or harnesses. Someone in another room is pulling you up and down like your dance partner, so I thought that’s what it was going to be like. I thought, “Oh, that’s not going to be too hard. You’ve just got to move around and look like you’re floating.” It was way harder. The spacesuits weighed like 35 pounds, we were being held by the lowest part of our hips like a pendulum, squeezing our glutes to move forward, squeezing our abs to go back. Lifting and trying to make it sound and look effortless. It was greatly challenging.

This has been adapted and changed a bit from the original source material, but I’m curious how much time you spent with Scott Kelly trying to get a handle on the gutting emotional aspect of this story?

Unfortunately, I didn’t get a lot of time with him. He was on set at one point because he wrote an episode and I got to spend a little bit of time with him, but I didn’t get as much time as I would have naturally liked. There was so much preparation, and so much we were doing and he wasn’t on set at that time. But I did get to speak to a lot of astronauts, which is very informative and helpful for the development process of the character and the story.

I’m sure most of them don’t deal with a circumstance like Scott dealt with or like your character deals with, but what did they tell you about how they handled the distance from loved ones?

Well, they all say that they know that that was a sacrifice they had to make, yet it was still harder than they imagined. It’s something that I think we all take for granted when someone’s with you and you know they’re going to be there. That’s something that I can really relate to. Being an actor, we travel so much and we’re constantly on the road. So we’re constantly away from our loved ones as well, albeit a little differently. But the astronauts I spoke to were in a position where they could communicate via phone, or Skype, or very much like was depicted in the story, but there was definitely an ache in their heart. They would go away for… Jessica Meir was just in space for seven months.

Chemistry is obviously so important for your character and Josh’s character even though you’re not necessarily next to each other for large parts of this. How was that forged?

You do this fun thing where you’re like… When you have a character with a house, it’s supposed to be a family with years of memories, so you have this day where you’re creating memories for photos to go into the house. So we would go and do all these fun things where we’d have a picnic with horses because they’d need to photograph that. So it’s like a crash course of family time with all these different events that we do, like get on bikes and we go for a little bike ride while they’re photographing us. And it’s funny, it’s something that you don’t think about. All the little ins and outs of telling a story that you don’t realize that when you look at a scene and you’re in someone’s house. Of course, those aren’t just faces put on someone else’s body. So, we did get a nice amount of time together and it formed our relationship in a way that was so important. Doing most of our scenes via Skype just added to the element of wanting to see the other person. But it’s an interesting way to, like you said, when you’re not with somebody, to develop that relationship and chemistry.

There have been a lot of interesting space-based dramas that have taken a deeper look at the emotional strain. How do you think this stands out, or stands with things like Ad Astra or Gravity?

I would say that even though this is a story, for sure about a mission to Mars and all the different human beings on their way to Mars on that journey together and what that entails, it’s also this beautiful love story between all those humans, those five astronauts and that gravitational pull of love back on Earth for all of them. It’s the common thread through all human beings that breaks down stereotypes between different races, it shows the human quality that we all want to give and receive love and how important it is to have no regrets. This story deals with those earthly human qualities as much as it does with living your whole purpose and going on a mission to Mars.

Was that the primary pull for you to take this on, to speak to that common thread within a big epic sci-fi story?

Yes. 100 percent. I love that it was dealing with all these layers of humanity, and different races and the LGBTQ storyline as well. I find that a lot of content that we see is mostly told, or has been in the past… it’s getting better now, [but it’s been told] through the white straight male point of view. When you walk down the street, it’s really colorful, there are so many different ways to move in your life and this show, I feel, depicts that. That was a huge drawing point for me. To show all the different colors that are actually out in the world.

‘Away’ is streaming now on Netflix

With most of the year somehow already behind us, it’s time to look ahead to what we are expecting from the remaining months of 2020. In the latest episode of Indiecast, Steven Hyden and Ian Cohen discuss upcoming projects that are slated for release this fall. There’s so much good music to look forward to this fall, and we’ve compiled it all in one convenient list. For the podcast, however, Hyden and Cohen each choose five albums they’re looking forward to for an in-depth discussion.

Each host’s individual list of anticipated albums covers a wide range of genre components, including upcoming projects from artists like A.G. Cook, Sufjan Stevens, Bartees Strange, Mary Lattimore, Matt Berninger, Deftones, Lana Del Rey, Idles, Touche Amore, Beabadoobee, and Respire. If you’re looking for more music, check out Hyden’s full list of anticipated albums here.

Plus, in addition to the albums Hyden and Cohen are looking forward to this fall, this week’s Recommendation Corner is dedicated to Bill Callahan’s forthcoming Gold Record and the debaucherous 2002 film 24 Hour Party People, starring Steve Coogan.

New episodes of Indiecast drop every Friday. Listen to Episode 5 below and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts here. Stay up to date and follow us on Instagram and Twitter.

In the months following his release from prison, Tekashi 69 has been building up hype for his next album, TattleTales, which has finally arrived today. To mark the occasion, the rapper has shared a video for “Tutu.”

Considering the often aggressive nature of Tekashi’s music, “Tutu” is a relatively calm track, carried by light synths floating atop a hard-hitting beat. The track sees Tekashi bragging about his affluence and success, saying, “I get money when I want to / I get b*tches when I want to / Tote this pistol when I want to / Money dance step, hit the one-two.” As for the video, it’s mostly Tekashi and some scantily clad women (one of them being Blac Chyna) surrounded by colorful vehicles.

While the rapper’s return to music after prison was highly anticipated, interest seems to have waned in recent months, at least when it comes to the commercial performance of his singles. “Gooba,” his comeback song, managed a peak at No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Its follow-up, the Nicki Minaj-featuring “Trollz,” earned him his first No. 1 song. After that, though, “Yaya” barely cracked the chart with a peak at No. 99, while its successor, “Punani,” failed to make the Hot 100 at all.

Watch the “Tutu” video above.