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Despite a healthy sense of self-doubt — the hallmark of any artist (and I don’t use the term “artist” lightly) — as an art director, animator, musician, videographer, director, designer, and pro skater it doesn’t seem like there is anything Alexis Sablone can’t do. Oh, and did we mention she also has a Masters Degree in Architecture from MIT? During the pandemic, Sablone pulled her various talents together to self-produce, score, shoot, and edit the promotional material for her new Converse CONS collection, Designed By Alexis, which features new iterations of Converse’s iconic One Star Pro, Jack Purcell Pro, and Louie Lopez Pro sneaker silhouettes made to Sablone’s performance-based specifications.

“I grew up skating by myself in a small town, so in some ways, skating New York City all alone during quarantine felt familiar,” Sablone tells us. “On the other hand, filming myself, making the music, and editing it all together with my animations was very new for me. I’ve never controlled all of the pieces in a project like this and the process really gave me a creative outlet and something to throw myself into during the isolation of quarantine.”

Originally conceived to be introduced at the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games where Sablone would ride as part of the inaugural US Skateboarding team before the pandemic put a pause on that, Sablone’s background in architecture and her artistic sensibilities pop up throughout the Designed By Alexis collection, as every minute detail feels consciously constructed. Throughout our chat, Sablone speaks of the tactile feel of the sneakers, the grip of a rubber toe, or the need for reinforced stitching to compliment her precise style. As such, every aspect of the design feels constructed with a purpose that artfully mixes functionality with style. The collection reflects a person who is interested not just in art from a superficial standpoint, but someone interested in exploring the inner workings of what makes the composition work in the first place.

So let’s jump into our chat with Alexis where we talk about her new sneaker line, creating during the pandemic, the influence of Japan, and the ways she hopes the skateboarding community continues to evolve to be a more inclusive space.

You’ve been making a name for yourself as a pro skater for quite a while, but it wasn’t until recently that you signed with Converse. What is your connection to the brand and why was Converse the perfect home for what you wanted to accomplish in footwear?

I grew up with Chucks. I had some awareness of the shoe’s early history as a basketball sneaker, but mainly I think Chucks always stood out because it was a shoe all different types of people loved to wear. Depending on who’s wearing it and how, Chucks take on a whole different style, but they’re always classic. That’s why when I eventually came to know Converse as a brand in skateboarding, it fit. I liked the way skateboarders looked in Converse and skateboarding is about a lot of things, but style is and always has been one of them. In addition, one of my best friends was the team manager at Converse Cons, plus the team has many of my favorite skateboarders. When the opportunity for me to join the team came along, it just made sense and felt right.

Tell us a little bit about what you were going for with the design of the One Star Pro?

Despite my love for Chuck Taylors, the One Star was almost immediately my favorite skate shoe when I got to Converse. I began skating in the ‘90s and although the One Star technically began as a ‘70s basketball shoe, to me, it was a shoe of the ‘90s. It has a little bit of that classic skate shoe of the ‘90s look, a little bit of that ‘90s punk kid at the mall look. Basically, it felt classic and nostalgic, bringing me back to my favorite period in skateboarding style and history.

I loved skating it as it was. But for my One Star Pro, I wanted to make some performance modifications and tried to do so in ways that were visible but kept the classic feel of the original. I blow through shoes really fast when I skate, plus I like the grippy feel of a rubber toe on the board, so I added reinforced stitching and a partial rubber toe cap to meet those needs. I’m really happy with how it came out and I think the modifications add to the lifetime of the shoe, which makes me feel good knowing kids out there buying it can get a lot out of it.

What about the Jack Purcell Pro and the Louie Lopez Pro made you want to include these silhouettes as part of the collection?

I thought the three shoes complemented each other. I enjoy skating in all three, but they each bring a little something different and feel pretty different to skate in. The signature thick rubber toe of the Jack Purcell Pro gave me an excuse to do a version of my One Star AS Pro with a suede toe rather than rubber just this once, since some people don’t like the grippy feel of rubber in the front. It was nice to work with a collection of three for that reason – I could make one really bright shoe (the Louie) and then two monotone shoes, all black and all white, but still tie the three together with details like the license plate and sole print, and also the mixing of multiple materials in each shoe.

One of the cool things about your new collection is how much creative control Converse gave you over the project, letting you make music, shoot and edit footage, make animations… What was their reaction to you taking such a hands-on approach and what was your favorite part of that process?

The decision to make that project came pretty naturally. It was a combination of timing — the pandemic and being isolated — plus my own desire to kind of push myself in new directions and see what came out, and finally, Converse’s willingness to trust me through the process. Obviously, the skateboarding itself wasn’t new to me, nor was the animation, since I’ve done a number of animation projects for skate videos at that point. But filming myself, editing, and certainly, making music was all totally new to me.

It’s hard to pick one favorite part of the process. Making the track was definitely the most frightening since, apart from loving music and being able to sing along to some extent, I knew nothing about how it was made. I’m sure I’ll look back and have a hard time listening past all the rookie mistakes. But, for now, I’m pretty excited about how it came out since I was really operating in the dark. Everything — not just the music — was a process of trial and error: “Nope, that looks wrong” or “nope, that sounds terrible” or “no this” and “no that.” Eventually, though, I think it came together and was a pretty rewarding process.

Ultimately, you could look at it and say “Ok, cool. It’s like, a little minute and a half long skate video.” But from the inside, with any creative process, like anyone that makes anything knows from experience, it’s a million little decisions, and a lot of careful thought and dreaming up ideas, and headaches trying to execute them, realizing they don’t always work out like you’d thought.

All in all, that’s my idea of fun, I guess. I always need a project to keep me going and this one really helped push me through a strange and isolating time in the world.

Your collaboration with Converse CONS paid tribute to Japan as inspiration, what specific inspiration did you draw from the country?

Well, initially, the shoes were supposed to be released around the 2020 Olympic games hosted in Tokyo. So that’s where the prompt began. But on a more personal level, from Miyazaki and Masaaki Yuasa to Maki Sasaki and Shigeru Mizuki, Tadanori Yokoo, Masahisa Fukase, Issey Miyake — just to name a few — many of my favorite artists are Japanese. So in that way, I’m constantly inspired by Japanese culture and work that has come out of it.

When I was younger, I had a book of Japanese woodblock prints as well as Hokusai Manga and I was obsessed with the idea of sequential images and the realization that my Disney cartoons were built off of this foundation, in a way. Also, I was in love with the way the signatures were drawn into the woodblock prints. Usually characters inside of a vertical box, and often in bright colors that really popped and stood out from the rest of the image — like a scroll almost superimposed, floating on top of the image. Somehow, graphically, this just really attracted me and I liked studying them. They were always the part I looked for first before the actual image!

The heel and sole details in the pack I designed for Converse, although totally different, tries to borrow from these colorful, graphic, signature strips, as well as the idea of sequence that early Manga gave to us. All three of the shoes share the same signature — a square red license plate on the back heel containing a perfect Converse star logo, but as you lift the heel, the red square continues and stretches into a long red rectangle down the sole, inside of which, the star evolves or devolves sequentially into abstraction.

You have a Master degree in Architecture from MIT, which is kind of the perfect academic study for a skater, how did your interest in art and architecture influence the Designed By Alexis line?

I think our influences often get all mushed together and ultimately combined with our own intuition and sensibilities as designers. So, it’s really hard to pull one thread and say how this affected that and so on and so forth. But, my background in architecture certainly helped me learn to work through the iterative and often painful design process. I say painful, because for me, there’s inevitably a part of the process in everything I design, where it’s not clicking, it feels wrong, and I don’t know how to make it right. There is no “right”, of course, but there’s a feeling I get and have learned — continue to learn — to trust, that tells me I’m moving in the right direction with a project. A lot of the work I’m doing now falls outside of the classic realm of architecture, but my process and development as a designer feels like a continuous evolution from many long sleepless nights at MIT.

Style is such a major part of the skateboarding scene, what kind of statement if at all are you trying to make with your sense of style?

I have always just been myself, dressed how I felt comfortable, and never wanted to do something loud just to make a statement. For me, that felt phony. Growing up, I hated the idea of people trying to stand out by looking the part but not really backing it up with substance. My outward style is still pretty simple. I guess it’s getting bolder as I get older because I feel more grounded and like each new year of experience gives me more of a right to not care what anyone else thinks. That said, I’ve always wanted to rely more on other creative outlets, drawing, animating, designing, and physically skateboarding, to try to express myself and let all of that work make its own statement — whatever that may be.

Pro-skater, architect, musician, director, videographer, artist … you do everything. With the Designed By Alexis line, as well as operating as an art director and deck designer within the skateboard industry, what is your approach to art direction and what are you trying to visually infuse into the realm of skate style?

There’s some overlap here in what I was just describing. If I’m making a statement, or visually infusing anything into skateboarding, It’s not part of a master plan I have beyond the fact that I try to trust my instincts and be as authentic as possible. I’m a perfectionist in many ways. As a result, I hate a lot of what I do at least at some point in the process. I’m obsessed with all of my work and I either love it or hate it and those sentiments flip flop from one second to the next. The biggest goals I have are personal. I’m not thinking about what I infuse into skateboarding at large. I’m in my own little bubble. I’m learning to press “send”, to put the pencil down, to take a step back and be okay with whatever I just made, so I can move forward and start working on the next thing.

Not only are you one of the most accomplished and visible women in skateboarding, but you’re also going on to be a core member of the United States’ first-ever Olympic skateboarding team. I wondered if you can speak on your experience operating in a sport overwhelmingly populated by straight men and what you hope for the world of skateboarding going forward?

I was 21 years old before I really first met and got to know any other non-male skaters. Growing up, most of the time it was just me skating alone. There weren’t other skaters in my town and there certainly weren’t any gay skaters or girls. I’ve always believed that skateboarding can and should be for everyone. It was a place for non-jocks and outcasts and weird kids when I started and I think that’s what drew me to it. It was something different and I think it helped me escape into something — a community, a culture — even before I was aware of what I was escaping or really knew that I was queer.

For that, I feel fortunate and am so grateful to have found skateboarding. It wasn’t until I was much older that I saw some of the flaws and had to deal with the uglier inequalities inside the industry. I think the skateboarding community is finally starting to become more self-aware and the industry is beginning to follow suit and improve its practices by supporting and promoting more than one kind of skater. I think there’s still a long way to go, but I’m hopeful.

How have you been spending your time in quarantine, and where is the first place you’re going to skate outside of New York when travel opens up?

I have no idea where I’ll go! I used to feel like JFK was becoming my second home and now I can’t even imagine stepping foot in there. I hope Paris. Whenever I romanticize traveling, Paris is the image that comes to mind. But anywhere will feel like an adventure at this point. In the meantime, I’m happy to be where I am. I’ve been busy skating in the streets and working on some new design projects in my studio and I have no complaints. NYC is my favorite city in the world and I feel lucky to live here every day.

The Designed By Alexis collection is available now at Converse.

Following up on his reporting from earlier this month about MLB potentially putting together dual National League and American League Bubbles for the playoffs, Jeff Passan said on The Pat McAfee Show that he expects baseball to play games in California and Texas this fall, with the World Series likely to be played at the Texas Rangers’ brand-new ballpark in Arlington, Texas.

More specifically, the American League will likely play its playoffs in Bubbles in Los Angeles and San Diego while the National League creates a Bubble-like playoff environment in Houston and Arlington.

“The plan is right now for the last week of the season, even if you’re at home, for you to be staying in a hotel,” Passan told McAfee. “The reason for that is they essentially want to get these teams isolated from everyone … and they are going to Bubble, essentially.”

As Passan reported, the league and players are sorting through details on everything from whether families will be included to what the specific protocols will be.

“At this point, the Bubble is a fait accompli,” Passan said.

Back in mid-August, Passan reported that the two states were front-runners for a potential Bubble because of weather concerns in colder parts of the country by the time the playoffs rolled around in the late fall. The report also stated that Dodger Stadium, San Diego’s Petco Park, the Rangers’ Globe Life Park and Houston’s Minute Maid Park could host multiple games per day in the early rounds of the playoffs.

One executive told Passan: “If we want to make sure we get through October, we really need to get this right.”

Since then, it appears they have settled on what will basically be four smaller pseudo-Bubbles, with players staying at hotels and not traveling. Considering the outbreaks MLB has seen on about one-fifths of its teams at this point, Passan seems to believe MLB has realized the necessity of a Bubble if the playoffs are to go off without a hitch.

This week saw the resignation of Liberty University president Jerry Falwell Jr. after the evangelical leader and early supporter of President Donald Trump found himself embroiled in a public sex scandal. On the night before the Republican National Convention, Falwell Jr. released a statement, in which he claimed that his wife, Becki, had engaged in a “brief affair” with another man over eight years ago, but the couple had immediately reconciled and moved on from the incident.

However, the man in question was revealed to be Giancarlo Granda, a former pool attendant who has long been the center of rumors regarding the couple’s sex life. Granda alleged in a statement that he was first approached by Becki, who invited up to her Miami hotel room to have intercourse while Falwell Jr. watched. While the couple disputed Granda’s allegations, Falwell Jr. resigned as university president shortly after Granda’s statement.

But the subject isn’t going away time soon. Granda appeared on Good Morning America on Friday and shared details of his first encounter with the Falwells in 2012 and how it led to multiple trysts over the next six years:

Granda said that the two men awkwardly discussed the parameters of the impending sexual encounter. He insisted that during that first encounter he reassured Falwell that if the older man became uncomfortable, he would leave, “Hey,” he said he told Falwell anxiously, “if at any point you get jealous or you want me to back off, just let me know and I’ll walk out of here.”

Granda said Falwell reassured him, urging him to “go for it.”

“He enjoyed watching,” said Granda, who told ABC News that the sexual encounters continued “multiple times a year” until 2018 in hotels in Miami, New York and at the Falwells’ Virginia home.

You can watch the full GMA interview with Granda below.

Granda’s interview arrives on the heels on yet another accusation against the Falwells. According to Politico, a Liberty University student has come forward with allegations that Becki Falwell “aggressively” pursued a sexual relationship with him and would use a secret Facebook account to make unwanted advances. But while these allegations have affected the Falwells standing in the Christian community, the scandal won’t be hurting them financially. The New York Post reports that Falwell Jr. could receive a $10.5 million payout from Liberty University for his resignation.

(Via ABC News)

The act of yanking a person’s underpants up their butt: is it a melvin, a murph, or a wedgie? Growing up, my cousins and I called it a “melvin” (they were older, and frequently melvin-ed me). Then at a certain point, someone corrected me, saying that what I was describing wasn’t actually called a melvin at all: it was a “murph,” or a “wedgie.”

It’s a hill I’ve been willing to die on for probably 30 years now, and it’s only gotten progressively lonelier. These days, a trip to Urban Dictionary’s entry for “melvin” nets you, as its top definition, “a frontal wedgie,” where the underwear “ride up into the labia.” Number three for “murph” is “a naturally occurring wedgie.” Based on the definitions of the previous two, do we even need to look up wedgie?

This is melvin erasure and I won’t stand for it. I base my stubborn conviction on a landmark nugget from pop culture. That’s right, I’m talking about Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey, the 1991 sequel to Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure (1989) which sees our lovably dopey, time-traveling Valley bros sent to hell. Where, in a climactic moment, they get out of a jam with the Grim Reaper by telling him his shoe is untied and then yanking his underwear up his butt crack (from behind!).

This leads to the immortal line, arguably the most memorable of the movie, “I can’t believe we just melvined Death!”

With Bogus Journey‘s long-overdue sequel, Bill & Ted Face The Music, opening this weekend, I reached out to screenwriters Ed Solomon and Chris Matheson (who’ve written all three Bill & Ted movies) to pick their… uh… brains. I wanted to know: whether they invented “melvin,” the background of their decision, and why we are right about this and everyone else is wrong. (Fun facts neither here nor there: Matheson is the son of prolific science fiction writer Richard Matheson, while Solomon’s ex-wife is the daughter of John Cleese).

ED SOLOMON: To Melvin someone was something we did way back in fifth grade. I always resisted calling it a “wedgie” cause it was so prosaic. And “we just Melvined death” sounded better. It was exactly the kind of low tech pop culture means of defense that is perfect for Bill and Ted.

CHRIS MATHESON: We definitely didn’t invent it. I vaguely remember hearing it [called that] from junior high, early high school. ’71-’75 basically. We did think it was funny, yeah.. can’t remember much more than that…

There you have it, folks. Pulling someone’s underwear up their butt is called a “melvin.” It’s been called that at least since the seventies. You could call it “wedgie,” if you want to sound like a philistine, but we all know what time it is. A front wedgie? God, what is wrong with you people.

‘Bill & Ted Face The Music’ opens August 28th on OnDemand. Vince Mancini is on Twitter. You can access his archive of reviews here.

In an extensive new report on the fallout between the WNBA’s Atlanta Dream and U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler of Georgia, ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne details the political calculus on both sides of the fight as well as the ongoing discussions among suitors who would like to purchase the Dream.

One of those is former Los Angeles Clippers star turned athlete investor Baron Davis, who said “I think it’s just life coming full circle,” after he was front and center for many years of the dark Donald Sterling saga in Los Angeles. Shelburne adds that Dream president Chris Sienko, majority owner Mary Brock and her husband and former Coca-Cola CEO John Brock, “have been providing financial information to potential buyers of the team.”

While Loeffler has stated her intention is not to sell the team and WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert has indicated it is not currently the plan of the league to force her to do so, the cleanest split would be for someone genuinely interested in growing women’s basketball in Atlanta to purchase the franchise. This is something Loeffler has shown herself unwilling to do any longer, as Shelburne brings in political scientists and longtime Atlantans to show how Loeffler’s fight with the WNBA grew spontaneously out of a need to win politically over a primary opponent who is seen as more supportive of President Trump than she is.

Whether Davis is the right person to becoming the managing partner of the Dream is unclear, but he is certainly a well-known and passionate person in the basketball community and seems to care about turning the page for the Dream after this fight with Loeffler.

Meanwhile, the players of the WNBA have worked with politicians like Michelle Obama and Stacey Abrams to develop a plan to encourage voter turnout in support of Loeffler’s Democratic opponent, Rev. Raphael Warnock, this fall. At the same time, the players have taken the stance of no longer mentioning Loeffler by name or addressing the situation directly, turning their cheeks to the woman who once supported them fully and now is using her connection with the league as a political advantage.

Cereal and coffee — they’re bonafide breakfast staples designed for people who live a life on the go. Even for those of us who have transitioned into the new normal of working from home, there isn’t really an easier way to start the day than with a bowl of cereal or a cup of joe. Both can be consumed rather quickly and provide a jolt of early morning energy to help propel you into your day. But we say, why choose just one when you can have both?

No, we’re not talking about pouring a cup of coffee into your bowl of cereal instead of milk — though… let’s try that. We’re talking about giving Post’s new caffeine-infused Dunkin’ Caramel Macchiato and Mocha Latte cereal a try. Sure, no one asked Post cereal to link up with Dunkin’. But hey, we’re all for random cross-brand collaborations. How else would we have things like the Doritos Locos Taco? Are you going to tell us you want to live in a world without Doritos Locos Tacos? Aren’t things bad enough as it is?

For the collaboration, Post utilized the flavors in Dunkin’s Caramel Macchiato and Mocha Latte sweetened coffees, infusing each bowl with caffeine, espresso swirled marshmallows and corn-pop like cereal bites that provide a crunch to go along with the layered flavors of the iced coffee of your choice. Basically, Post is offering us all an edible form of iced coffee.

We’ve tasked ourselves with figuring out not just which flavor is worth your money, but if a bowl of Dunkin’ cereal lives up to its namesake. Will this replace our morning cup of coffee? Let’s find out.

Dunkin’ Caramel Macchiato VS Dunkin’ Mocha Latte

You could argue that ranking these two cereal flavors is futile. Doesn’t it just fall to personal preference? In the coffee world maybe, but in the world of cereal, things are a little more black and white. For example, Cinnamon Toast Crunch is objectively better than Kellog’s All-Bran. While our own personal cereal rankings may differ slightly, the world of cereal is a world of truths. And the truth is that All-Bran, plain Shredded Wheat, Fibre 1, and Special K cereal just aren’t as good. For all we know, the Dunkin’ cereal line is awful, or maybe one is good and the other is trash — look we’re just going to shut up, eat the damn cereals, and tell you our thoughts.

Sometime later…

Alright, we’ve tried them! We felt it was important to try both boxes in three separate states: Dry, slightly milked, and fully engorged (excuse these names please). In the dry test, it was pretty clear that the Mocha Latte was superior over the Caramel Macchiato. Where the Caramel tasted like a violently sweet corn pop, the Mocha had a Cocoa Puffs quality that was further complemented by the earthy roasted flavors of espresso. I could truly taste the coffee with this one, but everything changed once milk was involved.

As the cereals started to gather milk, the flavors really started activating, turning the Caramel Macchiato into a surprisingly smooth experience with a creamy well-balanced flavor that was further complemented by the occasional burst of sugar via the espresso-swirled marshmallows. The experience was less like drinking a Dunkin’ Caramel Macchiato and more like drinking a blended caramel drink.

The Mocha Latte, on the other hand, went from being senses pleasing coffee forward experience to a bitter mess of chocolate chalk milk and a flavor that feels less harmonious than it’s Caramel counterpart. With the Caramel, the flavors truly mesh into one thing — save for the marshmallows — whereas in the Mocha you’ll find yourself wishing there were more marshmallows included. Let us say that overall we would’ve preferred more marshmallows in both boxes!

Both bowls of cereal improved when the cereal hit a soggy state, once the chocolate puffs soaked a good amount of milk in, the flavors became much more balanced and some of the harsh bitterness was tamped down, leaving a cereal that truly tastes like coffee in a bowl. Unfortunately for Mocha though, the Caramel also improved, with the milk further intensifying the flavors, bringing much more of the caramel flavor forward.

The verdict: We finished the bowl of Dunkin’ Caramel Macchiato cereal. We’ll probably never touch the Mocha Latte again.

How Do They Compare To Their Real Coffee Counterparts?

Our verdict on the Dunkin’ cereals is probably the opposite of their Dunkin’ coffee counterparts. Both iced coffees are almost sickeningly sweet, which by the way is fine for cereal, another story for coffee. Dunkin’s Mocha Latte iced coffee is a much more pleasant experience with hints of dark chocolate complimenting freshly ground espresso, resulting in a cool and creamy beverage that never fails to remind you that you’re drinking coffee.

The Caramel Macchiato on the other hand? It tastes like someone melted a Werther’s Original into a cup of ice, tasted it, said “hey any way we could get more caramel in here?” and then proceeded to melt one of those Green Caramel Apple pops into it and mixed it around with that weird candy apple pop (after dragging it along the bottom of their shoe) and then topped the whole thing off with skim milk to create the illusion of a “creamy” beverage. It’s just awful.

But if I had to choose, I’d opt for the bowl of Caramel Macchiato cereal over everything. Post’s Dunkin’ Caramel Macchiato cereal is a top ten cereal. Will fans of Dunkin’s coffee find something to love in the cereal versions? Maybe, but if you’re looking for a 1:1 flavor matchup between the cereal and its coffee, the Post Dunkin’ cereal is very much its own beast.

Will It Replace My Morning Cup Of Coffee?

Unfortunately, no. After I knocked back a bowl and a half of this stuff I wasn’t feeling the same buzz I’d get from a 16-oz. iced coffee thanks to Dunkin’ cereal only having about 1/10th as much caffeine as a cup of coffee. However, you’ll definitely feel more awake while you’re eating either cereal, as the unmistakable smell of coffee tricks your brain into thinking you’re about to get that much-needed dose of morning caffeine. Strangely, that makes the cereal a great option for someone who is trying to ween themselves off of caffeine. Unfortunately, that’s not us!

The only rush you’re going to get from a bowl is a sugar rush.

Run The Jewels is back with another video from their long-awaited, critically-acclaimed fourth studio album, RTJ4. This time, the dynamic duo links up with Ninian Doff, the director of the Amazon Original movie Get Duked!, for the surreal and hilarious “Out Of Sight” video featuring 2 Chainz. The director brings the cast of his movie along for the ride as they reprise their film characters in the midst of an art heist in a museum where all the paintings are living reproductions of El-P and Killer Mike in various styles throughout history.

The heist itself appears to be for a sculpture of the group’s fist-and-gun logo — the very same one from their album cover, in fact — but as the Get Duked! cast members make a few ill-advised moves, the scene rapidly turns into a RTJ-influenced trip.

Get Duked! (originally titled Boyz In The Wood), revolves around four kids from the city camping in the Scottish Highlands trying to escape “a mysterious huntsman.” It has a 96% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, so if you’ll excuse me, I’ll be putting that on momentarily.

RTJ4 was released earlier this year near the start of the pandemic that brought the music industry to a grinding halt. The group released it for free after the police murdered George Floyd and Breonna Stewart and Americans across the nation took to the streets in protest.

Watch Run The Jewels’ “Out Of Sight” video featuring 2 Chainz above.

RTJ4 is out now via Jewel Runners. Get it here.

The NBA will be back this weekend, but after extensive conversations with governors throughout the week, the league and its players released a joint statement on Friday detailing the concrete changes they hope to see going forward as they resume play.

Among those actions are the formation of a players’ social justice coalition (taking a nod from the WNBA which has had a players’ council since the beginning of the season); turning team-owned buildings into voting centers (following the lead of the Hawks and others that have already done so, in conjunction with LeBron James’ More Than A Vote initiative); and placing ad spots and public service announcements during broadcasts related to civic engagement and voter awareness.

In reports throughout the past few days, it’s become clear that many players and coaches, including most notably LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers, were ready to hang it up for 2020 unless team governors promised to do more to affect direct change. Governors will be tasked with working with local officials to turn team-owned venues into polling places or ballot intake sites, and the release states that the social justice coalition will also feature team governors. There also must be league-wide buy-in to take the step of airing ads and PSAs that are overtly political during game broadcasts.

NBA players have shown they are willing to put games on the line to enact change, so how this plays out in practice, as well as how the league continues to push outside the confines of the court, will clearly be just as big a part of the remainder of the 2020 playoffs as who comes away with the title.

This week, the NBA and players around the league have been finding ways to rethink their priorities in the wake of yet another police shooting of an unarmed Black man. The season abruptly went on hiatus on Wednesday as players staged a walkout in order to put pressure on the league and its owners to enact social reform using their connections and influence.

Individually, players have continued find ways to use their own voices, money, and influence to support change in their local communities and beyond. The stoppage of play has also acted as a rallying call for other sports leagues around the country, several of whom have also pressed pause on their seasons in the midst of a re-energized movement.

Donovan Mitchell of the Utah Jazz became the latest to use this opportunity to make a difference, announcing a joint effort with adidas on Friday to use a portion of the sales of his newest sneakers to help fund Jacob Blake’s children future education.

Mitchell will donate $45,000 of the proceeds from his sneaker sales to the Blake family, a number that will be matched by adidas, who confirmed the news in a release on Friday.

“adidas stands in solidarity with athletes, coaches and cultural leaders driving positive disruption and demanding justice for the senseless shooting of Jacob Blake and the many whose lives have been impacted by systemic racism.

Donovan Mitchell and adidas will donate all proceeds from the sales of the D.O.N. Issue #2 launching today, up to $90,000, to a college scholarship fund for the children of Jacob Blake.

In support of those voices being heard, all other product releases scheduled to launch this weekend will be postponed across adidas stores, adidas.com, the adidas app and CONFIRMED.”

The news comes just on the heels of the league announcing that it would return to action on Saturday after what will have been a 72-hour hiatus, marked by renewed efforts on the part of the league and the Board of Governors to create new initiatives for social justice reform.

KenTheMan‘s debut tape 4 Da 304s is strictly for the hoes. It’s an exhilarating thrill of sexual excitement and monetary gain at the expense of men from the first listen of its leading track “Try Me” to the raw “Freaky Freestyle.”

It’s the hoe lessons KenTheMan is instructing on the Houston native’s 10 track project that delivers fun and flirty guidance on how to make men pay up. There’s no crying in hoe life, just bags of money and good stories to tell. 4 Da 304s is one of the most sexy rap EPs out.

Uproxx spoke with KenTheMan about the making of 4 Da 304s, womanhood, and how she was finally able to quit Door Dash to rap full time, thanks to her 2019 hit song “He Be Like.”

Congratulations on your new project. 4 Da 304s coming out. Tell me about that title.

Well, I honestly was sitting in the studio and I’m like, bro, I can’t believe I still haven’t it figured out my album name. I said, man, I don’t know because this shit really for the hoes. And then I was like, oh, I should name it 4 Da Hoes. My engineer was like, man but I still got to figure out a way to make it a little more commercial to where it’s not curse words, so it can can get played in certain places that a curse word couldn’t. I could say “4 Da 3-oh-4s.” In high school and middle school and stuff, we used to call hoes, 304s.

On the calculator, right?

Yeah, and you turned it around, and it’d say “hoe.” I was like, damn, I’m going to name it 4 Da 304s because it’s for the hoes.

What can your fans expect on this project?

I feel like they should expect to get off their feet and feel confident and it’s really all turnt. Like it ain’t nothing soft on it. It’s all happy music. Like literally it’s all music that make you feel good.

Was that a conscious decision?

Yeah, because that’s what they into. I always switch it up. I drop different things because I’m a real versatile artist. When I dropped my slow song, they was like, we’re ready to stand on a chair. So I was like, all right, they want to stand on a chair. It’s like quarantine got everybody kind of like down, so I was like, why would I make down music during quarantine? I need to make something to make them at least feel like they outside.

I see you’re mainly working with a producer named Big Cuz and it looks like he produced like majorly all of your projects. Tell me about your relationship with him.

Me and him have been working for probably going on four years, this year. I was very uncomfortable in the studio and when we started working on this project… he makes beats on the spot and I was nervous to rap on the spot. I was very weird about him hearing me and my mistakes. Since I gained a relationship with him it started becoming comfortable for me to rap. He started making these beats that I feel like, he learned me just by having a personal relationship. We just clicked.

He would make the beat around my words. So when you would hear my beat kick up in a certain way, it’ll be because I said something a certain way and he made the beat, like it’s catered to it. So he’s dope.

I know right now women are like really running it in rap. It’s like such a great time to be a woman in rap right now but I know as women we deal with so many insecurities and societal pressures. We are seeing more women being more comfortable with themselves but it’s also making other people uncomfortable. Do you feel like maybe there’s going to be a time where women won’t be judged for anything that they do? You can just do whatever you want without…

I don’t feel like it’ll ever change. I feel like we’ll always be judged because no matter, it can be the classiest woman in the world and somebody’s going to tell her that she’s too fucking classy. It’s kind of like, if you’re doing you of course people are going to have something to say. I also feel like back then it’s been women that’s confident. We grew up on one of the most confident women in Nicki Minaj. I feel like it’s been going on. It’s just more of it now.

Sex been selling, like Trina, Kim, Foxy, like all them, they real grimy with they words and they really sell sex. I just don’t see why it’s such a shocker that people still selling sex. It’s just like now I don’t know if it’s more put in they face or maybe people is just highly opinionated. It ain’t going to stop. I just feel like it’s good that we have like a lot of female confident rappers, because why would we be sitting around acting like we not confident? I just feel like power to us, power to the pussy right now.

For you, when was that moment that you decided I’m going to do me and I know people are going to say whatever they want anyways?

When you try to do anything that you do, somebody’s got something to say about it. It kind of makes you just be like, you know what? I might as well, you know what I’m saying? Why am I trying to do stuff to please other people that are never going to be pleased? People are never pleased, naturally. So it’s kind of like when you start doing stuff for yourself, you notice that more people latch on to literally you doing you.

I do want to talk about your album cover. It looks like you’re teaching a class of some sort and there’s these girls taking notes. What kind of stuff are you teaching on this project?

How to not give a fuck and break these n****s. Again, I want every lady to know out there, that it’s no reason to be crying if you ain’t getting paid for it. I just had that logic. I had that logic like recently because of my ex. One day, it hit me like, wow, I should get some money for this. For every future relationship, I’m not going to let nobody stress me out. If we having a little ups and downs, at least you can pay for it. That’s how I feel. Just get something out of every situation and do you. It’s really a carefree tape. I’m just telling them like, to be your best hoe self girl. Just be you.

You’re basically coming off of a big single “He Be Like,” so how do you plan on following up that to make sure that everybody’s peeping this project out?

I don’t know. I’m just like, me, I’m weird. I never can make something like something. I made “He Be Like” on accident. I was driving — Door Dashing. Didn’t expect it to be a song that was going to literally stop me from having to Door Dash. “He Be Like” will always be my baby. I’ll never forget the song that stopped me from working and got me my bands girl. Got me my bands. I ain’t never forget.

What was the first thing you bought when you got your first big check?

I bought a lot of clothes, because I didn’t get to shop for a minute because I was kind of broke. I just bought a lot of clothes and shoes. Now that I’m a rapper, I got to fit the part girl. I felt really good. I can’t believe that I made a song and it was like, it’s my song. It’s nobody else’s song. It’s mine. I didn’t know it was going to be the song.

You were doing Door Dash, but like, do you remember the moment where you were like, I’m not doing Door Dash today?

I think after “He Be Like,” I was still Door Dashing because I was still broke, girl. You know those checks don’t come right away. Still got to make a living while the song is revving. I was still working and then I started getting booked a lot. I started realizing how much I had.

How have you been able to keep it going during Corona?

I just keep making music. I hate that this whole thing is going on. Of course I’m not happy that we’re experiencing some bullshit like this, but I really got like to pause real quick to get my shit together and I did because I made my tape during it. It gave me time to realize my priorities. When I had my single and money was flowing, I started getting comfortable not thinking like, oh shit, it’s time to get in EP mode. It’s time to get a body of work. I wasn’t thinking like that because it was moving so fast. I was always on a plane. I was here. I was there. It gave me a chance to sit in the house and realize, bitch, what are you going to do after this?

4 Da 304s is out now. Get it here.