Month: March 2023

Sometimes when you want to know if your favorite musician is releasing new music soon, all you have to do is open Twitter and ask them. Or at least that’s the case with the indie-rock moguls Grandaddy.

Tweeting at the frontman Jason Lytle‘s personal account, a fan wrote: “Hi Jason. I do love your music very much. It has gotten me through so many times. And I appreciate you being active on Twitter. May I ask, what are your plans for new @Grandaddy and/or Jason Lytle music? Do you foresee live performances? Thank you.”

Politeness goes a long way, because Jason Lytle replied in a quote-tweet, writing, “Ha!…All somebody had to do was ask. New grandaddy Lp recorded and is getting mixed very soon. I don’t see why it can’t be released in the middle of this year. Live shows…hmmm…no idea.”

In our 2020 interview with Lytle, he discussed dealing with bad memories through making music. “So let’s say that you have something in your life that’s just tearing you apart,” he said. “And the only way to deal with it is to write it down in a journal, which lots of people do and it helps. You get it out. It’s on paper. You’re just like, ‘All right, it’s in physical form.’ There’s something kind of cathartic about that like, ‘All right, I feel better.’ And you just move on. You close the journal, you put it in the drawer. Maybe it didn’t fix you, but you feel a lot better.”

Ja Morant is usually the member of the Memphis Grizzlies who levitates and makes opponents look silly. During Tuesday night’s game between Memphis and the Los Angeles Lakers, Morant instead watched from the sideline as Jaren Jackson Jr. threw down one of the nastiest putback dunks you will see this season at the expense of Anthony Davis.

Jackson broke up an attempted lob that Dennis Schröder threw to Davis during the fourth quarter while Morant was getting a breather. The other nine players beat him up the floor, so Jackson was behind the play as John Konchar attempted a runner that hit the back of the rim.

The benefit, however, was that Davis had zero idea that Jackson was right behind him. The Lakers star barely got off the ground as the frontrunner for league’s Defensive Player of the Year rose up and snatched the ball with only his left hand. Jackson didn’t even need to corral it and come back down, as he threw down right over Davis and got the crowd at FedExForum on their feet.

The entire Grizzlies bench got on their feet over the dunk, with Morant in complete awe in the middle of things.

Nicolas Cage was born to do many things. One of them is playing himself. Another is playing Dracula. After all, back in 1989 he did a kind of dry run for it without the bananas Vampire’s Kiss. But he finally go to play Bram Stoker’s seductive bloodsucker in the forthcoming Renfield, starring Nicholas Hoult as a modern day, less wackadoodle version of his familiar. And he thinks he only scraped the surface.

“You know, there are some minor moments here where you get to see some of the pathos in Dracula’s eyes,” Cage told Total Film (in a bit caught by Variety). “That made me think that maybe one day I might like to try for a whole movie where you’re really understanding the psyche of the character. I didn’t really have the time to delve into that here.”

Cage also said playing the role was destiny. “I also kind of always knew I had to do it at some point,” Cage explained. He even did some homework on the many previous big screen incarnations of fiction’s most popular vampire.

“I went back to Christopher Lee, in terms of his manner of speaking, but that was really only a starting point. I knew Christopher. I did a small scene with him in Season of the Witch, and I liked him very much. We had a lot of nice conversations, and he reminded me quite a bit of my father, August. So from then on, my dad sort of became the main inspiration for me.”

Renfield hits theaters on April 14.

(Via Total Film and Variety)

Dwight Howard‘s basketball playing career has continued over in Taiwan. While his team has struggled mightily and Shaquille O’Neal has used this as a way to continue his long-standing feud with his fellow ex-Magic and Lakers center, it seems like Howard is having a good time and putting up big numbers as a member of the Taoyuan Leopards.

His first year abroad included an All-Star nod, as Howard played in the inaugural T1 League All-Star Game on Tuesday. While his team lost — Team Infinity beat Team Beyond, 179-124 — the 8-time NBA All-Star won the game’s MVP award with a 37-point, 13-rebound, 8-assist performance. But that wasn’t all Howard did at the event, as he also participated in an NBA All-Star event that made its way over to Taiwan’s showcase of its best basketball players.

That’s right: Dwight Howard was in the Three Point Contest. Howard announced this back on Feb. 19 on his Instagram account — “I’m finally stepping out my comfort zone and doing what I know I could do despite what anyone has to say,” he wrote — and despite never being known for his ability to knock down shots from deep, he didn’t do too bad.

Howard’s 15 points despite taking too long and not finishing the final rack even though he had 70 seconds to complete the round was better than the scores put up by Julius Randle (13) and Kevin Huerter (8) during the NBA’s Three Point Contest earlier this month. Unfortunately for Howard, he was unable to get past the first round, as he would have needed to get 23 to move on.

As for the All-Star event that he’s won back in the States, Howard wasn’t a contestant in the Dunk Contest, as he instead judged the competition. He was, however, an important part of the final dunk of the evening, as the 6’2 Liu Chun-Ting of Tainan TSG GhostHawks jumped over Howard and threw down.

Lin did an admirable Mac McClung impression, as he was nearly perfect en route to winning the event.

Shakira‘s 2023 is looking bright. The singer just featured in “TQG,” a song and video with Karol G. Last month, she achieved her first Billboard Hot 100 top 10 single in over 15 years with “BZRP Music Sessions, Vol. 53.”

Now she’s elaborating on her decision to work with the powerhouse producer Bizarrap for the latter project. It was, in fact, not her idea. It came from her son, according to a new interview in Univision. A translation by Pop Crave reads: “He sent an audio to my manager saying ‘you have to make my mom work with Bizarrap.’ Even when we were editing the video, he came in and said ‘Mom, you’re a bit far from the microphone. Let’s fix this.’”

Karol G opened up to Uproxx recently about the experience of working with Shakira. “She was very sweet! All the photos we have together, we are literally laughing,” she said. “There was a lot of pressure days before to shoot this video. I was super afraid of how the vibe and energy would be like, but when we were on set, it was incredible. We had a great time. We helped each other a lot. We had a lot of admiration for each other. When she was filming, I was there. When I was filming, she was there. We were cheering each other on. Everything has been special.”

One could easily argue that Alex G‘s God Save The Animals and Alvvays‘ Blue Rev were the two best indie records of 2022. So it sure is a treat that both of those beloved acts are pairing together to hit the road this summer.

Both have been reveling in the success of their sublime records, with Alvvays giving a wonderful performance of “Belinda Says” on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and Alex G taking the emotive “Miracles” to The Late Show With Stephen Colbert. Alex G also performed an NPR Tiny Desk in December of last year, playing songs from the new album as well as deep-cuts from fan-favorited old LPs to satisfy as many fans as possible.

Meanwhile, Alvvays also have an exciting opening slot for the one and only Maggie Rogers at the Hollywood Bowl in August in addition to this run.

Find the full tour dates below.

08/13 — Hollywood Bowl @ Los Angeles, CA ^
08/23 — Brooklyn NY @ Prospect Park *
08/25 — Boston, MA @ Leader Bank Pavilion *
08/26 — Philadelphia, PA @ Dell Center *
08/27 — Martha’s Vineyard, MA @ Beach Road Festival
08/28 — Toronto, ON @ The Budweiser Stage *
08/30 — Detroit, MI @ Royal Oak *
08/31 — Pittsburgh, PA @ Stage AE *
09/01 — Buffalo, NY @ Art Park *

^ w/ Maggie Rogers
* co-headline date w/ Alex G

Find ticket information here.

On Monday, the world learned a not very surprising thing about Fox News. Last month, honcho Rupert Murdoch was deposed over the Dominion lawsuit against his network, a transcript of which was finally made public. It was not good, at least for him and for some of his employees. For one thing, Sean Hannity, Murdoch claimed, was “privately disgusted” by Donald Trump’s voter fraud antics. For another, Murdoch himself admitted he let his hosts spread some of that very nonsense, knowing it was bunk.

The news predictably did not go over well with Trump himself, who took to his rinky-dink Twitter clone with one of his barely coherent rants about the conservative powerhouse with whom he’s currently feuding.

“Why is Rupert Murdoch throwing his anchors under the table,” he asked about the media titan testifying under oath. Trump claimed Murdoch being honest (again, while under oath), was “killing his case and infuriating his viewers, who will again be leaving in droves – they already are.”

As it happened, texts from Fox News hosts shortly after the 2020 election showed them admitting they were elevating claims they knew were BS because they were afraid of losing viewers to the likes of Newsmax and OANN.

Trump then did what he often does: Baselessly claim there’s proof of voter fraud in an election he lost almost two-and-a-half years ago.

“There is MASSIVE evidence of voter fraud & irregularities in the 2020 Presidential Election,” Trump railed. He then cited Dinesh D’Souza’s roundly mocked and discredited doc 2000 Mules, which the likes of Fox News still won’t touch because they don’t want to get even more sued. He ended his post with the word, “RIGGED!!!”

Meanwhile, Trump had his own humiliating revelation recently: He allegedly goaded his poor staffers into complain to Jimmy Kimmel’s bosses because Kimmel kept making fun of him.

(Via The Daily Beast)

Tomorrow x Together kicked off the year with their 12tn EP, A Name Chapter: Temptation, which included their infectious hit “Sugar Rush Ride” and a seductive music video to go along with it. “It tells the story of youths who decide to embark on a long journey for their future but is swayed by the temptation in front of them,” member Soobin explained about the EP.

They took that memorable track to The Late Late Show With James Corden with an invigorating performance. The room is bursting with energy, like a literal sugar rush. Their sparkling harmonies are speckled with the shrieks of girls in the audience, obviously amazed to be in the group’s presence at all. Of course, their complicated and entertaining dance choreography is definitely inspiring the screams, as well.

The quintet, often going by the abbreviation TXT, is preparing to head out on the road for the massive Act: Sweet Mirage World Tour. The highly anticipated run begins next month in Seoul for two nights on March 25 and 26. It’ll hit in Singapore, Taipei, major cities in Japan, and then come over to the US for shows all over the country in May.

Watch their performance of “Sugar Rush Ride” above.

Shygirl‘s 2022 album Nymph was a singular, salacious excursion. The rapper knows how to hook a listener in, whether it’s with eccentric atmospherics and bewitching flows on “Come For Me” or uncensored sexuality on “Coochie (A Bedtime Story).” Now, she’s back with the announcement of Nymph_o, an expanded version of that LP.

The first taste of Nymph_o is delectable, namely “Heaven,” a dreamy collaboration with the one and only Tinashe. The two together are a force to be reckoned with; their voices coalesce to make stunning harmonies, like, “All I do is look at you, look at you / All I do is look at you, look at you.”

Nymph_o is full of exciting guests and remixes that will definitely excite fans. For instance, Björk transformed the track “Woe” after the pair worked together for the Fossora song “Ovule.”

Watch the video for “Heaven” above. Find the tracklist for Nymph_o below.

1. “Angel” – Shygirl x Fatima Al Qadiri
2. “Heaven” feat. Tinashe
3. “Crush” feat. Erika de Casier
4. “Woe” (I See It From Your Side) (Björk Remix)
5. “Shlut” feat. Sevdaliza
6. “Nike” feat. Deto Black
7. “Playboy / Positions”
8. “Poison” (Club Shy mix)
9. “Firefly” (Kingdom Edit)
10. “Wildfire” (Eartheater Remix)
11. “Unconditional” – Shygirl x Arca

Nymph_o is out 4/14 via Because Music. Pre-order it here.

After turning Kevin McCarthy’s Speaker of the House election into a mad house, Matt Gaetz is, alas, newly emboldened. Not only does his party have a wafer thin majority in the chamber, he may even have negotiated his way into some new powers. Whatever the case, one half of the GOP’s Beavis and Butt-Head been speaking up more. But that may not be so good for him, much less the rest of America.

As per HuffPost, a Congressional hearing with the House Armed Services Committee was held on Tuesday, during which Gaetz tried to be his usual combative self. Instead, he only wound up being calmly humiliated by a witness he was trying to grill. In an exchange with Colin Kahl, the undersecretary of defense for policy, Gaetz tried to slam U.S. involvement in Ukraine, inquiring whether the Pentagon has officials in the invaded nation. Kahl said they don’t.

Gaetz then tried to bust out a gotcha moment. He cited a report from Global Times about Pentagon allegedly training Ukrainians to fight. What is Global Times? Well, it’s an English-language daily tabloid run that’s a subsidiary of the Chinese Communist Party’s flagship newspaper The People’s Daily. In other words, it’s not exactly something a competent lawmaker cites in a hearing. And Kahl called him out on it.

“I’m sorry, is this the Global Times from China?” Kahl asked Gaetz.

Gaetz fumbled, first claiming it wasn’t then, after looking at the publication more closely, sheepishly saying, “Yeah, it might be. Yeah.”

Kahl calmly responded, “As a general matter, I don’t take Beijing’s propaganda at face value.”

Gaetz then asked if the allegation happened to be true anyway. “I don’t have any evidence one way or the other,” Kahl replied, then repeated, “As a general matter, I don’t take Beijing’s propaganda at face value.”

“Fair, fair enough,” an embarrassed Gaetz replied. “I would agree with that assessment.”

Gaetz oozes unearned bravado, so please enjoy him being cornered by someone who actually knows what he’s talking about.

(Via HuffPost)