Category: Viral

As the end credits rolled for Annette during the opening night of the Cannes Film Festival, the crowd launched into a five minute standing ovation, so Adam Driver did what anyone would’ve done in that situation: Lit up a cigarette.

No, really. You can see for yourself.

In Driver’s defense, even though the moment was clearly tongue-in-cheek, there were a couple things going on here. For starters, the cigarette was handed to him by Annette director Leos Carax, who Driver gamely obliged. As for the length of the standing ovation, it’s not an uncommon occurrence for audiences to stand and clap for the whole credits during Cannes. Although, this year, the crowd was in an understandably festive mood that permeated the air. Via Variety:

It was by no means a record for Cannes, but it also felt like the crowd wasn’t just celebrating the movie. The world’s glitziest film festival had pulled off a comeback, after taking a year off in 2020 due to COVID-19.

Indeed, it was not the same Cannes that met crowds two years ago on the French Riviera. While many of the visitors at Cannes have been vaccinated, there have been added precautions as the Delta variant sweeps across the globe.

However, Driver’s Annette performance does include him singing while performing cunnilingus on Marion Cotillard, so let’s not rule out that factor in the lengthy ovation. It’s gotta be in the mix.

(Via Variety)

It’s been a few months since City Girls served up their hit “Twerkulator,” their unofficiall entry for this year’s song of the summer. Fans have been absolutely loving the track — it instantly went viral on TikTok and City Girls brought the song to the 2021 BET Awards stage for an eye-catching performance. Now following up on the release, City Girls tapped Missy Elliot to direct a vibrant video for the single.

The visual opens with Elliott’s voice booming through megaphones. “This is not a test. Everyone, please take shelter immediately,” she says. “The Twerkulators have already invaded Twerk City and you don’t have much time. They’ve already landed and they’re taking over. Run for cover, motherf*ckers.” City Girls’ JT and Yung Miami then show up to reclaim their spot on the block alongside a number of twerking backup dancers.

“Twerkulator” marks City Girls’ only solo track of 2021, though they did appear on a remix of BRS Kash’s “Throat Baby” earlier this year. Other than that, City Girls have been remaining in the public eye with their recent relationships. Yung Miami was recently seen holding hands with Diddy while JT has been going steady with Lil Uzi Vert. In fact, JT revealed the rapper gifted her $30,000 on their first-ever date.

Watch the “Twerkulator” video above.

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

The last we heard from Courtney Barnett, she was teaming up with Vagabon to cover Sharon Van Etten’s “Don’t Do It” for the Epic Ten reissue (Don’t forget, these two have been great together before). Last year, she also gave fans a Gillian Welch cover with a little help from Phoebe Bridgers. Now, she’s done with covers for the moment and is back to releasing new music of her own. With today’s new single “Rae Street,” Barnett has shared her first new music since her 2019 MTV Unplugged Live In Melbourne album, or, really, since 2018’s Tell Me How You Really Feel.

But the single isn’t the only new music on the way from Barnett, as fans might’ve guessed from her recently announced tour dates, Barnett also shared the news that her next album is called Things Take Time, Take Time and that it will be out on November 12 of this year.

Watch the Rae Street video above and check out the Things Take Time, Take Time tracklist below.

1. “Rae Street”
2. “Sunfair Sundown”
3. “Here’s The Thing”
4. “Before You Gotta Go”
5. “Turning Green”
6. “Take It Day By Day”
7. “If I Don’t Hear From You Tonight”
8. “Write A List Of Things to Look Forward To”
9. “Splendour”
10. “Oh The Night”

Things Take Time, Take Time is out 10/12 via Mom + Pop Music/Marathon Artists. Pre-order it here.

WNBA star Nneka Ogwumike could play for Nigeria in the Tokyo Olympics just weeks after being snubbed from Team USA’s 12-player roster. Ogwumike and her sister/Los Angeles Sparks teammate, Chiney, are awaiting clearance from FIBA after the country’s basketball federation announced the duo, along with their younger sister, Erica, were part of the 15-player provisional roster.

The eldest Ogwumike spoke about her Olympic snub for the first time, saying she did not want to wait around and be a potential alternate on the American team. “I just wanted to bet on myself and also be a part of an organization that prioritizes me,” Ogwumike said about the potential to play for Nigeria, according to ESPN. “My perspective was like, ‘If it’s not impossible, I’m going to go for it.’ Because I believe I have Olympic status and I plan on being an Olympian.”

According to ESPN, both Nneka and Chiney, who have dual citizenship with the United States and Nigeria, have been released by USA Basketball upon request as an initial step to compete for Nigeria. Typically, FIBA holds players who have competed for a country past their 17th birthday to that program for future events. But there is a loophole if the organization’s secretary general believes it’s in the best of interest of the growth of basketball in Nigeria for the Ogwumike sisters to compete.

“It’s something I know my family would be very proud of,” Ogwumike said, according ESPN. “For it to happen would be such a blessing. To be able to do something big for a big part of our heritage would be fantastic. I’m hoping it will contribute to the growth we’re experiencing for Africa in basketball.”

It was a huge shock that the 6’2 forward — who was the MVP of Team USA’s 2020 Olympic FIBA Qualifying Tournament, was one of eight original invitees to the program’s college tour against top-10 programs in 2019, and won gold medals in 2018 and 2014 FIBA World Cups — wasn’t invited to play in Tokyo. She is the only WNBA MVP (2016) to not make an Olympic roster.

“It was more of a hurt than a shock, because I had experienced it before,” Ogwumike, who was cut from the 2016 and 2012 rosters, said to ESPN. “But there are decisions made in this life that you can’t control. I allowed myself to feel the hurt, but moving on, I decided, ‘I’m going to try to put matters in my own hands.’”

There was speculation that Ogwumike’s grade 2 knee sprain, which was reported on June 3 to keep her sidelined for four-to-six weeks, was the reason she was left off the team, but Erica publicly refuted that explanation, and Nneka told ESPN she believes she’ll be ready to compete in exhibition games starting next week.

Two members of the U.S. Olympic selection committee, University of Connecticut head coach Geno Auriemma and Connecticut Sun head coach Curt Miller, have declined or deferred comment on Ogwumike’s omission.

Several people in basketball have come to Ogwumike’s defense:

https://twitter.com/dame_lillard/status/1407933676625620996

We’ll have to wait and see if FIBA allows Nneka and Chiney to play, but if they’re cleared it won’t take long for us to watch them compete.

Team USA plays an exhibition game in Las Vegas on July 18 against Nigeria, which Nneka could play in if she’s healthy. If she chooses to wait until Olympic play, Team USA plays Nigeria in its opening group stage game on July 27.

At the start of this month, Halsey teased “a very special album artwork reveal & release date announcement” for her Trent Reznor- and Atticus Ross-produced album If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power. It turns out she wasn’t just drumming up anticipation with hyperbole, as the art is definitely noteworthy: She shared it today, and it features Halsey freeing the nipple, as one of her breasts is exposed in the art, which was inspired by a Renaissance painting (specifically, “Virgin And Child Surrounded By Angels,” from the Melun Diptych by Jean Fouquet).

That’s the sort of thing that tends to turn heads, and indeed, it did, as it didn’t take long for Halsey to become one of the day’s top-trending topics on Twitter as reactions to the reveal poured in.

At least one user observed a trend in skin-bearing album covers, as Halsey’s arrives not long after the also-viral Lorde album art for Solar Power.

Others noted that this image is a continuation of Halsey’s strong history of standout cover art.

When sharing the art, Halsey said of it:

“This album is a concept album about the joys and horrors of pregnancy and childbirth. It was very important to me that the cover art conveyed the sentiment of my journey over the past few months. The dichotomy of the Madonna and the Whore. The idea that me as a sexual being and my body as a vessel and gift to my child are two concepts that can co-exist peacefully and powerfully. My body has belonged to the world in many different ways the past few years, and this image is my means of reclaiming my autonomy and establishing my pride and strength as a life force for my human being.

This cover image celebrates pregnant and postpartum bodies as something beautiful, to be admired. We have a long way to go with eradicating the social stigma around bodies & breastfeeding. I hope this can be a step in the right direction!”

Find the NSFW art and more reactions below.

If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power is out 8/27 via Capitol. Pre-order it here.

With Vince Staples’ long-awaited self-titled album dropping this Friday, he’s doing the usual media tour, stopping by the hometown radio station, Power 106, to deliver an in-depth freestyle on the LA Leakers show over a classic West Coast instrumental. Taking on the beat from Dr. Dre’s 1999 2001 standout, “Xxplosive,” the Long Beach native gets especially busy with a wordplay-riddled verse that names names, makes big claims, and casts a skeptical glare at the rap game.

Let’s talk about those claims though. Among them, Vince insists:

– He’s done more for the Black community “than them Obamas did.”
– He has tagged the walls in his neighborhood every week.
– He fell off the grid in order to attend fútbol games in Spain.
– He lived out his favorite songs, which include 50 Cent’s “Many Men.”
– He will kill you if you say his name in his song. No rap.

Also, he shouts out Carmelitos, a place very near and dear to my heart. I’ll go ahead and say it: This is the best LA Leakers freestyle in a while.

In addition to absolutely disintegrating the Power 106 microphone, Vince has released two singles for the album, “Law Of Averages” and “Are You With That?,” written a comic book, Limbo Beach, and reminded fans he’s been real since Summertime 06.

Watch Vince Staples’ “explosive” LA Leakers freestyle above.

Vince Staples drops 7/9 on Blacksmith/Motown. Pre-save it here.

There aren’t many consistencies in the world of video games, but one thing we know for certain is we’re always going to have a new Assassin’s Creed game on the way. The long-running Ubisoft franchise has been an almost yearly release for a decade now and is easily their largest title. When games get as big as Assassin’s Creed has, there is a goal from companies to make them even bigger and more profitable. Lately, that solution has involved going the live services route.

Assassin’s Creed is reportedly planning to go the same way. In a report from Jason Schreier at Bloomberg, it was revealed that the next Assassin’s Creed release is going to be a live services game with an evolving world. While this is a game clearly still in the early stages, with years of development time ahead of it, there is a definite plan here to turn Assassin’s Creed into the next live service giant a la Grand Theft Auto Online, Fortnite, and the NBA 2K franchise.

Assassin’s Creed, a video game franchise set in huge worlds where each one can take hundreds of hours to complete, is getting even bigger. A new project, which is known inside Ubisoft Entertainment SA by the code name Assassin’s Creed Infinity, sets out to create a massive online platform that evolves over time, according to people familiar with its development.

The existence of the game was confirmed to Bloomberg and is going to be developed through a combined effort of Ubisoft Montreal and Ubisoft Quebec. Ubisoft themselves confirmed much of this information in a blog post to fans about the future of Assassins Creed.

Along with our announcement of new content coming for Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, we wanted to share some key updates on the talented and creative minds that will now be working in a collaborative, cross-studio structure between Ubisoft Montreal and Ubisoft Quebec that will guide, grow, evolve, and define the overall future of Assassin’s Creed that includes an important upcoming, early-in-development project codenamed Assassin’s Creed Infinity.

How the average fan of Assassin’s Creed feels about this likely varies. There are people who genuinely enjoy games as a service because it’s a series they can continue to play for years — worlds evolve, new content is added, and it’s a game that never really ends. For these people, they can enter the Assassin’s Creed universe and always expect new content to dive into.

However, there are others who hate the very existence of service-based games, because while all of the positives to it sound great, there’s usually a real-world cost to it. Microtransactions, yearly subscription fees, content hidden behind paywalls, and loot boxes are the bane of many players’ gaming experience and service-based games are usually full of them. If Assassin’s Creed goes this route, then to these players, it’s just another game meant to take money out of them for just wanting to play.

Along with being an award-winning musician, Halsey is an incredibly talented painter. That’s why it’s incredibly fitting that the cover art to her upcoming If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power, written with Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, is inspired by the painting “Virgin And Child Surrounded By Angels,” from Jean Fouquet’s Melun Diptych. Halsey just unveiled her LP’s artwork, and true to the era it was inspired by, it shows her freeing the nipple.

Halsey is posed looking exceptionally regal on her If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power album cover. She sports a jeweled crown and is seated on a grand golden throne. She holds a child in one arm and side of her lilac dress is tucked down to expose her breast.

Explaining the concept in a post on Instagram, Halsey wrote:

“This album is a concept album about the joys and horrors of pregnancy and childbirth. It was very important to me that the cover art conveyed the sentiment of my journey over the past few months. The dichotomy of the Madonna and the Whore. The idea that me as a sexual being and my body as a vessel and gift to my child are two concepts that can co-exist peacefully and powerfully. My body has belonged to the world in many different ways the past few years, and this image is my means of reclaiming my autonomy and establishing my pride and strength as a life force for my human being.

This cover image celebrates pregnant and postpartum bodies as something beautiful, to be admired. We have a long way to go with eradicating the social stigma around bodies & breastfeeding. I hope this can be a step in the right direction!”

In other Halsey news, the singer recently announced that her pronouns are she/they. She updated her social media bios to reflect the change, later explaining her reason. “for those asking RE: my updated IG bio, I am happy with either pronouns 🙂 the inclusion of ‘they’, in addition to ‘she’, feels most authentic to me,” she wrote. “If you know me at all you know what it means to me to express this outwardly. thanks for being the best.”

See Halsey’s If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power cover art below and watch her unveil the artwork at the Metropolitan Museum Of Art above.

If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power is out 8/27 via Capitol. Pre-order it here.

Bleachers, aka producer to the stars Jack Antonoff, and Jason Isbell announced today the release a special split 7-inch with the proceeds benefitting The Ally Coalition. Released via RCA Records, the 7-inch is out now and features Bleachers covering Isbell’s “Dreamsicle,” which Isbell And The 400 Unit released in April 2020. And in a cute switcharoo, the 7-inch also has Isbell covering Bleachers’ “45,” which Antonoff released in November of last year.

According to a release, the split 7-inch is available as a physical-only product, limited to 1,000 copies. Of the release, Antonoff said in a statement, “Jason Isbell is the sh*t!” (Succinct!) Isbell added, “Love this Bleachers song, I love what Jack did with ‘Dreamsicle.’ This was a hell of a lot of fun!”

Earlier in June, Antonoff announced the return of his band with a third full-length album, Take The Sadness Out Of Saturday Night, coming 7/30 via RCA. He also recently unveiled singles “Stop Making This Hurt” and earlier tracks “Chinatown,” “How Dare You Want More,” and the Ispell-covered “45.” Meanwhile, Isbell’s seventh studio album, Reunions (his fourth effort with The 400 Unit), dropped in May 2020.

Check out a teaser for each song above. Bleachers’ and Isbell’s special 7-inch is out now via RCA Records. Buy it here. Pre-order Bleachers’ Take The Sadness Out Of Saturday Night here, and purchase Isbell’s Reunions here.