Kobe Bryant and Gianna Bryant tragically passed away following a helicopter crash in Calabasas, California last year, breaking the hearts of basketball and sports fans across the world. Kobe was widely beloved as one of the greatest players of all time and his passing was so sudden that fans never got much of a chance to learn about the man off the court. His widow Vanessa has been continuing Kobe’s philanthropic work in the year following his death, also working on the multiple entertainment projects he had been planning.
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The lives of Vanessa Bryant and her three surviving children, Natalia, Bianca, and Capri, have changed forever as a result of the horrific accident and Vanessa is doing everything in her power to keep the legacies of her late husband and daughter alive until the end of time. On Tuesday night, Vanessa and Natalia Bryant got a housecall from tattoo artist Nikko Hurtado, who gave them some dope new pieces to commemorate Kobe and GiGi.
Vanessa proudly showed off her new “Mambacita” tattoo on her forearm, which is a tribute to her 13-year-old daughter Gianna, who adopted the nickname from her father. Natalia got a couple of tattoos during the session, including the word “Muse” on her finger, which was the title of Kobe’s documentary. She also got a “Mamba Sheath” on her wrist. Vanessa detailed the lengthy tattoo session with a few videos posted to her social media pages.
Earlier this month, Arizona rapper Baby Keem shared his first new single of 2021, “No Sense,” after a relatively quiet 2020 that saw the release of just two singles despite Keem’s appearance on the 2020 XXL Freshman cover. Today, he shared the apocalyptic video for the new track, which was produced by Kendrick Lamar’s pgLang, naturally.
The video finds Keem staring out the window of an apartment in a large apartment building complex, watching what appears to be masses of people congregating in the courtyard below. Inside the apartment, he seems to see a group of women sitting around a table exchanging little white packages, while outside, one of the buildings collapses for seemingly no reason.
Keem finally decides to leave the apartment, running to the parking garage and commandeering a car, but at the end of the video, he takes a curve in the exit corkscrew a little too quickly in his haste to escape and the car careens off the building before a smash-cut to black. If anyone wants to take a guess at what any of this means, they’re welcome to, because the video leaves a lot open to interpretation.
With “No Sense,” the total of videos he’s released since 2019’s “Orange Soda” blew up comes to three, including “Moshpit” and “Hooligan.” It seems clear that Keem is willing to take his time in releasing a full-length project and judging from the growing stream counts, his fans are more than willing to eagerly consume each long-awaited release.
In the Reel Goats-directed video for Rod Wave’s “Tombstone,” the Florida trap crooner recalls his struggles as he enjoys a snow day in the forest. However, in the deceptively sunny B-plot of the video, a little boy endures similar tribulations, watching his out-of-work father argue with his clearly overworked mom. His story comes to a head when he’s approached on the street by a police patrol car and things pretty much play out like you’d expect.
The somber video accompanies the latest single from Rod’s upcoming album, SoulFly, following the reflective “Street Runner.” The innovative rapper accompanied that single with a web video game that plays a chiptune version of the instrumental and lets players race a hot rod along a coastline at sunset collecting heart-shaped power-ups.
Before announcing the album’s release date, Rod had a falling out with his label over money, threatening to hold back its release until things were made right. Within a few days, though, he apologized for making the issue public and said everything had been resolved. He quickly followed up with a tracklist and release date: March 26, this Friday.
Watch Rod Wave’s “Tombstone” video above.
SoulFly is due 3/26 on Alamo Records. You can pre-save it here.
The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow, and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.
One of Guapdad 4000’s press pics is a photo of him and his grandma, whom he lovingly calls “Naynay.” It’s a Tagalog term of endearment meaning “mom”; the way he uses it reflects the relationship he has with his Filipino grandmother as a result of his rough-and-tumble upbringing in West Oakland. Throughout his newly-released album, 1176, he highlights those aspects of his Filipino heritage as he shares some of his most vulnerable and personal material yet.
That cultural honor comes through in the titles of songs like “Chicken Adobo,” in which he compares a partner’s love to the heartwarming flavor of the Philippines’ most recognizable dish. The autobiographical vulnerability comes through in songs like “Uncle Ricky,” where he details his run-ins with a reckless relative, and “Stoop Kid,” where the porch of the house from the album’s cover becomes the center of the mise en scene for dice games, shootouts, and family drama to play out over the course of Guapdad’s life.
It’s only right, then, that his prime partner in this endeavor is someone who can relate to some of those aspects of his upbringing. Enter Illmind, a near 20-year veteran producer who has worked with some of hip-hop’s biggest hitmakers and well-respected underground legends from Drake (“You & The 6“) and J. Cole (“Love Yourz“) to Little Brother (“Good Clothes“) and Skyzoo (“Luxury” with Westside Gunn) — and he just happens to be Filipino, as well. Guapdad and Illmind met at a mutual friend’s session and instantly formed a personal and creative bond that resonates throughout 1176, from the unexpected Alice Deejay flip on lead single “How Many” to the ghostly, deconstructed Miami bass R&B of “Catching Bodies,” that brings out some of Guapdad’s most cutting recollections and observations.
Uproxx connected with the “Cartier Kuyas” over the phone to break down the new album, but unfortunately, the conversation had to once again swing to address the sharp rise in anti-Asian hate crimes over the past year in the wake of the recent spa shooting spree in Atlanta. While that conversation helped to highlight a sense of solidarity between the two seemingly disparate groups that actually form Guapdad’s genetic makeup, the rest of our discussion illuminated the intriguing creative process behind bringing 1176 to life.
I have to ask: how are you feeling? How are you responding to the tough news?
Illmind: It’s coming as a surprise to me, just as much as everyone else. It’s really unfortunate. I’m saddened by it. I’m praying for the people who have been affected and the families of all the people that lost their lives so far in these hate crimes. 2020 was an intense year for obvious reasons and now it’s almost like we’re shifting to each culture every year.
It’s rooted in hate. So I pray that we can do what we can to start shifting the narrative and, this might sound whimsical and like I’m in fantasy land, but I am a real true believer in love conquering hate at the end of the day, but getting there is going to be the challenge.
Guapdad: That was a powerful statement, Illmind. I’m over here completely resonating with that. I’m trying to take my time and come up with my more diplomatic response, because right now I’m just on some Oakland n**** sh*t because it’s infuriating. If somebody touched my grandma, I’m going to kill him.
I feel you. I remember you said that the last time we talked about this. So, as far as the album goes: What was the seed? How did this get started? Where did the idea come from and how did you water it and make it grow?
Guapdad: Essentially, the seed came from us. I only talk in this with this type of diction because we homies and I like to give you a bit more deeper scoop than most of the shit we’ve been doing: Honestly, I feel like innately, me and Ill, have been preparing our whole lives to meet each other and work.
Everything that he liked, everything that I liked, everything that we had done up until this point kind of snowballed into us f*cking clash-of-the-Titans meeting each other and just feeling like we was already friends. We both have those similar life experiences throughout our whole lives that led us to there, to where we got this crazy synergy. I don’t give a f*ck what Ill play. As soon as I hear it, the song’s done.
Illmind: I mean Guap said it all. That’s exactly how it started. It’s crazy because we come from two different coasts. Guap is from the West, I’m from the East. We came up on a lot of the same things even with that distance, from fashion to just music taste to just this aesthetic, visual audio aesthetic, everything. And we both take our crafts very seriously and we’re deeply passionate.
When you put two guys like us together, on top of the fact that we both share a similar culture being Filipino, it’s like what Guap said, we were almost sort of destined to do this. The first time I had a session with Guap was in LA, and it was almost like a deja vu moment, where it was like either I saw this happening or it was kind of like written in the stars and it was like, “Oh yeah, whatever you’ve been doing up to this point led to this point right now.”
This is the house I grew up in. It was hella hard for me to go back and look at this demon in the face as we began to make art with it. A bitter sweet return birthed one of the most beautiful covers I’ve ever released Ty @paulxmiddletonpic.twitter.com/ZMnW0GGo7g
Guap, how do you tap into this vulnerable mode and why was it so important to do it on this project coming straight off Dior Deposits?
Guapdad: Honestly bro, that was just one big venting session. I’ve been doing a lot of running from a lot of demons, especially throughout just quarantine and all of these things going wrong. And all of these things popping up in my life that trouble me, that take sleep away from me, that add to the pressures of my career. I run away from these things by just working more. I distract myself with work because I’m a f*cking work machine.
I hadn’t processed losing my house because I never slowed down. Had a going away last party at the crib, and I went and I got my tears out. I cried harder than I ever cried in my life at this sayonara event to my old residence. But I feel emotionally, hadn’t really dealt with that devil face-to-face. And the music, these beats, my heart, my spirit was forcing me to talk about it. It was forcing me to talk about that because creatively, I’d probably always reference it and never get over it if I didn’t.
I don’t want to always talk about how much it hurt to lose the house. I don’t want to always look at white people in my neighborhood and get mad at them for gentrification. I don’t want to harbor hate. So it was necessary that I made a song like “Stoop Kid” so that I can still exist in a normal space.
Illmind: It was crazy because at the point in the album creation, when Guap was like, “All right, let’s do some shit. I want to tell some stories, man. I need to pull some emotions.” And a light bulb came off for me because those are, personally for me, those are some of my favorite types of records to make with people. And when he said that, I pulled out the bag.
On “You & The 6,” that was [Drake’s] first time he’s talking about his relationship with his mother and father. “Love Yourz,” a song about Cole talking about the importance of self love and valuing the right things, became the muse for Forest Hills Drive. I feel like when I make music, there’s this emotion that I put into it. And when an artist feels that same, resonates with that vibration and is able to pull something deep inside of them and write something incredible with it, that’s my North star where I feel like I did my job.
What does Naynay think about the wild stuff you sometimes say on these records?
Guapdad: She don’t give a f*ck. [All laughing.] I’m paying bills, and she know my heart is good. One thing that’s tight about my grandma is she sees my blackness and my extrovertedness, she’s always nurtured it. There is a side of me that is very blunt. And there is a side of me that’s non-filtered. And she always accepts that because she accepts me expressing myself. And this is how I choose to do it. So she f*cks with it.
All parents everywhere are just winging it. But as a kid or a person without kids, especially, who never thought on that level, you don’t realize that. Because that’s who you look to when you hungry. That’s who you look to when you need money. That’s what you look to when everything fails and you got to restart. Some people don’t get that privilege. It should be every human’s fail-safe. And that’s how I look at my grandma. She like God to me in that way because her forgiveness is indefinite, and I’m appreciative of that. There’s something tangible that I can hold onto. Even though it’s emotion, that shit is so thick with presence, I feel like it’s physical.
I know you guys have to sit through a lot of press days and have to answer a lot of the same questions over and over and over again. I want to know: What’s a question that you guys wished somebody would have asked you that nobody’s ever asked you?
Guapdad: I never get to talk about cinema, and I have a real love for movies. If you ask me who’s my favorite sound designer, I would say Hans Zimmer.
Illmind: I’m going to copy Guap. Can I do some movie talk too?
Go for it!
Illmind: I guess a lot of people don’t know this about me, but I love John Woo, the director. Hard Boiled, The Killer, all the OG sh*t. Bullet In The Head, The Replacement Killers are fire. But in general, I’ve been really getting into Korean cinema from the ’90s and early 2000s. Korean cinema is something that I was pretty obsessed with for a long time. But I just think their sh*t is super fly. The soundtracks, the visuals, the type of cameras they use, the goriness, the storylines are so bizarre, but so fire to me. Old Boy is the most insane script to put a green light on. I’m talking about the OG one.
Guapdad: One of the greatest movies of all time.
1176 is out now via Paradise Rising / 88rising Records / 12Tone Music. Get it here.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Though watching Verzuz battles are certainly enjoyable, there’s plenty of fun to be had in simply debating potential match-ups. After all, there is nothing a hip-hop fan loves more than a bit of competitive ranking. It’s a habit that transcending beyond rap music, however, reaching into the world of R&B as well. Case in point, Charlamagne Tha God recently found himself taking a strong position during a spontaneous debate with Timbaland, who suggested that Chris Brown was simply unbeatable in a Verzuz battle format.
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After Timbaland declared that “nobody’s catalog is like Chris Brown,” Charlamagne issues a truly incredulous “What?!” He proceeds to outline a scenario in which Chris Brown would face off with Usher, and ultimately fall to the Confessions melodist. “Chris Brown against Usher, nah, Usher wins that,” argues Tha God, sparking a counter from Timbo. “He can’t do that, Chris Brown got too much,” reasons the Verzuz co-founder. “He got like fifty bags!”
“But Usher got twenty nuclear weapons,” says Charlamagne. “Twenty weapons of mass destruction, Tim.” “Chris Brown has fifty nuclear weapons,” counters Timbo, but Tha God isn’t having it. “He got fifty weapons but not nukes,” he states, unwavering in his position. Naturally, the spirited discussion went on to spark a widespread one, as many proceeded to speculate as to which of the two R&B legends would emerge victorious in a Verzuz battle. And while both are certainly formidable, there can only be one — who do you think would take the crown, were Usher and Chris Brown to face off?
Throughout the video above, viewers can see Meek Mill rapping a snippet of his verse in a clip that applies a fisheye camera lens filter, and right after, fans can see PnB Rock laying out the details for the upcoming collaboration. While teasing his verse, PnB writes, “City bouta go Brazyover this one” before dropping a few diamond emojis and tagging his fellow Philadelphia artists.
Details have yet to surface surrounding the song’s release, but fans are already excited for the Philadelphia team-up. One social media user commented, “Ok Philly … love city Collabs” while another suggested that the artists deepen the roster with another hot Philadelphia rapper, saying, “The Tierra vocals in yet?”
If they were to add another feature, what other Philadelphia artists would you want to hear on Meek Mill, PnB Rock, and Lil Uzi Vert‘s upcoming collab?
Messy Wendy Williams is back in the news because of her latest comments about Youngboy Never Broke Again— somebody that she has criticized heavily in the past. While many of Wendy’s comments about the 21-year-old rapper have been about his seven children, the gossiper took aim at YB because of his recent arrest on Monday evening.
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Youngboy was arrested following a hot pursuit in Los Angeles, getting caught by a K-9 unit after reportedly fleeing from the cops and the feds. He was taken into custody and indicted on two charges related to his September 2020 arrest. Speaking about the rapper’s arrest on her talk show, Wendy had nothing nice to say about the “Make No Sense” artist, prompting the rapper’s mother to make some insulting comments of her own overnight. It’s not only members of YB’s family that are angry about Wendy’s incessant hate on Youngboy– even Boosie Badazz is pissed about what she had to say.
“He’s got to go to jail,” she said on Tuesday. “How do you do a hot pursuit? There are innocent people out here. You could have hurt innocent people in your hot pursuit and running through people’s backyards. Nobody wants that. Bringing down the property value.”
Fans already know that Detroit rapper Sada Baby has been dropping off quality for the streets, but now the unapologetic lyricist has officially hit a major mainstream milestone. Today, the rapper’s infectious single “Whole Lotta Choppas,” which ultimately went viral on TikTok while securing a Nicki Minaj remix, has officially been certified gold by the RIAA. It is Sada Baby’s first certification.
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In celebration of the occasion, Sada took to Instagram to share a lengthy reflection on his journey, making sure to thank some of the key contributors in his corner. “Im in nis shit for my legacy to be as strong as it kan, ain’t #No ni*ga from my way walkin around wit one of these OFF HIS OWN MUSCLE,” writes Sada. “My boss ain’t give me a gold plaque, I ain’t buy my verse from the goat @nickiminaj. @derrickmilano showed me love he ain’t have to and I appreciate all of my ppl on my team that helped me get here.”
“I’m gettin high as hell in LA today!” he declares, as several of his hip-hop peers slid through to offer congratulatory praise. “Well deserved,” writes Lil Yachty, with whom Sada collaborated on “SB5.” “Yes!” cheers Royce Da 5’9″, who has been quick to praise his fellow Detroit emcee whenever given the opportunity. Wayno, former Everyday Struggle host and longtime member of Sada’s team, took a moment to celebrate the accomplishment on his own page. “Stay low & keep firing , we caught a plaque during the Pandemic,” he captions.
Check out Sada’s reflections on securing his first gold plaque below.
Following a terrible week for the “Japan” rapper, who was robbed at gunpoint and arrested several days afterward for possession of a firearm, Dexter is sparking even more concern for a video in which he asks his followers to come through and braid his hair. His request isn’t the issue– it’s the manner in which he asks for help.
In the video, which has been reposted by outlets including DJ Akademiks, Famous Dex slurred through his sentences and asked someone to come and braid his hair. “If you in LA and you know how to do hair, box braids, I got a thousand dollars for you, DM me now, ladies only,” said the rapper in the video. He holds up some cash in his hand but people are noticing that he looks unhealthy and is having trouble pronouncing his words.
“Bro on crack,” said one commenter on the video. “Yo I thought he went to rehab bro,” said another person.
Hopefully, people are just overreacting. However, if Famous Dex is back on drugs, we hope that he gets the professional help that he needs to overcome addiction. Pray for him in the comments.
The global COVID-19 pandemic has caused a huge decrease in sales for many retailers across the country. The business of clothing, shoes, and accessories has boomed for centuries, but since the pandemic, many stores have seen an 87% sales drop from February 2020 to May 2020. Last year, major apparel and footwear company, VF Corporation […]
