saturday night live

‘SNL’ Paid Their Respects To DMX Through Jokes And A Tribute To Close The Show

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Early Friday morning, DMX’s family put out a statement confirming what the entertainment world would hope to be false. The legendary rapper sadly passed away at 50 following a reported drug overdose and heart attack. Tributes from all over, including the music and sports world, came pouring in and as the days go on, many are still finding their own ways to honor him with the latest being Saturday Night Live.

The first mention of DMX came during the late-night show’s cold open segment. The sketch was led by Kenan Thompson, Ego Nwodim, Kate McKinnon, and Alex Moffat who altogether played four Minnesota anchors that were initially discussing the murder of George Floyd but switch the topic after a disagreement.

“We lost royalty yesterday,” McKinnon said, in reference to Prince Phillip’s death on Friday. “Yes, the rapper DMX died,” Nwodim replied which was met by an applause from he audience. McKinnon tried to correct Nwodim saying, “I was talking about the prince,” but her attempt failed as Nwodim retorted, “Girl, Prince been dead!”

DMX’s came on a pair of occasions later in the show. The first came with a photo SNL put onscreen of the rapper and his stage name following a commercial break, the image from when he himself performed on the show back in 2000 where he performed “What’s My Name” from his 1999 album, … And Then There Was X.. Lastly, after host Carey Mulligan delivered her thank yous to the audience and viewers, Chris Redd held up a handwritten sign that read “R.I.P. DMX” in black lettering.

You can watch the cold open segment as well as view a screenshot of show’s closing moments above.

Lil Nas X Reacts To The ‘SNL’ Skit Featuring Him Giving God A Lap Dance

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St. Vincent was the musical guest on this past weekend’s episode of Saturday Night Live, but the show began with nods to Britney Spears and Lil Nas X.

The SNL cold open skit was a talk show hosted by Spears (wonderfully portrayed by Chloe Fineman). Her first guest on the program was Lil Nas X (played by Chris Redd), who spoke about his “Satan shoes” and his “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)” video. He explained the backlash to the video, “People are afraid of me because I’m different, but really, I’m just your typical gay, black, country-rap sneaker entrepreneur.” Then, at Spears’ suggestion, she brought out God and Nas gave him a lap dance to “even things out.”

Not long after the skit, Nas took to Twitter to share his thoughts. He tweeted a screenshot from the sketch and offered a tongue-in-cheek caption: “snl going to hell.”

Now that Nas has been parodied on SNL, he just has South Park left. He tried to will an episode of the long-running cartoon about his Satan saga into existence last week when he tweeted, “this gone be a good ass south park episode lmao.”

Watch the Saturday Night Live skit below.

‘SNL’ Let Pete Davidson And Jack Harlow Explain NFTs In Another Eminem Parody

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As confusing and head-scratching as it might be from afar, NFTs continue to become more popular in the digital world. From the sports world to the music and art world, creators and consumers are taking advantage of the opportunity to respectively sell and own a digitally exclusive piece of art. For those who are still trying to grasp the new concept of NFTs, however, Saturday Night Live tapped Pete Davidson and recent musical guest Jack Harlow to give an explainer about the growing form digital cryptocurrency.

The sketch takes place in a fictional classroom where students have just finished listening to a lecture from the Secretary Of Treasury Janet Yellen, who is played by Kate McKinnon. Pete Davidson takes advantage of her presence to ask a question. Soon, the beat from Eminem’s 2000 hit, “Without Me” begins playing in the background and, just like the Detroit rapper did in the song’s music video, Davidson is seen rocking a Robin superhero costume.

He asked what an NFT is through a rapid-fire rap that, all in all, left everyone in the room confused. Despite help from Chris Redd, who was an obvious Dr. Dre lookalike, they failed to receive an answer to the question. Thankfully, Jack Harlow, who played a nosy janitor, stepped into the classroom to give a more digestible explanation of NFTs with some raps of his own.

Check out the sketch in the video above.

Jack Harlow is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Jack Harlow Makes His ‘SNL’ Debut With Performances Of ‘Tyler Herro,’ ‘What’s Poppin’ And ‘Same Guy’

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There’s no denying the success of Jack Harlow. The Louisville spitter took the music world by storm at the beginning of 2020 thanks to the success of his “What’s Poppin” and closed out the year with the release of his debut album That’s What They Say. In between it all, he peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard singles chart, landed multiple guest features, and proved that he was here to stay in the industry. While his 2020 success is behind him, Harlow continues to deliver impressive moments and the latest example came through his debut performance on Saturday Night Live.

Harlow began the night by giving an energetic rendition of “Tyler Herro” and “What’s Poppin.” Dressed in all black under purple and blue and supported by a talented live band, the rapper’s sheer confidence was on full display on stage to start the night. Later on in the show, he returned with Maroon 5’s Adam Levine to perform “Same Guy,” another highlight from That’s What They Say. This performance came with a much lighter atmosphere as the duo sang about recognizing their bad qualities as men and expressing their desire to change and improve.

The SNL set comes after Harlow brought his talents to NPR’s Tiny Desk for a soulful performance of multiple songs from That’s What They Say. He also recently shared a video for “Route 66” off the album.

You can watch the performances in the video above.

Jack Harlow is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Nick Jonas Anchored An ‘SNL’ Edition Of The ‘Dionne Warwick Talk Show’

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Dionne Warwick has become everyone’s favorite auntie on Twitter. The legendary singer has graced her growing social media fan base with phenomenal content that ranges from poking fun at the young generation of artists to seeking knowledge about them as well. All in all, it’s been a joy to watch Warwick work through the Twitter world and it was only a matter of time before Saturday Night Live emulated her personality on the show, something the cast did during their most recent episode.

Setting up the stage for her daily show, Ego Nwodim played the role of Warwick for the Dionne Warwick Talk Show. The sketch began with Kenan Thompson, who appeared dressed as The Weeknd in his current After Hours plastic surgery look. She asked him about his apparent plastic surgery addiction, confusing his “love” for it as the basis of his “Can’t Feel My Face” track.

Warwick quickly rushed him off stage and invited Nick Jonas, who hosted and performed on the SNL episode, to replace him. The comical questions continued as she asked Nick, who is currently a coach on The Voice, how he could be a more boring contributor to the show than fellow coach John Legend. Warwick also mixed up him with his fellow Jonas brother, Joe, before asking Nick a daring question about his manhood.

The sketch continued with an appearance from Dua Lipa, played by Melissa Villasenor, who agreed to join Warwick in egging Wendy Williams’ house. Lastly Machine Gun Kelly, played by Pete Davidson, joined to close the show, but Warwick was extremely disturbed by his look and quickly asked him to leave.

You can watch the sketch above.

Dua Lipa is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Nick Jonas Gave Debut Performances Of ‘Spaceman’ And ‘This Is Heaven’ On ‘Saturday Night Live’

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It’s been nearly five years since the pop world received an album from Nick Jonas. His last effort was 2016’s Last Year Was Complicated and since then, the singer has been fairly busy thanks to his role as a coach on The Voice and the reunion of Jonas Brothers with siblings Joe and Kevin. Now, Nick is getting back to his solo career, a return that began with the release of “Spaceman” this past Friday. Just days later, he brought his talents back to the Saturday Night Live stage to perform the single for the first time and to debut a new track as well.

Serving as host and musical guest for the SNL episode, Nick began the night by performing “Spaceman.” He performed the track while rocking a thin astronaut-like jumpsuit, ideal for the out-of-this-world feeling he details on the song. Later in the show, he returned to debut a brand new single, “This Is Heaven.” This track is much livelier than the aforementioned single and found Nick getting lost in the groove of the uplifting song to end the night

Both songs will appear on his upcoming album, Spaceman, which is set for a release on March 12. During a recent interview on Zane Lowe’s Apple Music show, Nick spoke about the meaning behind the album’s title. “The key for me was trying to find a way to give this idea a persona, give it a name,” he said in regards to his 2016 album, Last Year Was Complicated. “So ‘Spaceman’ kind of came into my mind as I was thinking, ‘What’s the one thing that all of us have felt during this time? Completely disconnected from the world.’ We’ve gotten so accustomed to looking at a screen instead of human interaction and I think the thing that keeps us all encouraged and hopeful is the idea of knowing that there will be a tomorrow when this is our reality.”

You can watch the performances above.

Spaceman is out 3/12 via Island. Pre-order it here.

Bad Bunny Played A Talking Plant In An ‘SNL’ Music Video For A ‘Loco’ Quarantine Song

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Bad Bunny is an undeniable star at this point in his career, and it’s resulted in some pretty cool opportunities for the singer that don’t always pertain to his chart-topping Latin records. The latest example of this came when he landed a role in a recent Saturday Night Live episode as a talking plant.

In the sketch that also featured Ego Nwodim, Pete Davidson, and Bridgerton star Regé-Jean Page, the group creates a song titled “Loco.” Basically, it’s about the odd feeling that nearly a year worth of social distancing in a pandemic has left them with.

Led by Nwodim, she took viewers on a journey through the odd post-quarantine interactions that take place with people, one of them being Regé-Jean. Davidson lays a verse that follows her sentiments and when the mic returns to Nwodim, she’s interrupted by her talking plant, played by Bad Bunny, who labels her as a “loco” for holding a conversation with him in the first place.

The sketch joined two performances Bad Bunny delivered on SNL, both being songs from his late-2020 album, El Ultimo Tour Del Mundo. The first was “La Noche De Anoche” with Rosalía, who performed beside the singer for the intimate set, and the second was a solo rendition of “Te Deseo Lo Mejor” which Bad Bunny performed with his WWE championship belt beside him.

You can watch the sketch above.

Bad Bunny Dazzled With Performances Of ‘La Noche De Anoche’ And ‘Te Deseo Lo Mejor’ On ‘SNL’

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As if there weren’t plenty of highlights on his resume already, Bad Bunny adds another one to the list with a dazzling performance on Saturday Night Live. Bringing his talents, to the late-night set, he kicked off the night by performing “La Noche De Anoche” with Rosalia. Thanks to the warm red, pink, and purple lighting that appeared around the stage, the rendition of the El Ultimo Tour Del Mundo song proved to be a passionate one and even ended with an intimate moment between the singers.

Next, Bad Bunny returned to the stage by himself to perform “Te Deseo Lo Mejor,” another song from his El Ultimo Tour Del Mundo album. This performance was a bit more upbeat than the previous and one of the best parts about it was it featured Bad Bunny singing the track with his WWE 24/7 championship belt draped over his leg.

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The SNL appearance comes after Bad Bunny shared a passionate video for “La Noche De Anoche” with Rosalía on Valentine’s Day. The two appeared as an inseparable couple for the visual for the El Ultimo Tour Del Mundo highlight. As for what’s next? Bad Bunny may have a Grammy award in his future thanks to Best Latin Pop Album and Best Pop/Duo Group Performance nominations for YHLQMDLG and “Un Día.”

You can watch both SNL performances above.