NEWS
Joe Budden has never been the type to shy away from making people react online. The rapper turned podcaster sparked another round of conversation this weekend while he and the JBP crew talked about Megan Thee Stallion. During her defamation trial involving blogger Milagro Gramz, a Roc Nation staff member revealed that Megan once received an opportunity from the Call Of Duty video game franchise.
After she discovered she would be presented as a character players could shoot at, she turned the offer down. "That triggered her and she full stop said ‘I’m not doing this," Senior VP of Branding and Strategic Partnerships at Roc Nation Daniel Kinney explained.
Joe Budden and the rest of the team agreed that Megan had every reason to make that choice. The conversation shifted, however, once Joe added his own thought. "I do not even play Call Of Duty, I would have bought it off the strength."
Many people viewed that remark as an inappropriate joke tied to a serious situation. Those critics assumed Joe was suggesting he would purchase the game because it might allow players to shoot or "kill" Megan. For nearly a full day, he did not offer any follow up to clear up what he meant.
A recently surfaced audio clip from the JBTV After Hours show finally gives some clarity from Budden himself.
In the audio, Joe admits that his timing was "ill timed" and makes it clear that he is not attempting to defend the remark. He also explains that he did not say it for the purpose of cracking a joke.
His reasoning was the following: "If one of the number one games is trying to put you in as a shootable character, then that must have had data that says that will get a causal fan to the store, just for that reason."
He adds more context by saying, "So, I said as someone who does not play the game, I would go get the game. Again, maybe ill timed, but it was not so jokey jokey."
People are still pushing back on his comments, stating that he is simply trying to talk his way around what he said and that he did not truly mean any of this. As he also mentions in the clip, "There are a lot of agendas being pushed, none of them being mine."
In the end, listeners can either accept his explanation or dismiss it and disagree.
Megan's trial began on Thursday, November 20, in a Miami federal courtroom. She took the stand for roughly two hours that day, defending her belief that Milagro Gramz "created a space for a lot of people to come speak negatively about me." On Friday, November 21, Gramz' legal team cross examined her and challenged the strength of her claims.
NEWS
Placebo have kicked off their 30th anniversary tour by dusting off some tracks for the first time in over 20 years, and also playing new single ‘Helen Keller’ live for the first time.
The new dates come as the band are celebrating the 30 years since they dropped their 1996 debut album. To mark the occasion, they have announced a huge UK and European arena tour, where they have vowed to predominantly play material from their first album and their sophomore record ‘Without You I’m Nothing’.
At the opening night at Krakatoa in Mérignac, France, Brian Molko and co. delivered a stacked 19-song set, which began with ‘Pure Morning’, and immediately went into the first rendition of ‘Come Home’ in 20 years.
Another rarity came straight after, with the first live performance of ‘You Don’t Care About Us’ since 2001, as well as ‘Without You I’m Nothing’ and ‘Allergic (To Thoughts Of Mother Earth)’ which were played for the first time since 2018 and 2014 respectively.
‘Drowning by Numbers’, ‘Bruise Pristine’ and ‘My Sweet Prince’ were all introduced into the setlist for the first time since 2001, ‘Brick Shithouse’ was aired out for the first time since 2003, ‘Scared Of Girls’ was played for the first time since 2010, and both ‘Lady Of The Flowers’ and ‘36 Degrees’ were broken out for the first time in nine years.
The rest of the set was made up of ‘Teenage Angst’, ‘Bionic’, ‘I Know’ and ‘Every You Every Me’, and the band wrapped up the performance with two covers: Depeche Mode’s ‘I Feel You’, and Kate Bush’s ‘Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)’.
It wasn’t until a later show at the Super Bock Arena in Porto, Portugal, that Placebo broke out their new song ‘Helen Keller’ for the first time – playing it 13 songs into the setlist.
Check out more footage from the tour so far below, as well as the setlist from night one.
‘Pure Morning’
‘Come Home’ (First time since 2006)
‘You Don’t Care About Us'(First Time Since 2001)
‘Teenage Angst’
‘Bionic’
‘Without You I’m Nothing” (First Time Since 2018)
‘Allergic (to Thoughts of Mother Earth)” (First Time Since 2014)
‘Drowning by Numbers” (First Time Since 2001)
’36 Degrees” (Alternate Version – First Time Since 2017)
‘I Know’
‘Brick Shithouse’ (First Time Since 2003)
‘Scared of Girls’ (First Time Since 2010)
‘Bruise Pristine” (First Time Since 2001)
‘My Sweet Prince’ (First Time Since 2001)
‘Lady of the Flowers’ (First time since 2017)
‘Nancy Boy’
‘Every You Every Me’
‘I Feel You’ (Depeche Mode cover, live debut)
‘Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)’ (Kate Bush cover)
Placebo dropped the single ‘Helen Keller’ on September 28, and it sees them reach back to ‘H.K. Farewell’, a hidden instrumental from the era of their self-titled 1996 debut. In the track, they retain the eerie keyboard melody from the original, and push it to new dimensions with a heavier, more anguished feeling.
The title refers to the American author, who was also a disability rights advocate and political activist, who became deafblind as a young child and went on to become an internationally renowned writer and campaigner.
As well as the tour, Placebo also celebrated the 30th anniversary of their debut by releasing a reimagined version of the record. For the LP, Molko and Stefan Olsdal returned to the original master tapes and reworked all 10 songs from the 1996 record – describing it as a “director’s cut” that helped them inject the original songs with three decades more experience.
The ongoing tour will reach the UK and Ireland in late November and early December, where they will play Nottingham, Glasgow, Dublin, Manchester, London and Cardiff. See all the dates here and find any remaining tickets here.
Dates will head to Latin America in 2027, beginning in São Paulo on February 20 and running through Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Peru and Colombia before wrapping up with shows in Guadalajara and Monterrey in March.
Placebo dropped their last album of new material in 2022, with ‘Never Let Me Go’. That record was given a four-star review by NME, which described it as “a renaissance rock record with an experimental edge”, adding that it found Placebo “inspired and ready for a new era”.
