What’s an apikores to do on Yom Kippur? If you were an anarchist in London, New York, or Warsaw in the early 20th century, there’s a good chance you would have attended a Yom Kippur ball for the express purpose of eating, drinking, and thumbing your nose at tradition and the religious establishment.

The creators of the new comedy series YidLife Crisis have captured that heretical spirit, added a dash of irony and Yiddish profanity, and served it up for free online—with a side of poutine.

YidLife is the brainchild of Canadian comics Eli Batalion and Jamie Elman, who play Leizer and Chaimie, respectively. The web series follows the two thirty-somethings as they contemplate the modern Jewish condition against the backdrop of Montreal’s iconic restaurants. The best part? YidLife’s dialogue is spoken almost entirely in Yiddish.

In “Breaking the Fast,” the first episode of the series, Chaimie tries to persuade Leizer to ditch the whole Yom Kippur thing and indulge in some poutine, which, for the uninitiated, consists of French fries slathered in cheese curds and meat-based gravy—essentially a very delicious, very treyf heart attack in a bowl. Leizer doesn’t need much in the way of convincing, though he makes sure to keep his cheese curds and gravy separate. As Leizer himself puts it (in Yiddish), “If I have to break the fast, fine, but I will not mix milk and meat!”

Watch  “Breaking the Fast” below, and stay tuned for an interview with Batalion and Elman!

Related: Jews, Proselytizing, and Comedy Collide in ‘Jewvangelist’

The post New Web Series Celebrates Poutine, Lactaid, and Jewish Angst—in Yiddish appeared first on Jewcy.

Drake won his first Grammy last night, and it’s safe to say the award has already gone to his head. The rapper’s confidence has skyrocketed with each successive hit, and nowhere is it more visible than in his song lyrics. Let’s start with Drake’s claim in his new single, “Started From The Bottom,” that he wears “every single chain, even when he’s in the house.” It’s an odd type of brag that doesn’t even sound cool to imagine doing. It sounds like it would be really heavy and get in the way of regular tasks like opening the refrigerator or trying to find the remote. Drake owns what, like twenty chains? At least twenty. No one wears twenty chains at once—2 Chainz only wears two at the same time, which, according to Yahoo! Answers, is the acceptable limit.

What’s more, Drake might actually be telling the truth. Claire Hoffman’s memorable GQ interview, which ended with Drake asking if they would have sex, describes Drake’s house as the type of place where opening the fridge door is one’s last concern: “bronze animals—lions, elephants, giraffes!—checker the lawn, glimmering in the last light of the San Fernando Valley sun. A giant fire, fit for a king from Middle-earth, burns in an outdoor fireplace, and a flat-screen TV plays Sixteen Candles.” The man himself is humbly adorned with “two long diamond-rope necklaces.”

The king of bragging we hear in “From The Bottom” isn’t new to Drake. He’s as cocky as they get in the rap game. Which is fine, but what makes this single stand out, and what’s been drawing some ridicule, is its emphasis on class. The title gives it away—Drake started at the bottom, now he’s on the top. Along with the single he included a note on his blogspot (bless you, Drake) that partially read,

I feel sometimes that people don’t have enough information about my beginnings and therefore they make up a life story for me that isn’t consistent with actual events. My family and my second family (consisting of the best friends anybody could ever have) all struggled and worked extremely hard to make all this happen. I did not buy my way into this spot and it was the furthest thing from easy to achieve.

Drake’s background is pretty well-known at this point—I wouldn’t be writing about him for Jewcy if he didn’t have a Jewish mother—through a friend in school he was able to get onto the Canadian teen drama Degrassi as Jimmy Brooks, the nice guy (when Marco is having trouble coming out of the closet in Season 3, Jimmy organizes a sleepover with Marco and Spinner, where Marco saves Spinner from choking on a piece of cheese, helping them to later come to terms with Marco’s sexuality).

Drake grew up poor in a wealthy Toronto neighborhood, a child of divorce with parents living worlds away from each other in Canada and Tennessee. That’s got to be tough on a kid. But it’s not quite Chief Keef and Young Chop tough, growing up amidst Chicago’s shocking gang violence, murders getting announced regularly over the summer, and the mayor going on national television to plead with gangs not to target kids. That feels more like the bottom. And there’s no breakout role on Degrassi in that story.

Drake doesn’t try to downplay his squeaky clean TV past, but the choice to portray himself as such an underdog while 17-year-old Keef is heading to prison (and has a daughter) seems a bit much. Arguing with your mom “every month” is rough, Drake, but it’s not prison. The explosion of diversity of styles in mainstream rap over the last few years, an explosion Drake has partially led, has in turn expanded the range of allowable topics to rap about. So why return to the same old authenticity debate that we’ve been hearing since Ice Cube? Especially on a pretty lame track (to be fair, it’s got a great beat).

That’s the real problem here. Drake can talk about his upbringing as much as he wants, but he’s doing us all a disservice by playing this ‘I’m real’ game, because it’s 2013 and that shit matters less and less every day. More then any other type of music, rap has long been dominated by street cred—Lana Del Rey-gate was nothing compared to how 50 Cent ended (like really ended) Ja Rule’s very successful career with the song “Wanksta”—but it’s not 2002 anymore. With everyone creating, destroying, and reimagining personas on the Internet anyway, it’s increasingly pointless to rely solely on bragging about where you came from.

We know you’re at the top, Drake. Tell us what comes next.

(Photo by Ethan Miller/Getty Images)

***

Like this post? Sign up for our weekly newsletter to get new Jewcy stories in your inbox every Thursday.

The post Grammy Winner Drake is All Grown Up, But Still Focused on the Past appeared first on Jewcy.

Breaking news, young Jews: In a recent interview with New York Magazine, Matisyahu maintains that he is still more Jewish than Drake, even after the public release of his freshly shorn face in December 2011. Although Drake, the Canadian television star-turned-rapper, has a Jewish mother and is therefore halachically Jewish, Matisyahu upholds his claim that he reps the tribe better than the Canadian rapper. This, of course, despite Drake’s rambunctious and outrageously lavish Bar Mitzvah-themed music video.

Of course, biologically speaking, it is impossible for one Jew to be ‘more Jewish’ than another. But let’s run with it: although Matisyahu has ditched the scruff, he seems to identify with a more modern stream of Judaism. Unlike in a previous stage of life, during which he refused to walk outside with his glasses on so as to not be tempted by posters of scantily-clad women (there are women-obscuring glasses for that, it turns out), Matisyahu now has a broader and more open-minded perspective. Speaking of the character he plays in the new Jewish-themed dybbuk horror movie, The Possession, he says, “He saw that humanity was bigger than one race or religion, and I kind of feel like that’s what I do. People really ripped me apart for going out in the world and playing music for non-Jews, but that’s not the issue for me.”

Let’s not get too excited, though, about Matisyahu’s newly discovered secularism: he still keeps kosher, doesn’t hold concerts on Saturdays, and knows a lot about dybbuks from his new film. And let’s be real—his beard was shaved in a Supercuts on the Upper West Side, a place not-quite-devoid of Jewish brethren.

As Matisyahu said himself: “It grows back!”

Related: Matisyahu Shaves Beard, Is No Longer Hasidic [The Scroll]

The post Matisyahu Says He’s More Jewish Than Drake, Even Without His Beard appeared first on Jewcy.

We got Grossman’s top five Shatner moments of all time:

5. Shatner Introduces George Lucas: Whoever got the idea that William Shatner should appear at a gala for that overrated hack George Lucas was a genius. Classic light ego and charm, and a fun rendition of “My Way” at the end. And if you go full out nerd, you might even see this bit as an apology for the rough treatment he gave conventions back in 1986 on Saturday Night Live. The nicest type of trolling.

4. Rollins Meets Shatner: If there’s one person I trust on matter of personal taste, it’s Henry Rollins. So I was very pleased with his recounting of how he and Bill Shatner got to be friends, and how genuinely overjoyed Shatner was to be making original music. Make sure to check out part two, where Bill and Henry get scallops. This sounds like the greatest reality TV show of all time.

3. Bernie Taupin Introduces “Rocket Man:” Too many things to love in this one to mention. The touches of 70’s style that the 1978 Science Fiction Convention shelled out for. The deadness in the eyes of Bernie Taupin as he is forced by quick paycheck to announce how happy he is to hear this, the wannabe tough guy pose. Shatner’s just cashing in at this point, but figures he can be just cool enough for these nerds.

2. Shatner and Ben Folds on Conan: Before Has Been, before anyone knew that this could be a success. Maybe it shouldn’t be surprising what a great screen presence Shatner has here, but this was post-Star Trek and pre-Boston Legal, no one knew what to expect from him, it certainly wasn’t this. You can tell from the lame attempts at jokes in the interview afterwards that he’s still not completely in his comfort zone.

1. As opposed to here, at the height of his musical prowess: Shatner and Folds had a very light tour in support of Has Been, and it’s infuriating that this is the only clip I’ve been able to find. “It Hasn’t Happened Yet” isn’t even the best song off Has Been, but Shatner and his backing band squeeze out every iota of emotional power into the spoken word piece about the trying nature of fame.

(image credit: Taylor Hill/Getty Images)

The post Move Over Drake, William Shatner Wins Emotional Canadian Jew of the Week appeared first on Jewcy.