Selena Gomez and Taylor Swift both dated Jonas Brothers at the same time, but the real love story was the two women’s friendship that emerged from those romances.

While guesting on an episode of Jake Shane’s Therapuss posted Wednesday (Aug. 6), the Rare Beauty founder reflected on how she first connected with the Eras Tour headliner nearly two decades ago. “Taylor and I dated the Jonas Brothers,” Gomez said with a laugh. “I dated Nick, and she dated Joe … We all know and love each other now, and it’s so cute. We didn’t know what we were doing.”

“She and I like to say the best thing we got out of those relationships was each other,” Gomez continued. “I was about 15, she was about 18, and that’s when it was the crazy, curly [hair] Taylor, and she had all these bracelets that went all the way up [her arm] … We became best friends, bonded over the breakup, as girls do. Then we just stuck around for all the ups and downs that came after, and here we are now 16 years later.”

Indeed, Gomez and Swift are closer than ever. Following their romances with the JoBros, the two women have continued to support each other in their respective endeavors. In March, the 14-time Grammy winner praised the Wizards of Waverly Place alum’s joint album with fiancé Benny Blanco, I Said I Love You First, and in May, Gomez congratulated Swift on reclaiming her masters.

And, just a few weeks prior to the podcast, the former country star sent her bestie home-baked sourdough celebrating Gomez’s “loaf story” with Blanco, a play on the title of 2009 smash “Love Story.”

Speaking of the Fearless hit, Gomez revealed on Therapuss that it was the first song Swift ever played for her before it was even released. “I was in a hotel room, and I remember it vividly,” she told Shane, who was in a state of disbelief. “It was just one of those songs that I instantly heard and thought, ‘This is one of the most beautiful songs ever.’”

“It was so sweet,” Gomez recalled. “She was like, ‘OK, I just want to play you this song, but just, like, I don’t know. It’s going to be the first single, I think.’ Just hearing her say those little thoughts … She is a chameleon. She’s incredible.”

Watch Gomez’s full interview with Shane below.

Kid Cudi hasn’t been shy about his dependency on drugs or suicidal thoughts at various stages of his life in his music. His vulnerabilities endeared him to millions across the globe, helping fans who had similar experiences feel less alone.

The Cleveland rapper completely takes the mask off and pulls back the curtain on his life in his upcoming Cudi the Memoir, which will be released on Aug. 12. GQ shared a harrowing excerpt of the book, which found Cudi reflecting on his darkest hours and a near-fatal drug overdose while working on Man on the Moon II circa 2010.

“I was at peace with dying,” Cudi wrote. “After doing more coke than I ever had in my life I was losing all sense of what was real. I’d been alone in my New York apartment, crying for hours, listening to the Lykke Li song ‘Time Flies’ on repeat. It was a love song, but the melodies and her voice filled me with despair.”

He continued in the excerpt: “I tried to get up off the bed, but my legs wouldn’t work, so I collapsed to the floor and started to crawl. Eventually, I gave in and just laid on the ground. My heart was racing. It felt like it was going to burst any minute.

While Cudi’s music can be the medicine of choice for fans, he was the one ultimately looking for a life raft.

“I was a role model, but I didn’t feel like one. People called me their savior. But who was going to save me? I was a lighthouse for others, but I couldn’t find my own way,” he added. “It was peace I was after. Here, crippled on the floor, minutes from overdosing, was the closest I’d ever come to finding it. ‘You made great music that people loved,’ I thought, ‘but this is the end.’”

Elsewhere in the excerpt, Kid Cudi took fans back to sessions for 2015’s Speedin’ Bullet to Heaven, when he had been “plotting” to die by suicide.

“After we’d finished a session, I’d be alone Googling exit bags. I was thinking about a way I could actually do it. I was plotting it,” he admitted. “There’s a song at the end of Speedin’ Bullet where I say goodbye, and that was meant to be my final album. I was going to kill myself at the end of that album, or before it came out, or during that cycle. I was not planning to live that year. Not many people around me expected me to either.”

Cudi’s memoir arrives on Aug. 12, and then 10 days later, the multi-hyphenate entertainer will release his 12th studio album, Free, on Aug. 22.

If you or anyone you know is in crisis, call 988 or visit the website for the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, which offers free, confidential support 24/7. Those in need of confidential support for mental health or substance abuse issues can reach out to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.

Who would have thought that the Greatest Mysterio of All-Time began his wrestling career at 8 years old? If you ask WWE Superstar Dirty Dom, it’s his “deadbeat dad”, Hall of Famer, Rey Mysterio Jr., who’s looking up to him these days.

At 28, Dominik Mysterio has become WWE’s most reviled antagonist, drawing nuclear heat from coast to coast due to his snake-like antics and unrelenting arrogance. On Sunday (Aug. 3), Dirty Dom slithered his way to another win, outsmarting AJ Stylez in a cerebral SummerSlam showdown to retain his Intercontinental Championship.

“From the smartest guys to the biggest guys, if you’re smart in the ring, you’ll be able to outmaneuver and do whatever you want in there,” Mysterio told me the following day before Monday Night Raw from The Barclays Center. “I think I proved that by being a 20-year veteran in this business. AJ thought he was going to walk in there and mess with some kid, but he was messing with the Greatest Mysterio of all-time.”

Though Dirty Dom’s in-ring debut began in 2020, the pretentious son of Rey Mysterio Jr. inherited his slick ways from iconic WWE superstar Eddie Guerrero. Much like Latino Heat, the West Coast native fully embraces the art of lying, cheating, stealing — a philosophy that’s helped him climb to the top of the WWE food chain.

For Entry 010 of Mic Drops and Elbow Drops, Dirty Dom chops it up with Carl Lamarre about his Intercontinental Championship reign, who he thinks is the best heel in pro sports, and how he built the ruthless confidence that fuels his fire.

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The Eddie Guerrero homage was alive and well during that match. From your perspective as someone who honors his legacy, what do you think was Eddie’s most underrated skill as a wrestler?

I believe his ring IQ. People see how good he was inside the ring, what he did and how he achieved those things [because] his moves were great, but the way he would put things together and how he could be able to manipulate feelings based off what he was doing with his movements, I think that was severely underrated. There’s not a person that doesn’t say that when they worked with Eddie Guerrero, that he wasn’t the best person to work with because of how he carried himself. He can go in there and if there’s things he needed to change off the fly, he was the man to do it. So I think his ring IQ is definitely his most underrated skill.

You’ve now passed 100 days as Intercontinental Champion. Has the thought of chasing Gunther’s historic 666-day reign crossed your mind?

Honestly, I’m a day-by-day kind of guy. I am a very chill, California kid from San Diego, if you catch my vibe. I’m a day-by-day, figuring it out [type of wrestler]. I know this is a working man’s title, but hell, if I don’t think anyone is good enough to challenge me, I might hold off for a year. I might not even challenge [anyone] for a year. Who knows? If you’re not worthy of it, why should I let you challenge for my title? I just beat AJ Styles — who’s beaten everybody — so I’ve technically beaten everybody. Forget Steiner Math, this is Dirty Dom Math.

Let’s stir the pot a little. If you had to serve as special guest referee for a triple threat between Rhea Ripley, Roxanne Perez and Liv Morgan, who’s walking out with the win and why?

Liv. Liv’s winning, 100%. Not even based off me being a biased referee or anything. It’s just based off of skill and achievement. Liv is the only person that’s beaten Rhea Ripley more than three times, correct? She retired Becky Lynch. She is the greatest woman’s world champion. She’s a four-time woman’s tag champion. She’s a Slammy Award winner. There’s levels to this, and I believe Liv is at the top of her level. Not even being a biased ref, I would count it straight down the middle and she’d win.

Your first SummerSlam match was against Seth Rollins. Five years later, you’re beating AJ Styles. From both an in-ring and confidence standpoint, what are you most proud of in your growth since then?

I’ve grown massively. I’ve been more confident in the ring and being able to move and do what I want in the ring as far as move-sets and how I act and do things. And being with The Judgment Day as well gave me a level of confidence I didn’t have to the point where I had guys like Finn [Balor], JD [McDonagh], and Damian [Priest] helping me out with all this stuff, telling me, “Nah, dude. This is where you’re at. This is where you’re gonna be.” Sure enough, they helped me build that confidence. Even Voldemort.

Voldemort from Harry Porter?

No, the other person from the Judgment Day that I don’t say the name of. 

Who was the first heel you gravitated toward as a fan and idolized? 

JBL. 

Why JBL? 

Because everything he did seemed so genuine and with hatred. He called himself “The Wrestling God” for a reason. Being a Latino Mexican myself, the skit of him going down by the border — and I know it might be a touchy subject right now — was crazy to me. As a heel, you’re pushing the button as much as possible. So to me, JBL was that dude, to where he can get away with everything and just do anything — because he’s also a 6’7′ cowboy of a heel that’ll knock your head off with a clothesline. 

Which current WWE superstar do you think mastered the art of nuclear heat better than anyone?

Me. There’s no doubt about it. Also, the people around me have helped me so much because obviously these were uncharted territories that we were going into. It happened with Vicky [Guerrero] — but no disrespect to Vicky, she was never a wrestler. She was never bumping and going in there. I’m in there bumping, cutting promos, top of my game, Greatest Mysterio of All-Time — no one’s doing it like I am. Plus, I’m 28 years old. If I wanted to, I could step it up even more — and no one in the past, the present, coming up and even now would lay a finger on me. 

Lastly, who’s the biggest heel in pro sports right now, and what makes them so good at it?

I mean, he’s loved by the city, but hated by everyone else — I’m gonna have to go with my boy Fernando Tatis Jr. Just ’cause the way he carries himself, he’s so swagged out. He’s a stud. He’s a stud in the outfield, he’s a stud at shortstop if they need him there and he’s a stud hitter. The dude could steal homers. He can do it all. People hate him for it, because what? He’s a baller? He’s getting paid millions and millions of dollars and he does this to your favorite teams. All the Dodgers hate him.

Mets fans hate him too.

Are you a Mets fan? 

I’m on the right side of history.

I was gonna say y’all had a bad three-game sweep. And he embraces being a heel. You have to be OK with the boos, getting hated and you gotta be able to embrace it. I think he’s one of the few guys that embraces being the heel. He doesn’t mind getting booed, he’s OK with it. 

Busta Rhymes‘ former assistant is suing over allegations that the rapper assaulted him and then blacklisted him in the music industry – a lawsuit that quickly prompted the star to “categorically” deny any wrongdoing and threaten a countersuit.

In a case filed Tuesday in Brooklyn federal court, Dashiel Gables claims Busta (born Trevor Smith Jr.) repeatedly punched him in the face in January for using his phone on the job. After Gables filed a police report, he says the star retaliated by ensuring that nobody else will hire him.

“This industry-wide retaliation has devastated plaintiff’s career prospects and ability to earn a living in the only industry in which he has worked,” attorneys for Gables write in the filing obtained by Billboard.

But in a response statement Thursday, Rhymes said he “completely and categorically” denies the allegations from Gables, who the star described as an ex-staffer who only worked for him for “a very brief period.”

“Apparently, Dashiel has decided to respond to being let go by manufacturing claims against me in an attempt to attack and damage my reputation,” Rhymes wrote in a statement shared with Billboard. “I look forward to proving these allegations false, and am preparing a countersuit, which I am confident will expose this for what it is — an attempted shakedown by a disgruntled former assistant. Ultimately, I am certain the truth will prevail.” 

Rhymes was arrested in January over the alleged Jan. 10 attack in the lobby of the star’s luxury Brooklyn high-rise, in which police said the rapper punched the 50-year-old staffer in the face multiple times, sending him to the hospital. Court records do not indicate that prosecutors ended up pursuing charges over the incident.

In his lawsuit, Gables offered more alleged details on the incident, which he says was sparked by a phone call from his daughter while he was unloading the star’s luggage. Though Gables said he ignored the call, he claims he responded via text message, sending Rhymes “into a rage” in which the star allegedly screamed, “Stay the f–k off your phone.”

“When plaintiff explained it was his daughter, Busta Rhymes responded, ‘Don’t tell me about your f–king kid, what the f–k that gotta do with me?” Gables’ lawyers wrote. “When plaintiff responded that it could have been an emergency, Busta Rhymes asked ‘are you talking while I’m talking?’ and then, with a closed fist, punched plaintiff in the face.”

After Rhymes allegedly punched him again, Gables said he himself walked away from the scene, causing the rapper to “to become even more enraged” and scream more.

“While plaintiff tolerated a great deal of abuse while working for Busta Rhymes, he could not tolerate the repeated physical assault and was unable to return to work,” his lawyers said, confirming that he filed a report with the police.

The incident has allegedly left Gables “frozen out of the hip-hop music industry” after decades of work in that space: “Word of the assault and plaintiff’s complaint against Busta Rhymes has spread throughout the tight-knit hip-hop community, resulting in plaintiff being effectively blacklisted from employment opportunities in his chosen field.”

In technical terms, the lawsuit accuses Rhymes of a variety of federal and state employment law violations, as well as civil assault and battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress.