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Music

Skillz Finally Puts Our Stupid, Meme-Filled, Racist 2015 to Rest with His Yearly Rap Up

Were you worried Skillz wouldn't mention the dress? Don't be. He mentions the dress.

Every year, shortly before singing "auld lang syne," the world gathers together for an important tradition that helps us turn the page on all the events of the prior 12 months. That tradition is Skillz's Rap Up, in which the Virginia rapper cleverly weaves together the news stories that grabbed our attention that year. It can be a little hit or miss, but for all the year-end coverage that exists, few things tend to better sum up all the dumb things we cared about. After all, it's not like you were refreshing the BBC every day looking for ISIS updates; your dumb ass was making Snapchats about how "lit" everything was.

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And in that spirit, this year's edition is a model one, as you can probably already tell from the cover. What says 2015 better than a bad Jordan crying meme? Nothing. Quoth Skillz, re: the Drake/Meek Mill beef, "you can't win on the internet / and that's the facts."

Does Skillz mention the dress? You bet. He also touches on meme culture phenomena ranging from dabbing to "Hotline Bling" to Back to the Future day to DJ Khaled's catchphrases. His pop culture recap includes everything from 50 Shades of Grey to Fetty Wap to the Pacquiao/Mayweather fight (not as good as the movie Creed) to Zayn leaving One Direction. But there is also quite a bit of actual news in here, including things you might have already forgotten about, like Brian Williams leaving NBC Nightly News, Hillary Clinton's email scandal, and Kim Davis denying gay marriages in Kentucky, which "had everybody vexed."

The most pointed words are reserved for tackling the year's various race-related tragedies, from the death of Freddie Gray to the chuch shooting in Charleston and subsequent burning of black churches. Skillz lays out the frustrating struggle of the Black Lives Matter movement in the face of "All Lives Matter" contrarians perfectly: "Yeah black lives matter, but they only matter to us."

Elsewhere, he handles Caitlyn Jenner's transition with humor and empathy, quipping, "Caitlyn Jenner told Bruce 'bruh I got it from here.'" He also riffs on one of the year's dumber trends, hoverboards, while saving a punchline for one of the better trends: "y'all hopped on hoverboards and kept busting your ass / down goes another one like a Confederate flag."

Amy Schumer, Steph Curry, Dr. Dre, and Ronda Rousey are among the other people who get shout outs. To reminisce over the year properly with Skillz, listen up below, and take his final piece of advice for 2016, "just love whoever you come across."

Follow Kyle Kramer on Twitter.