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The Super Bowl is less than a week away, meaning championship rings are on a lot people’s minds — but is Travis Kelce thinking about another type of ring for Taylor Swift?
While speaking to reporters at the Super Bowl’s opening night in New Orleans Monday (Feb. 3), the tight end was asked whether he plans on popping the question to his superstar girlfriend at the Kansas City Chiefs’ ultimate game against the Philadelphia Eagles this weekend. In response, Kelce smiled coyly.
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” he replied cheekily.
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Engagement rumors have surrounded the New Heights podcaster and Swift since early on in their relationship, which began in the summer of 2023. In fact, this latest bout of ring-related speculation mirrors similar questions Kelce dodged ahead of last year’s Super Bowl, which Kansas City went on to win against the San Francisco 49ers.
But while he didn’t clear anything up at Monday’s press conference, Kelce did gush about the “Fortnight” singer’s culinary abilities. “Oh, she is quite the cook,” he said at one point before revealing his favorite dish Swift makes: “Her Pop Tarts are unbelievable.”
“I better hold up my end of the bargain, right?” Kelce added of Swift’s work ethic elsewhere in the Q&A session. “She’s up there being the superstar that she is and never taking no for an answer and always working her tail off. I better match that energy for sure.”
The opening night press junket comes one day after the musician attended the 2025 Grammys, to which Swift arrived solo in a Chiefs-red dress with a “T” charm attached to the hem. She didn’t win any out of her six nominations, but the “Karma” artist did inspire several viral moments during the ceremony’s broadcast, from snagging Janelle Monáe’s jacket to dancing with Alicia Keys’ son Genesis.
The award show marked Swift’s first Grammys since closing out her billion-dollar Eras Tour in December. At one of the run’s final stops, the songwriter played at New Orleans’ Caesars Superdome — the very same stadium where the Super Bowl will take place Sunday (Feb. 9).
While performing “Midnight Rain” at the venue Oct. 28, Swift did one of her boyfriend’s signature dance moves and held up three fingers, seemingly hoping to prime the stadium for a record third Chiefs Super Bowl win in a row. On Monday, Kelce was asked about the gesture.
“We both, we love to manifest things,” he replied, smiling. “Whatever she was doing, I’m sure it helped. And for me, not being able to be here supporting her during those weeks, it made me feel like I was there.”
Fans tuning in to the Super Bowl this weekend will hear a familiar voice, as Shania Twain lends her voice to an all-out “foam party” in the new Coffee Mate Cold Foam Creamer ad, which will air during the Super Bowl on Feb. 9, when the Philadelphia Eagles face off against the Kansas City Chiefs at Caesars Superdome in New Orleans.
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The five-time Grammy winner is the voice behind the ad’s uptempo pop song “Gimme Cold Foam,” which serves as a love letter to coffee, punctuated by the lines “Gimme cold foam! Gimme cold foam!/ I’m a dancing tongue, and I like the taste of cold foam.” The ad, in which Twain voices a tongue that not only sings and dances, but even does flips, was created by Wieden+Kennedy New York and directed by Dan Streit.
“The song is just so catchy,” Twain tells Billboard of “Gimme Cold Foam.” “It is just very danceable and fun and it just sticks in your brain. It is one of those catchy songs, so I just think it’s a really great little bop.”
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Twain laid down her vocals for the track in a hotel room in Mexico, as she was taking part in Brandi Carlile’s Girls Just Wanna Weekend. “It was so fun. I really get into character singing it, which made it a blast,” Twain recalls of recording the song.
Billboard caught up with Twain to discuss her role in the upcoming Coffee Mate Cold Foam Creamer Super Bowl ad, her hopes for the Super Bowl, and who she would love to see sing the national anthem.
Had you seen the footage for the commercial by the time you recorded the song?
No, I heard the music before I saw the video, which I think was a good idea because I was just attracted to the catchiness of the song. It was this cool, boppy tune and then watching the video, I just laughed. It was cheerful, quirky, funny–and I’m a dancing tongue, man!
What is your favorite coffee?
I’m one of these seasonal coffee people where in the cooler weather I want a hot coffee and in the summer I want a cold brew. And talking about this cold foam, for me, hot coffee, black with cold foam on top and then spoon up the rest. Coffee with the cold foam is more like an ice cream dessert.
You performed at the Super Bowl halftime show in 2003. What do you recall about the performance?
It was a very hectic environment, which I wasn’t expecting, but it wasn’t just your normal, “Okay, you’re on in five minutes.” There was so much rehearsal and a lot of the rehearsal was just getting from the backstage to across the field to the stage and all the security involved and all of this convoy of equipment and everything. It was a huge production and that just built the hype up for me so much more. So it felt like a very epic moment.
Speaking of the Super Bowl, who are you rooting for this year?
I’m not really rooting one way or the other. I really hope it’s a good, strong game, just so that makes it a very exciting game for everyone. I think this game has more anticipation than others because of Taylor [Swift]’s association with the [Kansas City] Chiefs. And of course, I don’t want my friend to go home disappointed. I want her to be happy and feel that joy.
Who would you love to see either sing the national anthem or do the halftime show at the Super Bowl?
I want to see Brandi Carlile. I don’t think she’s ever done the national anthem. It would be the ultimate.
See the Coffee Mate Cold Foam Creamer ad below:
The National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA) announced on Tuesday (Feb. 4) that it would issue takedown notices to Spotify for 2,500 podcast episodes on the platform that allegedly contain “unlicensed musical works” from 19 NMPA member publishers.
“Spotify has thousands of unlicensed songs in its podcasts, which it has done nothing to remedy. This takedown action comes as no surprise, we have warned of this issue for some time,” says NMPA president and CEO David Israelite of the takedown notices. According to the NMPA, this is just the start of the takedown requests, and the demands will continue to roll out.
This is the latest of many retaliatory actions the NMPA has taken against Spotify since last March, when Spotify significantly cut payments to NMPA’s members for premium subscriptions. By adding audiobooks into its premium subscription tiers, Spotify argued it qualified for a discounted royalty rate, known as “bundle,” given it would now have to pay for books and music from the same price tag that was once just for music. Israelite said at the time that he would “declare war” on Spotify for this move, and launched a number of actions to fight back.
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This included sending cease and desist notices for podcast and video content on its platform that were allegedly infringing on music IP; a legislative proposal, asking for the overhaul of the statutory license; complaints to the FTC and nine state attorneys general; and more. Around the same time, the Mechanical Licensing Collective (MLC) also fought back by filing a lawsuit against Spotify for the move to bundle premium subscriptions, calling it “unlawful.”
On Sunday, Jan. 26, the Spotify bundling issue was brought back into the headlines when Universal Music Group announced a new direct deal with Spotify which included changes both to the recorded music and publishing royalty rates. This marked the first direct deal between Spotify and a publisher since the passage of the Music Modernization Act (MMA), and sources close to the deal say that the agreement included improved remuneration for UMG’s publishing company, Universal Music Publishing Group, and its songwriters.
Still, all other publishers, most of which are members of the NMPA, remain on the baseline bundle rate. The NMPA told Billboard at the time that the deal was “good news for the entire industry” and that “a rising tide lifts all boats, and this signals that Spotify is coming back to the table,” but the organization also added it had no plans to stop any of the actions it had already set in motion against Spotify, and neither did the MLC.
A few days later, on Jan. 29, the MLC’s lawsuit against Spotify was dismissed, with a federal judge saying that Spotify’s move to bundling was supported by “unambiguous” regulations. The judge is not giving the MLC a chance to refile and said the law is clear. Still, if the MLC wants to, it can challenge the ruling at the federal appeals court.
These takedown requests make it clear that the NMPA is not ready to bury the hatchet with Spotify. Among the 2,500 takedown requests are podcasts that allegedly contain unlicensed musical works from publishers like ABKCO, Anthem Entertainment, Big Machine Music, BMG, Concord Music Publishing, Downtown Music Publishing, Hipgnosis Songs Group, Kobalt, Mayimba Music, peermusic, Primary Wave Music, Reservoir, The Royalty Network, Inc., Sony Music Publishing, Spirit Music Group, Ultra Music Publishing, Universal Music Publishing Group, Warner Chappell Music, and Wixen Music Publishing.
Israelite adds: “Podcasts are a growing source of revenue for songwriters and publishers, and it is essential that podcasts provide lawfully produced entertainment. This is not hard to do, and Spotify knows, and has known, how to fix this problem for their users. We hope podcast hosts will stand up for their fellow creators and demand that Spotify do better. Spotify will stop at nothing to undervalue songwriters on behalf of its bottom line. Look no further than its recent bundling scheme and its ill-conceived appeal of songwriters’ rate increase in CRB III. We will not stop until the platform fixes its podcast problem, and all other areas where songwriters are not earning what they deserve.”
“It’s almost like, an anti-pop song,” María Zardoya, the leader of The Marías, says of “No One Noticed.”
Considering the sighing production, murmured harmonies and somber lyrical tone as Zardoya pleads with a lover for attention and reassurance, “No One Noticed” understandably did not lead the indie-pop band’s second album, Submarine, upon its release last May. Yet in the months since, the song has transformed into a viral breakthrough and the band’s biggest hit to date.
Zardoya says that none of the band members expected “No One Noticed” to become The Marías’ first solo Billboard Hot 100 entry. Its success not only strengthened the band’s commercial footprint — it validated their entire aesthetic.
“It gets you in your feels — it’s pretty emotional, and kind of slow,” she says of “No One Noticed.” “It gives me hope that people are still open to listening to a song over and over that makes them cry.”
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The Marías photographed on January 15, 2025 in New York.
Caroline Tompkins
The enduring hit isn’t the bilingual, Los Angeles-based quartet’s first visit to the Hot 100, previously reaching the chart thanks to Bad Bunny: in 2022, the band was a featured act on “Otro Atardecer,” a buoyant Spanish-language album cut from the superstar’s Grammy-winning album Un Verano Sin Ti that peaked at No. 49. “That was always our No. 1 song on our Spotify page, by far, and we thought it was going to be forever,” says drummer/producer Josh Conway with a laugh. “That was a pretty big pinch-me moment, when ‘No One Noticed’ surpassed it. And now it’s surpassed it by a lot.”
The origin of “No One Noticed” predates the Bad Bunny collaboration — as well as The Marías album that came before Submarine. Zardoya, a Puerto Rico native who grew up in Atlanta, formed The Marías in 2016 when she started writing songs with L.A. native Conway, before recruiting Jesse Perlman on guitar and Edward James on keys. Following a pair of indie EPs and steady work as a touring band, The Marías signed an Atlantic Records deal in early 2021 and released their debut album, Cinema, that June.
Zardoya says that the band started writing “No One Noticed” during the pandemic in 2020, chipping away at a demo before ultimately “putting it on the back burner for a while,” then revisiting it as a potential addition to Submarine. Part of the reason why it was shrugged off for years was because as the group searched for a breakthrough single, they thought that meant something with a quicker pace than the viscous dreaminess of “No One Noticed.”
“We were understandably getting a little pressure from the label, and I think that the first thing labels look at as being a ‘hit’ is something with tempo,” Zardoya explains. So the band focused the Cinema campaign around the sleek dark-pop single “Hush,” and released the danceable electro-funk track “Run Your Mouth” as the lead single to Submarine last year. Both made the lower reaches of the Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart.
The Marías photographed on January 15, 2025 in New York.
Caroline Tompkins
Meanwhile, Mick Management’s Jonathan Eshak, the band’s manager who started working with The Marías between their two albums, identified a sizable live base for the band and prioritized streamlining their touring agenda for Submarine. “They could play pretty large rooms — not just in New York or L.A., but in markets that are a little less traveled,” Eshak says. “But a big mission statement from María, Josh, Jesse and Eddie was they didn’t want to be viewed as just a domestic act — they really wanted to speak to fans who are either Spanish-speaking, have ancestral roots in Latin America, or are in Latin America.” As such, The Marías kicked off their tour in support of Submarine with a four-night residency at Foro Puebla in Mexico City last June, before headlining across North America throughout the summer.
As they began presenting Submarine on tour, The Marías found it interesting that “No One Noticed” would elicit some of the evening’s biggest cheers; similarly, the band would hear from friends, and read fan comments, declaring the moody track as the album standout. By July, TikTok users had adopted the song — particularly its “Come on, don’t leave me, it can’t be that easy, babe/If you believe me, I guess I’ll get on a plane” breakdown — and when Billie Eilish posted a clip of herself singing along to “No One Noticed” on her Instagram story on July 17, streams began to skyrocket.
By early September, “No One Noticed” had reached the top 10 of the Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart. As the band was prepping for its first proper European tour for the fall, it was announced as an opener on the December leg of Eilish’s arena tour. “Billie showed love for ‘No One Noticed’ really early on,” says Zardoya, “so it was cool to perform that song live at her shows — I would dedicate it to her before we performed it, every single night.”
And as the crowd sizes increased, so did the song’s audience. Since serving as a summertime-sadness anthem thanks to its initial TikTok pickup, “No One Noticed” has crossed over to streaming platforms and even to radio. The song has 215.3 million official on-demand U.S. streams through Jan. 30, according to Luminate, and reached No. 4 on Hot Rock & Alternative Songs, No. 11 on Streaming Songs and No. 26 on Pop Airplay, where it hits a new high this week. “No One Noticed” has also peaked at No. 22 in 18 weeks on the Hot 100 and reentered the top 40 on the Feb. 1-dated chart.
The Marías are slated to perform at three South American editions of Lollapalooza in March before playing Coachella in April. Eshak says that, as the band prepares to play Submarine in front of oversized festival crowds, the rising interest in their catalog beyond “No One Noticed” demonstrates how much more growth they can achieve in 2025.
“There’s so much runway for this band,” he says. “Obviously a hit song’s a hit song, and we’ll take them where we can find them, but what I’m so excited about is how people are engaging with the band’s entire world.”
That world will also expand when the follow-up to Submarine arrives: The Marías spent some time at New York’s famed Electric Lady Studios in January and are planning on more sessions following their festival gigs in the spring.
“We were pretty surprised at how experimental things were in the studio,” says Conway of the recent sessions. “I think ‘No One Noticed’ helped pave the way for us to let our guard down a little and do whatever we want.”
Caroline Tompkins
This story appears in the Feb. 8, 2025, issue of Billboard.
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Source: Marvel Entertainment / Marvel
With the Marvel Cinematic Universe struggling to drum up any kind of interest from it’s hardcore fanbase (Captain America: Brave New World is not helping whatsoever), it seems like they just might’ve finally raised quite a few eyebrows as they’ve just released the first teaser trailer for their highly-anticipated film, The Fantastic Four.
Source: Marvel Entertainment / Marvel
Earlier today (Feb. 4), Marvel Studios gave fans a first look at what they can expect when the Matt Shakman directed feature premiers in theaters later this year and it’s looking like one helluva ride. Starring Pedro Pascal (Mr. Fantastic), Vanessa Kirby (Invisible Woman), Joseph Quinn (The Human Torch) and Ebon Moss-Bachrach (The Thing), the trailer finds the heroic foursome already well established heroes in their reality with a fanbase before facing off with the devouerer of worlds, Galactus (Ralph Ineson).
Now that Galactus has stumbled upon earth with an insatiable appetite, it’ll be on our heroes to try and stop big G from consuming earth and saving the day, but will they?
With rumors running around that The Fantastic Four will tie directly into Avengers: Doomsday and will ultimately lead to them traveling to the main Marvel timeline, it’ll be interesting to see how things play out and whether or not they can actually stop Galactus from destroying their world or if they have to save themselves by escaping his wraith.
There’s even word that this is the reality in which Doctor Doom resides and will be making his cinematic debut.
Either way, Marvel’s got our money for this one already. Captain America: Brave New World? Probably not. Just sayin.’
Check out the trailer for The Fantastic Four: First Steps below and let us know if you’ll be checking it out when it hits theaters on July 25 in the comments section.
Beyoncé had plenty of company when she celebrated her long-sought, first-ever album of the year win at Sunday night’s (Feb. 2) 67th Grammy Awards. The top prize went to Bey’s Cowboy Carter, but the trophy for second-most excited in the room definitely went to GloRilla, who was absolutely losing it when Queen Bey’s name was […]
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Source: Emma McIntyre / Getty
It’s not enough for anti-Trump voters and activists to speak out against the bigoted, oppressive, exclusionary and white nationalist-friendly agenda that President Donald Trump is forcing on the federal government, and, by extension, the nation.
We need our Democratic leaders, the people who are in the closest position to resist Trump’s policies, to speak out and do so without mincing words and using soft language. And, for that, we have Democratic Rep. Jasmine Crockett.
On Friday night (Jan. 31), the Trump administration began a purge of federal law enforcement employees, including prosecutors who handled Jan. 6 cases, officials involved in prosecutions against himself and FBI agents involved in investigations against him. Basically, we put a child-like bully back in the White House and now he’s exacting his revenge like he’s pretending to be his favorite cartoon villain. (In real life, he’s half the country’s least favorite cartoon villain.)
https://x.com/repjasmine/status/1885504967538004025
Anyway, Crockett kept it a buck.
From Raw Story:
The D.C. Field Office, in particular, has seen a wave of firings. It comes as the acting head of Trump’s Justice Department is also moving to eliminate the jobs of prosecutors who handled the Jan. 6 cases and worked with special counsel Jack Smith.
“Trump’s DOJ Deputy AG is ordering the FBI Acting Secretary to create a blacklist of officers for termination because they LAWFULLY INVESTIGATED an insurrection at the Capitol that resulted in severe injuries and deaths, including of law enforcement,” wrote Crockett, a former public defender, on X. “Instead of respecting the acts and contributions of the FBI for holding people to account for desecrating the hallowed halls of Congress, my Republican colleagues are now cheering for their removal.”
“LET’S BE CLEAR: Firing these experienced law enforcement officers is a victory for lawlessness, organized crime, and corruption,” she continued. “It is a get out of jail free card for the drug smugglers, human traffickers, child exploiters, and violent extremists that the FBI investigates.”
“But most importantly, tonight is a tragedy for the rule of law,” Crockett concluded.
That’s right, y’all. The so-called “party of law and order” who constantly deride their Democratic counterparts as being “soft on crime” are out here behaving disorderly as if they’re above the law and reminding us daily that they decide which crimes matter.
One would think Trump and his GOP goons were actually masters of manipulation, but, truthfully, white supremacy and idiocracy had already done all the work for them in the backward-ass country.
But MAGA, right?
President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order directing the U.S. to take steps to start developing a government-owned investment fund that he said could be used to profit off of TikTok if he’s successful at finding it an American buyer.
Trump signed an order on his first day office to grant TikTok until early April to find an approved partner or buyer, but he’s said he’s looking for the U.S. to take a 50% stake in the massive social media platform. He said Monday in the Oval Office that TikTok, which is owned by China-based ByteDance, was an example of what he could put in a new U.S. sovereign wealth fund.
“We might put that in the sovereign wealth fund, whatever we make or we do a partnership with very wealthy people, a lot of options,” he said of TikTok. “But we could put that as an example in the fund. We have a lot of other things that we could put in the fund.”
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Sovereign wealth funds invest in assets, such as stocks, bonds and real estate. They are typically funded by a country’s budgetary surpluses, which the U.S. currently does not have.
Trump noted many other nations have such investment funds and predicted that the U.S. could eventually top Saudi Arabia’s fund size. “Eventually we’ll catch it,” he promised.
There are over 90 sovereign wealth funds around the world that mange over $8 trillion in assets, according to The International Forum of Sovereign Wealth Funds, a London-based organization made up of roughly 50 of these entities.
In the U.S., more than 20 sovereign wealth funds exist at the state level, according to analysis from the Center for Global Development, a Washington-based nonpartisan think-tank.
The largest ones — based in Alaska, New Mexico and Texas — are financed through revenue that comes from oil, gas and mineral proceeds and used to fund in-state programs, such as education. Though these funds are owned by governments, they tend to operate as standalone institutions with their own investment strategies and staff, the center said.
The president put Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Howard Lutnick, Trump’s pick for commerce secretary, in charge of laying the groundwork for creating a the fund, which would likely require congressional approval. The executive order says a plan for the fund — including recommendations for investment strategies and a governance model — has to be submitted to Trump within 90 days.
Former President Joe Biden’s administration had studied the possibility of creating a sovereign wealth fund for national security investments, but the idea did not yield any concrete action before he left office last month.
Bessent said the administration’s goal was to have the fund open within the next 12 months, and Lutnick said another use of the fund could have been for the government to take an profit-earning stake in vaccine manufacturers.
“The extraordinary size and scale of the U.S government and the business it does with companies should create value for American citizens,” Lutnick told reporters.
TikTok was supposed to be banned in the U.S. last month under a federal law that forces ByteDance to divest its stakes or face a ban. The law was passed in April with bipartisan support in Congress and signed by Biden. The two companies and some users quickly took legal action against the statute, which was ultimately upheld by the Supreme Court last month.
After taking office, Trump, who had attempted to ban the popular app during his first term, directed the Justice Department to pause enforcement of the law for 75 days. The reprieve has given the company more time to work out a deal with the administration.
Several investors — including billionaire Frank McCourt and Trump’s former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin — have spoken publicly about their desire to purchase TikTok’s U.S. platform. Trump has said “many people” had also reached out to him privately about it. Last week, he said Microsoft was one of the U.S. companies eyeing the social media platform.
A San Francisco-based artificial intelligence startup called Perplexity AI presented a proposal to ByteDance last month that would allow the U.S. government to own up to 50% of an entity that combines TikTok’s U.S. platform with Perplexity’s business, a person familiar with the matter previously told the Associated Press. If successful, the proposal would allow the U.S. government to have a sizable stake in that entity once it makes an initial public offering of at least $300 billion.
If you asked H.E.R. what her life’s purpose is, she’d tell you it’s to inspire women and young girls. It’s no accident, then, that many of the major projects she’s taken on over the past couple of years have fallen in line with that mission, from contributing her newly Oscar-nominated Diane Warren collaboration “The Journey” to Tyler Perry’s Six Triple Eight — about the all-Black, all-female 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion of World War II — to examining her own definitions of womanhood and empowerment on a highly anticipated followup to 2021’s Back of My Mind, which she’s teased is arriving at some point in 2025. And now, H.E.R. is turning her focus on girls in sports, reimagining Bruce Springsteen’s iconic 1975 hit “Born to Run” for Dove’s moving new Super Bowl commercial that premiered Tuesday (Feb. 4) with an important message at its center.
Her full version of the track will arrive one day later.
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In the 30-second spot — which will air during fourth quarter of the ultimate Kansas City Chiefs vs. Philadelphia Eagles game Sunday (Feb. 9) — a breathless 3-year-old girl sprints through her suburb as H.E.R.’s buoyant take on The Boss’ anthem plays. “These legs are unstoppable,” onscreen text reads. “At 14, she’ll think they’re unbearable.”
Reminding viewers how frequently young female athletes hear critiques about their bodies, the commercial then calls on it’s audience to “change the way we talk to our girls.” It’s a directive that feels especially poignant considering the popularity boom women’s sports have seen in recent years (thanks in no small part to powerhouses like Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese), as well as the sociopolitical influx in online communities picking apart players’ appearances (thetransphobic hate cisgender Algerian boxer Imane Khelif experienced during the 2024 Olympics comes to mind). And it’s definitely something that weighs on H.E.R.’s mind as a former athlete and role model to her 18-year-old and 3-year-old sisters, which is why she says she jumped at the chance to translate “Born to Run” into a heartfelt tribute for young girls all over the world.
“I’m seeing myself in all of these young girls and thinking about all these things that we forget to appreciate,” she tells Billboard. “I have a body that simply moves, and I love all the things that it can do.”
“We’re born to run,” she adds, her voice swelling with passion. “There’s so many layers to that message. It’s like you’re born to be exactly who you are, to chase your path and follow your own dreams and your own heart. It’s not about anyone else. You’re born uniquely you.”
Speaking over Zoom just one day ahead of the premiere of Dove’s new campaign, the singer-guitarist broke down how she made Springsteen’s signature song her own, revealed how the project informed her upcoming album’s sound and explained why she aligns so strongly with the brand’s message. Read her conversation with Billboard below.
How did you approach re-recording such a famous song?
The song itself is so iconic, I didn’t want to do a complete left turn in my recreation of it. It’s so uplifting and joyful, and “born to run,” it’s the perfect lyric. It’s the perfect message, and kind of the perfect pace for a message like this.
It was all about the image of this young girl — keeping that in mind was the most important thing. We started with drums to kind of keep the energy but still make it my own, and I played some guitars on it to keep that iconic lead. It was all about adding even more soul to it. That iconic line that’s usually just the guitar line, I turned into vocals. I like doing things like that — taking pieces from the instrumentation and turning them into vocals — and my vocals definitely make [the song] a little more feminine.
Is Bruce a personal hero of yours?
Oh my gosh, absolutely. I love Bruce. I grew up listening to a lot of Bruce with my dad. He’s iconic.
I actually got to meet him two years ago and he was so sweet. I was like, “I’m such a big fan, my name’s Gabi.” He was like, “Oh my god, H.E.R., I’m such a big fan of you, I’ve mentioned you in interviews, you really rock out on stage.” And I’m like, “Man, I get it from you!”
Why does the message of the campaign resonate with you personally?
Where do I begin? A lot of my purpose has been to encourage women to be authentic and comfortable in their own skin and embrace who they are. That to me is one of the most important things I could ever do on this planet. That’s always been my mission, so that’s really what got me excited about this. It’s really perfect timing — I’ve been working on an album and the messaging of this album has really been about empowerment.
I have younger sisters, and it’s always so important for me to show them that they’re — I don’t want to say “enough.” I think we’ve outgrown that word. I think it’s to show them that who they are is perfectly imperfect, you know what I mean? We live in this age of social media, and comparison, like they say, is really the thief of joy. I’ve definitely experienced not feeling adequate. I’ve felt like, “Oh, maybe I need to change this about me, I need to fit into this mold.” But I’ve realized that there is no mold. I’ve tried to maintain that in my own life and exemplify that.
Speaking of your new album, what can you tell us about it?
I’ve been working on it in the midst of this [campaign]. It’s funny, because working on “Born to Run,” working on a Springsteen song, I feel like it’s only enhancing my process in the studio. I’m playing a lot more guitar on this album. And again, [the album] is all about empowerment. It was just perfect timing.
It’s this exploration of femininity and what it means to be a woman, what it means to me, what it means to depend on people around you and depend on yourself and love yourself, and what community means. What your expectations of love are, and the expectations you put on yourself. Just learning how to stand on my own.
It’s a lot of accepting ugly. And I mean that to say the parts of myself that I may ignore, that I think haven’t been enough. The parts that I may be afraid to face. It’s really been about embracing those things and empowering myself, not in the way that you’d expect, where it’s all about being triumphant … It’s more like, it’s OK not to be OK. It’s okay to be in the process of healing. You’re never fully healed. Just trusting the process and being OK with it.
One of your recent projects, “The Journey,” recently earned a best original song nomination ahead of the 2025 Oscars. How does that feel?
Oh my gosh, it’s crazy. I’m super excited about the song. It’s such a powerful song, and it’s also a really, really powerful movie — again, about women empowerment, and under-appreciated women. These stories hadn’t been heard. I feel blessed to be a part of that story, in a small way.
Women’s sports are more popular than ever, but with that there’s been an uptick in certain people picking apart women athletes for not looking “feminine enough.” With that in mind, why is this campaign more important than ever?
It’s discouraging. Telling a woman that her body is not the right type, or that she needs to look a certain way, or that she’s not “feminine enough” — what does that even mean? It just shows you what society’s idea of what’s feminine is, and it’s just not right. This message was definitely to break that barrier.
I played sports in high school and middle school, and I’m really grateful that my parents gave me that confidence to not care. But there’s definitely that shyness in the locker room, there’s those moments of, “Oh man, I’m afraid of myself. I’m afraid that people won’t accept me, that people won’t like me, despite my gifts or my ability.” You should never be discouraged to do something that you love and are passionate about because of the way you look.
There’s also been an outpouring of women expressing fear and uncertainty following the results of the 2025 election. Was that on your mind at all when working on this project?
I think, in general, we can’t live our lives in fear, no matter what. It’s all about empowering each other — I think that’s what it comes down to.
Hear H.E.R.’s cover of “Born to Run” in Dove’s new Super Bowl ad below.
The wait is over. In 2025, Billboard U.K. will be hosting its inaugural Power Players list, also known as the Power 100, for the U.K. and Ireland’s world-beating music industry professionals.
While Billboard’s Power 100 ranks the music industry’s most influential executives globally, this list will celebrate and recognise the executives and members that are at the forefront of the U.K. and Ireland’s music scene, and boosting the region’s hugely talented artists on a global scale
Billboard U.K.’s Power Players list will be published in June 2025, and will be celebrated with an exclusive event at the upcoming inaugural SXSW London.
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Further details will be shared in the coming months.
“The U.K. and Ireland has long been home to some of the most influential figures in global music, shaping the industry and driving artists to new heights,” says Mo Ghoneim, president of Billboard U.K. “We look forward to spotlighting the executives leading this charge with Billboard U.K.’s Power Players, from labels to live, streaming to rights, and beyond.”
The news follows a period of success for British and Irish artists in recent years. In 2024, there were appearances for Hozier, Dua Lipa, Charli XCX, Coldplay and Ed Sheeran on Billboard’s Year-End Top Artists charts. Rising stars, meanwhile, like Lola Young, Aretmas, Myles Smith and more are growing their audiences domestically and internationally.
2025 will also be a bumper year for concert-goers with the U.K. hosting some of the most in-demand tours and live experiences: Oasis will kick off their reunion tour in Wales before heading around the globe, and superstars like Lana Del Rey, Billie Eilish, Olivia Rodrigo, Sabrina Carpenter, Usher and more come into market for huge shows.
There are challenges to be met, too: Grassroots music venues face decimation without urgent action; legislation on artificial intelligence is paramount to the government’s agenda on growth; artists are finding touring a loss-making endeavour; the live and festival landscape continues to evolve and bring new obstacles. These themes will shape the inaugural U.K. Power Players, but the doors are wide open.
The Power Players list will be peer-nominated and selected by the Billboard U.K. team. Nominations open Feb. 4 and will close in two weeks on Feb. 17. Interested parties can fill in the nominations form here. For any queries, please contact power100@uk.billboard.com or tsmith@uk.billboard.com.
