State Champ Radio Author: djfrosty
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Will Smith brought out his son Jaden during a Father’s Day performance at London’s Wembley Stadium on Sunday (June 15). The rapper, singer and Oscar-winning actor performed at the U.K. stadium as part of Capital’s Summertime Ball, and called Jaden on stage to celebrate their father-son bond. “If you can just come up for a […]
What a difference 10 years can make. That was the last time Billboard tackled the monumental feat of ranking the top R&B artists, dating back to the ‘50s. Michael Jackson, whose grew from his R&B roots to capture the King of Pop crown, ruled over that 2015 tally. Now as the music industry and fans celebrate Black Music Month 2025, Billboard is picking up the “best of all time” gauntlet once again.
Expanding from 35 to 75 entries and substituting artists with singers, this latest iteration begins its rollout with today’s (June 16) reveal of the singers ranked 75-51. The unveiling will continue over the next several days — Nos. 50-26 followed by Nos. 26-11 — with the curtain raising on Juneteenth (June 19) to reveal the top 10 honorees.
Staff discussions on how to go about determining the entries and rankings were, to say the least, heated. Helping to fuel these illuminating and sometimes raucous discourses were generational debates over old school vs. new school. At the same time, “Mount Rushmore” debates were also raging on the social media front as fans weighed in on which R&B artists — like Jackson, Chris Brown, Luther Vandross, R. Kelly and Usher — truly deserve to have their images carved in stone for all time.
In the end, Billboard staffers agreed on the following criteria: vocal prowess, body of work, career longevity, industry achievements, game-changing influence and enduring generational/cultural impact. While some singers who made the list are also known for their lyrical skills, songwriting wasn’t a major deciding factor in this instance. And legendary singers best known for fronting groups versus their solo work were not included — which means a ranking of the best R&B groups of all time is no doubt in the offing.
In the meantime, any best-of compilation automatically invites naysayers to the party. As these 75 singers are revealed, the expectant clamor will rise in response to our staff’s effrontery in deciding who’s now on or off the list, who’s risen or been dropped or who still has never made this latest version or the 2015 ranking.
More crucial, however, is understanding a chief intention behind Billboard’s 75 Best R&B Singers of All Time. It’s a teachable moment at a time when Black history, culture and its achievements are being erased or revised across the board. Black Music Month originated in 1979 via the efforts of the observance’s co-founders Dyana Williams, Kenneth Gamble and Ed Wright. And each year it drives home an insightful comment made by author/activist Maya Angelou: “You can’t know where you are going until you know where you have been.”
So here’s to the rich past and the unlimited future of the multifaceted jewel that is R&B.
75. Ruth Brown
Image Credit: Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
When Lizzo sang, “Turn up the music, let’s celebrate,” Donald Trump‘s widely protested military birthday parade was not what she had in mind. After video of a performer singing Lizzo’s Billboard Hot 100-topping hit “About Damn Time” at the event in Washington, D.C., on Saturday (June 14) surfaced online, the hitmaker made her feelings quite […]
In 2023, The Beatles harnessed the power of artificial intelligence to help bring the Fab Four back together on the Grammy-winning “Now and Then,” billed as the band’s final song. Two years later, the Lennon/McCartney partnership is together again – but with a twist. Their sons Sean Ono Lennon and James McCartney have joined forces with Zak Starkey (son of Ringo Starr) on a new song.
The team-up arrives via supergroup Mantra of the Cosmos’ upcoming single “Rip Off,” which Starkey teased on his Instagram account on Sunday (June 16). Mantra of the Cosmos is the new supergroup formed by Starkey alongside Happy Mondays members Shaun Ryder and Bez and Ride’s Andy Bell. Vocals on “Rip Off” are shared between Sean, James and Shaun on the wistful track. Listen to a snippet below.
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Speaking to The Telegraph, however, Starkey dismissed any suggestions it was a mini-Beatles reunion. “No it’s not,” Starkey said in regards to any similarities to their fathers’ band. “It’s like Mantra of the Cosmos with them in it. It’s Sean of the Cosmos and James of the Cosmos, it’s still my band.” In response to The Telegraph’s James Hall suggesting he needed Dhani Harrison, son of George Harrison, for a full house, Starkey responded: “No I don’t. Why do I?”
Sean Ono Lennon, born in 1975, was the sole child of Lennon’s marriage to Yoko Ono. In his musical career, Sean has collaborated with Lana Del Rey, The Lemon Twigs and Fat White Family. James McCartney, born in 1977 to Paul and Linda McCartney, has also embarked on a solo music career, and in 2024 collaborated with Sean on “Primrose Hill.”
In 2012, James McCartney told the BBC that a supergroup between himself, Sean, Dhani and Zak had been “mooted.” This new collaboration is the first time that three of the Beatles’ children have collaborated on a piece of original music.
It’s another coup for Starkey’s band, following a collaboration with Noel Gallagher on recent single “Domino Bones,” which the Oasis man said was influenced by Bob Dylan, Salvador Dali and Allen Ginsberg.
Until recently, Starkey was the drummer in The Who but was fired (twice) from the band in relation to his performance at a show in London in March. He also claimed to have turned down a spot in Oasis’ reunion band (he drummed for the group between 2004-2008), contradicting an earlier statement that said he wasn’t asked.
Critics of the secondary ticket business are warning that an epidemic of misleading offers on sites like StubHub and Vivid Seats are eroding consumer confidence in the live event ticket business, and they’re asking for lawmakers to intervene. Longtime music managers like Randy Nichols with the band Underoath say online markets are allowing resellers to list tickets to events that haven’t gone on sale yet — from the 2026 World Cup to David Byrne’s upcoming tour — and reap huge profits from fans who think they are buying legitimate tickets to major sporting events and concerts.
Speculative ticketing exists because of legal loopholes, Nichols says, as well as hundreds of millions of dollars spent on Google advertising and fan naivete. For Byrne’s fall Who is the Sky tour, for example, tickets don’t go on sale until mid-June, but ads for tickets on sites like StubHub and Vivid Seats began popping up seconds after it was announced. On Stubhub, front-row tickets for his Nov. 20 show at L.A.’s Dolby Theater were selling for about $1,100.
Trending on Billboard
Often, the seller of these tickets will only procure them after someone has agreed to buy them, and often the seller will wait until a few days or weeks before the show to buy the tickets, knowing the price almost always goes down closer to the show date. StubHub doesn’t disclose that the person listing these tickets doesn’t have them in their possession.
“There’s even a hashtag scalpers like to use to make this point titled #itpaystowait,” Nichols says. “The longer they wait, the more profit the scalper makes.”
Now, Nichols and groups like the National Independent Venues Association and the National Independent Talent Organizations are lobbying hard at both the state and federal level to make such practices illegal. While critics have had success in Maryland passing legislation banning speculative ticketing, lawmakers in New York state recently gutted a bill that would have outlawed it there. Officials like NITO executive director Nathaniel Marro are also worried about federal legislation like the TICKET Act, which originally had language banning the practice but has since been altered with a legal loophole that allows for speculative ticketing as part of a concierge service provided by sites like StubHub and Vivid Seats.
“Think of it like your favorite grocery delivery service — but for incredible experiences,” Vivid Seats explains on its site. “You cart your selections; we’ll handle the shopping.”
Marro said these sites don’t make clear to fans what they’re buying; many think they’re buying a ticket, not paying someone to buy a ticket that they themselves could get much cheaper if they shopped around on their own.
“That’s the irony — many fans don’t realize that they could buy these tickets themselves,” Nichols tells Billboard. “The fan is tricked because most begin the process of buying tickets on sites like Google, where secondary sites spend hundreds of millions on deceptive ads and websites to trick consumers into thinking they’re buying tickets directly from the box office.”
Nichols says overcharging the customers means less money for fans to spend and notes that it’s often the box offices that have to deal with customer service problems. And while it’s common for the price of a ticket to go down over time, there are exceptions: with Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, sky-high demand made it impossible for some scalpers to fulfill their orders at the price they charged the customer. While some brokers fulfilled the orders at a loss to avoid being penalized by Stubhub, others simply cancelled orders, leaving fans without tickets having spent money on travel and hotels.
Nichols and Marro worry about the problems speculative ticketing will cause for major sporting events like the 2026 FIFA World Cup, which is taking place across North America next summer. Tickets for the global soccer tournament have not yet gone on sale, but hundreds are listed across Stubhub and Vivid Seats. There’s even a listing for tickets to sit on the pitch during the final championship match on July 19, at MetLife Stadium, for $1.1 million.
While it’s unlikely someone would pay that much money on StubHub for a World Cup ticket, even to the final championship game, the worry is that brokers will flood the site with speculative listings and cause a shortage of actual tickets, leaving some fans who traveled halfway around the world without their tickets.
Stephen Parker, executive director of NIVA, says his group has made progress at the state level outlawing the practice, but is worried that federal legislation protecting it as a concierge service could keep it legal for decades. Another concern is that the legislation protecting speculative tickets could quietly be added to Trump’s so-called “Big Beautiful Bill” and passed without any debate. “Lawmakers understand the issue but we’re up against a well-funded lobby,” Parker says. “The concern is that much of the progress we made at the state level will be lost with federal legislation.”
Mariah Carey achieves her landmark 50th career hit on the Billboard Hot 100, as her new single, “Type Dangerous,” debuts at No. 95 on the chart dated June 21, 2025.
Released June 6, the song starts with 2.5 million official streams, 14.7 million in radio airplay audience and 5,000 sold in the United States in the week ending June 12, according to data tracker Luminate.
Boosting its profile, Carey performed “Type Dangerous” on the 2025 BET Awards on June 9, when she was also honored with the Ultimate Icon Award.
Trending on Billboard
The track, which Carey co-wrote and co-produced, previews her 16th studio album, her first since Caution in 2018. The song’s official video premiered Saturday (June 14).
Carey debuts her first new title on the Hot 100 since “Oh Santa!,” featuring Ariana Grande and Jennifer Hudson, spent a week on the chart dated Dec. 19, 2020. “Type Dangerous” is her first nonseasonal song to reach the ranking since “I Don’t,” featuring YG, logged a week on the list dated Feb. 25, 2017. “Type Dangerous” is her first non-holiday entry without any billed artists since “Infinity,” on the May 16, 2015, chart.
Beginning in December 2019, through this past holiday season, Carey has decorated the top of the Hot 100 for 18 weeks with her evergreen (and red) 1994 classic, “All I Want for Christmas Is You.” The carol became her 19th No. 1 – the most among soloists and second overall only to the Beatles’ 20.
(Carey is also heard on two Hot 100 top 10s in recent years that don’t contribute to her chart history: Drake’s “Emotionless,” which hit No. 8 in July 2018, samples her 1991 leader “Emotions,” while Carey joined for a remix of Latto’s “Big Energy,” which nods to Carey’s 1995 Hot 100-topper “Fantasy” and reached No. 3 in April 2022.)
Carey made her Hot 100 debut with “Vision of Love” on the chart dated June 2, 1990. It became her first leader that August.
Beyond the Hot 100, “Type Dangerous,” Carey’s first single on gamma., as well as on an independent label (and the latest on her MARIAH imprint), begins at No. 4 on the Digital Song Sales chart, marking her 10th top 10.
On the all-format Radio Songs chart, “Type Dangerous” debuts at No. 47. It’s her first new song to make the survey since the Miguel-featuring “#Beautiful,” which hit No. 17 in June 2013. “Type Dangerous” opens on R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay at No. 7, Adult R&B Airplay at No. 15, Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay at No. 24, Adult Pop Airplay at No. 30, Rhythmic Airplay at No. 31 and Pop Airplay at No. 38. On R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, the single scores the highest entrance for a song in nearly 30 years, since Whitney Houston’s “Exhale (Shoop Shoop)” started at No. 6 in November 1995.
“Type Dangerous” concurrently soars in at No. 7 on Hot R&B Songs and No. 24 on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, which use the same multimetric methodology as the Hot 100.
All charts dated June 21 will update tomorrow, June 17, on Billboard.com.
The Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival was set to take place this past weekend, but was ended early due to extreme weather conditions in the region. On the website for Bonnaroo, it was shared that ticketholders for both the festivals and the campers on the ground will receive refunds.
Bonnaroo organizers posted on the festival’s website and on social media, writing, “We have put our hearts and souls into making this weekend the most special one of the year, and cannot express how crushed we are to have to make this decision. Thank you in advance for your patience, your positivity and your unfailing Bonnaroovian spirit.”
One-day ticket holders who purchased for shows happening from Friday (June 13) through Sunday (June 15) will get full refunds. Others who purchased four-day tickets and four-day camping ground slots will get 75% of their funds returned to their original mode of payment in under or around 30 days, according to the full statement.
Check out the Bonnaroo statement below.
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Photo: Josh Brasted / Getty
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AI music startup Udio is facing another copyright lawsuit — this time a proposed class action on behalf of independent artists who have been “left without a seat at the table” in the high-profile litigation filed by the major labels.
Weeks after news that Universal Music, Warner Music and Sony Music were in talks to potentially settle their billion-dollar lawsuit against Udio, a country singer named Tony Justice is filing his own case against the company in Manhattan federal court.
Seeking to represent “thousands” of other independent artists in a class action, Justice says the earlier lawsuit filed by the Big Three won’t adequately protect the interests of musicians who aren’t signed to a major label deal.
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“Independent artists, whose rights have been trampled the most, are the ones left without a seat at the table, unrepresented, and without a meaningful remedy,” attorneys for Justice write in the lawsuit, filed Monday (June 16). “Class members will never be able to claw back the intellectual property unlawfully copied by Udio and used to train its AI.”
A spokesperson for Udio did not immediately return a request for comment on Monday.
AI models like Udio are “trained” by ingesting millions of existing works, thus teaching them to spit out new ones. As AI tech has boomed in recent years, dozens of lawsuits have been filed in federal court over that training process, arguing that AI companies are violating copyrights on a massive scale.
AI firms argue back that such training is legal “fair use,” transforming all those old “inputs” into entirely new “outputs.” Whether that argument succeeds in court is a potentially trillion-dollar question — and one that has yet to be definitively answered by federal judges.
Universal, Warner and Sony sued both Udio and Suno, another AI music firm, last summer, claiming the tech startups had built their models by stealing music on an “unimaginable scale” and “trampling the rights of copyright owners.”
Those cases remain pending, but news broke earlier this month that all three music companies were in talks to potentially settle the litigation by striking licensing deals with the companies. In return for allowing Suno and Udio to train on the vast collections of songs, the proposed deals would see the majors collect fees and receive equity in the startups.
In Monday’s new case against Udio, Justice largely echoes the allegations made by the majors. He says the company has infringed copyrights by training its machines on his songs, including his “Last of the Cowboys,” which has racked up more than 8 million streams on Spotify.
But his case was filed as a proposed class action, meaning he wants to also represent other independent artists who have suffered similar alleged treatment by Udio. He says “thousands” of other artists could eventually be part of the case.
“These acts by Udio were abuse and exploitation of another’s intellectual property of the worst kind,” his lawyers write. “Rather than license copyrighted songs like every other tech-based business is required to do, Udio elected to simply steal the songs of independent artists, plaintiffs, and the class members to then generate AI-soundalike music at virtually no cost to Udio.”
06/16/2025
Listen to new must-hear songs from emerging R&B/hip-hop artists like Aaron Page and Nemzzz.
06/16/2025
Despite all the heat surrounding Sean “Diddy” Combs right now, two of his sons still showed love on Father’s Day.
Justin and Christian Combs hit social media with messages for their pops, standing by him even as his high-profile trial keeps making headlines.
Justin Combs posted late Sunday afternoon, dropping a behind-the-scenes video of Diddy talking to a group, saying it’s a proud day for him. The clip felt like a quiet moment of support, showing that the bond between father and son is still strong, no matter what’s going on.
Christian Combs took it back with a throwback photo, a red carpet moment from when he was a little kid, arms wrapped around his dad. His caption read, “Happy Fathers Day Pops!! I Love you & miss you !!! We waiting for you at” Short and sweet, it showed just how much he’s riding for his father.
Meanwhile, Diddy’s trial is still going full speed in New York City. Day 24 is about to kick off, and the courtroom drama hasn’t let up. The case includes serious allegations, from sex trafficking to racketeering and financial misconduct, tied to decades of Diddy’s time running the business side of Hip-Hop. The testimonies have been wild, with ex-Bad Boy staff and alleged victims giving the court some pretty graphic and emotional stories. Diddy’s team continues to deny all charges, but the details coming out have kept the public locked in.
To add more chaos, Kanye West popped up in the overflow gallery last week, turning heads and lighting up social media. With everything still up in the air, no one really knows how this is going to play out. Still, for his sons, it’s clear that Father’s Day wasn’t about headlines, it was about family. Through all the noise, Justin and Christian made it known: love for their dad hasn’t changed.
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