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Official HIGE DANdism’s ‘Subtitle’ Extends Record to 7 Weeks at No. 1 on Japan Hot 100

Official HIGE DANdism’s “Subtitle” continues to dominate the Billboard Japan Hot 100, dated Dec. 21, holding at No. 1 for the seventh week.

The theme of the highly acclaimed drama series silent is still going strong in streaming, logging 17,468,383 weekly streams to extend its record at No. 1 for the metric to nine consecutive weeks and 15,910 downloads to stay at No. 1 for the sixth non-consecutive week. It’s also performing well in video with 2,878,313 views to hold at No. 2, and moves up a notch to No. 5 for karaoke.

Kis-My-Ft2’s “Omoibana” ruled physical sales this weeks with 248,255 copies sold, more than the Johnny’s group’s previous single, “Two as One,” which launched with 173,309 copies. But the boy band’s 30th single couldn’t supplement that advantage with other metrics — No. 2 for radio, No. 56 for streaming, and No. 73 for video — and couldn’t overtake Kenshi Yonezu’s “KICK BACK,” which came in at No. 2 for streaming and No. 3 for video. Yonezu rises 3-2, while Kis-My-Ft2 debuts at No. 3 on the Japan Hot 100 this week.

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The global popularity of the Netflix series First Love starring Hikari Mitsushima and Takeru Sato continues to fuel Hikaru Utada’s “First Love,” which soars by about 200 percent from the previous week to 3,879 downloads (84-15), 15 percent for streaming to 7,792,651 streams (6-3), and also rises in video, radio and karaoke. The resurgent J-pop hit originally released in 1999 rises 7-5 on the Japan Hot 100 this week.

The Billboard Japan Hot 100 combines physical and digital sales, audio streams, radio airplay, YouTube and GYAO! video views and karaoke data.

Check out the full Billboard Japan Hot 100 chart, tallying the week from Dec. 12 to 18, here. For more on Japanese music and charts, visit Billboard Japan’s English Twitter account.

TWICE’s Tzuyu Gets Into the Holiday Spirit With a Christmas Cover of Ava Max: Watch

With just days left until Christmas, TWICE‘s Tzuyu is spreading cheer to ONCEs everywhere by gifting them a cover of a holiday track on Wednesday (Dec. 21). The K-pop star went with a modern Christmas song and put a sweet spin on Ava Max‘s 2020 song “Christmas Without You.”

The TWICE vocalist filmed a video to accompany her take from the studio, and is in a cozy white sweater, red scarf and a festive reindeer headband complete with small antlers.

Kicking off the first verse, Tzuyu went with a serene delivery of the track and its chorus. “Lights on the trees under fallen snow/ You get a bit closer when the winter’s cold/ Now I can’t wait ’til you’re by my side/ All of the best gifts, you just can’t buy,” she sang.

“Wherever you go, you light up the room/ I hope that you’ll make it back home soon/ ‘Cause it won’t feel like Christmas without you,” Tzuyu continued on the upbeat track.

She isn’t the only member of TWICE prepared to celebrate the holidays. She and the rest of the group’s members — Nayeon, Jeongyeon, Momo, Sana, Jihyo, Mina, Dahyun and Chaeyoung — had some fun holiday shenanigans in a new video for their 2017 holiday track “Merry & Happy.” The new version sees all the girls decorating a Christmas tree and dancing.

Watch Tzuyu’s cover of “Christmas Without You” above.

Chrissy Teigen Jokes About Posing for ‘Storks Illustrated’ in Bikini Photo Baring Her Baby Bump

Chrissy Teigen is proving that being a swimsuit model and being pregnant aren’t mutually exclusive. In a new Instagram photo from her and John Legend‘s beachside holiday getaway, the former Sports Illustrated covergirl showed off her baby bump in a black bikini — a shot she hilariously dubbed “Storks Illustrated.”

In the a photo shared Wednesday (Dec. 21), Teigen stands on a sandy shore with her feet in the water, looking on as her son, 4-year-old Miles, runs from an approaching wave. Facing slightly away from the camera, the Cravings founder’s belly is on full display in her two-piece, which she revealed in a followup post is from the brand Monday Swimwear.

“storks illustrated? I don’t know,” she jokingly captioned the post.

Teigen is currently expecting her third child with Legend, with whom she shares two children (before Miles came daughter Luna, who is 6). As revealed by the “All of Me” singer in an Instagram post of his own, the whole family is spending the holidays on the coast, somewhere sunny and sandy.

“’Storks Illustrated’ is some of your best work,” Legend commented on his wife’s post.

“A pregnant woman is a true athlete!” added one of Teigen’s followers. “This should be the cover of Sports illustrated!”

A couple days before her beachside photo, the cookbook author posted a different swimsuit snap with one of her trademark responses — this time aimed at commenters who’ve been bugging her with remarks that she’s been “pregnant forever.”

“‘omg I feel like she’s been pregnant foreverrrrrr,’” she captioned the Monday (Dec. 19) post, referencing the comments. “how do you think I feel thank u.”

See Chrissy Teigen’s “Storks Illustrated” photo below:

Kate Bush Reflects on ‘Running Up That Hill’ Success, Shares Message of ‘Hope’ in 2022 Christmas Message

Kate Bush is looking back on the ups and downs of 2022.

In a bittersweet message titled “Merry Christmas” on her website, the 64-year-old U.K. pop icon reflects on the pains of the the past year, including the war in Ukraine and death of Queen Elizabeth II, but also shares thanks for the renewed success of her classic 1985 song “Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)” and expresses hope for a brighter 2023.

“I don’t think any of us have ever known a year like this one,” Bush begins her note. “Life became incredibly frightening in the pandemic, but just as we think it might be over soon, it seems to keep going. It’s a bombardment — the horrific war in Ukraine, the famines, the droughts, the floods… and we lost our Queen.”

The singer-songwriter then turns to a more uplifting topic: the resurgence of “Running Up That Hill” on the Billboard charts, thanks to a high-profile synch in the fourth season of the 1980s-set sci-fi Netflix series Stranger Things.

“It’s been a crazy, roller coaster year for me,” Bush continues. “I still reel from the success of [Running Up That Hill], being the No 1 track of this summer. What an honour!”

After being featured in the show, “Running Up That Hill” — the lead single from Bush’s 1985 album, Hounds of Love — rose to No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and returned to the top 10 of the Alternative Airplay chart after a record 28-year absence. The song also felt success on a global level, topping charts in the U.K. and Australia.

“It was such a great feeling to see so many of the younger generation enjoying the song,” she writes. “It seems that quite a lot of them thought I was a new artist! I love that! Again, thank you so much to everyone who supported the track and made it a hit.”

Bush closes her message, which includes an image of a small robin, on a positive note by sharing some hopeful words from poet Emily Dickinson.

“I used a little robin in some of my Christmas gifts to friends this year. I felt that this humble little bird, which symbolises Christmas could also symbolise hope in the context of Emily Dickinson’s beautiful words: Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul,” Bush writes. “I‘d like to think that this Christmas when joy is so hard to find, hope will perch in all our souls. Merry Christmas!”

Alexandre Desplat Is Top Nominee for 2023 SCL Awards: Full List of Nominations

Less than 24 hours after Alexandre Desplat was shortlisted for Academy Awards for best original song and best original score for his work on Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio, the French composer emerges as the top nominee for the 2023 SCL Awards for his work on that same film.

Desplat is nominated for outstanding score for a studio film and outstanding song for a musical/comedy for “Ciao Papa,” which he co-wrote with Del Toro and Roeban Katz.

The awards by the Society of Composers & Lyricists, now in their fourth year, will be presented on Feb. 15, 2023, at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles. Actor-musician Darren Criss is set to host.

Many of the SCL nominees were shortlisted for Oscars on Dec. 21, but some who were left off received nods here, including Michael Giacchino (nominated for scoring The Batman), and Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (nominated for co-writing the song “(You Made It Feel Like) Home” from Bones and All).

The Society of Composers & Lyricists is a leading organization for professional film, television, video game, and musical theater composers and lyricists. The 77-year-old organization is focused on education and addressing the creative, technological and legal issues affecting the music for visual media community.

Next month, the composer and director recipients of the SCL Spirit of Collaboration Award will be announced. The SCL Awards ceremony will feature a presentation of that award and a performance.

Here are the nominees for the 2023 SCL Awards:

Outstanding score for a studio film

  • Alexandre Desplat – Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio
  • Carter Burwell – The Banshees of Inisherin
  • Michael Abels – Nope
  • Michael Giacchino – The Batman
  • John Powell – Don’t Worry Darling

Outstanding score for an independent film

  • Leo Birenberg, Zach Robinson – Weird: The Al Yankovic Story
  • Sharon Farber – Brainwashed: Sex-Camera-Power
  • Ryan Lott – Everything Everywhere All at Once
  • Rob Simonsen – The Whale
  • Mark Smythe – The Reef: Stalked

Outstanding song for a musical/comedy:

  • Alexandre Desplat, Roeban Katz, Guillermo Del Toro – “Ciao Papa” From Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio
  • Khiyon Hursey, Sukari Jones, Benj Pasek, Justin Paul, Mark Sonnenblick – “Good Afternoon” From Spirited
  • Danny Elfman – “Light the Match” From Central Park
  • Billy Eichner, Marc Shaiman – “Love Is Not Love” From Bros
  • Weird Al Yankovic - “Now You Know” From Weird: The Al Yankovic Story

Outstanding song for a drama/documentary:

  • Diane Warren – “Applause” From Tell It Like a Woman
  • Taylor Swift – “Carolina” From Where the Crawdads Sing
  • Lady Gaga, Bloodpop – “Hold My Hand” From Top Gun: Maverick
  • Tems, Rihanna, Ludwig Göransson, Ryan Coogler – “Lift Me Up” From Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
  • Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross – “(You Made It Feel Like) Home” From Bones and All

Outstanding score for television

  • Nicholas Britell – Andor
  • Siddhartha Khosla – Only Murders in the Building
  • Bear Mccreary – The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power
  • Theodore Shapiro – Severance
  • Cristobal Tapia De Veer – The White Lotus

Outstanding score for interactive media

  • Nainita Desai – Immortality
  • Stephanie Economou – Assassin’s Creed Valhalla: Dawn of Ragnarök
  • Bear Mccreary – God of War Ragnarök
  • Winifred Phillips – Jurassic World Primal Ops
  • Christopher Wiliis – Cat Burglar

David Raksin award for emerging talent

  • Dara Taylor – The Invitation
  • Anna Drubich – Barbarian
  • Deandre James Allen-Toole – God’s Country
  • Esin Aydingoz – Simchas and Sorrows
  • Nami Melumad – Star Trek: Strange New Worlds

Joycelyn Savage Allegedly Gives Birth To First Child With R. Kelly

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Bond Hearing Held In Chicago For R. Kelly's Federal Criminal Cases

Source: Nuccio DiNuzzo / Getty

The R. Kelly story just got even more bizarre. Joycelyn Savage has allegedly given birth to her first child with the disgraced singer.

As reported by MadameNoire, the social media personality made a big announcement last week. On Thursday, Dec. 8 she gave birth to her daughter Ava Lee Kelly. On her Instagram post reveal she wrote “My baby girl Ava when you were born , my whole world shined so bright. I knew that it was no longer about me anymore it was about us . Though the world is cold , I promise to always protect you . I am so happy to be your mother & you bring me so much joy . 12.08.22 ??”.

Earlier this year, Savage announced that she was pregnant with the “I Believe I Can Fly” singer’s child. Initially the Pied Piper’s lawyer, Jennifer Bonjean, dismissed the claims. “There is no truth to reports that Joy is releasing a tell-all memoir and she is certainly not pregnant with R Kelly’s child. People are just insane. Carry on,” she tweeted.

Jocelyn would go on to detail how the baby came to be in her book Love and Joy of Robert. “His lawyer didn’t know that prior to him going to jail, Robert and I were doing IVF because at the time I was told I couldn’t have a baby,” she wrote. “When he got sent to prison, we paused on it and I had them freeze my eggs until I was ready.”

To hear Savage tell it, Bonjean wanted her to abort the child. “Once his lawyer did find out, she wanted me to have an abortion because she didn’t feel that now was the time for me to have a child following the 30-year sentence” she explained. “Me and Robert wanted to have a child for a long time. He is very happy about it, his lawyer isn’t. Once I told her I was keeping my baby, she didn’t want me to announce but I wanted to share the news. I’ve always been there for him even before this new lawyer came into the picture.”

In recent R. Kelly news, his legal team confirmed that the I Admit It project was pieced together by thieves who allegedly stole a large chunk of his unreleased music. You can read about it here. 

Photo: Source: Nuccio DiNuzzo / Getty

Billie Eilish Celebrates 21st Birthday With Boyfriend Jesse Rutherford, Justin & Hailey Bieber

Billie Eilish turned 21 on Dec. 18, and some of music’s biggest stars showed out to help her celebrate. In photos shared by the “Happier Than Ever” pop star on Instagram early Thursday (Dec. 22), Justin Bieber, Hailey Bieber and The Neighbourhood‘s Jesse Rutherford — whom she’s currently dating — were all present at her birthday bash.

Born shortly before Christmas, it was only fitting that Eilish ring in her birthday wearing a red and white off-the-shoulder Santa-inspired dress, long gloves and candy cane earrings. She showed off her festive outfit in a carousel of Instagram photos from the occasion, which also included a snap of her and Rutherford, all smiles, locking eyes in front of a “Happy 21st Birthday” balloon arrangement.

In another photo, the “Bad Guy” singer, the Biebers and Rutherford squeeze into a photo booth. Justin rests his cheek on Hailey’s forehead, while Eilish kisses the 31-year-old “Sweater Weather” singer — whose face is mostly cut off in the carousel — on the cheek.

The seven-time Grammy winner simply captioned her post with a string of emojis: ❤️‍?❤️‍?❤️‍???

The celebration comes a few days after Eilish’s trio of end-of-year hometown shows at Los Angeles’ Kia Forum, at each of which she invited a handful of guest artists to share the spotlight with her. On night one (Dec. 13), she sang “I’ve Never Felt So Alone” from the Euphoria soundtrack with Labrinth; night two (Dec. 15) saw her perform a Taylor Hawkins tribute with Dave Grohl and duet with Phoebe Bridgers.

Finally, on night three (Dec. 16), she sang “Redbone” with Childish Gambino — who wished her a happy birthday onstage — and brought out Khalid to sing their 2018 smash hit duet “Lovely.”

Lady Gaga’s ‘Bloody Mary’ Slowed The Cramps‘ ’Wednesday’ Synch Boost — But Didn’t Kill It

The Cramps‘ 1981 recording of “Goo Goo Muck” became an out-of-left field success story in November after its use in a dance scene in the hit Netflix series Wednesday helped a new generation discover the song, first released in 1962 by Ronnie Cook and the Gaylads.

Music trends, created by viral hits on TikTok and YouTube, are unpredictable, though. As soon as “Goo Goo Muck” was enjoying its newfound fame, along came “Bloody Mary,” a deep cut from Lady Gaga‘s 2011 album Born This Way. Fans inspired by the Wednesday scene uploaded videos of themselves performing the dance to TikTok and other platforms, but many swapped out the audio of “Goo Goo Muck” with a sped-up version of “Bloody Mary” — including Gaga herself after the singer caught onto the trend.

Lady Gaga may have stolen some of The Cramps’ thunder. As weekly growth of on-demand streams of “Goo Goo Muck” slowed — from 177% to 7% in the last two weeks — on-demand streams of “Bloody Mary” increased 88% to 43.1 million in the week of Dec. 9. About 89% of the streams came from video platforms, namely YouTube, where the sped-up version of the recording is used in videos of people recreating the Wednesday dance scene.

Still, “Goo Goo Muck” is having a fairy tale of a fourth quarter. Between Nov. 18 to Dec. 16, its weekly U.S. on-demand streams increased about 200 times, from 31,000 to 6.1 million. Download sales were strong enough to put “Goo Goo Muck” at No. 25 on Billboard‘s Digital Song Sales chart for the week of Dec. 10. “It’s a really amazing, fun little bonanza,” Jim Shaw, owner of the song’s publishing rights, previously told Billboard.

Both tracks also got a boost from being featured on some major playlists. On Nov. 30, Spotify added “Goo Goo Muck” to its Big on the Internet playlist, which has nearly 3 million followers, and on Dec. 6 it added the track to its Teen Beats playlist, which boasts over 1.8 million followers, according to Chartmetric. “Bloody Mary” is also featured on both playlists and is currently the leadoff track on Teen Beats.

SZA Scores Her First Streaming Songs No. 1 With ‘Kill Bill’

SZA reaches No. 1 on Billboard’s Streaming Songs chart for the first time thanks to “Kill Bill,” which debuts atop the Dec. 24-dated tally.

“Bill” bows with 36.9 million official U.S. streams earned in the Dec. 9-15 tracking week, according to Luminate.

Her first ruler eclipses the No. 2 peaks of “Good Days” (2020), her featured credit on Doja Cat’s “Kiss Me More” (2021) and Summer Walker co-bill “No Love” (2021).

“Bill” is the first non-holiday song to reign on Streaming Songs past the first week of December (and before January) since 2018, when Ariana Grande‘s “Thank U, Next” ruled for the entire month of December.

SZA first made the chart — which began in 2013 — with “Love Galore,” featuring Travis Scott. That track peaked at No. 27 in 2017.

In all, four songs from SZA’s new album SOS reach Streaming Songs’ top 10, with “Bill” joined by “Nobody Gets Me” (No. 6, 25.1 million streams), “Blind” (No. 8, 24.4 million) and “Low” (No. 10, 22.3 million). Of the Dec. 24-dated top 10, only SZA’s entries are non-holiday songs.

A total of 19 songs from SOS appear on the Dec. 24 ranking, giving SZA a tie for the second-most simultaneous appearances by a woman in the chart’s history, alongside Taylor Swift’s 19 on the Nov. 27, 2021, list upon the release of the album Red (Taylor’s Version). Only Swift boasts more, with 20 achieved on the Nov. 5, 2022, ranking, after the debut of the album Midnights.

Concurrently, “Bill” starts atop R&B/Hip-Hop Streaming Songs and R&B Streaming Songs. It’s her fourth ruler on the former, following “Days,” “Love” and “I Hate U,” and her seventh on the latter, with the aforementioned four joined by “The Weekend,” “All the Stars” (alongside Kendrick Lamar) and “Hit Different,” featuring Ty Dolla $ign.

One other song from SOS reigns on a genre-based streaming chart: the pop-punk-esque “F2F,” which becomes her first to reign on Alternative Streaming Songs (13.7 million streams).

As previously reported, “Bill” is the top debut of SOS on the multi-metric Billboard Hot 100, bowing at No. 3. SOS itself also starts at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with 318,000 equivalent album units earned.

Coolio Talks Ancient Aliens, Metaverse, Secret 8th Continent On ‘Crypto Island’ Podcast

One of Coolio‘s last known interviews took place on a lark in an airport departure gate when the host of a crypto podcast happened to spot the rapper chilling out while waiting for a flight. In the new episode of PJ Vogt’s Crypto Island pod, the host describes his surprise at seeing someone who had the “incandescent shine” of a likely famous person casually sitting at a gate in New York’s JFK airport.

Wearing a green track suit and matching baseball hat with two slots cut in the top to make room for his signature at-attention braids, Coolio was friendly when Vogt asked him to introduce himself and a young fellow passenger named Grant whom the MC had befriended.

Waiting to board a flight to Copenhagen, Coolio explained to Vogt that he’d done his crypto research. “I am actually heavily invested into the metaverse,” said the “Gangsta’s Paradise” rapper who died on Sept. 28 in Los Angeles at age 59 of suspected cardiac arrest. “I have a nice swath of land in the metaverse and barring the internet crashing or somebody dropping an EMP (electomagnetic pulse) on the whole world and there being no power, this would be a good deal.”

Given the tremendous amount of energy needed to power crypto in the midst of what climate scientists have warned is a make-or-break moment for the rapidly warming Earth, Vogt asked Coolio to share his thoughts on the climate crisis. “I’m not so much worried about it,” Coolio said in a hoarse voice. “By the time it gets to be a serious problem I’ll be long dead.”

Though Vogt said Coolio understood the dangers of sea level rise and global warming, the rapper said he had “so many other things” to worry about right now that impending climate apocalypse was not on the list. Among them, Grant chimed in, was how they were going to get to Denmark. “Exactly, because I got a show tomorrow,” Coolio said. Though he’s more likely to suffer the ravages of climate catastrophe because of his age (20), Grant agreed about fretting in the right now versus worrying about our hothouse future.

And then Coolio dropped a serious bombshell. “I’m gonna tell y’all another thing that nobody will never tell you,” he said. “There’s another continent that they’re hiding from us.” Vogt, confused but intrigued, asked Coolio to elaborate. And so the rapper born Artis Leon Ivey Jr. explained that if you travel 50 miles out into the Antarctic Ocean — whether on a ship, plane or helicopter — you will be told by the military to turn back or face annihilation.

Grant said he’d also heard this conspiracy theory, and then doubled down with another one about hidden pyramids in Antarctica. “There are pyramids in the Grand Canyon,” Coolio noted. Vogt said he would save the rest of the chat for a later episode, but summarized a discussion with Coolio and Grant that involved them getting excited about what they described as an ancient race of aliens who were protecting part of the planet from marauding, fossil-fuel addicted humans.

The trio then boarded a plane — a sleepy Coolio in first class, Vogt in coach — with the host musing that as far-out as Coolio and Grant’s notions were, in a world where everything feels like it’s falling apart all the time, “it points to the allure of literally any distraction… any problem shinier than the big one: that we’ve accidentally created a world where our consumption is gradually killing us.”

Listen to the episode below (Coolio appears around 4:10 mark).