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1D has hit 1B — again. More than a decade after its release, the music video for One Direction‘s “Night Changes” has surpassed a billion views on YouTube, marking the band’s fourth visual to reach the milestone. Directed by Ben Winston and posted in November 2014, the “Night Changes” music video gave fans the chance […]
It’s not every day that a roomful of music industry executives keeps quiet during a party.
But Billboard’s annual Country Power Players Party celebrating the leaders in the genre, hosted June 4 at Category 10 in Downtown Nashville at Category 10, yielded respectful silence as a series of emotional moments highlighted the importance of health initiatives in the business.
Music Health Alliance founder Tatum Allsep challenged the industry to help financially in meeting the increasing mental health needs of the creative community as she accepted the Impact award from Brothers Osborne. Billboard country chart manager Jim Asker announced plans to step down from his position on Aug. 15, citing health issues, as Christian artist Lauren Daigle presented him with a farewell commemorative Billboard cover. And Little Big Town applied precision harmony to the poignant “Rich Man” as the band picked up the inaugural Ben Vaughn Song Champion award from songwriter Liz Rose (“Girl Crush,” “You Belong With Me”). The Song Champion hardware is named for the former Warner Music Nashville president/CEO, who died in January at only 49.
Vaughn “has left an indelible mark on our hearts,” LBT’s Karen Fairchild said, acknowledging his daughter, who attended the event. “I don’t feel at all worthy to talk about your dad, other than to just say that we miss him, and I know you do, and we’re here for you. You have a community of people here that will stand by you forever. All you do is just reach out and you tell us what you need, because that’s what your dad always did for us.”
Following a welcome by Melinda Newman, Billboard‘s executive editor of West Coast and Nashville, rising country artist Reyna Roberts hosted the Power Players Party, which included a surprise appearance by Garth Brooks, who handed the prestigious country executive of the year trophy to AEG/Goldenvoice executive vp Stacy Vee, recognizing her contributions to the high-profile Stagecoach Country Music Festival in Indio, Calif.
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Brooks portrayed Vee as an underdog in a male-dominated industry.
“In this business, like so many businesses, a female needs to work 1000 times harder than a male to get a tenth as much as the male gets,” Brooks said. “That’s just how it always has been. The blessing on that – I think that’s what makes Dolly Parton, Dolly Parton. I think that’s what – and I was firsthand watching this – makes Reba McEntire, Reba McEntire. You can’t outwork her, right? I’m married to one of the greatest singers of any format (Trisha Yearwood). I watch her every day work 1000 times harder than me to get a 10th as much as they give me. So with that, I think that kind of describes Stacy.”
BigXThaPlug scored the Innovator award, presented by Shaboozey just weeks after topping the Hot Country Songs chart dated April 19 with “All The Way,” a rap-and-country hybrid featuring guest Bailey Zimmerman from his forthcoming collaborations project.
“X is someone who didn’t just break the mold,” Shaboozey enthused. “He melted it down and made it his own.”
Ella Langley snagged the trailblazer award, presented by Lainey Wilson, while Riley Green – who collaborated on Langley’s “you look like you love me” – was handed the groundbreaker award by Ronnie Dunn, one-half of the duo Brooks & Dunn.
“Any wisdom that has been passed along to me from the women in the business, I’ve tried to share it with Ella, and Ella seems like she’s all ears,” Wilson told the crowd. “She wants to listen. She wants to know more and do more and be more, and that’s what makes her just a superstar. I’m proud of Ella, not just for being the trailblazing artist that she is, but for the heart that she’s got to go with it.”
Asker announced his intention to pass the torch on the influential Billboard country chart position while recounting challenges he’s faced as a stage IV non-Hodgkins cancer survivor.
“They didn’t think I’d make it through the first two weeks in the hospital,” Asker recalled.
He beat those odds and subsequently ran 15 26.2-mile marathons, raising money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. He expects to continue teaching writing classes at Columbia State Community College in Tennessee, and to study for another degree.
Music Health Alliance, meanwhile, has made assisting cancer patients and other members of the music community its non-profit mission. In the 12 years since its inception, the organization has reportedly benefited more than 32,000 people and saved the industry more than $145 million in health care costs. That’s particularly noteworthy; the majority of music-industry workers are independently contracted and historically face greater difficulty accessing insurance than corporate-employed staff.
T.J. Osborne hailed Allsep as “Nashville’s very own Mother Teresa.” Allsep, in turn, sought to motivate the movers and shakers in the room to step up their game in an increasingly difficult emotional period.
“In the last few months, MHA has seen a 250% increase in requests for mental health support,” she noted. “Y’all, that’s not a statistic. That’s a screaming flare. It is a fucking S.O.S. call, and we have got to do better.”
“We’ve got to have a plan for the long haul,” she continued, noting the MHA’s new mental health initiative in partnership with Universal Music Group. We know that music heals, but even the healers need healing. So here’s the ask to every label, to every publisher, to every platform, to every artist, everybody who makes a living in this industry: please don’t just admire the mission and the impact. Feel it. Fuel it. Fund it. We so desperately need you to stand with us, to nurture the noise, and then we can truly heal the music.”
Erykah Badu has announced that she’ll be dropping music later this summer on her own record label, Control FREAQ Records. Having been with Motown since at least 2007, this newly independent venture is a huge deal for Badu. The neo-soul pioneer established Control FREAQ Records in 2005, representing her “desire to foster creativity and innovation […]
Arthur Fonzarelli could have had a way different vibe if the team behind beloved 1970s/early ’80s sitcom Happy Days had gone with their second choice. At least according to The Monkees drummer Micky Dolenz, who told People magazine that back in the day he auditioned for the role of the jukebox-smacking, shark-jumping bad boy with a heart of gold.
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After his run on The Monkees (1966-1968), the last surviving member of that American fab four said he was on the hunt for a role that would break him out of the mop top drummer cage, so in 1973 he auditioned for the role of Arthur “The Fonzie” Fonzarelli, the leather jacket-wearing greaser next door who became the break-out star of the show.
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“I almost got it,” Dolenz, 80, said. “Supposedly it was between me and Henry [Winkler]. He remembers it too. The story I heard is that he was in the waiting room, saw me come in, and thought, ‘Oh s–t, I’ll never get this — Micky Dolenz is here!’ So we laugh about it now. He’s a good friend and a brilliant talent.”
While Yale School of Drama grad Winkler came into his audition with plenty of stage experience and roles in the indie movies The Lords of Flatbush and Crazy Joe, Dolenz was already a seasoned TV pro by the time he auditioned for Happy Days. At 11, he got the lead role of Corky in the adventure series Circus Boy, which ran on NBC for one season before jumping to ABC for another short run in 1957. A young Dolenz then scored a few TV roles in the late 1950s and early 1960s — credited as Micky Braddock — before being cast as Micky on The Monkees alongside Michael Nesmith, Davy Jones and Peter Tork.
When that show ended, Dolenz decided to focus on directing and producing, realizing that his gig as the spacey, floppy-haired drummer would likely get him typecast like his father, George Dolenz, an actor he said got pegged as a “swashbuckling romantic lead in sword-fighting movies” such as The Purple Mask and Sign of the Pagan.
“After Circus Boy, I went to a few auditions as a 12-year-old, and the minute I walked in, they’d say, ‘Circus Boy’! That’s just typical in this business. I knew it was par for the course,” said Dolenz, who added that after the Monkees it was more of the same. “‘What are you doing here? We don’t need any drummers!’” he said casting directors would tell him.
Following his pivot to a number of small movie roles and voice work on dozens of cartoons in the 1970s, “I’m a Believer” singer Dolenz said he has no regrets about the one that got away. “Oh my God, he’s just so good,” he said of Winkler, who parlayed his iconic role into a fifty-plus year career on TV (Mork & Mindy, Arrested Development) and movies (Night Shift, The French Dispatch). “I was definitely not as good as he was. Come on — he was The Fonz! He had that New York, New Jersey thing down. I’m from Southern California. It wasn’t gonna happen!,” Dolenz said.
Dolenz is going on tour this summer with his Songs & Stories tour, which mixes his iconic hits with stories about fellow L.A. legends such as Joni Mitchell, David Crosby and Jim Morrison. The tour is slated to kick off on August 11 at the Ocean City Music Pier in Ocean City, NJ.
ESPN is giving Lil Wayne fans a sneak peek at his The Carter VI album mere hours before it arrives. Unreleased track “The Days” featuring Bono has been used in a promo ad for game one of the NBA Finals between the Indiana Pacers and Oklahoma City Thunder on Thursday (June 5). “I pledge allegiance […]
Tiësto and Sexyy Red are revving their engines with the just-released collab “OMG!”
The slinky song, in which Sexyy Red opines about maxing out credit cards, breaking the rules and being “too high to be cool” over the Dutch producer’s woozy beat, comes from the forthcoming soundtrack to the Brad Pitt-starring racing film F1.
“Who would have thought that Tiësto would have a collab with Sexyy Red?” the producer recently told Billboard backstage at EDC Las Vegas. “No one, absolutely no one, but here it is, and it’s an amazing track. I think people will really like it. It’s super dance.”
“OMG!” has been in the works for awhile, with Tiësto playing it during a huge performance in October at the annual dance gathering ADE. The track comes from the F1 the Album soundtrack, with the corresponding film hitting theaters on June 27, the same day the soundtrack will be released.
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This soundtrack brings together a collection of musical titans including music by Dom Dolla (who’s slick contribution “No Room For a Saint” came out last month), Doja Cat, ROSÉ, Peggy Gou, Chris Stapleton, Ed Sheeran, Raye, Burna Boy, Roddy Rich, Madison Beer, Tate McRae, Don Toliver and Myke Towers.
Tiësto, a known racing fan, also makes a cameo in the film, which stars Pitt as an aging F1 driver who returns to the sport after a long absence, along with Damson Idris, Kerry Condon and Javier Bardem. F1 The Movie was directed by Joseph Kosinski, who also directed the global blockbuster Top Gun: Maverick.
Listen to “OMG!” below:
Lorde revealed in a new interview that she has multiple favorite songs from her upcoming album, Virgin. But on the other side of the coin, there’s one that she can’t even listen to because of how raw it is — and it’s about a pretty NSFW topic.
Speaking to Jake Shane on an episode of his Therapuss podcast posted Wednesday (June 4), the New Zealand native shared that track seven — which is named after a popular pregnancy test brand — is particularly emotional for her. “There’s a song that I love so much called ‘Clearblue’ that is about unprotected sex,” she began, laughing.
“And just the experience of taking a pregnancy test, and like, this flood of emotions that goes through your body,” she continued, noting that the track is one of several “slammers” on the album. “Whatever you want to say — it’s such a moment.”
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“That whole song just destroys me,” Lorde added. “I can’t even really listen to it.”
According to the pop star, “Clearblue” is one of several songs on Virgin that features sexual content, despite the album’s contradicting name. She explained to Shane of the title, “It speaks to a sort of purity, but the album is quite sexual, so it wasn’t sexual purity … virgin steel, virgin hair, all of these things that denote purity, but I’m also kind of always trying to take me to my teen self.”
Arriving June 27, Virgin will mark Lorde’s first album in four years. In the weeks leading up to its release, she’s been open about how the confluence of stopping birth control, recovering from disordered eating habits and embracing her gender fluidity have shaped the project’s direction.
The album’s subject matter and percussive, electric sound are expected to mark a distinct shift from the Grammy winner’s last project, Solar Power, which peaked at No. 5 on the Billboard 200. That LP found Lorde singing about her gravitation toward a more peaceful, unplugged lifestyle after years of living the pop-star life following the successes of 2013 debut album Pure Heroine and 2017 follow-up Melodrama. But on Therapuss, she revealed that the concept of Solar Power doesn’t really resonate with who she is today.
“I love Solar Power so much, and I truly needed to make it,” she told Shane. “I wouldn’t be here with another album if I hadn’t made Solar Power, but I think it showed me that you sort of just have no choice but to be what you’re supposed to be. Me sort of disappearing and being all wafty and on the beach, I was just like, ‘Actually, I don’t think this is me.’ I just am this person that’s meant to make bangers that f–k us all up … I love to vibe out. That is me to my core.”
Watch Lorde’s full Therapuss interview above.
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Offset does not play about his children. The Migos rapper made it clear he is ready to crash out over his son having matching braids with Stefon Diggs.
As per Page Six, Offset is none too happy about his son’s Wave hairstyle. Earlier this week, Stefon Diggs debuted his new braid pattern while at the New England Patriots practice at Gillette Stadium. The cornrows in question go down the sides of his head and feature a star-like pattern at the crown, which is identical to the style Wave has been sporting for about two months. As expected, this landed on Offset’s radar and he took to social media to express his frustration.
“Now when somebody die for playing with my son then call me the crash out,” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter. Minutes later he added, “Idc how I look trolling wit my kid ends bad.” His reaction caused a lot of stir online with many people criticizing Offset for his harsh response to the matter. So much so he eventually deactivated his X and Instagram accounts.
Earlier this month, his soon-to-be ex-wife Cardi B made her long-rumored relationship with Stefon Diggs official with a very spicy photo from their recent yacht outing. Offset also commented on that informal announcement saying, “Good roll out n PR,” via an X post that was accompanied with a video of a basketball being passed out the frame. The copy read “Today I pass.” Diggs seemingly responded to the Migos rapper with a photo showing him catching a ball, which was largely interpreted as him being overjoyed about having Cardi B in his life.
Offset and Cardi B wed in 2017. Since then, their relationship has had many ups and downs with rumors of him cheating with different women. They filed for divorce for a second time in July 2024. The two share three children. Cardi B has yet to comment on the matter.
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At a recent meet-and-greet, a fan got a little too handsy while posing for a photo with Megan Thee Stallion.
The guy, who goes by “King Paris” and is known as a celebrity hairstylist, posted the video himself. In it, his hands seem to go too low, and fans were quick to call him out online.
Instead of apologizing, the hairstylist doubled down. He shared another video and said, “@theestallion loves me, get tf outta here!!!! I definitely asked the queen.” He even joked that he should be made “co-captain of the Hotties.” In one clip, just as security was about to step in, Megan can be heard saying, “he’s good,” which made the situation even more confusing for fans.
While people are debating whether he crossed the line, Megan is keeping it moving with her latest project: her own tequila brand called Chicas Divertidas, which means “fun girls” in Spanish. It’s made in Mexico with 100% blue agave and comes in two flavors: Blanco (which has citrus and green tea vibes) and Reposado (which tastes like caramel and spices). It costs around $70–$80 per bottle. Megan made it clear this isn’t a sponsorship, it’s her business.
Along with launching her liquor brand, Megan is working on her own anime series and even has plans to open assisted living homes. So even though the fan moment got people talking, Megan is still all about her bag, her fans, and her future.
Check out some of the reactions below of a fan getting a little too handsy with the Houston Hottie, Meg Thee Stallion.
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Independent live events tech platform Fever said on Thursday it agreed to acquire the U.K. ticketing and discovery platform DICE, according to a press release.
The news comes a day after Fever announced it raised $100 million in a funding round led by L Catterton and Point72.
The tie-up will strengthen Fever’s standing as a global tech entertainment company and will help the 11-year-old DICE scale by giving it access to the 40 countries Fever operates in, the company’s executives said in a statement.
Fever, which operates a discovery platform and media reaching more than 300 million people in 40 countries, says joining forces with DICE will strengthen its global standing while helping DICE to scale. DICE says it has 10 million monthly active fans and ticket sales have doubled in the past two years, according to the press release.
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“We are strengthening our position as the leading global tech player for culture & live entertainment,” Fever’s co-founders Ignacio Bachiller, Alexandre Perez and Francisco Hein said in a statement. “We are firm believers that data and technology have the power to elevate the live music experience — making it more accessible, more personalized, and ultimately more impactful for fans, artists, and venues alike.”
Fever, which combines audience insights, ticketing and discovery tools for promoters and venues, was most-recently valued at $1.8 billion in 2023, Music Business Worldwide reported. The company partners with festivals, such as Primavera Sound, Rock in Rio Lisbon and Pitchfork, as well as independent venues like Clapham Grand.
DICE users will be able to continue using the platform “exactly as they are today,” according to the release.
LionTree Advisors LLC served as the financial advisor DICE, and Wilson, Sonsini, Goodrich & Rosati LLP served as their legal counsel. Fever Labs Inc. was advised by Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP and Morrisson & Foerster LLP.