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Post Malone brought out both Jelly Roll and Ed Sheeran for his Coachella-ending set on Sunday night. As captured in clips posted by fans who were in the desert, the “Rockstar” singer first welcomed the country star for a live rendition of their 2024 F-1 Trillion collaboration “Losers.” After Posty delivered the first verse and […]
If there’s one act that might’ve seemed unexpected at this year’s Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival, it’s Los Mirlos, the iconic Peruvian group whose distinct blend of psychedelic cumbia conjures the mysticism and vibrant energy of the Amazon jungle.
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In their native country, Los Mirlos (named after the blackbirds of the Peruvian jungle) are legends, who have carved out a legacy that transcends generations. Today, founder and lead vocalist, Jorge Rodríguez Grández, plays alongside his two sons, Jorge L. Rodríguez (musical director, pianist and guitar) and Roger Rodríguez (vocalist and guiro), who joins occasionally. They are joined by Danny Johnston (lead guitar), Dennis Sandoval (bass), Carlos Rengifo (percussion), Genderson Pineda (drums) and Junior Soto (second vocalist).
Beyond Peru’s borders, the seven-member group remains relatively unknown, much like many folk-rooted acts around the globe that thrive primarily within “world music” circles. Yet, the band took to the Sonora tent at Coachella in Indio, California, for two consecutive weekends, captivating a crowd of nearly 5,000 fans with electrifying performances that seamlessly fused echo-laden keyboards and hypnotic electric guitar riffs into their signature psychedelic cumbia sound.
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“It’s been extraordinary,” a tired Rodríguez Grández tells Billboard from Washington D.C., hours after the group’s second Coachella set. “We are so happy that they reached out to us, because we have been promoting our Amazonian cumbia vigorously, it’s what we represent. We come from Moyobamba in Peru, then moved to Lima, and have been recording since 1973. We never stopped.”
After the Coachella announcement, a furor followed: Los Mirlos had made history as the first Peruvian band to perform at the festival, bringing Amazonian cumbia to the global stage. It was a testament to the unwavering support from their dedicated fanbase over the years for the group’s untamed and profound echo of the jungle spirit.
Hailing from the lush landscapes of Moyobamba in Peru’s San Martín region, with a population of approximately 120,000 citizens (about the same as the Coachella capacity per day), Los Mirlos emerged in the 1970s as trailblazers of Amazonian cumbia, not only introducing this pulsating style to the world 50 years ago but also cementing their status as cultural pioneers.
Although Los Mirlos are well-known in neighboring countries, they have sporadically played in the U.S. Conversations to play at Coachella began after the festival’s team sought them out, tracking down the group’s manager to initiate the collaboration in 2023. “They were looking for us,” Rodriguez Grández remembers. “They wanted us to perform in 2024. They reached out to Javier, my son, our manager, in 2023, but we didn’t have enough time to get our working visas. So, we were on standby and resumed the conversation in 2024.”
Months before the initial Coachella conversation, the documentary La Danza De Los Mirlos — the directorial debut of Peruvian Álvaro Luque, written by Jorge Ossio Seminario and Emanuel Giraldo Betancur, which preserves the soul of the Amazon in its every beat through rare archival footage and intimate interviews — was released in August 2022.
“It was chosen by the board of filmmakers for the 26th Lima Film Festival, presented at the Gran Teatro Nacional,” Rodriguez Grández shares. “Of course, the director was very flattered that out of 300 films, they chose ours.”
The timing proved to be a boon, with a call from Coachella coming just after. “Alvaro Luque spent close to four years traveling and documenting Los Mirlos,” Mario Giancarlo Garibaldi, Artist Relations for Los Mirlos tells Billboard. “He finally released the documentary in late 2022, and it has been the catalyst for this new era. It made public the true story of the group and how charismatic and relentless Jorge Rodriguez, its leader and founder, has been.”
Los Mirlos
Jason Sullivan for DUPLA
Beyond the documentary release, however, the Los Mirlos brand was already firmly established. “We’ve performed at many festivals before,” Rodriguez Grández states. “We’ve been at Vive Latino in Mexico, the Luminato Festival in Toronto and the Cordillera Festival in Bogotá last year. But before the pandemic, we were at the Pitoonkatonk festival in Pittsburgh. We’ve even made it to Ruido Fest in Chicago. Plus, Los Mirlos’ record productions have been widely promoted in Latin America. This is in addition to social media and Spotify, which has been a strategic ally in helping our music spread worldwide.”
With their unmistakable sound, Los Mirlos brought their psychedelic cumbia (or chicha) beyond borders, solidifying their place as one of Peru’s most iconic bands. Their beats continue to resonate far and wide, inspiring a new wave of artists who draw from their pioneering melodies to keep the vibrant tradition of Amazonian cumbia thriving.
“We’ve collaborated with Renata Flores, Hit La Rosa, and other emerging acts,” Rodriguez Grández adds. “It’s a joy to team-up with young acts who have a different fanbase but who identify with Los Mirlos. There are also many established groups, orchestrated bands such as Agua Marina, Grupo 5, Armonía 10 from the north, other groups from the Amazon that are outstanding. We’re paving the way for other bands to have the opportunity to get to Coachella like us. That’s what happened in 1980 in Argentina, the first country we traveled to with our Amazonian cumbia. We spread our music throughout the country during the decade of 1980-1990, even until 1993, when other musical groups arrived.”
But to get to that next level of stardom is not just about availability, presence and collaborations — artists in Latin America, especially emerging bands, face insufficient resources and struggle due to lack of government financial support to help them access resources and build their presence and audience reach.
“Governments in Latin America provide financial support, through the Ministry of Culture like in Mexico,” Rodriguez Grández says. “In Peru, there is support, but lacks a bit. Outreach is as important, which is now happening more, where artists need to register to receive financial support. But it needs to be expanded further, as many groups don’t have the opportunities that Los Mirlos have. Our brand is recognized and well-positioned in the market, but emerging bands need more government support.”
Los Mirlos
Jason Sullivan for DUPLA
While Los Mirlos have built a strong reputation, it’s taken time to create pathways for their development, something achieved through dedication and a deep connection to their cultural roots. Their signature style is a clear subgenre of cumbia that blends hypnotic tropical rhythms with the rawness of the traditional Amazonian sounds, infused with psychedelic undertones.
“Our legacy is to maintain the original style of psychedelic Amazonian cumbia that emerged in ’73, which we continue to enjoy,” Rodriguez Grández adds. “The day I step aside, my children will continue with that style, because the world has shown me it is what it likes: the sound of the guitars that identifies the group, its personality, its identity. My grandchildren will come later, too; that’s my wish.”
It’s a true family affair, with even grandkids coming together to take part in rehearsals and share in the musical tradition. “My grandchildren are already attending rehearsals, playing the guiro — a Latin American percussion instrument — and the drums, and are learning to play the guitar too, and that’s nice, because one can rest easy knowing that this will continue: that’s the wish. Many along the way have asked me, ‘Don Jorge, why don’t you add trumpets, trombones, or saxophone? It would give it more weight…’ But no, I’ve kept it that way, buoyed by the synthesizer to vary some songs, but the essence is based on that bewitching guitar that gives our music its charm.”
In between the double-boiler Coachella sets, clad in flashy Amazonian-urban-styled uniforms co-designed with Adidas, Los Mirlos packed The Roxy Theatre in Los Angeles on April 14. As part of their Ayahuasca Tour 2025, they delivered a sold-out intimate show, serving as opening act for Seun Kuti & Egypt 80, one of the many renowned acts within their growing orbit. Adding to the desert energy, they met Camilo Lara of the Mexican Institute of Sound, and a handful of impassioned DJs who have included The Mirlos’ songs in their sets. “My joy would have been completed had I met Lady Gaga, at least for a photo,” Rodriguez Grández jokes.
Los Mirlos
Jason Sullivan
As for why “Ayahuasca Tour”: “We represent the jungle, and Ayahuasca is an ancient medicinal plant from our Amazon region,” explains Rodriguez Grández. “It’s a bark with healing properties, that guided by a shaman, extracts all the negativity of the body. Our song ‘Un Traguito de Ayahuasca’ has a positive message that conveys this.”
What’s next for Los Mirlos? “Well, we haven’t been to Japan, we want to visit Australia also,” muses Rodriguez Grández. “We are dropping a mastered version of our album El Milagro Verde on May 2nd, with new and classic songs produced by us. Also, a larger project is on the works, with very well-known artists, collaborations of new and classic songs. That’s going to be a bomb worldwide, I hope.” The album will be released via the independent label Revancha, founded by Peruvians Gino Pezzia and Alejandro León, with Marthin Chan as their new business A&R.
Rodriguez Grández says he would like Los Mirlos to be remembered with love, in every corner of the world: “The affection people have for us is great, and I feel very grateful to God because he gives us the opportunity to reach other generations; because their parents, grandparents, uncles danced to our music, now the youth is dancing as well.”
Los Mirlos
Courtesy Photo

On the latest Billboard 200 albums chart (dated April 26), SZA’s SOS surpasses Adele’s 21 for the most weeks spent in the top 10 among albums by women.
SOS, released in 2022, garners its 85th nonconsecutive week in the top 10 on the chart, where it climbs 4-3. Adele’s 21, released in 2011, was last in the top 10 for its 84th and final (nonconsecutive) week in the region on the Jan. 9, 2016-dated chart.
The new April 26, 2025-dated chart will be posted in full on Billboard‘s website April 22.
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Both SOS and 21 are former No. 1s, with SOS having spent 12 weeks atop the tally and 21 having logged 24 weeks at No. 1 (a record among albums by women). SOS collected its two most recent weeks at No. 1 in January following its SOS Deluxe: LANA reissue with additional songs.
Further, SOS now ties Peter, Paul and Mary’s self-titled album for the third-most weeks in the top 10 among albums by a singular artist. They both trail two albums by Morgan Wallen (Dangerous: The Double Album, with 158; and One Thing at a Time, with 106).
Since the Billboard 200 began publishing on a regular weekly basis, with the March 24, 1956-dated chart, the album with the most weeks in the top 10 is the original cast recording of stage musical My Fair Lady, with 173 weeks in the top 10 between 1956-60.
The Billboard 200 chart ranks the most popular albums of the week in the U.S. based on multi-metric consumption as measured in equivalent album units, compiled by Luminate. Units comprise album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). Each unit equals one album sale, or 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams generated by songs from an album.
Albums With the Most Weeks in the Top 10 on the Billboard 200 Chart:Weeks in Top 10, Artist, Title, Year First Reached Top 10173, Original Cast, My Fair Lady, 1956158, Morgan Wallen, Dangerous: The Double Album, 2023109, Soundtrack, The Sound of Music, 1965106, Morgan Wallen, One Thing at a Time, 2023106, Soundtrack, West Side Story, 1962105, Original Cast, The Sound of Music, 196090, Soundtrack, South Pacific, 195887, Original Cast, Camelot, 196187, Original Cast, Oklahoma!, 195685, SZA, SOS, 202285, Peter, Paul and Mary, Peter, Paul and Mary, 196284, Adele, 21, 201184, Bruce Springsteen, Born in the U.S.A., 1984(From March 24, 1956, through the April 26, 2025-dated chart)
Because of how the Billboard 200 chart is now compiled, where streaming activity is blended with album sales and track sales, albums tend to spend a longer time on the list thanks to continued streaming activity. The chart only began utilizing streaming information in its methodology in December 2014. Before then, the chart was based solely on traditional album sales.
Also, a lengthy tracklist with multiple popular songs can help accrue large streaming totals, so albums like SOS, One Thing at a Time and Dangerous — each with more than 30 songs apiece — benefit from the continued weekly streams of their long tracklists.
Further, older albums (known as catalog albums; generally defined today as titles at least 18 months old) were mostly restricted from charting on the Billboard 200 from May 25, 1991, through Nov. 28, 2009. After that, catalog and current (new/recently released) albums have charted together on the Billboard 200. In turn, older albums now regularly spend hundreds of weeks on the chart. On the April 26, 2025-dated list, for example, there are more than 30 albums with least 400 total weeks on the chart. Before the rule change in December 2009, allowing catalog albums back onto the chart, only three albums had spent more than 400 weeks on the list – led by Pink Floyd’s chart-topping The Dark Side of the Moon. Today, it continues to hold the record for the most weeks on the list, with 990.

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Source: Liane Hentscher/HBO / The Last of Us / Pedro Pascal
Gamers have already experienced this controversial moment in video game history. Still, watching it unfold in HBO’s hit television adaptation of the iconic video game, The Last of Us, has hit even harder, leaving fans stunned.
Like watching the Titanic barrel towards a massive iceberg, fans of The Last of Us video game knew this day was coming and eagerly anticipated seeing how casual viewers would handle this moment that sparked plenty of discourse in the video game world when The Last of Us Part II was released in 2020.
*Spoilers Ahead*
Okay, if you moved past the spoiler warning, you no longer care about what is about to be said.
How Joel’s Time Came To An End In The Last of Us Season 2
At the end of season 1, we saw Pedro Pascal’s Joel slaughter a bunch of members of the Fireflies and including doctors who were about perform a fatal surgery on Ellie (Bella Ramsey) in hopes of turning her immunity to the fungal plague into a cure to end the Cordyceps brain infection that ravaged the entire globe, basically bringing civilization to a crashing halt.
Joel’s decision to save his surrogate daughter comes back to haunt him in season 2 with the introduction of Abby (Kaitlyn Dever), who just happens to be the daughter of the head surgeon he killed in season 1, and yes, she wants revenge, and she gets it brutally.
After Joel saves her from a horde of infected, she quickly realizes he is the man she has been searching for. She shoots in the knee with a shotgun before brutally beating Joel with a golf club, delivering the fatal blow in front of Ellie for a gutwrenching scene as she screams for surrogate dad to get up, before dragging herself over to his lifeless body.
We knew it was coming, but man, it still hit like a ton of bricks.
Showrunners Craig Mazin & Neil Druckmann Didn’t Want To Torment Fans
The Last of Us television show is a rare gem, as it has rich source material to draw from in the game; for the most part, it perfectly mirrors the game with some slight changes made to the story.
Like in this season, Abby is not muscular like she is in the game, much to the chagrin of some purists, but Dever still plays the role with the same anger, and Joel’s death in the show was more brutal than it was in the game, and this was done on purpose.
In an interview with Variety, showrunners Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann explained why they wasted no time when handling Joel’s death in the show.
They admitted they had thought of every possible scenario. Still, Druckmann explained from a storytelling perspective that Joel’s death happening early made sense “because this is the inciting incident for this story.”
Mazin and Druckmann also wanted to address the elephant in the room, Joel’s death, because it has been looming over the show since season 1, and they felt they had an obligation to spare fans from any more torment.
“There’s a danger of tormenting people,” Mazin told Variety. “It’s not what we want to do. If people know it’s coming, they will start to feel tormented. And people who don’t know it’s coming are going to find out it’s coming because people are going to talk about the fact that it hasn’t shown up yet.
“Our instinct was to make sure that when we did it, that it felt natural in the story and was not some meta-function of us wanting to upset people.”
Social Media Reactions To The Last of Season 2’s Heartbreaking Moment
As expected, the reactions to Joel’s gruesome death were those of shock, and mostly people who knew it was coming were still left reeling after watching Pedro Pascal take a golf club and plenty of punches to the face.
We’re not sure if those people who were tuning in to watch Pedro Pascal will stick around, but if this one post on X, formerly Twitter, is an indicator, HBO and The Last of Us might be in trouble.
But we don’t think last night’s episode will be the last time we see Pascal’s Joel. Remember, we got a whole five years of time we need to catch up on.
Damn Joel, we hate it had to be you.
You can see more reactons to the episode in the gallery below.
1. If you hate her, that means she’s doing a phenomenal job

Kendrick Lamar and SZA kicked off their 39-date Grand National stadium tour in Minneapolis over the weekend, and they’re already making headlines. Before Lamar performed his smash single and Drake diss track “Not Like Us,” he decided to have a little fun by prefacing it with a skit poking fun at the Toronto rapper’s current […]
Doechii is singing Westside Gunn‘s praises after the Griselda rapper sampled her on his latest EP Heels Have Eyes. On “Egypt,” the fifth and final track from the project he released on Friday, Gunn samples a snippet of Doechii’s Apple Music interview with Ebro Darden. “One-hundred percent/ You know, recently I’ve been into a lot […]
Coachella is officially wrapped for 2025, and we’re taking you through the highlights of everything that happened during weekend 2. From Tyla’s outfit inspo speculation to ENHYPEN revealing a new mini-album, keep watching for everything you missed! Stay tuned for our All Access Tour Stop with ENHYPEN dropping later today! What did you think of […]
All products and services featured are independently chosen by editors. However, Billboard may receive a commission on orders placed through its retail links, and the retailer may receive certain auditable data for accounting purposes. Music festivals are the perfect time to think outside-the-box when it comes to hair and makeup looks. Whether you’re going for […]
Linkin Park notches its eighth leader and fifth in a row on Billboard’s Rock & Alternative Airplay chart, with “Up From the Bottom” bounding three places to No. 1 on the April 26-dated ranking.
The track leads with 4.7 million radio audience impressions (up 28%) in the week ending April 17, according to Luminate.
The song reigns in its third week on the tally, wrapping the shortest trip to the top since Linkin Park’s own “The Emptiness Machine” hit No. 1 in its second week last September on its way to a 15-week No. 1 command.
The band now boasts five consecutive No. 1s on Rock & Alternative Airplay, from the 20-week leader “Lost” in 2023 through “Friendly Fire,” “The Emptiness Machine” (both in 2024) and “Heavy Is the Crown” (beginning this January). Dating to the chart’s June 2009 start, Linkin Park extends its record for the most consecutive No. 1s, a mark previously broken when it nabbed its fourth straight.
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The streak encompasses the contributions of three vocalists; the last three songs feature newly added singer Emily Armstrong plus longtime singer, rapper and guitarist Mike Shinoda, while the first two were posthumously released after the death of singer Chester Bennington in 2017.
The rockers also led with “New Divide” in 2009, “The Catalyst” in 2010 and “Burn It Down” in 2012 and now tie for the second-most No. 1s in the chart’s history.
Most No. 1s, Rock & Alternative Airplay:11, Foo Fighters8, Green Day8, Linkin Park6, Cage the Elephant6, Twenty One Pilots5, The Black Keys5, Imagine Dragons4, Red Hot Chili Peppers3, Weezer
Concurrently, “Up From the Bottom” breaks into the top 10 of the Alternative Airplay and Mainstream Rock Airplay charts, jumping 11-7 on both. It’s the band’s 22nd top 10 on each tally, with Linkin Park moving into sole possession of the fifth-most on the former, which began in 1988.
Most Top 10s, Alternative Airplay:31, Foo Fighters28, Red Hot Chili Peppers27, Green Day23, U222, Linkin Park21, Pearl Jam21, Weezer20, The Offspring18, Cage the Elephant18, Twenty One Pilots
“Up From the Bottom” debuted at No. 2 on the multimetric Hot Hard Rock Songs chart dated April 12 and ranked at No. 3 in its second week. In addition to its radio airplay, the song earned 2.2 million official U.S. streams and sold 1,000 April 4-10.
The song is from the deluxe edition of Linkin Park’s eighth studio album, From Zero, due May 16. The standard version debuted at No. 1 on the Top Rock & Alternative Albums chart in November and has earned 350,000 equivalent album units to date.
All Billboard charts dated April 26 will update Tuesday, April 22, on Billboard.com.

Kelly Clarkson can make a wish, take a chance and make a change, but one of her most beloved hits will still be her musical director’s least favorite. On an episode of The Kelly Clarkson Show guest-hosted by Andy Cohen on Monday (April 21), Jason Halbert — who oversees all things music on the talk […]