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When Lavender Darcangelo last stood on the America’s Got Talent stage, she was covered in golden glitter.
On that occasion last month, the 27-year-old contestant stunned the judges with her performance of “Out Here on My Own,” originally sung by Irene Cara for the Fame soundtrack. It was a rendition that earned her a standing ovation not only from the crowd, but from all four of the judges on the panel.
On Tuesday night (Aug. 22), Darcangelo took center stage once again, this time in the AGT qualifiers.
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The Fitchburg, MA native, who is autistic and blind, left nothing to chance as she belted out a cover of Foreigner’s mid-‘80s ballad, “I Want to Know What Love Is”. Bathed in the light of a laser show, and with the lights dimmed in the room to create the vibe of a planetarium, Darcangelo showcased her vocals with a stripped-back version.
The cameras caught Simon Cowell smiling as Darcangelo tugged on the heart strings. Heidi Klum, who had awarded Darcangelo the Golden Buzzer in July, appeared to be holding back tears.
The result – another standing ovation from everyone in he room, including Cowell, Klum and their fellow judges Howie Mandel and Sofia Vergara.
“Lavender, I’m so proud of you,” responded Klum. “They love you Lavender. I feel you when you are singing, I feel you, I hope everyone in this room felt you. I hope everyone at home felt you.”
It’s simply “the most amazing feeling,” Cowell enthused, “when a contestant who everyone loves nails it, and you can feel it.”
The song should be a embedded in Cowell’s DNA. Following its release in 1984, the single spent seven weeks in the U.K. top 10, including a three week run at No. 1. It was a similar story in the U.S., where the single logged two weeks atop the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
The second half of Darcangelo’s performance, Cowell noted, “the whole song, the lyric took on a completely different meaning for me, and that was beautiful.”
Now, it’s America’s turn to vote.
Watch Darcangelo’s performance below.
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Ticketing company Dice raised $65 million from MUSIC, the holding company founded by music veteran Matt Pincus and LionTree, the company announced Wednesday (Aug. 23). Pincus, MUSIC’s CEO and a co-founder of SONGS Music Publishing, which was acquired by Kobalt in 2017, will join Dice’s board of directors.
Additional investors in the funding round include Structural Capital; Ahdritz Holding LLC, an investment vehicle for Kobalt Music founder Willard Ahdritz; Exor Ventures, a venture fund listed on the Euronext Amsterdam with a net asset value of €28.2 billion ($30.6 billion); and Mirabaud Lifestyle Fund, an investment fund of Mirabaud Asset Management that focuses on companies that address the needs of Millennials and Generation Z consumers.
While Dice is a relatively small player in a field filled with large competitors, Pincus considers Dice to be “a completely different business” than big platforms such as Live Nation’s Ticketmaster and AEG’s AXS. “Dice is a platform for fans,” he tells Billboard. Rather than create a standard ticketing platform, Dice built a platform used by those young consumers that attend concerts most frequently. “It’s a user-centric platform” people use to find shows, discover culture and lifestyle events in a new city and and compare activities with friends, says Pincus. “They made ticket-buying fun — which is really hard to do.”
“We’re investing heavily in building even more technology and this year alone we released over 60 new features for fans, venues and artists,” Phil Hutcheon, CEO and founder of Dice, said in a statement. “I’m excited that Matt (Pincus) has joined the board and we’re more focused than ever on our mission to get fans out more.”
The funding will help Dice launch in new cities and further its expansion in Europe and United States and support ongoing investment in product development. The London-based company believes it will serve more than 55,000 artists and over 10,000 venues, festivals and promoters this year across 30 cities in the United Kingdom, United States, France, Germany, India, Italy and Spain.
Ahdritz’s relationship with Hutcheon goes back to 2015. “Having started AWAL at that time, I needed so many more venues for all my acts to play,” Ahdritz said in a statement. “DICE delivers a transformative experience for all stakeholders – from fans to venues to artists and looked like the future for live music. DICE has come a long way on their vision, and today it’s even clearer that the live industry needs changing. I am excited to have the opportunity to be part of the company as an investor.”
“Structural Capital is very excited to be involved in helping DICE continue its success and future growth,” Kai Tse, Structural Capital co-founder and managing partner, said in a statement. “We believe DICE is a true industry innovator.”
Dice also announced the appointment of Ali Byrd as chief financial officer. Byrd was previously with healthcare technology company Olive and has held senior positions at Microsoft, Limewire and CoverWallet.
Warner Music’s affiliates in Canada and India are teaming up for 91 NORTH RECORDS, a joint venture with the aim of identifying and launching artists of South Asian heritage.
Said to be a first-of-its-kind JV, the new entity is guided by celebrated artist and producer Ikwinder “Ikky” Singh, who has chalked up more than two billion combined streams with such songs as Shubh’s “Baller”, Diljit Dosanjh’s “Chauffeur” and Sidhu Moose Wala’s “Bambiha Bole”.
Ikky, who launched his own label, 4N Records, in partnership with Warner Music and Coalition Music in 2021, serves as creative director for 91 NORTH RECORDS.
The venture launches to the public today (Aug. 23) with its first signings, Canadian-based Punjabi artists Karan Aujla and Jonita Gandhi, both of whom work closely with Ikky and A&R director Charlie B.
“I’ve always been fascinated by the blending of Indian and Western sounds into culturally impactful, innovative music,” Ikky comments in a statement. The new business “exists to elevate artists pursuing this fusion. Punjabi and South Asian music already competes worldwide, and I’m thrilled to collaborate with emerging talents, showcasing and amplifying what they have to offer. This is no experiment; it’s the future.”
91 NORTH RECORDS was presented Tuesday with a special event at Warner Music Canada’s offices in Toronto. Its name is a reference to India’s country code and Canada’s geographical location, and the logo is inspired by India’s national flower — the lotus.
“There is an incredible new generation of talent rising, influenced by their South Asian heritage, and we want to make sure these artists are represented both here and around the world,” comments Kristen Burke, president, Warner Music Canada. The label “allows artists to be truly authentic, and our global network gives us the opportunity to showcase their culture on a global stage.”
Adds Jay Mehta, managing director, Warner Music India: “This is certainly going to be a gamechanger initiative for artists who will now have global support from A&R, marketing, collaborations and more.”
Canada is home to almost 2.6 million people of South Asian heritage. Those expats have a “strong musical connection” with the subcontinent, reads a joint statement from Warner Music Canada and Warner Music India.
Punjabi-Canadian acts accounted for three of the top 10 tracks in India last year, according to data supplied by IFPI.
Oliver Anthony Music is the king of country right now, and it would appear that he’s using his fresh platform to bring people together. But some of his early supporters are hitting back at his calls for unity and diversity.
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The U.S. artist’s breakout viral hit “Rich Men North of Richmond” debuts at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 songs chart, in doing so making him the first artist ever to launch atop the list with no prior chart history in any form.
Since topping the tally, the Farmville, Va.-based singer-songwriter and former factory worker, born Christopher Anthony Lunsford (whose stage name honors his grandfather, Oliver Anthony) has kept quiet on his social accounts.
Though he did give an interview with Fox News which, like his popular song, has gone viral.
“We are the melting pot of the world,” he says in the interview, which took place at his concert in Moyock, N.C. on Saturday (Aug. 19). “And that’s what makes us strong, our diversity. And we need to learn to harness that and appreciate it and not use it as a political tool to keep everyone separate from it.”
Those statesmanlike comments, however, have fallen flat with conservatives. The “exclusive” interview with the rightwing Fox Network has triggered a social media pile-on.
Oliver Anthony: “We are the melting pot of the world and that’s what makes us strong, our diversity”Such a let down. Did he sell out already to the rich men north of Richmond? pic.twitter.com/UkT6Ex4EAD— iamyesyouareno (@iamyesyouareno) August 22, 2023
“Such a let down. Did he sell out already to the rich men north of Richmond?,” reads one tweet. Another claims, “Damn, thought we had a real one. He switched up so fast.”
Writes another social media user on the speed of the backlash, “S—. That was fast”.
The guy with the viral right wing song about hating taxes and fat people is already pissing off right wing twitter with generic statements about how not being openly racist is good pic.twitter.com/i077GZgLk0— Wild Geerters (@steinkobbe) August 22, 2023
After first catching drew buzz online earlier this month, the independently released song drew praise from the right and opposition from the left, with its lyrics referencing “your dollar taxed to no end ’cause of rich men north of Richmond,” as well as “the obese milkin’ welfare.”
Stated Anthony in a video posted Aug. 7, “I sit pretty dead center down the aisle on politics and always have.” He added on Facebook Aug. 17, “I am sad to see the world in the state it’s in, with everyone fighting with each other.”
On the left side of politics, legendary British singer and songwriter Billy Bragg penned an op-ed for The Guardian, the U.K.’s left-leaning daily, in which he posits that “Anthony really does punch down on the poor.” The Bard of Barking continues, “The lives of ordinary working people are being torn apart by the rich, he laments, but we can fix it if we cut welfare – and taxes too.”
As the divisive song went all the way to the top, and lines were being drawn, Anthony shared a comment with Billboard, “The hopelessness and frustration of our times resonate in the response to this song. The song itself is not anything special, but the people who have supported it are incredible and deserve to be heard.”
Erika Jayne is getting ready to start up her very own Las Vegas residency, Bet It All on Blonde. The star will kick off her five-week stay at the House of Blues starting Friday (Aug. 25), but before gracing the stage, she sat down with Billboard News to tell fans what they can expect of […]
Singer-songwriter Warren Zeiders notches his first Billboard Hot 100 chart hit, as “Pretty Little Poison” debuts at No. 86.
The song, released in March through 717/Warner/WEA, arrives with 5.8 million U.S. streams (up 17%), 3.3 million radio airplay audience impressions (up 10%) and 1,000 downloads sold (up 1%) in the Aug. 11-17 tracking week, according to Luminate. It also rises 38-37 on Country Airplay, having become Zeider’s first entry on the survey.
The song’s recent gains can partly be attributed to hype leading up to the release of Zeiders’ debut studio album, Pretty Little Poison, which includes “Poison,” on Aug. 18.
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TikTok has been a factor in the song’s growing profile, as a portion of the track has been used in over 65,000 clips to date. (TikTok does not presently contribute directly to Billboard‘s charts.)
“Poison” concurrently pushes 24-22 on Hot Country Songs, marking Zeider’s highest-charting entry. He previously charted five songs on the list: “Ride the Lightning (717 Tapes)” (No. 30 peak in 2021); “Outskirts of Heaven,” featuring Craig Campbell (No. 49, 2021); “Dark Night (717 Tapes)” (No. 40, 2022); “Wild Horse (717 Tapes)” (No. 35, 2022); and “Up to No Good” (No. 50, 2022).
Zeiders (real name: Brady Zeiders), from Hershey, Pennsylvania, scored his first Billboard chart appearance with “Ride the Lightning (717 Tapes)” in July 2021. The song went viral on TikTok, ahead of its Hot Country Songs debut, and led to a record deal with Warner.
“Warren is a gifted songwriter and storyteller, has the confidence and drive to work harder than anyone, understands all the modern tools at an artist’s fingertips to market and promote themselves, and is just a great human being,” Aaron Bay-Schuck, co-chairman and CEO of Warner Records, said upon Zeiders’ signing. “We just had the best time getting to know one another and both [co-chairman/COO] Tom [Corson] and I felt that Warner Records was a natural fit for Warren.”
Ariana Grande and Demi Lovato have split from manager Scooter Braun. Rihanna & A$AP Rocky have reportedly welcomed their second child together. Justin Timberlake is showing off his acting chops in the trailer for Netflix’s ‘Reptile,’ as *NSYNC is rumored to reunite in ‘Trolls Band Back Together.’ And more! Tetris Kelly:Scooter Braun loses some of […]
Olivia Rodrigo launches at No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart for a second time, as “Bad Idea Right?” debuts atop the Aug. 26-dated survey. The singer-songwriter first led with “Brutal,” which reigned in its debut week in June 2021. “Bad Idea Right?” concurrently bows as Rodrigo’s second No. 1, again after […]
The Weeknd will make the long haul later this year for the Australia and New Zealand leg of his After Hours Til Dawn Tour.
The Canadian R&B star is set to play stadiums on his swing Down Under, which kicks off Nov. 20 at Brisbane’s Suncorp Stadium, with stops in Sydney (Accor Stadium, Nov. 24), Melbourne (Marvel Stadium, Dec. 1) and a final date at Eden Park in Auckland, New Zealand (Dec. 7).
Produced by Live Nation, the tour celebrates the Weeknd’s 2020 LP After Hours and 2022’s Dawn FM, both of which led the ARIA Albums Chart (the artist also four total No. 1s in Australia, including Beauty Behind The Madness from 2015 and Starboy from 2016). Special guests on the ANZ tour are Mike Dean and Chxrry22.
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Vodafone customers can secure pre-sale tickets from Aug. 25, through a new arrangement announced today with LN and its joint venture partner Secret Sounds. The general ticket onsale starts Friday, Sept. 1.The Weeknd (real name Abel Tesfaye) has had another busy year, during which time he broke attendance records at London’s Wembley Stadium, made his TV series debut with HBO’s The Idol, and released two cuts from it — “Double Fantasy” featuring Future, and “Popular” with Playboi Carti and Madonna.
The Starboy also jumped on “K-pop” with Travis Scott and Bad Bunny, and released a remix of his 2016 collaboration with Ariana Grande, “Die For You,” marking the duo’s fourth collaboration, following up 2021’s remix of “Save Your Tears,” as well as his feature on her 2014 single “Love Me Harder” and “Off the Table” from Ari’s most recent album, 2020’s Positions.
As his tour works its way around the world, the singer dropped his first-ever live album on March 3, Live at SoFi Stadium, a 31-track collection chronicling his two-night stand at the Los Angeles venue in Nov. 2022.
The Weeknd’s “After Hours Til Dawn Tour 2023” Australia and New Zealand:Nov. 20 — Suncorp Stadium, BrisbaneNov. 24 — Accor Stadium, SydneyDec. 1 — Marvel Stadium, MelbourneDec. 7 – Eden Park, Auckland
It’s tight at the top of the midweek U.K. chart, as singles by Dua Lipa, Billie Eilish and Olivia Rodrigo joust for the crown.
As it stands, Lipa’s Barbie cut “Dance The Night” (via Warner Records) leads Eilish’s “What Was I Made For?” (Interscope) and Rodrigo’s “Vampire” (Geffen), respectively.
According to the Official Charts Company, less than 1,000 chart units currently separate the top three.
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Lupa will hope for a different result from last week, when “Dance The Night” led on the chart blast, only to be pipped by Eilish in the finals days of the chart week.
If it holds its spot, “Dance The Night” would give Lipa a fourth U.K. chart topper, and her first as a solo artist since “New Rules” back in 2017.
If “Vampire” takes flight and snatches the crown, it would give Rodrigo a third leader after “Drivers License” and “Good 4 U,” both from 2021.
“What Was I Made For?” last Friday (Aug. 18) became Elish’s second U.K. No. 1 single, following her Academy Award-winning James Bond single, “No Time To Die.” And it led an historic tally, on which the top six singles were all recorded by solo female artists.
The Official Chart Update is Girl Powered once again, as female solo artists rule positions 1-6, including Taylor Swift’s “Cruel Summer” (holding at No. 4 via EMI), Peggy Gou’s “(It Goes Like) Nanana” (up 6-5 via XL Recordings) and Doja Cat’s “Paint The Town Red” (Ministry of Sound) set to rise 19-6, for a new high.
Also, Becky Hill’s “Disconnect” (Polydor) with Chase & Status is on the brink of a new peak, up 9-7 on the chart blast, while Nicki Minaj, Ice Spice and Aqua’s “Barbie World” (Atlantic/Capitol/Republic) dips 7-9, bringing to eight the total of female-led singles in the midweek top 10.
All will be revealed when the Official U.K. Singles Chart is published Friday, Aug. 25.