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08/17/2023

The 1975’s Matty Healy and Ross MacDonald were far from the first artists to protest anti-LGBTQ laws through public displays during a concert.

08/17/2023

Travis Scott‘s super-sized roll-out of his Utopia album continued on Tuesday (Aug. 15) with the free YouTube posting of his 75-minute Circus Maximus film, as well as four Utopia music videos.
The trippy film — which played in select theaters on the album’s July 28th release date — opens with a scene in which Scott dreams he is being enveloped by a gigantic sea creature before setting off on a quest across a desolate landscape that brings him to a lavish mansion where he meets up with producer Rick Rubin.

Seen through a keyhole, their interaction initially finds Rubin asking probing questions (“is the house half empty, or completely empty?,” “how are the kids?,” “are you still crying?,” “how about the drugs, are they still working, or are you just tired of them?”) as an exasperated Scott tries to gather his thoughts.

What unfolds over the next hour-plus is a head-spinning film — written by Scot and co-directed by the rapper, Andrew Dosunmu and Kahlil Joseph — that incorporates all 19 tracks from the feature-filled album in a series of colorful vignettes. It bounces from Scott rapping “Hyaena” in an African village, to the MC participating in a Catalan-style human tower build in “Sirens,” all intercut with bits of the Rubin interview.

Elsewhere, there is a futuristic taxi chase set to the Beyoncé-assisted “Delresto (Echoes),” a strobing underground dance party for “Modern Jam” and some fresh footage cued to “Hyaena” and a remix of “Jam” in which Scott stands in front of a massive wall of speakers in Rome’s Circus Maximus, which bleeds into an extended run of footage from the recent album release show in the ancient venue that drew 60,000 fans and a surprise Kanye West cameo.

The break-out videos for “Sirens,” “Modern Jam,” “Hyaena” and “Delresto (Echoes)” are all versions of the clips that appear in the Maximus movie. Utopia has ruled the Billboard 200 albums chart for two weeks in a row, earning 147,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. for the week ending Aug. 10, down 70%, according to Luminate, from its debut the week before with 496,000 units earned.

Check out the Scott videos below.

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Corridos tumbados star Junior H is looking to set another milestone in his already prolific career: conquering the legendary Foro Sol stadium in Mexico City. Mexican promoter Ocesa announced on Monday (Aug 14) that the singer will perform at the storied venue on Nov. 23.

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The 23-year-old singer will arrive at the emblematic venue after having packing the Plaza de Toros México for two consecutive nights last May, drawing more than 80,000 people, according to organizers. Junior H is following in the footsteps of his genre colleague and July’s Billboard cover star Peso Pluma, who will perform at the Foro Sol 12 days earlier.

Junior H’s concert in the Mexican capital was announced after he kicked off his Sad Boyz 2023 U.S. arena tour on Friday at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, where he gathered around 13,000 people, according to his publicists.

Ocesa announced that a presale for Citibanamex cardholders will be held on August 22nd starting at 11:00 a.m. (Mexico City time); the general sale will begin one day later at the same time through Ticketmaster Mexico, and at the Palacio de los Deportes box office in Mexico City.

Prior to his concert at the Foro Sol, Junior H (whose real name is Antonio Herrera Pérez) will headline the Coordenada Festival on October 14 in Guadalajara, Jalisco, where he will share the bill with Mexican band Panteón Rococó and Queens Of The Stone Age.

In just four years, the self-proclaimed Sad Boy has solidified his position as one of the top exponents of corrido tumbado, a subgenre born after the release of Natanael Cano’s Corridos Tumbados album in 2019, with whom he has collaborated early in his career. He has also performed alongside other successful Mexican acts like Peso Pluma, Edén Muñoz, Gabito Ballesteros and Alemán.

Clocking in at more than 2 million plays in just a few weeks when it released in 2019, his song “No He Cambiado,” from his album Mi Vida en un Cigarro, became a phenomenon on digital platforms. Since then, he has placed 18 songs on Billboard’s Hot Latin Songs chart, four of which reached the top 10, and earlier this year he made inroads on the overall Billboard Hot 100 chart with the hit “Fin de semana” alongside Oscar Maydon.

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His latest track is “El Patrocinador” with Grupo Firme, whose video has more than 5.8 million views since its release 10 days ago.

Check out Ocesa’s announcement of the Junior H concert at the Foro Sol below:

Beyoncé showed some love for Lizzo during her Renaissance gig in Atlanta on Monday night (Aug. 14). After previously appearing to leave the “About Damn Time” singer out of the lyrics to the “Break My Soul (The Queens Remix)” earlier on the tour after Lizzo was hit with a lawsuit from three former dancers accusing her of creating a hostile environment and sexual harassment, Bey slotted Lizzo back in and added a shout out during the last of three gigs at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
“Lizzo. I love you, Lizzo!” Beyoncé shouted during the performance of the song that finds her ticking off a list of legendary female artists including Bessie Smith, her sister Solange, Erykah Badu, Janet Jackson, Lauryn Hill and many others.

Just a week after being hit with the lawsuit from the former dancers — which also included allegations that they were pressured to touch nude dancers during a live sex show — the lawyer representing the three dancers said last week that “we have received at least six inquiries from other people with similar stories since we filed the complaint.”

The original complaint covering alleged harassment that allegedly took place between 2021-2023, was filed on behalf of dancers Arianna Davis, Crystal Williams and Noelle Rodriguez. It accused Lizzo (born Melissa Jefferson) and her Big Grrrl Big Touring Inc. of a wide range of legal wrongdoing, including racial and religious discrimination. They also included allegations that the captain of Lizzo’s dance team, Shirlene Quigley, forced her religious beliefs on the plaintiffs and took repeated actions that made them uncomfortable, including commenting on their virginity and simulating oral sex on a banana in front of them.

Lizzo denied the initial allegations in a statement, in which she wrote that they are “false” and “sensationalized stories,” adding, “I am not the villain that people and the media have portrayed me to be these last few days. I am very open with my sexuality and expressing myself but I cannot accept or allow people to use that openness to make me out to be something I am not.”

She said that the allegations that she and her company created a hostile work environment were “unbelievable as they sound and too outrageous to not be addressed.” Beyoncé had pointedly left Lizzo’s name out of the live performance of the “Break My Soul” remix during an Aug. 1 show in Massachusetts, repeating Badu’s name four times instead; she reportedly slotted the singer’s call-out back into the song during a show in Maryland on Aug. 7. Bey’s mother, Tina Knowles, said the apparent Lizzo leave out was not done on purpose, pointing out that the singer also left out former Destiny’s Child member Kelly Rowland’s name that night, while fans have noted that not every name in the remix makes it into every performance.

Lizzo has kept a low profile since the lawsuit was filed and one of the only shows she had on her upcoming roster, a headlining slot at this year’s Made in America festival in Philly (Sept. 2-3), was pulled last week when organizers unexpectedly cancelled the event — which was also slated to feature SZA as a headliner — due to “severe circumstances outside of production control.”

Check out the Lizzo moment below.

New York City was popping over the weekend with #HipHop50 concerts and parties celebrating the NYC-spawned art form that began at DIY parties in housing projects and has grown into the most popular genre of music in America.
While Friday (Aug. 11) night’s Yankee Stadium concert featuring A-listers and neglected genre pioneers understandably got the most shine, ITSALLBLACKMUSIC’s 5X5 Block Party series ensured that each borough’s role in hip-hop’s evolution was honored, too. On Saturday (Aug. 12) at 1520 Sedgwick Avenue in the Bronx, luminaries from Public Enemy to KRS-One to Talib Kweli made damn sure the birthplace of hip-hop was rocking for the genre’s 50th anniversary.

Chuck D was listed on flyers as one of the Bronx concert’s headliners, but with Flavor Flav joining him on stage, Public Enemy was in full effect outside the residential building that hosted a storied breakbeat-heavy set in a rec room by DJ Kool Herc on Aug. 11, 1973. (That party, put on by Herc and his sister Cindy Campbell, is one of many key events in the genre’s genesis, but for purposes of the global #HipHop50 celebrations, their party at 1520 Sedgwick is the reason Aug. 11 is celebrated as birthday of hip-hop.)

Unapologetic as always, Chuck D said Public Enemy was offered a spot at the all-star Yankee Stadium concert but turned it down when KRS-One asked the group to make sure the Bronx birthplace got its dues on the anniversary. “F—k Yankee Stadium,” Chuck D concluded.

In between classic cuts like “Bring the Noise,” “911 Is a Joke” and “Fight the Power” (which still pack a wallop thanks to Chuck and Flav’s runaway-train energy), Chuck D demonstrated to the audience — a cross-generational swath of current residents, former locals trading tales of the not-necessarily-so-good-old-days and younger fans who needed Google Maps just to find the spot — that PE remains as politically outspoken as ever.

Chuck asked people to take out their phones, then reminded everyone that phones can be used to track your location and store data about you. He also shouted out imprisoned hip-hop pioneer Kidd Creole of Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five (not to be confused with the lead singer of Kid Creole and the Coconuts, another Bronx legend) and claimed the retired rapper, whose real name is Nathaniel Glover, was “railroaded” by the system.

“Free Kidd Creole,” Chuck said, adding that “someone needs to talk to [NYC Mayor] Eric Adams” about the situation.

In April 2022, Glover was found guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to 16 years in prison for stabbing a homeless man, who later died in a hospital, in 2017. Glover’s attorney argued the stabbing was in self-defense, alleging Glover felt threatened after the man approached him around midnight in midtown Manhattan.

Just one night after Hip Hop 50 Live rocked Yankee Stadium, Jonas Brothers took over the iconic New York City venue on Saturday (Aug. 12) for the opening night of their massive “Five Albums. One Night. The World Tour” trek.
The band’s latest world tour, which currently boasts a whopping 94 shows, features a setlist comprised of every song from each of their previous four studio albums — 2007’s Jonas Brothers, 2008’s A Little Bit Longer, 2009’s Lines, Vines and Trying Times and 2019’s Happiness Begins — as well as selections from 2023’s The Album, standalone singles such as “What a Man Gotta Do” and “Leave Before You Love Me,” and solo tracks like Nick Jonas’ “Jealous” and Joe Jonas’ (by way of DNCE) “Cake by the Ocean.” As Nick Jonas told People, “It’s our most ambitious show we’ve ever put on, in the sense that building out five albums in one night was a challenge that I don’t think we fully understood after we’d already put it on sale.” He continued, “It’s amazing to just go back and look at the road that brought us to this moment now.”

As it has often been for the past decade-and-a-half, it was a family affair. Nick Jonas’ wife, Citadel star Priyanka Chopra Jonas, attended the tour’s opening night show, and she brought along their 18-month-old daughter, Malti Marie Chopra Jonas, to soundcheck. “From soundcheck to the stage with my girls. Yankees night one was beyond words,” Nick captioned a photo of him and his daughter sitting behind a drum kit. Joe Jonas’ wife, Emmy-nominated actress Sophie Turner, was also in attendance, standing alongside Chopra Jonas as the two took in the show together.

The celebrity appearances didn’t stop with the immediate Jonas Family. During the band’s second night at Yankee Stadium, Jimmy Fallon surprised fans with a sing-along to The Killers’ “Mr. Brightside.” “Huge thanks to @jonasbrothers for giving me the surprise guest spot on ‘The Tour’ tour. And thank you to @yankeestadium for turning it into the world’s biggest karaoke party. This is one of those nights I will never forget,” Fallon posted on X (formerly known as Twitter) on Sunday night (Aug. 13).

In addition to Fallon, Grammy-winning gospel music superstar Kirk Franklin and Grammy-nominated producer and songwriter Jon Bellion joined Jonas Brothers for the first nights of The Tour. Both Franklin and Bellion appeared for a rendition of “Walls,” the lead single from The Album, which peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 back in May. Jonas Brothers even brought out their former security guard Robert “Big Rob” Feggans to rap his fan-favorite verse on “Burnin’ Up” (No. 5), one of the band’s several Hot 100 top ten hits to appear on the setlist. Jonas Brothers’ other top ten hits on The Tour setlist include 2008’s “Tonight” (No. 8) and 2019’s “Sucker” (No. 1).

Following their two sold-out Yankee Stadium shows, Jonas Brothers have announced a fifth hometown show at Prudential Center in New Jersey. Check out some videos of their performances below.

Dave Grohl loves a long con. And on Saturday night at the Outside Lands Festival in San Francisco he squared the circle on a joke he’s been telling for much of he Foo Fighters‘ current tour. For months at Foos shows, Grohl has been asking if anyone in the audience knows the lyrics to Michael Bublé‘s bouncy pop ditty “Haven’t Met You Yet” from the crooner’s 2009 Crazy Love album.
Aside from loving an inescapable pop hook, the gag is also a nod to the eclectic resume of drummer Josh Freese, a well-traveled studio and live player who, as luck would have it, did a stint playing for Bublé. And if it even has to be said, yes, Freese played the drums on the studio version of “Haven’t Met You Yet.”

Praising Freese’s lengthy resumé, Grohl had keyboardist Rami Jaffee cue up the springy piano intro to the song. “The last couple shows — I always look out [into the crowd] — someone’s like ‘I know the Bublé song,’ ‘I’ll come up and sing,’ ‘I know the f— Bublé song,’” Grohl said to the audience at the festival in a video of the moment.

“And every time someone f— says they know the song, they don’t know the f— song. Do you know the f— song? Who knows the f— song?,” the excitable Foos leader asked the crowd. Then, spotting a superfan in the crowd with an “I love Bublé” sign, Grohl called him up to the stage. “This motherf–er better know the song! Do you know the song? Because people say they know it but they don’t!”

Spoiler alert: it was the Bubes himself, who smoothly dropped right into the first verse as he took the stage in all-black for the perfectly executed gag with his old pal Freese backing him up. After crooning through the chorus (with some help from the crowd) Grohl admitted, “Okay, this guy’s pretty good. This guy’s pretty good,” before jumping in and asking if he could sing the hook.

Second spoiler alert: Grohl did not sing the word “met” in the chorus, substituting a more graphic lyric.

“Oh my God, it’s Michael Bublé!” Grohl said in shock surprise, explaining that every time they did it on tour people would claim to know the lyrics, but never actually did. “This bad-ass motherf—er, and I’m not even kidding, flew in today from Argentina to f–ing sing that song to you guys,” Grohl said. “‘Cause there’s no such thing as taking a joke too far.”

In a backstage bit posted by Bublé, the ultra-smooth singer announces that he’s finally been asked to join the Foos, to which Dave Grohl says, “f–k you Bublé!”

Watch the videos below.

“If you remember anything from tonight, remember this one thing: I ain’t s— without you,” proclaimed Lil Wayne at the Hip Hop 50 Live concert on Friday (Aug. 11). As tens of thousands of fans descended upon Yankee Stadium in the Bronx, New York, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of one of the most important and influential art forms in the world, Wayne’s message was proven correct.

Hip Hop 50 Live, which featured headliners Run-D.M.C. in their final show, was a celebration of the genre’s roots and evolution as much as it was a celebration of the fans and community that have kept pushing the culture forward for 50 years and counting. Featuring a crowd as diverse as New York City itself, the concert placed a heavy emphasis on honoring the genre’s pillars such as The Sugarhill Gang and Melle Mel. From undisputed icons like Roxanne Shante to new-school innovators like A Boogie wit da Hoodie, Friday night’s concert was the physical embodiment of the cross-generational impact of hip-hop.

Assembling a lineup that effectively conveys the cultural, regional, sexual, and generational diversity of a genre as multilayered as hip-hop is no easy task. While the show was notably lacking in contemporary stars, the concert’s lineup was more than capable of captivating the massive stadium. Performances included sets from Nas, Lil Wayne, Ice Cube, Wiz Khalifa, Ghostface Killah, Common, Lupe Fiasco, Cam’Ron, T.I., Lil’ Kim, Trina, Remy Ma, Fat Joe, Slick Rick, EPMD, Snoop Dogg and more.

Hip Hop 50 Live specifically commemorated a legendary party at 1520 Sedgwick Avenue hosted by Cindy Campbell and DJed by DJ Kool Herc — a party that birthed hip-hop. As such, the celebration took things all the way back to the beginning. The Sugarhill Gang delighted the audience with a rousing rendition of “Rapper’s Delight,” which is widely regarded as the first commercially released hip-hop song, and rap pioneer Grandmaster Caz rocked the house with performances of “It’s Us,” among other Cold Crush Brothers selections.

Of course, hip-hop is about more than just the rappers. DJs also got their due at Friday’s concert, with legendary DJs like Marley Marl and Mannie Fresh keeping the energy flowing with sets that frequently highlighted the sub-genres and sounds of hip-hop not present on the official bill.

As the night transitioned into lengthier sets, both Lil Wayne and T.I. reminded attendees that both have an endless stream of hits across eras and genres. T.I. held it down for the South and 20 years of Trap Muzik with a set that included such hits as “Swagga Like Us,” “Whatever You Like,” and “Live Your Life.” Lil Wayne, who masterfully tore through countless anthems, pulled out hits like “A Milli,” “Uproar,” “I’m Goin’ In,” and a cruel tease of “Back That Azz Up,” that left the crowd hanging.

Hip Hop 50 Live was co-produced by Mass Appeal, Live Nation, and the New York Yankees. Emmy Award-winner BASSic Black Entertainment CEO Adam Blackstone and producer and keyboardist Omar Edwards served as the concert’s creative music directors.

Here are the 8 best moments of Hip Hop 50 Live:

Doug E. Fresh Transforms Into ‘Human Beat Box’

Image Credit: Danny Vasquez/Mass Appeal

On Wednesday night, The Weeknd announced the “final feature” of his career during his Warsaw tour stop. The Canadian-Ethiopian superstar born Abel Tesfaye performed his verse from “Another One of Me” at Poland’s PGE Narodowy. “This next song I’m about to perform is an unreleased record. I haven’t dropped it yet. It’s called ‘Another One […]

The Boss paid tribute to the leader of The Band on Wednesday night (Aug. 9) at the kick-off of the E Street Band’s North American stadium/arena tour at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Just hours after the world learned that legendary singer/songwriter/composer Robbie Robertson of The Band had passed away at age 80 following a long illness, Bruce Springsteen dedicated a song to his fellow hard core troubadour.
“To my good friend Robbie Robertson,” Springsteen said before the band kicked into the emotional ballad “I’ll See You In My Dreams” from the E Street Band’s 2020 album Letter to You according to the Asbury Park Press. The sentimental track is an a tribute to a lost loved one in which Springsteen takes solace in a dream world reunion as he surrounds himself with the departed’s books and records.

“The road is long and seeming without end/ The days go on, I remember you my friend/ And though you’re gone and my heart’s been emptied it seems/ I’ll see you in my dreams,” Springsteen sings before hitting the hope-filled chorus on the song that closed out the 26-song, three-hour setlist for Wednesday night’s show. “I’ll see you in my dreams/ When all our summers have come to an end/ I’ll see you in my dreams/ We’ll meet and live and laugh again/ I’ll see you in my dreams,” Springsteen manifests on the chorus.

Earlier in the day, E Street Band guitarist “Little” Steven Van Zandt called Robertson “good friend and a genius. The Band’s music shocked the excess out of the Renaissance and were an essential part of the final back-to-the-roots trend of ‘60s. He was an underrated brilliant guitar player adding greatly to Bob Dylan’s best tour & best album,” he wrote on Twitter.

The APP noted that, like Springsteen, 73, Toronto native Robertson worked the boards on the New Jersey shore in the mid-1960s, working at clubs such as the former Tony Marts in Somers Point, NJ with The Band.

Robertson had just wrapped work on Martin Scorsese’s upcoming film Killers of the Flower Moon, the 14th collaboration with the man the legendary director called “one of my closest friends, a constant in my life and work.” He was one of the dozens of musicians, friends and admirers who paid tribute to Robertson, whose career spanned more than 65 years as a band member, solo star, actor and film composer.

From his beginnings as a teenage guitarist in Little Caesar and the Consuls to his stint in Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks in the early 1960s, a fruitful run with Bob Dylan in the mid-to-late 1960s and then the formation of Americana progenitors The Band, Robertson was a beloved, deeply soulful and thoughtful artist who former President Bill Clinton referred to as a “brilliant songwriter, guitarist and composer whose gifts changed music forever.”

Check out fan footage of the performance below.