Country
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Pop and R&B/hip-hop superstar Beyoncé made a surprise announcement during Super Bowl LVIII on Feb. 11, releasing two tracks noticeably different in sound from the bulk of her catalog: “Texas Hold ‘Em” and “16 Carriages.”
The former is officially being promoted to country radio, as announced in a Columbia Nashville email to stations Feb. 14 at 11 a.m. ET, and arrives as Beyoncé’s first entry on Billboard’s Country Airplay chart (dated Feb. 24), starting at No. 54 with 1.1 million in audience via 100 stations at the format in the tracking week ending Feb. 15.
The Country Airplay survey reflects songs’ audience impressions on nearly 150 U.S country radio stations as monitored by Mediabase and provided to Billboard by Luminate.
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“We immediately added it a sub-power rotation, which is where we put top-trending new music,” Alpha Media-owned KBAY San Jose, Calif., program director Bo Matthews tells Billboard of “Texas Hold ‘Em.” “I want people to hear it. One of the biggest artists in the world delivered a great country record for us to have fun with, and the song is really good. We are in the business of creating excitement for our listeners and I’m embracing the moment. Plus, there is plenty of room for great artists, even from other genres. It’s a big country tent.”
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Beyoncé has banked eight No. 1 songs on the Billboard Hot 100 and seven No. 1 albums on the Billboard 200 as a soloist, starting in 2003. Plus, Destiny’s Child, with her as a member, logged four leaders on the Hot 100 and two on the Billboard 200, beginning in 1999.
As a soloist, Beyoncé boasts 12 career No. 1s on the Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay chart, 11 on Rhythmic Airplay, seven on Pop Airplay, five on Dance/Mix Show Airplay and three on Adult R&B Airplay.
Concurrent with its Country Airplay entrance, “Texas Hold ‘Em” opens at No. 38 on Pop Airplay, with its plays on 98 chart reporters translating to 1.3 million audience impressions at the format.
Notably, Rhiannon Giddens plays banjo and viola on “Texas Hold ‘Em.” She hit No. 6 on Country Airplay in 2017 as featured on Eric Church’s “Kill a Word.” (She has charted one No. 1 on the Americana/Folk Albums list, Tomorrow Is My Turn, in 2016, and, as part of Carolina Chocolate Drops, two leaders on Bluegrass Albums.)
“We put the Beyoncé directly into a strong rotation so it can be heard. I want the station to sound as interesting as possible, because the opposite is boring,” muses Dave Parker, pd of Sinclair’s WUSH Norfolk, Va. “This song is sounding great and doesn’t sound like anything else. Plus, the feedback from listeners and even fellow staffers so far has been very positive.”
Says Tim Roberts, pd of Audacy’s WYCD Detroit, of “Texas Hold ‘Em”: “I think it’s a good record, and country is so popular right now, it’s great that she wants to be here. Just like we do with any song on our playlist, now the listeners will decide.”
All charts dated Feb. 24 – including the Hot 100, reflecting songs’ streaming, airplay and sales Feb. 9-15 – will update on Billboard.com Tuesday, Feb. 20 (a day later than usual due to the Presidents’ Day holiday in the U.S. Feb. 19).
The Voice alum Cassadee Pope has spent the last decade making a name for herself in Nashville as one of country music’s most outspoken talents. Now, she’s explaining why she’s ready to leave the genre behind.
In a new interview with Rolling Stone, the “Take You Home” singer explained that she decided to return to her rock roots (Pope originally fronted the pop-punk band Hey Monday before appearing on The Voice season three) after experiencing significant backlash for speaking out against racism and transphobia in the country scene, specifically from other stars such as Morgan Wallen and Jason Aldean’s wife.
“I realize every genre has problematic people in it,” she said of her decision to leave country. “I’m not saying there’s not a frontman in a band who hasn’t been accused of something in rock music. But I guess rock is in my bones more. You’re not completely ostracized and shamed for speaking out.”
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When Wallen was caught on camera using a racial slur in 2021, Pope was one of many artists to speak out about the incident, saying she was “disgusted” and that his behavior “does NOT represent all of country music.” Looking back, though, Pope said she regretted the way she handled her response. “I was just another angry white person who just learned about racism,” she said. “If that were to have happened today, I would have had a different response.”
Pope spoke up again when country star Jason Aldean’s wife, Brittany Aldean, made a series of transphobic comments online, thanking her parents for not “changing her gender” after she experienced a “tomboy phase.” When the beauty influencer continued spreading dangerous misinformation, Pope called her out, saying, “You’d think celebs with beauty brands would see the positives in including LGBTQ+ people in their messaging. But instead here we are, hearing someone compare their ‘tomboy phase’ to someone wanting to transition.”
She would later be joined by fellow country star Maren Morris, who famously referred to Brittany Aldean as “insurrection Barbie” in her response.
The Voice winner told the publication that, unlike her Wallen comments, she never felt embarrassed with how she responded to the beauty influencer’s post. “In that moment, I felt so proud. I had no feeling of regret. I just kept my head down and kept going,” she said. “It’s only been the past few months that I’ve let my guard down in therapy and said, ‘Wait, I actually wasn’t OK.’ But I think that kind of comes with the territory of including activism in your life.”
Pope is not the only former country singer who decided to depart the genre. In September, Morris said that she would be stepping away from the country music industry after witnessing the rise in “misogynistic and racist and homophobic and transphobic” messaging in the industry. “I’m trying to mature here and realize I can just walk away from the parts of this that no longer make me happy.”
Nate Smith’s “World on Fire” leads Billboard’s Country Airplay chart (dated Feb. 24) for a 10th week, tying for the longest domination in the survey’s 34-year history. It matches Morgan Wallen’s “You Proof,” which began its rule in October 2022.
Previously, two hits shared the mark for the longest Country Airplay command – eight weeks each – for nearly 20 years: Alan Jackson and Jimmy Buffett’s “It’s Five O’Clock Somewhere,” in 2003, and Lonestar’s “Amazed,” in 1999.
In the Feb. 9-15 tracking week, “World on Fire,” released on Arista Nashville/RCA Nashville, drew 30.8 million in audience, according to Luminate.
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The song, which Smith wrote with Ashley Gorley, Taylor Phillips and Lindsay Rimes, the lattermost of whom solely produced it, is the second straight career-opening Country Airplay leader for Smith. The Paradise, Calif., native first ruled with “Whiskey on You” for two weeks last February. Both songs are on the deluxe edition of his debut self-titled LP. The set arrived at its No. 6 high on Top Country Albums last May.
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“The crazy thing about this song is that it wasn’t even supposed to come out!,” Smith recently told Billboard. “It was starting to gain a lot of traction on social media and the demand was high. I’m so lucky to have a team that knew how to strategically release it alongside my debut album by releasing the deluxe version the same day [April 28, 2023] that the debut dropped. This song completely anchored the album.”
Smith, meanwhile, debuts at No. 40 (2.5 million) on the latest Country Airplay chart with his newest single, “Bulletproof,” released Feb. 8.
Gwen & Blake Are Back
Also notably, Gwen Stefani and Blake Shelton debut at No. 35 on Country Airplay with “Purple Irises” (2.7 million). The song is the pair’s third collaboration to have hit the chart, following two No. 1s in 2020: “Nobody but You” (for two weeks that May) and “Happy Anywhere” (one week, that December).
“You are not enough.”
That’s the indirect message people often receive on social media, according to a recent study led by Dr. Phillip Ozimek at Ruhr University Bochum in Germany. Thanks to the personalized ads and the endless posts featuring people at their best, the project found that the more participants consumed social media, the more unhappy and inadequate they tended to feel.
Unwittingly, Ozimek’s work provides scientific support for the newest Dan + Shay single, “Bigger Houses.” Since their 2013 arrival in the national spotlight, they’ve been able to change their lives in a material way. But that success also gave them a dramatic ability to recognize that money can’t buy happiness.
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“We get caught up in this rat race,” says the duo’s Dan Smyers, “of always wanting more, always feeling insignificant, looking at what everybody else has gotten and thinking ‘They’re doing so much better than me.’ ”
Country, of course, has frequently reminded listeners that it’s better to be rich in character than in financial assets. It’s a message that’s present in Dolly Parton’s “Coat of Many Colors,” Porter Wagoner’s “Satisfied Mind,” John Anderson’s “Money in the Bank” and Tim McGraw’s “Last Dollar (Fly Away).” And Smyers’ wife, Abby Law Smyers, provided similar advice when songwriter Andy Albert (“Thinking ’Bout You,” “Rednecker”) and his wife, Emily, were showing Abby the new house they had bought to accommodate their growing family. They repeatedly mentioned the things they wanted to change, and Abby periodically noted that the place was already beautiful. And then she made an offhand comment that everyone in their circle was buying bigger houses.
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Albert wrote the title “Bigger Houses” down, and he put more thought into it ahead of a writing session with Smyers and Jordan Minton (“Good Time,” “Your Place”) on April 5, 2023, at the home of songwriter Jordan Reynolds (“10,000 Hours,” “Speechless”).
“I kind of started unpacking it,” Albert says, “how everyone’s always just chasing the next thing and how sometimes happiness is right in front of you. You just have to choose to slow down and accept it.”
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As it happened, the writing session was a low-pressure situation. Dan + Shay had wrapped their next album, though it was still untitled. So the guys were free to write whatever they wanted. And when Albert served up the title and the all-important setup line — “The thing I’ve found about happiness is/ It don’t live in bigger houses” — they had something that resonated with all of them. Smyers had a line, “There’s always gonna be a higher high,” that he had planned to use in another song, but they repurposed it as the opener for a chorus that led to the “bigger houses” payoff.
Reynolds, on guitar, and Smyers, on piano, developed the musical framework; Smyers, in particular, oversaw the melody since he knew lead singer Shay Mooney’s voice best. That said, Mooney’s range is wide enough that they weren’t likely to make a misstep.
“Dan really has it all dialed in,” says Albert. “He’s such an amazing melodic writer. I think he just had a vision for it and just played through it for a half hour or whatever, and then all of a sudden, it sounds just exactly right. ‘Now we get to kind of sit down and fill in the words.’ ”
Many of the phrases they built into it — such as “greener grass in the yard next door” or “never gonna fill an empty cup” — played on clichés without exactly using them.
“The line that I remember the most is when we were writing the verse,” Minton notes, “And Andy said, ‘I’m not worried about keeping up with people named Jones.’ That is the coolest way I’ve ever heard someone say that phrase, and it made that phrase feel like I’ve never heard it before. That should be the name of a song: ‘People Named Jones.’”
In the second verse, they laid out a series of classic home-ownership sights and sounds: kids playing upstairs, dogs romping in the backyard and a couple rocking a porch swing. The only thing missing was a white picket fence.
“We tossed around throwing that in there,” recalls Minton. “It was kind of trying to dance around that picture as much as we could without going all the way. There’s plenty of clichés that we tried to twist in different ways, and it felt like that was going to be hard to put in a fresh way.”
At the end of the session, Smyers moved from piano to guitar, and Reynolds sang lead as they built a demo with mandolin and Dobro. Smyers subsequently sent it to Mooney, who was visiting his parents in Arkansas. It was the perfect scenario to hear a song about prioritizing family. “From the very first chorus, man, it was a strange experience because it felt like I was in the writing room,” Mooney says. “It’s so personal, it felt like words that I had in my spirit, almost just like this is exactly where I am in my life right now.”
Dan + Shay, along with the label and their team, thought “Bigger Houses” needed to be on the album — it needed to be the title of the album — so they set up a recording session at Nashville’s Backstage. They only hired one musician, guitarist Bryan Sutton, who played live as Mooney sang in the studio. Sutton also overdubbed new mandolin and Dobro parts, and outside of Smyers layering on harmonies, that was the whole thing.
“I fully thought that Dan was going to produce it out bigger,” says Reynolds, “but it stayed pretty stripped. We kept referencing, you know, Adele is one of the only people who can get away with super-stripped moments, but when it happens, it’s massive. And we always talk about how Shay has the capabilities of tearing the house down with just him and a piano.”
Mooney took an extremely restrained approach to the “Bigger Houses” vocal, determined to keep the focus on the words. “There’s not a lot of embellishment,” he concurs. “Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.”
Smyers apologized to his co-writers for not making “Bigger Houses” bigger, even though he thought the spare arrangement was right creatively. “There was probably no way it was ever going to be a radio single with this production approach,” he says.
But while in Los Angeles to work on The Voice, Dan + Shay began fantasizing about it as a follow-up to “Save Me the Trouble.” As fate would have it, Warner Music Nashville had the same thoughts. Warner released “Bigger Houses” to country radio via PlayMPE on Jan. 9. It debuted at No. 54 on the Country Airplay chart dated Feb. 17. Even though the song advocates an acceptance of life as it is, Reynolds can’t help but hope it gets big.
“The higher it gets on the charts, the more I’m encouraged by culture and where people are,” he reasons. “That’s honestly been so encouraging [that] other people relate to this because I think it’s easy to [think] we’re the only people who feel this way.” Regardless of how it performs publicly, “Bigger Houses” has made a huge impact on its creators.
“I think my competitiveness and drive was a big part of the reason I have gotten where I am,” says Smyers. “But I think it also caused me to miss a lot of great moments and cool things along the way. [“Bigger Houses”] changed that. I’m going to kind of move to a new mindset.”
At this point the only question might be: what genre can’t Post Malone tackle? The lanky rapper who began his career rhyming before pivoting back-and-forth between rock, pop and every combination in-between appears to be ready to fully take a country detour. After wowing the crowd at Super Bowl LVIII in Las Vegas last weekend with his meditative take on “American The Beautiful” on acoustic guitar, Posty surprised fans again on Thursday afternoon (Feb. 15) with a brief snippet of a new collaboration with Luke Combs.
Smoke in hand, Malone energetically plays air drums and shakes his head as he sings along to a song that appears to be called “Ain’t Got a Guy For That.” At press time spokespeople for Malone and Combs had not returned Billboard‘s request for additional information on the song.
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In the brief snippet, Combs can be heard singing “No VIP up at MIT/ And they still won’t let me fly the time machine,” before Malone grabs the chorus, “She’s searching for someone good who’s gonna built it back/ Ain’t I ain’t got a guy for that/ Ain’t got a guy for that (x3).”
Combs posted a comment on the snippet, matching Posty’s beer emoji and adding a fire one, while Malone’s label, Republic Records, commented, “LFG [cowboy emoji]” and Republic’s relaunched Mercury Records added, “in your country era fs.” Over Super Bowl weekend, Combs posted a pic with Malone and Peyton Manning.
Malone has been dipping his toe into country lately, including making his first Country Airplay chart appearance last year on a “duet” version of Joe Diffie’s “Pickup Man”, which debuted at No. 54 just after Posty teamed up with Morgan Wallen and HARDY to play the song at the 2023 CMA Awards; the track will appear on HARDY’s upcoming Hixtape Vol. 3: Difftape, due out on March 29.
Speaking to Access Hollywood at the time, Malone teased his own country music project when asked if he has a country album in the works. “I think so… yes,” he said.
In addition to covering Brad Paisley’s “I’m Gonna Miss Her (The Fishin’ Song),” Malone has performed on stage with a number of other country stars, including Blake Shelton, Little Big Town and Darius Rucker and he has been pictured in the studio or in writing rooms with Paisley and Combs.
In a June 2022 visit to Howard Stern’s SiriusXm radio show, Malone first hinted that a country turn might be in the offing. “To be honest, there’s nothing stopping me from taking a camera or setting up in my studio in Utah and just recording a country album and me just putting it on f–king YouTube,” Malone said. “I’m allowed to do that… I split my time between a lot of different things because I am happily obligated to do concerts and show love to my fans … and then I’m happily obligated to write music and make beats by myself, and I’m happily obligated to, you know, take care of my family. So, it’s a lot of time, and it’s about finding that space to allot that time. If I get another year to myself, maybe I’ll make a f–-king country album.”
In the meantime, the Malone country era will continue on April 28 when he takes the stage at the Stagecoach Festival, which will also feature sets from headliners Morgan Wallen, Miranda Lambert and Eric Church, as well as Jelly Roll, Dwight Yoakam, Willie Nelson & Family, Leon Bridges, Ernest, HARDY, Bailey Zimmerman and many more.
Watch Malone jam out to the Combs collab below.
UMG Nashville has launched Silver Wings Records, a distribution arm and independent artist services, fueled by Virgin Music Group’s global distribution network. Silver Wings Records will create custom campaign services for independent artists, offering options for developing and enhancing campaigns. Explore Explore See latest videos, charts and news See latest videos, charts and news UMGN’s […]
Folk singer-songwriter Allison Russell made history with her first Grammy win this year for best American roots performance. While her win presents a cause to celebrate for many, some in Tennessee’s statehouse aren’t interested in congratulating the singer.
On Monday (Feb. 12), Tennessee Democratic Rep. Justin Jones criticized the House Republican Caucus Chair Jeremy Faison for blocking a resolution he proposed to honor Russell for her first win at the Grammys. While a similar resolution honoring Paramore for winning two Grammys — for best rock album and best alternative music performance, respectively — passed, Faison objected to the resolution honoring Russell, removing the resolution from the chamber’s consent calendar.
Rep. Jones vented his frustrations on X about his colleagues snubbing Russell. “Tonight my Republican colleagues blocked a resolution honoring Black American Roots artist Allison Russell for her first Grammy win,” he wrote. “[She] has worked tirelessly to foster an inclusive Nashville through her music and continues to make Black History here in Tennessee.”
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In response, Russell thanked the representative, as well as Rep. Gloria Johnson, for standing up to Faison. “That you & [Rep. Johnson] presented this resolution is a high honour,” she wrote. “That the TN GOP blocked it, I take as a compliment. Their bigotry, sadly, is on relentless display. We have a chance this year to make a real change in TN.”
Billboard has reached out to representatives for Russell for additional comment.
Both Russell and Paramore’s Hayley Williams have been outspoken against Tennessee Republicans, specifically calling out a pair of anti-LGBTQ bills that passed in March 2023, which effectively banned gender-affirming care for transgender youth throughout the state and banned public drag performances. While the so-called drag ban has since been deemed unconstitutional by a federal judge, the state’s ban of gender-affirming care was upheld by a federal court in September 2023.
In protest of the Tennessee legislature passing these anti-LGBTQ laws, Russell helped organize Love Rising, a benefit concert for the LGBTQ community that took place at Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena on March 20. Williams served as one of the headliners for the event, alongside Russell, Maren Morris, Jason Isbell, Sheryl Crow and more.
Speaking to Billboard last year, Russell thanked Williams specifically for participating in Love Rising. “It’s people like Hayley [Williams] taking a red-eye flight to come back from opening for Taylor Swift, because she said she’d rather die than not be there to support the trans and drag community in Tennessee,” she said. “These incredible allies are so important.”
Check out Rep. Jones and Russell’s posts below:
Maren Morris sounds perfectly fine on her own on a cover of Billy Idol’s 1982 classic “Dancing With Myself.” The countrified, sultry take on the new wave rocker’s ode going it alone dropped on Thursday (Feb. 15), along with an appropriately one-woman music video shot inside Nashville’s iconic Grimey’s record store.
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As you might expect, Morris layers the original snarling rock tune with banjos, strummed acoustic guitars and her signature smoky vocals on the track produced by Gabe Simon (Noah Kahan, Lana Del Rey). In the visual, Morris dances her way through the aisles of the empty independent record store, pulling out pieces of vinyl and hoisting them over her head in between trips to a makeshift stage where she croons the song’s onanistic refrain into into a mic for an audience of none.
Morris, who finalized her divorce from husband Ryan Hurd earlier this month, told Yahoo! Entertainment that the song is a celebration of her single life. “I’m in this new slate in life and I want to sort of lean into the vulnerability of the lyrics, because when I was [writing] them down, I don’t know, it kind of struck this melancholic note and I feel like that’s such a relatable theme to singleness,” she said. [Being single] is fun and you’re really getting to know yourself, which is important because you are the longest relationship you’ll have in your life so you need to tend to that one. But there’s also, you know, moments of bittersweetness when you feel on those occasional nights a little lonely.”
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The singer said filming in Grimey’s was especially sweet because it’s located in East Nashville, which is where she lived when she first moved to town. “I just put my entire heart into not giving a s–t and dancing and looking stupid,” she said. “I felt really emotionally connected to the song. … I just was like, I am dancing with myself.”
After announcing last year that she was planning to “step back” from making country music — which she told the outlet was misinterpreted at the time — Morris said she’s in the “early creative stages” of writing her next album after going back to the drawing board on the project she was working on before the divorce. As for whether the album will be more pop than country, Morris said it’s “too early to tell.”
“Dancing” is Morris’ first new music since she dropped her two-song 2023 EP The Bridge. The singer will receive the Visionary Award for her commitment to speaking out about injustice at this year’s Billboard Women in Music Awards on March 6, where she will also perform.
Watch Morris’ video for “Dancing With Myself” below.
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Morgan Wallen is slated to be the latest artist with a bar in downtown Nashville.
The Billboard Hot 100 chart-topper and Knoxville-area native will open a six-story, 30,000-square-feet venue called This Bar and Tennessee Kitchen this summer on Nashville’s Lower Broadway, located on 4th Avenue. The venue will feature three live music stages and an open-air rooftop. A gift shop will feature exclusive Wallen merchandise offerings.
Wallen teamed with TC Restaurant Group to create the space; TC Restaurant Group is also responsible for working on other artist-curated venues including FGL House, Jason Aldean’s Kitchen + Rooftop Bar, Miranda Lambert’s Casa Rosa and Luke Bryan’s Luke’s 32 Bridge Food+Drink.
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Each floor of This Bar and Tennessee Kitchen will feature photos and memorabilia from Wallen’s childhood and career thus far. The menu will be curated by Wallen with chef Tomasz Wosiak, vice president of culinary development for TC Restaurant Group, and feature Southern delectables, bar bites, Tennessee favorites and some of Wallen’s mother’s recipes.
“I sing about finding myself in ‘this bar,’ and now it’s coming to life. This venue will hold true to everything I love and is inspired by my fans and the way they have embraced me and my music,” Wallen said in a statement. “We’re designing a menu around some of my family favorites, so it brings a piece of East Tennessee to Music City. I hope This Bar is a place you’ll want to find yourself in and make memories with your friends and family and celebrate the way country music has brought us all together.” “Morgan Wallen is one of the most sought after stars in the music industry, and we are thrilled that he has trusted us to deliver a concept that will bring him closer to his fans, hold fast to his roots and enshrine his name among an exclusive group of artists who can claim international stardom with a Lower Broadway destination fans all over the world seek out,” said Adam Hesler, president at TC Restaurant Group, via a statement.
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Wallen is just the latest artist to open a bar in downtown Nashville, following recent news of rocker Jon Bon Jovi’s upcoming space, also set for Lower Broadway. Other country artists with bars/restaurants in downtown Nashville include Jason Aldean, Dierks Bentley, Luke Bryan, Garth Brooks, Alan Jackson and Miranda Lambert, while Luke Combs and Eric Church also have bars set to open.
This is also the latest new business venture from Wallen, who recently teamed with Eric Church to announce they are purchasing the Field & Stream brand, with plans for relaunching the print magazine and to start an outdoor music festival.
As the entire world already knows, Beyoncé is in her country era. After hard-launching her new album — the as-yet-untitled second part of the three-act project she began with the Billboard 200-topping Renaissance back in 2022 — during the 2024 Super Bowl via a Verizon commercial, Queen Bey has released two new versions of the […]