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Thee Houston Hottie is hoping to team up with the Swamp Princess. While hanging out with fans on a recent TikTok livestream, Megan Thee Stallion revealed that Doechii is on her list of dream collaborators, with the former currently working on the third act in her Megan album series.
The topic of a team-up with the “Denial Is a River” rapper first came up as Meg gave Hotties an update on her next LP. “Act III is being made,” she told fans on the live. “I’m really just trying to figure out who do I want to do features with at this point in life. I only want to do features with people that … one, I haven’t done a feature with yet, and two, that I listen to on my own time — people that I actually, you know, f— with.”
When viewers started suggesting a certain Florida-born star’s name in the chat, the “Hiss” spitfire said excitedly, “I see Doechii, bi—, I love Doechii.”
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“I do want to do a song with Doechii,” Ms. Stallion added. “That’s on my list. That’s on my album wish list.”
But while Meg did confirm she does have a new song and music video in the works, she also said that she has “no song right now” that would make sense for Doechii to guest on. “I feel like Doechii would be the type of person that you would have to be in the studio to make a song with,” Meg explained. “I would like to hear a beat that she would like to rap over, and also I’m like challenging myself to rap over beats that I wouldn’t normally rap over without losing myself.”
Doechii has certainly been in high demand in recent months, with the musician recently becoming the third woman to ever win best rap album at the Grammys. She is also Billboard‘s Woman of the Year for 2025 and will be honored at the March 29 Women in Music ceremony in Los Angeles.
Thee Stallion’s Megan: Act II dropped in October last year, about four months after the original Megan debuted at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 in July. The rapper is now gearing up to perform at April’s Coachella, an event she has personally dubbed “Megchella.”
The top billing of this year’s festival features Lady Gaga, Green Day, Post Malone and Travis Scott, and there’s one headliner Meg is particularly excited to see take the stage in the desert. “I definitely am going to see Lady Gaga,” she told fans on the live. “Lady Gaga is the motherf—ing girl.”
The Kendrick Lamar parade atop Billboard’s Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay chart extends for another week, as “30 for 30,” the rapper’s collaboration with SZA, rallies 5-1 to crown the list dated March 29. The track replaces Lamar’s two-week leader “TV Off,” featuring Lefty Gunplay, which itself captured the summit from Lamar and SZA’s other active radio-promoted single, “Luther.” By linking three successive No. 1s, Lamar becomes only the fourth artist to achieve the feat in the 31-year history of the radio ranking.
“30 for 30” surges to No. 1 as the most played song on U.S. panel-contributing mainstream R&B/hip-hop radio stations in the tracking week of March 14-20, according to Luminate. The song added 14% more plays in the latest tracking window compared to the prior week; the swell gives “30 for 30” the chart’s weekly Greatest Gainer honor, awarded to the song with the largest play increase. Southern stations led the final push, with four of the five stations that recorded the most “30 for 30” plays this week — WQBT-FM (Savannah, Ga.), WHXT-FM (Columbia, S.C.) WHZT-FM (Montgomery, Ala.) and WZGB-FM (Louisville, Ky.) — from the region.
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The Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay chart ranks songs by weekly plays on more than 70 mainstream R&B/hip-hop (also known as urban) radio stations monitored by Mediabase, with data provided to Billboard by Luminate.
With “30 for 30,” SZA banks her fourth No. 1 on Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay. She previously ruled twice in 2023, with “Shirt” and “Snooze,” and added her third, “Luther,” another Lamar collaboration, earlier this month.
For Lamar, “30 for 30” gives the rapper his ninth career No. 1 on Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay. To rundown his collection:
“Swimming Pools (Drank),” nine weeks at No. 1, beginning Dec. 8, 2012
“F–kin Problems,” A$AP Rocky feat. Drake, 2 Chainz & Kendrick Lamar; two, Feb. 9, 2013
“Humble.,” nine, June 3, 2017
“Love.,” feat. Zacari; six, Dec. 30, 2017
“Like That,” with Future and Metro Boomin; three, June 1, 2024
“Not Like Us,” 12, June 22, 2024
“Luther,” with SZA; one, March 8, 2025
“TV Off,” feat. Lefty Gunplay; two, March 15, 2025
“30 for 30,” with SZA; one (to date), March 29, 2025
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Further, by linking three successive No. 1s without interruption on Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay chart, Lamar is only the fourth artist — and first entirely in lead or co-lead capacities — to achieve the feat since the chart launched in 1993. On the overall list, he joins:
50 Cent in 2005, through one lead role (“Candy Shop,” feat. Olivia) and two featured roles, both on tracks by The Game (“How We Do” and “Hate It or Love It”)
Lil Wayne in 2011, through one lead role (“How to Love”) and two featured roles (Kelly Rowland’s “Motivation” and DJ Khaled’s “I’m on One,” also with features from Drake and Rick Ross)
Drake in 2018, through two lead roles (“God’s Plan” and “Nice for What”) and one featured role (BlocBoy JB’s “Look Alive”)
Elsewhere, “30 for 30” repeats at its No. 5 high on the R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay chart, which ranks songs by combined audience totals from adult R&B and mainstream R&B/hip-hop stations. Despite no change in rank, the song improved 9% to 13.2 million in weekly audience at the format.
All charts dated March 29 will update on Billboard.com on Tuesday, March 25.
Who is Amir “Aura” Khan?
That’s the question everyone has been asking as McNeese State’s Men’s Basketball student manager has been taking March Madness and the Internet by storm with his tunnel walkouts.
Before each game, Aura leads McNeese State into battle, as he wraps a boombox around his neck that blasts various rap songs from rappers like Kodak Black and NBA Youngboy, and walks the Cowboys from the locker room, through the arena tunnel, and onto the basketball court.
The guy has personality as well, and takes his role very seriously. He once said, “If they kept manager stats for rebounding and wiping up wet spots on the court, I’d put up Wilt Chamberlain numbers.”
And look how he keeps himself in shape to be the best team manager in the nation.
The guys is a maniac, telling Sporting News that his fast mopping skills are what separates him from the field. “My quickness,” he told the outlet. “As soon as a player gets down, I’m running towards the wet spot, I’m diving on the floor for everyone, wiping up as quick as I can, but also making sure I get it. [Then] getting up as fast as possible and getting ready for the next one.”
His aura has earned him not only a lifelong nickname, but it’s earned him some paper. Khan is the first student manager to have NIL (Name, Image, and Likeness) deals, and he has them with TickPick, Insomnia Cookies and Buffalo Wild Wings.
Amir Khan, you are officially a pioneer. In the wildest couple of weeks anyone could have, you’ve stayed so humble & true to yourself. First-ever college student manager to ink a NIL deal… 3 deals… all with global brands… in a week! Keep going. You deserve it all✊@amirk_23 pic.twitter.com/hvEernU05Y— Reed Vial (@reed_vial3) March 16, 2025
Here he is letting everyone know what time it is like Shedeur Sanders.
He even has the cheerleader squad wearing socks with his face on them.
The god even takes time to give out some fan love.
If you’re still not convinced, check out this list I put together of some of his best rap moments this season.
I gotta warn you, though. The aura is contagious.
Kodak Black, “No Flockin’”
Playboi Carti has landed his first-ever No. 1 album in the U.K. with Music (March 21).
It marks Carti’s first LP in just more than four years, following December 2020’s Whole Lotta Red, which peaked at No. 17. The Atlanta rapper, born Jordan Terrell Carter, also previously saw success on the Official U.K. Albums Chart with 2018’s Die Lit (No. 27).
The sprawling 30-track effort features cameos from an all-star guestlist, including Kendrick Lamar, Travis Scott, Lil Uzi Vert and Jhené Aiko. The record was announced less than a week prior to its release, following years of development purgatory — from its title changing multiple times to a protracted recording process.
Two songs from Music also appear in the top 10 — “Evil J0rdan” (No. 7) and “Rather Lie” with The Weeknd (No. 10), taking Carti’s all-time Top 10 tally to four. Upon release, it became Spotify‘s most-streamed album in a single day in 2025 so far.
As the Short n’ Sweet Tour continues to roll through the U.K. and Europe, Sabrina Carpenter’s sixth LP lands at No. 2 this week. The 2025 BRITs Global Success award winner first topped the Official U.K. Albums Chart in September 2024, with Short n’ Sweet going on to become the third-biggest album of last year in the country.Songwriter and Porcupine Tree founder Steven Wilson follows at No. 3, matching his previous solo career-best with eighth studio collection The Overview. Lady Gaga’s MAYHEM slips three spots to No. 4, while Tate McRae rounds out the Top 5 with So Close To What.
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Following its release on Blood Records white powder-filled vinyl, Charli XCX’s Brat remix LP makes its Top 40 debut this week (No. 40). Titled Brat & It’s Completely Different But Also Still Brat, the collection’s initial streaming release in November 2024 pushed its parent album to No.1 in the U.K. for the first time.
After taking this week’s No. 1 single with “Ordinary,” breakout U.S. singer-songwriter Alex Warren is on the cusp of his first-ever Top 40 album with You’ll Be Alright, Kid (Chapter 1). Initially released in September, the record has jumped 13 spots to a new No. 41 peak.
Lizzo has long been a loud and proud advocate for embracing your body, no matter what size or shape it is. And after sharing earlier this year that she had reached her “weight release” goals and encouraging her fans that her journey is a reminder that “you can do anything you put your mind to,” the “Juice” singer told Andy Cohen on Thursday (March 20) that, frankly, she doesn’t think anyone really even understands what “body positivity” means anymore.
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“I think people don’t know what body positivity is because the body positivity movement was very political and it got taken and kind of commercialized and now body positivity to people is code word for ‘fat,’” Lizzo told Cohen on his SiriusXM show. “Like DEI is code word for Black… so they’re like, ‘Oh she’s not body positive anymore, I’m not fat anymore,’ but I’m still body positive because the body positive movement was actually created by a subgroup of people who were not put in the media, who were not praised, who were told we shouldn’t exist and we were not good enough because our bodies were bigger, or disabled, or even queer and trans.”
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Lizzo said all those traditionally marginalized communities were the latest wave of body positivity she said has been happening for “decades.” But she times her own engagement with the idea to 2016 when she began “bucking against society telling me I shouldn’t exist. I shouldn’t wear leotards and I shouldn’t like how I look.”
At that time she began speaking out about body positivity, hiring a group of plus-size dancers she named the Big Grrrls and, in 2020, telling Vogue magazine that, “I wan to normalize my body. And not just be like, ‘Ooh, look at this cool movement. Being fat is body positive.’ No, being fat is normal.”
Last year, Lizzo leaned into jokes she’d heard from people speculating that she was using one of the current popular weight-loss drugs as a helper in her health journey. She further tweaked haters by dressing up as “LizzOzempic” for Halloween in a costume inspired by a South Park episode from last May that parodied Lizzo’s well-known body positivity with a new medication: “Ask about the power of not giving a f— — with Lizzo,” the animated show joked in a commercial parody that claimed: “FDA-approved Lizzo makes you feel good about your weight, and it costs 90% less than Ozempic.”
She had a laugh about the episode, reacting by saying, “I just feel like, damn, I’m really that b—-. I showed the world how to love yourself, and now these men in Colorado know who the f— I am, and put it in their cartoon that’s been around for 25 years.” She promised, “I’m gonna keep on showing you how to not give a f—.”
You can (likely) hear all about it on the singer’s upcoming Love in Real Life album, which she announced this week is officially complete. Lizzo’s already released two songs from the upcoming LP, “Still Bad” and the title track and she’s slated to make her fourth appearance on Saturday Night Live as a musical guest alongside host Jon Hamm on April 12.
Watch Lizzo on Cohen’s show below.
Memphis-bred rap star GloRilla knows a thing or two about staging a comeback.
In 2022, she exploded into the mainstream with the Grammy Award-nominated, summer-dominating “F.N.F.” — and quickly followed it up with the Cardi B-assisted “Tomorrow 2,” which peaked at No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 and became her first top 10 hit on the chart.
But 2023 proved to be a far cry from her triumphant rookie year. She kicked it off with the Moneybagg Yo collaboration “On What U On,” which stalled at No. 56 on the Hot 100 — and was her only release that year to even reach the chart. Everything she dropped bricked, whether it was the radio-ready “Lick or Sum” or her direct response to detractors, “Internet Trolls.” And that March, tragedy struck when three people died in a fatal crowd surge at her concert with Finesse2tymes in Rochester, N.Y. With her commercial pull waning, everyone on the internet (trolls and otherwise) seemed to agree: Big Glo had fallen off.
“2023 was an eye-opener for me,” the 25-year-old says. “I realized that I can’t take my foot off the gas. I didn’t know I was doing that, but I did. It was a reality check when I would drop music and people would hate it. Getting closer to God was one of the key things that helped me.”
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Born Gloria Hallelujah Woods, the eighth of 10 children, GloRilla grew up in the church. She sang in the choir and her mother only allowed gospel music in the house; as her taste evolved and she found a home in hip-hop, gospel music and its encouraging messages remained present in her raps — from 2022’s “Blessed” to “Rain Down on Me,” a gospel-rap track from Glorious, her 2024 debut studio album.
GloRilla also looked to Yo Gotti, the rap superstar and fellow Memphian who’s now her label head, as a mentor. Since Gotti signed Glo to his CMG Records imprint in 2022, the two have worked closely to hone her sound and image, taking her from viral breakout to presidential campaign surrogate (she performed at a Wisconsin rally for former Vice President Kamala Harris last fall). “Even with all the success and accolades, she’s still the same authentic and ambitious hustler that I met back in 2022,” Gotti says of Glo.
With the help of her CMG team, renowned choreographer Sean Bankhead and creative director Coco Gilbert, GloRilla spent late 2023 plotting the perfect road map to recapture her momentum. The plan worked: With her first release of 2024, the anthemic “Yeah Glo!,” GloRilla came out swinging. Arriving in February, the motivational anthem took over nightclubs, cookouts and locker room celebrations. The song topped Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay for two weeks and reached No. 28 on the Hot 100, then her highest peak for a solo single.
“To have that little break, come back with ‘Yeah Glo!’ and have it start going up on the first day [of release] — that was personal,” GloRilla tells Billboard in between rehearsals for her forthcoming Glorious tour.
“Yeah Glo!” was meant to introduce GloRilla’s debut album, but its runaway success significantly shifted those plans. “I felt like I had to build my momentum back, so that’s where the mixtape kicked in,” she explains. “We made that decision around the time ‘Yeah Glo!’ came out.” Ehhthang Ehhthang arrived in April and yielded another hit single, the Megan Thee Stallion-assisted “Wanna Be,” which later received a Cardi B remix and peaked at No. 11 on the Hot 100. The week before, Megan had announced Glo as the special guest for her arena-conquering Hot Girl Summer Tour. Between Ehhthang Ehhthang and successful guest appearances on BossMan Dlow’s “Finesse” and Big Boogie’s “Bop,” GloRilla had become inescapable — and she hadn’t even launched her official album campaign yet.
While opening the Hot Girl Summer Tour in June, GloRilla released “TGIF,” which kicked her 2024 into an even higher gear. Within a week of the song’s release, Rihanna shared an instantly viral clip of herself adorably dancing and singing along to it. By February 2025, GloRilla became the first artist to simultaneously become a face of all four of Rihanna’s Fenty brands.
With Riri begging for an album in her DMs and Beyoncé posting pictures with her on Instagram, GloRilla had undoubtedly became the hottest woman MC in the game. As “TGIF” cemented her pop appeal, GloRilla kept her core audience fed — and reinforced her sound — with her feature on Real Boston Richey’s “Get in There.”
“Me and my team figured out the difference between a mixtape and album song: You just got to hear it,” she says. “My core sound is how [gritty] the mixtape sounded. When I went into album mode, I already had a lot of those songs before the mixtape — but I knew they weren’t mixtape songs.”
After months of recapturing and multiplying her momentum, GloRilla finally released Glorious in October. With collaborators ranging from Sexyy Red to Maverick City Music, Glo’s studio debut was a capstone on her massive year, earning the highest opening week total for an album by a female rapper in 2024 (69,000 units) for a No. 5 debut on the Billboard 200. Five of its songs landed on the Hot 100, including “Whatchu Kno About Me” (No. 17), which Taylor Swift later used to soundtrack an Eras Tour TikTok. “I was real excited about that,” Glo recalls. “Everybody was sending it to me — I was feeling like ‘that girl’ when she posted that.”
Now, after scoring three Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay No. 1 hits in under a year and being named Billboard’s Hottest Female Rapper of 2024, Billboard’s 2025 Women in Music Powerhouse is determined to deliver an impeccable show on her tour, which commenced March 5 in Oklahoma City and will play arenas and music halls throughout the United States.
“Even though I’m not as good at dancing, I’m getting better and I learn fast,” she says, noting that her tour prep playlist includes gospel classics like Yolanda Adams’ “Open My Heart.” “I learn about two new routines a day. I like helping out with choreography because I get to do what I’m comfortable with and showcase my vision.”
Still, GloRilla isn’t as concerned with being the best rapper alive as she is with her own consistent personal growth. “I have the desire to be the best me I can be,” she proclaims.
This story appears in the March 22, 2025, issue of Billboard.
When Playboi Carti released his long-awaited third album, Music, in the early hours of March 14, it was met with a tidal wave of interest — its songs immediately flooded the daily Spotify and Apple Music streaming charts, and it immediately became Spotify’s most-streamed album in a day in 2025. And the album — his first in nearly five years, since 2020’s Whole Lotta Red — will likely become his second No. 1 on the Billboard 200 when it officially debuts on the chart next week.
It’s been a long time coming, and fans were certainly ready. And Carti has been building anticipation for the release for an extended period, teasing songs on social media, putting up billboards in Los Angeles, dropping singles seemingly at random and debuting new tracks in live performances, including at Rolling Loud earlier this month. That was all according to plan. “It was always kind of teasing and never fully announcing, keeping fans engaged in the mystery until we finally announced the new album was dropping,” says Carti’s manager, Opium Records president/CEO Erin Larsen. And now, with Music poised to become the biggest release of Carti’s career, Larsen has earned the title of Billboard’s Executive of the Week.
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Here, Larsen breaks down some of the strategies behind the rollout of Music, and how the team helped build anticipation for the album. “Carti’s a perfectionist,” Larsen explains. “He wants to take his time building out the music and the world around it and really developing the sound for the album.”
This week, Playboi Carti released his latest album MUSIC, becoming the most-streamed album in a single day in 2025 on Spotify and likely leading to his second No. 1 album on the Billboard 200. What key decisions did you make to help make that happen?
Our pre-release campaign started in 2023 and that was the first time he revealed the “I AM MUSIC” logo alongside the first song release on Instagram. We focused on consistent branding throughout the longer campaign and creating different moments that tied in like the NBA jerseys, “I AM MUSIC” out of home, key press moments, teasing records during live performances, etc. It was always kind of teasing and never fully announcing, keeping fans engaged in the mystery until we finally announced the new album was dropping.
This is Carti’s first album in almost five years. Why the gap in projects, and what effect do you think that extended time between projects had on the anticipation for this eventual release?
Carti’s a perfectionist. He wants to take his time building out the music and the world around it and really developing the sound for the album. The music is a larger representation of his creative vision and I think every project he’s offered something different. He remains at the forefront of conversation when fans are wondering what direction sonically he’ll go with this album and we tried to create moments along the way to bring them into that process.
Playboi Carti photographed by Matthew Salacuse on Aug. 2, 2024 at Seret Studios in Brooklyn.
Carti has been teasing songs from this project in a variety of different ways, releasing videos solely to social media, performing unreleased songs at shows and dropping singles out of nowhere. How has that strategy helped to build towards the eventual release of the project?
This felt like an innovative approach on how to drop music. We didn’t play snippets. We dropped an entire song on YouTube or Instagram and fans tapped into those platforms to hear them because they weren’t available on DSPs. In the process, he built the hype up around the sound of the album, and we were able to see which tracks really resonated with people. The strategy really opened the conversation and made the fans feel like a part of the process.
After such an extended wait, and after a series of billboards that helped sow breadcrumbs, Carti announced the project’s release date the day before it came out. Why did you guys consider that to be the best way to announce it?
The “I AM MUSIC” branding became so integral in the rollout because it was synonymous with an upcoming Carti moment. We built the anticipation and continued to create moments to keep fans captive and engaged throughout the rollout. I think this approach intrigued new fans as well.
How do you build on this momentum moving forward for Carti?
We’re going to continue to drive awareness to the project, build the songs with strategic moments and continue to engage the core fans. His music always resonates well live and brings his vision to life, so touring will be impactful. We’ve got great partners at Interscope and will work with them to expose the music to different audiences, build records at radio, use digital marketing and socials as well as branding opportunities.
What moves the needle for an artist in 2025?
Beyond great music I would say authenticity, building a strong brand and finding a way to organically connect with your audience.
Jack Harlow and Doja Cat throw a dinner party for the ages in the sultry video for their new single “Just Us.” While their sizzling back-and-forth makes it seems like they can’t see anyone else in the room, the Neal Farmer-directed video makes it clear that if they look around they might just spot Oscar, Grammy and SAG award-winners at every table.
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Sprinkled around the room at the L.A. eatery where the pair trade NSFW lines about how much they need each other, like, right now, are a bearded Matt Damon, a chatty John Mayer, as well as British singer PinkPantheress, DJ Drama, Succession star Nicholas Braun, sports journalist Taylor Rooks and singer Malcolm Todd.
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Fully in his alpha flirt mode, Harlow starts out making eyes at Doja from across the room, trying to rope her in with some subtle come-ons. “I wish it was just in this b–ch/ But they can’t trust us in this b–ch/ ‘Cus I’m trying to buss nuts in this huh/ Let’s keep it on the hush hush in this b–ch,” he raps as Doja casts a dubious eye while rocking a skin-tight, shimmering red latex minidress. “I told her she so pretty/ And she just blushed in this b–ch/ She clutch clutching my huh/ I’m adjusting my huh/ She husky like mush mush in this b–ch,” he adds on the song produced by Hollywood Cole, Tay Keith, Angel Lopez, OjiVolta and Dylan Graham.
Rubbing up on Jack in the bustling kitchen, Doja gives as good as she gets, rapping, “Two hands in my fro/ Staring into my soul/ Leg up on that chair/ Hand on that arm/ Tongue in that throat/ I don’t play with my pen/ Leave it on a good note/ Keep you all on yo toes/ Leave the tv off for this show.”
Harlow has been manifesting this collab for years, admitting in a 2020 Instagram Live that he has long been infatuated with Doja. “I need to talk to you for a second though,” he said during the chat between the two. “People thought we were dating because your man apparently looks like me.” After Doja gave him props for being “great,” Harlow waited until she left to tell his followers, “I’ve had a crush on her for months.”
“Just Us” is the follow-up to Harlow’s previous 2025 single, “Set You Free,” which dropped last month and December’s hater baiting “Tranquility“; Harlow’s most recent album was 2023’s Jackman. Doja Cat teamed up with LISA and Raye in February for the single “Born Again,” with all three taking the stage at the 97th Annual Academy Awards earlier this month for a medley of James Bond classics.
Watch the “Just Us” video below.
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Jack Harlow has called on Doja Cat for his newest collaboration, the flirty “Just Us,” which arrived on Friday (March 21). I wish it was just us in this b—h/ But they can’t trust us in this b—h,” Harlow raps on the track. “Because I’m tryna bust nuts in this, huh/ Let’s keep it on the hush-hush in […]