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It was the Year of Hootie: With grunge tailing off, country getting huge and top 40 starting to drift to a mellower and rootsier middle, an unassuming group of good-time frat-rockers became the biggest thing in 1995 popular music. After the mid-1994 release of Cracked Rear View started to spread from the Carolinas to the rest of the country, Hootie & the Blowfish dominated 1995 from front to back, with three top 10 hits, a guest (sort-of) appearance on the year’s hottest TV show, over 10 million in sales and nearly as many annoying questions about the band’s name. But within a couple years, the band’s quick fall from pop stardom would prove just as dramatic and difficult-to-explain as its rise.
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On this week’s Vintage Pop Stardom episode of the Greatest Pop Stars podcast, host Andrew Unterberger is joined by Billboard managing editor Christine Werthman, a member of the Blowfish’s school since ’95, to talk about the band’s unquestioned peak year of pop stardom. We talk about the many cultural and musical factors that led to the Hootie takeover — and still how improbable the sheer size and scope of it ended up being — as well as why it ultimately wasn’t built to last, and whether the band deserves better than they got in terms of their legacy in both rock and pop music.
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And of course, along the way, we ask all the big questions about Hootie & the Blowfish’s year as the big men on the pop-rock campus: Why did so many critics love to hate on Hootie? Is “Hold My Hand” more anthemic or simplistic? Did the SportsCenter anchors in the “Only Wanna Be With You” video go a little too hard with the catchphrases? Was an invisible Hootie cameo worth more to a ’90s sitcom than another band actually showing up? And of course: What kind of career could Hootie & the Blowfish have had if they had just gone with a different band name a decade earlier?
Check it out above — along with a YouTube playlist of some of the most important moments from Hootie’s 1995, all of which are discussed in the podcast — and subscribe to the Greatest Pop Stars podcast on Apple Music or Spotify (or wherever you get your podcasts) for weekly discussions every Thursday about all things related to pop stardom!
And as we say in every one of these GPS podcast posts — if you have the time and money to spare, please consider donating to any of these causes in the fight for trans rights:
Transgender Law Center
Trans Lifeline
Gender-Affirming Care Fundraising on GoFundMe
Also, please consider giving your local congresspeople a call in support of trans rights, with contact information you can find on 5Calls.org — and if you’re in the D.C. area this weekend (May 30-31), definitely check out Liberation Weekend, a music festival supporting trans rights with an incredible lineup of trans artists and allies.
There are lucky fans, like the ones who managed to get tickets to see Beyoncé for her ongoing Cowboy Carter tour, and then there are really lucky fans, such as the couple who got Queen Bey to do a gender-reveal for their first born child. In the middle Wednesday night’s (May 28) rain-soaked stop of […]
As one of the biggest pop stars in the world, ROSÉ can’t exactly walk around in public without being recognized — not without a little creativity, at least.
In a Dazed cover story published Thursday (May 29), the BLACKPINK star opened up about a time she disguised herself as an old lady, just so she could walk around for a little while without fans knowing it was her. The getup was elaborate, with ROSÉ hiring a professional team to deck her out with prosthetic wrinkles and a gray wig.
“It was really, really intense,” she told the publication, noting that the fear of being caught in the costume ultimately outweighed the freedom it brought her. “I don’t think I’ll ever do that again.”
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Even so, the K-pop star says that experiencing life as a regular person, even if only for a little bit, still calls to her. “What does freedom look like to me?” she mused in the interview. “Freedom means being anonymous.”
ROSÉ also said that she misses “not having to be terrified of small things” and “not having to be the annoying person in the room full of my friends who is paranoid about something, when I want to be very nonchalant and chill, but I have to be careful about everything.”
“Even if I’m not doing anything wrong, I have to think, ‘What if this makes people think that I’m doing something wrong?’” she continued, adding that her fame means she’s always grappling with the “fear of being misunderstood.”
The New Zealand native’s thoughts on celebrity and anonymity come at a time when she’s more famous than ever. In addition to being one-fourth of what is arguably the biggest girl group in the world, ROSÉ also recently elevated her superstar status by dropping her debut solo album, Rosie, in December. The LP featured smash hit “APT.” featuring Bruno Mars, which spent 12 weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Global 200.
She’s now gearing up to regroup with LISA, JENNIE and JISOO as BLACKPINK plans to reunite this summer, embarking on a world tour that kicks off in July. ROSÉ didn’t say much about the upcoming comeback, but she did tell Dazed, “Each of us has gone out and been inspired and learned so much about ourselves, and now we’re coming back to each other with good energy.”
As for her own ambitions, the “Number One Girl” singer opened up about wanting to win a Grammy someday. “That would be incredible,” she said. “But I think if it means more to my community, it’d be special. That’s the first thing that I want, and whatever awards or celebration comes after it, that would feel extra rewarding.”
Lorde has never been afraid of catharsis. The singer, literally, strips it down in the new video for her entrancing single “Man of the Year,” offering an unadorned version of herself as revealing as the song’s lyrics. In the striking visual directed by Grant Singer that dropped on Thursday morning (May 29), the 28-year-old vocalist is caught in close up, before the camera pans out to show her sitting on a stool in an empty loft while wearing jeans and a white T-shirt.
“Glidin’ through on my bike, glidin’ through/ Like new from my recent ego death/ Sirens sing overnight, violent, sweet music/ You met me at a really strange time in my life/ Take my knife and I cut the cord,” she sings in a loud whisper over a gently plucked bass guitar. As she describes becoming “someone else,” someone she says is “more like myself,” Lorde strips off her shirt and covers her breasts with electrical tape in the prelude to a thrashing dance routine on a pile of sand spread out in a corner of the loft.
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The song co-produced by Lorde and Jim-E Stack — her main collaborator on the upcoming Virgin album due out on June 27 — builds from the alluring, subtle bass accompaniment to a noisy rumble as burbling keyboards and distant drums bubble up alongside cello from Blood Orange’s Dev Hynes.
“Who’s gon’ love me like this?/ Oh-oh, oh, who could give me lightness?/ Way he flow down through me/ Love me like this/ Now I’m broken open/ Let’s hear it for the man of the year,” she sings on the chorus of second song released so far from the LP. “Man of the Year” follows April’s “What Was That,” which debuted at No. 36 on the Billboard Hot 100. In an Instagram post previewing the second single last week, Lorde wrote that it was an “offering from really deep inside me,” calling it the “song I’m proudest of on Virgin.”
In a recent Rolling Stone cover story, Lorde discussed writing “Man of the Year” after stopping her birth control for the first time since she was a teenager and realizing that her gender felt more fluid than she’d previously realized. Just before writing the song, she said she taped her own chest with duct tape — as in the video — in an effort to reach a vision of herself “that was fully representative of how [her] gender felt in that moment,” she told RS.
“I felt like stopping taking my birth control, I had cut some sort of cord between myself and this regulated femininity,” she added. “It sounds crazy, but I felt that all of a sudden, I was off the map of femininity. And I totally believed that that allowed things to open up.” The unadorned “Man of the Year” look was previewed at this year’s Met Gala, where Lorde wore a strapless, slate-colored strip of fabric across her chest that she told Vogue was an “Easter egg” that “really represents where I’m at gender-wise. I feel like a man and a woman kind of vibe.”
In addition to the song and video, Lorde also revealed the track list for her anticipated follow-up to 2021’s Solar Power. Among the songs on the album are: “Hammer,” “Shapeshifter,” “Favourite Daughter,” “Current Affairs,” “Clearblue,” “GRWM,” “Broken Glass,” “If She Could See Me Now” and “David.”
Lorce will launch the Ultrasound world tour on September 17 at the Moody Center in Austin, TX on an outing that will feature special guests Blood Orange, The Japanese House, Nilüfer Yanya, Chanel Beads, Empress Of, co-producer Jim-E Stack and Oklou on select dates.
Watch the “Man of the Year” video and check out the Virgin tracklist reveal below.
Lorde returned to the spotlight in New Zealand this week, appearing at the 2025 Aotearoa Music Awards in Auckland on Thursday night (May 29), just hours after hosting an intimate, invite-only performance inside a YMCA bathroom.
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The rare public appearance comes as Lorde ramps up promo for her upcoming album Virgin, due out June 27. Her attendance at the AMAs — New Zealand’s biggest night in music — marks her first red carpet appearance in the country in several years.
The day prior, Lorde teased a cryptic Instagram post showing a cracked iPhone tucked into the waistband of a pair of jeans, tagged “Auckland.” The post included a link to a WhatsApp group, where she invited fans to meet her in the city that night.
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“Auckland I wanna play you something .. Meet me in the city tonight? Message me if you’re keen,” she wrote.
More than 300 fans gathered outside the YMCA venue, with small groups of 30 admitted every 15 minutes to witness the pop-up performance.
The performance came one day before the release of Lorde’s new single “Man of the Year,” which follows previous track “What Was That.” Both songs will appear on Virgin, her first album since 2021’s Solar Power.
Lorde’s innovative approach to album promotion has included surprise concerts, fan text blasts, and spontaneous performances in public spaces. In April, she debuted “What Was That” in New York City’s Washington Square Park, drawing such a large crowd that the police shut it down. She performed again in the same location just a few hours later.
Several early winners were announced at the 2025 Aotearoa Music Awards ahead of the main ceremony, including MOKOTRON (Best Electronic Artist), Cassie Henderson (Best Pop Artist), and Holly Arrowsmith (Best Folk Artist).
Lorde’s debut album Pure Heroine peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard 200, with lead single “Royals” spending nine weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. Her 2017 LP Melodrama debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and earned a Grammy nomination for album of the year. Solar Power, released in 2021, debuted at No. 5 on the Billboard 200.
Virgin arrives June 27 via Universal Music New Zealand.
05/28/2025
With new single “THUNDER” and collaborations with Pharrell and Timbaland, the group celebrates a decade together with genre explorations and solo tracks.
05/28/2025
As Beyoncé fans gear up for her latest dates on the Cowboy Carter tour, Drag Race superstar Trixie Mattel is sharing her own glowing review of the pop superstar’s latest trek. On the latest episode of her podcast The Bald and the Beautiful with fellow Drag Race star Katya on Tuesday, Mattel shared her unabashed […]
Smokey Robinson has filed a countersuit against four longtime housekeepers who accused him of rape earlier this month, claiming the allegations were part of an “extortionate scheme” by the women and their attorneys.
The new cross-complaint, filed in Los Angeles court Wednesday (May 28), came three weeks after the unnamed housekeepers filed a $50 million civil lawsuit over allegations that the legendary Motown singer repeatedly raped them over nearly two decades in his employ.
In filing the countersuit, defense attorneys for Robinson went on offense — accusing the four women and their attorneys (John W. Harris and Herbert Hayden) of defamation, invasion of privacy, civil conspiracy and even elder abuse over the “fabricated” allegations.
“The depths of plaintiffs’ avarice and greed knows no bounds,” Robinson’s attorney Christopher Frost writes, according to a copy of the submitted complaint obtained by Billboard. “During the very time that the Robinsons were being extraordinarily generous with plaintiffs, plaintiffs were concocting an extortionate plan to take everything from the Robinsons … and wrongfully destroy the Robinsons’ well-built reputations.”
Allegations made during court cases, such as those against Robinson, are typically shielded from defamation lawsuits by the First Amendment. But Robinson’s attorneys say the accusers and their lawyers stepped outside those protections by holding a press conference in which they “paraded themselves in front of the media” and created a “media whirlwind.”
“While the law protects plaintiffs’ ability to concoct whatever fiction they may wish to create in a legal pleading … it does not allow plaintiffs to make gratuitous and slanderous allegations in media circus-type press conferences,” Frost wrote in the cross-complaint.
Attorneys for the accusers did not immediately return a request for comment on Wednesday. Frost confirmed that the cross-complaint was filed with the court on Wednesday but declined to comment otherwise.
Robinson was sued on May 6, accused of forcing the housekeepers to have oral and vaginal sex in his Los Angeles-area bedroom dozens of times between 2007 and 2024. The singer’s wife, Frances Robinson, was also named as a defendant over claims that she didn’t do enough to stop the abuse, despite knowing that he had a history of sexual misconduct.
In addition to the sexual abuse allegations, the lawsuit also claimed that the Robinsons paid their employees below minimum wage, and that Frances Robinson created a hostile work environment replete with screaming and “racially-charged epithets.” The accusers also filed a police report, leading the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department to open a criminal investigation.
In Wednesday’s countersuit, the Robinsons’ attorneys told a very different story. They said the housekeepers had “stayed with the Robinsons year after year” because the couple had treated them as “extended family,” including financially helping them and celebrating holidays together. The complaint quoted alleged text messages in which the accusers wished Robinson a happy birthday and told him “love you.”
“The Robinsons did not abuse, harm, or take advantage of plaintiffs,” Frost wrote. “They treated plaintiffs with the utmost kindness and generosity.”
According to Wednesday’s new filing, the housekeepers and their lawyers made “pre-litigation demands for $100 million or more” before filing their case. When that failed to work, the new filing says the accusers went public with the allegations as loudly as they could.
“The resulting media whirlwind was swift and severe, being picked up by virtually every major media outlet worldwide, and the harm to the Robinsons’ reputation [is] palpable,” Frost wrote. “The Robinsons are afraid to open the newspaper, read the internet, or even go out in public for fear of what they may hear or see next, no matter how fabricated.”
The filing focused on statements by Harris, the attorney, at a May 6 press conference calling Robinson a “serial and sick rapist” and a “serial assaulter” — statements that Robinson says are fair game for a defamation case: “Plaintiffs may be able to make slanderous statements in a legal pleading (for now), but they are not entitled to do so in gratuitous, self-serving press conferences.”
In addition to defamation and other wrongdoing, the Robinsons say the accusers tried to “hide, conceal, and destroy evidence exposing their illegal scheme,” including by taking Frances Robinson’s phone and deleting text conversations. The filing hinted that the Robinsons would seek additional penalties for such “spoliation” of evidence.
SEVENTEEN is headed for some big changes, as most of the boy band’s 13 members are currently serving or gearing up to enlist in the South Korean military to fulfill their mandatory service to their country.
But that doesn’t mean the group mates have any plans of putting their musical evolution on pause. In a Hollywood Reporter profile published Wednesday (May 28), the members of the K-pop phenomenon revealed their game plan for the next couple of years as Jeonghan, Hoshi, Wonwoo, Woozi, Mingyu, DK, Seungkwan, Vernon and Dino complete their civic duties, from dropping solo music to reuniting stronger than ever at the end of their service. (Joshua, a U.S. citizen; The 8 and Jun, who are Chinese citizens; and S.Coups, who is exempt due to an ACL injury, are the only members who are not required to serve.)
“This is something that has been inevitable for us all along,” Hoshi told the publication of enlisting. “We have been prepared. We have a lot of projects that we have discussed with [Hybe] very thoroughly up until now.”
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First thing’s first: On Monday (May 26), SEVENTEEN dropped new album Happy Burstday, featuring a solo song performed by each member, in addition to three full-group tracks. The move to showcase their individual capabilities before enlisting was intentional, priming each bandmate for more opportunities to explore music even as everyone else in the group is pulled in different directions. It’s a strategy not unlike the one used by BTS over the past couple of years, with all seven of the “Dynamite” singers dropping solo music at different points during their own enlistments ahead of their upcoming post-military reunion this year.
“Up until now, we’ve mostly focused on our group promotions,” Hoshi continued. “We would like to show more of our individualities, each of the members’ personalities and capabilities, so that when the time comes and we get back together again as a group, we‘ll be able to showcase ourselves as a better SEVENTEEN.”
And while nine of the members carry out their service, group leader S.Coups said that he and the other three bandmates plan to “stick together and make something great to showcase to the fans” in the meantime.
“We understand that the fans are very sad that some of us are going to be away, but among ourselves, [we] don’t consider this to be a really huge deal because we know that we are going to stay together,” added Woozi. “We should consider this as quite a long preparation phase for the next album that’s going to be even better and greater.”
According to THR, the nine eligible bandmates must enlist in South Korea before they turn 30. Jeonghan and Wonwoo, who are 29 and 28, respectively, are already serving.
SEVENTEEN is also similar to BTS in that the former’s military shift will come right at the height of the group’s popularity. As announced by Billboard on Wednesday, the “Super” band is the top K-pop group and No. 3 overall on the midyear Boxscore charts, grossing $120.9 million and 842,000 tickets sold on tour in 2025.
The interview also follows a three-year run of six top 10 albums on the Billboard 200. But according to S.Coups, SEVENTEEN — even in spite of its upcoming challenges — is just getting started.
“We are ready to reinvent ourselves,” he told THR. “We are standing at a new starting line, preparing for a new path ahead and ready to blaze a new trail.”
Teddy Swims makes history on this week’s Hot 100: “Lose Control,” the singer-songwriter’s soulful pop-rock anthem, spends its 92nd week on the chart, breaking the record that it shared with Glass Animals’ “Heat Waves” as of last week and setting the new longevity mark for the nearly 68-year-old song chart.
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After debuting on the Hot 100 back in August 2023, “Lose Control” only topped the chart for 1 week, back in March 2024. Yet the song remains in the top 20 more than a year later (coming in at No. 11 on the latest chart), after spending a record-setting 63 weeks in the top 10.
“The burn has been minimal,” Alex Tear, Vice President of music programming at SiriusXM + Pandora, tells Billboard of the breakthrough hit’s maintained momentum. “The audience reaction is something that we completely adhere to — subscribers tell us what they want to hear, and how often they want to hear it… And [‘Lose Control’] is still undeniable, pure mass appeal.”
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Swims’ smash hasn’t been alone in spending months upon months in the Hot 100’s upper tier. Before Morgan Wallen’s new album I’m the Problem cleared out a sizable chunk of the chart this week with its 29 new debuts, the top half of the Hot 100 was littered with hits that had spent months — and in some cases, over a year — on the tally.
Some of them, like “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” by Shaboozey, “Die With a Smile” by Lady Gaga & Bruno Mars and “I Had Some Help” by Post Malone and Wallen, have stuck around after logging multiple weeks at No. 1; others, like Benson Boone’s “Beautiful Things,” Gigi Perez’s “Sailor Song” and Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso,” never reached the top spot, but have lingered near it since mid-2024. Kendrick Lamar and SZA’s “Luther” may have just spent 13 straight weeks atop the Hot 100 before being dethroned by Wallen and Tate McRae’s “What I Want” this week, but even that smash collaboration spent 12 weeks on the chart before reaching its peak in late February.
The Hot 100 always includes a wide swath of ubiquitous hits — but rarely have so many of those hits endured at once. On the Hot 100 dated May 24, zero songs in the top 10 had spent a single-digit number of weeks on the chart. The average number of weeks spent on the chart by the songs in the top 20 was 30.35 weeks; five years ago (on the Hot 100 dated May 30, 2020), that average was 18.75 weeks. On the recent Hot 100, a total of nine songs in the top 20 had spent 30 weeks or more on the chart; 10 years ago (on the Hot 100 dated May 30, 2015), that total was one song in the top 20.
What’s causing this period of smashes that last forever on the chart? Part of the explanation for the lack of 2025 chart movement is the glut of new pop voices from 2024 spilling over into a new year, says Spotify editorial lead Talia Kraines. “I think that 2024 was such a crazy year for pop music, and incredible new songs and artists, that was years in the making,” she says.
Kraines points to artists like Chappell Roan, whose “Pink Pony Club” is approaching 50 weeks on the Hot 100, and Charli XCX, whose 2020 song “party 4 u” is just now hitting the chart, who helped define the mainstream last year while also boasting ample back catalogs for fans to explore on streaming services. “They were fully formed propositions,” says Kraines. “I feel like a whole new generation found their new favorite artist and their new favorite song, and they’re digging in on that.”
Chart longevity may also be a product of post-pandemic timing, says Michael Martin, SVP of programming at Audacy. After all, before “Lose Control” logged 92 weeks on the chart, The Weeknd’s “Blinding Lights” and Glass Animals’ “Heat Waves” were quarantine-era anthems that previously set the record in April 2021 and October 2022, respectively.
The fact that the record has been reset three times in the past five years nods to how the lifespan of a mega-hit changed to account for audience appetites. “Everybody wanted comfort food, right?” says Martin of pandemic-era pop. “People wanted things they knew, like their favorite TV show that they binge-watched again. There’s something about that familiar song that they loved and wanted to keep hearing.”
Yet Kraines points out that the key difference between the music industry of five years ago and the industry today is how viral hits are located and promoted by labels to set up longer chart runs. At the dawn of the TikTok era, unknown artists with a viral spark were quickly signed and pushed to radio programmers and streaming services; now, artists like Swims (who was signed to Warner Records in late 2019 after some YouTube covers made noise) are often developed for years before a single receives mainstream promotion.
“We’re seeing that the whole nature of artist development takes time,” says Kraines. “And songs that maybe don’t come out of the gate super hot are definitely growing.” Case in point: “Lose Control” debuted at No. 99 on the Hot 100, then spent a record 32 weeks climbing to the top of the chart. “People are taking more time to sit with music and enjoy it — they’re not just one-and-done,” adds Kraines.
Meanwhile, the streaming era has included less distinction between singles being actively promoted by artists and album cuts that have no shot at extended chart runs. Last year, Billie Eilish launched her Hit Me Hard and Soft era with “Lunch” as the focus track, but quickly pivoted when fans embraced “Birds of a Feather” on streaming services. Demand for “Feather” has remained strong across platforms since its release — so radio programmers kept playing it, streaming services kept it high on their flagship playlists, and the song just crossed the one-year mark on the Hot 100.
One key to that type of extended run, says Tear, is the smart deployment of follow-up singles — songs from a popular artist that prevent listeners from getting tired of their mega-hit, but don’t necessarily get in its way, either. A generation ago, radio stations couldn’t feature multiple songs by the same artist in heavy rotation, but now that streaming has blurred those lines, programmers can balance a handful of songs by the same artist and ultimately extend the life of a smash.
“The audience wants to hear more than one song being played over and over again,” Tear explains. “I’m now able to go two, three, four songs deep [per artist], like we do with Sabrina Carpenter, Benson Boone and Teddy Swims. That relieves a little bit of the fatigue, and they stay around longer.”
Paradoxically, the fragmentation of popular music — and how the streaming era has affected the number of songs that reach cultural ubiquity — may be the reason why we now have so many smash hits that stick around forever. Veteran radio programmer and consultant Guy Zapoleon has spent his career chronicling 10-year music cycles of popular radio, and says that modern “lack of consensus” caused by the proliferation of music platforms means that, when a song does become huge, it stays huge for longer.
“Because there’s so many different sources to go to, it’s difficult for songs outside the very biggest songs to become hits,” says Zapoleon. “And because of that, those songs take a while to become hits, and then they stay there for the longest period of time — longer than we’ve ever seen in the history of music.”
The good news is that this industry era of extended chart runs emphasizes hit songs regardless of who they’re coming from. While A-listers like Kendrick Lamar, SZA and Morgan Wallen have topped the Hot 100 in recent months, the top 10 has been rife with new artists scoring their first chart hits in 2025, just as it was last year.
“You can keep delivering listeners songs like ‘Lose Control’ that they’re just not tired of, but you can also deliver the new artists that they’re asking about — Doechii, Sombr, Alex Warren, Lola Young, Ravyn Lenae,” Martin points out. “So I don’t think there’s stagnation in new product, or in new artists.”
