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Trending on Billboard “Amazing!” That was just one of the many accolades being shouted out by fans exiting the Kia Forum on Sunday night after Brandy and Monica wrapped a two-night stopover in Inglewood, California, on their co-headlining The Boy Is Mine Tour. Since launching the highly anticipated 32-date tour in Cincinnati (Oct. 16), Brandy […]
Trending on Billboard Summer Walker revealed the star-studded list of collaborators on her forthcoming third studio album Finally Over It on Monday (Nov. 10). She partnered with Spotify on the exclusive two-part announcement, that includes a behind-the-scenes clip from Walker’s “wedding” (as teased in her album artwork) and a reception seating chart graphic of the […]
Listen to new must-hear songs from emerging R&B/hip-hop artists like detahjae and rum•gold.
11/10/2025
Trending on Billboard Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” surges to the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100, Leon Thomas’ “Mutt” moves up. Will Alex Warren’s “Ordinary” or HUNTR/X’s “Golden” be able to make No. 1 this week? Tetris Kelly: Michael Jackson makes a holiday return to the charts as Taylor Swift still battles with KPop Demon […]
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It’s a dog-eat-dog world, and Leon Thomas leads the pack.
On Friday, the singer woke up to a whopping six 2026 Grammy nominations, including album of the year, for his breakthrough sophomore album Mutt.
“Thank you God, my team, every collaborator, every producer, family, friends and most especially my fans, I couldn’t have done it without you,” he wrote in an Instagram caption for a graphic listing his nominations. “I got a show tonight and I’m gonna continue working harder on this next album.”
In addition to album of the year, Thomas — who won his first Grammy in 2023 thanks to his production contributions to SZA’s “Snooze” — also earned a nomination for best new artist. Poetically, his two general field nominations come 15 years after Victorious, the television series that established him as a Gen Z child star, premiered on Nickelodeon. Thomas earned his first Grammy nod back in 2020 in the best rap song category for his work on Rick Ross and Drake’s “Gold Roses.”
Mutt also earned a nomination for best R&B album, while several tracks were individually recognized, including “Yes It Is” (best R&B song), “Vibes Don’t Lie” (best traditional R&B performance), and the NPR Tiny Desk live version of “Mutt” (best R&B performance).
Six Grammy nominations cap a whirlwind breakthrough year for Thomas. Outside of earning his first Hot 100 top 10 hit as a performer with “Mutt” (No. 10), the multi-hyphenate also won best new artist at the BET Awards, made his late night TV debut on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, and shared a new funk-forward EP titled PHOLKS. Last week, he played Austin City Limits and kicked off his headlining Mutts Don’t Heel Tour at Dallas’ House of Blues. The R&B star’s new trek will visit venues across the U.S., Europe and Australia, before concluding on April 19 at Perth’s Metro City.
In Thomas’ Billboard cover story, his manager, Jonathan Azu, remarked, “I hope he’s the guy with the Lauryn Hill photo [holding multiple trophies]. Every year, there’s somebody and I hope it’s him. He is a man of his peers, and I think over the past year he has proven to them that he’s here to stay.”
Looks like Leon Thomas is one step closer to re-creating that iconic photograph. Check out the “Mutt” singer’s reaction to his 2026 Grammy nominations below.
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After winning his first Grammy this year for best R&B song with SZA’s “Snooze,” Leon Thomas could sweep almost every R&B category at the 68th annual Grammy Awards, as the nominations were announced Friday morning (Nov. 7).
While the continued success of his Billboard Hot 100 top 10 hit “Mutt” has proven Thomas is no underdog anymore, its “Live From NPR’s Tiny Desk” version is up for best R&B performance. (The original version was commercially released on Aug. 8, 2024, during the eligibility period for the 2025 Grammy Awards, and it was submitted for consideration then. Thomas released the 5-song Mutt (Live From NPR’s Tiny Desk) EP on Aug. 15, 2025, which qualifies for next year’s ceremony.) Its parent album, which shares the same title, is nominated for best R&B album, while its tracks “Vibes Don’t Lie” and “Yes It Is” are up for best traditional R&B performance and best R&B song, respectively.
Following Thomas, Durand Bernarr has the second most nominations in the R&B field with three: best traditional R&B performance (“Here We Are”), best R&B song (“Overqualified”) and best progressive R&B album (Bloom). He only scored his first Grammy nod ever this year in the best progressive R&B album category. “Folded,” arguably the biggest song of Kehlani’s career to date, has earned her her first Hot 100 top 10 hit and No. 1 on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs and Hot R&B Songs (charts dated Nov. 8), and now two Grammy nods for best R&B performance and best R&B song. While Kehlani has yet to win a Grammy, they’re poised to take home the gold for the first time next year.
“I’m not big [on letting] any award validate how great your art is. But it’s nice when the system in place or the hierarchy of what you’re doing in art recognizes that what you’re doing is great,” Kehlani told Billboard earlier this year while reflecting on her debut commercial mixtape You Should Be Here, which earned the star her first Grammy nod 10 years ago for best urban contemporary album.
Ledisi could snag her first best traditional R&B performance win in five years with “Love You Too,” the lead single from her 12th studio album The Crown, which is up for best R&B album. After the deluxe edition of 11:11 won best R&B album this year, Chris Brown returns to the best R&B performance field one year later with “It Depends,” featuring Bryson Tiller, which is also up for best R&B song. This week, “It Depends” rose to the No. 1 spot on R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay and spends a fifth week atop Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay. And one week before Summer Walker’s third studio album Finally Over It drops, its lead single “Heart of a Woman” earns two nomination for best R&B performance and best R&B song.
Five years ago, Teyana Taylor called out the Recording Academy for the male-dominated best R&B album category after she dropped her third studio album The Album. “Y’all was better off just saying best MALE R&B ALBUM cause all I see is d–k in this category,” she wrote on X. Now, she’s up for her first Grammy ever in this female-dominated category, with Escape Room coming alongside Ledisi with The Crown and Coco Jones with her debut album Why Not More? Bilal’s first album in nine years, Adjust Brightness, earns the dynamic singer/songwriter/musician his first Grammy in 10 years for best progressive R&B album. After their “Peaches” collaboration with Daniel Caesar scored Justin Bieber and Giveon a hefty sum of nominations at the 2022 Grammy Awards, where both lost in every category they were up in, both could avenge themselves in the R&B field, as Bieber is up for best R&B performance (with “Yukon”) for the first time since “Peaches” and Giveon is up for best R&B album (for Beloved) for the first time since Take Time scored a nod in 2021.
U.K. R&B acts like kwn and Odeal have made a lot of noise from across the pond this year, but FLO is the only one nominated for a Grammy next year, as the girl group earns its first nod for best progressive R&B album with its debut album Access All Areas. And after five songs from SZA’s blockbuster 2022 album SOS earned Grammy nods at the 2024 awards ceremony, where SZA was the most-nominated artist with nine total nods, one more is added to her collection: “Crybaby,” from the deluxe Lana edition of SOS, is up for best traditional R&B performance.
While Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason jr. welcomed The Weeknd back with open arms during the ceremony earlier this year, where he performed “Cry for Me” and “Timeless” with Playboi Carti, Grammy voters did not. His repeat shut out includes “Baptized in Fear” from his sixth studio album Hurry Up Tomorrow not being included in the best R&B song slate. Ravyn Lenae also surprisingly received zero nominations despite her R&B/pop crossover hit “Love Me Not” reaching No. 5 on the Hot 100 and, as Billboard’s awards editor Paul Grein put it, being “played on every pop radio station in America every hour on the hour during the voting period.” While “Love Me Not” competed in the pop field, “Love Is Blind” from the same Bird’s Eye album was submitted for best R&B song, and received no love.
Drake and PartyNextDoor’s “Somebody Loves Me” is nominated for best melodic rap performance, but its parent album $ome $exy $ongs 4 U isn’t up for best progressive R&B album as some might’ve expected. Mariah the Scientist’s breakthrough year isn’t captured by the 2026 nominations either, as “Burning Blue,” her first Hot 100 top 40 hit and first Rhythmic Airplay chart-topper, is looked over for both best R&B performance and best R&B song, and its parent album Hearts Sold Separately, her highest-charting Billboard 200 album (No. 11), isn’t up for best R&B album.
The 2026 Grammy Awards will be held on Sunday, Feb. 1 at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, California, airing live on CBS and Paramount+ Premium at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT.
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Quincy Jones, the late legendary producer, songwriter and composer extraordinaire, returns to the top of a Billboard chart for the first time since his death on Nov. 3, 2024, thanks to his production work on Michael Jackson’s 43-year-old classic “Thriller.”
The song, which Jones produced, makes its annual Halloween resurgence across multiple Billboard charts dated Nov. 8. “Thriller” reenters the Billboard Hot 100 at No. 32 and rises 7-4 on Hot R&B Songs and 18-5 on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs. According to Luminate, the song raked in 8.9 million official U.S. streams (up 74% week-over-week), 4.2 million in radio airplay audience (up 90%) and 2,000 downloads sold (up 101%) Oct. 24-30. With Halloween falling on a Friday this year — the first day of the next data tracking period — the song is likely to see an even bigger bump on next week’s Nov. 15-dated charts.
Thanks to his work on “Thriller,” Jones hits No. 1 on Billboard’s R&B/Hip-Hop Producers and R&B Producers charts. It’s the first time he’s ranked at No. 1 on a Billboard chart since Feb. 9, 2019, when he led the since-discontinued Jazz Digital Song Sales chart with 1981’s “One Hundred Ways” featuring vocalist James Ingram. Before that, he last placed at No. 1 on March 6, 1999, when his album From Q, With Love ruled both the Jazz Albums and Contemporary Jazz Albums charts.
Over his seven-decade career, Jones helped shape modern popular music, producing seminal works by Jackson, Frank Sinatra, Lesley Gore and the Brothers Johnson, among many others. He produced 12 No. 1 hits on the Hot 100 in his lifetime, nine of which were sung by Jackson.
In addition to his behind-the-scenes triumphs, Jones earned many other No. 1s under his own name. He topped Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs with “Stuff Like That” (1978), “I’ll Be Good to You” featuring Ray Charles and Chaka Khan (1990), “The Secret Garden” (1990) and “Tomorrow (A Better You, Better Me)” with Tevin Campbell (1990). He also led Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums with Body Heat (1974) and Back on the Block (1990); Dance Club Songs with “I’ll Be Good to You” and “Stomp” featuring the Cast of Stomp/The Yes/No Productions (1996); and Contemporary Jazz Albums with Back on the Block (1990), Q’s Jook Joint (1995) and From Q, With Love (1999).
Billboard‘s R&B/Hip-Hop Producers and R&B Producers charts are based on total points accrued by a producer for each attributed song that appears on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs and Hot R&B Songs, respectively. For songs with multiple producers, every credited producer splits points equally (which occasionally leads to ties on rankings).
The full R&B/Hip-Hop Songwriters and R&B/Hip-Hop Producers charts, plus those for other genres, can be found on Billboard.com.
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From Leon Thomas’ “Mutt” breakthrough to Kehlani scoring a long-overdue Hot 100 top 10 hit with “Folded,” R&B is in the midst of an upswing — and the world is taking notice. When she first started making music over 13 years ago, Brazilian superstar Ludmilla chose a moniker inspired by Billboard’s No. 4 Greatest R&B Artist of All Time. Though she’s long retired her “MC Beyoncé” stage name, Ludmilla looked to Queen Bey’s signature genre for her latest evolution.
Out Friday (Nov. 6), Fragmentos is Ludmilla’s formal pivot into R&B. Anchored by SZA-esque, guitar-backed ballads and steamy, imaginative amalgamations of R&B, dance, baile funk, pagode and hip-hop, the Latin Grammy winner’s sixth studio album is sleek, sexy and stacked with some of the year’s catchiest melodies. Featuring collaborations with Victoria Monét, Muni Long and Latto, the album also finds Ludmilla using the vast expanse of R&B to wax poetic about both her queerness and her maturation since becoming a mother in May. With heart-wrenching songs like “Paraiso” communicating the “blues” elements of R&B, Ludmilla tackled the genre’s “rhythm” side with tracks like the sultry Monét-assisted “Cam Girl.”
After her successful transition from pop and funk carioca to pagode (an offshoot of samba), Ludmilla became the first Afro-Latina artist to cross one billion streams on Spotify and the first Afro-Latina act to play Coachella’s mainstage, which means she’s no stranger to big risks and bigger rewards. Even though initial apprehension steered her back to funk after early Fragmentos writing sessions resulted in unmistakably R&B songs, Ludmilla heeded her wife Brunna Gonçalves’ advice to always “trust her feelings.”
“I was the first Black woman to sell out a stadium in Brazil,” she tells Billboard via her translator, with a humility that belies the magnitude of her achievement. “A lot of things contributed to me [feeling comfortable] taking this risk.”
With hopes of an intimate Fragmentos tour next year and Brazil’s annual Carnival celebrations just a few months away, Ludmilla is entering her latest chapter more self-assured than ever before. Below, she speaks with Billboard about finding her lane in R&B, challenging herself to pull something new out of familiar melodies and processing her queer journey through her songwriting.
What inspired the shift into a deeper R&B sound?
I had a project called Numanice, which was mostly pagode, a local rhythm in Brazil similar to R&B but still very different. After doing that project, I felt free to start singing about love. I always wanted to sing about love, but I was holding on to pop music and dance.
How big was R&B in Brazil when you were growing up, and how big would you say it is now?
R&B in Brazil has no playlisting, no radio support, no festivals — it’s very small. I’m very inspired and motivated to do R&B because I was doing it 10 years ago, but Brazilians didn’t know R&B as they do now. In Brazil, we mostly listen to international R&B artists. We don’t have big local R&B artists.
In that case, did this album feel like a risk?
100%. It [was the same risk] I felt when I shifted into pagode, because there were no women singing that genre at the time. Now, many artists are doing pagode projects and switching their genres because of me. It was a really big risk because I [made my name] singing pop and funk. It’s a big investment, but I believe in what I’m doing.
When and where did you record most of the album? What was the first song that you knew for sure was going to be on the project?
The first song I realized would be a part of the album is actually the first track, “Whiskey Com Água de Choro.” I wrote it two years ago in São Paulo, and once I finished it, I was like, “I’m going to sing a whole R&B project.” I wrote a bunch of funk songs after that, but I wanted to follow what I believed and what I was feeling in the moment. My wife told me to always trust my feelings because I end up being right. [Smiles]. I was very successful in changing my career from pop to pagode… did I want to do it again? I realized that I should.
When did you know that the album was finished?
After working on 50 songs. [Laughs.]
Why did you select “Cam Girl” as a pre-single?
“Cam Girl” was a strategy to let my audience, and Brazilians in general, understand that R&B is not only slow songs. I wanted people to understand that you can dance to R&B, too. I’ve always wanted to collaborate with Victoria [Monét], because we’re friends and we’ve been talking about collaborating for a while. Because the first single was “Paraiso” and it was slower, “Cam Girl” showed that you can dance and party with R&B.
Talk to me about collaborating with Muni Long.
It was so nice collaborating with Muni Long; I love her song “Hrs & Hrs.” When she followed me on Instagram, I was like, “Oh my God, she knows me?” Then we started texting and became instant friends. We knew we needed to do a song together — but she finished her album first, so I was like, “You’re going to be on my album.” I didn’t even ask her to sing in Portuguese; she just sent her verse in, and it was her singing in Portuguese. She wanted to do that. She was like, “Your language is so beautiful, I want to sing in your language.”
I cried a lot the first time I listened to the song — because I didn’t even ask Muni to do that, and she really respected my language. Portuguese is global, but it’s a very small language. I am still very emotional.
You also linked up with Latto on “Bota.” How did that one come together?
I wrote a lot of funk songs [at the beginning of the album process], and this was one of those. It’s very dirty and sexy, and when I finished writing it, I was like, “I want Latto on this song.” I’m known in Brazil as being very versatile, and she didn’t want to stick to one genre. After some time, I was like, “This is my album, f—k it, I’m gonna do whatever I want.” It’s R&B, but I’ll have fun music and pagode and whatever I want on it. This song with Latto is for Carnival!
On “Textos Longos,” you flip Ghost Town DJs’ 1996 classic “My Boo.” How do you strive to create something fresh out of songs that have been reimagined so many times?
It’s very challenging using samples, because people already have feelings about [the original song]. But those are the times when I can experiment and just have fun. Nowadays, it’s also very difficult, because there’s a lot of people doing different things with the same song, and it’s hard for you to do something new.
What’s the most emotional song on the album?
“Paraioso” is the most emotional song I’ve ever made, because it tells the beginning of my relationship with my wife. When I started dating my wife, I was not out of the closet, because I thought that my career would be [negatively impacted]. I was very scared. This part of her life was very sad, because I needed to hide who I truly was. I couldn’t kiss my wife or have any type of public affection. That left a mark on me.
A lot of fans were speculating about a Beyoncé collaboration based on your “Cam Girl” visualizer…
After Beyoncé introducing me at Coachella… nothing is impossible.
Do you have any plans to tour this record?
I want to tour next year. The last tour was outdoors, and now I want to do something indoors and more intimate.
For Americans looking to get into baile funk, what are three funk songs everyone should know?
“Verdinha” by [myself], Topo La Maskara, Walshy Fire; “Noite das Safadas” by Mc Byana, MC Fabinho da Osk, MC Foca do Salgueiro, and “Baile n Morro” by Dj Win, MC Tairon, and Mc Vitin Da Igrejinha.
Trending on Billboard Kehlani isn’t ready to let a relationship go “Out the Window” on her new single that dropped on Friday (Nov. 7) via Atlantic Records. She resurrects that old school R&B feel even on the “Out the Window” cover art, which was shot by photographer Markus Klinko, who also did the cover of […]
Trending on Billboard This is partner content. The Billboard Live Music Summit & Awards was full of enlightening panels and the hottest stars. Usher & Rauw Alejandro spoke about their experiences while touring, and Shakira won big. Keep watching for all the details! Usher: Live music and live entertainment is really the source, and I’m […]
